Tag: Mar-a-Lago

Week 57 in Trump

Posted on February 27, 2018 in Politics, Trump

Last week’s shooting lit up the gun control debate once more, but this time sounds different and this time the polls are moving in favor of some moderate restrictions. I, for one, am hoping we can make some reasonable changes without taking away everyone’s guns (which I’m pretty sure will never happen anyway). Anyway, here’s what else happened in politics this week…

Russia:

  1. Robert Mueller charges Alex Van Der Zwaan with making false statements to the FBI about Rick Gates and with deleting documents requested by prosecutors. Van Der Zwaan pleads guilty, but he’s not cooperating.
  2. Rick Gate pleads guilty to charges of conspiracy and making false statements. He’s cooperating with the Mueller investigation. This is the fifth guilty plea in the Russia probe.
  3. Mueller brings nearly three dozen additional charges against Paul Manafort and Rick Gates.
  4. The Democrats release their redacted memo, which says:
    • The FBI and DOJ didn’t abuse the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), didn’t omit relevant information from the FISA request, and didn’t use FISA to spy on Trump or his campaign.
    • The FBI opened their investigation months before they knew of the Steele dossier.
    • The Steele dossier was a very small part of the FISA request.
    • The FBI didn’t pay Steele for this information.
    • If the FISA warrant wasn’t paying off, the courts wouldn’t have continued to reauthorize it.

The memo includes excerpts directly from the FISA warrant application that prove the Nunes memo was incorrect. NPR has the full text with annotations.

  1. Trump wants Jeff Sessions to launch an investigation into whether the Obama administration did enough to stop Russia from interfering in our 2016 elections.
  2. A federal judge who was appointed by Trump, worked on Trump’s transition team, and donated to Trump’s campaign refuses to recuse himself from a case involving Fusion GPS (the firm that commissioned Christopher Steele’s dossier).
  3. Mike Flynn refuses to accept money from Trump’s legal fund, Trump, or Trump Organization to help out with his legal fees in the Russia case.
  4. One reason Jared Kushner hasn’t received full security clearance yet is the ongoing Russia investigation.
  5. Russian hackers attack hundreds of Olympic computers and then plant fake evidence to make investigators think that North Korea was behind it.

Courts/Justice:

  1. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals rules that Maryland’s ban on assault weapons and their magazine size restrictions aren’t in violation of the constitution. The court says the Second Amendment doesn’t apply to weapons of war.
  2. The Supreme Court rejects a case against California’s 10-day waiting period for purchasing assault weapons.
  3. Maryland and DC attorneys general expand their lawsuit against Trump for accepting gifts from foreign and state governments.

Healthcare:

  1. Trump proposes a regulation to allow short-term health insurance policies that aren’t required to meet ACA-defined protections and to let them last up to a year. They don’t even have to offer a comprehensive package.‪‬

International:

  1. U.S. intelligence agencies believe that the person who is in charge of Russian mercenaries in Syria was in touch with both the Kremlin and Syrian officials before the mercenary attack on U.S. held assets last week.
  2. Trump announces new sanctions against North Korea. These sanctions focus on shipping companies and ships, which are thought to be used to help North Korea get around the sanctions that are already in place.
  3. The UN Security Council passes a 30-day cease fire in Syria after a barrage of bombings on civilians.
  4. Mexico President Enrique Pena Nieto cancels his first planned trip to the Trump White House after a tense phone call about the border wall.
  5. The international group Financial Action Task Force places Pakistan on it’s terrorist-funded watch list. This comes at the urging of the U.S.
  6. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s corruption scandal grows as more accusations are brought against him and as friends and colleagues are charged and arrested.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. After the Parkland shooting and in front of students, the Florida state House voted against a move to merely allow the House to consider a bill banning assault rifles and high-capacity magazines.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. A couple ways Trump has moved the Republican party on immigration:
    • GOP leaders in Congress are now insisting that any immigration reform include reducing legal immigration. Up until 2016, this was considered extreme by the vast majority of Republicans in office.
    • The first time Trump brought up a Muslim ban in his campaign, Republicans roundly criticized the idea. When he actually rolled it out, Republicans praised him for it. When Republican-appointed judges blocked the ban (saying it was unconstitutional), Republicans criticized those judges.
  1. A lesbian couple in Texas sues the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops for not allowing them to be foster parents to a refugee child. Apparently they were told that they don’t “mirror the Holy Family.” Also, there’s a shortage of foster parents…
  2. Melania Trump’s parents are permanent residents of the U.S., triggering speculation that they were allowed here through family-based migration programs (or chain-migration, if you’re looking for the more racially charged term for it).
  3. Trump threatens to pull ICE agents from California as punishment for sanctuary policies.
  4. A civil rights group sues the Trump administration to prevent him from deporting certain immigrant groups here under temporary protected status.
  5. ICE has increasingly been using a little-known law to conduct searches on private property and in areas up to 100 miles from the border. They’re also using it to search trains and buses.

Climate/EPA:

  1. One of Trump’s biggest successes last year seemed to be efforts to reverse environmental, health, and other protections, but many got caught up in legal challenges. Here are a few regulations the courts upheld:
    • Dentists must prevent their mercury waste from getting into waterways.
    • Methane emission limits on oil and gas wells.
    • Ground-level ozone standards to reduce smog-causing air pollutants.
    • Limits on levels of lead in paint and dust.
    • Listing the rusty patched bumblebee on the endangered species list.
    • New energy efficiency regulations for certain appliances.
    • Restrictions on mining in Bristol Bay, AL (home of a major salmon fishery).

Many others are in legal limbo right now or facing new legal challenges.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Missouri’s governor is indicted for invasion of privacy. He took nude photos of his mistress, and then allegedly used them to blackmail her to keep quiet about their affair. Fun side note: This guy actually reduced Missouri’s minimum wage.
  2. Trump’s infrastructure plan drops his promised requirement that oil and gas pipelines use steel manufactured in the U.S.
  3. After announcing bonuses for employees because of last year’s tax reform, Walt Disney says it will withhold bonuses for union members (who are in the midst of negotiations) until they sign on to a contract favored by Disney. I think there’s a word for that. Like extortion.
  4. Glitches in the new tax law have been popping up. Some are drafting errors and some rules just weren’t thought all the way through. Here are just a few:
    • Legislators intended for businesses to be able to take advantage of deductions for certain building improvements, but the new law denies this to restaurants and retailers, among others.
    • Wealthy money managers can avoid losing a lucrative tax break around carried interest, which will let them pay a lower rate on some income.
    • Farmers who sell grain to co-ops could avoid taxes all together.
    • The law contains conflicting dates about when certain rules kick in.

Elections:

  1. Because Pennsylvania’s governor rejected the GOP’s court-ordered redrawing of their gerrymandered districts, an independent analyst redraws the map. The state supreme court approves the map, which is even more favorable to Democrats than the map the Democrats themselves submitted. Analysts say this map represents the state much more fairly.
  2. Trump supports the GOP fight against the new districts and says that they must fight it all the way to the Supreme Court. Fun fact: The Supreme Court has already refused to hear this case… just a few weeks ago.
  3. In the middle of an election year during which we are woefully unprepared to prevent further meddling by Russia, Paul Ryan decides to replace the chair of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. They’re still looking for a potential nominee to the position, which oversees election security.
  4. State election officials across the county are returning to paper ballots for better security and to prevent foreign interference.

Parkland:

And the gun debate goes on…

  1. #NeverAgain. Students across the country stage walkouts to protest gun violence.
  2. Schools threaten to discipline students who participate in walkouts in protest of gun violence. Universities assure students that walking out won’t count against them when they apply for colleges.
  3. Conspiracy theories abound on social media, and Donald Trump Jr. liked several conspiracy theories on Twitter.
  4. Russian bots and far right trolls make up stories about students who survived the shooting and are now speaking out. Many of their families are now receiving death threats. Seriously. Gun rights advocates need to DIAL IT BACK.
  5. As a result of the publicity and backlash against the NRA, major corporations begin to cut ties with the NRA.
  6. Opinion alert: NRA speakers and listeners at CPAC this week behave horribly in the wake of this tragedy. There’s just no excuse for this no matter how much you love your guns.
  7. Wayne LaPierre, CEO and VP of the NRA, blames the shooting on the failure of the family and a failure of school security. LaPierre also warns of a wave of socialism that will take away your guns.
  8. NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch says that the media loves mass shootings. She also blames the Broward County Sheriffs and the FBI.
  9. This is rich. LaPierre says, “The elites care not one whit about America’s school system and schoolchildren.” LaPierre makes $5,000,000 per year. How is that not elite?
  10. Florida Governor Rick Scott at first pushes back against any changes to gun laws, but with the continued student protests, he begins to soften on things like age limits and addressing mental health.
  11. Students and parents attend town halls with elected officials, including Marco Rubio, and a listening session with Donald Trump.
  12. Trump promotes arming teachers, rejects active shooter drills, repeats things Wayne LaPierre said at CPAC the previous day, and is open to banning bump stocks. But he balks at restrictions on assault rifles.
  13. Attendees heckle Rubio when he refuses to back a full ban on assault weapons. Rubio supports raising the legal age to 21 and creating gun violence restraining orders, opposes arming teachers, and is reconsidering a ban on high-capacity magazines. Students didn’t let him off easy; they pressed him hard on key questions.
  14. Trump appears unsure of next steps on gun violence. He surveys guests at Mar-a-Lago for their opinions. He seems to agree with gun controls a few times but then comes back around to a more hardline stance. At one point he agrees that we should tighten background checks, and wants to ban bump stocks.
  15. The security guard at the school is suspended and then resigns after it comes out that he hid instead of going in the school to confront the shooter.
  16. Both Trump and the NRA endorse arming teachers. However, in May 2016, Trump tweeted: “Crooked Hillary said that I want guns brought into the school classroom…Wrong!” After the Columbine shooting, the NRA also endorsed gun-free schools. At the time, LaPierre said, “First, we believe in absolutely gun free, zero tolerance, totally safe schools. That means no guns in America’s schools, period, with the rare exception of law enforcement officers or trained security personnel.”

Miscellaneous:

  1. Twitter continues a purge of suspected Russian bots, resulting in conservative Twitter users losing thousands of followers in one day.
  2. CPAC continues its march to the far right this year. Speakers include French politician Marion Marechal-Le Pen, Breitbart London Editor Raheem Kassam, and Brexit leader Nigel Farage. Former White House staffer Sebastian Gorka participate on a panel. Both Trump and Mike Pence addressed the conference.
  3. The Department of Health and Human Services puts Jon Cordova, a top official at the agency, on leave while they investigate his social media activity. Cordova posts baseless claims, smear campaigns, and conspiracy theories. How did our government fill up with people like this?
  4. Jared Kushner will continue in his role, which includes access to highly classified material, despite his inability to obtain permanent government security clearance.
  5. But then John F. Kelly says no one whose clearance hasn’t been finalized will be able to look at top-secret information. So they could stop letting Kushner see top-secret documents by next week.
  6. The FCC officially files their order to repeal net neutrality, which will go into effect April 23.
  7. After a backlash against the RNC using campaign funds to pay for Trump’s legal bills in the Russia investigation, the RNC now pays over $37,000 per month in rent at Trump Tower. They also pay a monthly salary to Mike Pence’s nephew John.
  8. There’s a dating site for Trump supporters. It features a man convicted of having sex with a minor on its homepage. I guess the real news here is… there’s a dating site for Trump supporters?
  9. The head of the VA, David Shulkin, has permission from the White House to get rid of any subversion in his agency. He says anyone who defies his authority will be fired. This comes after the inspector general found that Shulkin pressured his chief of staff to doctor an email so the VA would cover his wife’s European airfare. The inspector also found Shulkin improperly accepted Wimbledon tickets on the same trip.
  10. Trump wants his military parade to be on Veterans Day, and to start at the White House and end at the Capitol.
  11. The majority owner of the Trump-branded hotel in Panama orders all Trump employees out of the building in an attempt to take over the hotel. He says that the Trump name is bringing down revenue and keeping rooms empty.
  12. Elaine Duke, deputy secretary of Homeland Security, says she’ll step down. Her role has been minimized since Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen took over last year.

Polls:

  1. 62% of Americans blame Trump and Congress for not doing enough about mass shootings.
  2. 77% of Americans think better mental health screening and treatment could’ve prevented the shooting last week.
  3. 66% of Americans support stronger gun laws, including 50% of gun owners.
  4. The Presidential Greatness Survey (a survey of presidential scholars) ranks Trump as the worst president so far. Among just Republican scholars surveyed, he’s the fourth worst. They ranked him most polarizing.
  5. 51% of voters say they haven’t seen an increase in take-home pay since the new tax law passed. 25% say they have.
  6. After a brief boost, Trump’s approval rating is back down to 37% with 58% disapproving.

Week 49 in Trump

Posted on January 2, 2018 in Politics, Trump

Here’s my last weekly recap for 2017, and I’m finally caught up from the holidays. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty happy to see 2017 circling the drain. It was an exhausting, emotional, and stressful year. In the words of Gin and Tacos and my husband Mohi:

But this year was such a thrill ride down Fuck Everything Boulevard… in a clown car.

So here’s hoping for a brighter, happier, lighter, easier, and more prosperous and joyful 2018.

And here’s what happened in week 49…

Russia:

  1. A small group of Republicans headed by Devin Nunes is investigating the FBI over its use of the Steele dossier to launch the investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties with Russia. But then…
    • It turns out that it wasn’t the Steele dossier that launched the investigation.
    • Instead, it was George Papadopoulos’s drunken revelation to a top Australian diplomat that he knew the Russians had political dirt on Hillary Clinton.
    • Australian officials then reported that info to their American counterparts.
    • George spilled the beans in May 2016, the Australians reported it two months later (why the wait?), and the FBI opened the investigation in July 2016.
  1. Both Democrats and Republicans criticize Nunes over the tactics he’s using to attack federal law enforcement. Most think if there’s any corruption in the FBI, the DOJ should investigate it and that all Nunes will do is cause damage to law enforcement.
  2. On top of that, it turns out that Nunes never fully recused himself from the Russia investigation after his strange White House antics last year. While he handed over the day to day activities of the committee chair, he retained sole power to sign subpoenas, restricting committee Democrats‘ ability to do their jobs.
  3. There’s increased Russian submarine activity around undersea trans-Atlantic data cables. This is the most Russian sub activity we’ve seen since the Cold War. These cables provide internet to North American and Europe, so it’s possible Russia’s looking for ways to tap into the data.
  4. NATO responds to the activity by announcing plans to re-open a Cold War command post to secure the north Atlantic.
  5. Part of Robert Mueller’s investigation includes looking at whether the Trump campaign and RNC used voter information that was obtained through Russian hackers. We know that Russian hackers stole data from several states’ election databases in 2016. Jared Kushner was in charge of the campaign’s digital operations.
  6. A Russian who earlier admitted to hacking the DNC servers for the Russian government says he left a data signature that proves he’s telling the truth.
  7. Trump’s legal team, along with other Trump supporters in D.C. and in the media, start to paint Michael Flynn as a liar in order to discredit him before his testimony comes up in the Russia investigation.
  8. Putin expresses disappointment in the deteriorating relationship between Russia and the U.S.
  9. A Russian court upholds a ruling that bans Putin’s opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, from running against him in the next elections.
  10. Facebook announces it won’t use red flags to indicate fake news articles anymore. Apparently the flags just enticed more people to click on the stories. They found that showing related articles is more effective to combat fake stories.

Courts/Justice:

  1. An appeals court upheld its previous ruling that basically upheld an Obama-era fracking rule for federal lands. The Department of Interior is working to repeal the regulation anyway, but the rule could go back into effect on January 12.

Healthcare:

  1. Despite government outreach being cut by 90%, the sign-up window being cut in half, and Trump’s declaration that Obamacare is dead, enrollment in the ACA was surprisingly strong with nearly 9 million enrollees so far. That’s down from 12.2 million who signed up last year, but there are still more to be counted and not all markets are closed.
  2. Over 80% of people who enrolled in the ACA live in states where Trump won, with the top four states being Texas, George, North Carolina, and Florida.

