Not a Warm Moment

Not a Warm Moment

When the president spoke to Congress this week, he brought with him a 13 year boy who has struggled mightily with cancer.

This could have been “a warm moment”. It was, rather, a disgusting stunt and yet another embarrassment to our country. Why? Because trump and his son Eric stole money from a childhood cancer charity. The New York Attorney General said in 2019, “Not only has the Trump Foundation been shut down for its misconduct, but the president has been forced to pay $2 million for misusing charitable funds for his own political gain. Charities are not a means to an end, which is why these damages speak to the president’s abuse of power and represent a victory for not-for-profits that follow the law. Funds have finally gone where they deserve — to eight credible charities. No one is above the law — not a businessman, not a candidate for office, and not even the president of the United States.”

And if that weren’t bad enough, the felon president has recently gutted funding for cancer and HIV research, and in doing so is acting in direct violation of the law. Treatments being given to patients right now will stop. This endangers the life of the patient and also creates treatment-resistant disease that will be much harder or impossible to treat in the future. The cuts are causing irreparable damage to ongoing research for cures and treatments for cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, ALS, diabetes, Mental Health disorders, opioid abuse, genetic and other diseases affecting American families. trump is attempting, once again, to steal funds promised to scientific research institutions funded by the NIH, despite an explicit legal prohibition against doing so.

This isn’t the first time the felon has made deep cuts to medical, disease and health care research. In 2017, the first trump administration proposed making deep cuts to funding for NIH research by approximately $6 billion. Jobs held by the very scientists and doctors who could find cures and save lives have been lost.

I will never understand how a guy who steals money from a kids’ cancer charity is still seen as ‘the good guy’. I will never understand how anyone can continue to support and defend a person so bereft of human compassion and morals.

So, no, it WASN’T a warm moment. It was a shameful disgrace to the office of the president, to our country and to every decent human being.

Bronwyn Della-Volpe