Tag: terrorism

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 40 in Trump

Posted on October 30, 2017 in Politics, Trump

If you were wondering why all sorts of stories about investigations into Clinton popped up this week, we found out on Friday that Mueller filed the first charges in the Russia investigation. By the time I publish this, we’ll know much more about the charges, but the message for week 40 was deflect, deflect, deflect.

Here’s what happened.

Missed Previously:

Around the time that the U.S. recalled much of the diplomatic personnel from Cuba, we also expelled 15 Cuban diplomats from the U.S. I missed this when researching the mysterious symptoms our personnel were experiencing in Cuba.

Russia:

  1. Putin places Bill Browder on the Interpol list, which led to the U.S. border control temporarily halting his travel to the U.S. Browder was instrumental in the Magnitsky Act and he’s testified in the Russia investigation.
  2. Kaspersky Labs allows outside experts to come in and look at their software to dispel any worries that the Kremlin uses their products to spy on the U.S.
  3. Even though a foreign country worked to undermine our democracy, and even though we know they are still doing it and will continue doing it into the next elections, it doesn’t appear that Congress is motivated to do much about it. It’s up to us, people. Let’s not fall for the bullshit again.
  4. The Trump administration still hasn’t implemented the sanctions on Russia that Congress signed into law last August. They’re almost a month past deadline to implement the policy.
  5. It turns out that the reason behind the failure to implement sanctions is that Rex Tillerson dissolved the office responsible for that (the Coordinator for Sanctions Policy).
  6. With big news coming up in the Russia investigation, there’s a new push to deflect attention to Hillary Clinton:
    • Devin Nunez announces a new congressional probe into Russia’s relationship with the Clintons regarding a 2010 uranium mine deal.
    • Trump personally tells the Justice Department to lift a gag order on an FBI informant around the uranium deal so the informant can testify to Congress. The U.S. has already prosecuted Russian agents for bribery and kickbacks to a trucking a company.
    • The House announces two committee inquiries into James Comey’s handling of the Clinton email case and into the FBI’s 2016 investigation of some members of Trump‘s campaign.
    • We learn that the Podesta Group and its chairman Tony Podesta (brother of Clinton campaign manager John Podesta) is part of the Mueller investigation for working with Paul Manafort’s agency on a pro-Ukraine PR campaign.
    • The original funder of Fusion GPS’s opposition research on Trump is a conservative website, The Washington Free Beacon, which hired Fusion GPS in fall of 2015 presumably on behalf of a Republican primary candidate. This initial research found Trump’s business interests were heavily weighted toward Russia.
    • Around the time the Beacon stopped funding the opposition (in May), the DNC and Clinton campaign (through a lawyer) hired Fusion GPS to continue their work (in April).
    • Since Fusion GPS’s previous research had already led them to Russia, they contracted Steele to continue that line of research.
    • The Campaign Legal Center files a complaint with the FEC against the DNC and Clinton campaign saying they hid payments to Fusion GPS on their FEC filings.
    • Trump personally tells the State Department to speed up the release of all remaining Clinton emails.
    • Hyperbole much? Sebastian Gorka says Hillary should be tried for treason and executed.
  1. While much of the above is coming out now in an attempt to discredit the Steele dossier, the intelligence community came to their conclusions about Russia meddling without using the dossier at all.
  2. A top employee at Cambridge Analytica, the firm the Trump campaign used to target certain demographics, says he contacted Wikileaks about Clinton’s emails, offering to help index them so they’d be more easily searchable online. Julian Assange refused the offer. This occurred in August 2016. After we knew Russia was behind the hack, and after Cambridge Analytica started working with the Trump campaign.
  3. Trump plans to pay almost a half million dollars for his aides legal fees around the Russia investigation.
  4. Mueller files the initial charges in the Russia probe. As of the end of the week, they’re still sealed under orders from the court.
  5. After the charges are announced, Roger Stone unleashes a profane tirade on Twitter, which gets him banned permanently from Twitter.
  6. Twitter bans ads from Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik.
  7. Facebook, Twitter, and Google played a much bigger role in the election than we thought. The companies offered to embed their employees in both Clinton’s and Trump’s campaigns, though Clinton declined. Those employees created campaign strategies and communications for Trump’s campaign, including targeting voters and preparing responses to attacks.
  8. Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer who met with Donald Trump Jr. last year, says the information she had to share was from her own research, but it turns out that her paperwork included verbatim text from Russia’s prosecutor general.
  9. To help combat the disinformation campaign, Quartz creates a bot that hunts down political bots on Twitter, @probabot. You can follow it on Twitter.
  10. Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, meets with the House Intelligence Committee to discuss a request he made to Dmitry Peskov for help in building Trump Tower Moscow. The request was made during the 2016 campaign.

Courts/Justice:

  1. The inspector general for the Treasury Department releases a report on the allegations that the IRS under Obama targeted conservative organizations for heavier scrutiny of eligibility for tax-exempt status. It turns out that equal scrutiny was given to both liberal and conservative groups during this time, and that both were more heavily scrutinized.
  2. However, despite all the above information, the DOJ under Sessions settles cases with some conservative groups anyway. The settlements are pending court approval.

Healthcare:

  1. The company that created OxyContin, Purdue Pharma, is spreading the opioid epidemic abroad. They’re pushing into international markets, and providing educational tools and text for medical schools.
  2. Trump declares a national public health emergency instead of a national emergency in the opioid epidemic. This gives agencies more flexibility in dealing with the problem but doesn’t provide funding like a national emergency would. This only provides $57,000 in funding and doesn’t improve access to the life-saving drug naloxone.
  3. Trump’s solution to the problem seems to be “just say no,” which didn’t work the first time we tried it in the 1980s. Agencies dealing with the crisis still haven’t been given direction from the administration.
  4. While opioid addiction is the big problem, the increased number of deaths seems to be coming from fentanyl mixed in with heroin.
  5. The CBO estimates that the latest bipartisan healthcare bill being proposed would reduce the deficit by $4 billion while funding the insurance subsidies and giving states more flexibility. They also say that not funding subsidies would increase the deficit by $194 billion over 9 years.
  6. Joshua Kushner, Jared’s brother, writes an op-ed supporting the ACA and criticizing Trump’s handling of it. He’s in the insurance industry.
  7. While industry experts say that the healthcare markets and associated premiums had pretty much stabilized, now it turns out that premiums are increasing 34% as a result of the uncertainty around Trump’s and the GOP’s policies.
  8. Congress let the funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) expire more than three weeks ago. Some states can continue funding it for a few more months, but others are running out of money.

International:

  1. General Dunford holds a press conference to answer questions about how the troops died in Niger.
  2. It turns out that hardly any members of Congress knew we had so many troops in Niger. They’ve been there since 2013.
  3. While the administration has been pushing a narrative of success with security in Afghanistan, Rex Tillerson meets with the president of Afghanistan in what he says is the capital city of Kabul. But they actually met at a military base, as noticed by the military clock on the wall in the press photo of the two. At least Afghanistan PR was smart enough to photoshop the clock out of the picture.
  4. Trump says the end of the ISIS caliphate is in sight, and he could be right thanks to steady losses over the past three years. Anti-ISIS fighters have squeezed ISIS down into a tiny fraction of the land they once occupied.
  5. Jared Kushner takes an unannounced trip to Saudi Arabia to continue Middle East peace talks.
  6. Cuba blames the “sonic attacks” that led to many U.S. diplomats there returning home on cicadas. They got this from comparing recordings the U.S. embassy provided them for investigation.
  7. Airlines with direct flights to the U.S. from abroad must now comply with new HHS rules that include tougher screenings, including interviews with security. The tougher rules come from the findings earlier this year that explosive devices could be hidden inside laptops.
  8. Normally the different areas in Spain are mostly run by their own local governments, but the government of Spain is taking over Catalonia’s government after their recent attempt to gain independence.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. The House schedules a hearing on a heartbeat abortion bill. This could pass the House but it’s doubtful it would pass the Senate. Even if it gets signed into law, the courts would strike it down as it has with each state that’s tried to pass similar legislation.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. ICE detains a 10-year-old with cerebral palsy immediately following an emergency surgery. She’s been in the U.S. since she was three months old.
  2. Trump lifts the refugee ban, but the administration caps the number of refugees allowed each year and implements new and more strict vetting rules.
  3. White Lives Matter holds rallies in Tennessee, chanting “Closed borders, white nation! Now we start the deportation!” I only found one incidence of violence, where white supremacists beat an interracial couple in a restaurant.
  4. Counter-protestors outnumber the White Lives Matter crowd, and they play Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech over their speaker system, drowning out the White Lives Matter speakers.
  5. HUD secretary Ben Carson ends a rule to prevent housing segregation. The rule would’ve stopped a practice that limited the areas where low-income families could live and would’ve allowed them to move into areas with more opportunities. In response, civil rights groups sue Carson and HUD.
  6. While Trump goes ahead with his border wall prototypes, emails show a chaotic and confusing bidding process. Even basic details, like how and where to submit bids, were confusing. One industry expert says that this indicates the administration doesn’t have a clear picture of what they want. Shocking, I know.
  7. Senate Republicans form a group to work on immigration issues, including saving Dreamers.

Climate/EPA:

  1. China shuts down tens of thousands of factories in a crackdown on pollution violations. China has been making great headway in clean energy sources, but it needs to clean up its smog problem before it can make full use of solar, because the sun doesn’t make it through the smog enough.
  2. The National Park Service plans to increase fees to our national parks, in some cases more than double the current price. One example is Joshua Tree in California, where the price per car would go from $25 to $75, and would increase to $50 per motorcycle and $30 for biking or walking in.
  3. To compound matters, Trump’s budget cuts $400 million from parks. Members of Congress have proposed bipartisan bills that would use $12 billion in federal oil and gas revenue to pay for long-needed maintenance in the parks, which is the reason for the above increases.
  4. The Department of the Interior’s four-year strategic plan removes any mention of climate change. Rather than emphasizing conservation, their strategy appears to emphasize “American energy dominance” by exploiting public lands for their “vast amounts” of energy reserves.
  5. Trump announces plans to shrink two national monuments in Utah, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase – Escalante.
  6. Rick Perry wants to reward coal and nuclear plants for storing 90 days of fuel on site saying it makes the power grid more reliable. Natural gas and renewable energy producers, along with public utilities, say it would inhibit competition and increase prices for consumers.

