Tag: jcpoa

Week 128 in Trump

Posted on July 10, 2019 in Politics, Trump

The billionaire most vilified by the right and the billionaire most vilified by the left have joined forces to end what they call “forever war.” Yes, George Soros and Charles Koch are creating a think tank to work on coming up with diplomatic solutions instead of using bombs and threats. That they’re working together on this underscores just how important they think it is, and it’s something most of us can get behind. And if they can come together, maybe the rest of us from opposite ends of the spectrum can start to do the same. Maybe?

Here’s what else happened in politics for the week ending July 7…

Missing From Last Week:

  1. Illinois becomes the 11th state to decriminalize marijuana, and will vacate around 800,000 previous convictions.

Russia:

  1. A new study underscores the success of the Russian disinformation campaign in the 2016 presidential campaigns. The study found a direct correlation between Trump’s popularity and the social media activity of Russian trolls and bots. For every 25,000 retweets, Trump’s popularity moved up 1%. The Russian activity didn’t have much of an effect on Clinton’s popularity.
    • For comparison, Trump won by 0.7% in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, and by 0.3% in Michigan.
    • Reminder: Correlation doesn’t equal causation; but given that the election hinged on 75,000 votes across three states, there’s a strong likelihood that there was an effect on our elections.
  1. One of Trump’s campaign consultants is taking a page from the Russian disinformation playbook and now runs several fake websites spoofing Democratic presidential campaigns. He also runs a Republican political consulting firm. Seriously folks. Learn how to discern real websites from fake ones. Your country is depending on you.

Legal Fallout:

  1. The House Ways and Means Committee sues the Treasury and IRS for Trump’s tax returns. The lawsuit alleges that Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig “have mounted an extraordinary attack on the authority of Congress to obtain information needed to conduct oversight of Treasury, the IRS, and the tax laws on behalf of the American people who participate in the Nation’s voluntary tax system.”
  2. The House Ethics Committee opens an investigation into Representative Matt Gaetz (R-Florida) essentially for witness tampering. Gaetz threatened Michael Cohen the night before Cohen’s testimony to the House Oversight Committee, saying he was going to release embarrassing personal information about Cohen.
  3. Officials arrest child molester and trafficker Jeff Epstein, charging him with new sex trafficking charges.
    • You might remember that Acting Labor Secretary Alex Acosta gave Epstein a sweet plea deal for similar charges in Florida where Epstein basically ended up pleading out to far lesser counts of soliciting prostitution. Epstein was actually trafficking and molesting underage girls.
    • As part of that deal, Epstein also could pretty much come and go from prison as he pleased during his short sentence.
    • Acosta is now Trump’s nominee to be Labor Secretary.
    • This could have far-reaching implications given the number of high-power, wealth men who hung around with Epstein.

Healthcare:

  1. A federal judge temporarily blocks Ohio’s fetal heartbeat law, which bans abortions after six weeks of pregnancy.
    • The term “fetal heartbeat” is a misnomer, because at six weeks a fetus doesn’t have a formed heart.
    • What is detectable at six weeks is a flurry of electrical impulses in the area where the heart will eventually form.
    • These impulses aren’t audible, even with a stethoscope.
  1. The AMA sues the state of North Dakota over their Compelled Reversal Mandate law. The law forces doctors to tell their patients that a medication-induced abortion is reversible if they don’t finish their course of pills. This is false and unscientific, and it forces doctors to breach their Hippocratic oath.

International:

  1. Iran says they now have more low-enriched uranium than the limit allowed by the JCPOA (the Iran deal). Up until Trump withdrew the U.S. from the deal, and even for a while after, Iran followed the conditions of the deal.
    • Europe has been trying to work around the U.S. sanctions, and now Iran says they’ll restart working toward weapons-grade uranium if Europe doesn’t offer them a deal.
  1. Protests continue in Hong Kong against the Chinese extradition bill, which has since been suspended. Things get more heated this week as protestors ransack and occupy Hong Kong’s Legislative Council chambers, and police end up using tear gas.
  2. Days after Trump paid a “surprise” visit to North Korea to meet briefly with Kim Jong-Un, North Korea accuses Trump of lying. While he’s pushing the public narrative that the two countries have an open dialog, North Korea claims he’s also “hell-bent” on hostile acts.
  3. Brexit party leader Nigel Farage says it’s more important to Brexit from the EU, deal or no deal, than it is to keep the United Kingdom together.
    • Both of Farage’s kids are German citizens and he’s applied for German citizenship himself. If successful, he’ll still be a citizen of the EU. Filing this one under “Hypocrite.”
    • Meanwhile, about 40% of the citizens of the UK are so worried about the aftermath of Brexit that they’re stockpiling food and supplies. Businesses warn of shortages coming up within the next few weeks.
    • The Scottish government pushes for a second referendum on separating from the UK and remaining part of the EU.
  1. When asked about his relationships with dictators, Trump tells reporters, “I get along with everybody. Except you people, actually… I get along with President Putin. I get along with Mohammad from Saudi Arabia. President Erdogan, he’s tough but I get along with him.”
  2. Someone leaks cables from UK’s ambassador to the United States, which reveal that the ambassador has called Trump incompetent, inept, and insecure. He also says conflicts within the White House are like “knife fights.” The White House says they will no longer deal with this ambassador.
  3. We’re not the only country that treats refugees with callousness. European counties have been deporting refugees back to Libyan detention camps, placing them in the middle of a war zone. This week, an airstrike kills 53 migrants being held in Tripoli.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. While the Senate is blocking nearly every piece of legislation put in front of them, here’s a taste of what the House has passed, all while pursuing investigations into Russia, obstruction, and corruption (yes, lawmakers and walk and chew gum at the same time):
    • HR1, For the People Act: One of the most sweeping election reform bills to ensure voting rights and give power back to the people.
    • HR5, Equality Act: A bill to protect the rights of our LGBTQ brothers and sisters in the areas of employment, housing, education, loans, and the jury system, among others.
    • HR6, American Dream and Promise Act: A bill to protect DACA recipients and those with Temporary Protected Status, and to provide them with a pathway to citizenship.
    • HR7, Paycheck Fairness Act: Equal pay for equal work. Note that this doesn’t say that if my husband makes X, I should make X. It says if my colleague who does the same job as me with the same experience and productivity makes X, then I should also make X.
    • HR8, Gun Violence Protection Act: Closes loopholes that allow gun sales without background checks. In other words, mandates universal background checks.
    • HR9, Climate Action Now Act: Requires the president to provide an annual plan for how the U.S. will meet its promises under the Paris Agreement.
    • HR 1644, Save the Internet Act: A bill to restore the FCC’s net neutrality rules, keeping the internet free and open, and preventing internet service providers from price-gouging customers or throttling bandwidth.
    • HR 1585, Violence Against Women Act: This is just a re-authorization of an existing act that improved criminal justice and community responses for victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking. Why does this even need to be reauthorized? Why isn’t it permanent? And why won’t Republicans reauthorize it?
    • 10 bills to lower healthcare and drug prices.
  1. In fact, the House has passed 180 bills, most of which are dead in the Senate. These include a number of bills to help veterans, to mitigate the effects of climate change, to protect women’s rights, and more.
  2. House Democrats fold in a fight with Senate Republicans over emergency funding for the humanitarian crisis (caused by us) at the border. Republicans refused to approve additional requirements for how CBP treats detainees, along with these requirements for refugees:
    • Basic medical care
    • Basic nutrition, water, and hygiene
    • Translators at ICE, CBP, and Citizenship and Immigration Services
  1. Michigan Representative Justin Amash leaves the Republican Party after resigning from the House Freedom Caucus over lack of motivation to impeach Trump. Amash is one of the more conservatives members of Congress, and is a founding members of the Freedom Caucus. He might run for president as a Libertarian.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. A federal judge orders CBP to allow medical personnel into detention centers holding immigrant minors to ensure the children are in a safe and sanitary environment.
