By Rieley McDonnell, Staff Writer

Trump is once again president of the United States. It’s scary and unprecedented.

 I am a self-proclaimed progressive, liberal Catholic. I believe in religious freedom, equity, human rights, LGBTQ+ rights, promoting diversity, justice and so much more that hangs in the balance. Translation: this new administration scares me.

 The president that is supposed to represent me didn’t put his hand on the Bible when he was sworn into office. The man who got 60% of the white Catholic vote didn’t place his hand on the Bible, despite saying that he’s Christian. The new president with a Catholic vice president couldn’t place his hand on the Bible.

 The inauguration last week was a real “who’s who” of the political and economic scene. His cabinet members and tech billionaires sat on the same side of the room. One would think the cabinet would have had the better seats but instead they were seated behind the billionaires.

 What message does this send? That billionaires seem to hold more importance to the billionaire in office than his own cabinet members, frighteningly resembling the mood of an oligarchy. It sends a message that billionaires are more important than the people who are, in theory, supposed to make this country better.

 Better is a subjective term. Maybe Trump thinks he is making this country better, bringing it to a “golden age” as he called it, by squashing the rights of the people who live and work here. Maybe renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America will fix all the country’s problems.

 It won’t, but it’s something he’s devoted an executive order to. He said he would bring the price of eggs down on day one or end the war in Ukraine on day one. He didn’t do those things – things that would actually help the country or the world. No, renaming the Gulf of Mexico was his play.

 Those things he said he would do?  They might get done, but what cost? On inflation, he plans to impose tariffs on the United States’s trade partners. The thing is, the cost of a tariff is not put on the shoulders of the country on which it is imposed. The burden is given to the citizens of the tariff imposer, who want to buy the imported goods. This means higher prices.

 Trump’s way of ending the war with Ukraine and Russia would probably not be one which favors the Ukrainian people. He has said many good things about the “president” of Russia Vladimir Putin. Ending to the war would probably favor Putin and not the people of Ukraine, who just want to keep their freedom.

 As a person who has many LGBTQ+ friends and identifies as demiromantic, some of the orders Trump has signed are both very frightening and a little humorous. One order makes it so certain government documents will only have two gender boxes: male and female. It erases nonbinary people from the picture.

 Another order redefines federal ideas of “sex” as based in biological sex. However, the wording isn’t very scientific. It defines female as those who produce the large reproductive cell at the time of conception and male as those who produce the small reproductive cell at time of conception. The wording is not scientifically accurate, as a fetus’s biological sex is not determined at the time of conception. This also fails to take into account people who are intersex and who may have the capacity to produce both reproductive cells.

 As a woman, I feel gross about having a man who has been accused of sexual misconduct by many women helming the government. The Access Hollywood tape is more than enough to make me uncomfortable and the allegations just make it worse.

 As a law abiding citizen, having a 34-time convicted felon as president is unprecedented and frankly insulting. He was convicted of falsifying business records in regards to “hush money” payments made to adult film actor Stormy Daniels.  

I’m done with living in these unprecedented times, but I don’t get a choice. I’m a self- proclaimed progressive, liberal Catholic and my beliefs tell me I don’t get to sit on the sidelines during these times.

 This time period is one of change, but whether it will be for the better or the worse is not yet known. All I know is I’m scared, but not apathetic. I’ll fight for what I believe is right, even if the person who is supposed to lead my country and represent me, to a degree, is actively trying to stop my goals.