Caution: Autocracy Ahead

In February of 2017, Steve Bannon, then Trump administration mastermind, spoke at CPAC about how the policies of Donald Trump would become a "deconstruction of the administrative state."  At the time, many observers believed he meant that the Trump administration would seek to change taxes, trade pacts and regulations in order to reduce the size of government and positively impact the economy and America's growth.

However, Americans who have been following political news since that time should by now realize that Trump and his administration have amplified Bannon's statements to also mean strengthening and widening executive branch authority and tearing away at the balance of power between the branches of government.

We are now seeing what the founding fathers could never have imagined.  The office of the President of the United States has always had great authority and power, but there were limitations on that power.  Trump has seized power that was never intended by the founding fathers.

During Trump's first term he has been able to replace administration officials that many thought would keep him in line.  Anyone in his administration who would not comply with or simply spoke out against Trump's actions, especially when those actions were illegal or Constitutionally subversive, was fired.  Any Justice Department official who was investigating him was fired or publicly humiliated by Trump.  Trump replaced those officials with people who would be subservient and loyal to him and not to the Constitution of the United States or any oath they took for office.

In order to gain complete control of government so that no other branch has authority over him, Trump would need to have the cooperation of the Congress, cooperation of the Justice Department  and a Judicial branch that would favor his policies without question.  Trump is testing those waters now.

When he fired Jeff Sessions as Attorney General, Trump himself took the first step in creating his autocracy by hiring William Barr.   Trump knew that Barr would be loyal to him and not the Constitution since he had written a memo in June of 2018, that some saw as a resume letter for the job of Attorney General.  The letter showed he believed Trump could not be guilty of obstruction of justice.  Barr had been known to be a proponent of the unitary executive theory ascribing to a nearly unhampered presidential authority.

Barr had criticized the Mueller report before taking office. While Attorney General, he summarized it publicly before the report was made available.  Barr's summary indicated that the Mueller report was a complete exoneration of Donald Trump.  It was not.

The investigation of the Mueller investigators requested by Trump showed no evidence that there was political bias against Trump, but Barr publicly stated that he did not believe his Inspector General.  Barr was born to be Trump's second Roy Cohn and the person most likely to create an American dictator.  With Barr at his side, Trump has complete control over the Justice Department.

Trump and his Republican cronies in Congress have already shown that they band together like a criminal organization where loyalty to the leader means more to them than loyalty to the nation.  We know that the GOP meets with Trump to corroborate policies with him.  They are in lock-step with Trump.  The GOP has given up their Congressional power in this submission to Trump.  To them, violating their oaths of office and the Constitution of the United States means nothing.

In allowing Trump to trample on the Constitution without rebuke, the Republican party has taken the second step into making Trump an autocrat.  As long as Senate Republicans do not vote with the Democrats, Trump will not be removed from office.  That is a priority in becoming a dictator.  You must first be the President.  Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, has publicly stated that he will not be an impartial juror and will be coordinating with the White House lawyers during any Senate impeachment trial.  McConnell has also stated that he does not want any witnesses to appear.  McConnell has said that Trump will never be removed from office, effectively admitting that the GOP will run a scam trial in order to acquit Trump.

The third step in becoming an autocrat is getting a docile and cooperative Judicial branch.  Under Mitch McConnell, this began many years ago.  The Republican party has been working diligently on the lifetime appointments of many conservative judges.  More conservative judges have been appointed during Trump's term than ever before.  With the GOP giving up their power to Trump, the judicial branch of Republican judges should fall in line with the needs of the party on substantial issues.

McConnell had prevented Obama from appointing a Supreme Court judge for two years of his Presidency in hopes that a Republican would become the next President to appoint another Supreme Court conservative judge.  That is exactly what happened.  Judgeships are important to the Republican party and a key element in giving Donald J. Trump autocratic rule.  But cooperating with the Judicial branch is not really very important to Donald Trump.  White House officials have reported that Trump has already questioned the need for judges, signaling an end to the judiciary if he becomes the first United States dictator.

So all of the steps are in motion.  Without some other intervening force, it seems very likely that Donald Trump will become the first United States dictator.  Some readers may think this is impossible, but isn't it strange that Donald Trump has not been stopped yet?  His plan is clear.  His violations of Constitutional law are obvious.  His mental state is questionable and many experts have stated that he is a danger to the security of America.  Trump has been continuously assaulting American democracy since he was elected.  This assault has not been prevented and appears will be encouraged by the Republican party.  In a real democracy where there is a respect for the constitution and checks and balances, he would have been stopped long ago.  Those checks and balances are no longer effective.  Not much else is in his way.

