Donald Trump’s Year in Review: An Opinion Piece

Recently, Trump’s first year as the President came to a close. This year was filled with controversy, so I will point out some of Trump’s biggest successes, failures, and points that he can improve on in this new year. 

Three Biggest Successes

1. The Economy: In Trump’s first year, the DOW rose to an all-time high of 26,000. The unemployment rate is down to 4.1%, the lowest in 17 years. Trump’s “America First” ideology has definitely caused a meteoric rise in the Dow Jones and has put about 2,000 more people in the workforce.
2. Trump’s Tax Cuts: This was Trump’s “Christmas Gift to America”. This bill will cut taxes for most people by 13%. It also lowers the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%. This is what sparked many big businesses to give Christmas bonuses and raise the minimum wage. This shows the principle of trickle-down economics, where if the top earners have more money, they will invest it back into the economy and the economy will grow. Some estimates say that this tax cut will increase our national debt by $1.5 trillion in the next decade. However, these estimates do not account for the increased economic growth that has come and will hopefully continue in the upcoming years.
3. Appointing Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court: After the untimely death of Justice Antonin Scalia, we were voting on not only the president but also on the next supreme court justice in this most recent election. He has served to balance the court because there are now four conservative justices, four liberal justices, and one swing vote.

Three Biggest Failures:

1. The Paris Climate Accords: Trump pulled out of the Paris Climate Accords and the Green Climate Fund, a subset of the Paris Accords this year, which caused a lot of backlash from the media. This really could have been avoided if Trump fully explained what the Paris Climate Accords are and how it would affect the US. America pledged $3 billion to the Green Climate Fund, which uses this money to repair some of the effects of climate change like the lack of monsoons in India. Trump pulling out of this goes directly to his slogan of “America First”.
2. Not Repealing and Replacing Obamacare: Because of Obamacare, many companies don’t want to employ a full-time employee and would rather hire 2 part-time employees because they wouldn’t have to buy insurance for the part-time employees. When the ACA was passed, more than 1 million people lost their health care. For these reasons, you can see that there is a problem with the ACA and it needs to be fixed.
3. Trump’s Tweets and Language: Trump’s tweets are a point of many conflicts because some people like how he says what he thinks, and others don’t like how his tweets are very petty and offensive. His tweets also come off as very childish and not what you would want to come from the man at the head of the nation. His tweet about how the Mainstream Media’s licenses need to be revoked is a violation of the First Amendment rights of the MSM. His tweets about Kim Jong-un are especially childish, like how he nicknamed him ‘Rocket Man’ or described him as ‘short and fat’. His scariest one was when he tweeted that he may have to completely annihilate North Korea. His most recent comment about immigration might represent a sentiment felt by some subset of Americans, but he still should not use that kind of offensive language as the President of the United States

Overall, Trump’s first year in office has been filled with ups, downs, and a whole lot of controversy. He had success with his tax bill, but is yet to fulfill many of his campaign promises in the first year.