Nearly two dozen Jewish leaders were among the estimated 100 activists who on Thursday shut down a Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in an act of civil disobedience. They had a clear message to send, not just to the...
Trump’s inauguration was attended by between 250,000 and 300,000 people, on the smaller side in comparison to other modern inauguration crowds yet in line with his abysmal approval ratings. Entering office (a time when, historically, a President’s ratings are at their highest) trump’s popularity is sitting at 40%. If this is the high, I can only imagine where he’ll go from here. Especially after what he’s been up to this week…
Within his first few hours as President, one of trump’s first orders of business was to reverse an executive action by President Obama from earlier this month, which, as of January 27th, would have decreased insurance premiums for homeowners with FHA mortgages by an average of $500 a year. What trump has done will mean that low-income homeowners will have to continue to pay higher fees.
The day after the inauguration, 500,000 people packed DC for the Women’s March. They were joined by sister marches in over 600 cities across the US and around the world, totaling over 4.1 million protesters in the US, making this the largest one-day protest in US history. They were an overwhelming force of resistance and solidarity, uniting around the principles of intersectionality.
Organizers of the march have provided participants with tons of resources on ways to stay involved going forward. The first step in their 10 Actions in 100 Days campaign, for example, is to mail a postcard to your Senators on the issue(s) that matter most to you.
Since the Women’s March, three more marches on Washington have been announced. They include the March for Science, (on April 22nd), the People’s Climate March (on April 29th), and the LGBT National Pride March (on June 11th).
This show of strength from the Women’s March, right on the heels of trump’s own ego-bruisingly low turnout, was something he couldn’t let pass without comment. Against the advice of his aids, he forced his Press Secretary, Sean Spicer, to open his first press conference by deliberately lying about how many people attended his inauguration, claiming it was “the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration. Period.” An objectively false statement, easily disproven, yet forced forward in order to stroke the president’s hurt feelings.
When Kelly Ann Conway, trump’s aid and former campaign manager, was asked on Sunday why they put out this absurd falsehood, she stated that while the media reported the fact that trump’s inauguration was clearly smaller than Obama’s 2009 inauguration, Spicer was merely asserting an “alternative fact.” Let the memes begin.
At a speech at CIA headquarters on Saturday, trump doubled-down on the lie, claiming that the real number of attendees was “like a million, or a million-and-a-half.” Video of the speech appears to show a receptive crowd, yet reporting on the event includes the claim from some CIA officials that the first few rows were deliberately filled with trump supporters, brought in by the president’s team in order to cheer and clap for him. They also dispute the White House’s claim that “there were people waiting to get into the event,” by saying that of the thousands who were invited to attend the event, about 400 showed up. In fact, instead of describing the crowd as receptive or supportive of the new President, sources described the impressions of the crowd as “uncomfortable,” “stunned and at times offended,” and feeling as though the visit actually “made relations with the intelligence community worse.”
The CIA is certainly far from the only agency to feel put off by trump this week. On Tuesday he forced a social media ban on the Environmental Protection Agency and the US Department of Agriculture. This bans them from posting any information on their social media sites, providing any information to journalists, issuing new contracts, grants, or work assignments, and publishing any press releases, fact sheets, or photos.
Lucky for all of us, employees of these agencies and related departments have created alternative social media accounts, most notably the @AltNatParkSer and @RogueNASA, (among many others) where they have “gone rogue” by posting scientific facts about the environment and climate change.
The ways that restricted or selective access to scientific work may impact global climate policy will soon become clear, but we have a very good idea right now on the immediate impacts of trump reinstating- and expanding- the Global Gag Rule. Also known as the Mexico City Policy, this executive order bans all funding to foreign non-governmental organizations (NGOs) which provide health care that includes even the availability of information about abortion.
