Something that has made me think recently has been Donald Trump's attempt to change a body of water. I never thought that something like this could cause such a big issue in our world and yet here we are. According to (ap news) The Associated Press, people in Trump's administration started to scratch the term Gulf of Mexico and instead use Gulf of America. They used this in things like public statements and even press releases.
Ap states, “It is a fact that the body of water off the coast of Louisiana is called the Gulf of America,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Feb. 12. “It’s very important to this administration that we get that right, not just for people here at home, but also for the rest of the world.”
Trumo, for some reason, was under the impression that people would start to use this term even though people have been saying Gulf of Mexico for so every it's very widely established. All a sudden, just changing a body of water's name because the president wants to, and then expect everyone else to use it is crazy. Just because the reporters did not want to and refused to say Gulf of America, they were banished from going to the white house to cover events. Simply just because they didn't use the term Gulf of America, I believe that this is such a random and strange move by Trump, as this is limiting access to journalists access b/c they won't change their language.
This is limiting what Americans are getting access to, as not all reporters are unable to access the same stuff and information from the white house. This seems like this is hindering our First Amendment rights as the government is controlling what information we can get in order by how we comply with what he said. (and something crazy at that, that doesn't even matter). When this came before a judge the final verdict of what was decided was that this is an infringement on our First Amendment as our rights, we are being limited on what we can and can't say. The ruling of the Court gives me a sliver of Hope that the use of checks and balances are being honored in the US.
https://apnews.com/article/trump-gulf-of-mexico-bc438f4feca1234475a1adef99344da7
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/gulf-of-america-day-2025/
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp820m733p3o
4 comments:
This is such a bizarre example of how far political branding can go. Renaming a geographical feature just to fit a narrative, and then punishing journalists who don’t comply, feels like something out of satire. I like how you pointed out the real danger here, how its not just about the name, but about restricting press access and shaping public language. The First Amendment ruling is reassuring, but the fact that this even made it to court says a lot about how fragile our freedoms can become when power is unchecked. Nice job tying back this strange story back to a bigger issue.
I think it's kind of concerning that the current administration is focusing on this when there are bigger issues happening in America right now. Preventing journalists from entering the White House because they won't follow this new name seems like a pretty serious first amendment violation, because the freedom of the press if so important to maintaining America's democracy.
I think the changing of the name is a disgrace. The Gulf of Mexico is majority Mexican coastline anyway so I don't know why we would try to take credit for it. America is very much intertwined with Mexican culture based off the proximity so that makes a lot of Americans also Mexican and vise versa. Having the Gulf of Mexico as a symbol of our collectiveness was nice but since Trump started issues by claiming it as Americas', it's starting tensions between Americans and Mexicans, when we are all from the same Land! It's really petty from Trump.
I never really thought about how naming a body of water could become a constitutional issue. It serves as a clear example of how both the constitution and the check and balances system is set up to protect even small infringements on rights. The court ruling is a small but powerful example of how the checks and balances in our government are still working. Like in the many SCOTUS cases we discussed in class, this illustrates how the 1st amendment is a powerful tool in protecting our individual rights. Although this is a very minor situation in comparison to much larger current issues, it still serves to demonstrate how the government is set up to protect us against oversteps of power.
Post a Comment