Puerto Rico:

  1. A few GOP Senators hold up the disaster relief bill, citing concerns for Puerto Rico. Jeff Flake and Mike Lee have fiscal concerns but also want Puerto Rico to be able to ignore the Jones Act.
  2. The electric company that won the contract in Puerto Rico is a 2-man operation from Whitefish, MT, where Ryan Zinke is from.
  3. Two House committees and one federal watchdog (the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General) open investigations into how the contract was awarded.
  4. Whitefish also gets into a Twitter war with San Juan’s mayor over her requests for an open process, threatening to stop working.
  5. While the contract with Whitefish says that FEMA reviewed and approved it, FEMA says they never saw it. And even though FEMA’s responsible for paying WhiteFish, the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) is the agency that authorized the contract.
  6. The governor of Puerto Rico demands that PREPA cancel the contract with Whitefish citing a lack of transparency.
  7. The rates charged by Whitefish are more than double those that would be paid by the Army Corps of Engineers. The contract includes a clause that says the government can’t review the labor rates.
  8. Questions come up about the number of dead from hurricane Maria as well as the methodology of counting them. Some put the number closer to 1,000 than the official count of 51, largely due to lack of medical care after the hurricane struck.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Wall Street scores another win, as Republicans in the Senate barely pass a bill to repeal Obama-era rules about forced arbitration clauses. This repeal makes it harder for consumers to fight back against unscrupulous acts by financial institutions by allowing consumers to be forced into arbitration clauses. In other words, banks can sue you, but you can’t sue banks. The Obama-era rule is what allowed Wells Fargo customers to file a suit against the bank after learning Wells Fargo signed people up for accounts without their knowledge.
  2. The GOP tax and budget framework gets mixed reviews. Some of the changes include:
    • Immediate write-offs for equipment investment.
    • Cutting corporate tax rates, which decreases tax revenue and raises deficits.
    • Windfall subsidies on past corporate investments.
    • Not charging companies U.S. taxes on foreign income, which could encourage companies to ship jobs and profits overseas.
    • A $1 trillion cut to Medicaid and a $1/2 trillion cut to Medicare.
  1. 100% of leading economists surveyed don’t think the tax plan will boost the economy enough to pay for itself.
  2. While Senators Corker, Flake, and McCain have been speaking up for what they think is morally right, they all also just voted to give consumers no recourse when they are swindled by banks and they voted for a tax cut for the wealthy accompanied by a $1.5 trillion cut to healthcare for the elderly and needy.
  3. The currently approved framework leaves 401K limits alone for now. Previously, Congress floated dropping the annual limit that you can put in your 401K from $18,000 to $2,400.
  4. There’s disagreement among Republicans in Congress over getting rid of two tax deductions, one for local property taxes and one for state taxes.
  5. Building contractors and realtors object to the possibility of removing the tax deduction on mortgage interest.
  6. Scott Garrett, Trump’s pick for the import-export bank, goes before the Senate November 1. In the model of other Trump appointees who’s job seems to be dismantling their agencies, Garrett has spent many years trying to dismantle the bank.
  7. Every investor in Trump Tower Toronto lost money on their investment except Trump.
  8. Since Trump made his “Buy American” promise, imports of foreign steel are up 24%.
  9. Republicans in Congress are increasingly certain they can pass tax reform by year’s end. They think passing reform will cause some Republicans to rethink their decision to retire out of frustration at not being able to get anything done. The push for passing tax reform is so strong because the GOP thinks this will secure them majorities in the House and Senate in 2018. They plan to run a multi-million-dollar ad campaign to promote their plan.
  10. Congressional Republicans worry that Trump will make passing tax reform harder by what he says and does. Remember the hit the ACA repeal effort took when Trump called the House healthcare plan “mean.”

Elections:

  1. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) announces it will investigate Trump’s voter fraud commission over how it’s using federal funds, its methodology, and how it’s protecting voter information and following regulations.
  2. Trump’s voter fraud commission isn’t keeping the Democrats on the commission in the loop.

Miscellaneous:

  1. File this one under hypocrisy. After criticizing Democrats for not distancing themselves from Weinstein fast enough, not returning his donated money fast enough, and not doing enough to stop him, FoxNews brings accused predator Bill O’Reilly back on air to let him air his grievances about being set up. I’m sure the women he’s harassed were thrilled to see him there.
  2. On top of that, we learn that before FoxNews fired him, they renewed O’Reilly’s contract for $100 million for four years, and this was after he settled what was at least his SIXTH sexual harassment suit, this one for $32 million dollars. So please stop trying to make sexual predation a political issue. It’s a power issue.
  3. Trump has a very bad Tuesday. Jeff Flake gives a 20-minute impassioned critique on the Senate floor about the state of politics and Trump, saying he won’t run again. Bob Corker gives a brutally honest 6-minute interview on the way to the GOP lunch. And then, as Trump walks to the lunch with Mitch McConnell, a protestor throws Russian flags at them and calls Trump a traitor.
  4. Both Mitch McConnell and John McCain praise Flake for his speech on the Senate floor. Sarah Huckabee Sanders calls it petty and not “befitting of the Senate floor.”
  5. The latest Pew Research study on politics and policy shows that a majority of both Republicans and Democrats think that “their side” is losing. Surprising for Republicans, since they control the federal government and over half of state governments.
  6. Trump brags for at least the 20th time this year about getting standing ovations, this time at the Senate luncheon.
  7. Trump announces the release of the remaining JFK files as per a pre-scheduled release date, but there’s a short delay because they didn’t know that certain files needed to be reviewed and redacted. Several documents were released, but some will be released next April.
  8. The Education Department is no longer fully protecting students who were defrauded by for-profit colleges. Instead of forgiving their loans, which was the policy under Obama, the students are responsible for half the amount.
  9. In a profile with Politico, John Boehner blames the increasing divide and partisanship on the rise of talk radio and social media. He also says “Fuck [Rep. Jim] Jordan. Fuck [Rep. Jason] Chaffetz. They’re both assholes.” Jordan helped cofound the Freedom Caucus (which caused Boehner no end of trouble) and Chaffetz chaired the House Oversight Committee. It’s a long piece, but lots of interesting tidbits.
  10. Ajit Pai announces plans to loosen media ownership regulations, opening the door for even more consolidation in media outlets and less consumer choice. The FCC will vote on this in November.
  11. As of this week, 1 in 5 Senate Republicans have been the target of Trump’s attacks, including Bob Corker, Ted Cruz, Jeff Flake, Lindsey Graham, Dean Heller, John McCain, Mitch McConnell, Lisa Murkowski, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, and Ben Sasse. The great negotiator might be forgetting that he can only afford to lose two Republican votes on any Senate bill.

Polls:

  1. 58% of Republicans say that Trump is the hardest working president since WWII. This, despite the fact that as of October 22, he has spent 75 out of 279 days playing golf, or 1 of every 3.7 days. Or 3 times as much vacation times as Obama took by this time.
  2. 71% of Americans think U.S. politics “have reached a dangerous low point.” 80% say Congress is dysfunctional. 60% say Trump is making it more dysfunctional.
  3. The percent of American who think politicians are honest has dropped from 39 to 14 since 1987.
  4. 87% think politicians will do whatever it takes to get re-elected.
  5. 48% of registered voters prefer a Congress controlled by Democrats. 41% prefer Republican control.
  6. 53% of military officers disapprove of Trump, and 40% of all troops disapprove of him.

Stupid Things Politicians Say:

“The people that made the Russians successful are the Democrats, and the people who have continued this nonsense over and over and over again, looking for Russians behind every tree.”

– House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA), as a way of blaming Democrats for the Russian meddling in 2016. Even though what really made the Russians successful were the people who believed and helped spread the fake stories out of Russia and Macedonia.

Week 39 in Trump

Posted on October 23, 2017 in Politics, Trump

You wanna know how much faith we can put in Congressional hearings? Here’s a quote from Trey Gowdy, who relentlessly ran the Benghazi hearings that repeatedly found Clinton not guilty of anything while dragging her through the mud for a few years.

“Congressional investigations unfortunately are usually overtly political investigations, where it is to one side’s advantage to drag things out,” says Gowdy. “The notion that one side is playing the part of defense attorney and that the other side is just these white-hat defenders of the truth is laughable … This is politics.”

And apparently a waste of time that the taxpayers fund. Kevin McCarthy said as much when he said that the Benghazi hearings had done the intended job of smearing Clinton (which did lose him the speakership, so at least there’s that). I think we’ll have to rely on Mueller, not Congress, to learn what really happened last year.

That’s my rant and here’s what happened in week 39.

Russia:

  1. Here’s what we learn this week about Russian troll farm workers:
    • They had a quota for the number of political and non-political posts they had to make, as well as for the number of daily comments. They wanted to flood social media with agitating propaganda (agitprop).
    • One troll worker says “Our goal wasn’t to turn the Americans toward Russia. Our task was to set Americans against their own government: to provoke unrest and discontent, and to lower Obama’s support ratings.” Well done, guys.
    • Their goal was to smear Hillary in three ways: Bill Clinton’s sex scandals, the Clintons’ wealth, and her use of a private email server.
    • They had to watch “House of Cards” to learn about American politics.
    • They organized events, rallies, and protests in the U.S. and hired activists to hold rallies. The activists didn’t know they were working for Russia.
  2. U.S. investigators now believe that a man called Putin’s chef, Yevgeny Prigozhin, was behind one of the Russian troll farms.
  3. Fusion GPS, the company that commissioned the Steele dossier, objects to the previous week’s subpoenas from the House Intelligence Committee, saying they aren’t even sure if Devin Nunes has the authority to sign off on them. Nunes is supposed to be recused from the investigation.
  4. Facebook wants to hire people with national security clearance, likely to help prevent future attempts by foreign agents to manipulate information on the site.
  5. Mueller interviews Matt Tait, the cyber expert who was recruited by Peter Smith to collude with Russia. He wrote a pretty interesting blog on it called The Time I Got Recruited to Collude with the Russians.
  6. Sean Spicer meets with Robert Mueller’s team. They talk about James Comey’s firing and Trump’s meeting with Russian officials.
  7. The Senate Intelligence Committee subpoenas Carter Page, who has been refusing to testify.
  8. Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s former campaign manager, meets with the Senate Intelligence Committee.
  9. Jeff Sessions testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee to defend the firing of James Comey. Sessions hasn’t been interviewed by Mueller yet.
  10. Members of the House Oversight Committee push for subpoenas of the White House for documents about Michael Flynn. The documents they are looking for could lead to criminal prosecution, though, and Congress doesn’t prosecute crimes.
  11. A bipartisan bill in the Senate would force social media companies to disclose who purchased an online political ad so we would know if it was Russian-sponsored.
  12. Russian state-owned media RT misses its deadline to register as a foreign agent under FARA after a DOJ request to do so.
  13. In an about-face, Putin says the American people need to stop disrespecting Trump.
  14. In a tweet, Trump basically accuses the FBI, Russia, and the Mueller investigation of conspiracy to frame him.
  15. Partisanship gets in the way of the congressional investigations of Russia, leading some to express concern that each committee will come to two different conclusions.
  16. Mike Pompeo, head of the CIA, says Russian meddling didn’t affect the results of the election, even though the intelligence report concludes that was Russia’s aim. Whether they were successful hasn’t been concluded yet.

