Donald Trump's presidential win has been a devastating reality for many us, especially Latinos, Muslims, blacks, and women. Many of us not only feel threatened by his discriminating tone and his aggressive supporters, but also fear that his policies could tear apart numerous families and communities throughout the country. The good news is, it looks like Trump is already compromising some of his hard stances, including his mass deportation pledge. Not to say that we can sit back and relax, but if he continues on this path we may be able to take a deep breath on some things. Here are a few changes Trump is already making, along with other policies we still need to look out for!
More from Mamás Latinas: 8 Scary facts about Donald Trump's 100-day plan
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He might not build all along the Mexican border.
Throughout Trump’s long and nauseating campaign, we saw him insist on wanting to build a wall along our Southern border to prevent Mexicans from entering the United States. But in a recent interview with CBS60 Minutes, Trump seemed to be pushing back on his original stance. He told interviewer Lesley Stahl that the barrier might wind up looking more like a fence in certain spots instead. “Certain areas, a wall is more appropriate," he said. "I’m very good at this, it’s called construction.” Let’s cross our fingers he doesn’t get away with building any kind of barrier at all.
He’s no longer deporting undocumented immigrants.
Trump has been saying since the beginning of his campaign his vow to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the states. But during his 60 Minutes interview he said he was “not looking for mass deportations.” He claims that he is only interested in deporting undocumented immigrants who happen to be criminals. “What we are going to do is get the people that are [criminals] and have criminal records, gang members, drug dealers,” he said. “We have a lot of these people. Probably two million, it could be even three million. We are getting them out of our country or we are going to incarcerate.”
He’s not supporting hate crimes.
One of the fears many blacks, Latinos, and Muslims have are that under Donald Trump’s presidency intolerance will become acceptable. That is the message he was sending his supporters throughout his campaigning and we have already seen quite a few hate crimes occur since he stepped into the oval office. “I am so saddened to hear that. And I say, stop it. If it–if it helps, I will say this, and I will say right to the cameras, stop it,” Trump told his supporters after hearing about the hate crimes, racial slurs, and threats Muslims, Latinos, and blacks have received from his supporters after the election. Now let’s pray his supporters actually listen and stop the hate.
He’s not entirely repealing Obamacare.
It looks like Trump is pushing back on his plan to completely repeal President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act. He recently stated that he would consider leaving parts of the health initiative after a meeting he had with Obama at the White House on Thursday. Let’s keep our eyes and ears open and see what happens.
He’s going to stop bullying on Twitter.
Trump has continued tweet rants even after the election. But in an interview with CBS60 Minutes he promised that he would be “very restrained” with how he uses his Twitter moving forward. We’re not holding our breath, but hoping he keeps to his word.
He’s fine with same-sex marriage.
One of the biggest fears a lot of us had is Trump’s presidency posing a threat to the LGBTQ community. But in the 60 Minutes interview, Trump told Lesley Stahl that he is “fine” with same-sex marriage. “It – it’s irrelevant because it was already settled,” he said when asked if he supported gay marriages. “It’s law. It was settled in the Supreme Court. I mean it’s done.” Hopefully that means he’s going to leave it alone and more states will go on board with offering same-sex marriage licenses and rights.
We still need to worry about abortion rights.
Here’s where things get scary. Trump still plans on passing new pro-life abortion laws. This could become a serious threat to women’s reproductive health rights and could wind up overturning Roe Vs. Wade. “Here’s what going to happen,” he told Stahl, “I’m going to – I’m pro life. The judges will be pro-life. Having to do with abortion – if it ever were overturned, it would go back to the states. So it would go back to the states.”
He still doesn’t believe in climate change.
Trump still plans on canceling billions in payments to U.N. climate change programs because he believes global warming is a “hoax.” Instead he wants to use the money to fix America’s water and environmental infrastructure. This is a huge problem and could potentially undo all the climate change efforts that were made during Obama's presidential term.
He still wants to suspend immigration from Muslim nations.
One of the things Trump still wants to do during his first 100 days in office is suspend immigration from “terror-prone regions,” otherwise known as Muslim nations. This would be considered unconstitutional and would stir a lot of discrimination, hate crimes, and violence towards the Muslim American community.
He just appointed Stephen Bannon as chief White House strategist.
Trump’s decision to appoint Stephen Bannon, former CEO and chairman of Breitbart News, as his chief strategist and senior counselor in the White House is causing a lot of controversy because of his close associations with the “alt-right” movement. The “alt-right” movement is a fringe conservative movement that supports racially insensitive rhetoric and white nationalism. There is a Change.org petition that has been created to take him out of the White House.
