WE HAVE SURVIVED TWO YEARS OF PRESIDENT
TRUMP.
Trump's Top Achievements of his FIRST year.
100 percent vote by UN Security Council to
sanction North Korea.
41 percent decline in illegal southern
border crossings
97,482 illegal immigrant arrests, 70 percent
convicted of additional crimes, 52,169 expelled
Adopted a resolute policy on Afghanistan
Advocated for practical tertiary education
Advocated for skills-based immigration
policies
American companies now expanding rather than
shipping jobs overseas
Announced sanctions targeting Iran’s
Revolutionary Guards
Appointed a Transportation Secretary who is
modernizing air traffic control
Appointed an Education Secretary who is
correcting abuses of Title IX
Appointed an EPA administrator who has
rescinded over 30 regulations
Appointed an FDA director who is
facilitating generic drug competition
Appointed an Interior Secretary to improve
forest management and expand users of public lands
Approved the Keystone pipeline
Called for international support of Iranian
protesters
Canceled school lunch program that failed to
force children to eat unpopular foods
Constructed test models of the border fence
Convinced Japan and South Korea to increase
defense spending
Convinced NATO members to honor minimum
financial commitments
Decertified Iranian nuclear treaty and sent
it to Senate as constitutionally required
Designated North Korea as a state-sponsor of
terrorism
Eliminated prohibition on interstate health
insurance sales
Ended abuses of the student loan forgiveness
program
Ended forced provision of contraception by
Catholic nunneries
Ended requirement for state funding of
Planned Parenthood
Ended research into Y2K preparedness
Ended rule requiring employers to report pay
data by gender and race
Expanded school-choice efforts
FCC has begun to dismantle unnecessary
Internet “Neutrality” regulations
Foreign firms building plants and creating
jobs in the U.S.
Improved rules of engagement for military in
combat situations
Initiated resistance “sue and settle”
tactics against EPA
Initiated sanctions on Venezuelan
dictatorship
Introduced regulatory budgeting requiring
agencies to rescind two rules to issue a new one
ISIS bombing ramped up from about 20 to 500
or more airstrikes per week
ISIS ground campaign intensified; Raqqa
captured, its fighters surrendering in large numbers
Issued a National Security Strategy
Kate's Law passed House now pending in
Senate
Leveraged U.S. contribution to UN budget to
force 5 percent budget cut and reduce staffs
NLRB reversed rule making indirect employee
control sufficient to be “joint employees”
Nominated 60 judges, 21 confirmed, none yet
denied
Nominated a new Fed chief
Nominated one Supreme Court judge, who was
confirmed
Obtained release of Aya Hijazi after three
years in Egyptian prison
Obtained release of Caitlan Coleman and
husband from Haqqani
Obtained release of UCLA basketball players
from China
Raised awareness of Opioid addiction crisis
Recognized Jerusalem as Israeli capital and
announced plan to move U.S. embassy there
Reduced excess size of two national parks in
Utah
Reduced permanent staff in all Cabinet
agencies except VA, HS and Interior
Reduced White House staff by 110
Repeal of ACA mandate included in tax change
bill
Requested increased funding for missile
defense in face of North Korean and Iranian threats.