Don't count on the American voter to remove Trump.  If Trump is not removed from office, he will advertise it as complete exoneration.  He is guilty of asking a foreign nation to interfere in an American election for his personal advantage.  Knowing he can get away with it will inspire more of the same with other countries.  We may have many foreign nations interfering in our elections.   Who can tell if the vote tallies will be affected?

Don't count on the military to remove Trump.  The President of the United States is the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces.  They won't be able to help.

In a world where the President has unlimited power and malignant narcissism, expect the worst.  My guess is that Trump will establish himself and family as the present and future rulers of America for the rest of our lifetimes.  Why should he stop at himself being the dictator when he could have his family rule as American royalty for as long as Trumps exist.

Am I being too unrealistic and negative?  I don't think so.  I think Trump is totally capable of making a monarchy out of American democracy.

Who's going to stop him?

Trump's Acquittal is not Guaranteed

Partners in Crime

Today, America witnessed the start of the early proceedings to prepare the Senate for the impeachment trial of Donald John Trump, current President of the united States.

But before those proceedings, we heard from the Government Accountability Office.  The GAO has announced that Trump and the Budget Office did in fact break the law when Trump ordered that money approved by Congress to be released to Ukraine, was withheld.

Before that, Lev Parnas, an associate on team Trump, who was tasked along with Rudy Giuliani and others, to coerce Ukrainian President Zelinsky, to announce an investigation into the Biden's, was interviewed on the Rachael Maddow show.

Parnas admitted that Donald J. Trump directed and knew everything about this plot.  Parnas reported that Trump's purpose was to gain political advantage over Joe Biden in the upcoming 2020 election.  There were many pieces to accomplish this plot, including releasing Ukrainian oligarch Dimitry Firtash from DOJ prosecution in a legal case he was involved in, in exchange for announcing information that would be detrimental to the Mueller investigation.

Parnas says that William Barr knew of the plot to release Firtash and was part of the team working for Trump.  The Justice Department has denied any truth to those statements.  Two colluding fox news TV lawyers (Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing) would become Firtash's lawyers and Parnas would broker them.  All of this was to help ensure that the Ukrainians would make the announcement of the Biden investigation.  Back at home, Trump had others at Fox news promoting his conspiracy theories about Joe Biden's son Hunter, to keep the Republican base focused on defending their leader.

It seems appropriate that there should be an investigation into the actions of William Barr, Devin Nunes and others in the administration who colluded in this plot.  If justice is done, we should see additional impeachments or incarceration against others in the Trump circle.

It is hard to believe that the start of the Senate impeachment proceeding would be preempted by such relevant news directly related to the guilt of Donald J. Trump, but this is Trump's America where a mad man rules.  You can expect the worst when a malignant narcissist has the keys to the country.

Meanwhile, back to the impeachment trial.

Chief Justice John Roberts was sworn in by Chuck Grassley, to do impartial justice according to the Constitution and the law.  Roberts gave the oath to swear in to all Senators, also to do impartial justice according to the Constitution and the law.  Each Senator was called up to sign the document of their oath.

Remember that McConnell and Graham have already publicly declared that they would be traitors to the Constitution and not be impartial jurors.  They also already predetermined and announced that Trump would be acquitted in a rapid trial with no witnesses.

I wonder how many of the GOP sycophants in the Senate were feeling a little differently about how their vote would go, being that they had just made a promise to the American people to be impartial.  This was the quietest and most solemn period I have ever seen in the Senate.

We shall see what GOP Senators will do in the coming days.  They should be re-evaluating their intentions given the additional information that has come out recently.  More incriminating evidence is sure to come out before the Senate trial begins.

The Senate is expected to begin their trial in earnest on Tuesday of next week, January 21, 2020, although additional findings and Trump's travels may delay it.

Trump's Soleimani Secrets

Qasem Soleimani

If you didn't know Donald Trump was a compulsive liar, then you probably will believe the lies he has been telling about the killing of the Iranian Quds Force commander, Qasem Soleimani.  

Trump has been telling America that Soleimani was planning an imminent attack on four American embassies.  Trump says Solemani's death stopped those attacks and saved American lives.  In order for Trump to take military action without the approval of Congress, it would require an imminent threat to American lives.  Without the urgency of an imminent attack, Trump would be abusing his Presidential authority and guilty once again of violating the American Constitution.