International:

  1. Just days before Trump’s inauguration (between January 9 and 12, 2016) Romanian hackers took control of nearly two-thirds of D.C.’s surveillance cameras. The cameras were unable to record for several days. This doesn’t seem to be related to Trump—it was a ransomware scheme and the hackers have been arrested.
  2. At least four times in the past week, the Trump administration threatens the UN with dropping financial support if they don’t comply with U.S. demands.
  3. A Gunman attacks a Coptic Christian church in Egypt, killing nine. The police are criticized for their slow response.
  4. Anti-government protests erupt across Iran, largely spurred by a stagnant economy and a repressive regime. Twelve have died so far in the protests, and this is the largest uprising since the 2009 protests that were violently stamped out.
  5. Trump tweets support for the protesters, saying the Iranian government should listen to them. “Iranian govt should respect their people’s rights, including right to express themselves.” So protests against the government are a good thing in Iran, but not in the U.S.?
  6. Iranian President Rouhani walks a fine line between the protesters and the Ayatollah, saying that people have a right to criticize the government and protest, and that this could be an opportunity. But he also says he’ll crack down on lawbreakers. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on the other hand, blames the protests on Iran’s enemies.
  7. Both Russia and China sneak around the sanctions on North Korea and trade goods.
  8. There are two bombings in Kabul this week—one on Christmas day and the other in the middle of a funeral for a government official.
  9. A defecting soldier from North Korea had traces of anthrax in his lungs, and others showed signs of exposure to radiation. This raises concerns that North Korea is working on biological weapons.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. While Trump says he’s signed more legislation than any other president in their first year, he’s actually signed the fewest since Eisenhower. In fairness, he got off to a strong start with all the Congressional Review signings that merely undid rules made by federal agencies under Obama.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. A federal judge rules that Arizona’s law banning classes on ethnic studies is unconstitutional, saying it was motivated by racial animus. Ya think?
  2. Trump holds Dreamers hostage and says there will be no clean DREAM Act without funding for the wall between us and Mexico.
  3. Trump fires the remaining HIV/AIDS advisory council members via FedEx with no explanation. He does say they can reapply. If you remember, several members resigned together earlier in 2017.
  4. The Trump administration drops its appeal of the court decision blocking the transgender ban in the military after not just one, but two courts reject the ban.
  5. In a June meeting, Trump reportedly said that all Haitians have AIDS and that Nigerians would never go back to their huts. It’s no surprise that Trump uses fear tactics to stoke hatred of immigrants.
  6. At the same meeting, Trump was visibly upset over the number of foreign visitors to the U.S. during his first 6 months and he couldn’t understand that some were here temporarily—one-time visitors just here on vacation.
  7. A federal judge blocks Trump’s restrictions on “follow-to-join” refugees, which are spouses and children of refugees who are already settled here.
  8. The same federal judge partially suspends Trump’s ban on refugees from 11 largely Muslim countries, allowing refugees with bona fide relationships and granting bona fide relationship status to refugees who have agreements with humanitarian and relocation agencies.
  9. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rules that Trump exceeded his authority in the latest travel ban and that it violates federal law. The law remains in effect, though, per the Supreme Court, while challenges move through the courts.
  10. Bitcoin is the currency of choice for far-right extremists and white nationalists because PayPal and other payment platforms have banned racists and extremists.

Climate/EPA:

  1. Proving once again that he doesn’t understand the difference between climate and weather or the effect of climate change on weather, Trump makes fun of global warming in a tweet because it’s so cold in the eastern U.S.
  2. Trump rolls back the safety rules for offshore drilling that were created after the Deepwater Horizon spill.

Puerto Rico:

Here’s where Puerto Rico stands more than three months after the hurricane:

  • 96% of the island has water.
  • Almost 70% of the island has electricity.
  • 88% of gas stations are open.
  • 8% of supermarkets are still closed.
  • 392 people still need shelter; 24 shelters are open.
  • 3,039 FEMA personnel, along with 15,000 civilian and military personnel, are on the ground there.
  • All airports and federally maintained ports are open.
  • All hospitals are open.
  • More than 168,000 Puerto Ricans have gone to Florida.

Budget/Economy:

  1. While praising the new tax plan and saying they’ll give everyone $1,000 bonuses, AT&T also announces that they’ll lay off over 1,000 employees.
  2. After signing the tax bill into law, Trump tells his friends at Mar-a-Lago, “You all just got a lot richer.” And for once he was telling the truth.
  3. Goldman Sachs expects that banks will take a hit to their profits this year because of taxes on money held overseas. But after taking that hit, banks will be the biggest winners of the new tax plan.
  4. Senator Marco Rubio says Republicans “went too far” in cutting taxes for corporations. He thinks companies will either buy back shares or increase dividends to shareholders, neither of which will create any great economic growth.
  5. Trump goes after the USPS about undercharging Amazon even though Amazon uses UPS and is working on delivering their own stuff.
  6. Despite being a cheerleader for infrastructure during the campaign, Trump stops funding for an Obama-era project to fix damaged railroad tunnels, tracks, and bridges in New York and New Jersey. This is an area where 9 of 10 workers commute.
  7. The Centre for Economics and Business Research projects that China will overtake the U.S. economy by 2032, and that India will move into the top 5 economies around the same time.

Elections:

  1. Roy Moore sues to block Alabama’s election results citing systematic voter fraud. The court dismisses Moore’s case and certifies Doug Jones, who is later sworn in.
  2. If you remember a while back, a Democrat on Trump’s voter fraud commission sued to get access to committee records from Kris Kobach and other Republicans on the commission. This week, a federal judge rules that they must share records with ALL members of the panel.
  3. The one remaining seat in the Virginia House of Delegates won’t be decided soon. The name-drawing to decide the tie vote is postponed, pending a court challenge over whether the election was actually a tie. If the Democrat wins, Democrats will have a 51-49 lead. If the Republican wins, the House will be tied.
  4. While the Department of Homeland Security has warned states about election-hacking threats in the 2018 elections, they might not be able to perform security screenings on all election servers in time for the elections.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Trump is the first to president not to win the most admired man of the year in the annual Gallup survey. President Obama wins that distinction for the 10th time. Hillary Clinton is the most admired woman for the 16th year in a row. Color me confused.
  2. The Trump foundation is being investigated for inappropriate use of funds, and cannot raise any funds until the probe is over. One of Trump’s golf courses has already had to pay back the Trump foundation for using foundation funds to pay the golf course’s legal fees.
  3. Trump is the first president not to host a state dinner in his first year.
  4. Trump says he’ll be back to work the day after Christmas. The day after Christmas, Trump goes golfing. Who really cares, right? Except that he made a big deal out of Obama golfing. Trump has definitely golfed at least 50% more than Obama in his first year and has likely golfed even more than that. He’s visited a golf course at least 88 times.
  5. Trump’s cabinet is unusually secretive, hiding their schedules, travel plans, and the people or groups they’re meeting with. At least six agencies don’t release appointment calendars, in potential violation of the Freedom of Information Act. This is a thing because department heads have been meeting with leaders from the industries that they’re supposed to be regulating.
  6. Trump gives an impromptu interview to a New York Times reporter. I won’t fact-check the whole thing, but here are a few tidbits:
    • He denies 16 times that his campaign colluded with Russia, but then says that even if there was collusion, it’s not a crime.
    • He says Democrats say there’s no collusion (they don’t).
    • However, he says there was collusion between the Russians and Democrats.
    • He thinks Mueller will treat him fairly.
    • He thinks he can do whatever he wants with the Department of Justice (he can’t). This was about reopening the investigation into Hillary’s emails.
    • He says he’ll win in 2020 because the media needs him and will tank without him. He says the media HAS TO LET HIM WIN. Wow.
    • He says he knows more about big bills than any other president. (Remember, it was a huge surprise to him that healthcare was so hard. Who knew?)
    • He also knows more about taxes than the greatest CPA, he says (lawmakers who worked with him on healthcare and taxes were shocked by how little he knew about both).
    • He thinks China’s hurting us on trade, but he hasn’t dealt with it yet because war is more important right now (I assume he’s talking about North Korea here).

    • He says he saved coal and that West Virginia is doing fantastically now (only 900 new coal jobs have been created since he became president).
    • He brings up the conspiracy theory around Debbie Wasserman-Schultz and a Pakistani IT staffer.
    • He says he boosted Luther Strange’s rating, and that before his endorsement Strange was in 5th place (in a race with only 3 people).
    • He says the reason the Alabama race was so close was because he endorsed Roy Moore (an accused child molester).
    • He says we’ve spent $7 trillion on the MidEast and it’s a bigger mess than ever (the actual number is $1.6 trillion, if he’s talking about the wars).
    • He says he’s created healthcare associations and that millions of people are joining—people who formerly had Obamacare or no insurance (the rules for the associations haven’t yet been issued and no one has joined).
    • He says the wall will stop the smuggling of drugs from Mexico (most drugs come in through legal ports of entry or from tunnels).
  1. The Trump administration has the highest first-year departure rate of any administration in the past four decades with 34% of senior officials having resigned, been fired, or been reassigned. Ronald Reagan’s was the second highest with half the departure rate.
  2. New York City, San Francisco, and Philadelphia file a lawsuit against the Department of Defense for inadequate reporting of service members who are not allowed to own guns. This stems from the shooter in a small town in Texas who should have been flagged in the background check database but wasn’t.
  3. Christmas couldn’t keep Trump satisfied for long. The day after, he goes after the FBI and Hillary on Twitter. Tip: Let it go, dude. You won.

Polls:

  1. 52% of us say the U.S. is less respected around the world than it was one year ago. 21% say we’re more respected than before.

Week 44 in Trump

Posted on November 28, 2017 in Politics, Trump

This week, I’m thankful for much-needed vacations. Which means this week’s recap is short and sweet. I do want to highlight my favorite story of the week though…

In a meeting with Democratic Senators on tax reform, Gary Cohn fakes a bad connection to get Trump off the call. Senator Tom Carper said “We’re not going to have a real conversation here – can’t you just tell the president that he is brilliant and say we’re losing … the connection and then hang up?” So Cohn did just that.

If this is how advisors and members of Congress have to work with the president, what does it say about him? Anyway, here’s what else happened in week 44…

Russia:

  1. Mueller is now interested in Representative Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) over meetings he had with Julian Assange in August. The Kremlin regards Rohrabacher as an intelligence source, and values him enough to give him a secret code name.
  2. In a sign he might be negotiating a deal with Mueller, Michael Flynn cuts ties with Trump’s lawyers.
  3. Mueller adds Michael Flynn’s business partner to the list of people he’s investigating.
  4. Jared Kushner’s role in the white house diminishes as he becomes further involved in the Russia investigation. Kushner says he’s just focusing on the important things and that there’s nothing to worry about.
  5. The FBI knew for at least a year that Russian hackers were trying to break into many U.S. officials’ gmail accounts, but the FBI never bothered to warn the targeted officials about it.

Courts/Justice:

  1. In yet another instance where state abortion laws ignore the the actual law, a federal court overturns Texas’s latest anti-abortion law.
  2. Police chiefs in several cities are frustrated by the DOJ’S hands-off approach to the consent decrees agreed to under Obama. These decrees were put in place to help police departments deal with problems of injustice and systemic prejudice.

International:

  1. Trump adds North Korea back to the list of state sponsors of terrorism.
  2. In the midst of impeachment hearings, Zimbabwe’s President Mugabe resigns after 37 years in power.
  3. About a dozen State Department officials formally accuse Secretary of State Tillerson of violating a federal law, in this case one to prevent enlisting child soldiers. He did this by excluding Iraq, Afghanistan, and Myanmar from a list of offenders.
  4. A few weeks ago, the prime minister of Lebanon, Saad Hariri, resigned suddenly citing issues with Iran and Hezbollah. Now he says he’s not resigning yet. Apparently the Iran-backed president of Lebanon urged him to rethink it.
  5. Despite coming out tough on Syria at the start of his term, Trump has pretty much ceded leadership on post-war planning to Putin. Putin hosts the leaders of Iran and Turkey in a planning meeting, and experts say Putin has won in Syria.
  6. Terrorists bomb a Sufi Mosque in Egypt, killing at least 305 people. Trump responds by saying we need to build that wall.
  7. Despite Clinton being criticized as Secretary of state for security issues, Tillerson not only refused to meet with his security director for most of this year, but he dismissed the director after one 5-minute meeting, leaving the security position empty.
  8. The Trump administration announces that the Palestinian diplomatic delegation in D.C. will be shut down, but then changes its mind and says it can stay open for at least 90 more days. After the initial decision, Abbas refuses a call from Kushner, referring him instead to the Palestinian Authority’s representative in Washington.
  9. Air Force General John Hyten, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM), says if Trump made an illegal nuclear launch request, he would push back against it.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. Even Congress gets a break over Thanksgiving…

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. While House Republicans oblige Trump’s request for hiring a large number of ICE officers, Senate Republicans don’t include funding for it in their version of the appropriations bill. Both houses included extra funding for Customs and Border Patrol though.
  2. The U.S. votes against a UN resolution that condemns the glorification of Nazism, basically saying that the U.S. values freedom of speech over condemning hate speech. The only two other countries to vote against it are Ukraine and Palau.
  3. Trump says what a great thing it is that women are speaking out about sexual misconduct (that is, except for those coming out against Roy Moore and those who came out against Trump himself).
  4. For the second time, a federal judge blocks Trump’s ban on transgender troops. This judge says that Trump’s tweets on the ban were “capricious, arbitrary, and unqualified.”
  5. Customs and Border Patrol confirms they were taken completely by surprise with Trump’s first executive order demanding a travel ban. It turns out that the Trump administration disobeyed a court order in its implementation of the initial travel ban.
  6. The DHS apparently tried to hide a damning report from its inspector general and hasn’t been complying with oversight efforts.
  7. A district court judge blocks an executive order that would cut funding to sanctuary cities, saying that Trump can’t change the conditions for funding that’s already approved by Congress.
  8. Trump speaks at an event to honor the Native American Code Talkers who served in WWII, and in doing so repeats his standard attack on Elizabeth Warren by calling her Pocahontas. He’s roundly criticized for using a racial slur at this event.

Puerto Rico:

  1. Trump withdraws the USNS Comfort hospital ship from Puerto Rico, even though the island is still largely without power.

Budget/Economy:

  1. 37 out of 38 economists say that the GOP House and Senate tax plans would increase the debt substantially faster than they would improve the economy. The sole economist who disagreed says he misread the question.
  2. According to the Tax Policy Center, 50% of Americans would see higher taxes by 2027 in the Senate tax plan.
  3. The house tax plan removes the $250 deduction teachers receive in order to buy school supplies; the Senate version doubles the deduction. (Remember that even with the deduction, teachers still pay most of this out of their own pockets.)
  4. A CBO analysis finds that the Senate tax plan hurts the poor. Here are some highlights:
    • People making $30,000 or less would pay more in taxes starting in 2019.
    • Starting in 2021, people making $40,000 or less would pay more.
    • After a decade, most people making $75,000 or less would pay more.
    • Millionaires and people making $100,000 to $500,000 get tax cuts all around.
    • The healthcare changes in the Senate bill would disproportionately affect the poor.
  5. The DOJ plans to sue to prevent the merger between AT&T and Time Warner. The DOJ requested that AT&T sell CNN as a precondition, but AT&T says no thanks.
  6. After the Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) steps down, his deputy director becomes the acting director. But Trump uses a presidential power that lets him fill vacancies and appoints Mick Mulvaney, who is also the Director of the Office of Management and Budget. So now the courts will have to decide who will lead the agency.
  7. The FCC announces plans to end net neutrality. This means that your internet service providers will be able to tier services much like your cable company, and this means you might have to pay to access your favorite sites. In response to states promising to protect net neutrality locally, the FCC also plans to prevent states from implementing their own net neutrality rules.
  8. The legalization of marijuana in the U.S. has brought the price down by two-thirds. You’d think that would discourage the Mexican cartels, but they just moved over to shipping us more heroin instead.