  2. CBP has not been having a great couple of weeks. Last week, a group of immigration lawyers reported on squalid and unhygienic conditions in an immigrant detention facility. This week they try to repair their image by cleaning things up and inviting some journalists for a visit, but they don’t let them talk to the kids.
  3. But then, a disastrous report containing the findings of the DHS inspector general‘s investigation into detention centers is publicized.
    • The report talks about standing-room-only quarters, no access to showers (they were given wet wipes instead), and no hot meals (just bologna sandwiches). Some children were given hot meals once inspectors arrived.
    • The report also warned DHS two months ago that conditions at a specific facility in El Paso had gotten so bad that agents there were gearing up for possible riots. There were four showers available for 756 detainees, more than half of whom were being held outdoors. Inside was five times past capacity, people couldn’t lay down to sleep, and temperatures were above 80 degrees.
    • DHS Secretary Kevin McAleenan disputes his own inspector general’s report.
  1. And then, ProPublica releases messages from a Border Patrol Facebook page that are extremely racist and misogynistic.
    • Former and current agents joke about immigrant deaths and photoshop a picture to show Trump forcing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to give him head.
    • There are 9,600 members on the page, and these are the guys who are taking care of vulnerable women and children. Yay.
    • It’s easy to see why the CBP has trouble hiring and retaining female agents.
  1. And then, we find out that CBP has known about this page for years and has dealt with complaints on the posts before.
  2. And then (yes, there’s more), it leaks that Border Patrol agents tried to humiliate a male Honduran migrant by making walk past detainees holding a sign that said “I like men.”
  3. Members of Congress visit detention centers, including the above-mentioned AOC (who said women in detention told her that border patrol officers told them to drink water out of the toilet). Understandably, the congressional members questioned whether they were actually safe visiting the centers. Democratic presidential candidates have also visited facilities.
  4. The Trump administration gives in on adding a citizenship question to the 2020 Census.
    • But then, the DOJ announces that they’re looking into ways to add it, per Trump’s request. Trump floats the idea of delaying the Census (he can’t), or adding the question through an executive order.
    • This leads the judge in the case to call an emergency meeting with lawyers from both sides of the case. For an uncomfortable read, here’s the laughable transcript of the DOJ lawyers trying to explain the change of plan to the judge, though they don’t have a new plan.
    • And now, the DOJ is trying to replace the current lawyers in the case. So either the current lawyers objected to the new tactics or they’ve just lost credibility because of the chaos from the White House.
    • DOJ lawyers are now scrambling to come up with a legal justification for adding the citizenship question. Attorney General William Barr believes there’s a way. Which tells me he is ignoring a boatload of evidence about the reasons behind the question.
  1. Trump plans to end the practice of having court interpreters for immigrants and asylum seekers at their initial hearings. What could go wrong?
  2. The Trump administration prepares to launch a panel focused on “natural law and natural rights.” The panel will advise Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on human rights. This is an issue because “natural law and natural rights” typically means anti-LGBTQ rights.
  3. A federal judge blocks Trump’s attempt to deny asylum seekers timely bonding hearings and detain them longer. If Trump had been allowed to go forward with this plan, it would’ve meant indefinite detention. Which is crazy when you think of how overcrowded the detention centers already are.
  4. DHS fines some undocumented immigrants nearly $500,000 for failing to leave the U.S. ICE says that under the law they can find people $500 per day for each day they are in violation of an order to leave, and immigration lawyers say they’ve never seen that clause used like this.
  5. Trump again threatens major ICE raids and deportations after July 4th, saying he’ll deport all undocumented immigrants because “that’s what we do.”
  6. A pregnant Alabama woman got in a fight with another woman that resulted in the other woman shooting her in the stomach, causing her to lose the pregnancy. A grand jury refuses to indict the shooter (it seems they thought it was self defense), but they did indict the pregnant woman for putting herself in a position where her fetus could be harmed. So she was arrested. After a boatload of backlash over it, the DA decides not to prosecute and releases here. Talk about personhood laws run amok.
  7. After the American women’s soccer team wins the World Cup, the fans break into echoing chants of “Equal pay! Equal pay!”