We have seen firsthand how the giving and taking away of this funding over the past three decades, depending entirely on the party affiliation of the president, severely impacts the health, well-being, and even mortality of people dealing with pregnancy across the world. By reinstating the Global Gag Rule, trump has opted to let people die rather than provide them access to information on a range of healthcare options, including birth control methods. Restricting information on and safe access to abortion does not reduce the number of abortions, but rather increases the number of people who will experience complications from unsafe, often self-administered, procedures. Thousands will die, and millions will lose access to birth control, HIV treatment, and maternal and pre-and post-natal care. We know this. And trump knows it too.
In response, the government of the Netherlands is organizing “an international fund which would finance projects relating to access for birth control, abortion and women’s education, throughout developing countries,” in order to “compensate this financial setback as much as possible”. They have committed $10 million to the project, which, while dwarfed by the amount being withheld by the US- $600 million over four years- is greatly welcomed nonetheless. The Canadian government is currently considering options for assisting the Netherlands in this effort, though they have yet to commit a dollar amount.
Trump followed this executive order the next day with several others which call for a fast-tracking of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipelines and a general fast-track for all new infrastructure projects which would radically limit the depth and time given to current environmental impact studies of proposed projects.
Dave Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, spoke out strongly against the order which violates his tribe’s long-standing legal right to the land. “By granting the easement,” he said, “trump is risking our treaty rights and water supply to benefit his wealthy contributors and friends at DAPL. […] Creating a second Flint does not make America great again.” Organizers around the county called for emergency protests to take place that evening to oppose trump’s strong-arming, resulting in thousands of activists mobilizing in cities throughout the country, including Washington DC, New York City, Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Philadelphia.
On Wednesday, trump signed two more executive orders, this time on immigration. The first calls for “the immediate construction of a physical wall on the southern border,” yet outlines no plan to pay for this massively expensive- and ultimately ineffective- project. He also called for the hiring of an additional 5,000 Customs and Border Patrol agents, and 10,000 additional Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers, increasing their current numbers by 50 percent.
Under Obama, priority cases for deportation were (relatively) limited to those who were “convicted of a felony, serious misdemeanor or multiple misdemeanors.” Now, any undocumented person charged with any crime, even wrongly, could face a fast-tracked deportation. But that’s not the only threat. ICE officers have also been granted expanded authority, allowing them to deport any undocumented immigrant whom, in their opinion, poses “a risk to public safety or national security.”
His second executive order also calls for the withholding of federal funds to the approximately 300 cities and communities which have policies protecting the undocumented. These communities are commonly referred to as sanctuary cities. In his executive order, trump described these cities as having caused “immeasurable harm to the American people and to the very fabric of our Republic,” and likely intends to have Jeff Sessions, should he be confirmed as Attorney General, “sue [sanctuary] cities on the grounds they are violating federal law by refusing to cooperate with immigration enforcement.”
Yet another frightening aspect of his order on sanctuary cities is the call for a comprehensive list to be made public on a weekly basis outlining crimes committed (or, allegedly committed) by undocumented immigrants. Ostensibly for the purpose of “better inform[ing] the public regarding the public safety threats associated with sanctuary jurisdictions,” such a list, especially if “comprehensive” means the inclusion of personal information, can only result in a lessening of public safety.
Historian and author Andrea Ptizer compared the impetus behind such a list to a feature in an old Nazi newspaper called Der Stürme. “…They had a department called "Letter Box," and readers were invited to send in stories of supposed Jewish crimes. And Der Stürmer would publish them, and they would include some pretty horrific graphic illustrations of these crimes, as well.” Speaking with Juan Gonzalez on “Democracy Now,” they explained how purposely focusing on the alleged crimes of one marginalized subset of the population makes those alleged crimes appear more common or depraved than crimes committed by others, despite the proven fact that crimes rates among immigrants in the US are actually lower than crimes committed by those born here.
Marielena Hincapié, executive director of the National Immigration Law Center, has described the President’s actions as “extremist” and said that he is “taking a wrecking ball to our immigration system. It shouldn't come as a surprise that chaos and destruction will be the outcome."