Elections:

  1. Trump pretty much endorses Roy Moore for Senate. He says, “We don’t need a liberal Democrat in that seat. He totally denies [the accusations], you have to listen to him also … we don’t need somebody soft on crime like [Doug] Jones.” Except that Doug Jones IS tough on crime. He prosecuted the KKK members who bombed the 16th Street Baptist Church and he indicted the Atlanta Olympic bomber, for starters.
  2. Kellyanne Conway’s comments get her in trouble again with the Office of Government Ethics. The office accuses Conway of violating the Hatch Act when she attacked Alabama Senate candidate Doug Jones.
  3. There have so far been at least three different efforts to discredit Roy Moore’s accusers and the press covering the story:
    • A Twitter account, which has since been deleted, started a false story about a Washington Post reporter offering money for dirt on Moore.
    • A group sent out robocalls pretending to be WaPo reporters and again offering bribes for dirt on Moore.
    • A woman associated with Project Veritas contacted a WaPo reporter saying Moore had impregnated her when she was 15 and helped her get an abortion. Her facts didn’t check out though, and reporters later saw her entering Veritas’ offices. (Fun fact: Trump has made donations to Project Veritas.)

These all show an incredible lack of understanding of how real journalism works, and should show everyone how vigorously major newspapers research their stories.

Miscellaneous:

  1. One border patrol agent is killed and one badly wounded on the job, both apparently hit over the head and beaten.
  2. Trump’s current pick to lead the 2020 census is a professor who wrote a book on why competitive elections are a bad thing, which signals an effort to politicize the census.
  3. Representative Dave Trott (R-MI), who already announced he wouldn’t run for re-election, cites Trump as a factor in his decision.
  4. New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman is investigating the FCC for a scheme to corrupt the comment process on net neutrality, saying public commenters impersonated 100,000s of Americans.
  5. Trump spends Thanksgiving at Mar-a-Lago. Trump and the White House both say he’s working and very busy just an hour before he ends up on a golf course. Trump has golfed every 5.1 days of his presidency, even though he said he wouldn’t have time for that because he’d be busy working for us.
  6. Trump’s charitable foundation is in the process of shutting down. He agreed to do this last year to avoid conflicts of interest, but the foundation has also admitted to self-dealing (which means funneling charity funds to yourself, your business, or your family). For example, Trump’s golf club in Westchester County used Trump Foundation money to settle a lawsuit.
  7. Florida Democrat John Morgan says he’s leaving the party to be an independent, but also encourages Democrat Bill Nelson to leave Congress and run for governor.
  8. And in completely non-political news, Charles Manson dies. This is huge for people my age (or at least for me), because we grew up with him as the boogeyman and got scared out of our wits by Helter Skelter. Good riddance, Chuck.

Week 41 in Trump

Posted on November 6, 2017 in Politics, Trump

Getty Images

Another mass shooting ends the week, this one being the fourth most deadly shooting in the U.S. and a real small-town tragedy. The shooter, who was discharged from the Air Force for bad conduct around a domestic dispute, entered a church in small Texas town and killed 26 people. On his way out, a local shot at him and he took off in his car. The brave local chased him, the shooter crashed his car, and he was later found dead. If the Air Force had correctly registered his domestic assault charge, the shooter might not have been able to get his hands on a gun.

Here’s what else happened in week 41…

Russia:

Mueller’s Charges and Legal Documents:

The first of the charges in Mueller’s investigation come out, along with evidentiary documents. Here’s what comes from all that:

  1. Mueller unveils 12 counts against Paul Manafort and his associate Rick Gates, including conspiracy against the U.S., conspiracy to launder money, FARA violations, false statements, and failure to report financial information.
  2. Trump tweets a response that this shows there was “no collusion,” which might have been a little premature, because an hour later George Papadopoulos, the Trump campaign’s former foreign policy advisor, pleads guilty to making a false statement to the FBI.
  3. Documents show that Corey Lewandowski was also involved in discussions with Papadopoulos about Russia meetings.
  4. Carter Page (also a foreign policy advisor to the campaign) says he spoke about Russia with Papadopoulos after originally denying it, and he also testifies that he told Sessions about a trip he took to Russia during the campaign. During this July 2016 trip, he met with Russian government officials. Remember, Sessions testified under oath to the Senate Intelligence Committee that he didn’t have any knowledge of Russian contact with the campaign.
  5. Page emailed campaign staff about his findings from the trip, which were read at testimony
  6. An email from Manafort to a campaign official says about the trips to Russia, “We need someone to communicate that DT is not doing these trips. It should be someone low level in the campaign so as not to send any signal.”
  7. Manafort has a trial date in May of 2018.
  8. Rick Gates was also being paid by the RNC for political strategy services.
  9. Sam Clovis, who was about to go up for confirmation to the post of top scientist of the Department of Agriculture (even though he has no science background, but that’s another story), withdraws his nomination. It turns out he testified to the grand jury the previous week, which the White House didn’t find out until the media broke the news.
  10. An email chain shows that Clovis discussed the potential Russia meetings with Papadopoulos, and Clovis is referenced in the court filing. And according to Papadopoulos’ plea agreement, Clovis impressed on him that relations with Russia were a primary focus of their foreign policy efforts.
  11. Here’s a timeline of Russian contact to help you keep it all straight.
  12. The Papadopoulos plea agreement and supporting documents reveal:
    • He met with a Russian agent (the Professor) in March of 2016 (after Papadopoulos knew he would be a foreign policy advisor for Trump’s campaign).
    • The Professor was only interested in him after finding out he was working with Trump’s campaign.
    • In April of 2016, the Professor told him that Russian agents have dirt on Clinton (a month after Papadopoulos joined Trump’s campaign).
    • The Professor then told him that the Russians had emails on Clinton, thousands of emails.
    • A person at the March 2016 meeting where Papadopoulos brought up meeting with the Putin says Trump didn’t dismiss the idea but Jeff Sessions did object.
    • In July 2016, Papadopoulos sent an email to his Russian contact the saying the meeting had been approved.
    • The above implies that the Trump campaign knew about the hacked emails long before they were released. And while both Trump and Jeff Sessions deny any knowledge of contacts between the Trump campaign and Russia, the latest court documents indicate otherwise.
    • Papadopoulos has been cooperating with the investigation since July 2017.
  1. Jeff Sessions led the foreign policy group that Papadopoulos was part of.
  2. Interesting note: It was Jared Kushner and Ivanka who pushed for Trump to hire Manafort to the campaign.
  3. Also of note: Despite attempts by certain parties to draw the dossier into question, none of the charges revealed this week stemmed from the dossier.
  4. Trump, conservative media, and some GOP politicians try to deflect attention off the charges by belittling Papadopoulos’ role in the campaign, by saying Manafort‘s crimes occurred long before Manafort was part of the campaign, and by focusing attention on Obamacare, Hillary Clinton, Democrats, the Fusion GPS dossier, tax cuts, the uranium deal, and Mueller’s (made up) conflict of interest.
  5. Jared Kushner provides Mueller with documents related to his potential role in obstructing justice.
  6. Representative Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) introduces a House resolution saying Mueller has a conflict of interest because he worked at the FBI with James Comey and he worked there when the Uranium One deal went through. A deal that had nothing to do with Mueller or the FBI. How did Mueller go from the perfect investigator for all sides to being compromised in the GOP’s view?
  7. Tony Podesta steps down from his role at The Podesta Group. Even though the firm wasn’t named in the indictments and so far there are no accusations of wrong-doing, they worked with Manafort in the past to help improve the Ukrainian government’s image.

And The Rest of Russia Things:

  1. I‘m compiling a list of the fake stories and ads pushed by Russian troll farms to interfere with our elections just to see how many I saw last year. Here’s the first few. Feel free to add more in the comments if you know of any I missed.
  2. And since we’re on fake news, former FBI agent Clint Watts says Russia’s been using this strategy to manipulate us since 2014. He testifies again to the Senate this week.
  3. A Russian troll farm created a persona named Jenna Abrams in 2014. She built a solid base and, once established, she began posting divisive propaganda. Russia created a fake “real American” who showed up in most major news outlets.
  4. Members of the Trump campaign followed Russian accounts on Twitter and shared their posts.
  5. Facebook, Twitter, and Google testify in three hearings to a Senate Judiciary sub-committee. Here’s what we learn there:
    • Russian trolls used Facebook accounts to instigate violence against social and political groups, including undocumented immigrants, Muslims, police officers, Black Lives Matter activists, and more.
    • Facebook exposed Russia-linked pages to 126 million Americans, slightly less than the number that actually voted.
    • The posts by Russian trolls focused on our divisions in order to spread discord—primarily around race, religion, gun rights, and LGBTQ issues.
    • The posts also targeted users based on where they live, race, religion, and political leanings.
    • Instagram exposed Russian ads to millions of their users also.
  1. Russian interests hold large stakes in Twitter and Facebook. Documents show that Yuri Milner, a Russian tech leader, invested in Facebook and Twitter through a Kushner associate and he has a stake in a company co-owned by Kushner.
  2. Russian hacking didn’t stop with U.S. Democrats. They targeted thousands of national and international government officials and defense contractors during a multi-year attempt to break into email accounts worldwide. They mostly targeted the U.S. and Ukraine.
  3. The DOJ says they have enough evidence to charge six Russian government officials who were involved in the DNC email hack.
  4. Billionaire and conservative funder Robert Mercer sells his stake in Breitbart to his daughter and steps down from his company in an effort to distance himself from Trump and the Russia probe. Mercer was also a big funder for Cambridge Analytica, which provided big data and demographic targeting services for the Trump campaign.
  5. Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross has a stake in a shipping venture with Putin’s son-in-law, which Ross didn’t disclose during his confirmation process.
  6. It’s proven that Guccifer 2.0 modified some of the campaign emails leaked on Wikileaks.

Courts/Justice:

  1. After the New York City terror attack, Trump calls our justice system a joke and a laughing stock. He then calls for the terrorist to be sent to Gitmo, but then recants when he learns that our justice system is actually faster and more efficient.
  2. Trump interferes in two cases: one for the New York terrorist and one for Bowe Bergdahl.
    • Trump calls for the terrorist to be sentenced to death, which experts say will now likely not happen in order to avoid the perception of the president having undue influence.
    • The judge in the Bowe Bergdahl trial gave him a dishonorable discharge with no time served, which Trump criticized as light. But the judge was likely trying to prevent the appearance of undue influence after Trump made inflammatory comments about the case, which Bergdahl’s lawyers continually argued made it impossible to have a fair trial.
  1. Trump’s influence over the DOJ is further questioned after he refuses to rule out firing Jeff Sessions if he won’t investigate the things Trump wants investigated. He wants Sessions to look into his adversaries (mostly Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren), setting up the DOJ for a breach of protocol if they follow through on it.
  2. While Congress is trying to pass more restrictive abortion bills, a federal court just struck down two abortion restrictions passed in Alabama
  3. A Cleveland court throws out all charges against 12 protestors at the 2016 Republican National Convention.

Healthcare:

  1. Based on conflicting actions coming from the White House, there seems to be a battle going on over whether to save the ACA and if so, by how much:
    • The administration lets the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) send out notices with ACA enrollment reminders, man their call centers, and work to enroll the currently uninsured. They also made the plans publicly available a week in advance so consumers could preview them.
    • At the same time, the administration ended ACA enrollment partnerships across the country, ended insurance subsidies, discouraged Congress from passing a bill that would stabilize the markets, and cut the budget for outreach and assistance by 90%.
  1. The IRS announces that it will continue to fully enforce the mandate that everyone have insurance.
  2. The House and Senate agree to fund the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), but disagree on how to pay for it. The House version would be funded by 700,000 low-income people losing their insurance.

International:

  1. U.S. forces capture one of the terrorists who attacked the Benghazi compound in 2012.
  2. In defending the lack of staffing at the State Department, Trump says that the only who matters is him because he makes all the policy.
  3. The U.S. pulls out of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), which is an effort to fight corruption in the energy market. The EITI requires countries to disclose fossil fuel and mining revenues.
  4. Trump starts his trip to Asia with a few days in Hawaii, where he’s greeted by hundreds of protestors.
  5. Saudi Arabia arrests several princes in what they call an anti-corruption crackdown, but what really appears to be a consolidation of power.
  6. White House officials say that the Office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan might be reinstated. Trump got rid of the office shortly after taking office himself.
  7. Yet another set of confidential documents is leaked. The Paradise Papers include information about tax havens for the super rich and where they keep their money. The information touches on celebrities, government officials, Trump associates and cabinet members, businessmen, and corporations. Here’s a list, if you’re interested.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. Trump signs a bill that repeals the Obama-era consumer protections that prevented financial institutions from forcing customers into arbitration clauses, preventing legal action in cases of wrongdoing against consumers.
  2. Senators Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) propose a bill that would require more disclosure in social media ads, specifically around who’s funding them.
  3. Here’s a little roundup of what Congress has been doing around women’s reproductive health. Do you see the problem here?
    • Making it harder to get birth control, and then…
    • Making it harder to get reproductive health and counseling services, and then…
    • Making it harder to get an abortion, and then…
    • Making it harder to adopt unwanted or orphaned children.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. A federal judge blocks Trump’s transgender ban in the military from being fully enforced.
  2. Trump says Congress should end an immigration lottery program that the New York City terrorist used to come to the U.S., blaming the program on Chuck Schumer. Schumer was one of the Gang of 8 that worked on a bill to get rid of the program a few years ago. The Senate passed the bill, but it didn’t get through the GOP-led House.
  3. Lawyers sue to have ICE release the 10-year-old undocumented immigrant with cerebral palsy who was detained when she came out of gall bladder surgery. She’s finally released later in the week.
  4. After 62 venues refuse to host Milo Yiannopolous, he’s forced to cancel his public appearance.
  5. New York City passes a series of “sanctuary” bills to protect undocumented immigrants and to limit how city employees can work with ICE.
  6. Contractors that are building the wall prototypes south of San Diego are afraid they’ll lose business because of it (and they will). They want the DOJ to sue to prevent state and local governments from denying them contracts or divesting from their companies.
  7. These same contractors also want to be reimbursed for any security they provide and they want local authorities to provide protection as well.
  8. Mar-a-Lago gets permission to hire 70 foreign workers for the 2017-2018 season.

Climate/EPA:

  1. The White House approves a report concluding that climate change is real and manmade. At odds with their current stance on the subject. According to the report:

“Every day we see more evidence that climate change is dramatically affecting our planet. This week, we found out the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere reached its highest level in 800,000 years in 2016. The majority of Americans understand the seriousness of climate change, and they demand action. We need to invest in clean energy alternatives to fossil fuels and work toward a 100 percent clean energy system—not continue to let the fossil fuel industry make billions in profits and buy out politicians while destroying our planet.”

  1. The EPA bans scientists who receive grant money from serving on advisory panels, even though these advisors sign an agreement to not take any grant money during their time on the panel. It is expected that Scott Pruitt will replace these scientists with industry officials who have previously fought against EPA standards.
  2. New Mexico defeats an effort to remove jaguars from their endangered species list.
  3. The hole in the ozone layer shrinks to its smallest size since 1988, partly due to warmer weather and partly due to a united global effort to reduce ozone-depleting chemicals.
  4. The Trump administration has so far failed three times to repeal Obama’s methane emissions rules, foiled once by the Senate and twice by the courts. This has the gas and oil industry working to fill the void by creating voluntary programs to address the problem of emissions.

