Tag: Children

HARMFUL POLICIES OF THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION

Trump administration policies are doing wide-ranging harm to people and our society. We need to protest and resist to convince elected officials, business and academic leaders, and others to stand up and push back.

Trump administration policies are doing wide-ranging harm to people and our society. We need to protest and resist to convince elected officials, business and academic leaders, and others to stand up and push back.

(Note: If you find a post too long to read, please just skim the bolded portions. Thanks for reading my blog!)

Trump administration policies are doing wide-ranging harm to people and our society. This is why we need to protest and resist in every way possible and however each of us can. We need to make it clear these policies are unpopular and convince elected officials, business and academic leaders, and others to stand up and push back. Perhaps some of the topics below will suggest wording for your protest signs. This previous post highlighted some of the harms of the recently passed Trump / Republican budget and thisprevious post documented some of the harm to seniors.

This post highlights harmful policies in crime and violence prevention, in children’s health and well-being, and for low-income seniors. It also notes harms to economic data and states’ finances.

CRIME AND VIOLENCE PREVENTION: The Trump administration has slashed funding for multiple programs that fight crime, reduce violence, and improve public safety. In April, the Department of Justice (DOJ) canceled $820 million in grants that had supported over 500 organizations working to reduce crime and promote public safety. This included $13 million for a program that funded rural law enforcement, supporting investigations of sexual assaults and reductions in child abuse. It cut a $3.5 million collaboration program for law enforcement, community leaders, and researchers to reduce violent crime – a program that Trump had touted as a success in his first term. These cuts are literally defunding the police. [1]

These programs had been working. After a spike in violent and property crimes during the pandemic, over the last three years crime has fallen substantially. Homicides have fallen in major cities, e.g., down 62% in Baltimore to a record low and also to record lows in Chicago and New York.

YOUNG CHILDREN’S WELL-BEING: The Head Start program provides essential services and supports to almost 800,000 low-income children up to age 5 and their families each year. The services include early education and child care, health and dental referrals, nutrition, and parenting supports, including support for getting a job.

The Trump administration’s ban on enrolling children who are undocumented is punishing children for their parents’ status and behaviors. This is like telling parents they can’t send a child to school because they got a ticket for running a red light. Denying them Head Start services will jeopardize the children’s development and ability to succeed in school and in life – early nutrition and development have life-long effects. Moreover, parents may not be able to work because they will have lost their child care. [2]

Head Start has provided these services and supports to over 40 million children and their families since 1965 with no questions asked because they benefit the children as well as their and our society’s futures.

Moreover, between Trump’s inauguration on January 20 and April 15, 2025, according to the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office (GAO), the Trump administration illegally withheld more than $800 million from Head Start programs. Some Head Start programs were forced to close at least temporarily, negatively affecting thousands of children and hundreds of staff. [3]

CHILD MALNUTRITION: The Trump administration recently ordered the destruction of over 500 tons of emergency high-nutrition biscuits that would have prevented malnutrition for about 1.5 million children for a week. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) had spent about $800,000 on this important food source for distribution to children in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It was in storage when the Trump administration gutted USAID stopping its distribution. Secretary of State Marco Rubio assured the House Appropriations Committee that the food would get to the children before it spoiled. However, the State Department ordered the destruction of the food because providing food to Afghanistan might benefit terrorists (although no reason was given for destroying the food destined for Pakistan and apparently no option of delivering the food to another country was considered). Destroying it will cost the U.S. taxpayers $130,000. [4]

WORK PROGRAM FOR LOW-INCOME SENIORS: The Trump Labor Department has quietly ended that Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP). This program helped tens of thousands of seniors (55 or older) who are living on the edge of poverty get part-time employment. The Labor Department withheld about $300 million from grant recipients in July. This is doubly cruel as the Trump / Republican budget is putting work requirements in place for these seniors to qualify for Medicaid health care coverage and for food assistance from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). [5]

