When Donald Trump became president of the US early last year, five million people marched in 670 towns and cities around the globe. The last time we saw such a scale and breadth of coordinated demonstrations was in February 2003 against the Iraq war. In the US itself the numbers were even higher this time than they were during the anti-war movement.
Trump is a bigoted property developing millionaire who is trying to make his terrible racist and sexist views appear respectable. No mainstream U.S. politician in recent decades has openly displayed as much hate – toward immigrants, women, Muslims and anybody else who dares to disagree with him – as Donald Trump.
We hate Trump because he is sexist – Donald Trump bragged in vulgar terms about kissing, groping and trying to have sex with women, saying that “when you’re a star, they let you do it”. This is typical of his attitude to women. He is also against abortion and has stopped government funds being paid to any organisation that tries to advice women on having an abortion. He was the owner of the Miss Universe beauty pageant that degrades women.
We hate Trump because he is racist – in January 2018 with a group of senators, he said the U.S. should not accept immigrants from Haiti and “shithole countries” in Africa. During the election he pledged to ban Muslims from entering the US and called immigrants from Mexico rapists.
He also tried to ban visitors to America from predominantly Muslim countries, stopping people from seven countries from going to the US when he first became president.
We hate Trump because he is against trade unions – he has a history of making it difficult for his workers to join trade unions and is against increasing the minimum wage. The Apprentice is an American reality television program that judges the business skills of participants. Trump became known for his fateful catch phrase, “You’re fired!” He has sacked many of his advisors since becoming president.
We hate Trump because he is a climate change denier – he claims that climate change (which is already killing tens of thousands of people due to the drying up of Lake Chad, for example) is a Chinese plot and has pulled the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement. He has also given free range to oil and coal companies to extract carbon fuels from the Artic and other protected areas.
We hate Trump because he wants to make the rich richer and the poor poorer. His tax cut bill in December 2017 was a trillion dollar handout to corporations and rich individuals. It slashed corporate tax from 35 to 20 percent and piled higher taxes onto poor people. It also repealed parts of the Affordable Care Act—“Obamacare”—which provides limited health care for millions of poor people in America. Trump has refused to release his tax returns so people cannot see what taxes he has paid (or not). His companies filed for bankruptcy six times to avoid paying bills and salaries.
But what is worse than his views and individual actions is that he is now the most powerful person in the world. So his views gain wide acceptance – resulting in increased levels of sexism and racism. He also makes the world a far more dangerous place, being responsible for the largest horde of nuclear weapons. He has greatly increased insecurity in the Middle East by ending the nuclear deal with Iran and moving the American embassy to Jerusalem giving support to the racist state of Israel.
Donald Trump is the new and ugly face of American Imperialism. This is why hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated in the streets of London and other British cities during Trump’s recent visit.
by Drew POVEY
