Donald Trump’s First 100 Days Report Card From A Libertarian Perspective
The first 100 days of a President’s administration is one of the most important in regards to their agenda and course setting for the next 4 years. Presidents are judged by the effectiveness of these 100 days in office and can be a barometer for the mid-term and re-election campaigns.
Donald Trump is not even to his first 100 days in office and we felt in already necessary to grade him on his progress. After 71 days as President of the United States here at the Libertarian Vindicator we give him the following grade:
We wanted to give him an F but felt since we are judging him before his 100 days are up we would give him a little room for improvement.
There were so many in January that was giving us crap here at the Vindicator for attacking Trump the way we were and not giving him the ability to actually do the job. While that might have been a fair critique of our opinion at least we were right!
The latest Gallup Poll has the President’s approval rating at 40%. There are others that have him in the 30’s, but we will give the benefit of the doubt and use the most reputable polling agency. There are well over half (56%) of the American people that don’t agree with the job that President Trump is doing. Yes, he might try to call that fake news, but in reality, he is floundering at every turn and portraying himself as one of the worst Presidents this country has seen in quite some time.
So, why do we give him the D-? It is quite simple!
Health Care
First, let us start with the failure of the Obamacare repeal and replacement plan under the American Healthcare Act. One of Trump’s campaign promises centered around the dismantling of Obamacare as one of the biggest travesties in America. He spoke at rally’s across this country telling people he would dismantle hallmark law of the Obama Administration, but when push came to shove neither him or the Republicans in Congress could get it done.
Yes, he and they will try to blame the House Freedom Caucus for the failure of the AHA, but we all know that it was just Obamacare Lite and principled members of Congress could not vote for something that didn’t even changed the key aspects of the previous law.
Immigration
Another one of his biggest campaign promises was tighter controls on illegal immigration. He promised that a wall would be built along the southern border of the United States and that Mexico would pay for it. Right away in his term as President we all learned that it won’t be Mexico paying for that stupid wall, but rather the American people will take on the cost. First, many were not really sold on the idea of a border wall that stretched thousands of miles. The only ones that want this abomination are his hardcore supporters that think a physical wall will actually stop illegal immigration to this country.
Second, take the immigration bans that he instituted right away on countries in the middle east he suspected had ties to terrorist organizations and stopped people in our airports coming from those countries. Right away these executive orders were struck down by the courts and the American people started to learn that as he was banning travel from certain countries in the middle east he ignored the countries that he had business ties to like Saudi Arabia (which by the way was home to 90% of the 9/11 attackers).
Russia Investigation
The other big failure of his first 100 days centers around the investigation into Russian influence in the elections. Almost every day since he took the office of President there has been some type of news story about Russian connection into his campaign and staffers. In the first couple of weeks his national security advisor had to resign because he lied about his conversations with the Russian Ambassador.
The United States Congress has been holding hearings into this Russian connection and there seems to be no end in sight.
Whether or not there is something to this investigation is still to be seen, but if something does come out of it there might be a Constitutional crisis like we haven’t seen since Nixon. Possible resignation or impeachment might be imminent.
The Good of Trump
The reason we didn’t give Trump an F on his report card is he has done some good. He has scaled back some of the Obama regulations that made it harder for businesses in the United States. He is focusing on manufacturing and the core of American production like coal and helping those industries out. He is trying to get businesses to stay in the United States and that is an admirable fight.
However, his grade stays down because he is ignoring the concept of free trade. Trump is not a free trader and as Libertarians, we know that it works. If the world is freely trading with one another we all benefit with good products and world peace. Trump is now threatening our relationships around the world by having an isolationist tone. We can’t just put walls up and not trade with our world partners and expect to stay a world power. Free trade is essential to a more prosperous world and society.
Conclusion
Overall, President Trump is doing an awful job as President and we predicted this before he took office. He doesn’t have a clue in what he is doing. He is taking hits and loses. He never expected the office to be this intense and he is floundering at every turn. It feels like he is in his 4th year as President, but we haven’t even made it to 100 days. It is only day 71 and he can’t recover from this mess he has created.