Courts/Justice:

  1. A district judge refuses to vacate Joe Arpaio’s criminal contempt conviction, even though Trump pardoned him. Judge Bolton says the pardon doesn’t change the historical facts of the case. So while Arpaio won’t have to do jail time, he might now be more vulnerable to civil suits.
  2. Trump personally interviews two candidates for U.S. District Attorney in New York, opening up the question of whether the people hired for these jobs will be beholden to him. This is a big question in light of Mueller seeming to look for state crimes as well as federal.
  3. The DOJ dropped a request to obtain the names of Facebook users who liked a specific inauguration day protest page. This was part of the investigation into inauguration day riots, but this request was seen as overreach.
  4. Justices Kagan and Gorsuch spar behind the scenes, and not in the good way Supreme Court justices typically do.

Healthcare:

  1. Eighteen states and DC sue Trump over stopping the ACA subsidy payments.
  2. After Trump’s decision to end healthcare subsidies, states work frantically to approve higher insurance rates to shore up the insurance companies and to stop them from leaving their markets. Medical and insurance stocks took a hit after Trump’s announcement.
  3. Pennsylvania’s insurance commissioner says that insurance premiums will rise in Philadelphia an average of 30% due to Trump’s gutting of the ACA last week. Oregon has already told insurers to go ahead and raise premiums.
  4. Republicans scramble to work out a deal that would continue the ACA subsidy payments, and a bipartisan agreement looks possible. Lamar Alexander and Patty Murray create an agreement that could stabilize markets in the short term. Note that this is not a bill yet, it’s just a deal that they think both sides can get behind.
  5. Trump expresses opposition to the bipartisan bill, and then later expresses support for it in a speech, and then later blasts the bill in a tweet. So I don’t know if he’s for or against it, but I think in the end he’s against it.
  6. Paul Ryan doesn’t support the bipartisan agreement. All Democrats in the Senate say they’ll support it, which, combined with the 12 Republican cosponsors of the bill, gives a filibuster-proof majority.
  7. The association health care plans Trump is pushing in place of the individual market have a history of fraud and abuse, as shown in dozens of court cases. In many cases, people were left on the hook for medical expenses that should’ve been covered by insurance.
  8. Trump blindsided officials with his promise of an emergency declaration on the opioid crisis. Those officials scramble to create such a plan, saying they aren’t ready for it and there’s no consensus on how to implement it.
  9. Betty Price, Georgia state Representative and wife of former HHS secretary Tom Price, suggests that people with HIV should be quarantined, and that in the past it wasn’t so much of a problem because they “died more readily.”
  10. Due to the shortened enrollment period for the ACA, people who are automatically re-enrolled in their policy might not be getting the best option. Previously they’d receive a reminder to look for less expensive or more comprehensive policies. But the shortened period doesn’t give enough time for that.
  11. Republican representative Tom Marino, Trump’s pick for drug czar, removes himself from the running due to his involvement in passing legislation that made it easier to distribute opioids while making it harder for the DEA to stop it.

International:

  1. After reading the provisions of Trump’s Iran decree, it’s pretty apparent to me that he doesn’t understand that the Iran agreement is about nuclear proliferation only. It doesn’t address terrorism or security and that wasn’t the intent.
  2. Forces backed by the U.S. liberate Raqqa from ISIS. ISIS has been consistently losing physical ground for several years now.
  3. Two groups supported by the U.S. are fighting in Iraq. The Kurds want to separate from Iraq, which has spurred an armed conflict between the two.
  4. The U.S. military starts evacuation drills to practice what they would do in case of armed conflict with North Korea.
  5. Rex Tillerson says that our foreign policy is “resilient enough to accommodate unknowns,” including Trump’s tweets. While the tweets catch him off guard, Tillerson tries to include those messages in his strategies.
  6. Japan holds a snap election so prime minister Abe can bolster support to update their constitution. The U.S. occupied Japan after WWII and rewrote their constitution to limit their military might. With the new threat from North Korea, Japan wants to build back up its military.
  7. Trump tweets “United Kingdom crime rises 13% annually amid spread of Radical Islamic terror.” The U.K. Agency that published the crime stats says this is false; the rise in crime has nothing to do with terrorism. It’s possible this information came from a conspiracy TV network, OANN.
  8. Information is still sketchy about the deaths of four Green Berets in Niger. The Pentagon is investigating the attack to determine whether our forces there were on an unapproved mission or just routine patrol. There are conflicting stories about what happened.
  9. We should expect hearings over Niger. There was no overhead surveillance, no American quick-reaction force to back them up, French back-up couldn’t use force, and one body was found a mile away and two days later.
  10. Chad helps us and our allies fight Islamic extremists, and has been since 2012. It’s where we set up strategic headquarters for the counterterrorist fight in Africa. They don’t have a lot of people joining Islamic militants, but neighboring places do (like Niger).
    • A few weeks ago, Trump adds Chad to the travel ban. (How does Chad end up on the banned list and not, say, Niger? No one knows. Maybe because Chad fined Exxon $74 billion?)
    • The state department and military oppose the move, and experts warn that putting Chad on the travel ban puts Americans in danger, as reported a few weeks back.
    • Four Green Berets are killed in Niger.
    • Chad begins removing troops from the fight in Niger against Islamic extremists.
    • Finally we find out. It turns out that Chad ran out of passport paper when they needed to send the administration a sample, and that’s how they ended up on the travel ban.
    • CORRECTION: It looks like Chad moved their troops after the ambush on our soldiers. I updated the order above. Given this chronology, the events appear to be unrelated.
  11. At China’s Communist Party congress, Prime Minister Xi pushes an agenda to make China a stronger military and economic powerhouse, fight government corruption, and be a global leader in trade and global warming. He’s not wasting any time in taking advantage of the void left by the U.S.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. Six Republicans members on the House Ways and Means Committee are retiring or resigning from Congress. That’s about a quarter of the GOP members of this elite panel who are checking out. Representatives spend years trying to get on this panel.
  2. Congress is going to make Dreamers wait to find out their fate; they’re completely focused on tax reform right now.
  3. Interestingly, one congressional aide says they have the bandwidth to deal with both tax reform and immigration, but only if Democrats agree to increased border security. Democrats have already indicated support for enhanced security, just not a border wall.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. In the midst of the anthem debate, the NFL throws its support behind criminal justice reform.
  2. Colin Kaepernick files a grievance against the NFL, accusing them of colluding against him.
  3. NFL owners decide not to change their rules. Players can kneel or stand during the anthem. Trump continues his war on the NFL.
  4. A federal judge in Hawaii blocks Trump’s travel ban nationwide just hours before it would’ve taken effect. The block does not include the ban on travel from North Korea and Venezuela.
  5. A day later, a second federal judge, this time in Maryland, blocks the travel ban.
  6. Donald Trump Jr.‘s take on sexual harassment in the workplace (at least last year) is this: “If you can’t handle some of the basic stuff that’s become a problem in the workforce today, then you don’t belong in the workforce. Like, you should go maybe teach kindergarten.” Or maybe men should just not sexually harass women. Or discriminate against them.
  7. A unit of an upstate New York police department surveils Black Lives Matters members despite being told by the courts to stop. This comes on top of learning that black activist groups are being eyed as terrorist groups by some in the FBI, raising concerns of racial profiling and further marginalization.
  8. The Customs and Border Patrol denies Indonesia’s military chief entry to the U.S. He was invited to an event by U.S. General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. U.S. officials apologize, but Indonesia is demanding answers.
  9. We learn that Trump teases Mike Pence about his views on the LGBTQ community, having joked around that Pence wants to hang all gays. He also teases him for a lack of success in making abortion illegal, and for making people pray. Real funny stuff.
  10. Businesses band together in the Coalition for the American Dream to support Dreamers and push immigration reform, focusing entirely on Republican legislators. Here are a few of those businesses: Microsoft, IBM, Facebook, Google, Apple, Cisco, Intel, Uber, Lyft, Airbnb, Spotify, Under Armour, Chobani, Marriott, Hilton, Ikea, and Best Buy.
  11. Hotels have been quietly refusing to let white nationalists book their conventions at the hotels.
  12. White nationalist Richard Spencer speaks to an unfriendly crowd at the University of Florida in Gainesville. Three of Spencer’s supporters are arrested for attempted homicide after shooting guns at protestors.
  13. Trump considers suspending the refugee family reunification program, which allows the families of refugees to join them in the U.S. He’s also looking at putting women from designated high-risk countries through the same scrutiny as men.

Climate/EPA:

  1. Environmental groups often sue the EPA to get them to enforce their own regulations, but Scott Pruitt makes this more difficult and expensive by ending the practice of settling lawsuits against the EPA. This could backfire, though, if the courts find against the EPA in future suits.
  2. A study links pollution to almost 1 in every 6 deaths in 2015, mostly from air pollution, mostly in rapidly industrializing nations, and mostly affecting children and the poor. So yes, let’s dismantle the EPA.
  3. Three EPA experts were scheduled to speak about their findings in a 500-page report on climate change effects on an eastern estuary. The EPA cancels their appearance, intensifying concerns that the government will prevent scientists from talking about climate change or even from working on climate issues.

  4. The EPA says higher radiation levels have no harmful health effects, setting the acceptable level for drinking water at 10 times what it was under Obama. Previous EPA guidelines said that NO level was safe.
  5. The EPA removes yet more climate change resources from its website. These resources helped local governments to deal with the effects of climate change that affect them directly and to come up with plans to adapt.
  6. A Trump appointee to the EPA was a leader in the chemical industry. She’s trying to change the rules to make it harder to track perfluorooctanoic acid, of PFOA, which is linked to serious health problems like kidney cancer and birth defects. The EPA has struggled to keep PFOA from contaminating our drinking water. This appointee has also proposed rewriting a dozen rules in order to align the EPA more with the chemical industry’s wishes.

