President of the United States Donald Trump shut down the government on December 22, 2018. As of January 20, 2019, the government is still shut down. It is the longest shut down in American history, and for reasons that are not feasible.

Trump pushed for and promised to build a wall on the United States- Mexico border while on the campaign trail in 2016. Now that his term in office is about to end, he trying to fulfill that promise. How the wall would be constructed and paid for has changed many times over since 2016. Trump has stated such things as Mexico would pay for the wall, or the wall would actually be a fence to many different things. But it is mostly based on pure racism and hatred. Trump has no problem with immigrants from other countries, it is just those from South America: “We have people coming into the country, or trying to come in — and we’re stopping a lot of them — but we’re taking people out of the country. You wouldn’t believe how bad these people are. These aren’t people. These are animals. And we’re taking them out of the country at a level and at a rate that’s never happened before.”

When Trump could not get his wall to keep out the “others” like he promised, he threw a fit and shut down the government. Trump of course is being unrealistic. Not just in the idea of rejecting America’s founding “give me your sick and your poor” ideology, but also the cost of what a wall the size of the Mexico American border would cost. There was a Gofundme to raise $5 billion dollars, but that amount would not even cover a fraction of the price. Also, it is a lot more complicated to build a wall then just simply building it: “Whatever we think it’s going to cost, experience shows us we must multiply it by more than 500 percent.”

But Trump sees no logic and will take anyone down to get his way.

When the president shut down the government, a lot of jobs for government employees were shut down as a result. Jobs belonging to the hardworking Americans he is supposed to be helping and representing. Many continue to work without pay: “More than 420,000 federal employees across numerous agencies will continue to work even as the government shuts down. They just won’t get paid for it immediately.” But it has now been over a month without pay for those 420,000 workers. If and how the workers will be paid after the shutdown is over is also unclear. And if this continues, the outcome will not be positive.

No income for a month means that for some there is no way to access resources needed- like housing, healthcare and food. Many federal employees are turning to food banks to help feed them and their families since there is a lack of income to buy food. “Over the past two weeks, more than 280 federal employees have used a food bank that Catholic Community Services of Northern Utah operates, which is a 50% increase over the 566 regular clients who used services during that time”. Trump is leaving Americans without an income, essentially leading them into poverty.

Whether Trump and those who support him will admit it, it is obvious that the president did not calculate what putting this amount of people out of work would do. Or maybe Trump simply did not consider it. Either way, Trump is playing a toddler throwing a tantrum and will not stop until he gets his way. No matter who it affects.

By: Chelsea Hinkofer

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