ACCURATE ECONOMIC DATA: The accuracy of economic data provided by the Trump administration has been a matter of concern for months. Cuts to staff at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), a key source of economic data, have hurt the timely production of accurate data. For example, the Consumer Price Index and related data that the BLS produces have included a lot more estimated data than in the past. [6]

When the August 1 jobs report from the BLS showed low job creation for the last three months, Trump falsely claimed that the data had been manipulated to make him look bad. So, Trump fired the Commissioner of Labor Statistics, Dr. Erika McEntarfer. With a Trump replacement, future data from the BLS, which is important to investors and business leaders making decisions about hiring and growth, will be even more suspect that it has been to date.

IMPACT ON STATES’ BUDGETS: Massachusetts Governor, Maura Healey, has introduced legislation to spend $400 million of emergency state funds on research and development. This is an effort to soften the blow of Trump administration cuts of research and development grants. MA state programs have lost $714 million in federal funding already this year and universities and other entities have also lost federal research and development funding. MA receives over $8 billion annually in federal research and development funding, which supports 81,300 jobs and generates $16 billion in ancillary economic activity. In New England, the Trump administration has canceled hundreds of research grants from the National Science Foundation and the Health and Human Services Department totaling over $3 billion. [7]

[1]      Waldman, M., 7/22/25, “Trump defunds effective crime-prevention policies,” Brennan Center for Justice: The Briefing (https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/trump-defunds-effective-crime-prevention-policies”

[2]      Hilliard, J., 7/14/25, “Immigration policy shift threatens Head Start,” The Boston Globe

[3]      Conley, J., 7/23/25, “Nonpartisan watchdog agency finds Trump admin illegally withheld Head Start funds,” Common Dreams (https://www.commondreams.org/news/head-start-trump)

[4]      Cox Richardson, H., 7/15/25, “Letters from an American,” (https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/july-15-2025)

[5]      Johnson, J., 7/20/25, “‘Extra cruel’: Trump admin ends job program for seniors as work requirements loom,” Common Dreams (https://www.commondreams.org/news/senior-job-training-program)

[6]      Cox Richardson, H., 8/1/25, “Letters from an American,” (https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/august-1-2025)

[7]      Gross, S. 8/1/25, “Mass. Research would get $400m,” The Boston Globe

EXAMPLES OF THE HUMAN TOLL OF TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ACTIONS

The Trump administration is making us less safe from disease, violence, and death. Cuts to Medicaid and Medicare will increase deaths. So will weakening gun violence prevention efforts. Finally, the Trump administration’s war on children is harming children and will increase deaths for them too.

The Trump administration is making us all less safe in many ways, including less safe from disease, violence, and death. Cuts to the Medicaid and Medicare health care programs will increase deaths. So will the weakening of gun violence prevention efforts. Finally, the Trump administration is engaged in a war on children that is harming the well-being of children and will increase deaths for them as well.

(Note: If you find a post too long to read, please just skim the bolded portions. Thanks for reading my blog!)

STORY #1: The expansion of Medicaid by the Affordable Care Act (ACA, aka Obama Care) has saved 27,400 lives. The National Bureau of Economic Research recently published an analysis of 37 million Americans since the passage of the ACA in 2010. The low-income adults who got Medicaid coverage under the ACA expansion were 21% less likely to die each year than those who did not have Medicaid coverage. Deaths also fell for 20 and 30-year-olds. Overall, the analysis estimated that 27,400 lives were saved by the Medicaid expansion. This is one of several studies that have found that having Medicaid coverage saves lives. These findings are particularly relevant now, given that the Republican budget just passed by the U.S. House would end Medicaid coverage for roughly eight million people who now have it. [1]

