Jim Hoagland: Making America safer for The Donald

One of Donald Trump’s objectives is to make America safe again. Vice President Mike Pence says this is why Trump fired FBI Director James Comey. Do you feel safer after this unprecedented act?

To make us safe, Trump says he should ban from entry and remove from the country many dark-skinned persons – particularly Latinos and Muslims. So far the courts haven’t agreed that it’s constitutional.

Then there is the border wall – the grand gesture so popular with his racist base. How many clips did we watch of an animated Donald and his followers chanting that Mexico would pay? Now American taxpayers are supposed to pay. This does not include the author of this farce, who brags about paying no federal income taxes. If The Donald really wants to make America safe again, he could start by proposing a comprehensive gun-control bill. Instead, Trump revoked an Obama plan which would have allowed Social Security cooperation in identifying mentally incompetent people who should not be allowed to purchase firearms.

A reasonable gun-control plan would make America safer than discriminating against Latinos and Muslims, building a wall or firing the FBI director who was leading the investigation into whether Trump’s campaign team colluded with Russia. Perhaps what Pence meant was that now The Donald feels safer.

This story was originally published May 22, 2017 at 12:56 PM with the headline "Jim Hoagland: Making America safer for The Donald."