Puerto Rico:

  1. The USNS Comfort is still mostly empty instead of handling urgent patients in Puerto Rico. Only 13% of the beds are being used, despite a great need and overwhelmed hospitals on the island.
  2. Reports are that the death count in Puerto Rico is inaccurate and could possibly be up to 450. Congressional Democrats request an accurate count.
  3. According to recent interviews, many Trump supporters who were victims of the Houston hurricane and are receiving government funds to rebuild don’t think that Puerto Ricans should receive the same assistance. The overriding sentiment here appears to be that Houstonians aren’t taking advantage of the system, but those darn Puerto Ricans are. Makes you proud to be an American, right?
  4. About a month into recovery, Trump rates his hurricane response to Puerto Rico a 10 out of 10. 30% of the island is still without drinking water and 80% are still without power. St. Croix and the U.S. Virgin Islands also have around 80% without power.

Budget/Economy:

  1. The Senate approves a budget that lets the GOP avoid a Democratic filibuster. The House needs to sign an identical version to bypass the filibuster.
  2. The Senate version of the budget cuts energy and national resource spending by $1 billion over a decade. It also calls for legislation to cut domestic spending by $5.1 trillion, including cutting Medicaid by $1 trillion and medicare by $470 billion.
  3. The House version includes a directive for the oversight and reform committee to find ways to save $32 billion over 10 years.
  4. Republican Senator Bob Corker calls the Senate budget a “meaningless hoax” and says it’s only designed to bypass the Democrats in order to sign a tax plan.
  5. Republicans are considering reducing the allowable annual 401K contribution from $18,000 per year to $2,400, reducing workers’ ability to save for retirement.
  6. Almost half the income from pass-through corporations goes to the top 1%. Almost 80% of pass-through income goes to the top 20%. So Republicans are incorrect when they say their tax break for pass-through corporations will help middle income ranges and small business owners.
  7. In talking about the latest budget, Mulvaney admits that it’s difficult to cut spending in Washington.
  8. Trump pushes for bipartisan tax reform, but it’s already too late for that. Republicans have already been working behind closed doors for weeks.
  9. Steve Mnuchin warns that if Congress fails to cut taxes, they could tank the stock market. I’m not sure if that was a warning or a threat.
  10. He also says that it’s hard not to give tax cuts to the wealthy.
  11. Because marijuana is still not federally legal, marijuana farmer’s can’t get crop insurance. Farmers in Northern California lost millions in the fires that they won’t be able to recoup.

Elections:

  1. Trump says he’ll try to talk Steve Bannon out of his “season of war” against Republicans in next year’s elections. Trump and McConnell meet about this, and afterward, Trump says they’re closer than ever.
  2. On average, a member of Congress running for re-election raises $24,149 each week. Maybe we should get the money out of politics so they can legislate instead of fundraise.
  3. Trump’s campaign has raised $36,469,896 this year.
  4. Joe Arpaio speaks at a fundraiser at the Trump National Golf Club in Southern California in support of a GOP opponent to Representative Maxine Waters.

Miscellaneous:

  1. In one week, John McCain, Barack Obama, and George Bush all take thinly veiled jabs at the Trump administration and the nationalism and populism that put him in office.
  2. In his speech accepting the Liberty Medal, John McCain warned against “half-baked, spurious nationalism.” In his own words: “We will not thrive in a world where our leadership and ideals are absent. To fear the world we have organized and led for three-quarters of a century, to abandon the ideals we have advanced around the globe, to refuse the obligations of international leadership and our duty to remain the last best hope of earth for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history.”
  3. Afterward, Trump warns McCain to be careful, because eventually Trump will fight back.
  4. Also, during a panel discussion, Condoleezza Rice and Madeleine Albright school Nikki Haley on statesmanship.
  5. According to Forbes, Trump’s worth dropped by $600 million over the past year due to a tough New York real estate market, expensive lawsuits, and an expensive presidential campaign. Also, the least wealthy person on the Forbes richest 400 Americans is worth $2 billion. 169 billionaires didn’t make the list this year.
  6. John Kelly gives Cabinet members more freedom to choose their staff, reversing the way things were done under Reince Priebus. So maybe they’ll finally get staffed up.
  7. As part of an ongoing suit resulting from sexual harassment charges, subpoenas are issued to Trump for any documents from his campaign that relate to any woman that accused him of sexual assault or harassment
  8. 6,663 Texas inmates pulled together $53,863 in donations for Hurricane Harvey relief efforts.
  9. When a reporter asks Trump why he hadn’t yet made a statement yet about the deaths of the four soldiers in Niger, it launches the week’s wars. Trump accuses previous presidents, and specifically Obama, of not calling the families of fallen troops–this is easily disproven. As is his claim that he calls all the families, which leads his staff to scramble to get the names of all soldiers fallen this year so Trump can hurry up and call them. Trump drags John Kelly unwillingly into the fray. One of his calls to the families of the four Green Berets killed in Niger is leaked leading to a fight with both a Congresswoman and the widow of the deceased soldier. And then Kelly joins the fight, and seriously things just get so darn ugly. You need a chart of all the missteps just to keep it straight. Trump could’ve ended this with a single empathetic phone call.
  10. All five living ex-president come together for a fundraising concert for hurricane victims.
  11. Shareholders at Tribune Media vote to approve the merger with Sinclair Broadcasting, though the FCC is still taking public comment.
  12. Trump signs an Executive Order to expand the authority of service secretaries to recall both enlisted and officer retirees to Active Duty.
  13. Trump brags about discrediting the media when a poll comes out showing nearly half of Americans don’t trust the media. He says they make up stories about him. Real media sources literally do not do this.
  14. As of this week, the Education Department under Betsy Devon has rescinded 72 documents defining rights for students with disabilities. They say the documents are outdated or unnecessary, but disability rights groups are reviewing them.
  15. 18 Democratic attorneys general sue Betsy DeVos over her department’s refusal enforce rules that protect people from predatory colleges.
  16. Trump promised to drain the swamp, but only one of his five proposals to limit lobbying is implemented so far. Spending on lobbying came to nearly $1.7 billion for the first half of this year, which is the highest since 2012.
  17. Fox and Friends increasingly sets the media tone for the day. Trump watches it in the morning, tweets something from it, and the rest of the media takes the bait.
  18. Trump announces he’ll declassify the remaining JFK assassination files.

Polls:

  1. Nearly 60% of Americans think the current tax plan favors the rich.
  2. 66% of Americans want the ACA fixed instead of repealed.
  3. Trump’s attacks on the media are working. 46% of voters think that the media makes up stories about Trump and his staff. 76% of Republicans believe it.
  4. 42% of Americans think Trump will go down as one of worst presidents in history.

Week 36 in Trump

Posted on October 3, 2017 in Politics, Trump

The Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S. October 2, 2017. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

It just seems like it’s one thing after another, between natural disasters and man-made horrors. This week ends with a mass shooting at a country music festival in Las Vegas—the largest mass shooting in the U.S. We’re still working through the horrific aftermath of this, trying to figure out the shooter’s motivation and why he had such a large arsenal. People in Las Vegas are lining up around blocks to give blood and do what they can to help. It’s heartbreaking.

But politics still goes on. Here’s what happened last week.

Russia:

  1. The Russian ads and accounts turned over to Congress by Facebook were designed to create and spread divisive messages on hot-button topics like LGBT rights, race, immigration, and guns. They exploited our differences and used them against us.
  2. Russian ads on Facebook during the 2016 campaign:
    • Promoted votes for both Jill Stein and Bernie Sanders in the general election after Hillary had won the primary.
    • Started rumors that Clinton created, funded, and armed ISIS, and alternatively that John McCain started ISIS.
    • Criticized Clinton and questioned her authenticity while promoting Trump.
    • Impersonated black lives matter activists.
    • Impersonated a real, but obsolete, Muslim group in the U.S.
    • Seemed more intent on increasing the divide between us than pushing a certain candidate.
  3. Facebook reveals that they notified the FBI last summer that they saw what looked like Russian espionage. Later they reported that Russians were feeding the information they stole back into social media.
  4. Twitter goes before congress this week. They’ve also found social media accounts linked to Russian Facebook ads. In fact, there’s evidence that Russians used Twitter more extensively than Facebook to sow division.
  5. In an indication that Russia is still trying to affect the electorate and amplify division, hundreds of Russia-linked Twitter accounts tweet about the NFL controversy on BOTH SIDES. Pay attention people! Stop feeding Russian propaganda.
  6. According to experts, this is Russia’s method of creating chaos and division. They’ve been using similar tactics since the cold war.
  7. A member of the Senate Judiciary Committee says he’s 99% sure that Mueller’s investigation will result in criminal indictments. My guess is the most likely to be indicted are Manafort and Flynn.
  8. Sean Spicer lawyers up.
  9. The IRS criminal division shares information with Mueller’s office in the Russia investigation.
  10. The DOJ tells a company that provides services to RT America that they must register as a foreign agent under FARA. Russia warns the U.S. against taking any actions against the state-owned media groups Sputnik and RT.
  11. Federal investigators are looking into whether RT and Sputnik were involved in Russia’s propaganda campaign in 2016.

Courts/Justice:

  1. 30 House Democrats file an amicus brief claiming that the pardon of Joe Arpaio is unconstitutional and usurps the courts’ authority.

  2. The Senate Judiciary Committee approves Trump’s nominee to head the criminal division of the Department of Justice, Brian Benczkowski. This is only important because Brian represented Alfa Bank, one of the Russian organizations with close ties to Putin and one that is part of the Russia probe.

  3. The DOJ gets search warrants to force Facebook to turn over information about people who liked, commented on, followed, or reacted to a DisruptJ20 Facebook page and two other anti-Trump pages. This is about the inauguration day violence.

Healthcare:

  1. The CBO is unable to do a complete scoring of the Graham-Cassidy healthcare bill because it wasn’t given enough time, though they do estimate millions would lose healthcare and would reduce the deficit some.
  2. Susan Collins waits for the CBO report before deciding on the bill. She then says that while the Medicaid bribe means Maine would be OK with the healthcare bill, it would harm most of America and would eventually blow up on Maine as well.
  3. The latest ACA repeal effort goes out with a whimper. This takes the GOP-led Congress into October with no major legislative actions.
  4. Despite the cancellation of the vote on the ACA repeal bill, Trump says repeal is right on track saying they’d have a vote if Thad Cochran wasn’t in the hospital. Thad is not in the hospital and offered to come in if his vote is needed.
  5. Senate Republicans aren’t ready to shut the door on ACA repeal. They’re still looking at combining ACA repeal with tax reform or addressing it in the 2018 or 2019 budget.