Climate:

  1. Anchorage, Alaska, sets an all-time heat record this week, reaching 90 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s five degrees hotter than ever previously recorded there. Other cities across Alaska set their own heat records as well.

Budget/Economy:

  1. As a means to push oil prices back up, OPEC agrees to continue production cuts for 9 more months. They state the following reasons: trade tensions, central bank policies, increased U.S. production, and “geopolitical issues.”
  2. Because of a long-lasting subsidy dispute between Boeing and Airbus, Trump adds more EU products to the list of items to be subject to new tariffs.
  3. 77% of publicly traded companies issue warning ahead of their earnings announcements, saying they won’t make their expected numbers. But it doesn’t seem to hurt their stock prices; U.S. stock markets hit new highs this week.
  4. Morgan Stanley analysts warn of a coming recession, but we’ve been hearing this for more than a year now, so take it with whatever grain of salt you’re comfortable with.
  5. Global manufacturing numbers for June are in. They were weaker; in fact they were at their weakest since October 2012. New orders contracted sharply.
    • This could partly be from the impact of all the newly imposed tariffs, and this could reverse if there’s really a truce.
  1. May’s job numbers were low enough to give economists a little scare (72,000), but June’s numbers bounced back up to 224,000.
  2. People of color are finally starting to reap the benefits of a tight job market, and the unemployment gap between white people and people of color is beginning to shrink.
  3. An analysis of last year’s tax returns finds that around 2/3 of Americans paid less in taxes and 6% paid more (I was one of those lucky ones).
    • Refunds for people making between $100,000 and $250,000 dropped, but rose for people making between $250,000 and $500,000 (which could be from the change in withholding rules).
    • Even though the IRS was more lenient in handing out penalties for underpayment, the penalties they did impose were higher.
    • Note that these numbers don’t include taxpayers who filed for an extension, who tend to be higher-income with more complicated returns.
    • The tax rate dropped for all income brackets, and no income bracket below $500,000 in income reached a 20% rate. And even the average of the highest earners didn’t reach 30%.
    • The number of people using the standard deduction instead of itemizing jumped by 70%.
    • The AMT was essentially removed for households with incomes under $1 million.

Elections:

  1. After Kamala Harris talked about being bussed to desegregated schools, Donald Trump Jr. shared a tweet questioning whether Harris was black enough to talk about the issues facing black Americans. This fits in with the latest right-wing attack on Harris that she isn’t really black because her father is Jamaican and her mother is Indian. Sorry hon, that lady is black.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Trump decides he wants to insert himself into the annual 4th of July celebration on the National Mall in DC. The last time a sitting president spoke on the National Mall on July 4th was nearly 70 years ago, when Truman marked the 175th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
    • So Trump hosts a 4th of July ceremony, a Salute to America, where he gives a speech with military tanks and a military flyover. It looks like it could get rained out, and many are concerned that Trump will make the 4th all about himself, but after a rain delay, he mostly sticks to the teleprompter and doesn’t go too far off the rails.
    • The National Park Service is forced to divert $2.5 million in park fees to help fund Trump’s display.
    • The White House reserves VIP tickets to Trump’s 4th of July event for major Republican donors and political appointees.
  1. The White House hires Breitbart’s White House correspondent to the office of Domestic Policy Council.
  2. California has it’s largest earthquake in years, which is followed up the next day by another quake 11 times stronger than the first one. The earthquakes are centered in Ridgecrest, a town near the China Lake Naval Weapons Center, which is no longer mission capable and is evacuated because of the quakes. There have been thousands of aftershocks, and the quakes left a huge fissure in the Mojave desert. The governor declares a state of emergency.

Tweet of the Week:

This tweet captures the citizenship question chaos:

The DOJ gave up on this yesterday, but then President Crazy Train issued a tweet that required a federal judge to call the DOJ to the carpet to demand an explanation, and they don’t have one.”

I wish I knew who it was, because that crazy train takes another turn this week.

Week 67 in Trump

Posted on May 7, 2018 in Politics, Trump

Here’s how fast things change from week to week. From Peter Baker of the New York Times:

“As of last week, the American public had been told that President Trump’s doctor had certified he would be the “the healthiest individual ever elected.” That the president was happy with his legal team and would not hire a new lawyer. That he did not know about the $130,000 payment to a former pornographic film actress who claimed to have had an affair with him.

As of this week, it turns out that the statement about his health was not actually from the doctor but had been dictated by Mr. Trump himself. That the president has split with the leaders of his legal team and hired the same new lawyer he had denied recruiting. And that Mr. Trump himself financed the $130,000 payment intended to buy the silence of the actress known as Stormy Daniels.”

Also, ICYMI, you should change your Twitter password.

Here’s what happened last week in politics…

Russia:

  1. The New York Time obtains a list of questions that Mueller supposedly wants to ask the president. The questions turn out to be written by Trump’s legal team (specifically Jay Sekulow) after Mueller gave them the topics he wants to talk about.
  2. But still, Trump tries to use the questions as proof that Mueller isn’t looking into collusion… even though several of the questions are about collusion.
  3. The leaked questions apparently came from the Trump team, who is blaming the leak on Mueller, which is unlikely because Mueller’s team has probably never seen this list.
  4. At any rate, the president’s team says this proves that Mueller has overreached the scope of his investigation even though they aren’t Mueller’s questions.
  5. Trump’s lead attorney John Dowd (now resigned) says that Mueller recently brought up the idea of subpoenaing Trump if he refuses to appear. In response, Trump says Mueller is trying to set him up and trap him.
  6. Ty Cobb announces his retirement as White House Counsel, and Emmet Flood will replace him. Flood was an impeachment lawyer for Bill Clinton in the 90s.
  7. No one in Trump’s current legal team has the security clearances needed to discuss sensitive issues should Trump meet with Mueller. John Dowd, who left in March, was the only one on the team who had the needed clearance.
  8. Cambridge Analytica closes its operations after losing clients and facing steep legal fees. The company is accused of misusing Facebook data to influence the 2016 elections in the U.S. and to influence the Brexit vote in the UK.
  9. But then we learn that Rebekah and Jennifer Mercer have already joined a new data company, Emerdata, as directors. The Mercers were the money behind Cambridge Analytica, and Emerdata is owned by Cambridge Analytica’s parent company. The CEO and other members of Cambridge Analytica have also moved over to Emerdata. It seems they’re just rebranding Cambridge Analytica as Emerdata.
  10. UK regulators order Cambridge Analytica to release the information they scraped about a U.S. voter along with details on how they obtained the data and what they did with it. The voter requested the information under UK laws, getting around the U.S. system that doesn’t provide the means to obtain this data. It’s possible we could all force Cambridge Analytica to give us this information about our own data.
  11. In a round of media interviews, Rudy Giuliani says:
    • Trump is immune from being subpoenaed in a criminal proceeding (something the Supreme Court has not yet supported—the court tends to reject efforts to protect the president this way).
    • Jeff Sessions and Rod Rosenstein should redeem themselves by ending the special counsel’s investigation.
    • FBI agents are like Nazi stormtroopers.
  1. The judge in Paul Manafort’s trial questions why Mueller’s investigation into Manafort falls under his jurisdiction but the investigation into Michael Cohen doesn’t. He wonders if Mueller is just trying to squeeze Manafort for information about Trump.
  2. None of the above means the judge thinks Manafort isn’t guilty; he just raises the possibility of sending the case down to a state prosecutor.
  3. Mueller puts in a request for 70 blank subpoenas in the Manafort case.
  4. Mueller also requests a 60-day postponement in Michael Flynn’s sentencing.
  5. Devin Nunes didn’t bother to read a document turned over to him by the DOJ after Nunes threatened impeachment against Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray. The 2-page document contains the evidence used by the DOJ and FBI to open the Russia investigation (not the same as the Steele dossier, BTW).
  6. And now Nunes wants to hold Jeff Sessions in contempt of Congress for not releasing classified documents to Nunes committee, which is investigating FISA abuses.
  7. Rod Rosenstein responds to the articles of impeachment drawn up against him by the House Freedom Caucus by saying that the DOJ won’t be extorted and that threats won’t stop him from doing his job.
  8. We learn that after Trump agreed to sell the Ukraine missiles to help in their fight against Russia last year, the Ukraine stopped cooperating with the Mueller investigation and they halted their own investigation into Paul Manafort.
  9. Demonstrators across Russia rally to protest Vladimir Putin’s inauguration. Nearly 1,600 protesters are arrested, including Putin’s most prominent opponent, Alexei Navalny.

Courts/Justice:

Apparently the Justice Department has been too busy fighting congressional subpoenas to get anything done this week.

Healthcare:

  1. Tom Price, former Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, says that last year’s tax reform will raise health insurance costs because it repealed the individual mandate. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) agrees, saying average premiums will increase by around 10% per year more than if the mandate remained in place. This will amount to about an 18% increase this year, according to the Urban Institute.
  2. Whoops! Tom Price later walks those statements back, saying repealing the mandate was absolutely the right thing to do.
  3. The Urban Institute also predicts that getting rid of the mandate, along with other changes like allowing substandard policies, will cost the federal government $33 billion per year MORE to insure 6.4 million FEWER people.
  4. Four million fewer people are already uninsured compared to this time in 2016.
  5. Iowa passes the “Fetal Heartbeat” bill, making most abortions illegal after about 6 weeks (or once a heartbeat is detected). Many women don’t even know they’re pregnant at this point.
  6. Because it’s not enough that fentanyl added to heroine led to a massive increase in overdoses, dealers are also adding fentanyl to cocaine. Cocaine deaths have been rising as dealers target drug users who are trying to avoid opiates. Many states don’t keep record of this kind of drug combination, but in Connecticut where they do track it, cocaine+fentanyl deaths rose 420% over the past three years.
  7. Trump says he’ll appoint Dr. Mehmet Oz to the Sport, Fitness, and Nutrition council.

