The following is a timeline of instances of extremism in the Trump administration in May 2018.
President Trump has opened the White House doors to extremism, not only consulting with hate groups on policies that erode our country’s civil rights protections but enabling the infiltration of extremist ideas into the administration’s rhetoric and agenda.
Once relegated to the fringes, the radical right now has a toehold in the White House.
Groups and individuals referenced in the list below are not associated with hate groups and extremist ideology unless indicated by a hate group profile.
Vice President Mike Pence calls former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio a "tireless champion of strong borders and the rule of law.”
Trump administration ends Temporary Protected Status for 57,000 Hondurans.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions announces DHS will separate children from parents at border.
White House Chief of Staff John Kelly says immigrants are "not people that would easily assimilate into the United States, into our modern society."
HHS prepares to make site visits to military bases, where it says it will shelter migrant children.
Tony Perkins, head of the anti-LGBT, anti-Muslim hate group Family Research Council, appointed to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.
President Trump says, “We have people coming into the country, or trying to come in — we’re stopping a lot of them. You wouldn’t believe how bad these people are. These aren’t people, these are animals."
Attorney General Jeff Sessions curtails "administrative closings" of immigration court cases, referring them instead to himself to rule on directly.
Doubling down on President Trump's comment, White House releases a statement headlined, “What you need to know about the violent animals of MS-13,” repeating the word "animals" nine more times.
Contradicting settled law, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos suggests that whether to report undocumented students to ICE is "a school decision. That’s a local community decision."
President Trump says in New York that migrant children "look so innocent. They're not innocent," and reiterated his claim that "They're not people. These are animals."
Former White House aide Stephen Bannon says "Martin Luther King would be proud" of President Trump.
President Trump suggests the U.S. eliminate courts and judges in the immigration system in favor of "what's called security, people. People who stand there and say you can't come in."
President Trump suggests in an interview that players who refuse to stand for the national anthem "shouldn't be in the country."
Ronald Mortenson, a fellow at the anti-immigrant hate group Center for Immigration Studies, nominated to be assistant secretary for the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration.
Referencing his comments earlier in the month, President Trump exhorts crowd at rally to yell "Animals!" and says "They're not human beings."
John Bolton taps Fred Fleitz, senior vice president of the anti-Muslim hate group Center for Security Policy, to be his chief of staff at NSC.