STORY #2: The Republican budget just passed by the U.S. House would increase the deficit so much that it would trigger mandatory spending cuts, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The cuts would include a roughly $50 billion a year reduction in Medicare spending. Explicit cuts to Medicaid (health coverage for low-income Americans including many seniors in nursing homes) are specified in the Republican budget. The cuts to Medicare (health coverage for all seniors) are not explicit in the budget but are forced by the budget’s sizable increase in the annual federal budget deficit. The CBO’s non-partisan analysis estimated that the Republican budget would increase the deficit by about $230 billion a year. Therefore, under the 2010 Pay-As-You-Go Act (PAYGO), the White House Office of Management and Budget would have to reduce spending (i.e., sequester authorized spending) by $230 billion a year. About $50 billion of this would come from cuts to Medicare, according to the CBO. [2]

STORY #3: The Trump administration is weakening multiple facets of gun violence prevention efforts. This makes us all less safe. On day two as President in 2025, Trump closed the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention. Despite Trump’s promises to keep Americans safe and reduce crime, this and other actions that weaken gun violence prevention will do the opposite. The White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, created by President Biden, brought a coordinated, government-wide approach to gun violence prevention for the first time. It coordinated the federal response to mass shootings and community violence. Its cross-agency, public health approach to the uniquely American epidemic of gun violence contributed to a 13.5% decline in the homicide rate in 2023, the largest annual decrease ever. It also contributed to a significant drop in the number of untraceable “ghost” guns, i.e., guns without serial numbers. It worked with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to close down 644 gun dealers who had engaged in illegal sales. [3]

The Trump administration has also:

  • Legalized the sale of devices that convert ordinary guns into automatic weapons, i.e., machine guns,
  • Advocated for a nationwide right to carry a concealed weapon,
  • Cut Centers for Disease Control funding for studying and analyzing gun violence,
  • Promoted policies that would make it easier and more profitable to sell gun silencers, and
  • Facilitated re-licensing of gun dealers who had their licenses revoked for illegal activity.

Three hundred Americans are shot every day on average. Weakening gun violence protection efforts puts the interests and profits of the gun industry above the safety of children and all the rest of us.

STORY #4: The Trump administration is putting children at risk and making them less safe in multiple ways. The risks start at birth and continue through adolescence. The lack of federal regulations and enforcement for the health care of pregnant and post-partem women has led to significant increases in maternal and infant mortality.

The Trump administration has laid off thousands of workers who run programs that help children and their families. They have also cut funding or plan to cut funding for many of these programs. For example, the staffs of programs that help families keep the electricity and heat on have been fired en masse. The staff that provides enforcement for child support payments has been decimated. Funding has been terminated for investigating child sexual abuse, responding to internet crimes against children, preventing youth violence, and following up on reports of missing children. Billions of dollars for school meals and school safety have been suspended or delayed. [4]

Trump wants to eliminate funding for Head Start, which provides hundreds of thousands of low-income children annually with high quality early education along with meals and family support. The federal staff that oversees Head Start programs and processes their federal funding has been decimated, which may force some programs to shut down.

The Trump administration’s cutting of funding for food assistance, gun violence prevention efforts, and the suicide hotline will all disproportionately harm children. It’s ignoring the harm that social media does to children. And last, but by no means least, its targeting of immigrants, who frequently are parents of children (who may well be U.S. citizens) is doing untold and immeasurable harm to children.

[1]      Kliff, S., & Sanger-Katz, M., 5/17/25, “Medicaid expansion saved 27,000 lives, study finds,” The Boston Globe from The New York Times

[2]      Johnson, J., 5/21/25, “‘They’re not just cutting Medicaid’: GOP bill would trigger over $500 billion in Medicare cuts,” Common Dreams (https://www.commondreams.org/news/cuts-to-medicare)

[3]      Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, retrieved from the Internet 5/27/25, “Press releases,” (https://www.bradyunited.org/press)

[4]      Hager, E., 4/23/25, “The Trump administration’s war on children,” ProPublica (https://www.propublica.org/article/how-trump-budget-cuts-harm-kids-child-care-education-abuse)