Budget/Economy:

  1. House Republicans release their tax package. I listed out a few details in a separate post because these recaps are getting long!
  2. Small businesses come out against the plan. 60% of Americans don’t think businesses will spend their tax savings on employees. Only 12% of Americans approve of the plan.
  3. Trump nominates Jerome Powell to head the Fed. He’s already on the board, so likely won’t change course much. He might be a little more business friendly.
  4. Out-of-work coal miners have training for new jobs freely available to them, but they aren’t taking it because they think their coal jobs are coming back.
  5. With monumental rebuilding efforts going on as a result of fires, floods, and hurricanes in the U.S., Trump slaps tariffs on imports of certain Canadian lumber, which will certainly cause an increase in costs. And it’s increasing tensions in already tense NAFTA negotiations.
  6. Trump throws a little influence into the stock market by tweeting “Would very much appreciate Saudi Arabia doing their IPO of Aramco with the New York Stock Exchange. Important to the United States!”

Elections:

  1. All eyes are on Virginia and New Jersey elections on the 7th, though there are state elections around the country going on at the same time.
  2. In what could be a case of the second worst timing ever (right behind the timing of Comey’s re-opening the Clinton email case last November), the week before the Virginia elections Donna Brazile releases an excerpt from her book where she implies that the DNC and Clinton campaigns colluded. It turns out she didn’t reveal anything we didn’t already know two years ago, and that both the Bernie and Hillary campaigns were made the same offer by the DNC. It probably wasn’t a fair deal, but the elections weren’t rigged. Her book comes out this week… on election day.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Some Fox employees express embarrassment and frustration over their network’s (nonexistent) coverage of the Russia charges revealed this week, with many saying they want to quit.
  2. An outgoing Twitter employee becomes a hero for a day when they briefly shut down Trump’s Twitter account.
  3. Far right media manufacture an antifa uprising for the weekend calling it a planned civil war. When the Civil War doesn’t happen, that same media makes fun of antifa for failing.
  4. Rand Paul‘s neighbor assaults him in his yard, breaking some ribs and bruising his lung. The reason for the attack isn’t yet known, though the neighbor is cooperating with police.
  5. Over half of Trump’s nominees have close ties to the industries they’re supposed to regulate.
  6. Bush Jr. and Sr. release a book in which Sr. calls Trump a blowhard and Jr. says Trump just fans anger and doesn’t understand the job.

Polls:

  1. Trump’s approval rating in the Gallup poll hits an all-time low of 33%.
  2. Almost 80% of Trump voters think he shouldn’t leave office even if the Russia allegations are proven. Even so, the number of Americans who think he should be impeached is greater than the number who think he shouldn’t be.
  3. Nearly half of Americans think Trump committed a crime.
  4. An ABC/WaPo poll says that 65% of Americans don’t think Trump has accomplished much.
  5. Trump’s “enemy of the people” rhetoric is sticking with some. 63% of Republicans think the press is the enemy of the people, followed by 38% of independents, and 11% of Democrats.

Week 32 in Trump

Posted on September 4, 2017 in Politics, Trump

Photo courtesy of NBC

This is a photo of DACA recipient Jesus Contreras. He’s an EMT in Houston who’s been working tirelessly to rescue and assist victims of the flooding. If DACA is repealed, he could be deported. Another DACA recipient, Alonso Guillen, died while out rescuing others. These are the kinds of people Trump wants to deport. It’s time for us to give these youngsters a break and find a path to citizenship for them. Please write your members of congress and urge them to work out a solution that does not tear families apart.
Anyway, here’s what happened last week in Trump:

Russia:

  1. Michael Cohen, who was helping Trump Organization in the effort to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, asked Putin’s personal spokesperson for assistance. Michael’s emails reveal the following:
    • While Trump was running for president, his company was working on a deal to build a Trump Tower in Moscow and Trump personally spoke with Cohen about it at least three times (despite him claiming over and over again that he had no dealings with Russia).
    • The people handling this for Trump said Putin would help Trump become president. And I quote: “Our boy can become president of the USA and we can engineer it.”
    • Trump signed a letter of intent to develop the tower when he was four months into his campaign.
  1. Trump refuses to call Russia a security threat.
  2. The Kremlin confirms that Trump’s lawyer requested help from them with the stalled Trump Tower project.
  3. Representative Ron DeSantis (R-FL) issues a proposal to reduce funding for the Mueller investigation.
  4. The IRS Office of Special Investigations is helping Mueller in the Russia investigation.
  5. Donald Trump Jr. agrees to testify in closed-door congressional hearings.
  6. Trump’s calls Chuck Grassley to pledge support for the ethanol industry, an issue important to Grassley’s state of Iowa. Coincidentally, Grassley is investigating Trump Jr.’s meeting with Russians last year.
  7. Mueller obtains a draft letter showing Trump’s original reasoning for firing Comey. White House counsel opposed the letter, so it was never sent, but it gives an idea of what was behind Trump’s thinking when he fired Comey.
  8. Mueller coordinates with NY State Attorney Eric Schneiderman to share evidence on Manafort’s potential financial crimes.
  9. In response to Russia kicking out hundreds of U.S. diplomats, the Trump administration closes several Russian consulates around the U.S. Russia calls it an act of aggression.
  10. As a result of a Freedom of Information request, the DOJ confirms that there is no evidence that either the DOJ or the FBI were surveilling Trump Tower during the 2016 elections. This directly contradicts Trump’s wiretapping tweets where he accused Obama of illegally spying on him.
  11. American-Russian lobbyist Rinat Akhmetshin testifies before Mueller’s grand jury.

Courts/Justice:

  1. The Trump administration restores the use of military surplus equipment by police departments, leading to concerns of over-militarization of the police.
  2. Jeff Sessions put together the Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety, which he thought would give him ammunition for his war on marijuana. However, the task force says we should just keep current policies.
  3. Texas loses another federal case. This time its latest abortion law was struck down. Texas isn’t having a great track record on its legislation this year. They’ve had voter, redistricting, abortion, and sanctuary city laws struck down or blocked by the courts. Maybe it’s time their legislators review the constitution.

Healthcare:

  1. Governors Kasich and Hinkenlooper announce a bipartisan deal on a way to stabilize Obamacare markets.
  2. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) says they’ll gut funding for ads and education for the ACA by 90% ahead of the open enrollment period.

International:

  1. North Korea launches a missile over Japan, placing Japan on high alert and drawing rebukes from around the globe.
  2. Trump responds by saying all options are on the table, but that talking is not the answer. Mattis contradicts him, saying diplomatic efforts are always an option.
  3. Nikki Haley says something must be done; that sanctions don’t seem to be helping and their current actions are unacceptable.
  4. South Korea responds by flying fighter jets over the border and dropping bombs.
  5. Trump says that the U.S. pays extortion money to North Korea. It’s not clear what money he’s talking about.
  6. Later on in the week, North Korea detonates a nuclear device that they say is a hydrogen bomb that could be attached to a missile that could reach the U.S.
  7. As part of his reorganization efforts, Tillerson says he’ll cut around three dozen special envoys, including the representative for climate change (because of course he would).
  8. China and India pull troops away from their border standoff in the Himalayas.
  9. Two more State Department officials step down—the lead envoy to the UN and the U.S. assistant secretary of state for international narcotics and law enforcement affairs. The State Department is very minimally staffed right now.
  10. In a press conference with Finland’s president, Trump says Finland is buying “large amounts” of F-18s from us. Finland later clarifies, “No, we’re not.”
  11. After Hurricane Harvey hits Texas, there are fewer foreign governments offering assistance than in previous disasters. Trump’s “America First” approach seems to have alienated even our allies.
  12. A federal grand jury indicts 15 of Turkish president Erdogon’s bodyguards and 4 other Turkish nationals involved in the attack on protestors last May.
  13. Mexico and Canada both offer aid to Texas after massive flooding, but neither have been accepted yet.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. In light of the flooding after Hurricane Harvey, Republican Rep. Jeb Hensarling is hoping to get reforms to the National Flood Assistance Program passed as soon as Congress reconvenes.
  2. Bannon throws his and Breitbart’s support behind Roy Moore, who is running against Trump-backed Luther Strange in Alabama.
  3. Both Texas Senators (Ted Cruz and John Cornyn) voted against additional funds for the recovery from Super Storm Sandy. Now that they need to ask for federal assistance themselves, they both back pedal and try to explain away their previous votes. We’ll see how much they end up requesting.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. Trump threatens to end DACA, leaving hundreds of thousands in limbo. Both democrats and republicans in Congress implore him not to end it. Interestingly, while Paul Ryan says Obama overstepped in creating DACA, he does not support ending it. Instead, he thinks we need a legislative answer. Obama asked them for a legislative answer for years and got nothing, which is why he wrote the executive order in the first place. And why we’re where we are now.
  2. Business leaders ask Trump not to end DACA, saying it’ll cost them millions and they’ll lose valued workers.
  3. When asked about his pardon of Joe Arpaio, Trump says “I assumed the ratings would be far higher” because of Hurricane Harvey coverage.
  4. The judge in Joe Arpaio’s case refuses to throw out the conviction (per Trump’s pardon) without oral arguments as to why.
  5. Faith leaders and their congregants from multiple denominations and religions march in Washington D.C. to protest Trump’s lack of moral leadership, especially around the Charlottesville violence.
  6. Other faith leaders and progressives continue their 10-day march from Charlottesville to Washington D.C. in protest of white supremacists.
  7. Under Trumps travel ban, all green card applicants could be required to do an interview starting in October. Currently, interviews are limited to higher risk groups and we don’t have the resources in place to interview everyone.
  8. Mattis says that in spite of Trump’s transgender ban, there will be no changes to current policy for those already serving until he’s put together a panel to analyze it and received their recommendations. But it sounds like, for now, no new openly transgender service members are allowed.
  9. Senate Democrats are working on an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that could reverse Trump’s transgender ban or at least protect those who are already serving.
  10. The city of Houston felt it necessary to put out a statement that they are not checking papers or looking for undocumented immigrants in any of the shelters.
  11. A federal judge blocks Texas anti-sanctuary city bill while the case is being heard.
  12. Several Members of Congress from both parties urge a vote to protect DACA recipients.
  13. Homeland Security selects its first contractors to build prototypes of the wall, even though they haven’t received authorization or funding. These contracts are not public info, so we don’t know who the contractors are. I wish they’d do it somewhere besides California. I don’t want the eyesore in my backyard.
  14. With the estimates of the damage from Hurricane Harvey in the 10s of billions, Trump backs down on his threat to defund the government if he doesn’t get funding for the wall.

Climate/EPA:

  1. Earlier in August, the Trump administration rescinded an Obama-era rule that required all new infrastructure projects to be designed for climate resilience. Under the rule, things like roads and bridges would need to be built taking into consideration things like rising sea levels in flood-prone areas. Obama’s rule had bipartisan and business support, and experts urged Trump to reconsider. But real estate developer lobbied hard to overturn the rule.
  2. After seeing the devastation from Hurricane Harvey, the administration considers implementing a new, similar rule.
  3. The devastation from Hurricane Harvey is immense. Countless people have been rescued, at least 50 are dead, and shelters and churches are overflowing with people.
  4. Hurricane Harvey brings so much rain to Texas that the National Weather Service has to add new colors to its weather map to show it. More than 50 inches in some areas.
  5. There are a series of explosions at the Arkema plant, which stores volatile peroxides. The smoke is noxious and anyone living nearby is told to stay indoors.
  6. The Chemical Safety Board (which Trump wants to eliminate) starts investigating the Arkema plant explosion.
  7. The EPA gets criticism for not starting to evaluate the “Superfund” areas in Houston yet. These are the areas most likely to be contaminated.
  8. Damage to refineries and plants in Texas releases about two million pounds of noxious chemicals into the air.
  9. Interesting side note: Houston has no zoning laws.
  10. Louisiana also gets hit by the remnants of the storm, with more flooding there.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Mexico says they won’t negotiate NAFTA over social media.
  2. Under the Trump administration, the number of federal employees drops by 11,000. In 2013, sequestration forced a reduction of 57,000 jobs, most of which were added back in 2015 and 2016.
  3. All 19 agencies threatened with defunding in Trump’s early drafts of the budget appear to be safe for now. Trump changed his mind on a few, and the Congress is so far protecting the rest. Not all of the spending bills have been passed yet though.
  4. Trump launches his tax reform push in Missouri, though it looks like both the House and Senate are going their own way on the issue.
  5. Only 15% of households in Harris County, Texas, have flood insurance, which means they will have to rely more than ever on FEMA and other government assistance.
  6. Gary Cohn dismisses Democratic concerns about repealing the estate tax by saying “Only morons pay the estate tax.”
  7. Trump rejects an offer from China to cut overcapacity of steel, though his advisors support the deal. Trump would rather just impose steeper tariffs.
  8. The Trump administration ends a rule that required large companies to report employee salaries by race and gender. This was an Obama policy targeting the wage gap.
  9. Nebraska Republican Representative Ben Sasse says Trump has an 18th century view of trade, thinking of it as a zero-sum game instead of the nuanced and complicated strategy it actually is.
  10. Trump wants to halt the trade deal between the U.S. and South Korea.
  11. Trump wants to tie recovery aid for Hurricane Harvey to raising the debt ceiling, but backs off of that later in the week.
  12. House Republicans look to cut $1 billion in FEMA funds to help pay for the border wall, while at the same time Trump asks for billions in relief for the hurricane victims.

Elections:

  1. Illinois passes a law enabling automatic voter registration, becoming the 10th state to do so.
  2. As of this week, there are seven lawsuits pending against Trump’s voter fraud committee.
  3. Kris Kobach, Kansas Secretary of State and head of Trump’s election commission, is now a paid columnist for Breitbart. Steve Bannon, who runs Breitbart, was previously on the board of Cambridge Analytica, potentially giving Kobach tools to target his voter restriction efforts.
  4. Democrat Adam Schiff is pushing to defund the elections commission as part of the spending bill. Democrats are concerned that the commission’s actual goal is to restrict minority voting.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Texas activates the National Guard to help out with the flooding.
  2. Donald and Melania Trump visits Texas.
  3. 21st Century Fox announces it’s dropping FoxNews in the U.K. due to lack of interest.
  4. Betsy DeVos selects a former DeVry official to head the watchdog agency that monitors for-profit schools like DeVry, which was fined $100 million last year for fraud.
  5. The UN Human Rights Chief condemns Trump for attacking the media, saying it could incite violence and delegitimize democratic norms. He specifically denounced Trump calling the media “crooked” and “fake news.”
  6. After smaller than normal crowds at his Phoenix rally, Trump informs the guy who organized it that he will never manage another Trump rally again.
  7. The administration puts a halt to plans to test truck drivers and train engineers for sleep apnea. The condition has been blamed for fatal crashes.
  8. Trump pledges to donate $1 million to the Hurricane Harvey recovery effort.
  9. Rumor has it that Trump’s generals have a deal that at least one of them would be in town at all times to make sure Trump doesn’t do anything destructive, like start a war.
  10. 60% of the public comments received by the FCC are against overturning net neutrality. If you remove spam and form letters, the difference is more stark: 1,520,000 comments for net neutrality and just 23,000 comments against. That’s 98.5% for preserving net neutrality.
  11. Trump tweets that Comey prematurely cleared Hillary Clinton of wrongdoing in the email investigation. This is after two congressional Republicans accuse Comey of drafting a statement clearing Clinton before the final two interviews of the investigation.
  12. The Pentagon says they sent 6,300 active troops to Texas to help with Harvey, but they only sent 1,638. They blame an accounting error.
  13. The AP reports that Trump received $17 million from his insurance policy for hurricane damage at Mar-a-Lago years ago, but the AP couldn’t find evidence of that much damage. Trump acknowledged that he transferred some of those funds into his personal accounts. AFAIK, that’s perfectly legal and the amount he kept for himself is not known.
  14. Controversial Sheriff David Clarke resigns as sheriff. I assumed it was to accept a job in the Trump administration, but I haven’t heard any word on that yet.
  15. Hours after CNN reports on Trump’s pledge to donate $1 million to Hurricane Harvey victims, Eric Trumps tweets: “Let’s see if @CNN or the #MSM acknowledges this incredible generosity. My guess: they won’t…” Moron.
  16. It turns out the Kushner real estate company has been deep in debt for a few years.
  17. Trump makes over three dozen nominations to government positions this week.
  18. Trump nominates Republican Representative James Bridenstine to head up NASA, generating a backlash from both of Florida’s senators. They say the head of NASA should be a space professional and not a politician.
  19. In the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, Laura Ingraham criticizes Trump’s lack of staffing for FEMA. He responds (by Twitter) that he’s leaving the FEMA positions empty on purpose as a way of downsizing government.
  20. A voter focus group in Pennsylvania came down hard on Trump, criticizing his performance so far. The group was a pretty even mix of Trump and Hillary voters and one Jill Stein voter.
  21. Republicans in 20 states have proposed anti-protestor legislation. Six states have approved it. A) This violates our first amendment rights, and B) we didn’t see this same kind of action from Democratic states when the Tea Party protests picked up.
  22. Chief of Staff John Kelly filters out The Daily Caller and Breitbart from Trump’s daily information feed.

