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Having been defeated in the 2020 presidential election, there is a strong impetus to erase all
vestiges of the onerous Donald Trump regime. We should not rush blindly to do so! All that Donald Trump did or tried to do
was not necessarily wrong, evil nor immoral. There are some elements of what were achieved during his four years in office
that were positive and beneficial. America should retain and build upon those successes. We should not vindictively and
foolishly undo what have turned out to be positive and successful achievements of Donald Trump.
In the rest of this article, I will address some positive results achieved by President Trump and
his administration. There may be others, but I will leave them for further analyses and discussions. The mere mention of the
name Donald Trump stirs up many negative passions and prejudices. We should not let these blind us to the positive aspects
of his presidency – and there were positive aspects and achievements!
Reversing the Flood of Illegal Immigrants
“One of the major successes of the Trump administration was the result of President Trump clamping
down on the rampant illegal immigration that had been allowed - even encouraged – to persist during previous
administrations.” (Ref. 1)
When President Biden took office, one of his first actions was to reverse the immigration policies
of the previous administration – those of Donald Trump. The disastrous results of Biden's hasty and ill-advised action
immediately became obvious.
As reported on the day before St. Patrick’s day in 2021, the immigration crisis at the border was
cresting and was threatening to spill into every corner of the nation. A member of the Center for Immigration Studies said
that, “It’s almost the biggest story out there and it’s the biggest story Joe Biden doesn’t want people to notice.” This
followed the explosive rise in the numbers of crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border, including thousands of migrant children
arriving without their parents. “This crisis is created by the presidential policies of this new administration,” reported
a lawmaker from California who blamed the increse in illegal boder crossings on President Biden’s efforts to undo former
President Donald Trump’s
immigration restrictions. A member of the Center for Immigration Studies cited the same problem, adding that
no matter if you loved
or hated Trump, his policies helped control the flood of immigrants at the southern border. “President Biden should
be holding
the line and restoring policies the Trump administration imposed,” she said, adding that requiring immigrants to remain in
Mexico until their appeal to enter the U.S. was decided was a good first step. “Mexico didn’t want to be a doormat anymore,”
she said. That, in turn, had Mexico pressuring Central American neighbors to help out and assist those seeking asylum.
Now all that work is eroding. “It’s a free-for-all now,” she said. “Everyone feels sorry for these people,
but we should not encourage illegal immigration.”
In February 2021, President Biden’s first full month in office, border agents recorded more than
100,000 border crossings, including 9,457 unaccompanied migrant children, according to data from U.S. Customs
and Border Protection.[2]
While, after assuming office, President Biden’s administration said it would start “phase one of a
program to restore safe and orderly processing at the southwest border”, this was nothing but Orwellian double-speak,
since Trump’s program had already restored both security and order at the border. The Biden moves quickly began undermining
both security and order at our southern border.[3]
Early in September 2021,the U.S. Supreme Court did President Joe Biden a favor in ordering the
reinstatement of the “Remain in Mexico” policy governing asylum-seekers from Central America.
The program, part of former President Donald Trump’s Migrant Protection Protocols, was put in place
in 2019 to deal with caravans of migrants who were showing up at the southern border claiming to be refugees from violence
and persecution in their home countries. Trump’s policy sent the applicants back across the border to wait for adjudication
of their claim. Within seven months, encounters at the border dropped to 36,500 a month from 144,000.
And then Biden took over and immediately scrapped Trump’s immigration policies, including the
"Remain in Mexico" order. As a result, in July 2021, encounters with migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border hit 200,000,
a 21-year high.
Biden eliminated the programs on his first day in office for no other reason than they were
implemented by Trump! President Biden should return to the Trump plan, which was working quite well and which was on the
way toward maintaining a secure and orderly border.[4]
Finally Bringing Hope of Peace and Stability to the Middle East
For over forty years, numerous Administrations - Democratic and Republican - had repeatedly
fumbled the ball when it came to formulating and implementing a realistic and effective Middle East foreign policy. Iran had
risen to its destructive position as the chief fomenter and financier of terror and unrest and it was continuing on it path of
developing nuclear weapons and means of delivering them. Israel and the “Palestinians” continued in their ongoing hostility
with Israel constantly being subjected to terrorist attacks from Gaza and the West Bank. At best, the peace between Israel
and its Arab neighbors was a cold peace.