But now defense secretary Mark Esper has admitted that there was no intelligence that discussed any immediate threat especially to American embassies.  Esper indicated that he shared Trump's opinion, but it was only a personal opinion and not based on any information from the American intelligence community.  He also said that the gang of eight had been told about the imminent threat.

Adam Schiff, who is chair of the House Intelligence Committee and a member of the gang of eight, who are privy to highly classified information, indicated that there was no such intelligence shared with the gang of eight members.

The original story Trump put out to the public was a lie.  

NBC news has reported that Trump, at the insistence of Pompeo and Bolton, authorized the killing of Soleimani months ago but he required final sign-off and only if Iran killed an American.  When a US contractor was killed in Iraq by Iranian proxies, killing Soleimani then qualified as an option for the US to counter the attack.  But the US intelligence agencies indicated that Iran did not intend to escalate, but just keep pressure on the United States.  The intelligence did not support the idea of an imminent threat to other Americans.

After the contractor was killed, Trump ordered strikes that killed dozens of Iran-backed militia members, which led to protesters attack on the Baghdad embassy.  This is when Trump decided to order the killing of Soleimani.  There was no imminent threat.

One of Trump's greatest lies is that he is a stable genius.  In this case as in so many others with this President, Trump's malignant narcissism prevents him from taking the appropriate actions and allows him to carry out actions that support his alternative view of reality.  

We have a mad man running the United States who has been given permission by his party to mold America into the newest Western dictatorship.  If Republicans in Congress won't agree to remove him, then he must be removed from office by American voters before he can accomplish his sinister goal.

Trump's Legal Defense Team

Besides the Senate Republicans, Trump has defense lawyers defending him in the Senate impeachment trial.  By now the public has become familiar with Trump's peculiar choices in defense attorneys.  A quick synopsis of some of them and their connection to Trump follows.

Pat Cipollone served as assistant to Attorney General William Barr from 1992 to 1993.  In private life, Trump was a client of Cipollone.  Cipollone succeeded Don McGahn who departed (was fired) after he refused to fire Mueller as Trump requested him to do.  Cipollone has been the voice of opposition to the Trump investigations and established the obstruction posture regarding the impeachment demands of Congress.

Jay Sekulow has a history of making millions of dollars from businesses and charity organizations that he created with himself and his family members as owners.  The Guardian reported that documents they obtained showed that attorneys general in New York and North Carolina had opened investigations into one of Sekulow's charities for pressure tactics on donors and misdirecting money to him and his family.  Michael Cohen testified that Sekulow and other Trump attorneys made changes to his false statements about the length of time the Trump Tower project in Russia was ongoing.  Cohen testified that it was Sekulow who instructed him to lie to Congress and testify falsely about the duration of the project.

Ken Starr is best known for heading investigations into the Clinton administration known as "Whitewater."  He was initially appointed by the Bush administration to investigate the death of Vince Foster and investments in Whitewater real estate by Bill Clinton.  This was later expanded into investigating Bill Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky.  After four years of investigations, he released the Starr report, which stated that Clinton lied about his affair in a sworn deposition.  This led to the Clinton impeachment.  He was fired as president of Baylor University because he mishandled several sexual assaults there.

Alan Dershowitz has been involved in several high profile legal cases.  He is probably best known for his part as an attorney for O.J. Simpson during his murder trial.  He has handled celebrity cases for Mike Tyson, Patty Hearst and Jim Bakker.  He won an appeal for Claus von Bulow and defended Jeffrey Epstein as well being a consultant for the legal team defending Harvey Weinstein.  Dershowitz stated that he will take a minor role in the defense of Trump, speaking only to the constitutional aspects of impeachment.

Robert Ray has been the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York and was the successor to Ken Starr as the Independent Council when he investigated and issued final reports on the Whitewater investigation and other controversies.