Stupid Things Politicians Say:

“I hope they are found & hung from a tall tree with a long rope.”

– GOP Missouri state Rep. Warren Love on Wednesday calling for a lynching of an unidentified vandal who threw paint on a Confederate memorial in Springfield National Cemetery.

Week 30 in Trump

Posted on August 21, 2017 in Politics, Trump

A few quotes apropos of this past week’s events:

From Robert E. Lee himself: “I think it wiser not to keep open the sores of war but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife, to commit to oblivion the feelings engendered.”

From one of my favorite bloggers: “We all have the right to protest, but not all protests are right.”

From the University of Texas at Austin: “We do not choose our history, but we choose what we honor and celebrate on our campus.”

And just my opinion here, but we’ve seen a lot of strong intellectuals, scientists, and business leaders jumping Trump’s ship—and there are calls for Gary Cohn to step down and save his reputation. But we need brains and leadership to help guide this careening ship, so I hope he stays, along with other thoughtful, smart people.

Here’s what happened in week 30…

Russia:

  1. One of the veteran FBI investigators working on the Russia probe, Peter Strzok, moves into a human resources position. We don’t know if it was voluntary or not.
  2. Internal Trump campaign emails show that one of Trump’s campaign advisers, George Papadopoulos, tried several times to set up meetings between the campaign and Russian leaders during the run-up to last year’s election.
  3. Mueller wants to talk to Reince Preibus in the Russia probe.

Courts/Justice:

  1. We learn that Jeff Sessions requested info on 1.3 million visitors to an anti-Trump organizing site. It looks like this is part of the investigation into the antifa violence on inauguration day. The host company is pushing back against the request saying that it’s too broad and captures too much information.
  2. Judge Gorsuch raises ethics questions when he agrees to speak at an event being held at the Trump Hotel, which is under litigation around conflicts of interest.
  3. Sessions once again criticizes Chicago, the right’s poster child for the unproven narrative of failed liberal policies leading to violence. He says their sanctuary policies are what’s driving violent crime there.

Healthcare:

  1. The Trump administration continues its effort to roll back Obama’s anti-arbitration regulations. At question are patients’ rights to sue healthcare companies, including nursing homes, for harm caused. Most healthcare institutions have anti-arbitration clauses that you must sign before receiving services or moving into a nursing home. This gives consumers little to fall back on when they are mistreated, and especially affects eldercare in nursing homes.
  2. The CBO reports that cutting the ACA subsidies would not only increase insurance premiums, but would also increase the cost to the federal government. Trump agrees to continue paying the subsidies. But did he do it in time to mitigate the expected increase in next year’s premiums?
  3. Tom Price ends an experiment to see if bundling payments for certain procedures, like hip surgeries, would lower overall costs. Under the program, healthcare facilities were required to charge the same price across the board for the same procedures. I guess we won’t find out if it would have worked.

International:

  1. North Korea backs down from its threats to bomb Guam, but says the U.S. is still on notice.
  2. American intelligence agencies link North Korea’s success in their missile tests with an old Ukrainian factory with ties to Russia’s cold-war missile program.
  3. Iran threatens to drop out of the nuclear deal if any new sanctions are put in place against them. This would let them get back to work on nuclear weapons, so this is not something we want.
  4. Not political, but definitely newsworthy and not getting enough coverage: At least 200 people die in a massive mudslide in Sierra Leone, and hundreds are missing. At least 3,000 people lose their homes.
  5. There are multiple terrorist attacks in Spain, with a vehicular attack on a main tourist pedestrian street in Barcelona and a bomb that accidentally exploded in the terrorists home. There are 15 dead, including several perpetrators.
  6. Trump reacts more swiftly and harshly against the terrorist attacks in Barcelona than the one in Charlottesville.
  7. After that measured response, Trump also tweets a debunked rumor about General Pershing shooting Muslims with bullets soaked in pig’s blood. Seriously people. This never happened.
  8. Pence cuts his South American trip short to meet with Trump about the war on Afghanistan.
  9. A terrorist wielding a knife kills two and injures eight in Finland. This is a bad week for terrorism.
  10. The U.S. starts a trade investigation into China’s trade violations around intellectual property. This presents risks at time when hostility with North Korea is building up and we could use China’s help. But China has ignored our intellectual property laws for decades, cutting into the profits of U.S. companies.
  11. Trump moves the cyber command unit of the military up so it will be better able to improve its capabilities to fight cyber attacks.
  12. Again? Another U.S. Navy destroyer collides with a ship—this time an oil tanker—off the coast of Singapore. Ten people are missing. This puts us down three destroyers so far. The Navy opens a broad investigation into the accidents.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

Charlottesville Fallout:

  1. Days after the Charlottesville attack, Trump retweets a GIF of a train hitting CNN (a person with a CNN logo). He later deletes the tweet.
  2. The University of Virginia holds a candlelight vigil for Heather Heyer, who was killed in the car attack. They didn’t want to put it on social media because they were afraid neo-nazis would show up.
  3. Two days after his statement blaming ″both sides″ in the Charlottesville violence, Trump reads a written statement denouncing white supremacist groups specifically by name.
  4. And then on Tuesday, he screws up any goodwill he might have gotten by doubling down on his words from Saturday and arguing with reporters for several minutes about how both sides are equally to blame and equally as bad. This was an unplanned Q&A at the end of a press conference on infrastructure, and Trump sounded very angry, defensive, and frustrated.
  5. Trump later says he feels liberated by his off the rails press conference.
  6. News hosts covering the press conference show their stunned reactions in real-time. All of them, from CNN to Fox to local news channels, are shaken by what they just saw.
  7. Even Trump’s staffers say they’re “stunned and disheartened” by Trump’s remarks.
  8. This is a tactic Trump has used before—delay denouncing members of his base for 48 hours or so, and then say something to dampen the media frenzy caused by his lack of calling out the bad apples.
  9. Here are a few of the responses across the country to the violence and Trump’s handling of it:
    • The Illinois Senate passes a resolution to have police classify neo-nazi groups as terrorist organizations.
    • Cities accelerate the pace of removing Confederate statues. Unfortunately, some city councils have voted to have the statues destroyed instead of maintained in a museum or other facility.
    • Foreign leaders denounce Trump’s response to Charlottesville.
    • So many CEOs pull out of Trump’s business councils that he disbands them.
    • The CEO of Walmart criticizes Trump’s response in a memo to his employees.
    • GoDaddy, Google, and Squarespace kick white supremacist sites off their servers.
    • Republicans are forced to step up and take a stand against racist hate groups.
    • So far, at least 16 charities have pulled their events from Mar-a-Lago.
    • One pastor resigns from Trump’s Evangelical Advisory Board, saying they have conflicting values after Charlottesville.
    • All 16 commissioners on the Committee on the Arts and the Humanities resign in a scathing letter (where they also spell out ″RESIST″ in the first letter of each paragraph).
    • James Murdoch, son of Rupert and CEO of 21st Century Fox, writes a letter condemning white hate groups and pledging to donate $1 million to the Anti-Defamation League.
    • A group of Liberty University alumni return their diplomas in protest of university president Jerry Fallwell’s defense of Trump’s comments on Charlottesville.
    • House Democrats introduce a measure to censure Trump over his comments on Charlottesville.
  10. Trump says that the counter protests were illegal because they didn’t have permits. They did have permits.
  11. The White House issues a memo urging GOP members to back Trump’s original remarks on Charlottesville.
  12. Obama’s response to the Charlottesville tragedy becomes the most liked and (so far) 4th most retweeted tweet in history.
  13. Both former presidents Bush 1 and 2 denounce racism and bigotry. Paul Ryan calls white supremacy “repulsive.” Mitch McConnell says those ideologies are not welcome here. Mitt Romney pens an eloquent and scathing letter denouncing both racist hate groups and Trump’s response.
  14. The four branches of military, the Navy, Marines, Army, Air Force, and National Guard, felt the need to denounce racism after Trump’s remarks.

Everything Else:

  1. Two weeks later, we’re still waiting for Trump to denounce the bombing of a mosque in Minnesota.
  2. John Dowd, Trump’s lead lawyer on the Russia investigation, sends a bizarre email to conservative journalists saying that there’s basically no difference between George Washington and General Robert E. Lee. If I have to explain the difference to you, you need to go back to school.
  3. Dowd’s email also says that Black Lives Matter has been totally infiltrated by terrorist groups.
  4. Someone vandalizes the Lincoln Memorial, spraying painting “Fuck law” in red paint.
  5. Alt-right leaders start dealing with the fact that police and authorities in Virginia didn’t back them up last weekend. They’re having to come to terms with the realities of being members of an unpopular minority group.
  6. White supremacists have a bizarre affection for Russia:
    • From Richard Spencer: “Russia is the sole white power in the world.”
    • From David Duke: “Russia is key to white survival.”
  7. Trump’s Thursday tweet storm shows a lack of understanding about American culture and the meaning behind Confederate monuments. In this tweet storm, he:
    • Attacks two sitting GOP senators.
    • Goes after the fake news media (again).
    • Says he’s sad that we’re removing our beautiful statues. Side note: Most of these statues were erected during the Jim Crow and civil rights eras as a reminder of white supremacy.
    • Wonders if we’ll pull down all the Jefferson monuments.
    • Says we’re ripping apart our culture.
  8. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, there are around 900 hate groups in the U.S. Their list is controversial because they include anti-LGBTQ Christian groups, but sorry folks, hate is hate is hate. Here’s their reasoning, if you’re interested.
  9. The ACLU says they will no longer defend the right to free speech if the group in question is armed with guns. The ACLU originally defended the alt-right’s right to march in Charlottesville. Some feel that hate speech or intent to promote violence should play into whether they defend someone, but up until now, they have defended the 1st amendment without question.
  10. The Charlottesville incident raises new concerns about pending legislation in six states to protect drivers who hit protesters with your car.
  11. People organize marches across the country in support of Charlottesville.
  12. There are also rallies across the country calling for the removal of Confederate monuments, plus a few to keep the statues up.
  13. Several ″free speech″ March on Google rallies are scheduled across the country, with counter protests also planned. Organizers cancel the March on Google rallies, citing fears of violence; but the counter protests go on. Actually it looks like the March on Google rallies didn’t spark much interest.
  14. A free speech rally in Boston draws tens of thousands of counter protesters amid suspicion that it was actually a white supremacist rally. Police arrest 27 people, mostly for disorderly conduct, but nobody is injured.
  15. While organizers claim the free speech rally isn’t a white supremacist rally, several speakers either pull out or are uninvited after the events in Charlottesville. At least two of them are known white supremacists.
  16. During the Boston marches, Trump tweets “Looks like many anti-police agitators in Boston. Police are looking tough and smart! Thank you.” It was easier for him to call out peaceful protesters who didn’t kill or injure anyone than to call out the white hate groups that did.
  17. In contrast, Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh said, “I think it’s clear today that Boston stood for peace and love, not bigotry and hate.”
  18. And then later, someone must’ve taken over Trump’s account because he tweeted “I want to applaud the many protestors in Boston who are speaking out against bigotry and hate. Our country will soon come together as one!”
  19. Fox News tweets that thousands turn out for the free speech rally in Boston. In reality, tens of thousands turn out to protest the rally due to the white supremacist speakers scheduled. The number of rally attendees was fewer than 100.
  20. Of note, the protesters aren’t protesting free speech, but rather the white supremacists who organized the free speech rallies. The rallies were organized under the guise of protecting the free speech of the Google employee who was fired after his screed on gender in tech. Since he’s not being prosecuted, this is not a free speech issue.
  21. The University of Texas at Austin begins removal of Confederate statues in the middle of the night.
  22. As of August, Trump has a mixed record on immigration and border control. We have fewer Border Patrol officers than when he started, and if the current pace keeps up, 10,000 fewer undocumented immigrants will be deported this year. Illegal border crossings are down though. Side note: We just got back from Mexico, and the border area is really beautiful and rugged. The fence is already a blight and I think building a massive wall would just be a shame.
  23. A nazi rally in Berlin brings 500 nazis and 1,000 protestors.
  24. Some NYPD officers hold a rally in support of Colin Kaepernick. Frank Serpico attends. Yes, that Frank Serpico.
  25. In a May report,“White Supremacist Extremism Poses Persistent Threat of Lethal Violence,” the FBI and DHS warned Trump about white hate groups. The report says these groups “likely will continue to pose a threat of lethal violence over the next year,” and that they carried out more attacks than any other domestic extremist group in the past 16 years.
  26. Trans-surgical care is put on hold in the military, pending further guidance.
  27. The DHS ends a program where Central American children can apply for parole status, but it continues the program for applying for refugee status. The parole component was started as a way to reduce the flow of children illegally crossing the border.

Climate/EPA:

  1. Ryan Zinke announces that, for now, the Sand to Snow National Monument east of Los Angeles is safe for now. This is one of the monuments Obama designated. No word on the other monuments under review.
  2. Trump disbands the federal advisory panel for the National Climate Assessment. This group helps government and private-sector officials plan around the government’s climate analysis.
  3. A surge of GOP Members of Congress publicly jump the climate-denial ship. The House Climate Solutions Caucus has more than tripled its membership since January. And last month, 46 GOP members voted with Democrats to stop an amendment that would have removed the requirement that the Department of Defense prepare for the effects of climate change.
  4. Meanwhile, the EPA is revising an Obama-era regulation that limits the dumping of toxic metals from coal-fired power plants, along with a regulation that sets emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Trump signs an executive order expediting the environmental review process for high-profile infrastructure projects, like highways, bridges, and, probably most importantly, his amazing wall.
  2. NAFTA talks get underway between Canadian, U.S., and Mexican trade officials.
  3. Senator James Lankford (R-Okla.) says that having a trade deficit is a good thing because it means that foreigners are investing in our economy. For example, when a foreign agent invests in a U.S. company or buys U.S. Treasury bonds, that increases our trade deficit.
  4. While groups from all sides have come forward opposing the merger between the Sinclair Broadcasting Group and Tribune Media, none have come forward to defend the merger. Conservative media oppose it because of the competition and everybody else opposes it because of Sinclair’s mandatory conservative op-eds.
  5. There’s a lot of talk about housing some of the Confederate statues in museums, but Trump’s budget eliminates funding to museums.
  6. In just 7 months, the Secret Service has gone through their entire year’s budget for protecting Trump and his family.
  7. Trump drops his plan to form an infrastructure advisory committee in light of the disbanding of his other two business advisory boards. IMO, this is not a good development—he needs all the help and support he can get here.
  8. Pence makes a few small trade deals in South America that opens up markets for U.S. agriculture, and South Korea lifts its ban on U.S. poultry and egg products.

