The COVID-19 pandemic is exacerbating sexual and reproductive health inequities in the United States and around the world and threatening to undo decades of progress on access to care. To do this, it must focus on helping as many people as possible achieve reproductive autonomy, with a particular focus on those who are facing the steepest barriers to care, such as Black and Indigenous people, other people of color, people with disabilities, immigrants, people with low incomes and young people. The Biden-Harris administration should use its electoral mandate decisively and make 2021 a turning point, starting in the first 100 days in office. Advocates have laid out an ambitious agenda on this front and now must hold leaders in the White House accountable to ensure that harmful policies passed under the Trump-Pence administration are dismantled and replaced with evidence-based ones that ensure sexual and reproductive health and rights for all. Though there is much work to do over the next four years, there are several issues that require immediate attention. In order to successfully tackle these challenges, the Biden-Harris administration must center sexual and reproductive health, rights and justice at the heart of its responses. As the country looks toward the start of this new administration, it is still gripped by three related crises: the COVID-19 pandemic, an economic recession, and deep-seated racial and social inequities. To read more columns like this, go to the Opinion front page.Donate Now First published online: December 2, 2020Īdvocates of sexual and reproductive health and rights are celebrating Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s historic victory. In addition to its own editorials, USA TODAY publishes diverse opinions from outside writers, including our Board of Contributors. Paul Mero is CEO of The Leadership Project for America. Of course, who knows? We’re only taking him at his word. If there is time left in his first 100 days, President Trump would likely continue to investigate the validity of former President Obama’s birthplace, lift regulations on nutritional supplements and business bankruptcies, and sign an executive order creating National Losers Day in honor of Rosie O’Donnell, Arianna Huffington, Cher, Mark Cuban, Megyn Kelly and other identified “losers” of President Trump’s disliking. He also would very likely order all drug enforcement operations to cease and call on Congress to tax and legalize drugs as the only way to stop the "drug czars” from profiting instead of his government. Otherwise, President Trump would be very slow to move on agency appointments but would dramatically cut the budgets of the Department of Education and the Environmental Protection Agency. In addition to triggering a trade war, President Trump would move to stop China’s manipulation of currency.Īt his first chance, President Trump would likely seek to remove John Roberts from his chief justice role on the U.S.
On foreign affairs, President Trump’s first 100 days would be spent understanding the “nuclear triad,” and coming up with a stated plan to deal with ISIS, outside of his noted willingness to kill their family members if they get in the way.Īnd, of course, there is China.
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Protecting his innate business sensibilities, Trump would likely crack down on the influence of unions against big business, encourage the legal taking of private property through expanded use of government eminent domain, and promise to sign legislation to audit the Federal Reserve. He is very clear about what he would do: He would begin the deportation of all undocumented immigrants, regardless of family circumstances, commence building a fence or wall along our southern border, assign his Justice Department to challenge birthright citizenship, order the shutdown of certain mosques, and call on federal authorities to identify and track all Muslims living in the U.S.Īttacking the economy, President Trump would slap a 45% tariff on Chinese imports, triggering a trade war. But once he did, immigration would surely be on his mind.īy hook or by crook, President Trump would stop immigration - legal and illegal - until he got his head around the issue from the watchtower of the White House. It might be hard for him to stop the celebrations and get down to business.