Shealah Craighead/Official White House Portrait
President Trump on the Issues
The Economy
- Considering cutting capital gains tax.
- Lowered corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent in 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
- Withdrew from Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in 2017.
- Negotiated and ratified USMCA between the United States, Mexico and Canada.
- Hinted at raising the minimum wage to 15 dollars an hour but no action.
- Pledges to create 10 million jobs in 10 months and 1 million new small businesses but has not expanded on potential plans.
COVID-19
- Opposes a national mask mandate.
- Pledges development of a vaccine by the end of 2020, Advisor to Operation Warp Speed believes vaccine in 2020 unlikely.
- Removed the United States from the World Health Organization.
- The administration supports the full reopening of schools, suggested a potential removal of federal funding from schools if they do not reopen. (Funding for schools goes through Congress, not the president).
- Pledges a ‘return to normal in 2021’ (offers no follow-up plan)
- Invoked Defense Production Act in April but has not used its authority for PPE manufacturing.
Climate Change
- Instituted rollbacks of the Clean Water Act and Obama-era water protections.
- Officially withdrew the United States from the 2015 Paris Climate Accord, set to go into effect on Nov. 4.
- Issued proposal to remove restrictions on oil and gas drilling in National Forests
- Removed the words ‘climate change’ from EPA Strategic Plan for 2018-2022
- States that the administration would partner with other nations to clean up oceans and waterways.
Racial and Social Inequality
- Pledges to end the cashless bail system as an alternative to cash bail.
- Opposes ending qualified immunity. Called the idea ‘crazy’ in a meeting with the National Association of Police Organizers.
- Supports lowering mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines as outlined in the First Step Act. No clear position on abolishing mandatory minimums as a whole.
- Supports the Death Penalty, the federal government resumed executions in 2020 following a near two-decade unofficial moratorium.
- Increased use of private prisons by the Department of Justice. The administration sued the State of California for a ban on private prisons.
Female and LGBTQ+ Rights
- Supports the appointment of conservative judges and justices to the federal judiciary.
- Supports increased restrictions on abortion. Backed an unsuccessful bill that would criminalize abortions after 20 weeks.
- Supports defunding Planned Parenthood through Title X.
- Signed executive order banning transgender individuals from military service.
- Rolled back LBGTQ+ protections in both Healthcare and Homeless protections.
- Supports religious liberty defense and official 2020 Republican Party platform which calls for the overturning of Obergefell V. Hodges and Roe V. Wade.
- Appointed 3 conservative justices to the US Supreme Court who opposed either LGBTQ+ protections, the Obergefell V. Hodges decision, or both.
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