Saturday (April 29) marked the end of that artificial construct between politics and media known as the “first 100 days.” While both sides agree the period is essentially meaningless in terms of predicting the eventual success of a presidency, neither is willing to ignore it.
One thing that is clear so far: White evangelical Christians, who helped put President Trump in the White House and who will be affected by many of his policies, both promised and delivered, remain his staunchest allies.Three-fourths of them approve of his actions to date, according to the Pew Research Center. That is nearly twice as high as the president’s approval rating among the general public, which hovers just below 40 percent.
So here’s a look at Trump’s accomplishments in his first 100 days in office as they relate to religion and people of faith.
Candidate Trump pledged to repeal a 1954 law that prohibits religious institutions from campaigning for political candidates. President Trump placed that promise front and center in one of his first official appearances. “I will get rid of, totally destroy the Johnson Amendment and allow our representatives of faith to speak freely and without fear,” Trump told faith leaders. A repeal of the amendment may be included in the administration’s tax package. It was not done in the first 100 days.
As a candidate, Trump called for a ban on all Muslims entering the U.S. As a newly minted president, he signed an executive order that temporarily suspended entry of refugees to the U.S., halted the entry of Syrian refugees entirely and restricted travel by residents of several predominantly Muslim countries. The order also gave priority to refugees claiming religious persecution, which would reward “persecuted Christian” refugees. Judges blocked that first order — and a second one issued on March 6. The Trump administration is appealing the rulings. Regardless of the legality of the travel ban orders, the administration’s clampdown on immigration is having the intended effect. “Last month was the lowest month for immigration illegally into our country in 17 years,” Attorney General Jeff Sessions said last week. “That is a remarkable thing to accomplish.”
When Trump picked Betsy DeVos as education secretary, many religious conservatives cheered. DeVos — a Michigan billionaire, businesswoman and Christian evangelical —is a proponent of school vouchers, which would send public money to private schools, including religious ones. DeVos said of herself and her husband, “Our desire is to … confront the culture in which we all live today in ways which will continue to advance God’s kingdom, not to stay in our own safe territories,” meaning Christian schools.
When Neil Gorsuch became an associate justice on April 17, he fulfilled the president’s promise to fill the Supreme Court seat left vacant by the death of Antonin Scalia. Michael Farris, president of Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian legal organization, said Gorsuch would “affirm our most fundamental freedom — religious liberty.”
One of Trump’s first actions as president was to reinstate the Reagan-era “Mexico City policy” prohibiting the use of American foreign aid by overseas health care providers that include abortion as a family planning option. The Susan B. Anthony List made the reinstatement of the Mexico City policy one of its six “pro-life accomplishments made by the Trump Administration in the first 100 days.” Also on the SBAL’s list are the “strong pro-life appointments to key positions” of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price, presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway and Gorsuch. In January, Vice President Mike Pence addressed the March for Life in Washington, D.C., the highest administration official ever to appear at the annual anti-abortion event.
One of Trump’s main campaign promises — and one many religious leaders rallied around — was to “restore” religious liberty. Many pundits considered this a political “dog whistle” — a signal to Trump’s conservative Christian base that he would scale back Obama-era protections for LGBTQ Americans. Recently, 51 Republican lawmakers urged the president to sign an executive order that would do just that, according to USA Today. This week, a White House official told USA Today that “some sort of policy to protect religious liberty is still in the works and is a Trump priority in coming days.
“Evangelicals are particularly important to Trump,” John Green, an expert on religion and politics at the University of Akron in Ohio, said. “On two issues – abortion and the Supreme Court – he made some pretty strong promises during the campaign, and at least so far he has kept them.” Other promises have not been fulfilled as of yet but are still in the works and most Christians seem to be optimistic about getting those accomplished in the near future.