Nearly all that came to an end with the ascension of Donald Trump to the presidency of the United
States. American foreign policy with regard to the Middle East took a new and positive turn with Trump's Abraham
Accords. Arabs and Jews were visiting with
and talking to each other. The terrorists in the West Bank and Gaza found out that they were about to lose their constant war
of terrorism against the only true democracy in the Middle East. America needs to continue this innovative and
successful Middle Eastern policy!
“President Joe Biden is undoing several foreign policy successes of the Trump administration
for no apparent reason other than radical ideology and political spite.
“In each case, former President Donald Trump was able to achieve goals that both parties had long
claimed to share. And in each case, Biden has not only hurt the interests of the United States, but reduced the leverage that
he might otherwise have had to pursue foreign policy goals unique to his administration.” (Ref. 5)
Former U.S. ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley has correctly pointed out the remarkable progress of
Arab-Israeli peace achieved by President Donald Trump. She noted the resultant blooming of friendships that have developed
between Israel and numerous Arab countries in the four years of the Trump presidency. While there would be strong partisan
pressure to reject
most, if not all, of President Trump’s foreign policy, she urged President Biden to ignore such pressure. “That would
be a mistake. Sweeping away the achievements and strategies of the past four years would endanger American safety and
interests.” “The Obama administration said such a peace would never happen. But it did — because of U.S. leadership.”
“Trump refused to accept the tired thinking that the Palestinian cause was the key to broader regional peace.”
(Ref. 6)
In a blatant anti-Israel gesture, liberal Democrats moved to pressure President Biden and other
Democrats into returning to the failed U.S. policy of hostility toward Israel and appeasement of the “Palestinian” terrorists
in Gaza and the West Bank.
A letter from 73 Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives, including a number in leadership
positions, urged President Joe Biden to make a number of moves to reverse what they called the Trump administration’s
“abandonment of longstanding, bipartisan United States policy” on Israeli-Palestinian relations.
Among other things, the letter called for Biden to firmly consider Israeli settlements
illegal and the West Bank occupied, two things the Trump administration stated that it would no longer do. It also
pushed for all “relevant official U.S. documents and communications” to “once again consistently refer to the status of the
West Bank and Gaza Strip as occupied.”
Donald Trump had upended decades of counterproductive U.S. policy in the region by recognizing the
right of Israel to annex parts of the West Bank, in addition to agreeing to Israel’s claim to the Golan Heights and moving the
U.S. embassy to Jerusalem.
Unfortunately, Biden had already indicated that he favored some of the recommendations in the letter
that rewarded the Fatah and Hamas terrorists, e.g., a resumption of sending aid to the "Palestinians" and reopening a separate
consulate in Jerusalem for the “Palestinians”.
Perhaps, most importantly, the letter also called on Biden to abandon Trump’s peace plan -
the only positive and successful step toward peace in over 40 years – and which had already led to the establishment
of peaceful relations between Israel and a number of Arab nations.[7]
Running Away From Afghanistan
Since President Biden announced his Afghan withdrawal, almost half the country immediately flipped to
Taliban control. Then, at the end of August 2021, Afghanistan reverted to total Taliban control. Afghanistan once again became
a potential sanctuary for the world’s worst terrorist organizations - like Al Qaeda and ISIS.
One of the reasons for this happening is that the Taliban is a $1 billion a year enterprise, smuggling
drugs, extorting businesses, mining minerals, and controlling customs posts.
The Afghan army and police had fought for 20 years and many of its best commanders were killed. Their
thinly armored vehicles were particularly vulnerable to roadside bombs. Twenty years on, the air force remained tiny and
inadequate, and ended up flying less often because Biden withdrew the maintainers.
The essential flaw of Biden’s precipitous and uncoordinated withdrawal was that the Afghans relied on
Americans to help with air strikes and logistics, which were then gone. Perhaps most importantly, ordinary Afghans felt the
Americans had abandoned their cause. This was especially destabilizing because Afghanistan was and is a tribal system. The
tribe and sub-tribe will prevaricate in the face of an unstable situation and support both sides. But if one side looks set
to win, the tribe will flip to that side. This ended up in a surge of recruiting into the Taliban ranks as tribes tried to
make good with the winners.
