The student news site of Pleasant Valley High School

Spartan Shield

The student news site of Pleasant Valley High School

Spartan Shield

The student news site of Pleasant Valley High School

Spartan Shield

Seek and Destroy

President Donald Trump, in his fiery and sometimes violent campaign rallies, promised a variety of executive actions in his first 100 days aimed at undoing President Barack Obama’s key policy initiatives and achieving “peace through strength,” which usually transforms into the rather oxymoronic “peace through war.”

In his first 100 days, President Trump promised to immediately cancel Obama’s executive actions on immigration and gun control; eliminating gun-free zones in schools, removing the requirement for background checks at gun shows, and terminating the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Act. Doing so would ensure that 1.7 million children brought to the US illegally in hopes of a better life would be deported immediately. Essentially, President Trump is committed to ensuring schools have more guns and fewer immigrant children.

Perhaps most iconic was Trump’s promise for a border wall with Mexico, that Mexico would pay for. Trump has already ordered Congress to appropriate funds and begin construction for the border wall, and it’s becoming clear that the near-$14 billion dollar price tag will fall on the shoulders of American taxpayers, not Mexico.

While shouldering the burden of the border wall, Trump has promised to cut personal and corporate taxes, reducing the corporate tax rate from 35 to 15 percent and eliminating multiple federal tax brackets. Trump’s plan, which he’s dubbed the Middle Class Tax Relief and Simplification Act,  would raise taxes on single parents and lower taxes significantly on the ultra-wealthy, exploding the federal debt by $5 trillion.

Also essential to Trump’s policy agenda is the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, perhaps the principal achievement of President Obama in his eight years in the White House. Trump and GOP leaders in Congress have laid out their healthcare agenda, which effectively changes the name of Obamacare and eliminates the dreaded individual mandate. Their plan would keep the popular parts of Obamacare, like the pre-existing conditions clause, and do away with the unpopular parts, like the individual mandate. This is problematic, however, is because the individual mandate is the only thing keeping health care prices even relatively affordable. If the insurance market is saturated with cancer patients and the elderly who use their health insurance often, and no one else is required to sign up for insurance, prices will skyrocket.

Regardless of the efficacy of Trump’s campaign promises or of the rate at which they are implemented, the Trump administration represents a serious threat to minority rights, affordable and available health insurance, and the middle class. Nevertheless, it’s clear that Trump and his team of grossly unqualified fearmongers are working their darndest to reverse the historic feats of political courage we’ve witnessed thus far in American history.

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    Dan BastolaMar 3, 2017 at 8:29 am

    Great facts and understanding of the topic. Very controversial topic so great job to go at it.

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