International:

  1. While North Korea took Trump’s recent words as a declaration of war, North Korean officials are also reaching out to Republican operatives to get a better understanding of Trump.
  2. Trump criticizes Rex Tillerson for continuing diplomatic efforts with North Korea.
  3. China orders all North Korean businesses in the country to close as part of the UN sanctions.
  4. U.S. intelligence says they have no evidence to back up Trump’s Tweet that Iran tested a missile last weekend. Trump based it on an announcement from an Iran news station, but our sensors show no indications of the test.
  5. The death toll from the earthquake in Mexico is now over 360.
  6. While the U.S. government doesn’t think that Cuba is behind whatever is causing the strange illnesses in U.S. diplomatic personnel in Havana, they plan to pull everyone out for now and warn tourists not to go there.
  7. Catalonia votes for independence from Spain, with less than half voting. Spain sends in law enforcement to prevent people from voting, and violence ensues. Spain says the vote is illegal.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. Republican Senator Bob Corker announces he won’t run again in 2018.
  2. The House plans to vote on a bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks, with exceptions for health and incest or rape.
  3. Congress works on an aid package for Puerto Rico.
  4. Illinois lifts restrictions on using Medicaid to cover abortions and removes language in their law aiming to criminalize abortion if Roe v. Wade is ever overturned.
  5. House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, who’s been out for several months recovering from the baseball field shooting, returns to Congress. Just in time for the upcoming bill to make it easier to buy gun silencers.
  6. Congress quietly let funding for the following programs expire (but I assume will revive them?):
    • Healthcare for low-income kids (CHIP)
    • Community health centers
    • Loans for low-income college students

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. The UNC Tarheels national basketball champions join the list of teams who won’t be visiting the White House this year.
  2. Three House GOP members propose an alternative to the DREAM Act to make sure DACA kids aren’t deported. For some reason, it cuts off eligibility for those who were brought here after 2012.
  3. Homeland Security creates a new rule to let them collect and store social media information in their immigrant files. This includes social media aliases and handles, associated information, and even search results for all immigrants—including permanent residents and naturalized citizens. I can’t tell if this is for new immigrants only or if it’s retroactive.
  4. The State Department and Pentagon oppose including Chad in the travel ban, but Trump includes it anyway (possibly on Stephen Miller’s advice). The ban will jeopardize U.S. interests in Chad since they’re one of our more reliable allies in Africa in the fight against terrorism.
  5. Trump doesn’t seem to know why Sudan was removed from the travel ban.
  6. Trump caps refugee admissions at 45,000; it’s never been below 67,000. The defense and state departments, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the UN recommend allowing at least 50,000. Stephen Miller and John Kelly pushed for a 15,000 limit.
  7. Jeff Sessions’ Justice Department argues in court that employers should be allowed to fire people for being gay. This pits them against another federal agency, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), which says that equal employment rules protect against discrimination based on religion, sex, or race, and that sex includes sexual orientation. The court can’t figure out why the DOJ jumped in here, and legal experts predict the DOJ will lose.
  8. Trump continues to blast the NFL. He says he started with the NFL comments because owners were calling him asking him to do something and they were afraid of their players. I can’t even with this one. Owners can’t either.
  9. In an impromptu press conference five days after Trump started his fight with the NFL, he says they need to change or their business is going to go to hell.
  10. It turns out that Trump didn’t like the crowd size when he stumped for Luther Strange, but his comments about the NFL were a hit there. Thus the 5-day Twitter storm about the players’ protest.
  11. Trump and his top aides privately admit that this is a culture war he’s waging to rally his base.
  12. Alt-right groups appear to be flailing right now amid infighting and splintering. They’ve planned and then cancelled several events, and are struggling to get any traction.
  13. Even though a Homeland Security report says the border is more difficult to cross than ever before, Trump moves forward with his wall prototypes between San Diego and Tijuana.
  14. In a massive sweep of so-called sanctuary cities, ICE detains nearly 500 undocumented immigrants.
  15. ICE deports the father of an autistic son despite not having any criminal record and never missing an ICE meeting. He is now in Tijuana, away from his wife of 23 years (a U.S. citizen) and their two children (also U.S. citizens).
  16. Jared Kushner works behind John Kelly’s back on a DACA deal with Lindsey Graham and Dick Durbin.

Climate/EPA:

  1. Paranoid much? The EPA is building a sound-proof booth for Scott Pruitt to conduct official business so none of the staffers can hear him.
  2. A new study shows that an Obama-era effort to ban sales of bottled water at some parks had a significant effect. The rule saved up to 111,743 pounds of plastic, 141 million tons of CO2-equivalent greenhouse gases, and 3.4 billion BTUs of energy. Oh, as part of Trump’s deregulation efforts, the National Park Service rescinded this rule last month.
  3. Senate Republicans include wording in a budget resolution to pave the way to open ANWR to oil and gas drilling. The refuge has been protected for more than 50 years.

Budget/Economy:

  1. The GOP tax plan, which was drafted behind close doors by six Republicans (apparently the new modus operandi), would be a mixed bag for taxpayers and a tax cut for corporations. Here’s are the main points:
    • It shrinks the number of brackets from 7 to 3, meaning lower taxes for some, higher taxes for others. The tax rate for the lowest income would be higher, and for high-middle income would be lower. The rate for the top money earners would drop by nearly 5 points.
    • It cuts business taxes drastically, but removes certain loopholes.
    • It repeals the estate tax.
    • It gives tax breaks to people who’s income is passed through a closely-held corporation.
    • It removes certain deductions, like the state tax deductions, but doubles the standard deduction.
    • It removes the ATM tax.
  2. Polls show the middle class doesn’t necessarily want tax cuts; they just want the government to use their money better.
  3. The Tax Policy Center says the proposed tax changes would benefit the wealthiest Americans and businesses most.
  4. Gary Cohn, who’s worth about $266 million, says a family of four with $100,000 in income would save around $1,000 a year with the new tax plan—enough to “renovate their kitchen. They can buy a new car. They can take a family vacation. They can increase their lifestyle.” I’m thinking this guy doesn’t do a lot of his own shopping.
  5. Cohn also won’t guarantee that the tax plan will help the middle class, but he does say the wealthy won’t get a tax break. That’s a plain out lie.
  6. Under the Republicans’ budget proposal, they can increase the deficit up to $1.5 trillion over 10 years, which will help them lower taxes on businesses and the wealthy. They think the tax cuts will cause the economy to soar and make up for any deficits.
  7. Every economic level is now officially out of the recession. Minorities and people without high school diplomas have seen the greatest gains since 2013. This didn’t narrow the wealth gap though, since higher income sectors got a jump start on the recovery.
  8. Trump dumps his original plan to include private sector funding for his infrastructure program, which leaves state and local governments to pay for it (unless he can get funding through Congress).
  9. Trump says that the new tax plan will cause growth to increase up to 6% per year, more than double what most economists say is possible.
  10. Trump went to Indiana to stump for the new tax plan, saying that it’s the largest tax cut in history (it isn’t), that cutting the estate tax will help small farmers and businesses (there are only about 80 that qualify), and that we have the highest corporate tax rate of developed countries (what corporations actually pay is below the average). He also says our tax code is ridiculously complicated, and there he’s spot on. But then he says the changes won’t help him out, which OF COURSE they would.
  11. Steve Mnuchin says workers benefit most from corporate tax cuts, and then removes a page from the Treasury website that includes a 2012 economic analysis refuting that.
  12. The Senate budget resolution removes a requirement that they wait 28 hours after a CBO score to vote on a bill. The requirement was put in place two years ago, so it seems the Republicans put it in place and then removed it.
  13. 12% of Americans want to decrease taxes on the wealthy, and 16% want to cut taxes for corporations. The majority want to increase those taxes instead.

Elections:

  1. A University of Wisconsin study estimates that the state’s stricter voter ID laws prevented 17,000 registered voters from voting in 2016. It was Wisconsin’s lowest voter turnout since 2000.
  2. In Alabama, Bannon-backed Roy Moore defeats Trump-backed Luther Strange. Moore thinks:
    • Homosexuality should be illegal.
    • Homosexuality is no different than beastiality.
    • “Blacks and whites” are fighting, “reds and yellows” are fighting.
    • There’s no such thing as evolution.
    • Sharia law is being enforced in the U.S.
    • Islam is a fake religion.
  3. After his candidate lost in Alabama, Trump starts deleting his tweets supporting Luther Strange.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Last week, we learned that Jared Kushner uses a private email account for White House business at times. This week, we find out that at least six high-level White House staffers have done the same.
  2. Anthony Weiner gets a 21-month sentence for the sexting case that reopened Hillary’s email case the week before the 2016 election.
  3. I don’t even know what Ryan Zinke means here. He accuses a third of his staff at the Department of the Interior of not being loyal to the flag or the president. He says this to the National Petroleum Council, so maybe what he really means is that a third of his department isn’t loyal to fossil fuels?
  4. Trump at first refuses a congressional request to waive the Jones Act (shipping restrictions) to help get aid to Puerto Rico. He waived the act quickly for Houston and Florida hurricane relief. The DHS cited lack of port availability in Puerto Rico.
  5. In an impromptu press conference, Trump says he doesn’t want to lift the Jones Act, even though it would speed up recovery efforts in Puerto Rico, because the shipping industry is against it.
  6. The next day, he says he’ll waive the Jones Act.
  7. As we start to see the extent of the devastation in Puerto Rico, the Trump administration receives criticism for its slow response. And a Twitter war follows…
  8. The acting head of Homeland Security calls Puerto Rico relief efforts a “good news” story; the mayor of San Juan, along with journalists on the ground, disagree.
  9. Puerto Rican’s are told to register for FEMA relief via the internet, which most of them don’t even have.
  10. Musician Pitbull sends his private jet to Puerto Rico to airlift out chemo patients who can’t get life-saving treatment.
  11. General Buchanan, who is now running the relief operation, says they just don’t have the resources to deal with this kind of devastation—neither enough people nor resources.
  12. Brock Long, head of FEMA, says they are making good progress.
  13. Trump accuses the mayor of San Juan Puerto Rico of being a poor leader and says the Democrats told her she has to be nasty to him. He continues his twitter fight with her through the week, calling her an ingrate. She’s been living in a shelter because her home was destroyed and is trying to hold the city together.
  14. Trump also says things were so bad in Puerto Rico even before the storm that they were at their lives end. He says Puerto Rico will have to figure out how to repay the U.S., so it sounds like he still doesn’t understand they are part of the U.S. He hasn’t talked about how Texas or Florida will repay the government.
  15. Both Republicans and Democrats launch new committees to influence congressional and state legislative district lines following the next census. IMO, it’s time for independent commissions to take care of drawing up all these lines.
  16. A librarian rejects Melania Trump’s gift of Dr. Seuss books in an unnecessarily snarky manner.
  17. Jeff Sessions claims that protestors routinely shut down speeches and debates across the U.S. from people who they disagree with, and calls for a renewed commitment to free speech.
  18. The acting DEA administrator resigns, saying Trump doesn’t care about the rule of law.
  19. Milo Yiannopoulos gives a brief speech at Berkeley in lieu of free speech week (which he couldn’t garner enough support for). Students boo and mock him.
  20. Ryan Zinke gets called out for using non-commercial planes at taxpayer expense, along with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, EPA administrator Scott Pruitt, and HHS Secretary Tom Price. In fairness, Obama’s cabinet used private or military flights slightly more frequently during the same period.
  21. Tom Price has an ongoing scandal around investments in a medical company at the time he was nominated. Price was also trying to reopen the executive dining room at HHS while gutting his department and cutting spending on healthcare for Americans.
  22. And then Tom Price resigns.
  23. As of now, Trump has rolled back or delayed around 800 Obama-era regulations.
  24. After Hurricane Maria, the State Department evacuated 225 people from Dominica, but made them agree to reimburse the department for travel expenses.

