The Environmental Impacts of The Trump Administration: A Series

This article series will be focusing on the positive and negative environmental impacts that occurred during the 4 years that Donald J. Trump was the 46th president of the United States.

Donald J. Trump first expressed interest in becoming the President of the United States in 1987 and even entered the race in 2000 as a Reform candidate. After 2008, Trump became one of the most outspoken members of the “birther” movement – a movement which questioned the legitimacy or existence of Barack Obama’s birth certificate – insisting that Obama was born outside of the U.S. It wasn’t until 2015 that Trump formally announced his entrance into the 2016 race for the White House. When announcing his candidacy he said, “We need somebody that literally will take this country and make it great again. We can do that.” He also promised that he would be a perfect candidate, as he had no cause to fundraise, and therefore would have no ties to special interests, and was the ideal “outsider candidate”.

“We need somebody that literally will take this country and make it great again. We can do that.”

DONALD J. TRUMP

Under the slogan Make America Great Again, Trump ran an exceptionally divisive and controversial campaign, built upon promises to strengthen the nation’s economy, build a wall on the border of America and Mexico (which he claimed Mexico would pay for) and to temporarily ban immigration to Muslims “until our country’s representatives can figure out what’s going on.”

Donald Trump’s unexpected victory in 2016 was something few pundits believed was possible as polling day approached, despite the last-minute boost in his favour from the Hilary Clinton e-mail scandal. As of January 20, 2017, when he was sworn in as the 46th President of the United States, Trump was officially the first American President to have never held elected office or served in the military.

While it was once considered a long shot, President Trump is now nearing the end of his four-year term. Throughout his time as President, Donald Trump and his administration have made significant changes to policies, agreements, and legislation originally adopted to protect America’s lands, wildlife, water, and air. While the process first began with the withholding of information when Trump took office in 2017, it quickly evolved into actions such as executive orders, that would open public land for economic use. Over the past 4 years, a number of states, municipalities, and NGOs have responded to these changes by filing lawsuits to block the Trump administration.

I will be publishing a series looking at the various ways in which the Trump administration has impacted the environmental integrity of the United States of America through a number of actions and choices. Each post will be focusing on 1 of 5 areas of environmental concern for the United States:

1. Air;
2. Water;
3. Wildlife;
4. Lands;
5. Environmental Education, Research & Funding

Find all parts of the series here:

The Environmental Impacts of The Trump Administration: A Series

The Environmental Impacts of the Trump Administration (Part 1)

The Environmental Impacts of the Trump Administration (Part 2)

The Environmental Impacts of the Trump Administration (Part 3)

The Environmental Impacts of the Trump Administration (Part 4)

The Environmental Impacts of the Trump Administration (Part 5)