Rescinded 2015 Waters of the United States
rule
Rescinded ban drilling in the Arctic and
coastal areas
Rescinded coal mining ban on public lands
Rescinded criminalization of accidental
killing of migratory birds
Rescinded Cuban cash give-away
Rescinded the “Clean Power Plan”
Rescinded the “War on Coal”
Rescinded threat to pull funds from schools
that prohibit transgenders picking their bathrooms
Rescinded Title IX “guidance letter” on
sexual harassment
Restored policy barring federal funding of
abortions overseas
Restoring military capability in the face of
personnel shortages and equipment failures
Revamped U.S. space program, assigning
ambitious new objectives
Revised rules for screening potential
terrorist tourists
Sanctioned Venezuela for human rights
violations
Sanctuary cities legislation passed House
pending in Senate
Signed 74 legislative bills (13 reversing
executive orders) and 23 joint resolutions into law
Signed comprehensive tax change bill
containing most of the changes he proposed
Signed legislation opening Arctic Natural
Wildlife Reserve [ANWR] to oil drilling
Signed legislation to expedite firing of
incompetent VA officials
Supreme Court largely upheld ban on selected
travelers
Taking steps to control the rogue Consumer
Finance Protection Agency
Targeted MS13 gang members for priority
deportation
The president’s lawyers announced a
framework for restoring the separation of powers:
Congress should cease delegating its
legislative power to the executive branch
Courts should stop rubber-stamping
regulations and orders that lack force of law
Executive will end informal “guidance
documents” that undermine due process
U.S. energy production is on the upswing
U.S. sorties and assisted forces reduced
ISIS to 2 percent of the area controlled in 2016
Unemployment is at 4.1 percent, a 17-year
low
Withdrew from Paris Climate Accord
Withdrew from UNESCO (a warning to other
wasteful, overstaffed UN agencies
Those were
the ones you may not have been aware of.
The Following is what I call the “BIG SIX”.
1. Justice Gorsuch & Record number of other
Federal Judges If there’s
one area where Trump has kept his exceeded the expectations of conservative
critics and properly focused on
long-term policy gains, it’s the judiciary, starting with his selection of Neil Gorsuch to replace Antonin
Scalia on the Supreme Court. Trump has also gotten appellate judges confirmed
at a historic clip.
2. Tax cuts. After a long year of legislative frustration,
the GOP tax bill was a big shot in the arm to Republican morale, and a major
positive for the economy going forward. The bill itself was a compromise, so
not what I or really anyone else would have written from scratch, but its
business tax cuts are a long-overdue pro-growth step, and the moves in the
direction of larger child tax credits and caps on the use of large deductions
for mortgages and state and local taxes for high-income taxpayers are welcome
steps towards a fairer tax code. It even got rid of the hated Obamacare
mandate, a policy so unpopular that Obama himself had campaigned against it in
the 2008 Democratic primaries. In a bad year for Republican health-care policy,
that’s a plus.
3. Regulatory relief. Trump’s administration has moved on numerous
fronts — from net neutrality to environmental regulations — to reduce
regulatory burdens on the economy. Most of those steps can be undone by the
next administration — but not all, given the use by this Congress of the
Congressional Review Act to enact legal barriers to several of the Obama
administration’s last-year regulatory initiatives.
While
presidents in general, and presidents in their first year in office in
particular, tend to get too much credit and too much blame for the economy, the
combination of promised (then delivered) corporate tax cuts and relief from
regulatory burdens has undoubtedly contributed to a booming stock market and
some fairly solid economic growth in Trump’s first year. Trump ultimately cut 22 regulations for each new one enacted
this year, saving taxpayers bill
4. Withdraw From Paris Climate Accord. Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate
Accords was a bold step, but Trump pulled the trigger, collapsing a symbolic
sham of an agreement that ill-served American interests. The contrast to the
prior administration’s literally chasing the Chinese delegation to beg them to
sign something is a dramatic one.
5.
Individual
mandate repeal. Through tax reform, Trump fulfilled another
key campaign promise: repealing Obamacare’s individual mandate.
Senate Republicans included a measure to kill the mandate in
their initial tax bill, paving the way for its subsequent inclusion in the
final tax reform package that cleared the president’s desk. The mandate, which
required Americans to carry health insurance or pay an annual penalty as part
of Obamacare, was long seen by GOP voters as the worst element of the 2010
healthcare law.
Public
opinion polls taken in the months leading up to the final healthcare vote
showed between 51 and 65 percent of self-identified Republicans opposed the
individual mandate.
6. Jerusalem. The
decision to move the U.S. Embassy in Israel, eventually, to Jerusalem is more
symbolic than anything, and will still take some time to carry out, time enough
that a successor administration might yet frustrate it. But give Trump credit:
It’s been two decades since Congress passed a law directing that this action be
taken, and subsequent administrations of both parties have offered empty
promises while going wobbly before pulling the trigger. Trump, unconcerned as
he is with how his actions look, finally did it.
