im so tired so here’s a recap of what trump did today summarized and probably incomplete because we are in super hell:
- End birthright citizenship (a.k.a the 14th amendment)
- Remove the legal existence of non-binary people
- Withdraw from the world health organization
- pardon jan 6 people
- He did sign an executive order saying that children born in the U.S., but to undocumented immigrants, won’t be U.S. citizens. But there’s no way the Supreme Court will stand for ending the 14th amendment via executive order. Even his appointees oppose this.
- An important note nonetheless: The Nazi Party started out by declaring a state of emergency so it could seize dictatorial powers, which he hasn’t done, and by ending birthright citizenship. So that it could strip citizenship from the Jews. This is what you might call a huge red flag – one in a lonnnng line of them.
- He didn’t remove the legal existence of nonbinary people, but he did sign an order saying that “All government agencies will ensure that official documents, including passports, visas and Global Entry cards, must ‘accurately reflect the holder’s sex.’” Which will presumably mean that they don’t allow people to put X for nonbinary.
- And that “departments running federal prisons, migrant shelters, rape shelters and other 'intimate spaces’ will be directed to protect single-sex spaces for privacy.”
- And that federal employee records and federal department messaging will also uphold this.
- The real fuckery here is gonna be in this part: “It is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female. These sexes are not changeable… “Female” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell. “Male” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the small reproductive cell.”
- That may also be its downfall, I suppose. I don’t think it’s possible to say what size reproductive cell someone was fated to produce at conception. This drags it into some wild religious belief territory, for starters.
- Even more likely to become its downfall: the number of people suing because to all intents and purposes, they’re “biologically” men or women, but the federal government is now demanding that they…. Whatever it’s going to demand they do… with the visibly wrong crowd.
- The executive order also says, “Within 30 days of the date of this order, the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall provide to the U.S. Government, external partners, and the public clear guidance expanding on the sex-based definitions set forth in this order.”
- Good fucking luck to THEM.
- This executive order also bans “Federal funds… expended for any medical procedure, treatment, or drug for the purpose of conforming an inmate’s appearance to that of the opposite sex.”
- Which will definitely be yet another series of court cases.
- “Agencies shall effectuate this policy by taking appropriate action to ensure that intimate spaces designated for women, girls, or females (or for men, boys, or males) are designated by sex and not identity.” In practice, unless you change the bathroom signs to say “Small reproductive cell/Large reproductive cell,” people are just going to go on as we all normally do.
- I’m just dying to hear which intersex variations produce which sizes of reproductive cells.
- What about the ones who don’t produce reproductive cells at all?
- “Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect: (i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof” LMAO what.
- TL;DR: He didn’t remove the legal existence of nonbinary people, he removed the legal recognition of nonbinary people, and all other transgender people, by federal agencies.
- A whole lot of shit is run by state, county, and city agencies.
- He did withdraw from the WHO. He did not give any kind of deadline for how long that will take, and the to-do list in the executive order sounds really onerous and detailed and difficult.
“Thanks to decades of strong partnership, the United States of America plays a crucial role in supporting WHO to protect and improve the health of Americans and people around the world. The United States is a strong advocate for global health security. An example is the fight against polio, where the country is a key partner in the WHO-led eradication efforts, which protect Americans and communities worldwide from the resurgence of this preventable disease. In partnership with the United States, WHO is advancing innovation in health surveillance and biolab security to address emerging threats. Through improved monitoring and preparation of responses, WHO and the United States are working together to strengthen global resilience against health and security risks.
- Those are all major bipartisan issues.
- I’m gonna predict he’s going to have massive pushback from Congress on this one.
- And he did pardon everyone involved in Jan 6, and commuted the sentences of the 14 people convicted of seditious conspiracy.
Trump pardons roughly 1,500 criminal defendants charged in the Jan. 6 Capitol attack
At the time Trump issued the pardons, there were about 700 defendants who either never received prison sentences or had already completed their sentences, meaning pardons or commutations would have little practical impact on them, beyond restoring voting rights and gun rights for those who were convicted of felonies.
More than 600 people were sentenced to incarceration, but only a small fraction of them are still behind bars. Many of those who are in the custody of the federal Bureau of Prisons were convicted of violent attacks on police officers protecting the Capitol during an assault in which Jan. 6 defendants were armed with firearms, stun guns, flagpoles, fire extinguishers, bike racks, batons, a metal whip, office furniture, pepper spray, bear spray, a tomahawk ax, a hatchet, a hockey stick, knuckle gloves, a baseball bat, a massive “Trump” billboard, “Trump” flags, a pitchfork, pieces of lumber, crutches and even an explosive device.
More than 140 police officers were injured and several Trump supporters died during the attack, including one who was shot trying to breach the House Speaker’s Lobby and another who died in the middle of a brutal battle at the lower west tunnel, where some of the worst violence of the day took place.…An attorney who worked on Jan. 6 cases as a federal prosecutor told NBC News that it was always possible that Trump would return to power and pardon Capitol riot defendants but that the Justice Department "pressed ahead anyway” because “political considerations should not play any part in the Justice Department’s evaluation of facts and law, which showed that these were crimes — some of them terribly serious crimes — that warranted prosecution.”
The source said that they and, they suspected, many of their colleagues "have no regrets about having pursued these cases” and that the effort remains highly consequential because it created “a definitive, public factual record of what actually transpired” on Jan. 6.
“These cases assured police officers and civilians who were assaulted at the Capitol that there were people, and there was a Department of Justice, who recognized what they endured and sacrificed. These cases led to hundreds of defendants’ acknowledging their crimes by pleading guilty in open court and hundreds of others’ being found guilty at trial,” the source said. “The work is likely be terminated before it can be fully completed, most significantly by the abrupt termination of the special counsel’s work. But the record stands.”As I said elsewhere:
I am begging everyone to stop treating EOs like they are passed laws or judicial decisions. They’re not. The entire point of this is to scare everyone and get them to comply in advance. This is 'Shock and Awe, Executive Order edition.’ Will Congress comply? Maybe. Will the courts bow down to him? Maybe. But don’t act like you assume that they will, don’t obey in anticipation. Make plans to keep yourself safe if Congress does roll over and the courts do just suck up to him, yes, but don’t comply in advance. Fascism expects you to do this.