The Trump Family Threatens Women
Until late Monday night, President Trump held the government funding bill hostage in order to strong-arm Congress for a down payment on his poorly thought-out border wall. Today, he is holding it hostage for massive tax cuts for corporations. If Congress fails to pass a funding bill this week — in large part due to Trump’s bullying tactics — the government will shut down.
But the sad reality is that the American people will lose greatly under Trump, whether the government stays open or not — and the biggest losers will continue to be American women.
Last week, Trump tried to use foreign policy events to distract from his broken promises at home. He also promised the American people a better health care system, an infrastructure bill, and tax reform. However, so far, he hasn’t successfully delivered on anything despite a Republican controlled House and Senate. Perhaps “The Art of the Deal” should be renamed “The Art of Disaster?” A common theme with the Trump Administration has clearly emerged: present the American people with no policy plan, (i.e. his noticeably non-existent infrastructure bill) or present the American people with a terrible plan (i.e. his failed Obamacare repeal and replace bill and his newly released tax plan that favors the mega-rich).
It should be no surprise, then, that early on Tuesday, Ivanka Trump was booed on stage at the Women’s-20 summit in Germany when she said her father has been a “tremendous champion of supporting families.” Ivanka was speaking on a panel with IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde and German Chancellor Angela Merkel about the lack of paid family leave in the United States. The bottom line, whether Ivanka refuses to accept it or not, is that these are again empty words with no real policy solutions to back them up: Her father’s administration has done absolutely nothing to support working women, instead doing just the opposite.
As recently as last month, President Trump revoked years of efforts to advance women’s rights in the workplace by signing an executive order which overturned an Obama era effort to ensure companies that receive lucrative government contracts pay women fairly. American women are paying their fair share in taxes (while we still have yet to see any proof that Trump has paid his) only for the government to take our hard-earned money and award it to companies that discriminate against us. The Trump Administration is moving women’s rights backwards, not forwards. Where was Ivanka when this E.O. was signed?
Even on stage on Tuesday, Ivanka presented no plan for paid family leave in the United States — while pointing out that the U.S. is the only developed nation in the entire world to lack a national policy on this. Furthermore, Ivanka’s tax cut proposal to offset child-care costs disproportionately benefit wealthy women, not working class women. What happened to putting America’s working class families first?
Moreover, if Trump’s efforts to repeal and replace Obamacare do ultimately succeed, women’s protections under the current law would be rolled back. Prior to Obamacare, women were unfairly subject to higher premiums; a pregnancy, a cesarean-section, or even history of domestic violence could be classified as pre-existing conditions, which caused insurance companies to offer less coverage for higher costs.
In addition to decreased protections, women would see their physical (and financial) health decline. Right now under Obamacare, fewer than 4 percent of women with employer sponsored health insurance pay any out of pocket expense for birth control and contraceptive services. Prior to Obamacare, over 20 percent of women had to pay out of pocket expenses for this basic need. Obamacare also expanded access to maternity care and helped to curb price disparities between men and women’s health plans in the same age group. If Trump gets his way, these advances will be revoked, and women will again be forced to pay more money for less care.
Unfortunately, even this early into his administration, President Trump has already signed a deleterious law discriminating against women’s health providers in low-income areas. The new law nullifies a rule established in the Obama Administration that prevented state and local governments from withholding federal dollars from organizations that provide for women’s reproductive health care needs, including breast and cervical cancer screenings, regardless of whether they also performed abortions. With this law, it became clear where Trump’s priorities are — and aren’t.
Essentially, while Trump promised “America First” on the campaign trail, what we see already — even before his first 100 Days are up — is that when he’s not busy playing golf, he’s been busy putting Americans last, specifically American women.
Bassima Alghussein is a Political Partner with Truman National Security Project. She currently serves as C.E.O. to Alghussein Global Strategies and previously served as a Legislative Advisor in the Obama Administration and as a Congressional Aide on Capitol Hill. Views expressed are her own.