Polls:

  1. 57% of Americans don’t think NFL players should be fired for kneeling during the anthem, though most say they themselves stand. Polls show us pretty evenly divided on the protest.
  2. 83% of voters would support a path to legal residence for illegal immigrants. 14% say “deport as many as possible.”

 

Week 34 in Trump

Posted on September 18, 2017 in Politics, Trump

The Senate is giving ACA repeal one final chance, with the latest bill being the most extreme of all they’ve introduced this year. Whether you’re for full repeal, universal healthcare, or something completely different, PLEASE CALL YOUR SENATORS and tell them to vote no on this fake fix. Ask them for REAL healthcare reform that makes quality, affordable healthcare available to everyone (or whatever you think quality healthcare should be). Your members of Congress don’t know what you want if you don’t tell them.

Russia:

  1. Building on their revelations from last week, Facebook says that Russians used false identities to organize and promote political protests on Facebook. The most recent events were anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim rallies in Idaho.
  2. Mueller obtains a warrant for the records of the fake Russian accounts and their associated ads, an indication that he has already found reasonable proof that a crime was committed using those accounts.
  3. The Department of Homeland security forbids federal agencies from using Russian-owned Kaspersky security software. Kaspersky has been linked to the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) and Homeland is worried about cyber security.
  4. According to documents sent by House Democrats to Robert Mueller, Michael Flynn neglected to disclose yet another foreign trip on his security clearance. This trip was to the Middle East to look at a business deal between the Saudi and Russian governments.
  5. Michael Flynn continues to refuse to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee. Flynn’s son is also being investigated as part of the Russia probe.
  6. In closed-door testimony, Susan Rice says she unmasked American names in intelligence reports last year to determine what the crown prince of the UAE was doing in NY last year. Usually foreign dignitaries alert the White House before visiting the states, but the crown prince didn’t do that for this trip.
  7. High-ranking members from both parties say they don’t think Rice did anything wrong.
  8. Turf wars are surfacing around the Russia investigation. The Justice Department won’t let the Senate interview top FBI officials over Comey’s firing (which could just mean that Mueller is focusing on the firing too). The Senate Judiciary Committee won’t promise Mueller’s team complete access to Donald Trump Jr.’s testimony.
  9. Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Lindsay Graham propose a bill to create a 9/11-style commission to study cyber attacks around the 2016 elections and to recommend ways to deflect such attacks in the future.
  10. The FBI is investigating Sputnik, the Russian news agency, for possible violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which forbids acting as an undeclared propaganda arm of a foreign government in the U.S.
  11. Russian parliamentarian Vyacheslav Nikonov says U.S. “intelligence missed it when Russian intelligence stole the president of the United States.”
  12. The Senate Judiciary committee has two bills in development that would protect Mueller from being fired by Trump.

Courts/Justice:

  1. The Supreme Court gives Texas a little breather from its long chain of court losses on voting issues. In this case, the court says Texas doesn’t have to redraw their illegal district lines immediately. So the 2018 election will likely go on with the gerrymandered districts. The conservative justices gave no reason for their decision.
  2. The Department of Justice under Sessions gives it’s argument supporting the pardon of Joe Arpaio and vacating all charges.
  3. The House reacts to Jeff Session’s announcement that the DoJ will expand the practice of civil forfeiture by adopting an amendment to prohibit it. Representatives say taking people’s property is unconstitutional and violates civil and property rights.
  4. The DoJ refuses to bring charges against the Baltimore police officers who arrested Freddie Gray, who died from spinal cord injuries while in their custody.
  5. The Senate has a long tradition of consulting with Senators from a specific state before confirming judges from that state. It’s part of the Senate’s role to provide “advice and consent” as written in the constitution. While Republicans refused 18 of Obama’s nominations using blue slips, they now want to get rid of the practice so Trump’s nominees won’t be blocked.
  6. Jeff Sessions wants all National Security Council staff to take lie detector tests, presumably to identify leakers.

Healthcare:

  1. Bernie Sanders introduces a Medicare-for-all healthcare bill, co-sponsored by 16 Democrats.
  2. Well done, GOP. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that Trump will be successful in his attempts to hurt the ACA by refusing to pay subsidies, keeping the market uncertain, and making it harder to enroll. All of these together will cause premiums to rise and will decrease enrollment. IMO, the GOP’s 6-year refusal to fix the ACA and attempts at repeal has cost the people in the individual market dearly. How much more of this will we take before we start saying no more?
  3. The latest ACA repeal bill is headed for a vote in the Senate, this one from Lindsay Graham and Bill Cassidy. Here’s the lowdown on the bill:
    • It’s essentially a repeal-and-don’t-replace bill that gets rid of many of the provisions of the ACA.
    • It would decrease the number of insured by millions more than the previous repeal bills. The CBO estimates the number of uninsured would increase by 32 million compared with current law.
    • It increases the costs for each state, likely by billions.
    • It would punish states that expanded Medicaid under the ACA by drastically reducing funding, and would reward those states that didn’t expand Medicaid by increasing their funding.
    • It would increased premiums by 100% by 2026.

International:

  1. The UN Security Council votes unanimously to place new sanctions on North Korea in retaliation for their nuclear tests.
  2. And North Korea says “I don’t care!” and launches another test missile over Japan.
  3. John Boehner criticizes Trump’s threats to pull out of trade agreements with South Korea, saying that would undermine our objectives in the region.
  4. Mexico rescinds its offer to help with the Hurricane Harvey recovery when Trump fails to express condolences or offer assistance for the 8.1 earthquake that hit southern Mexico.
  5. Shockingly, Mexico’s view of America hits an all-time low. The percent of Mexicans who view the U.S. unfavorably has doubled under Trump to 65%. 93% don’t trust Trump to do the right thing in world affairs.
  6. England raises it’s terror threat level to critical after a bomb goes off in the subway, injuring around 30 people. This launches a major manhunt, evacuating neighborhoods and resulting in two arrests so far.
  7. After the Charlottesville attack where he blamed both sides, Trump said that he didn’t condemn the white supremacists at the time because they didn’t have all the information. However, in the London case, he is quick to call out the “Loser terrorists” and make assumptions in the London case. Theresa May says his response was speculative and unhelpful.
  8. Trump’s partner in his latest golf course in Dubai contracts with state-owned China State Construction Engineering Corporation to build some of the infrastructure. Trump promised not to work with foreign entities as president.
  9. A Senate report on Trump’s foreign policy calls it a doctrine of retreat, and warns that it will only weaken America’s standing in the world.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. The House votes to defund Obama’s EPA rules to limit methane emissions for new drilling sites. This is on top of Scott Pruitt’s efforts to block the implementation of these rules, and comes even though most industry experts say it’s a cheap and easy fix. There are lawsuits pending against rescinding these rules.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. Two groups file lawsuits claiming that Trump’s pardon of Arpaio is unconstitutional.
  2. The Supreme court temporarily upholds the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals expanded definition of a bona fide family relationship under Trump’s travel ban, but it also temporarily blocks the lower court’s attempt to expand the definition to include refugee assistance services as bona fide relationships. The court will hear the case next month.
  3. Meanwhile, H.R. McMaster says the White House is considering a new stricter and tougher travel ban.
  4. Now that Trump has put the lives of around 800,000 DACA recipients in limbo, he turns his attention to immigrants with Temporary Protected Status (TPS). Trump is weighing whether to extend the status for nearly a half million people. TPS status is granted for a variety of reasons, including natural disasters or violence in their home countries.
  5. The House and Senate both unanimously pass the joint resolution denouncing white hate groups. Trump signs the non-binding resolution into law, but says he still blames both sides.
  6. After meeting with Tim Scott, the lone black Republican in the Senate, Trump reiterates his previous statements that both sides were to blame in Charlottesville. Scott, who condemned Trump’s response to Charlottesville, says he didn’t expect Trump to have an epiphany–he is who he is.
  7. Trump waives over a dozen environmental and religious laws in order to get the initial construction done on his wall. This should give you an idea of how he plans to make this happen, regardless of law, environmental effects, and property rights.
  8. Eleven people sue the Department of Homeland Security for what they call unlawful searches of laptops and phones at border crossings and customs.
  9. Over dinner, Trump and Democratic leaders Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi appear to come to an agreement to protect Dreamers and enact border security measures that don’t include the wall. Democrats are thrilled; the White House is muted.
  10. And then Sarah Huckabee Sanders says, “While DACA and border security were both discussed, excluding the wall was certainly not agreed to.”
  11. And then Trump says that a deal was definitely in the works and that the border wall could come later.
  12. By the end of the week, I’m still not clear on whether there was any kind of agreement.
  13. The Trump administration considers lowering the refugee quota to its lowest level since 1980. He’s already reduced the cap to 50,000, less than half the cap under Obama’s last year.
  14. The pope criticizes Trump’s actions on DACA, saying you can’t be pro-life yet willing to rip apart families, because families are at the core of pro-life belief.
  15. Congressman Kevin Yoder (R-Kansas) goes to bat for the widow of Srinivas Kuchibhotla. Srinivas was shot in a Kansas bar by a man who told him to get out of our country, and his death put his widow at risk for deportation. Yoder is helping her obtain her own H-1B visa so she can keep her current job and stay in the U.S.
  16. Yoder previously held a very hard line on immigration, but since helping out in this case, he’s now arguing for immigration reform.
  17. The ACLU files a motion requesting an immediate halt to Trump’s transgender military ban.
  18. Senators Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) introduce an amendment that would block Trump’s latest transgender military ban.
  19. So far, three days of protest follow a judge’s decision to acquit a police officer who shot Anthony Lamar Smith after a high-speed chase. The protests started out peaceful, but 80 people were arrested after violence and rioting broke out. Police tried to control the crowd with tear gas.
  20. A federal judge rules that Jeff Sessions exceeded his authority by saying cities must cooperate with immigration officials or lose funds to help fight crime; in other words, federal funding can’t be withheld just because a city is a sanctuary city. The judge ruled a temporary nationwide injunction on the DoJ’s sanctuary cities standards.
  21. California passes a statewide sanctuary bill, joining Oregon as the only other sanctuary state. This is the result of negotiations and compromise between sheriff’s departments, legislators, and civil rights groups. Before you jump to any conclusions, the bill doesn’t protect violent felons; the sheriff’s department will still work with immigration officials on those. But it does make our neighborhoods safer by developing trust between law enforcement and residents.

