On August 18 Steve Bannon, executive chairman of Breitbart News, said “The Trump presidency that we fought for, and won, is over.” Let that sink in for a moment. Establishment Republicans betrayed those tens of millions of Americans, populists and nationalists at heart who devoted time and treasure, and voted for their perceived national savior. Their own congressmen and senators—as well as White House staff—have prevented Donald Trump from following through on his promise to “Make America Great Again.” The evidence? Let’s start with DACA.
DACA
During Trump’s presidential campaign he referred to DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) as “illegal amnesty.” He also wrote “I want all Americans to succeed together. President Obama’s illegal executive amnesty undermines job prospects for the poorest Americans while making everybody less safe in this age of rising crime and global terrorism.” Nine months into his presidency he tweeted “Congress now has 6 months to legalize DACA (something the Obama administration was unable to do). If they can’t, I will revisit this issue!” Next, there is the wall.
The Wall
Trump has long advocated building a wall along our southern border. In June 2015 he said “Build a wall. Deport all undocumented immigrants.” Yet, by September 2016 he said “Look, we do it in a very humane way, and we’re going to see with the people that are in the country. Obviously I want to get the gang members out, the drug peddlers out, I want to get the drug dealers out. We’ve got a lot of people in this country that you can’t have, and those people we’ll get out,” he said. “And then we’re going to make a decision at a later date once everything is stabilized … I think you’re going to see there’s really quite a bit of softening.” Next, trade relations and NAFTA.
NAFTA
On October 9 last year in St. Louis Trump said “Because NAFTA, signed by [Bill Clinton], is perhaps the greatest disaster trade deal in the history of the world. Not in this country. It stripped us of manufacturing jobs. We lost our jobs. We lost our money. We lost our plants. It is a disaster.” Yet, by April of this year Trump told reports at the White House “I decided rather than terminating NAFTA, which would be a pretty big, you know, shock to the system, we will renegotiate,” Then, we have Trump position on the United Nations, which has flip-flopped several times.
The United Nations
As a businessman back in 2005, at a Senate subcommittee hearing, Trump testified “I have to start by saying I’m a big fan, a very big fan, of the United Nations and all it stands for.” Then, on the campaign trail on March 21, 2016 Trump said “The United Nations is not a friend of democracy. It’s not a friend to freedom. It’s not a friend even to the United States of America, where as all know, it has its home.” Then, on April 24, 2017 (and again just last week during his U.N. address), Trump spoke positively of the institution: “The United Nations is an under-performer, but it has huge potential … I think that the United Nations has tremendous potential.” Next, foreign relations and NATO.
NATO
In an interview with Bloomberg Politics on March 23, 2016 Trump said “I think NATO may be obsolete.” A year later at a White House news conference he recanted: “I said it was obsolete. It’s no longer obsolete.” Finally, my last exhibit: international finance and the Export-Import Bank.
Export-Import Bank
Two months into Trump’s campaign for president, on August 26, 2015, in an interview with Bloomberg Politics, of the Export-Import Bank he said “I don’t like it. I think it’s a lot of excess baggage. I think it’s unnecessary.” Three months into his presidency in an April 12, 2017 interview with the Wall Street Journal Trump said “Actually, it’s a very good thing. And it actually makes money; it could make a lot of money.” Enough examples of altered positions. Where to from here?
As Steve Bannon said in the August 18 The Weekly Standard interview, “[Trump’s] natural tendency … his actual default position is the position of his base, the position that got him elected.” Yet, as we’ve seen, those who influence and often neuter Trump have prevented him from accomplishing the goals he set before the American people. Will the voters remember their turncoat representatives and Senators during the mid-term elections? Maybe. In the meantime, Texans ought to realize hitching their future to an establishment dominated U.S. government is a losing gamble. We need to restore our Republic of Texas to have any hope of regaining representative control of our future. #TEXIT!
Andrew Piziali is a retired design verification engineer with a passion for Jesus Christ and liberty. He is a former member of the Collin County chapter of the Texas Nationalist Movement, now writing as an expat from Prescott, Arizona.