Pam Bondi is a former Florida Attorney General.  Bondi was the lead attorney general in the unsuccessful lawsuit intended to overturn the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.  She argued that the individual mandate provision of the Act was unconstitutional.  Bondi joined with nineteen other Republican run states to allow insurance companies to charge people with pre-existing conditions more for insurance or to deny them coverage.  While Bondi was still attorney general, she hosted Fox news shows and appeared on the Sean Hannity show.  While Bondi was Florida attorney general, she first claimed to be joining a New York suit against Donald Trump for tax fraud in regard to the Trump University scandal.  When a few days later, she received a $25,000 contribution from the Donald J Trump Foundation, she decided to drop out of the fraud case against Trump.  In 2016, Bondi appeared at the Republican Convention where she led cheers of "lock her up" against Hillary Clinton.  In 2019 she was hired by Ballad Partners, a firm with close ties to Trump.  She also began working as a lobbyist for Qatar.  She was hired by the Trump administration to help with messaging during Trump's impeachment.

Jane Raskin is a Florida lawyer who represented Trump during the Mueller investigations.  Resistance to Mueller's requests for interviews came from Raskin and her husband, also a lawyer on Trump's Mueller defense team.

Senate Scam Impeachment Trial

Enemy of Justice

Nancy Pelosi will be passing the impeachment articles on to the Senate the week of January 13th.  Shortly after that, Mitch McConnell will begin the Senate trial to decide the status of Trump's presidency.  

The fate of our Democratic Republic depends on the outcome of the Senate impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump. 

Senator McConnell said that he will not be an impartial juror and will coordinate every step of the Senate trial with the White House and Trump.  Before the Senate trial even starts, Mitch McConnell, has publicly stated that Donald J. Trump will be acquitted and not be removed from office.

 McConnell says this, not because he believes Trump is innocent, but because he and the GOP Senators are rigging the trial to allow a guilty President to go unpunished and continue his abuse of power.  The GOP will ignore their oath of office and the oath they will take before the trial to be impartial jurors.  If there could be a definition of a treasonous party without there being a war, the GOP would exemplify it.

The prosecutors of the Senate trial are the House members who are chosen as "case managers."  At this time it is unclear who these people will be, but it is fairly certain that  Adam Schiff, House Intelligence Committee chair and Jerry Nadler, Judiciary Committee chair will be among them.   

Besides every Republican member of the Senate, Trump will have White House lawyers defending him.  There is rumor that Alan Dershowitz may also be on Trump's legal team.

It's possible that the Republicans may vote to dismiss the impeachment even before a trial commences.  In the case of a Senate impeachment trial, only a simple majority would be needed to eliminate the impeachment proceedings.  Although the expected outcome of dismissal would be the same as a scam trial, it may be too arrogant or at least unwise for the GOP to eliminate the trial altogether.  There is the smallest chance that a few Republicans would vote against dismissing. With a dismissal, Republicans would not have a chance to cloud the issue of Trump's guilt and help him appear innocent to confuse American voters.

As the trial starts, the Senate's sergeant-at-arms will proclaim that all persons are to remain silent, on pain of imprisonment, while the House is exhibiting to the Senate the articles of impeachment. 

The trial will be overseen by Chief Justice John Roberts.  With the Republicans so openly partisan and standing steadfastly by their guilty president, John Roberts' role may be moot.  The Chief Justice will be able to rule on questions about evidence, however, his decision can be overridden by a simple majority vote in the Senate.  Unless the Democrats can convince four or more Republican Senators to vote with them, it is likely that all votes will follow the Republican game plan and favor Trump.  

McConnell said that he does not want any witnesses to be heard, however, Republican Senator Susan Collins has publicly announced that she is working with a small contingent of Republicans to ensure that witnesses can be heard.  Based on Collins' previous actions it is fairly certain that she will walk back those words if a vote on witnesses is required, but we shall see.

It would take a super majority of sixty-seven votes to convict and remove Donald Trump from office. Anything short of that leads to an acquittal.  That verdict would be final and no appeals would be allowed.

The outcome is certain.  Donald Trump will be allowed to continue his pursuit of the destruction of our Constitution and democratic republic.  

Perhaps the GOP believes Donald Trump will support their re-election, helping to maintain their Republican Senate majority.  But they miss the most important point.  Trump is guilty of violating our Constitution and is abusing Presidential power.  The GOP has lost its sense of justice and its ability to do what is right for the country.  Some could argue that the GOP lost those things many years ago, but it has become worse with Trump.  

The best result of the trial we could expect is that it could generate significant controversy around the actions of the GOP in excusing Trump's violation of our Constitution.  It may lead to more active participation by more Americans in peaceful demonstrations against autocracy.  It may cause more Americans to vote against the GOP and Donald Trump in upcoming elections. Let's hope the GOP loses their Senate majority and loses the Presidency in 2020.