Climate/EPA:

  1. The pope criticizes climate change deniers during a flyover of the islands hit with Hurricane Irma’s destruction. He urges them to consult actual scientists and says history will judge our decisions.
  2. Climate deniers in the House attack NOAA scientists who published a paper debunking the idea of a hiatus in global warming from 1998 to 2012. The House Science Committee Chair Lamar Smith issues subpoenas for the scientists’ emails, accusing them of manipulating data even though a judge threw out those accusations last month.
  3. I mentioned this under Legislation/Congress, but it’s worth noting again that the House voted not to fund Obama’s methane emissions regulations, even though methane is 30x more potent than carbon dioxide at trapping heat.
  4. The Senate Appropriations committee approves a 2018 spending bill that does not include any funding for grants, assistance, or contributions to the Green Climate Fund.
  5. The House passes a bill cutting funding to the EPA by over $500 million. This is 75% of their operating budget from 2010. We’re on a path to help polluters and reduce our own air and water quality. And don’t even get me started on climate change.
  6. Ryan Zinke signs an expansive order to open public lands to more hunting and fishing, as well as provide educational outreach. He says this administration understands hunters better than Obama’s did, although groups of hunters have banded in disagreement over some of Zinke’s changes, saying they’ll open public land to more development and less hunting.
  7. This week we hear rumors that Trump isn’t going to pull out of the Paris accord. And then we hear he’s still withdrawing. Or is he? I guess we’ll find out, but for now it seems we are still on track to withdraw.
  8. Scientists are working to push back against policy changes that ignore science. The Science Protection Program urges scientists to report interference, helps preserve their data using encrypted channels, and offers legal advice. Public health and scientific agencies are part of this effort.
  9. I think this might’ve been mentioned a few weeks ago, but Zinke’s recommendations to Trump after his national monument review include reductions to four protected areas: Utah’s Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, Nevada’s Gold Butte, Oregon’s Cascade-Siskiyou, the Pacific Remote Islands, and the Rose Atoll.
  10. Zinke also proposes removing restrictions on seismic studies in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the first step in opening it to oil and gas drilling. The melting ice and tundra in the area have turned ANWR into a playground for polar bears, which are already at risk from global warming.
  11. Last week Trump called Irma the biggest hurricane we’ve ever seen. This week, when asked about climate change, Trump says we’ve seen bigger hurricanes than this.
  12. While the EPA works to overturn Obama’s Clean Power Plan climate regulations, Trump considers replacing it with a new plan instead of just junking it.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Trump’s budget includes deep cuts to many agencies that members of Congress hold dear, including the National Institutes of Health. This week, not only did Congress reject the cuts to the NIH, they increased spending on biomedical research, fearing that cutting the NIH budget would cripple American innovation and delay new cures.
  2. The Senate Appropriations Committee approves a 2018 spending bill that does not include the cuts that Trump requested to the State Department, much to the relief of most diplomats.
  3. It turns out that Equifax spent $500,000 lobbying the government to limit the liability of credit agencies in case any of their data was hacked. It’s like they saw it coming.

Elections:

  1. In light of Kris Kobach’s baseless accusations of voter fraud in New Hampshire the previous week, voter rights activists protest at the second (and fairly contentious) voter fraud commission meeting.
  2. Also at the voter fraud commission meeting, John Lott (researcher and Fox News commentator) proposes that voters be subjected to the same kind of background check as is required to buy a gun.
  3. A FOIA request reveals the contents of an email sent by the Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky, who is a member of the voter fraud commission. The email urges the Justice Department to create the voter fraud commission with a membership stacked in favor of tighter voter restrictions, saying no Democrats and no moderate Republicans should serve on the commission. In other words, he only wants extremists who believe in voter fraud conspiracies to serve on the panel. Spakovsky had previously denied writing the email.
  4. While a number of GOP members of Congress have announced they’ll retire at the end of their current term, Steve Bannon says he’s planning primary challenges to several GOP incumbents who are not retiring.
  5. Kid Rock declares his candidacy for the Senate in Michigan.

Miscellaneous:

  1. The Trump Organization removes the part in Trump’s online corporate bio that mentioned his birtherism. Just a reminder, Trump worked to prove that Obama wasn’t born in the U.S. and that his birth certificate was fake. And then later admitted that Obama was born in the U.S.
  2. The Office of Government Ethics reversed an earlier decision and now says it’s OK for lobbyists to give money to the legal defense funds of White House staffers.
  3. The Trump administration put regulations around organic eggs on hold and might rescind them. The regulations require organic egg producers to provide outside space for each hen.
  4. Gun sales are on track to be down 11% from last year, likely because people don’t think gun reform is in our near future.
  5. In an interview, Sean Spicer says his job as press secretary was to say what Trump told him to and that included lying.
  6. The California State Assembly passes a bill requiring presidential candidates to release their tax returns in order to get on the statewide ballot.
  7. While emergency officials in Manatee County, Florida, were giving out evacuation and shelter information for Hurricane Irma, the sign-language translator instead signed about random things like pizza, monsters, cats, and dogs.
  8. Hillary Clinton is back in the news promoting her new book, What Happened, about the 2016 elections. As usual, she ignites a shitstorm of ignorant and sexist criticism.
  9. Pharmaceutical executive and all-around douchebag Martin Shkreli is back in jail after a judge revokes his bail for offering $5,000 to anyone who can get one of Hillary Clinton’s hairs, follicle and all, at one of her book signings.
  10. Trump retweets a GIF of himself hitting a golf ball that hits Hillary Clinton, knocking her over. I guess he doesn’t like her book.

Week 33 in Trump

Posted on September 12, 2017 in Politics, Trump

Hurricanes, earthquakes, and fires! Oh my! If you’re looking for more ways to help with hurricane relief, here are two good sources:

This week was a perfect example of how Trump shoots the hostage. By rescinding DACA, he forces Congress’s hand in making real, lasting immigration change. But he also throws nearly 800,000 DACA protected workers and students into limbo for the next six months and generates a boatload of ill will. This year, he could’ve used many of Obama’s leftovers as bargaining chips (the Paris accord, TPP, the Iran deal, DACA) but instead, he tends to rip the band-aid off too fast and lose his leverage in the process.

Here’s what happened in week 33…

Russia:

  1. In a review of their own operations, Facebook finds that 33,000 ads bought during the election have links to a Russian “troll farm” that pushes pro-Kremlin propaganda. $100,000 worth of ads lead to a Russian company that targeted voters in 2016.
  2. As part of their audit, they also found nearly 500 suspicious accounts operated out of Russia. That actually seems pretty small in the scheme of things.
  3. We learn that the House Intelligence Committee subpoenaed FBI and DOJ documents around the Steele Dossier a few months ago. According to the head of the House investigation, Republican Rep. Michael Conaway, “We’ve got to run this thing to ground.” Whatever that means?
  4. Even though he stepped aside as the head of the House investigation, Devin Nunes (R-Cali) has been running his own side investigation into Russia, which might be hurting Trump’s case more than helping it.
  5. Donald Trump Jr. testifies for five hours behind closed doors. The interview was mostly conducted by committee staff with only a handful of committee members attending.
  6. In testimony, Don Jr. says he met with Russians last year because they said they had dirt and he was trying to determine Hillary Clinton’s “fitness for office.” He also denied that his father helped draft his original (and incorrect) statement.
  7. Like Kushner, Don Jr. tries to paint the Trump campaign as too chaotic and disorganized to have had a plan for collusion.
  8. There were gaps in Don Jr.’s testimony and he’ll likely be asked back for a public hearing.
  9. Trump has already met with the new Russian Ambassador to the U.S. with zero publicity. It wasn’t on his public schedule and there are no pictures and no info from the White House. Why did we not hear about this in the news? Because American press wasn’t invited. However, Russian press did report on the meeting.
  10. Around 3,000 cyber attacks hit Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union party, some of which they traced back to Russian IP addresses. Hopefully Europe has learned from the Russian meddling in both England’s and our elections…
  11. Mueller announces his intention to interview Sean Spicer, Reince Priebus, Hope Hicks, and several White House lawyers.
  12. Ahead of next year’s elections, the DNC begins shoring up it’s cybersecurity. About time, no?

Courts/Justice:

  1. The Justice Department drops its defense of Obama’s overtime rule, denying workers of their earned wages. The overtime rule would have required overtime pay for about 4 million more workers, putting more money in people’s pockets.
  2. Trump and Attorney General Sessions file an amicus brief with the Supreme Court that argues that it’s a constitutional right for businesses to discriminate against people in the LGBTQ community. If the court finds this to be true, a business could literally put a sign in their window that says “We don’t serve gays” and it would be legal. This is a slippery slope for anti-discrimination protections and equal protections under the law.

Healthcare:

  1. Not only did the Health and Humans Services Department defund almost all ACA outreach prior to open enrollment, but they put out ads criticizing the ACA to discourage enrollment. They also launched a social media attack against the ACA.
  2. Insurance regulators ask the government to extend the ACA subsidies past 2018 to help stabilize the insurance market.