Elections:

  1. A federal court rules that the district lines in Texas (drawn by the GOP) discriminate against ethnic minorities and must be redrawn before the midterm elections. If the Texas legislature won’t fix them, the court will.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Carl Icahn resigns from his advisory role to the White House ahead of an article discussing his potential conflicts of interest and possible illegalities.
  2. Trump closes his off-the-cuff press conference by bragging that he owns one of the largest wineries in the US, right there in Charlottesville.
  3. Steve Bannon calls a liberal journalist whom he respects to talk about trade policies, but ends up giving an accidental on-the-record interview. He undercuts Trump, mocks the alt-right as irrelevant clowns, and talks about the in-fighting in the White House.
  4. And just like that, Bannon is out. He says his purpose there is done; he’s achieved what he wanted to achieve.
  5. Bannon will go back to Breitbart, where he’ll have an even wider audience for his own brand of propaganda. Yay. Here’s what sources close the Bannon say about that:
    • Bannon will be “going to war” for Trump, vowing to intensify the fight from the outside.
    • “Steve is now unchained. Fully unchained.”
    • “He’s going nuclear. You have no idea. This is gonna be really fucking bad.”
    • According to a GOP Member of Congress: “Now the real circus begins. … This is the tea party coming full circle.”
    • From Bannon himself: “The Trump presidency that we fought for, and won, is over.”
  6. Bannon says he’s going after his enemies, so if you’re a Breitbart reader, be on the lookout for hit jobs against the following: Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner, and Gary Cohn.
  7. Trump thinks Bannon was behind the leaks targeting McMaster, specifically that he has a drinking problem and that he’s anti-Israel.
  8. GOP leaders worry that they don’t have anyone on their side in the White House anymore.
  9. Donald and Melania Trump announce that they will not participate in the Kennedy Center Honors this year so as not to cause political distractions.
  10. Trump hosts a dinner at his Bedminster country club with some of his most generous donors.
  11. Trump ignores Phoenix mayor’s request to cancel his rally in the city.
  12. Hope Hicks takes over as Trump’s interim Director of Communication.
  13. Prescient. During a campaign speech last year for Hillary Clinton, Obama said that no one changes the president, but instead the office “magnifies” who you are already. So if you “accept the support of Klan sympathizers before you’re President, or you’re kind of slow in disowning it, saying, ‘Well, I don’t know,’ then that’s how you’ll be as President.” Of note, Hillary also warned us.
  14. And on a positive note, with Newt Gingrich’s wife taking on the ambassadorship to the Vatican, Newt will soon be leaving the country.

Polls:

  1. Trump’s approval rating continues its slow decline, sitting at 34% in the latest Gallup poll. 61% disapprove, a new high for the Gallup poll.
  2. The percent of Americans who think Trump should be impeached has increased from 30% to 40% over the course of his presidency.
  3. Most countries worldwide trust Putin more than Trump to handle global affairs. Of the countries who trust Trump more, most trust him just barely more than Putin.
  4. Trump’s approval rating is at 34% to 36% in the three states that won him the election: Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. 60% in those states say Trump has embarrassed them.

Week 14 In Trump

Posted on May 1, 2017 in Politics, Trump

Quote of the week:

“I love my previous life. I had so many things going. I, actually, this is more work than in my previous life,” Trump said. “I thought it would be easier. I thought it was more of a — I’m a details-oriented person I think you would say that. But I do miss my old life. I like to work so that’s not a problem but this is actually more work.”

Anybody who thinks presidenting is easy — in fact anyone who doesn’t think it’s just about the hardest job in the world — has never really paid attention to our government.

Russia:

  1. The Senate Intelligence Committee adds more staffers to help investigate Russia ties after they are criticized for the slow pace of their investigation.
  2. The slow pace also generates a bigger push for an independent investigation (73% of Americans want one).
  3. Rep. Jason Chaffetz says that it appears Michael Flynn broke the law in accepting foreign money for appearances and lobbying because as a retired Lieutenant General he is required to obtain permission.
  4. Sean Spicer shifts blame to the Obama administration for having given Flynn security clearance, though Obama had also fired Flynn. Meanwhile, the White House refuses to turn over the documents requested by the oversight committee, something Spicer denies.
  5. The Defense Department inspector general also launches an investigation into Michael Flynn.

 

Courts/Justice:

  1. Arkansas forges ahead with their executions, killing three more inmates this week.
  2. Trump says he’ll get rid of the requirement that employers provide birth-control coverage to their employees, but the DoJ indicates that they intend to continue fighting for that coverage.
  3. The Senate confirms Rod Rosenstein as Deputy Attorney General, and he’ll be taking over handling of the Russia probe.
  4. We learn that the DoJ, in a 180-degree turn, has withdrawn a primary claim against a Texas voter ID law. The DoJ until now has maintained that the law was written with discriminatory intent, a reversal that indicates the DoJ’s new position toward protecting minority interests. Or toward not protecting those interests.
  5. In response to a California judge ruling against Trump’s financial threats against sanctuary cities, Trump says he’s considering breaking apart the ninth circuit court of appeals, apparently unaware of presidential limits.
  6. In the ongoing conflict between North Carolina’s Republican legislature and its new Democratic governor, the legislature is trying to pass bills that would strip Governor Cooper of his ability to fill seats on the state court of appeals. In response, conservative Republican Judge J. Douglas McCullough steps down a month before his required retirement date to allow the governor to appoint someone to fill his seat. He is so opposed to the Republican antics that he is willing to have a Democrat replace him on the bench.

Healthcare:

  1. The GOP works again to revise their healthcare bill so they can bring it to a vote, this time catering to the interests of the Freedom Caucus.
  2. Changes to the bill give states more flexibility, letting them apply for waivers to some provisions. This includes rules around pre-existing conditions, patient age, prescription drug coverage, and mental health coverage.
  3. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, government costs would actually increase by $2.3 billion if they stop paying the ACA subsidies (as has been threatened in order to make the system fail).
  4. 79% of Americans say Trump should try to make the ACA work instead of trying to make it fail quickly. 50% of Americans don’t have faith in the replacement plan for the ACA.
  5. The UN sends a letter to the Trump administration warning that repealing the ACA without a robust replacement that ensures coverage is available to all could violate our obligations to international law.
  6. The House fails again to pull together enough votes to repeal and replace the ACA. The latest iteration got the Freedom Caucus on board, but lost moderate Republicans.
  7. Rep. Warren Davidson tells a woman at a town hall that her son isn’t skilled enough to have insurance coverage. When later asked about it, he reiterated that healthcare coverage is something we have to earn.

International:

  1. French President Hollande throws his support behind Emmanuel Macron in next month’s elections, calling on voters to reject far-right candidate Marine Le Pen.
  2. All the Senators are bused up to the White House for a briefing on North Korea by Rex Tillerson, Jim Mattis, Dan Coats, and General Joseph Dunford.
  3. Trump says that there could be a “major, major” conflict with North Korea. While most Senators and news media agree the situation is bad, Fox News says tensions are at a “fever pitch.”
  4. North Korea launches yet another ballistic missile test. Like the last one, this missile also fails.
  5. Secretary Mattis travels to Afghanistan to figure out how to handle the issue of Russia supplying the Taliban with weapons.
  6. In retaliation for Syria’s chemical attack, the U.S. imposes new sanctions against them.
  7. A Russian spy ship collides with a freighter and sinks in the Black Sea.
  8. The Trumps host Mauricio Macri, the president of Argentina, and his wife at the White House.
  9. Trump invites Philippine strongman (and human rights violator) Rodrigo Duterte for a White House visit.
  10. In continuing his moves to stifle dissent and free speech, Turkish President Erdogan fires around 4,000 government workers, and bans access to Wikipedia and certain TV shows countrywide. Remember Erdogan is the guy Trump called to congratulate on his win in consolidating power.
  11. The State Department wants to vet any remarks made by Nikki Haley before she speaks.

Legislation:

  1. In yet another move to pretend Obama’s presidency never happened, Trump signs an executive order to review our national monuments (federally protected and owned land). In fairness, this affects all monuments, not just those designated by Obama; however Trump has specifically pointed out those that were designated by Obama as inhibiting development. He can either abolish the designations or make the monuments smaller.
  2. The next day he tweets “As families prepare for summer vacations in our National Parks – Democrats threaten to close them and shut down the government. Terrible!” A little disconnect?
  3. In response to the executive order, clothing maker Patagonia threatens legal action.
  4. The FCC proposes rules to weaken net neutrality. More than 800 leaders of U.S. start-ups signed a letter to Ajit Pai, FCC chairman, asking that these rules not be changed. In brief, net neutrality forces ISPs to treat all packets of information equally. For example, they can’t charge Hulu more for data than Netflix or YouTube, and they can’t slow down one person’s data so another’s can flow faster.
  5. Trump signs an executive order around agriculture, which instructs Sonny Perdue (Secretary of Agriculture) to review regulations and identify unnecessary rules that can be eliminated. It creates a new task force to make recommendations on existing food and agriculture policies that could hinder profit-making of agribusiness.
  6. Trump signs an executive order to encourage offshore drilling in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, making federal waters available for oil and gas leasing. Many cities and states have their own laws around this, so parts of the Atlantic may still be off limits.
  7. Despite his criticism of executive orders, especially of Obama’s use of executive orders, Trump ends the week with 32 executive orders under his belt, the most of any president in their first 100 days since WWII.
  8. Trump ends his first 100 days having signed 29 pieces of legislation from Congress, 11 of which do nothing more than repeal Obama-era rules and regulations.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. According to the Anti-Defamation League, anti-semitic incidents are up 86% the first three months of this year compared to the same period last year. Only around a third of those were the hoax bomb threats against Jewish community centers.
  2. The Trump administration awards GEO, a company that donated almost half a million dollars to his campaign, the contract for a private immigration detention center.
  3. A federal judge blocks the Trump administration’s attempts to cut funding to sanctuary cities. Trump accuses his opponents of “judge shopping.” Once again, the administration’s words come back to haunt them. They previously said they would wield funding like a weapon and bring sanctuary cities to their knees, among other threats. The judge took their statements into account in his ruling.
  4. Mexico expresses concern that the border wall could violate a 47-year-old treaty between the U.S. and Mexico, and also that a wall could worsen flooding in some areas. The decision could be left up to international courts if Mexico protests the wall based on the treaty.
  5. Trump and Republican leaders butt heads over LGBTQ protections versus religious rights. Trump wants protection policies to remain; Republicans favor restricting those policies based on religious liberty. Trump has in the past professed support for protecting the LGBTQ community.
  6. Homeland Security creates a new agency, Victims of Immigration Crime Engagement or Voice, or VOICE, to assist families of victims of crimes by undocumented immigrants, even though undocumented immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than citizens. Some of their work appears to duplicate work already being done by states and localities, such as VINE, or Victim Information and Notification Everyday.
  7. Of the undocumented immigrants targeted for deportation in the days after Trump took office, around half had either no criminal offenses or minor traffic offenses. The number of immigrants picked up represents about a 32% increase over the previous year.

Climate:

  1. Energy Secretary Rick Perry endorses renegotiating parts of the Paris agreement instead of simply withdrawing from it.
  2. Protestors against Trump’s climate policies march in cities across the country on Trump’s 100th day in support of science-based policies that support our health and the health of the planet.
  3. The night before the climate marches, the EPA removes its scientific climate change website from public view. The site is archived, and they say they’re updating it to match the new direction of the agency. This causes great concern in the scientific community, but we’ll see whether the info gets put back up.
  4. Because of climate change, coffee production has been in a deficit for the past 4 years. Meanwhile consumption is reaching an all-time high. But not to worry; scientists are on it, working on plants that can withstand disease and grow with less water.
  5. Ice roads in Canada are freezing later and melting earlier than before, reducing the window in which isolated residents can travel and goods can be trucked. The roads take longer to freeze and the ice isn’t as thick, making it more dangerous for travel.

Budget/Economy/Trade:

  1. Trump issues a tax plan, which is more like a wishlist than an actual plan. In short, the plan:
    • Cuts corporate taxes for businesses of all sizes, from the biggest to mom-and-pop stores.
    • Cuts the top tax rate by 4.6 points.
    • Eliminates the ACA tax of 3.8% on top earners, bringing their total tax cut to 8.4 points.
    • Eliminates the estate tax and the alternative minimum tax (AMT).
    • Increases the standard deduction to help middle class earners (this might require eliminating other deductions).
    • Doesn’t include tax revenue to support the infrastructure plan.
    • Rejects the border tariff proposed by House Republicans.
    • Creates a loophole where people could create pass-through corporations and lower their effective tax rate to 15%.
    • Eliminates the state and local tax deductions from federal income tax.
  2. Analysts say the economy would have to grow by 5% to make up for the budget shortfall.
  3. The Tax Policy Center estimates the cuts will reduce federal revenue by $6.2 trillion over 10 years.
  4. Mnuchin says he can’t guarantee that the middle class won’t pay more under the new tax bill but he says there should be no absolute tax breaks for the wealthy. Even though their tax bracket is dropping at least four points. I’m trying to work out the math here…
  5. Analysts say that the economic policies in the tax plan don’t support policies in Trump’s trade and immigration plans. They say he needs an overall economic vision that brings all the different pieces together, a vision that is currently lacking.
  6. Trump orders a 20% tariff on softwood lumber coming in from Canada, which is predicted to increase the cost of new homes. He argues that the lumber is unfairly subsidized which hurts lumber companies in the U.S., but this seems to be in response to an import tax Canada on U.S. dairy products processed in a certain way (the processing style was used as a way to get around NAFTA trade rules).
  7. Democrats say they’ll stall the spending bill and risk a government shutdown if the healthcare vote happens this week.
  8. On Wednesday, Congress leans toward signing a one-week extension to the budget to keep the government going.
  9. Trump throws in a wrench by making demands to begin funding the border wall and to begin defunding the ACA (specifically the payments that help low-income people).
  10. Trump backs away from his demands around the border wall and the ACA this go around.
  11. Or wait, does he really?
  12. Yes. Yes, he does.
  13. Ryan says the spending bill will not include ACA payments that help lower-income people afford care.
  14. Or wait, will it?
  15. Yes. Yes, it will include those payments.
  16. The House and Senate pass a short-term budget bill to prevent a shutdown. The vote didn’t hinge on any healthcare changes nor on any funding for the wall.
  17. Also in the bill, the NIH will get a $2 billion dollar increase, a rejection of Trump’s cuts to the agency in his proposed budget.
  18. The White House submits a draft proposal to withdraw from NAFTA. Republicans and Democrats in Congress both say hold up, wait a minute here.
  19. Trump threatens to terminate NAFTA, causing shakeups in the markets, Congress, Canada, and Mexico.
  20. After both Mexican and Canadian leaders phone Trump, he agrees not to terminate NAFTA. It seems that what actually convinced him, though, was Sonny Perdue, Secretary of Agriculture, showing him map of the farmers who would be negatively affected by scrapping NAFTA and telling him that these are Trump voters.
  21. The latest numbers show that the U.S. had sluggish economic growth last quarter at just .7%, the weakest in three years. Consumer spending was down as well. This might not have much to do with Trump, though, as we’re still on Obama’s budget.

Miscellaneous:

  1. To add to Fox’s public image issues, a new class-action lawsuit against the media conglomerate alleges racial discrimination.
  2. The Senate denies Breitbart’s request for permanent press pass credentials saying they need answers to more questions.
  3. It’s another bad week for Alex Jones of InfoWars, who is in the middle of a custody suit. Chobani sues him for defamation after Jones linked the founder of the company to a sexual assault case and accused him of importing refugee rapists. And then Jones lost his custody suit.
  4. The State Department removes a page on its website featuring Mar-a-Lago after criticism that it used government resources to basically advertise the resort.
  5. The Senate confirms Alexander Acosta as Secretary of Labor.
  6. Trump thought once he won, the press would be kinder to him.
  7. Trump speaks at the annual NRA meeting in Atlanta, the first sitting president since Ronald Reagan in 1983 to do so.
  8. Ivanka travels to Germany for a panel discussion on women’s economic empowerment, on Angela Merkel’s invite. The first day doesn’t go well as she’s forced to defend her father to a skeptical audience.
  9. Ann Coulter is speaking at UC Berkeley. Then she’s not (UCB postponed for security concerns). Then she is (forget security, I’ll just speak in a public square). Then she’s not (she lost the support of the groups who asked her to speak). The primary catalyst here is the security concern with far right and far left extremist groups, but the issue quickly escalates into accusations of free speech infringement.
  10. Paul Ryan is less popular than Donald Trump with just a 22% approval rating.
  11. A new poll shows that most Trump voters do believe that Obama was spying on the Trump campaign.
  12. And finally of note this week is this Politico story about press office lies. It seems the press were warned from the start that the White House would feed them lies just to mess with them. Staffers lie more for sport than for furthering any agenda; it’s all a game. Information is plentiful when you’re doing a story on palace intrigue, but not so much when it comes to actual policy. What they say off the record is far more accurate than what they say on the record, especially when it comes to TV appearances. For example, Spicer has lied or mislead 51 times in his briefings.

