With President Trump running for re-election next year in 2020, it makes you wonder whether or not he will serve for one more term as president of the United States. Currently, Donald Trump stands as a fan favorite with an approval rating of forty-four percent and a predicted chance of winning re-election at a staggering seventy percent. In fact, Trump’s approval rating has only continued to climb within the last month as the economy has improved under his presidency. However, even with this in mind, if President Trump’s approval rating were to just drop to around forty percent over the course of the next few months then the likelihood of him winning the next election will become a toss-up. According to an article titled Trump will be ‘very tough to beat’ in 2020 if he gets three things right written by Yen Nee Lee of CNBC, there are three things Donald Trump needs to secure the election: the economy to continue to grow, the border security strategy to continue to gain support, and his foreign policies to show progress. The only factor within this prediction that is actually showing some progress is the U.S economy.

The current economy, under the direction of President Trump, is in fact, performing fairly well compared to how it was in the early 2000s. The current unemployment rate in the United States has reached a record low of 3.9 percent and currently there are more jobs available than the number of citizens seeking employment. In fact, a Gallup Poll was created in which people were asked whether or not seeking a job of high-quality was a possibility in our current climate. From this poll they found very interesting results. Under Trump’s Presidency, sixty-five percent of Americans think that finding a high quality job in our current climate is a good idea. This is the highest percentage that this poll has ever recorded for this question which really goes to show that, in the realm of economics, Trump’s Presidency has had some benefits.

President Trump’s plan to build a wall over the southern border of the United States has caused immense controversy across the nation since it’s proposal in the 2016 election. This wall has been so controversial mainly because many Americans are not willing to fund a wall that will cost over 5.6 billion dollars and that is not guaranteed to fully solve the current problem of illegal immigration in America. In an article titled Poll: Americans are becoming more polarized on the border wall written by Tara Golshan of Vox, it was found that the number of Republicans in support of the wall had gone up from seventy-two percent to an impressive eighty-two percent just within the past year. However, an opposite trend was seen amongst Democrats in the United States. It was found that, over the past year, Democrat support for the wall had begun at thirteen percent at the beginning of last year and has decreased substantially to a mere six percent. I attribute the support for the wall amongst members of the Republican Party to the ongoing persistence of President Trump’s to get the wall built in order to fulfill one of his main campaign promises. Overall, forty-two percent of Americans as of today support the idea of building a wall across the southern border. This is actually not that bad given he has gotten almost half of the United States to agree with this portion of his campaign more than anything else.

The way in which President Trump conducts as well as enforces foreign policy has certainly been one of the weakest features of his presidency. In fact, many Americans also strongly agree that Trump’s ability to conduct foreign policy is poor. According to an article titled A majority of Americans disapprove of Trump’s foreign Policy by Jen Kirby of Vox, a poll was taken in which sixty-three percent of Americans disapproved of the way in which President Trump was handling foreign policy. This can be attributed to how aggressive Trump’s rhetoric has been to foreign leaders over the course of his presidency and how this rhetoric has negatively impacted the perception of the United States on a global scale as a whole.

Even with the predicted odds of re-election for President Trump at seventy percent, he will still certainly have his work cut out for him. Competition for President Trump in the 2020 election includes New Jersey senator Cory Booker, Former Texas House of Representative Beto O’Rourke, politician John Delaney, and former rival Bernie Sanders. However, even with these strong competitors up to take his place, President Trump will most likely prevail and win the 2020 election. With the strength of the economy increasing as well as support for the wall gaining more momentum each day, President Trump may actually have this upcoming election in the bag.  