Fortunately, several Mayors (most notably from New York, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, and Seattle)are taking a strong stand, defending their status as sanctuary cities and vowing to remain welcoming and safe communities for all of their residents. Chicago’s Mayor Rahm Emanuel spoke clearly about his commitment to remaining a sanctuary city. “We’re going to stay a sanctuary city,” he promised. “There is no stranger among us. Whether you’re from Poland or Pakistan, whether you’re from Ireland or India or Israel and whether you’re from Mexico or Moldova, where my grandfather came from, you are welcome in Chicago as you pursue the American dream.”
The Mayor of Boston, Marty Walsh, likened the order to “a direct attack on Boston’s people, Boston’s strength and Boston’s values.” He stated that 28% of Boston’s residents are immigrants, and that nearly half have at least one foreign-born parent. “I want to say directly to anyone who feels threatened today or vulnerable you are safe in Boston,” Walsh vowed. “We will do everything in our power to protect you – if necessary we will use City Hall itself to shelter and protect anyone who is targeted unjustly.”
To finish out his first week in office, trump published yet another executive order on Friday, instituting a 90-day ban on any non-citizen trying to enter the country from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, or Yemen, including legal immigrants and permanent residents who have already been vetted and issued valid visas. Travelers with dual-nationalities are also denied entry by the ban. Refugees have been banned for 120 days, even those who have already been through- and approved by- the toughest, longest vetting process in the world, and have already waited between 18 and 24 months to enter the country.
The executive order also calls for cutting the number of refugees from any country accepted into the United States for 2017 by more than half, down to 50,000 from 110,000. In 2016, 12,486 Syrian refugees found safe haven in America, but now refugee applications from Syria have been suspended indefinitely. “I hereby proclaim,” the President said, “that the entry of nationals of Syria as refugees is detrimental to the interests of the United States.
Americans disagree.
Protesters quickly mobilized at airports around the country, with the largest groups at Dulles in Washington D, JFK in New York City, and O’Hare in Chicago, to make sure that immigrants and refugees were being treated civilly and knew that they were welcome. They were also there, of course, to express their anger at the trump administration for instituting a Muslim ban to the United States, a country founded on the principle of religious liberty. Throughout the weekend, nearly 100 airports around the country saw large solidarity rallies.
While trump’s administration likes to say this isn’t a ban specifically on Muslims, they show their hand when they admit that, as refugee applications re-open, priority will be given to Christians who have faced “religious persecution.” In an interview Friday, trump seemed to believe that for the past several years the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security had been favoring Muslim refugees, making it “impossible, or at least very tough” for Christians from Syria to enter the US.
He provided no evidence of this, which would have been impossible, or at least very tough, because there is no evidence that such a policy was in practice. In fact, of all refugees accepted into the country last year, 50.9% were Muslim and 49.1% were Christian. In Syria specifically, 87% of the population is Muslim, and 10% is Christian. Among those accepted in the US as refugees in 2016, 99% were Muslim, and 1% Christian. Still, as trump has halted all refugee immigration from Syria, it’s unclear how he intends to prioritize any of them. It should also be noted that trump’s claim that Christians in the Middle East are specifically targeted by terrorists is false. The vast majority of people that ISIS kills are Muslim.
People in Syria find themselves and their families in grave and immediate danger every day. They want to get away from extremism. They want to be free from terror. And when we close our doors to them, we are the ones responsible for their deaths. Our president may be willing to turn his back on them, but we never will.
We have seen a truly amazing outpouring this week of love in action. We have seen solidarity and intersectionality and hope. We have stood by each other, stood for each other, and proved to each other and ourselves that we are not alone.
Dalam keadaan mendesak, kita berusaha melakukan apa pun untuk keluar dari kondisi seperti itu. Tak terkecuali, hingga mempercayai kemustajaban doa setelah adzan. Seperti tak ada pilihan lain untuk menghindar. Mau tak mau kita lakukan juga.
Jangan berani-beraninya mengatakan kalimat “tidak apa-apa”, jika kau tidak yakin dirimu sedang tidak apa-apa. Hati-hati. Biasanya pernyataan tersebut malah menjebak. Dan hanya akan menambah permasalahan baru di lain waktu.
