Trump: Administration will ‘keep our children healthy and strong’

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Children’s health will remain a priority for the administration of President Donald J. Trump.

On March 4, the president addressed a joint session of Congress to outline his vision for the next four years. Along with economic policies, federal regulatory authorities and border policies, he mentioned health care and the efforts of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, to end childhood illness and disease.

Childhood health

President Donald J. Trump
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Trump referred to D.J. Daniel, 13, an attendee who was diagnosed with brain cancer in 2018. Daniel was given five months to live, but has survived and has been sworn in as an honorary law enforcement officer, fulfilling his career dream. The president said he would ask Secret Service Director Sean Curran to make Daniel an agent.

Daniel’s “doctors believe his cancer likely came from a chemical he was exposed to when he was younger,” the president said.

“Since 1975, rates of child cancer have increased by more than 40 percent,” the president said. “Reversing this trend is one of the top priorities for our new presidential commission to make America healthy again, chaired by our new Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

“Our goal is to get toxins out of our environment, poisons out of our food supply and keep our children healthy and strong,” Trump said. “As an example, not long ago, and you can't even believe these numbers, one in 10,000 children had autism, one in 10,000. And now it's one in 36. There's something wrong. One in 36, think of that.

“So we're going to find out what it is and there's nobody better than Bobby and all of the people that are working with you,” the president said. “You have the best, to figure out what is going on. OK, Bobby, good luck. It's a very important job.”

‘No mandate’

The audience at times was raucous and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) had Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) ejected from the chamber due to his comments relating to health care.

“He has no mandate to cut Medicaid,” Green said, as recorded by NBC News.

Green later told that outlet: “This whole budget that he has is one that is going to cause Medicaid to be cut, and when he said he had a mandate, it triggered something. It really did. Because he doesn’t have a mandate, and he doesn’t have a mandate to cut health care from poor people."

Opioid epidemic

Trump mentioned United States trade deficits with Mexico and Canada and those nations’ lax enforcement of the illegal drug trade. His address took place on the same day new American trade tariffs were to take effect, and the president mentioned taxes on imported goods as part of his economic policy.

“But even more importantly, they have allowed fentanyl to come into our country at levels never seen before, killing hundreds of thousands of our citizens,” the president said. “And many very young, beautiful people, destroying families. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. They are, in fact, receiving subsidies of hundreds of billions of dollars. We pay subsidies to Canada and to Mexico of hundreds of billions of dollars, and the United States will not be doing that any longer."

WHO and other policies

Trump mentioned his actions involving various government actions including withdrawing “the corrupt World Health Organization,” which prompted applause from the crowd.

The president also touted his executive orders banning public schools from indoctrinating children with transgender ideology and cutting off taxpayer funding to any institution that engages in sexual mutilation of youth. He called for Congress to pass a bill permanently banning and criminalizing sex changes on children “and forever ending the lie that any child is trapped in the wrong body.”

Elderly, old and ancient

The president also referred to Americans’ health in a roundabout way when discussing Social Security. Government databases list 4.7 million Social Security numbers aged 100 to 109 years old, 3.6 million from ages 110 to 119 years, 3.47 million people aged 120 to 129 years, 3.9 million people aged 130 to 139 years, and 3.5 million people aged 140 to 149, 1.3 million people aged 150 to 159, and more than 130,000 people aged 160 years or older.

“We have a healthier country than I thought, Bobby,” Trump said. He added that records show 1,039 people aged 220 to 229 years, a person aged 240 to 249 years, and one person 360 years, “more than 100 years older than our country,” the president said.

“But we’re going to find out where that money’s going and it’s not going to be pretty,” Trump said. “By slashing all of the fraud, waste and theft, we can find we will defeat inflation, bring down mortgage rates, lower car payments and grocery prices, protect our seniors and put more money in the pockets of American families.”