By MARIANNE N. NACANAYNAY, age 13
Hundreds of students at high schools in Des Moines, IA staged a walkout on Wednesday, November 9 to voice their concerns about the 2016 election outcome and express their support for each other. Photo by Phil Roeder
On November 8, 2016, the United States elected Donald Trump as its next president. He will become the first president who hasn’t served in elected office since Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952.
Trump’s victory is already being protested across the country. Trump made a large number of racist, xenophobic and sexist statements during his campaign. Multiple individuals brought up rape charges against him, and in October, audio from a recording in 2005 showed Trump making lewd comments about women that suggested sexual harassment and rape.
Last April, Trump attacked Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, saying, “The only thing [Clinton’s] got going is the woman card.” Surprisingly, though, the majority of white women voted for Trump in the election.
Trump’s plans for his first 100 days in office include allowing the Keystone Pipeline construction to move forward and canceling “every unconstitutional executive action, memorandum and order” President Obama has delivered.
If Trump reversed all of Obama’s executive actions, he would also get rid of an immigration program called DACA, or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. Immigrant youth who fall under the program are better known as Dreamers, and there are an estimated 700,000 of them at risk of being deported.
But Trump’s anti-immigration stance is another reason why he ended up with 290 out of 538 electoral college votes. During his campaign, Trump talked about building a wall between the U.S. and Mexico (and having Mexico pay for it), banning Muslims from entering the country and deporting more than 11 million undocumented immigrants.
According to an August Pew Research Center poll, 79 percent of Trump’s supporters think the southern border wall should be built. In an interview with NPR, Texas Republican representative Maria Guadalupe Dempsey said, “You build a fence, you put a gate up and you open and close it as you wish. You invite people in. You don’t want people who are not invited to come into the country.”
In the days immediately following the election, journalists and activists have reported incidents of racist and anti-Muslim harassment. For example, one Afghan woman in Nashville said the neighbor she had grown up with her entire life told her to “go back to where I came from and get the hell out of HER country.”
Muslim kids protesting Donald Trump in December 2015 in New York City hold up signs to combat Islamophobia. One of Trump’s plans for his first 100 days in office is to ban immigration from many Muslim-majority countries associated with terrorism. Photo by Joe Catron
Beginning the day after Election Day, protests against Trump’s victory sprung up across the country. Across Los Angeles county, an estimated 4,000 high school students, too young to vote, walked out of school on November 10 in protest; plans for a country-wide student walkout on November 14 are being spread on social media.
“We feel unsafe with our futures,” said student Dana Douthwight of West Seattle High School, another school that had an estimated 200 students leave class.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is also protesting by taking steps toward preparing for court against Trump. In a blog post published the day after the election, the ACLU asked Trump to change his positions on his campaign promises. Calling the proposals “unlawful” and “unconstitutional”, the organization addressed the president-elect directly and said, “If you do not reverse course and instead endeavor to make these campaign promises a reality, you will have to contend with the full firepower of the ACLU at every step.”
I think everybody has a right to speak out and tell others what they think.I also think that everybody should be treated equally even if were different skin color or from different religion. We should also support everybody no matter what.But this is what I think and so you may think differently from what I think but that doesn’t matter because we’ll all different but were also the same. So when Donald Trump starts his work do what you do best and you’ll do great in life whether he’s president or not. PEACE YA’LL and I hope you think about what i wrote. Hear from me later your dear friend Amma!!!!!!!!!!
This article includes many of the things that anger me about trump an d I am glad that it is being told to the world.
Excellent reporting! Reading this after so many of these items are now a reality is beyond terrifying.
I feel sad that anyone would vote for trump
and I never thought that he would win
If people don’t like Trump, why would people elect him as president? Also, I agree with Indykids because I disagree about the idea that Trump has been talking about: Building a wall between Mexico and U.S.A. I don’t agree with that idea because it makes me think that Trump doesn’t want Mexicans in U.S.A.
I disagree with Trump’s idea of building a wall and even having Mexico to pay for it and not letting Muslims enter the U.S. I think that everyone should have the right to come to the United States. I disagree with what Trump said about Clinton that she only has a woman card because many white women voted for Trump. Finally, you do not judge people by color, you judge them by their actions
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I think if Trump wants to build a wall between Mexico and the U.S., and tells Mexico to pay for it, then this is a bad idea. It is not right because he is the one who wants to build it, not Mexico.I also disagree with him thinking of not letting Muslims enter the country only because of their religion. I also think that he should not stop immigrants to come in to the U.S., because America is a country full of immigrants. That is why it’s called the Melting Pot, and most of all, Trump shouldn’t sort people by races or religion. I believe that all people should have the right to enter the U.S.
I agree with this article. I think Trump should let Muslims enter the country because I think it is not fair that just because someone is from a different country, that doesn’t mean they are not a good person. I hope Trump does not separate us from the rest of the world because everyone should have the same rights. I think everyone should have the same amount of freedom because of the first amendment. Therefore, I agree with this article.