by Megan Dreher and August Kissel
Asst. Editor and Editor
On Jan. 20 2017, Donald John Trump was inaugurated and became the 45th President of the United States.
People from all around attended the inauguration, including supporters and protesters. The attendees saw performances from Jackie Evancho, 3 Doors Down, and Toby Keith over the span of the morning.
Here at Manhattan College, there have been mixed opinions about this day and what it means for the nation as well as the school.
Associate Professor of Government, Margaret Groarke contributed to this discussion on campus.
“I think there are a lot more intense feelings on both sides,” said Groarke.
These feelings have been demonstrated through a mixture of protests and festivities after the announcement of President Trump’s win.
Freshman at Manhattan College, Brian Opher spoke highly of President Trump.
“I am thrilled for Trump’s inauguration. This country needs a real change and a real president to take control,” said freshman Brian Opher.
At the inauguration President Trump promised to improve the relationship with Russia, return jobs to United States workers, take down ISIS, build a wall along the southern border of the United States and to vett incoming immigrants. Vetting is the process President Trump plans on using to remove immigrants who have hostile tendencies towards women, Christians, and those of the LGBTQ community.
“We don’t know what’s possible for him to do. Some of the things that he wants to do, he just isn’t capable of doing. People who didn’t support him, and his campaign are kind of nervous, what they see as less good ideas are actually going to happen,” said Professor Groarke. “ I think for people who support him, there might be a certain level of disappointment. People often attach to someone who they voted for and start to believe they will do anything that I would like to them to do. And that’s unlikely to be the case.”
Congress has already started to deconstruct the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare. This program was one of former President Barack Obama’s most prominent programs. It has provided healthcare to tens of millions and included a provision allowing young people to stay on their parent’s health care program until they reach the age of 26.
Isabella Lleva, junior at MC, voiced her criticism of President Trump.
“I think that he is just rewinding the clock on educational progress, women’s rights, and everything, health care. All of it,” said Lleva.
Lleva was a part of a group of students who participated in anti-Trump protests and she also attended the Women’s March on New York in Manhattan. Other Manhattan students took a bus to Washington, D.C to march in the epicenter of the protest.
“You have to wonder how that is going to shake out and what it’s going to mean for political organization, and what movements are going to arise, and what candidates for future elections are going to arise,” said Groarke. “I think there would be some reshaping of some kind and it’s hard to know what it is right now.”
As the nation embarks on this new era, Former President Barack Obama suggested that we shall remember the fundamentals of the United States.
“I am asking you to hold fast to that faith written into our founding documents; that idea whispered by slaves and abolitionists; that spirit sung by immigrants and homesteaders and those who marched for justice; that creed reaffirmed by those who planted flags from foreign battlefields to the surface of the moon; a creed at the core of every American whose story is not yet written: Yes We Can. Yes We Did,” said Former President Obama in his farewell address.