Week 12 in Trump

Posted on April 17, 2017 in Politics, Trump

In week 12, we had the usual international intrigue, quietly signed resolutions, and a number of policy reversals. I also added a new category, Stupid Things Politicians Say. Sadly necessary.

Here’s what happened last week.

Russian Investigation:

  1. American authorities request the arrest of Russian hacker Peotr Levashov in Spain. His wife had told Russian state media RT that he was one of the hackers involved in the 2016 U.S. elections.
  2. Documents show that Paul Manafort actively courted Trump in order to get a foothold in his campaign. Manafort claims it was the other way around.
  3. Tillerson says Russia needs to confront their meddling in our elections and Europe’s to evaluate how it fits in with their long-term goals. He also says that things won’t improve between our countries as long as this is ongoing.
  4. Both Republicans and Democrats in the House review the documents that Devin Nunes saw at the White House and that he later said unmasked the names of Trump associates who were incidentally surveilled. Members of both parties agree that there’s no there there. Nunes’ original reaction appears to have led to Trump’s accusations of Susan Rice, but it seems Rice hasn’t done anything illegal or out of the usual.
  5. We now know that the FBI obtained a secret FISA warrant last year to surveil communications of Carter Page, who was an adviser to Trump at the time. This indicates that federal agencies had probable cause to think that Page is or was an agent of a foreign power (or in layman’s terms, a spy).
  6. Documents surface that confirm that a pro-Russian political party in the Ukraine made payments to Paul Manafort. This supports the “black ledger” that was found last year with a list of payments along with accusations that money was being laundered through his company.

Courts/Justice:

  1. Neil Gorsuch is sworn in as a Supreme Court justice.
  2. In another strike against gerrymandering, a federal judge upheld a lower court’s 2014 ruling that a Texas voter ID law passed in 2011 had the intent to discriminate against blacks and Latinos. This opens the possibility that certain Texas districts could be placed under preclearance, which means they can’t implement any voting changes without approval from the U.S. Attorney General or the U.S. District Court for D.C.
  3. Gerrymandering continues to be a big issue in the courts – there are at least six active cases. As one radio host told his guest this week “I’m sorry to keep bringing you back on the same goddamn law.”
  4. AG Jeff Sessions plans to end the National Commission on Forensic Science, a scientific partnership to improve forensic science standards. The commission was chartered by Obama in 2013, so I can only assume this is why it’s being disbanded.
  5. It turns out that the money behind Gorsuch’s ad campaign came from the Judicial Crisis Network.
  6. Impeachment hearings begin for Alabama’s governor Robert Bentley. Bentley is accused of using government resources to cover up an affair. He subsequently resigns and is replaced by Lt. Gov. Kay Ivey.
  7. Based on requests from Elizabeth Warren and Elijah Cummings, the GAO announces an investigation into Trump’s transition regarding the use of funds and conflicts of interest.
  8. In response to lawsuits accusing Trump of inciting violence at some of his campaign rallies, his legal team says he is immune from lawsuits because he won the election. Hmmm… they might want to revisit Jones v. Clinton.

Healthcare:

  1. Trump says he wants to renew efforts at repealing and replacing the ACA.
  2. Trump threatens to withhold ACA payments to insurance companies in the billions of dollars in order to cause the healthcare system to blow up. He thinks this will force Democrats to work with him on a solution. Insurance companies warn that this would cause chaos in the individual markets.
  3. The administration later recants and continues to make the payments, possibly because the CBO found that the healthcare exchanges are likely to stay stable and Standard & Poor found that the markets could become profitable, refuting the theory that the ACA is in a death spiral.

International:

  1. The White House accuses Putin of trying to hide Assad’s role in the chemical attack the previous week, and officials think that Putin was aware of the attack before it happened. There is no evidence Russia was involved, though a Russian drone flying over the hospital that Assad later bombed could point to some coordination.
  2. Putin suggests that the chemical attack was a false flag attack, designed by the U.S. to frame Assad. He also compares the U.S. assessment of the Syrian chemical attack to us going into Iraq based on (seemingly incorrect) intelligence over weapons of mass destruction. Even though the results of this attack are readily apparent.
  3. After several days of back and forth over whether it would happen, Tillerson meets in person with Putin. Both agree that relations between our countries are at a low.
  4. Tillerson says Russia has to choose between Assad and the US.
  5. Russia vetoes a UN resolution that would’ve required Assad to cooperate with an independent investigation into the chemical attacks.
  6. Trump hasn’t tried to set up a meeting with Pope Francis during the G7 summit in Italy. This is a pretty unusual omission for a sitting president.
  7. A bomb explodes near the German soccer team’s bus. The suspect is an Iraqi with alleged ties to ISIS, though there is no solid evidence as of now.
  8. Hot on the heels of the 59 tomahawk missiles launched at Syria, the U.S. drops the MOAB (mother of all bombs), our largest non-nuclear bomb, in Afghanistan with the intent to destroy a network of tunnels and caves used by ISIS. It’s reported that 94 ISIS military were killed, and a network of tunnels and caves was destroyed along with weapons and ammunition.
  9. The U.S. warns of using a preemptive strike against North Korea if we suspect they’re going to test a nuclear weapon. North Korea responds by saying they’d strike first.
  10. China mobilizes 25,000 troops and its military is on nationwide alert given the tensions with North Korea. China is urging cool heads and de-escalation between the U.S. and North Korea.
  11. The day before Easter and the day after its annual military parade, North Korea attempted another missile launch which failed, blowing up almost immediately.
  12. A North Korean official says that Trump’s tweets are behind the escalating tensions between us.
  13. In Syria, a U.S. drone attack killed at least 18 Syrian allies in what the Pentagon is calling the worst friendly fire incident in the war against ISIS.
  14. Interesting comparison on support for airstrikes in Syria:
    • In 2013, 38% of Democrats supported them; in 2017, that number is 37%.
    • In 2103, 22% of Republican supported them; in 2017, that number is 86%.

Legislation:

  1. In Alabama, the Senate votes to allow the Briarwood Presbyterian church in Birmingham to form its own police force.
  2. The New York legislature passes a law making tuition at state or city colleges free for residents making less than a specified income. This will be phased in over three years.
  3. Trump signs another resolution overturning Obama-era rules. This reversal allows states to defund clinics that perform abortions even though federal funds legally cannot be used to fund abortions.
  4. Later that same day, Trump signs the 13th resolution overturning Obama-era rules. This reversal cuts a Labor Department regulation that would’ve allowed states and counties to expand retirement savings accounts for people who don’t get those through their employers.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. The North Caroline legislature puts forth a bill to ban same sex marriage in the state. The bill doesn’t make it to the house floor and won’t be heard this year.
  2. Two members of groups labeled as hate groups by the SPLC are assigned to positions in immigration agencies in the White House. John Feere worked at CIS and Julie Kirchner worked at FAIR.
  3. ICE officials stop distributing their weekly report of cities and counties not cooperating with immigration because they kept getting it wrong. This report is required as part of the executive orders signed by Trump in January.
  4. The U.S. tourism industry has upped their estimated losses to $7 billion due to extreme vetting and other travel-related regulations enacted by Trump.
  5. Newly released data show that phones are being searched twice as frequently this year as last year for travelers entering the U.S. The data also show that the searches primarily target Muslims and that the searches are often accompanied by hostile questioning.
  6. AG Sessions toured the U.S./Mexico border and unveiled new guidance for enforcing immigration law.

Climate/EPA:

  1. Scott Pruitt says we should exit the Paris climate accord, which has been endorsed by all but about 20 countries. However, according to the rules of the agreement, it takes three years for a country to withdraw with a one-year waiting period. So it wouldn’t happen until the current presidential term is up.
  2. Trump solicits comments from business leaders on which regulations to get rid of. Not surprisingly the EPA and labor are the two biggest targets. Look for more regulation changes to come around these suggestions.
  3. The EPA proposes cutting programs that protect children (and the rest of us) from lead exposure including lead paint removal regulations and emissions testing, the two largest contributors of exposure to lead. Studies show that exposure to too much lead as a child results in developmental issues and possible violence, and it is largely irreversible.
  4. Trump prepares an order to expand offshore drilling, including Arctic drilling.
  5. 61% of Americans disapprove of Trump’s handling of environmental issues. 79% of Americans under 35 disapprove.

Budget/Economy:

  1. The Trump administration looks to end the federal hiring freeze because of complaints that it’s hampering the government’s ability to get things done. Apparently the freeze increased the VA’s backlog of benefits claims, delayed processing Social Security payments, caused childcare facilities for military personnel to close, and reduced the number of FDA employees working on approving new drugs.
  2. Trump scraps the tax reform platform that was part of his election campaign and starts planning from scratch again. Time is tight, as Mnuchin set an August deadline for the plan.
  3. On top of the infrastructure plan being put on the back-burner, recent governmental actions will reduce infrastructure spending across the country. Cutbacks are largely around train lines and transportation grants.
  4. After Trump says that the dollar is getting too strong the dollar index reaches its lowest level of the month.
  5. The tax bill being drafted includes a repeal of the Johnson Amendment, which is in place to prevent church leaders from making political endorsements.
  6. 60% of Americans say that corporations and the very wealthy are likely not paying their fair share in taxes.
  7. The U.S. and China agree to a 100-day trade plan and avoid a trade war.
  8. The Office of Budget Management plans to send guidance to government agencies telling them to plan for big cuts.

Flip-flops:

In one week Trump changes his stance on a bunch of campaign statements.

  1. During the campaign, we were going to label China a currency manipulator. As of now, China is no longer a currency manipulator.
  2. During the campaign, NATO was an obsolete agency. As of now, NATO is no longer obsolete.
  3. During the campaign, Janet Yellen was ruining the country. As of now, Trump likes and respects Yellen and is considering keep her on.
  4. During the campaign, Trump thought low interest rates might cause a recession. As of now, he supports a low interest rate policy.
  5. During the campaign, Trump said “Our military is in shambles!” As of now, “It’s so incredible. It’s brilliant. It’s genius. Our technology, our equipment, is better than anybody by a factor of five.”
  6. During the campaign, Trump said the U.S. Export-Import Bank was excess garbage and agreed with conservatives on shutting it down. As of now, he says “It turns out that, first of all, lots of small companies are really helped, the vendor companies.”
  7. During the campaign, Trump said he would place steep tariffs on Chinese imports. As of now, he says there will be no 45% tariff on Chinese goods.
  8. During the campaign, Trump pushed a non-interventionist stance in Syria. As of now, he’s not only bombed Syria, but also increased troops on the ground.
  9. During the campaign, Trump promised to eliminate the debt in eight years. As of now, Mick Mulvaney says that was hyperbole.
  10. During the campaign, Wikileaks and Julian Assange were doing a service. As of now, Mike Pompeo says “WikiLeaks walks like a hostile intelligence service and talks like a hostile intelligence service.” He calls Assange a narcissist and a fraud.

Miscellaneous:

  1. In a newspaper interview, Trump appears to distance himself from Steve Bannon and diminished the role he played in the campaign. He won’t say whether he still has confidence in Bannon, and claims he didn’t know Bannon until the campaign even though they met six years ago.
  2. Firemen rescue Ben Carson and his wife from a stuck elevator in an affordable housing complex in Miami.
  3. Trump leaves for Mar-a-Lago a day early this week for the Easter weekend. This is his seventh trip there in 12 weeks.
  4. Betsy DeVos reverses some of Obama’s protections for student loan borrowers, including general auditing and accountability requirements for loaners.
  5. The White House announces that visitor logs will be kept secret. Three agencies sue for access.
  6. Trump’s approval rating ticks up a bit following his shows of force abroad.
  7. In what was expected to be the second biggest day of protest since the election, Tax Marches are held across the country to urge Trump to release his taxes for the past five years as is standard for recent presidents.
  8. Trump again claims the marchers are paid protestors, and I again respond, “where’s my #*$&* money?”
  9. In a Kansas district that Republicans have easily won by double-digit margins for the past 25 years, the Republican candidate won by only 7 points. Trump won by 27% and previous Republican candidates have won by margins greater than 30 points.

Stupid Things Politicians Say:

  1. Spicer puts his foot in his mouth while trying to make the point that those who support Assad are in the wrong: “You had someone as despicable as Hitler who didn’t even sink to chemical weapons.” He continued to dig himself deeper instead of just correcting himself.
  2. Defending his vote on internet privacy rules, Representative Jim Sensenbrenner (R – Wisconsin) says, “Nobody’s got to use the Internet.” Huh? Except anybody who works. Or goes to school. Or really, pretty much anyone in the U.S. who wants any chance at success.
  3. Representative Markwayne Mullin (R – Oklahoma) says at a town hall meeting with constituents, “You say you pay for me to do this? That’s bullcrap.” Then doubling down, he says “I pay for myself. I paid enough taxes before I got here and continue to through my company to pay my own salary. This is a service. No one here pays me to go.”

Week Nine in Trump

Posted on March 28, 2017 in Politics

In his two months in office, Trump has signed the rollbacks of protections for trade, the environment, workers, borrowers, women, retirees, internet privacy, and transgender folks. He’s approved the construction of the Keystone and Dakota Access pipelines, and he conducted his first military excursion with mixed results. He’s also gotten several appointees confirmed.
But he’s meeting resistance from both sides on the plan to repeal and replace the ACA (which ultimately failed), his budget proposal (which includes the wall), and the new travel ban (hitting legal issues again). Gorsuch won’t be a slam dunk either. He hasn’t started yet on his tax reform and infrastructure plans, and the plan to defeat ISIS is still in the works (though a recent report says we’re close to a military success already).

Russia Investigation:

  1. James Comey and Mike Rogers testify in front of the House intelligence committee over Russian collusion and Trump’s wiretap accusations. Here’s what we found out:
    • Russia meddled in our elections and favored Trump over Hillary.
    • The FBI is investigating members of the current administration for coordinating with Russia.
    • The FBI has no information to support Trump’s claims of wiretapping.
  2. Prior to the testimony, Trump sends out a series of tweets saying the Democrats made up the Russia story and that it’s fake news when the media reports that there’s no evidence to support his wiretapping accusations.
  3. House Republicans ignore the testimony and focus on the leaks coming from the White House.
  4. Trump sends out multiple inaccurate tweets during the testimony, some of which Comey refutes in real time.
  5. The FBI, the NSA, and the Department of Justice all refute Trumps accusations of wiretapping.
  6. Sean Spicer tells the press that Michael Flynn was a volunteer in the election campaign and that Paul Manafort had a very limited role. Manafort was Trump’s campaign chairman from March to August (unpaid, though).
  7. It turns out that Mike Flynn worked with Turkey to try to find a way to avoid the US extradition process to transfer Fethullah Gulen (the mullah blamed for the failed Turkish coup) to Turkey.
  8. Documents reveal that Paul Manafort not only received payments from pro-Russian agencies in Ukraine, he tried to hide them. Manafort says the records are a forgery.
  9. Manafort apparently worked for a Russian billionaire on behalf of Putin where his role was to come up with a plan to undermine anti-Russian opposition in former Soviet republics (source: AP). His strategy was to influence US and European politics, business, and news for Putin’s benefit. He used non-profit groups and media to undercut Putin’s adversaries in eastern Europe.
  10. Allegedly, Manafort’s daughter sent these two texts (among many others) about her father to her sister: “He has no moral or legal compass” and “Do you know whose strategy that was to cause that, to send those people out and get them slaughtered.”
  11. Officials reveal that the FBI is investigating collusion between Trump associates and Russian officials around information that was released that damaged Clinton’s campaign. Specifically, they have information that there may have been some coordination around the timing of the releases.
  12. Breitbart and Info Wars are included in the investigation into the Russian meddling in the election.
  13. Devin Nunes, chair of the House Intelligence Committee, secretly receives classified information revealing that some Trump communications, or those of his associates, were incidentally intercepted as part of surveillance of foreign nationals. Without briefing committee members first, he rushes to tell the president and the press that names were unmasked (they should have been hidden), seemingly giving some credence to Trump’s wiretapping accusations. The RNCC uses this in their marketing emails saying that the wiretapping accusations were confirmed. It is suspected, and later confirmed, that Nunes received the information from someone in the White House.
  14. Remember when Roger Stone tweeted that something was about to go down with Podesta right before his emails were leaked? Stone’s over-familiarity with WikiLeaks are under increased scrutiny as part of the investigations into Russia’s meddling in the election.
  15. Anti-corruption protests break out across Russia, mainly protesting Prime Minister Medvedev. Hundreds of protesters are arrested, including the organizer and Putin’s primary opposition leader, Alexei Navally.
  16. Polling shows 66% of Americans want an independent investigation into Russia.