International:

  1. In a public presentation to the Israeli Defense Ministry, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that Iran has lied about its nuclear weapons program. The information he presents is from 1999-2003, a time when we pretty much knew Iran was lying about their program, but the presentation seems aimed at making us think they’ve broken the Iran deal, which Netanyahu wants Trump to dump.
    My 2 cents? Leaving the agreement frees up Iran to develop whatever nuclear program they want, and we will have given them back $1.7 billion worth of previously frozen assets to do it. What kind of deal is that?
  2. We learn that Trump aides hired Israeli private investigators last year to find dirt on key members of the Obama administration who were responsible for negotiating the Iran deal, including national security advisors Ben Rhodes and Colin Kahl. One thing they were trying to find is whether either Rhodes or Kahl had benefited personally or professionally from the deal (which IMO reveals more about Trump than it does about Rhodes or Kahl).
  3. Kahl reveals a mysterious attempt from a UK company last year to contact his wife about a school she volunteers with. The company’s website has since been taken down, and Kahl thinks it was part of the above investigation.
  4. The Israeli investigators hired by Trump’s aides were also hired by Harvey Weinstein to go after his accusers and stop the publicity around his sexual harassment and abuse.
  5. After Netanyahu’s presentation, the White House issues a statement that Iran has a robust, clandestine nuclear program that it hides from the world and Iranian citizens. This alarms many people because of its similarities to the accusations that pushed us into the Iraq war. The White House later updates the statement to say Iran HAD not HAS such a program. They blame the error on a typo.
  6. John Kerry has been working behind the scenes to save the Iran deal, meeting with UN and foreign officials to find ways to keep the deal in place.
  7. Trumps says that withdrawing from the Iran deal sends North Korea the right message in the lead up to our negotiations with them. I guess that could be true if the right message is that we don’t hold up our agreements.
  8. If the U.S. pulls out of the Iran deal, it would leave the rest of the world to navigate a very complicated web of sanctions on international businesses.
  9. The Trump administration is working to get three U.S. hostages held in North Korea released. I wish him success, but two things: 1) Rudy Giuliani claims that their release has already been obtained (it hasn’t), and 2) Trump says that the past administration tried to get them released with no success (two of the three were imprisoned last year, so it’s highly doubtful Obama was involved).
  10. North Korea accuses Trump of provoking them with his tough talk on military might. They also warn us not to mistake their willingness to talk for weakness.
  11. Ahead of his meeting with North Korea, Trump orders the Pentagon to prepare for pulling troops out of South Korea.
  12. Trump freezes funding for Syria‘s main humanitarian group, the White Helmets. If you don’t know who they are, check out the short documentary about them.
  13. Suicide bombers in Kabul kill at least 31 people.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. The House chaplain, who Paul Ryan forced to resign last week, rescinds his resignation, forcing Ryan to either fire him or keep him on. Ryan decides to keep him, leaving us all wondering what the heck happened there.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. Seven states, including Texas, file a lawsuit against the Trump administration to end DACA, even though Trump has already attempted to do this and the courts stopped him.
    • Here are the states involved in the suit, along with the number of people with DACA status: Texas (121,000), South Carolina (6,400), Arkansas (5,100), Alabama (4,300), Nebraska (3,400), Louisiana (2,000), and West Virginia (100).
    • Compare that to California (223,000), Illinois (42,000), New York (42,000), and Florida (33,000). It seems the states least affect by DACA (with the exception of Texas) are the ones that want to end it.
  1. An all-black, all-female team of three was named a finalist in NASA’s high school competition, but NASA had to end public voting early when racists on 4chan launched a racially-based social media campaign against them.
  2. Kirstjen Nielsen, Homeland Security Secretary, ends temporary protected status for the Hondurans who came hear nearly two decades ago as refugees after Hurricane Mitch devastated their country. That’s nearly 86,000 people who have called the U.S. their home for 20 years.
  3. They may not call it a Muslim ban, but actions speak louder than words. So far this fiscal year, Christians refugees admitted into the U.S. outnumber Muslims by more almost four times. 1,800 Muslims have been allowed compared to 6,700 Christians, and the number of Muslims has shrunk by more than any other religious group, right in line with Trump having said he’ll prioritize Christian refugees.
  4. Several U.S. citizens get caught up each year in ICE detainments, some of whom have been detained for over three years. The average time U.S. citizens are detained is 180 days; that’s a half a year these people lose. Citizens have also been deported, and had to have an embassy intervene for their return.
    Side note: It’s illegal for ICE to detain U.S. citizens. Where’s the accountability here?
  5. About 250 members of the caravan of asylum seekers marching across Mexico reach the U.S. border, where most are turned away by border patrol. 49 have been admitted to the U.S. while the rest are living in a tent city south of the border.
  6. Mike Pence calls Joe Arpaio a tireless champion for the rule of law. In case you forgot, Arpaio’s lost countless civil suits for his treatment of prisoners and is also a convict himself, though he was pardoned by Trump.
  7. 2017 saw a 17% drop in international students coming to the U.S. Why is this important? Foreign students contribute about $37 billion to the U.S. economy each year.
  8. In 44 states, a majority of residents support the right for same-sex couples to marry. The states that don’t support it: Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, West Virginia, Louisiana, and North Carolina. Alabama is the only state where a majority oppose that right.

