A large debate of geopolitical criticism and controversy sparked last night when our 47th president, Donald J. Trump, signed a new executive order that changed the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. This new change took immediate effect on many platforms in the United States such as Google Earth and Google Maps for which they had to say this about the change: “People using Maps in the U.S. will see ‘Gulf of America,’ and people in Mexico will see ‘Gulf of Mexico.’ Everyone else will see both names.” This geographical change has also caused the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to announce that they too will be updating its data and charts to reflect the commander-in-chief’s new change.
In regard to the FAA’s announcements of changes the Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy took to X (formerly Twitter): “In line with my commitment to restoring sanity to @USDOT, the FAA will resume using the term ‘Notice to Airmen’ instead of ‘Notice to Air Missions.’ Also, pilot charts will now reference the Gulf of America and Mt. McKinley. Thanks to President Trump, we are taking back our language, our history, and our country.”
This decision has left many people divided on whether our president is using his authority to focus on issues that don’t feel beneficial to much larger international and domestic issues while on the other hand, the White House has stated that “the area formerly known as the Gulf of Mexico has long been an integral asset to our once burgeoning nation and has remained an indelible part of America.” They concluded this statement by noting, “The Gulf will continue to play a pivotal role in shaping America’s future and the global economy, and in recognition of this flourishing economic resource and its critical importance to our nation’s economy and its people, I am directing that it officially be renamed the Gulf of America.”
After interviewing some very insightful students and one professor I concluded that both supporters and opposers of President Donald Trump alike are not very keen on this new executive order that’s been signed into place. One student Jacob Orsannes expresses his concern over how this impact by saying” He’s trying to dominate as much as possible and there’s going to be a president right after him.” This viewpoint is important to look at due to the serious and changes that are being made under this new administration and could potentially lead to a huge “cleanup” job for the next president to take office. A mutual concern that has been observed from both parties is that this is just a display of power and after interviewing construction instructor, Raymond Jubal, he had this insight to provide on the matter: “The United States is a place in the world that is a dominant power.” Then Jubal goes on to state later, “I don’t want to pretend that we don’t live in a world where you know, national dominance and national politics don’t dominate the international scene but I definitely think it’s a power move.”
These two standpoints are both very important and impactful due to the serious matter it’s taking by one standpoint points out the existing problems of politicians seemingly ignoring larger global and domestic issues and while the other is pointing out the aspect of how a historical shift such as the name change of the formerly known Gulf of Mexico is significant in recognizing our the history as well as future of our countries economy.
