Trump will End the Peace Corps
Trump is an ever-present threat to Peace Corps. If elected, he directly defies our notion of the value of Americans…
If Trump Is Elected– End the Peace Corps
In his few years as President (2017-2021), Donald Trumps did not think much about the Peace Corps. In his very first year as president, in 2017, he eliminated more than 20 percent of the staff.
In 2017, newspaper columnist Gene Michol, visiting his Peace Corps daughter in the Gambia, wrote in an ob-ed piece how Trump was trying to eliminate the Peace Corps, writing, “In Trump’s world these young heroes are losers. They toil in obscurity. They come home broke. They put others’ comfort and prospects above their own. They don’t want the world to quake in fear at America’s greatness. Their patriotism calls them to use marked skills, boundless energies and opened arms to forge partnership with less generously blessed peoples across the globe.
“To our president, they’re chumps. For him, the only reason to deal with a place like Gambia is to exploit its people and resources. Winners take. They use. They grow the bottom line. They produce bigger buildings, larger portfolios. All the world envies them. Character, selflessness and service aren’t part of the framework. They never enter the calculus. They never have.”
Read more at: https://www.newsobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article162953253.html#storylink=cpy
In March of 2019, Shirley Sagawa, CEO of Service Year Alliance, would write, “We are deeply concerned that, for the third year in a row, President Trump has proposed eliminating the Corporation for National and Community Service, the federal agency that oversees AmeriCorps. “The Peace Corps and YouthBuild are also on the chopping block, with proposed cuts of $14 million and $5 million, respectively. These proposed cuts ignore the impact that national service has in communities across the country and the long history of bipartisan support.”
By 2020, Trump proposed a $9.3 million cut in baseline funding for the Peace Corps. His proposal provided $401.2 million for the agency, down from $415.
John Bridgeland, director of the USA Freedom Corps, who had worked in the Bush Administration, said he was shocked at the lack of engagement between the administration and the Peace Corps and other national service organizations. “It’s contrary to decades of bipartisan presidential leadership to support the Peace Corps,” said Mr. Bridgeland, a vice chairman of Service Year Alliance. “In a time when the administration is disengaging from the world and diminishing American leadership abroad, I think the Peace Corps is more important than ever.”
In his inaugural address, Kennedy asked what young people could do for their country. In his inaugural, Trump wanted young people out of national service. His first budget proposal eliminated the Corporation for National and Community Service, and with it, AmeriCorps, Senior Corps and Vista.
If re-elected Trump would also zero out the loan forgiveness program for graduates who choose public service jobs. He would cut U.S. programs that encouraged young Americans to teach in at-risk schools, become police officers, or take careers in social work.
If Trump is reelected, we can kiss the Peace Corps goodbye. He will return to the White House and finish what he wanted to do with our “American Democracy” when he was first elected President of the United States, get rid of Peace Corps Volunteers.
Posted by John Coyne (Ethiopia 1962-64)
John,
Thank you.
Moke Chee and I voted last Monday. It felt good.
We’re praying that good feeling still stands on November 6th.
Be well, Jim w
Thanks for this note, very important to know!
Yes, John, just another reason to be terrified by the prospect of Trump winning this upcoming election. We’re all holding our breath…
Taking action: RPCVs from my training group identified a toss-up Congressional race and have been making donations to the candidate who is most aligned with the Peace Corps spirit. His chances of upsetting and replacing the incumbent are rated “neck and neck”.
Jim Wolter said it well–I hope the good feeling is still there on November 6th!
Your excellent article serves as a warning to everyone who knows or respects our Peace Corps service. President Obama repeats the line, “Don’t boo – vote!” over and over. Vice-President Harris says that our actions, not our opinions, are really what count. I will send this article to every relative and friend who is wavering before this crucial election. Then I will spend time canvassing. Every vote counts.
If it is a choice between a Peace Corps run by Trump appointees and a Director, who reports to the President, who swears his loyalty to Trump, and a suspended/defunded Peace Corps, I would chose the latter. My concern about a Trump dominated Peace Corps is not so much about Volunteers, but the people with whom PCVs have worked for over 60 years.
I also believe the real Peace Corps spirit resides in the RPCV community, independent of any governmental control. In our country dominated by a Trump presidency, there will be much to do and I bellieve the RPCV community will do it.
One good thing Trump did while he was in office was to eliminate Project Minerva, the federal program which funded Department of Defense social science programs. Sounds like he doesn’t like Peace Corps either, but Peace Corps survived Richard Nixon, and according to everything I’ve read, Nixon hated the Peace Corps. According to When the World Calls by late Peace Corps historian Stanley Meisler, he was trying to get rid of Peace Corps, first by making it subservient to an Umbrella agency called ACTION, and might have accomplished his diabolical mission had not he had his hands full with the Watergatete crisis during his second term. So maybe Peace Corps can survive a Donald Trump presidency too, assuming he’s elected, especially with stalwart election denier and Thailand RPCV Peter Navarro in his corner. Peter would surely put it in some kind words for Peace Corps if Trump decided he wanted to defund it. Woundln’t he?
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Trump is an ever-present threat to Peace Corps. If elected, he directly defies our notion of the value of Americans helping developing nations to attain their goals, establish friendships and ultimately foreign relations good will. He will make our service seem inconsequential and ridiculous. I don’t think we’d want that, do you?
Leita Kaldi Davis