The Biden administration understood almost none of this, or it would not have withdrawn. Joe Biden
said the Afghan government and its allies could win if they had the will to fight. Biden showed no awareness that he had
upset a delicate political and military balance that swung widely with relatively small changes. So, the departure of just
2,500 American troops (plus contractors) had a huge impact on a fight between 300,000 government troops and 60,000
Taliban.
Biden’s abandonment of Afghanistan was a strategic blunder with very real human consequences. The
Taliban are coldblooded killers. Since 1995 they killed tribal elders who resisted them. As areas came under their sway,
they killed whoever they deemed to have cooperated too closely with the U.S. and the Afghan government. This means
interpreters, government officials and anyone associated with the war effort. The sense of fear is palpable. More will be
murdered!
The Taliban are not reasonable people. They are killers who have an agenda of the compete domination
of the country. The Biden administration failed to understand what drove the war, the kind of people they faced and the psyche
of their Afghan allies. They threw their best friends in Afghanistan to the wolves, and let in a movement that prides itself
on upholding values from the Middle Ages, and that kills without remorse. It is also a close ally of al Qaeda, who are now
fighting alongside the Taliban.
In short, this abject surrender to terrorism was a blunder of historic proportions with huge
consequences for people who helped us the most, and for America itself.[8]
Canceling the Permit for Keystone XL
“It was understood that Biden would rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement - even though the U.S. reduced
carbon emissions without it, and experts admitted it would not be enough to make any real impact on the global climate. However,
he went further, canceling the permit for the Keystone XL - a pipeline that would have created tens of thousands of ‘good,
paying, union jobs’ (to quote Biden’s favorite refrain) on both sides of the border. The pipeline is the cleanest, least
carbon-intensive way of transporting oil that will now most likely be moved by rail and by truck. Canada’s Liberal government,
under Justin Trudeau, was only too happy to see the project canceled, never mind the economic cost. But all Biden needed to
do was leave the Keystone XL in place. Instead, he pursued a symbolic victory to appease radical environmentalists, increasing
emissions while killing jobs and undermining America’s hard-fought energy independence.” (Ref. 5)
In Conclusion
“If we learn from our experience, we are considered intelligent. If we learn from our
experience and other people’s as well, we are considered highly intelligent. If we learn from neither, we are
considered stupid.
“In contrast to President Donald Trump, President Joe Biden held government positions {before
becoming president}. {The lessons to be learned were} there for him to see, over and over and over again. Having earned
a baccalaureate degree and a law degree, he was surely capable of learning from both {Trump’s failures and his successes}.
Yet he did neither. Worse, he {has chosen} to undo the success[es] and {institute} the failure[s]. And that, dear readers,
constitutes STUPIDITY writ large.” (Ref. 9)
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References:
- ‘Viva Biden’ – Illegal Migrant Groups Swarming U.S. Border Wearing Biden T-Shirts, Paul Crespo,
American Defense News, 5 March 2021.
- Analysis: Biden Administration Creates Border Crisis, Denies Its Existence, Guy Benson,
Townhall,
4 March 2021.
- Biden creates a new border crises, Rich Lowry, Boston Herald, Page 15, 6 March 2021.
- A wise return to Donald Trump’s border policies, Boston Herald: Page 12, 10 September 2021.
- Three Trump Foreign Policy Successes Biden Is Undoing, Joel B. Pollak, Breitbart,
7 March 2021.
- Haley: Biden can foster peace by not ‘caving to Iran or turning on Israel’, Paul Shindman,
World Irael News ,
17 December 2020.
- 73 congressional Democrats to Biden: Reverse more of Trump’s Israel policies and call settlements illegal,
Ron Kampeas, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, 24 June 2021.
- U.S. withdrawal enables Taliban killers in Afghanistan, Douglas Grindle, Boston Herald:
Page 15,
9 August 2021.
- President Biden’s Foolish Refusal to Learn, Vincent Ryan Ruggiero, Catholic Journal,
Accessed 10 September 2021.
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