Dear President Trump,

I could drown you in statistics and facts in an attempt to explain to you why many of your policies are unethical, impractical and abusive, because, honestly, those figures are everywhere.

Out of the seven countries whose citizens you had banned, not even one person had committed a terrorist attack in the U.S. since before 9/11. Your impulsive tweets, which often tend to slam the media for ‘fake news’, are ironically 100% false in themselves. Despite your supposed ‘America first’ stance, the most key members of your campaign and cabinet, including you, have had communication with or strong ties to Russian officials. Those are only three of the many reasons why, for many Americans, your presidency has given birth to a new age of wariness towards the U.S. government and the actions that it has taken.

Unfortunately, it seems that in spite of all the facts that should have deterred you from most of the actions you have taken since you were sworn in, you’ve been irrational and unjustifiable, which is probably why one of your first executive orders was overturned.

I have no idea what spurred you to act the way you did. In just over a month, you have outrightly denied entry to 721 people, including green card holders, who had every right to be in the United States, appointed a secretary of education who knows little to nothing about education, taken away basic rights of the transgender community that you vowed to protect and held an hour-long press conference, after which there were articles even on conservative news outlets questioning your mental health.

As you are the president of America, millions of people want to give you a chance and support you, even though they didn’t during your campaign, but you are giving them no reason to switch sides. In fact, you are making them doubt you even more. It seems that you should know better, but evidently, you just don’t.

Huge proportions of minorities like women, people of color, muslims and the LGBTQ+ community feel unsafe under your leadership, something that, as president, you should be trying to change. Instead, you’d rather do whatever you want and skim over who it could hurt. So no, this will not be a letter that attempts to win you over with reason; unfortunately, your denial of the truth at every turn shows that your administration doesn’t quite respond to fact.

Instead, I am writing this letter to tell you that your efforts to “Make America Great Again” (with a definition of great as warped as Kellyanne Conway’s definition of a fact) will not work. Your vision scares so many of us, which is probably why sales of Orwell’s 1984 are higher than they’ve been in decades.

Your tweets telling people to ignore all criticism of you aren’t going to work; your efforts to turn American into an oppressive regime with you as unquestionable king aren’t going to work. The longer you try to muddle your way through your presidency, the more people recognize you for what you are.

You are closed-minded billionaire whose privilege has blinded him to the needs of anyone who is different than he is. You are an abusive leader who preyed on a mistreated working class to get himself elected, and who prefers to respond to the world by building walls rather than embracing it.

Still, more and more people see that as time goes by, and the realisation dawning on this country is beautiful to witness.

It is beautiful to see millions around America march in peaceful protest on your first day as president to tell you that you can’t take away their rights.

It is beautiful to see #ResistFromDayOne and #NotMyPresident trending on Twitter.

It is beautiful to see teenagers like me feel like we can have an effect in a world of politics that we can’t even vote in for another few years.

It is just absolutely beautiful to see people all over the country and the world come together, rise above your station, and send you a clear message: you do not represent us and you never will. Us together, protesting against you: that is what democracy looks like.

Finally, I would like to write about me. It is myself that truly convinces me that no change you make will be lasting, and nothing you do will change what this country is.

I know this because I am not a democrat or a U.S. citizen. I am just an adolescent that happened to move the the U.S. six months ago and who really has no major reason to care about the political situation here.

You made me care. You tore families apart, turned away innocent people who were just chasing the American dream and put unacceptable fear into the minorities that make this country what it is.

Your rise to power truly inspires me, not to be like you, but to be a person who is capable of helping to stop people like you from coming to power, wherever in the world that may happen. And I know that if you can inspire me to want to do something, there are countless others who want to resist your tyranny as well.

Ironically, it is you who is the one convincing people like me that you aren’t a good leader. It is you who is demonstrating that when a leader insults certain communities of people over and over again, he won’t protect them. You are the one who is setting yourself up to lose the presidency in four years by disregarding almost half of the American people.

I implore you to see and recognize that soon, so you can at least attempt to turn this country back into the minority-friendly, inclusive place that it once was rather than continuing to tear it further apart.

Sincerely,

Anika Bahl