Donald Trump, Keeping America Great?

Ever since late January, Donald Trump had been downplaying the fatality and the speed of the coronavirus spread, stating that his administration “totally had it under control”. It did not. Instead, it would do less than the bare minimum to counteract this pandemic once it had grown out of proportion, such as stimulus checks, recommending social distancing and mask use, testing, and others. However, 35 million citizens had not received their checks by July, and those who would get them early would only receive a minuscule amount of money that could not even pay for less than a month averages rent. Meanwhile, the president disregards using masks and promotes misinformed conspiracy theories, ironically catching the virus himself. Furthermore, he receives the best care in Walter Reed Medicine socialized medicine, the same one Trump wants to get rid of alongside Obamacare- while he calls the approximately 200,000 people who died of coronavirus and tells those infected to not “let it dominate you”. To digress, 90% of Americans have yet to be tested as of July. Obviously, the Trump administration has been highly irresponsible in controlling and preventing the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, a great shame for all US citizens.

With election season coming up and with presidential approval rates plummeting, Donald Trump has whipped out conspiracy theories regarding mail-in voting, calling it a scam that Democrats will use to commit voter fraud. This is false, as it has been proven by researchers that this voting method is totally safe, with fraud being extremely rare. It should also be pointed out that Trump himself has voted through the mail in the electoral primaries; this was not a mistake. Clearly, he plans to threaten citizens by casting doubt on the electoral process. However, the real threats to democracy are the budget cuts Trump has cast on USPS (along with the removal of mail collection boxes), as it will make it harder for working-class Americans to not only have their votes delivered on time but to have them without any tampering whatsoever. Furthermore, his recent refusal of a peaceful transfer of power sharpens fears of a possible coup d’etat and, with the sudden rise of fascism in this country, it is hard to say whether he will or not.

Ever since Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death, there has been an empty seat in the Supreme court, one that Trump plans to fill with the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett. Although predictable from Trump’s behalf, this candidate is dubious due to her questionable stance on climate change, stating that “she’s not a scientist” and that she “won’t talk about a controversial topic”, catchphrases synonymous among climate change deniers. It doesn’t seem that Barrett is too keen on segregation either, as it’s been documented that she does not constitute saying the n-word in a workplace environment as hostile or toxic behavior that could ensue litigation; so, although implicit, this reveals her racism. Furthermore, she has been shown to be pro-life by signing her name on anti-abortion ads and by declining to concede on whether Roe v Wade was correct or not, arousing more suspicion. And look, whether religious or secular, you should understand that abortion means a lot for women’s rights to freedom and that taking that away only enforces the same patriarchal powers that thrived during Puritan times. But I digress, Barrett’s nomination could mean the possibility of many reversals of laws regarding climate change, segregation, and abortion among other things, especially under a Republican majority.