Trump's First 100 Days

Wednesday marked the hundredth day of President Trump’s second term. The period since Trump’s inauguration has been characterized by mass government cuts and deportations as well as tariffs on more than 60 countries.

The first hundred days of a presidency are often used as a measurement of the president’s achievements during the height of their influence. The phrase was first coined by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in a 1933 radio address, and has since been used as a benchmark and prediction for a president’s overall success.

Some outlets on the left criticized Trump’s actions during his first hundred days as extreme and an overreach of executive power, whereas some outlets on the right praised the president for his decisiveness and fulfilling campaign promises.

A writer for New York Post Opinion (Right bias) wrote, “Still, the avalanche of orders, actions and proposals reveals his biggest and most important accomplishment — Trump is continually expanding the outer limits of what a president can hope to achieve. His comfort with the power and prestige of the office allows him to unmask conventional wisdom as a paper tiger. Tell him that something can’t be done, and he takes that as a challenge. That is his defining difference.”

Jamelle Bouie (Left) wrote in The New York Times Opinion (Left), “As consequential as they have been, and as exhausting as they’ve felt to many Americans, these first months of Trump’s second term fall far short of what Roosevelt accomplished. Yes, Trump has wreaked havoc throughout the federal government and destroyed our relationships abroad, but his main goal — the total subordination of American democracy to his will — remains unfulfilled.”

The Washington Times Editorial Board (Lean Right) published a piece that read, “Like a jiu-jitsu master, Mr. Trump has turned resistance to his advantage… It’s not quite the Golden Age yet, but we certainly are headed in that direction. There’s no telling what more lies ahead in the next 100 days.”

Grist (Lean Left) published an opinion saying, “The Trump administration’s breakneck pace has also kicked up a haze that makes it hard for the federal government and states to govern, and could make it more difficult for Trump to accomplish his full agenda in the long term as he makes the switch from institutional policy changes to legislative policy changes, like extending his 2017 tax cuts.”