The GOP will regret the day that they helped create the first American dictator. 

How Trump's "Accomplishments" hurt Americans

President Donald (mocking J) Trump

Republican media has stated that many more evangelicals will vote for Donald Trump in the 2020 election compared to 2016 because now they have seen all the things he has accomplished.

Since this is such a general statement of unproven fact, we thought it would make sense to review those things that the Trump Presidency has done for you.

The Trump Administration has published a list that it considers accomplishments of Donald Trump. They range from taking credit for 400,000 manufacturing jobs being created in three years to eliminating regulations. The complete list is found at http://whitehouse.gov/trump-administration-accomplishments/.

In order to discuss how these "accomplishments" really hurt average Americans, I have grouped them into categories as follows:

1. Job related
2. Regulation related
3. Tax cut related
4. Health related
5. Energy related
6. Armed forces related
7. Judiciary related
8. Export/Import related
9. Immigration related

Job related accomplishments
Trump is taking credit for the growth in jobs, which amounted to 4,000,000 jobs since his election. Based on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, jobs since the recovery from the "great recession" of 2007, have been maintaining the same rate of growth. This growth rate was started due to the economic successes of the Obama administration in dealing with the greatest financial crisis since the great depression. The most Trump should take credit for related to job growth is that he hasn't yet had a downturn in job growth rate during his first term. 

Regulation related
Trump boasts that he has made it easier for businesses by reducing regulations. What he doesn't admit is that in many cases, those regulations were created to protect the environment and the Americans that must live in it. The Trump administration has reversed or is in process of reversing a total of ninety-five environmental regulations on pollution, toxic substances and safety and water purity. In many cases, this was done in an underhanded manner where the administration failed to provide a legal argument for the changes and skipped steps in the process such as notifying the public and asking for public comment. It has been estimated by the New York University Law School's State Energy and Environmental Impact Center that the increase in greenhouse gases and emissions from these regulation changes alone could lead to thousands of unnecessary deaths every year from air pollution and many more from the eventual damage to the earth through climate change.
One can read the details of some of these and other reversed regulations on the Brookings Institute site. Reviewing these regulation reversals makes it seem Trump thinks making America great again includes returning to a time when pollution was rampant. It also shows that he honors oil and gas company lobbyists much more than he values life.

Tax cut related
Trump is very proud of his tax cut program. He boasts that it is the biggest tax cut in history. But when one takes a closer look into the bill, one can understand why most Democrats view it as a tax scam. Briefly, the tax cuts created will deliver over $1.7 trillion dollars to the ultra rich in the next ten years. That is a very small percentage of Americans with income in the millions of dollars. The bill is written so that it continues indefinitely for the ultra rich, but will stop it's small benefit to the rest of us in 2025. It has been estimated that nearly 87% of all benefits of the tax scam bill go to the ultra-rich and Corporate America.

Additionally, the GOP tax scam bill will increase the United States deficit by trillions of dollars. This plays perfectly into GOP leadership hands as they will now have a reason for reducing Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and the social safety net in the near future. If Republicans become the majority in Congress and Trump wins re-election you can be assured that they will not care about anyone who needs those services, including their own base.

Health related
Trump says his administration has "reformed" Medicare by stopping hospitals from overcharging low-income seniors for drugs. He claims his administration has provided more healthcare options. He takes credit for the FDA approving more lower cost generic drugs. 

Donald Trump and the GOP currently have lawyers pursuing ending the Affordable Care Act in the courts. They have also taken steps to help destroy the act by passing legislation designed to defund the act. They have passed legislation tied to the tax scam act that removed the individual mandate, which will cause more of a financial burden on the implementation of the act. Trump and the GOP almost destroyed the Affordable Care Act in 2017 before Senator McCain voted to stop their plans. At every turn, the GOP have tried to take away the benefit that the ACA has provided to so many people who have not had health insurance before. The plans that Trump would prefer are those that give the upper hand to the insurance companies. The GOP wants you to have a full compliment of insurance plans that can reject covering you for certain diseases, drop you from their plans at will, charge you rediculously high deductibles and not cover your pre-existing conditions.