Links:

Trump’s Chances in 2020 Are Better Than You Think

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-should-have-a-70-percent-chance-of-winning-in-2020

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/26/trumps-chances-in-2020-us-presidential-election-anthony-scaramucci.html

https://www.vox.com/2019/1/16/18184442/poll-shutdown-border-wall-trump

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/support-for-trumps-wall-reaches-all-time-high-poll

https://www.vox.com/world/2019/1/28/18200489/trump-foreign-policy-poll-russia-north-korea

Actor Jussie Smollett, who plays a homosexual character on Fox’s hit tv show Empire and who is also homosexual in real-life, has been charged by the Chicago Police Department with filing a false police report and staging a hate crime. In Smollett’s account of the attack, two white men wearing Make America Great Again hats had jumped him right outside his apartment building in Chicago on January 29, 2019. In this alleged attack, Smollett was beaten to the ground, a noose was wrapped around his neck, he was doused in bleach, and as the perpetrators had left the scene they yelled: “ This is MAGA country”. During this whole entire attack, Smollett managed to stay on the phone with his manager, therefore, his manager was able to hear the attack as it unfolded. This violent assault, according to Smollett, only lasted about thirty seconds. He then continued by calling the police, however, this was after forty-five minutes had already passed since the attack had occurred. When he was found by Chicago police, the noose was still wrapped tightly around his neck, his face was slightly bruised, and there were visible scratch marks under his eyes. The Chicago Police Department, from what Smollett had told them about the attack, were able to label the attack on Empire actor, Jussie Smollett, a hate crime. Unfortunately for Smollett, no surveillance footage was captured from the attack as the only camera on the premises was facing and recording in the opposite direction of where the violent attack had occurred.

However, surveillance footage was able to capture two men walking towards the scene of the crime from a camera attached to a post on a neighboring street. These two unidentified men in the footage soon became persons of interest in the Chicago’s Police Department’s investigation of the alleged attack on actor Jussie Smollett.

Smollett then took this opportunity of fame to follow through on his scheduled show in Los Angeles after spending almost three and a half days in the hospital. At this performance, he pronounced himself as being the “Gay Tupac” of the new generation. He then followed up by telling the audience what had occurred during the attack and then aggressively yelled, into a crowd of over five hundred people, that he “fought the f*ck back”. The crowd responded by praising Smollett for his bravery. At this very moment, he was considered a survivor of a hate crime rather than a victim of one.

This attack put a huge spotlight on President Trump as it was alleged to be carried out by Trump supporters. This attack according to Smollett was believed to be politically motivated and a byproduct of President Trump’s controversial rhetoric and hate speech. As a result, many political figures such as Congresswoman Maxine Waters and the cast members of the show such as Taraji P. Henson and Terrence Howard took to social media to show immense support for Smollett and shame President Donald Trump.

Within the next few days, Smollett appeared on Good Morning America and sat down with reporter Robin Roberts to tell his story. He delivered a very heartfelt account of the story and when asked by Roberts if the story was fabricated, in the midst of suspicions that the story was fake, Jussie simply replied by saying, “Why would I lie about something like this?” After this segment aired, police began digging deeper into Smollett’s story and began to find inconsistencies as well as fallacies within his account of the alleged attack.

After an immense investigation into Smollett’s story, the Chicago Police Department discovered that the two men Smollett identified as his attackers were not whom they seemed to be. These two gentlemen were not white like Smollett described them to be in his police report and where, in fact, his friends whom he had worked with in the past on the set of Empire. It was found that these two men were also given $3500 in the form of a check by Smollet for their participation in this staged hate crime. In addition, the police even found a letter that had been sent to Smollett a week before with a picture of a black stick figure with a noose around their neck with racist hate speech printed on the front of it. When police went to investigate Smollett’s home, however, they found cutouts of this letter on his living room floor. This only made Smollett’s story even harder to believe. Days later Smollett was arrested and brought up on charges by the Chicago Police Department for filing a false police report and orchestrating a hate crime on himself.

After Jussie Smollett was charged with orchestrating a hate crime that resulted in causing mass hysteria across the United States, President Trump took to Twitter to say “ What about MAGA and the tens of millions of people you insulted with your racist and dangerous comments!?” This was President Trump’s way to fire back at Smollet for his prior hurtful comments about Trump’s presidency and the way he conducted his presidential campaign. President Trump was certainly not pleased with Smollett’s actions as others who are close to and who support Smollett also felt the same way. Currently, as of today, Smollett is free on bond and is awaiting his next court date set for March 14, 2019.

