How many of Trump's '100 Days' promises has he kept?

Donald Trump put together a list of promises he would keep when elected president, not merely by the end of his first term but specifically by the end of his first 100 days in office in his "100 day action plan". How many of these promises has he kept? I have rated the results below on a scale from 1-5 Bannons (more Bannons are good) to 1-5 Kushners (more Kushners are bad).

Appointing Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court: When running for President Trump produced a list of conservative judges and promised to pick the next justice from that list. Neil Gorsuch was on that list. Trump did exactly as he promised in a very timely fashion, and keeping this promise was extremely important because the balance of the Supreme Court was at stake.

Rating: 5 Bannons.

Tax reform. Trump promised to introduce legislation to reduce taxes within his first 100 days. He has failed to do that, instead producing a vague outline of goals, which would reduce corporate tax rates drastically but personal tax rates only marginally (from 39% to 35%). It is still an improvement over the current system, however.

Rating: 3 Bannons.

Lifting restrictions on energy production. Here Trump has done what no President since Ronald Reagan has done, challenging much of the land that Obama and even George W. Bush and Clinton have set aside for "monuments" and opening up oceans for oil drilling. When it comes to easing land restrictions and economic regulations, Trump has certainly kept his word.

Rating: 5 Bannons.

Pulling out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. He's done it. Whatever you think of the merits of it, Trump kept his word.

Rating: 5 Bannons.

Repealing Obamacare. Trump promised to introduce legislation repealing Obamacare within his first 100 days. Note he did not promise to repeal Obamacare by himself; that requires the Congress to approve. But at the least he promised to introduce a full repeal and to fight for it.

Trump never introduced any Obamacare legislation. The legislation that was talked about in the Congress was only a partial repeal, keeping the worst elements of Obamacare (the costly mandates, the redistribution of income) in place. Trump threatened members of Congress to vote for it. They refused. Now a new compromise may be taking shape that will allow states to "waive" some Obamacare requirements, but leave Obamacare in place, so a future president can restore it again at any time. Trump has clearly reneged on his promise to submit legislation and fight for a total repeal.

Rating: 4 Kushners.

Ending funding to Sanctuary Cities. Trump promised to end all federal funding to Sanctuary Cities within his first 100 days. He instead proposed ending all funding from a single, small Justice Department grant program totaling less than 30 million dollars (and even that proposal has been put on hold by a federal judge). Trump has never even attempted to cut the flow of billions of federal dollars that flow in grants to Sanctuary Cities. Obviously, this was never meant to be more than a token effort.

Rating: 4 Kushners.

Removing criminal aliens and canceling visas from countries who refuse to take them back. Trump is indeed removing criminal aliens at a faster rate, but has made no move to cancel visas from countries which refuse to take their illegals back.

Rating: 3 Bannons.

Suspending Immigration from Syria. A federal judge blocked Trump's efforts to formally suspend entry from Syria per se; but Trump still commands the ability to grant refugee status or not to grant refugees status to individual Syrians, and no federal judge can force him to do that. Given the choice, Trump has admitted Syrians at a faster rate than Obama did, and even is taking 1200 Syrians that Australia doesn't want. Obviously, Trump was not being truthful when he promised to stop the entry of Syrian refugees.

Rating: 5 Kushners.

Terminating the "DREAMer"program. Trump promised to terminate the "DREAMer" program in his first 100 days. Instead, he has continued it, saying he felt sympathy for children of illegal aliens. Trump not only lied on the campaign trail when he said he would end this program immediately, but he is committing an unconstitutional act by continuing to grant blanket amnesty without authorizing legislation from Congress.

Rating: 5 Kushners.

Funding the border wall. Trump pledged to introduce legislation calling for funding the border wall (before Mexico reimburses us, ha ha), within his first 100 days. Trump has not introduced any such legislation. He has made it clear that he will sign a spending bill this week that funds Obamacare and Planned Parenthood, but not his wall. Trump blames Democrats but he never even fought for the funding. He has a veto pen. This was his main campaign promise.  If he is not willing to fight for it now, when will he?  Trump has put Chuck Schumer in charge of his wall policy. It is also clear the "wall" was just a gimmick to get himself elected. If Trump really cared about it, he would veto spending bills without such funding and fight for it now.

Rating: 5 Kushners.

Label China a "currency manipulator." Trump refused to, saying China is not a currency manipulator. He says he's delaying because he wants China's help with North Korea. So far, China has done little to help with North Korea.

Rating: 5 Kushners.

Overall rating for Trump's first 100 days: 2 and a half Kushners.

It's important to note two things about these promises:

1) Trump explicitly promised to get them done in his first 100 days,

and

2) He had the power to do so. He could have ended the "DREAMer" program without Congress's involvement. He could have introduced legislation to fund his wall or threatened to veto spending bills without it. He could have stopped granting refugee status to individual Syrians; no federal judge could make him do that.

But he didn't. Clearly, Trump is better than Hillary Clinton would have been. But equally clearly, he flat out lied about many of his promises. Trump supporters always say that there is a "long game" going on and we can never know about Trump's top secret 10 year plans; but when he fails to do what he easily can do, the principles of Occam's razor applies -- the simpler explanation is almost certainly the correct one.

Ed Straker is the senior writer at NewsMachete.com

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