Energy related
Trump celebrates and takes credit for the coal, oil and gas industries accomplishments. They have increased coal exports and reached record high oil production recently. Natural gas is exported now from the United States. These environmentally hazardous industries are big donors to the Trump campaign, so Trump must do his best to keep them profitable. Trump refers proudly to exiting from the "illegal" clean power plan. Investing in developing sources of clean energy is seen as a threat to the fossil fuel industry, so Trump and the GOP will vote clean energy down. Trump lists withdrawing from the "job-killing" Paris Climate Accord as an accomplishment.
Trump and the GOP are not interested in the health of individual Americans nor are they interested in saving the earth from climate change. If the GOP as a group shows people they are not valued, that is a good reason to remove yourself from the party.

Armed Forces related
Trump considers record making budgets for the military an accomplishment. He sees forcing NATO allies into an uncomfortable position to get them to donate more to NATO as a good thing. He considers his "guns in space" Space Force idea, brilliant. He is taking credit for violating the Iran Nuclear deal.

Unless Trump is planning on starting World War III, there is no reason for the United States to fund our military with more money than the combined total amount of the next 10 largest military countries in the world. When the GOP thinks about the deficit, instead of thinking about reducing the social safety net, perhaps they should start with reducing the military budget and giving back the tax scam money.

Trump has turned America into a fair weather friend insofar as our NATO allies are concerned. Because of Trump's poor treatment of our NATO allies, Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, has said that Europe can no longer depend on America. The world is less secure with Donald Trump as the American President.

Because Trump withdrew from the Iran deal, we are today in a much less secure world. The middle east is now more destabilized because of Trump's actions regarding Iran and his decision to violate the Iranian deal.

Judiciary related
Trump takes credit for confirming more conservative judges than any other Republican president. He is happy to acknowledge that he selected two Supreme Court judges.

Mitch McConnell deserves much of the credit that Trump takes for judge confirmations. McConnell changed the rules for confirming judges, so that only a simple majority vote (fifty-one votes) was required instead of 2/3 majority. This may have lead to the appointment and confirmation of many unqualified judges. The American Bar Association has given a "Not Qualified" rating to many of the judges the GOP has confirmed.

For two years, Mitch McConnell held up a Supreme Court judgeship that was legally President Obama's to appoint. As a result Trump was able to appoint a conservative judge to the Supreme Court. With such trickery going on for appointment of unqualified judges, there really is nothing for Trump to be proud of.

Export/Import related
Trump sees removing the United States from the NAFTA agreement as an accomplishment. It was really a deal that did not need to be redone. He is replacing the NAFTA agreement with a USMCA agreement between the United States, Mexico and Canada. Thanks to the Democrats, the USMCA agreement is better than the original agreement designed by Trump and the GOP. It is currently being held up by Mexico who does not agree with provisions for the United States to inspect Mexican manufacturing sites.

The riskier side of the equation that Trump is toying with includes the negative effect on consumer incomes that has been caused by his questionable tariff program. Tariffs increase cost of goods to consumers and the companies that must use the imported goods in their manufacturing processes. Trump has placed tariffs on steel, aluminum, and various products from China. We have seen that farmers have been affected so badly by Trump's tariffs, that they have had to be reimbursed for $billions in losses. All of this has a negative impact on the economy as a whole.

Immigration related
Trump claims that a travel ban against certain Islamic nations is an accomplishment. He claims that improved vetting and screening of refugees and switching to overseas settlement is an accomplishment. He claims he has begun building the Southern border wall which he thinks all Republicans want.

Trump and his administration have removed children seeking refuge in the United States from their parents permanently. This inhumanity to fellow humans is criminal. In the meantime, people entering the United States from airports, or docks or any other border crossing are allowed in without problem. Even people seeking legal refuge from the Southern border are being denied entry.
Trump touts his wall while he takes land by eminent domain from his base at the border. 

Other issues
Let's not forget that Trump has been impeached. There is a continuous flow of information that is proving Trump is violating the Constitution and should be removed from office. In allowing Trump to act against the Constitution without rebuke, the GOP is complicit. Mitch McConnell has stated he will coordinate with the White House lawyers and will not remove Donald Trump from office. That should be all you need to know about Trump and the GOP. None of them deserve to govern. 

The lesson is that you must investigate the claims that Trump and the GOP make. The underlying philosophy of the party is that big donors are their primary concern. The average American can only help them get elected and so their promises during campaigns and their claims while in the majority are usually lies designed to convince the electorate that GOP policies will benefit them. Once they are elected, the legislation they support only caters to their corporate donors. Average Americans are ignored and as shown here, may suffer or at least lose benefits from GOP policies once they are in office. 

Be smart and don't vote for a party that doesn't really care about you.