Links :

https://www.gq.com/story/jussie-smollett-story-timeline

https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2019/02/21/jussie-smollett-charged-felony-staged-attack-to-promote-career-police-say/2936589002/

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/02/jussie-smollett-good-morning-america-interview

It’s been close to five years since the news story broke about the water crisis in Flint, Michigan. Back in 2014, the city of Flint chose to change their main water supply from the water of Lake Huron and The Detroit River to the lead-infested waters of the Flint River. This transition was all in efforts to save money for the city of Flint in order to rebuild the infrastructure of the pipes connecting both Lake Huron and the Detroit River to the city of Flint, Michigan. People in Flint were told by numerous political figures such as the former mayor of Flint, Dayne Walling, that the water within the Flint River was safe to drink. They even continued by providing skewed data and flawed statistics about the status of water in the Flint River.

After the water had been approved as safe to drink, residents soon began complaining about the strange color and sewer like smell emitting from the water. Many described its physical appearance as being similar to that of urine and emitting a smell similar to that of a sewer.

In 2015, the water supply was changed back its original water supply from Lake Huron but unfortunately, it was too late. As a result of the Flint water crisis, over 100,000 citizens in Flint were affected. The largest population affected by this crisis were children and pregnant women.

As data on pregnant women in Flint, Michigan shows, the water in Flint has led to a drop in healthy pregnancies and has lead to an increase in fetal deaths and miscarriages says Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post in his article titled Flint’s lead-poisoned water had a horrifyingly large’ effect on fetal deaths, study finds. Women who were contaminated by this lead infested water now have a lower chance of having healthy pregnancies. In addition, medical professionals in Flint have found a large amount of the lead within the blood of their pediatric patients along with cases of patients contracting Legionnaires’ disease. This disease, which occurs as a result of inhalation of bacteria into the lungs, claimed the lives of twelve individuals in Flint and hospitalized almost eighty-seven. Legionnaires’ Disease occurs due to low levels of chlorine in water and higher levels of bacteria within it. The symptoms that this disease presents are similar to that of ammonia and are fortunately not contagious.

Since death can be a result and one risks contracting Legionnaires’ Disease by drinking the contaminated water, so many people have taken safety precautions when it has come to their drinking water. This is a reason why many people in Flint have chosen to drink bottled water instead. Many people have even taken further precaution by bathing, cooking, and even washing their clothes by hand with bottled water just to make sure they do not contract diseases such as this one. Life since this crisis has changed the lives of many across America and has been marked one of the worst water crises in American History. The sad part about this whole thing is that many people in the city of Flint are lower class minorities who are impoverished and do not have the means to relocate. This is why asking the question of “Why don’t people just leave Flint” can be very inconsiderate as some of these individuals have no other choice. However, the bigger question is: “Who is to Blame for all this?”.

The attorney general of Michigan, Bill Schuette, in 2016 looked to further investigate this issue. He wanted to put those behind this crisis behind bars and help those affected by it find some form of justice. This investigation has sadly led nowhere, and as of 2019. The fifteen individuals who were accused pleaded no contest and have had their records wiped completely clean as of recently. It seems that those who are responsible have only gotten a slap on their wrist for what they have done. This personally makes me lose trust in the government as a whole and politicians in general as they are the ones we elect to protect us not harm our health. Those responsible for this should be ashamed for what they have done and should never serve in any political position for the rest of their lives. Hopefully, justice is one day truly served in this issue and the people of Flint fully recover from this crisis.

Links :

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/09/21/flints-lead-poisoned-water-had-a-horrifyingly-large-effect-on-fetal-deaths-study-finds/?utm_term=.4381dfe28891

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/years-after-flint-water-crisis-began-no-one-is-behind-bars

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/02/05/582482024/lethal-pneumonia-outbreak-caused-by-low-chlorine-in-flint-water

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