Climate/EPA:

  1. Eighteen states, including California, sue the Trump administration over its attempts to roll back Obama-era fuel efficiency goals.
  2. The sea ice cover in the Bering Sea this winter hit a record low, and a striking low at that. It was just half the cover of the previous record low.
  3. Scott Pruitt’s questionable foreign travel has been facilitated by lobbyists and wealthy donors, including Richard Smotkin, who arranged Pruitt’s trip to Morocco was later awarded a $40,000/month contract to lobby for the Moroccan government. Sheldon Adelson helped him with his trip to Israel. And former lobbyist Matthew Freedman worked to line up a trip to Australia.
  4. Three top-level officials part ways with the EPA after Pruitt testified to Congress the previous week. Pruitt blamed subordinates for his own ethical lapses.
  5. Under Ryan Zinke, the Fish and Wildlife Service removes Yellowstone grizzlies from the endangered species list. At the same time they’re working on solutions to diversify this small group of bears by importing bears from other areas. So they’ll take bears from areas where they’re still considered endangered, and move them to an area where they are not considered endangered?
  6. There are rumors of a power struggle between Pruitt and Zinke, which could be why so many negative stories about both of them are coming out.

Budget/Economy:

  1. The unemployment rate drops to 3.9%, and wages rise slightly, though not as much as economists expect in such a tight labor market. One reason could be increasing inflation or fears of it.
  2. California moves up to fifth in the world economies, behind the U.S., China, Japan, and Germany. The state is 12% of the U.S. population (nearing 40 million) and provides 14.2% of the U.S. economy.
  3. Marco Rubio criticizes the GOP tax reform, saying, “There’s no evidence whatsoever that the money’s been massively poured back into the American worker.”
  4. Whoops again! He later walks that statement back (just like Tom Price did on healthcare).
  5. Arizona teachers end their walkout after getting most, but not all, of what they were protesting for.
  6. Here’s a new one for corporations. They’ve started creating response plans just in case Trump targets them or their industry in one of his Twitter rants.
  7. The Purdue University Ag Economy Barometer, which shot up on Trump’s election, falls for the second month in a row. The barometer is an indicator of how the agricultural industry is doing as a whole.

Elections:

  1. All four Federal Election Commission (FEC) commissioners have held their jobs well past their intended terms. They’ve stayed on 11, 9, 7, and 5 years past the end of their terms. Also, there are supposed to be six commissioners, not four. The Senate majority and minority leaders are supposed to recommend replacements, but they haven’t.
  2. The DOJ updates its policy manual, removing a reference to maintaining a free press and expanding their policy on whistleblowers.
  3. Paul Ryan warns that if Democrats win in the November midterms, they could make it impossible to get anything done and would be more aggressive in congressional oversight of the administration. Well if that’s not the pot calling the kettle black…
  4. Since not enough has been done to ensure the security of our midterm elections from foreign interference, Democrats in Congress pledge to NOT exploit any stolen materials in their campaigns. Republicans have so far refused to do the same, leaving us open to continued interference.
  5. Dianne Feinstein is the frontrunner in California’s senate race, but the second place runner is an anti-Semite running on the Republican ticket. The GOP just kicked him out of their convention and plan to vote to kick him out of the party. But how is this guy second?!

