Around five dozen people showed up Monday for a local version of the National Day of Protest on President’s Day, held at Liberty Square in Mathews County.
The group in Mathews used the occasion primarily to share information about the impact that measures proposed by the current administration could have on local residents. In other places the event was primarily a protest against the actions of the Trump administration.
Constitutional crisis
Kent Willis spoke of a Constitutional crisis that “may be developing” in the U.S., in which President Trump has issued executive orders being challenged through the court system as unconstitutional. Willis said the orders have set up a question for the Supreme Court to answer about the intersection between the power of Congress and the power of the president.
A case expected to be heard this week could signal future decisions by the court, said Willis. In that case, Hampton Dellinger, head of the Office of Special Counsel, is challenging his termination by the president on the grounds that he runs an independent agency protected by law from dismissals by the president, except “in cases of neglect of duty, malfeasance or inefficiency.”
School funding
Mathews County School Board member Linda Hodges said that the U.S. Department of Education is under threat of elimination, and she spoke about what the department does in Mathews schools.
Federal funding, about 3 percent of the total budget, funds the Head Start, Special Education, Title I, and career and technical education programs, she said. The federal government also oversees performance measurement and enforces laws governing schools, she said, for example, interceding for a child in a wheelchair who might need special accommodations.
Adult literacy and high school equivalency are federally funded, said Hodges, along with Pell Grants, financial aid, and work-study programs for college students.
Farmers
Peggy Newsome spoke of the impact of the administration’s policies on farmers. As the daughter of a farmer and granddaughter of a rancher, she said she’s worried about what will be done to the agricultural community, which annually supports over a million jobs and creates more than $200 billion in economic activity.
The administration’s “drastic dismantling of agencies, freezing of grants, and breaking of contracts” is already affecting cotton and grain growers, said Newsome. They’re losing contracts with longtime Canadian buyers because “Canadian buyers don’t trust the stability of U.S. export commerce under this administration.”
Cancellation of the U.S. Agency for International Development cuts $2 billion “straight out of farmers’ pockets,” she said, adding that food that’s already been paid for with taxpayer funds is “sitting at docks spoiling while people starve.”
Is broadband at risk?
Sheila Crowley spoke about programs that will be at risk in Mathews if federal funding is cut, including a child care program that relies on federal child care subsidies, Meals on Wheels, and a much-anticipated federal grant to fund universal broadband coverage.
A Congressional resolution that outlines the priorities for spending focuses on tax cuts, completing the border wall, and cutting mandatory spending to help pay for the tax cuts, said Crowley. She said Medicaid and food stamps are the two programs most likely to be impacted to help fund those initiatives.
Crowley said nearly 10 percent of the Mathews population relies on food stamp and SNAP benefits, and that Virginia overall has “a lot of Medicaid recipients.”
Audience members were given an opportunity to speak, as well, and Bill Naquin, Debbie Krahn and Molly Hoffman all spoke about protecting the rights of LGBTQ and transgender people, while Dean Gill urged everyone to avoid despair, continue to believe in “the ideas that made this country great,” support the rights of those seeking to come to the U.S. to find freedom, and support Ukraine in its fight against Russia.