Court:

  1. The confirmation hearings for Neil Gorsuch begin with some scorching reminders of the year-long refusal of the GOP senate to hear Merrick Garland confirmations.
  2. Some Democratic senators say they will block the confirmation of Gorsuch until the Russian investigations are complete, saying that their reasoning is similar to Mitch McConnell refusing to hold hearings for Merrick Garland.
  3. A campaign in support of Gorsuch is being funded to the tune of $10 million in political spending, but we don’t know who is funding it.
  4. Awkward. While Gorsuch testifies on his own behalf, the Supreme Court rules unanimously against one of his previous decisions (in a case involving rights of disabled students).
  5. Later in the week, Democrats say they’ll filibuster Gorsuch’s nomination for a few reasons. One is to make a point that Democracy doesn’t work when one party refuses to hold hearings for a president’s nominations because he’s in his last year in office. They say it sets a bad precedent, and makes for a blurry line that could stretch to the last two years in a term or to election years. The second point is that the current administration is under investigation and that casts doubt on the legitimacy of any of their nominees.
  6. Democrats on the judiciary committee delay the vote to send Gorsuch’s nomination to the full senate for a week.
  7. Fun fact: “Gorsuch” auto-corrects to “Grouch” on my phone.

Healthcare:

If you want more detail, WaPo has a pretty good article about what went wrong with the healthcare deal.

  1. According to the latest CBO report, more people would lose coverage under the healthcare replacement bill than if they just repealed the ACA without a replacement.
  2. Ryan makes these changes to the healthcare bill:
    • Give states the option to make Medicaid recipients work.
    • Give states the option to receive Medicaid per capita or as a block grant.
    • Ban the federal government from reimbursing Medicaid funds raised by state governments.
    • Set aside $75 billion for more tax credits, but let the senate decide how to regulate it.
  3. The original repeal plan reduced the deficit by about $337 billion. The above changes would reduce the deficit by half that and wouldn’t insure any more people.
  4. Paul Ryan pulls the Thursday vote in order to hold further negotiations and to modify the bill. Even with the changes, it didn’t cut enough for the Freedom Caucus to support it.
  5. House Republicans consider dropping the following 10 requirements. Without these, it can’t pass the senate though.
    • Ambulatory services
    • Emergency services
    • Hospitalization (like surgery and overnight stays)
    • Pregnancy, maternity and newborn care
    • Mental health and substance use disorder services
    • Prescription drugs
    • Rehabilitative and habilitative services
    • Laboratory services
    • Preventive care and chronic disease management
    • Pediatric services
  6. After working into the night Thursday to make the updates, the House scuttles the rule that a bill has to be available for full day before a vote, scheduling the vote for Friday. That vote is also pulled because they don’t have the support to pass it just in the House.
  7. After the bill was pulled, several ads created by the American Action Network PAC ran on CBS. The ads congratulated House Republicans for the passing of the bill. Whoops.
  8. Trump blames Democrats for the healthcare bill’s failure, even though they were never approached and Republicans control both the House and the Senate. He also says Dems will be seeking a deal on healthcare within a year when Obamacare explodes, which Trump says he would not only allow but would accelerate.
  9. Trump at various times blames Reince Preibus, Tom Price, and Jared Kushner for the bill’s failure.
  10. Trump urges supporters to watch “Justice With Judge Jeanine” a few hours before Jeanine says Paul Ryan must step down because he let everyone down on healthcare reform.
  11. Additional states look into expanding Medicaid now that the ACA isn’t being repealed.

International:

  1. Five people die and 50 are injured when a terrorist drives his car onto a sidewalk on Westminster Bridge and then stabs an officer.  Trump offers our full cooperation and support and Donald Trump Jr. criticizes London’s mayor.
  2. Tillerson has a scheduling conflict with the NATO foreign ministers meeting and plans instead to accompany Trump to Mar-a-Lago for a visit with China’s president. He plans to visit Russia in April.
    UPDATE: NATO agrees to change the meeting dates to accommodate Tillerson.
  3. Tillerson tells Erin McPike, the journalist from IJR that he brought along on his Asia trip, that he was about to retire to his ranch in March and that he never wanted this job.

Legislation:

  1. The House and Senate both passed a bill that would expand drug testing for people receiving unemployment benefits, and forwarded it to Trump to sign.
  2. Mission to Mars! Trump signs Senate Bill 442 into law, authorizing appropriations for NASA.
  3. In another party-line vote, the Senate voted to reverse FCC internet privacy rules from last year. With the reversal, internet service providers won’t need to get your permission to use your personal info for ads.

Travel Ban/Immigration:

  1. The US and UK ban carrying electronic devices bigger than a certain size on flights from certain countries. Computers and iPads must be checked. Intel says that people have figured out how to fit a bomb inside the battery compartment. Emirates Airlines is monitoring the effects of this ban and might reduce flights to the US.
  2. ICE specifically targets sanctuary cities to put pressure on them to cooperate.
  3. There were no African attendees at the African Global Economic and Development Summit in Southern California. Every African citizen who applied for a visa was denied.
  4. More undocumented immigrants are reportedly afraid to interact with the police, even to report a crime, for greater fear of deportation. Sexual assault reports are down 25% and domestic violence reports are down 10% among Los Angeles’s Latino population. What this really means is that more criminals are getting away with more crimes.
  5. Many undocumented immigrants begin making plans in case they are deported and someone else has to care for their children.
  6. Schools in Toronto, Ontario, will no longer allow school field trips to the US for fear of running into issues at the border.
  7. Stories are starting to come out that the Trump administration has threatened eminent domain to take the property needed to build his damn wall.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Trump gives an interview where he repeats the same debunked lines about voter fraud, immigrants in Sweden, how NATO works, wiretapping, Muslims celebrating on 9/11, and wiretapping allegations, finishing with “I can’t be doing so badly, because I’m president and you’re not.”
  2. The Secret Service requests an additional $60 million to protect Trump and his family next year.
  3. There are several pro-Trump “Make America Great Again” rallies across the US, some of which broke out in violence (though the stories aren’t clear about who started what).
  4. Eric Trump says he’ll update his father on the Trump business quarterly, though Trump has said he’s divested himself of the biz.
  5. Ivanka Trump’s not technically a government employee and doesn’t have a title, but she’ll have an office in the West Wing office with security clearance to classified information and government-issued communications devices.
  6. And while I don’t care how much any president has golfed during their term, Trump promised he wouldn’t golf and said he’d spend all his time working until everything is fixed. He’s golfed 13 times in 9 weeks, outpacing his predecessors, including the last president, who Trump complained about golfing the most.
  7. Trump’s approval rating drops another percent to 36%.

Week Six in Trump

Posted on March 6, 2017 in Politics, Trump

Here’s what I missed from last week:

  1. At the governor’s meeting, a report was presented stating that the current vision for replacing the ACA could reduce the number of insured Americans and cost states billions of dollars in the long run. Republican Governors are divided on how to address the repeal-and-replace of the ACA.
  2. A fourth mosque in 7 weeks was burned. Three have so far been listed as arson; the other is still being investigated.
  3. The 10% increase in military spending proposed by Trump (around $54 billion) would result in cuts to domestic programs to make up the difference.
  4. When protections were pulled back for transgender students, the White House said it was “a joint decision made … by the Department of Justice and the Department of Education.” This was, in fact, Trump’s decision.

Here’s what happened this past week. I’m sure I didn’t catch everything because I was lulled into complacency on a few slow news days.

  1. At least 16 Jewish centers and day schools receive bomb threats in one day, in the 5th wave of similar threats in under 2 months. A St. Louis man is arrested in relation to 8 of the threats. He turns out to be a journalist fired from the Intercept, a left-leaning news site. It also turns out he was doing it in retaliation for a break-up. The remaining 90+ threats are still being investigated.
  2. Sean Spicer personally arranges for CIA director Mike Pompeo and Senate Select Intelligence Committee Chair Richard Burr to contact reporters to push back on the stories about Trump team’s communication with Russia, which they did without providing any details.
  3. The Justice Department drops its opposition to a voter ID law in Texas that was found by a lower court judge to intentionally discriminate against black and Latino voters.
  4. The US is a clear favorite to host the 2026 FIFA World Cup (possibly in conjunction with Mexico and Canada). However, a travel ban would damage our chances of getting the games.
  5. The administration considers withdrawing from the UN Human Rights Council. At the same time, Rex Tillerson skips the State Department’s annual announcement on human rights.  Noteworthy because the US has traditionally been a leader in human rights policies.
  6. Trump admits that healthcare overhaul is more complicated than he expected.
  7. Trump accuses Obama of orchestrating the protests over the past month, blames Obama and his allies for the leaks, and implies that the spate of threats and vandalism targeting Jewish centers might be false flags (that is, Jews are doing it themselves for publicity).
  8. A short film produced by Shell Oil in 1991 surfaces, indicating that they’ve know since then that man-made climate change is a real thing and needs to be addressed. One paper from 1986 noted the uncertainty of the science behind climate change while warning of the potential danger of ignoring it. Their predictions were “remarkably accurate” according to scientists. This is in addition to investigations that found Exxon has known all along as well, despite both Shell and Exxon lobbying against renewable energy sources and climate policies, and while funding misleading programs about climate change.
  9. Sessions claims that marijuana use is linked to increased violence, a claim that has been debunked in recent studies. Oooh. Reefer Madness. Anyway, he says the Justice Department will crack down on marijuana offenses, and coincidentally will also expand the use of private prisons. Hmmm.
  10. Sessions states he’ll get tough on crime, saying that we’ve become complacent with the steady decline in crime and we need to take the recent uptick seriously.
  11. The GOP blocks the release of Trump’s taxes. This from the party who spent eight years demanding the release of Obama’s school transcripts and birth certificate.
  12. More than 120 retired generals pen a letter to Congress objecting to the State Department cuts in Trump’s proposed budget, saying that funding is “critical to keeping America safe.” General Mattis also says putting more effort into diplomacy could offset the costs needed for the military.
  13. Trump speaks to Congress, giving a high-level overview of his plans. Reviews are mixed, but it seems everyone is impressed that he was able to stick to his script. I’ll fact check the speech in a later post.
  14. Trump says he’s open to a pathway to legal status for undocumented immigrants while at the same time highlighting the danger of undocumented immigrants in his speech to Congress.
  15. Barack and Michelle Obama sign large book deals with Penguin Random House, and pledge to donate a significant amount of the proceeds to charity.
  16. Trump finally speaks out against Kansas shooting that killed an Indian engineer and wounded another. Another person who heroically intervened was also wounded.
  17. A Sikh man was shot in Seattle in an apparent hate crime.
  18. The House GOP votes against compelling the Justice Department to turn over documents and information on Trump-Russia ties.
  19. Trump signs measure reversing an Obama-era regulation that made it harder for severely mentally ill people to get guns.
  20. Trump begins the largest rollback of environmental laws and rules since Richard Nixon enacted the Environmental Protection Act.
  21. Trump signs an executive order to start the repeal of Obama’s Clean Water Rule. Following the signing ceremony, Scott Pruitt (EPA head) let agricultural companies know that he’d be rolling back EPA regulations.
  22. Trump’s budget proposal is expected to include a 25% cut to the EPA’s current budget of $8.1 million.
  23. Potential budget cuts to NOAA could impact their network of weather satellites.
  24. It comes out that Sessions spoke twice with a Russian ambassador last year, but did not disclose this in his hearings. In fact, during his hearing he wasn’t asked directly whether he met with any Russians, but he offered up the information that he didn’t (…”I did not have communications with the Russians”). Also, in response to a written query from a senator asking whether he met with any Russians, Sessions answered “No.” This leads to a protest at the US Department of Justice and Sessions recuses himself from any investigation into Russian ties.
  25. The Trump administration claims Sessions was acting as a Senator when he met with the Russian ambassador, though he paid his expenses for the trip using political funds instead of legislative funds. He also spoke about the Trump campaign during the event.
  26. Senior Pentagon officials tell NBC News that the recent raid in Yemen, which killed a Navy SEAL, led to no valuable intelligence, though others have said there were many names learned and they are already acting on this information.
  27. A draft of Trump’s new travel ban omits Iraq from the list of banned countries, and makes exceptions for current green card and visa holders.
  28. Police chiefs pen a letter to Trump objecting to his push to use them to detain undocumented immigrants, saying it will make their communities less safe.
  29. The Senate confirms Ben Carson as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Rick Perry as Secretary of Energy, and Ryan Zinke for the Department of the Interior. Zinke is at least willing to say humans are influencing climate change.
  30. Trump’s transition team cancelled “an orientation class that would have prepared political appointees and White House staff for a series of ethical and legal issues” per CNN.
  31. Though DACA immigrants are supposed to be exempt from the expanded deportation definitions, several DREAMers are still detained by ICE.
  32. It comes out that Vice-President Pence used a private email for official business during his time as governor. And his email was hacked… The lack of Republican response to this indicates one standard for Democrats, and another for Republicans.
  33. Add Jared Kushner to the list of Trump associates who met with Russian officials last fall.
  34. McMaster rolls back Flynn’s changes at the NSC, leaving in question whether Bannon still has a place there.
  35. Bannon is pushing for the US to pull out of the Paris agreement, but Rex Tillerson and Ivanka Trump disagree.
  36. Former President Barack Obama is named the 2017 “Profile in Courage” award honoree by the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation.
  37. Carter Page says “I do not deny” meeting with the Russian ambassador, contradicting his previous statements that he did not meet with Russians last year.
  38. Trump accuses Democrats of slowing down the cabinet confirmation process, though as of this week, his confirmations are equal to Obama’s at this time. Also, several delays have been from the Trump team not getting the required paperwork to the congress and from certain nominees withdrawing.
  39. The requirement to use steel made in America for the Keystone pipeline is dropped.
  40. Mexico sets up legal assistance in all of their consulates in the US to help Mexicans in this country and to advocate for their rights.
  41. According to a New York Times report, “the United States still does not have the ability to effectively counter the North Korean nuclear and missile programs. Those threats are far more resilient than many experts thought… and pose such a danger that Mr. Obama… warned President Trump they were likely to be the most urgent problem he would confront.”
  42. The Trump administration temporarily suspends expedited applications for H-1B visas. These visas let graduate students work at US companies in fields requiring a higher level of education. (Reuters)
  43. Just when I thought we’d have a quiet weekend…In a series of tweets, Trump accuses Obama of wiretapping his phones at Trump Tower, a very serious charge if true. The White House staff backs up his accusations, but there is no evidence at this time and it is assumed by some that he got the information from a Breitbart article.
  44. Trump urged legislators to investigate the above claims. Republicans have said this would likely be part of any investigation into Trump-Russia ties. Democrats, on the other hand, have criticized the tweets and requested evidence to back up the assertions.
  45. As has become the norm, there were protests and rallies across the country this week, some pro-Trump, some for the upcoming International Women’s Day, some for calling on Sessions to resign.