What did Donald Trump do today?

He tried to cheat Americans on their student loans.

The Public Service Student Loan Forgiveness Program was created during the George W. Bush administration to help Americans who went into jobs in the public or non-profit sectors. These jobs, which often provide critical local services like health care, counseling, drug rehabilitation, and education, often pay less than private sector work. Participants who worked in a qualifying job and made payments on the loan for ten years are eligible to have the rest of their loans forgiven.

During his first term, Trump effectively shut down the program through deliberate neglect, slow-walking applications so much that only 7,000 applications were processed in four years. The Biden Administration restored the program.

Today, Trump signed an executive order that, if upheld, would cancel it again—but this time explicitly for employees of organizations he deems "illegal." Neither Trump nor his staff would say what that meant, except that it had something to do with "improper activities" around immigration and "terrorism." 

This appears to mean that Trump will try to exclude people who work for organizations that oppose his immigration policy. That would include virtually every mainstream religious organization in the country, all of the many charities run by those religious groups, the American Red Cross, the American Medical Association, and city and state governments representing more than half of the country.

Why does this matter?

• It's wrong to screw over teachers and nurses who played by the rules of a program established almost 20 years ago.

• Presidents don't get to decide whether American citizens are entitled to the benefits the law provides for.

• Using power to punish citizens you imagine are your enemies is what dictators do.