TRUMP’S INAUGURAL SPEECH: THE MADNESS OF COMMON SENSE

The era of common sense is over

(Photograph: Donald Trump (center left, hand upraised) is sworn in as the 47th president of the United States on Jan. 20, 2025, in the rotunda of the US Capitol in Washington, DC. (AFP/Pool/Saul Loeb))

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In his inaugural speech on January 20, 2025, Donald Trump proclaimed that the U.S. government would recognize only two sexes—male and female—while ending “radical and wasteful” diversity, equity, and inclusion programs within federal agencies. Officials branded both measures as “common sense” orders that are part of a broader “restoring sanity” agenda. To add insult to injury, the gender order was presented as part of a policy aimed at “defending women from gender ideology extremism and restoring biological truth to the federal government.”

The order will also prevent taxpayer funds from being used for gender-transition healthcare and will oppose adding “privacy in intimate spaces” provisions in facilities such as prisons, migrant shelters, and rape shelters. "Kamala is for them/them. President Trump is for you," a Trump propagandist cynically remarked, mocking the use of “they” as a pronoun instead of she or he. Another controversial claim was that it was “very fitting” for these orders to be announced on Martin Luther King Jr. Day because “this order is meant to return to the promise and hope captured by civil rights champions—that one day all Americans can be treated based on their character, not the color of their skin.”

One can only wonder why Trump, in addition to proclaiming two national emergency states (concerning ecology and immigration), did not declare an emergency state for the defense of "normal" sexuality. Regarding ecology, Trump pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement and stated: “America will be a manufacturing nation once again, and we have something that no other manufacturing nation will ever have—the largest amount of oil and gas of any country on Earth—and we are going to use it.” To enforce this measure, Trump declared a “national energy emergency” and concluded with his familiar refrain: “We will drill, baby, drill.”

Trump also announced the U.S. withdrawal from the World Health Organization—a measure that could cause enormous suffering if—or rather, when—a new viral epidemic emerges. In the same vein of opposing global cooperation, Trump enacted sweeping immigration executive actions: declaring a national emergency at the U.S. southern border, immediately ending the use of a border app called CBP One (which had allowed migrants to legally enter the United States), and initiating steps to end birthright citizenship.