Miscellaneous:

  1. Thousands of demonstrators in Puerto Rico protest over austerity measures, which come at a horrible time as they try to rebuild. Police shut the protests down using tear gas.
  2. The Department of Education is sending $600 million in disaster assistance to Puerto Rico.
  3. Trump’s previous personal physician, Harold Bornstein, who before the 2016 election purportedly wrote a glowing letter about Trump’s health in hyperbolic terms, now says that Trump dictated that letter. You’re shocked, I know. I was shocked too.
  4. Bornstein also says that Trump aides, including his personal bodyguard, raided Bornstein’s office and took all of Trump’s medical records. The White House says that was just part of the transition into office.
  5. With both Trump and Pence slated to speak at the NRA convention, parts of the convention have ironically been designated gun-free zones. Good thing the bad guy with a gun didn’t find out there were no good guys with a gun there.
  6. During his NRA speech (and also full of irony), Trump reads an article from “fake news” CNN as proof that Mueller overreached in his investigation (though the article didn’t really say that).
  7. Also in his speech, Trump criticized both France’s and the UK’s gun laws, saying those laws failed to prevent the 2015 terrorist attack in France and the knife violence in the UK. To bring his point home, Trump mimed shooting a gun at one victim at a time in reference to the Paris attacks. France and the UK are both pretty pissed.
  8. At the NRA convention, you can buy pistols that look like cell phones. This come just one month after Sacramento police killed an unarmed man because they mistook his cell phone for a gun.
  9. Rudy Giuliani tries to clear Trump of one crime by insinuating he committed another—and on a Hannity interview no less. He says Trump reimbursed Michael Cohen for the Stormy Daniels payment, inferring that Trump knew about the hush money despite his claims otherwise.
  10. Giuliani also says it’s possible Trump paid hush money to additional women, but later walks that back.
  11. Trump, or more likely someone more speaking for Trump, tweets an explanation for what Giuliani said, but basically confirms that he reimbursed Cohen.
  12. Trump himself excuses Giuliani saying that he’s the new guy and he’ll get his facts straight. Well then what was he doing touring national TV talk shows?
  13. In another less than helpful moment, Giuliani says it would be OK if Mueller went after Jared Kushner, but not Ivanka. Apparently Kushner is disposable.
  14. Giuliani later says that Trump didn’t realize until just last week that his payments to Michael Cohen were to cover the hush money paid to Stormy Daniels.
  15. Kellyanne Conway’s husband, George Conway, tweets the relevant FEC rules, which suggest that no matter how the payment went down, election rules were violated.
  16. Trump signs an executive order to expand grants and partnerships with faith-based groups in an effort to reduce separation of church and state. Every agency is ordered to work on faith-based partnerships.
  17. Even the Nobel prize runs up against #MeToo. There will be no prize in literature awarded this year because of a sex scandal. They’ll name two winners next year instead.
  18. And speaking of the Nobel prize, several House Republicans nominate Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize for the work he’s doing with North Korea.
  19. In John McCain’s new book, he says he regrets not picking Joe Lieberman as his 2008 running mate instead of Sarah Palin. Even if they still wouldn’t have been elected, I would argue that picking Lieberman would’ve drastically changed our current political climate.
  20. Gina Haspel offers to withdraw her name from the nomination for CIA director, but the White House says they’ll continue to back her.
  21. Rick Perry supports ending the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) because he thinks applied research belongs in the private sector (I guess so someone can profit off it). ARPA-E advances innovative energy research, often resuscitating research that stalled in the private sector. George W. Bush created ARPA-E, but it was first funded by Obama, so that could be why Trump wants to kill it.
  22. You remember that lobbyist’s condo that Scott Pruitt was paying submarket rents for? Well it turns out that Mike Crapo (R-ID), the Senate Banking Committee chair, held 78 campaign events there.
  23. NASA launches a new mission to Mars. The InSight robotic lander will send a probe into the layers of Mars’ surface and study the structure. It’s scheduled to land on Mars on November 26.
  24. And in nonpolitical news, Mt. Kilauea erupts on Hawaii’s big island, opening multiple fissures in Leilani Estates, causing evacuations, and destroying homes, cars, and structures. The eruption caused several earthquakes, including one 6.9 in magnitude. The smaller island of Kauai had it’s own national disaster a few weeks ago, with severe flooding on the north side after receiving 50 inches of rain in 24 hours.