Trump's Top 10 Achievements of his second year.
1.
Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court
– His confirmation, messy and controversial as it was, secures another
conservative jurist with an originalist constitutional approach and a
restrained view of judicial power. With Neil Gorsuch and Kavanaugh in place,
Trump has kept his promise to remake the high court with young, conservative
thinkers.
2.
Confronting China – Much of the
heartland anxiety that vaulted Trump into the Oval Office emanates directly
from the abusive economic warfare waged by China for decades against the United
States. At long last, those workers find a champion in Donald Trump, who
slapped serious tariffs upon Beijing and finally forced the regime to negotiate
fairly. America now embraces its strong bargaining position and demands
reciprocity in trade and an end to rampant industrial theft and piracy.
3.
Middle-Class Wages Rise – Incomes in
general soared in 2018, with average hourly earnings finally eclipsing 3 percent growth for the first time since before the Great
Recession. The news is even better for blue-collar workers, who now realize wage growth above that of white-collar workers for the
first time in nearly a decade.
4.
U.S.-Mexico-Canada Trade Deal –
Trump proved that America welcomes equitable global commerce by cementing a
badly needed modernization of NAFTA. The USMCA provides a template for other
such trade pacts and effectively isolates China’s increasingly untenable
posture.
5.
Ending the Iran Nuclear Deal – Gone
are the days of coddling the mullahs who have terrorized America and our allies
for decades. Instead of counting the billions of dollars of cash sent via
secret nighttime flights by the Obama administration, the Tehran regime now
faces a U.S. leadership determined to thwart its tyranny and prevent its
nuclearization.
6.
Moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem
– Trump proved once again how differently he governs compared to Washington
norms. Past presidents promised for decades to make this move and U.S. law has
required it since 1995, but only President Trump made good on his pledge,
honored our ally, and recognized the obvious reality that Jerusalem is the
eternal capital of Israel.
7.
Smashing the ISIS Caliphate and
Exiting Syria – Unlike his predecessor, who haughtily dismissed and ignored the
ISIS threat as terrorists’ “JV team,” President Trump smartly dispatched
limited U.S. troops to help our partners erase the territorial caliphate that
had inflicted unspeakable human rights abuses. Just as importantly, Trump also
announced the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Syria, placing the primary burden
for ongoing stability upon regional powers Israel, Saudi Arabia and the
UAE. This president will not repeat the disastrous nation-building
mistakes of Presidents Bush and Obama.
8.
Increasing Minority Jobs – If Trump
is actually racist, as biased mainstream media “journalists” often claim, he’s
remarkably bad at it, because people of color have thrived under the pro-growth
policies of the Trump Boom. Black joblessness in 2018 reached the lowest levels
ever recorded. For Hispanics, in history there have been a total of 14
months with a jobless rate under 5 percent -- and 13 of those months have unfolded under the leadership of President Trump. Small
business dynamism is particularly crucial for minority advancement, and small
business surveys report optimism among entrepreneurs at record highs in
2018.
9.
Holding the Line with Migrant
Caravans – In the face of continual demagoguery from liberal politicians and
their allies in the legacy media, President Trump took a tough and principled
stance against would-be trespassers. Lawless caravans assault our
sovereignty and abuse our generous asylum statutes. Such provocations
validate the need for a border wall along with reforms to immigration
laws.
10.
Record American Oil Production – In
2018, the U.S. surpassed Russia and Saudi Arabia to become the world’s largest
producer of crude oil. Through aggressive regulatory relief and pro-energy
moves like green-lighting the Keystone XL pipeline, President Trump paved the
way for an independent energy future.
If it were not for the obstructionist Democrats, and the
judicial overreach of obstructionist federal judges, there is simply no telling
what Trump could have accomplished during the year. Which brings me to his biggest failure, which
is the fact that there is still no wall…
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