Damielys Duarte/Assistant Opinion Director
These last seven months have been a social and political mess with Black Lives Matter protests taking place in major cities across the country, and states struggling to handle the Coronavirus outbreak at different lengths. It seems that everyone is turning to their representatives, and their pleas are falling on deaf ears. Now, more than ever, we require a strong leader who will take decisive action in regards to the global pandemic and our floundering economy, and President Trump is that contender.
Despite the media’s baseless claims that Trump has ruined our diplomatic relations with foreign countries, Trump recently brokered a historic peace agreement between Sudan and Israel. This is the third U.S.-assisted agreement between Israel and an Arab-Muslim nation in less than three months, a record-breaking number compared to Obama’s eight years in office, which only fueled our trans-Atlantic tensions with the Middle East.
Now, more than ever, we require a strong leader who will take decisive action in regards to the global pandemic and our floundering economy
There has also been controversy over his alleged refusal to condemn white supremacists. However, in September of 2020 President Trump signed the “Platinum Plan for Black Americans,” which labels Antifa and the KKK as terrorist groups and makes lynching a national hate crime. In addition, he promised to invest $500 billion to uplift Black communities across the nation by providing federal funding to Black churches and postsecondary institutions and promote a National Clemency Program to resolve wrongful prosecution and improve drug rehabilitation.
Then there’s the matter of COVID-19, which has taken the lives of 200,000 Americans. While that is a tragic loss, we cannot blame Incumbent Trump for those deaths. Our President was not the one who created and released the virus; he has simply tried to contain this spilled jar of fire ants to the best of his abilities, seeing as no one has experienced such a massive pandemic since the early 1900’s. It didn’t help that the World Health Organization and the CDC were just as perplexed, sending out information only to redact their statements months later. This only proves how even the scientists fighting the virus have made mistakes due to inexperience, and consequently we cannot hold political leaders to a higher standard.
And although our President was inexperienced with the virus, he was quick to order a travel restriction, despite Democrats (including Biden) claiming this was xenophobic, only to turn around a few months later and say the restriction was not strict nor fast enough. Furthermore, Trump passed the Memorandum on Order Under the Defense Production Act Regarding the Purchase of Ventilators, which facilitated the distribution of PPE and ventilators to healthcare providers during the onset of the pandemic.
This year has been characterized by panic and uncertainty and states are opening for the sake of their businesses only to close again due to the political strings of COVID-19. This back and forth will only result in the destruction of America and while measures must be taken to slow the spread of COVID-19, we cannot listen to politicians such as Joe Biden who wants to mandate nation-wide mask usage and close entire business centers for a virus with a 1% mortality rate. President Trump will offer states the right to determine their COVID-19 regulations, depending on their own situations and reduce the government’s control over the average American.
In addition, Trump has made it very clear that he will take care of our environment without damaging the nation’s economy, hence why he refused to sign and join the Paris Climate Accord, since it required the U.S. to comply with carbon emission regulations by 2030 — much sooner than equally developed nations such as China. This would have resulted in a massive blow to our economy and cost us nearly 25% of our businesses, as they would not have been able to comply with such costly regulations so quickly.
While promoting clean energy legislation is commendable and necessary, we must be realistic with our expectations and not assume that an entire nation based on oil can switch to pure electricity in the span of 10 years.
For those claiming Trump is indifferent to the preservation of our environment, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration U.S. CO2 emissions in 2019 were the lowest they have been since 1992. Furthermore, Trump has initiated more Superfund hazardous waste clean-ups than any of the previous administrations and set records in almost every year. President Trump also signed the Great American Outdoors Act in August 2020, which dedicates up to 1.9 billion per year for five years to fund deferred maintenance projects identified by the National Park Service and other federal wildlife services.
As a nation we are all welcome to having differing views. But as we can see, the media has done very little to unite the people. Instead, they are utilizing their influence to continue furthering racial, economic and social divides by consistently reporting false, misleading or negative information regarding our incumbent president. Although he is no saint by any means and it is the media’s job to report politicians’ corruption, I also believe it is their duty to put their personal political beliefs aside and report on our leaders professionally and without bias.
With that said, it is my personal belief that the candidate that will best serve America’s interest is Donald J. Trump due to his incredible economic, environmental and diplomatic advances these first four years.
DISCLAIMER:
The opinions presented within this page do not represent the views of PantherNOW Editorial Board. These views are separate from editorials and reflect individual perspectives of contributing writers and/or members of the University community.
Photo by Jernej Furman on Flickr.
Wow! This is amazing! Dami you nailed it!