Donald Trump was born and raised a New Yorker and now seems to be taking his vengeance on his hometown.
The first university targeted for financial punishment based on politics was Columbia, getting the Ivy League school to capitulate almost instantly. Trump’s broader funding cuts for medical research hit hard here, home to so many teaching hospitals.
New York is the center of immigration for America, with the Statue of Liberty in the harbor and our huge pool of foreign-born residents, who have come to make up nearly 40% of the city’s population. Now, Trump and his indiscriminate immigration crackdown threaten the very fabric of this city.
Those who would defend these immigrants in a legal profession that has long been an anchor of our corporate sector are now under threat from Trump’s targeting of big law firms, whom he sees as adversaries in his quest to subjugate the law to his aims. Our significant tax base of Wall Street, which once seemed enthusiastic for the president’s reelection, is now staring down a market crash driven by Trump’s short-sighted tariffs and bashing of the Fed.
We are the national locus of the press, an institution that has borne the brunt of Trump’s repeated attacks, including the legendary CBS News program “60 Minutes,” which faces a spurious lawsuit from the president, who is otherwise aiming his administrative firepower at all insufficiently friendly outlets. Also on the chopping block are cultural institutions that have dared to embrace any programs or offerings that fall under his nebulous and ever-expanding definitions of DEI, as well as institutions that don’t sufficiently toe the line.
All these are things that our city is attract tens of millions of foreign visitors a year, who come to experience our culture and see our sights, or at least they did. Tourism has plummeted as international anger over tariffs and fear over immigration crackdowns makes the country a less and less attractive place to go. Myriad NYC industries, from hotels to souvenir shops to pretty much half of Times Square, and all the people who provide services for those industries, depend on tourism and will suffer as a result.
As they contend with these economic shocks, they’ll also have to contend with health, safety and climate ones, as the Department of Health and Human Services under RFK Jr. and the Environmental Protection Agency under Lee Zeldin decide to step back from their traditional roles and leave us to the wolves.
The city that was so beset by the COVID pandemic now must worry about the rampant spread of other pathogens as the officials in charge of monitoring and responding to disease are fired or reassigned and RFK embarks on his own quixotic and conspiracy-fueled quests, while Zeldin’s affinity for helping the energy sector threatens our air and our resiliency as climate change intensifies.
On all fronts, the city that made Trump’s name is bearing the brunt of his misguided or outright authoritarian leadership. We don’t and never have expected any loyalty from Trump, a man who throws allies under the bus for sport, but we hope at least the city can understand that this once-New Yorker president is no true friend to the greatest city in the world.
