Social policy of the first Donald Trump administration

All of them later went on to vote in the majority opinion of Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, the Supreme Court case overturning Roe v. Wade and ending federal abortion rights nationwide.

[31] In May 1989, shortly after the Central Park jogger case received widespread media attention, Trump purchased a full-page ad in four New York City newspapers with the title "BRING BACK THE DEATH PENALTY!"

[31][38] On September 3, 2020, Michael Forest Reinoehl—suspected in the killing of a member of a far-right group in Portland, Oregon a week earlier— initiated a shootout with law enforcement which wanted to arrest him; he was fatally shot.

[42] Trump has said that if elected, he would loosen defamation laws so that when journalists write "purposely negative and horrible and false articles, we can sue them and win lots of money."

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and other First Amendment advocates condemned Trump's proposal, which would make it easier to win lawsuits accusing newspapers of libel.

"[56] In 2016, Trump decried the fact that Ahmad Khan Rahami, a U.S. citizen charged in connection with the bombings in New York and New Jersey, would be provided with medical treatment and the right to counsel, calling this "sad".

[59] Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook called the remark "chilling" and said: "Trump thinks that the presidency is like some banana republic dictatorship where you can lock up your political opponents.

[60] The remark was condemned by a number of prominent Republican lawyers, such as Paul K. Charlton, Marc Jimenez, and Peter Zeidenberg,[61] as well as David B. Rivkin and Michael Chertoff.

"[73][74] In early- and mid-October 2016, Trump repeatedly claimed the election was "rigged" and alleged that the media coordinated with the Clinton campaign, citing Alec Baldwin's portrayal of him on Saturday Night Live.

[89] After taking office, Trump said he would launch a major investigation into these unsubstantiated allegations, and appointing his vice president, Mike Pence, to head a White House commission to do so.

[102] President Trump selected Dr. Francis Collins, who supports federally funded embryonic stem-cell research, to continue serving as director of the National Institutes of Health.

[118] Trump, a previously self-described Presbyterian who was described by CNN as "unique among modern American presidents for his seeming lack of deep religious orientation", has considered the support of evangelical voters as instrumental to his election.

[133] Trump has also lent his voice to the claim—originally promulgated in the United States through Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly in the early 2000s—that there is a "War on Christmas" led by department stores that do not use the name of the holiday.

[148] Then on September 24, Presidential Proclamation 9645 aimed at more permanently establishing travel restrictions on those countries except Sudan, while adding North Korea and Venezuela which had not previously been included.

"[163][164][165] In June 2017, the Department of Homeland Security dropped a planned 400,000 dollar grant to "Life After Hate", a program which was intended to de-radicalize Neo-Nazis and stop white extremism.

[232] In September 2016, he announced a policy proposal created in part by his daughter Ivanka, to guarantee six weeks of paid maternity leave to mothers who do not already receive similar benefits from their employers.

"[236] In 2019 Trump signed the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 which contained an amendment guaranteeing 12 weeks of parental leave for most federal employees occurring on or after October 1, 2020.

[3] Rea Carey, the executive director of the National LGBTQ Task Force, described his public statements on LGBT issues during the campaign as "confusing and conflicting".

[258] On June 13, 2016, Trump gave a speech framed around the threat of "radical Islamic terrorists," referring to a recent mass shooting at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando.

[272] Trump has offered qualified support for the First Amendment Defense Act, which aims to protect those who oppose same-sex marriage based on their religious beliefs from action by the federal government, such as revocation of tax-exempt status, grants, loans, benefits, or employment.

[13][15][281][282][283][284][285] The Advocate, an American LGBT-interest magazine, characterized Trump's proposed Supreme Court nominees as "LGBT-unfriendly", noting that "not all have ruled in LGBT rights cases, but those who have are largely unsympathetic, and some have the backing of anti-LGBT activists.

"[314] On July 26, 2017, the Department of Justice argued in court that federal civil rights law does not ban employers from discriminating against employees based on sexual orientation.

[321][322] Near the end of Trump's term, on December 7, 2020, the administration finalized a rule allowing faith-based employers to discriminate against LGBT employees in their contracts with the federal government.

[348] In Trump's State of the Union address on February 5, 2019, he devoted a few words to announcing a new program by scientists in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that hopes to reduce new HIV infections by 90% in ten years.

[369] In October 2018 it was reported that the Trump administration is considering a definition of a person's gender as based on their genitalia at birth and not changeable later in life, in effect defining transgender out of existence.

A staff member of the Matthew Shepard Foundation read aloud the parents' written statement: "We find it interesting and hypocritical that he [Attorney General William Barr] would invite us to this event commemorating a hate crime law named after our son and Mr. Byrd, while, at the same time, asking the Supreme Court to allow the legalized firing of transgender employees."

The "Trump Pride" co-chairs were named as Richard Grenell, Jill Homan, Charles Moran, and Bill White, and the other 19 advisory board members were Michael Baker, Chris Barron, Martina Bolano, Matthew Craffey, Jamie Ensley, Stephen Gale, Bryan Eure, Dan Innis, Bob Kabel, "Brokeback Patriot," William McLaughlin, "The Gay Who Strayed," Ernest Olivias, Ashton T. Randle, Rebecca Schiff, Shane Shannon, Rob Smith, Andre Soriano, and Ed Williams.

[404] Working off a preliminary list of the expected members of the commission, the LGBTQ rights organization GLAAD found that seven of those people (Mary Ann Glendon, Peter Berkowitz, Hamza Yusuf Hanson, Jacqueline Rivers, Meir Soloveichik, Christopher Tollefsen, and F. Cartwright Weiland) had previously made anti-LGBTQ remarks.

In November 2019, it was reported that Merritt Corrigan, a former RNC employee who once tweeted that the "LGBT agenda" is "tyrannical" and that the US was a "homo-empire," had begun a new job at the Hungarian embassy in Washington.

In the pledge, put forth by the anti-pornography group Enough Is Enough, Trump promised to "give serious consideration to appointing a Presidential Commission to examine the harmful public health impact of Internet pornography on youth, families and the American culture and the prevention of the sexual exploitation of children in the digital age".