International:

  1. The UN Security Council holds an emergency meeting to discuss North Korea’s nuclear threat. The U.S. urges the council to impose an oil embargo on North Korea and ban their textile exports.
  2. South Korea leaders think Trump is a little crazy, especially after he criticized them (in a tweet) over their handling of North Korea.
  3. The EU says that all their member countries must open their doors to refugees. Countries like Hungary and Slovakia have been holding out, and Slovakia is still refusing.
  4. It appears the U.S. didn’t offer Mexico any aid after the earthquake and hurricane that hit within days of each other, even though Mexico offered assistance for Harvey.
  5. Areas recently liberated from ISIS in Iraq and Syria provide a trove of intelligence info, giving us thousands of names of suspected ISIS operatives.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. The House unanimously approves a bill that says states can’t block the use of self-driving cars. This bill also allows the auto industry to place up to 25,000 self-driving cars on our roads without having to meet auto safety standards.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. Trump ends DACA, saying he’ll phase it out over six months and that Congress should fix it within that time. Some of his advisors fear he doesn’t understand what it means to rescind DACA. The current end date is March 5, 2018.
  2. And as is the new norm under this presidency, there is an angry outcry with protests and rallies across the country. Protests last throughout the week.
  3. After Nancy Pelosi (D-Cali) urges Trump to reassure DACA recipients that they’ll be OK, Trump tweets that he’ll revisit DACA in 6 months if Congress hasn’t codified it. DACA recipients are still shell-shocked and scared.
  4. Trumps aides say he asked them for a way out of his campaign promise to rescind DACA while several state Attorneys General threatened a lawsuit against DACA.
  5. Mayors and law officials from around the country denounce the move to rescind DACA and express support for their DACA populations.
  6. As a result of the changes to DACA, the president of the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce resigns from Trump’s National Diversity Coalition.
  7. State Attorneys General across the country threaten to sue Trump over his DACA. At least 20 have urged him not to follow through on this.
  8. Fifteen states plus D.C. bring a lawsuit challenging Trump’s decision to rescind DACA.
  9. Business leaders speak out against rescinding DACA.
  10. Both Barack Obama and Bill Clinton came out against rescinding DACA.
  11. Colleges and universities say they started last fall to implement steps to protect their DACA students from a Trump presidency.
  12. The University of California school system files a lawsuit against Trump for rescinding DACA.
  13. Janet Napolitano files a lawsuit against Trump over DACA.
  14. The Department of Homeland Security puts out a talking points memo that includes this: “The Department of Homeland Security urges DACA recipients to use the time remaining on their work authorizations to prepare for and arrange their departure from the United States—including proactively seeking travel documentation—or to apply for other immigration benefits for which they may be eligible.” Basically they’re threatening deportation.
  15. If DACA expires with no congressional fix, the DHS says it won’t “proactively provide immigration officers with a list with the names and addresses of DACA recipients, but if ICE officers ask for it, the agency will provide it.”
  16. Another lawsuit is filed against Trump’s transgender ban in the military.
  17. This is also listed under “Courts/Justice”, but it’s so discriminatory that it’s worth mentioning in this category as well. Trump and Sessions came out in favor of a baker who discriminated against a gay couple by refusing to bake them a wedding cake.
  18. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upholds a previous court ruling expanding the definition of “bona fide relationship” in Trump’s travel ban (expanded now to include grandparents, nieces and nephews, and so on). The court also ruled that working with a resettlement agency constitutes a bona fide relationship, opening the door to letting in more refugees.
  19. The Department of Homeland Security announces that it cancelled its plans to conduct nationwide ICE raids, which would have targeted around 8,400 undocumented immigrants—the largest ICE raid of its kind. In light of the hurricanes, they decided to cancel it.
  20. A bipartisan group of Senators roll out a joint resolution condemning the white supremacists rallies in Charlottesville and denouncing hate groups like white supremacists, the KKK, neo-nazis, and so on. If the resolution passes, it will force Trump to either sign it (thus endorsing the condemnation) or not sign it (indicating that his loyalties do lie with these hate groups).

Climate/EPA:

  1. In a rare trifecta, there are three concurrent hurricanes threatening land. Along with Irma, Katia hits Mexico’s east side and Jose is expected to hang around Bermuda and Bahamas before hopefully going back out into the Atlantic.
  2. Hurricane Irma becomes a category 5, one of the strongest storms ever recorded In the Atlantic. The storm slams into the Caribbean islands and makes its way up the west side of Florida before becoming a tropical storm by the time it hits Georgia.
  3. The EPA claims they haven’t visited 13 Superfund sites in Texas because they aren’t accessible, but an Associated Press reporter went to 12 of them by land vehicle or foot and 1 by boat. The EPA called the story misleading and went after the reporter personally.
  4. Trump’s nominee to head up NASA, James Bridenstine, doesn’t believe in anthropogenic global warming. So he will be the head of a science-based agency.
  5. The EPA hired an inexperienced political employee to review grants and make final funding decisions for research projects. John Konkus reviews every award and grant, and has warned staff that he will be on the look out for the double C (climate change). Scientists will have to come up with a code word.
  6. While much of what Konkus has cut so were Obama’s priorities, he’s giving the heavily Republican state of Alaska the most scrutiny. This is likely related to threats from government agencies over Lisa Murkowski’s healthcare vote.
  7. The Senate Appropriations Committee voted to restore funding to the UN’s climate change agency, the agency that oversees the Paris accord. According to Rex Tillerson, we need to continue monitoring climate change and keep our seat at the table. Trump wants to stop funding the agency.
  8. EPA head Scott Pruitt says this isn’t the time to talk about climate change, even though the worsened storms we’re seeing now were predicted by scientists over a decade ago. At the very least, now is the time to talk about developing infrastructure to withstand climate change.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Trump continues to say that the U.S. is one of the highest taxed countries in the world. In truth, personal income tax falls somewhere near the middle compared with developed countries (when looking at tax revenue as a percent of GDP). Corporate tax revenue is even lower in comparison to other countries (538). The Tax Policy Center rates us even lower.
  2. Trump heads to North Dakota to push his tax plan.
  3. In a meeting with Senate and House leaders, Trump strikes a deal with Congressional Democrats on hurricane relief, the debt ceiling, and government funding. The caveat is that the debt ceiling and funding portions are only for the next three months; Republicans were looking for something longer term. This is a clean bill with no border wall funding and no protections for DACA (but it should give Congress some space to focus on immigration over the next few months).
  4. Republican leaders express disbelief and frustration to Mick Mulvaney that Trump struck a deal with Democratic leaders to pass a clean debt ceiling and spending bill. Chuck ain’t “Crying Chuck” no more…at least for now.
  5. After receiving positive press over the deal, Trump calls Schumer and Pelosi both to revel in the news.
  6. Congress signs the hurricane relief bill just in time. FEMA was expected to run out of money by the weekend.
  7. Schumer and Trump agree to try and end the debt ceiling, putting an end to a contentious ritual that has outlived its usefulness.

Elections:

  1. After the hacking attempts during the 2016 elections, some successful and some not, the U.S. needs to spend hundreds of millions to improve cybersecurity and voting practices. However, Congress is still fighting over the role Russian hackers played in the election (as are the American people), and they can’t agree on a way forward. Ideas include replacing voting equipment, strengthening state voter databases, training election workers better, and conducting post-election audits.
  2. Kris Kobach, Kansas Secretary of State and the head of the voter suppression commission, publishes an essay on Breitbart claiming he has proof that thousands of out-of-state voters illegally voted in New Hampshire in 2016 and that they probably affected the results of the elections in that state.
  3. WaPo easily debunks Kobach’s “proof” with interviews of college students who did vote on out-of-state licenses, which is completely legal. Note that studies estimate Kobach’s voter laws in Kansas prevented about 34,000 legal voters in that state from having their votes count.
  4. Kobach’s suggestion that New Hampshire Democrat Maggie Hassan’s election was rigged has ignited a firestorm before the voter commission’s second meeting.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Almost 80 lobbyists and government contractors have memberships at Trump’s golf courses, and around 2/3 of them have golfed there at the same time as Trump. This leads some to question the constitutionality of Trump making money off people who are trying to access the office of the president.
  2. Word has it that Trump hasn’t even interviewed a candidate to replace John Kelly as Secretary of Homeland Security.
  3. In North Dakota, Trump tells the crowd that even with the drought (that is killing their crops), Dakotans are better off than those affected by Hurricane Harvey. He also says he’ll make the drought go away and is surprised that drought could happen this far north. Dust bowl anyone?
  4. Betsy DeVos rolls back Obama-era protections for victims of rape and sexual assault on campuses without replacing them with any new protections or guidelines.
  5. Trump denies emergency assistance to Oregon for the fires. He approved it for Montana after originally denying it, so maybe it’ll be the same here.
  6. An 8.1 earthquake strikes off the southwest coast of Mexico. Nearly 100 are dead and the recovery is still underway.
  7. The Florida corrections agency evacuates thousands of federal inmates, though it’s also reported that thousands are left in the hurricane evacuation zone.
  8. Trump begins selling gold “presidential medals” with his face on them to fundraise for his re-election campaign.
  9. In the weirdest Hurricane Irma news, someone starts a Facebook page on a lark urging people to shoot their guns into Irma to stop the hurricane and providing a “scientific” explanation for how it will all work. This forces Florida officials to issue several warnings to NOT shoot into Irma.
  10. All five living ex-presidents come together in an ad campaign for unity and to drum up aid for hurricane victims.

Polls:

  1. According to a recent poll, 76% of Americans think Dreamers should not be deported and should be allowed to obtain either citizenship or permanent residence.

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 25 in Trump

Posted on July 17, 2017 in Legislation, Politics

(Credit: AP/Kirsty Wigglesworth/Getty/Don Emmert/Peter Muhly)

With Congress spinning their wheels and not able to actually push much through other than undoing some Obama rules, something John Boehner said several weeks ago rings true for several of their bigger goals. He said he doesn’t think tax reform is going to happen this year:

“I was a little more optimistic about it early in the year; now my odds are 60/40. The border adjustment tax is deader than a doornail. Tax reform is just a bunch of happy talk.”

And so once again Russia dominates the week. Here’s what happened…

Russia:

  1. Last week we heard about Donald Trump Jr.’s meeting with a Russian lawyer and the changing stories he gave around it. This week, he releases the entire email thread setting up the meeting. He says he’s just being transparent, but it turns out the New York Times was about to release them and were waiting his response. He scooped them.
  2. The emails show he was looking for compromising information on Clinton and that he was OK working with the Russian effort to discredit her.
  3. We learn the meetings were set up by British publicist Rod Goldstone, who offered to connect Don Jr. with sensitive documents from the Russia government that would be damaging to Clinton as “part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.” To which Don Jr. said “I love it.”
  4. Before we get ahead of ourselves, the meeting may have broken federal law, but doesn’t amount to treason. It might be conspiracy, but definitely not treason.
  5. The meeting implicates Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner, who didn’t reveal this meeting in his security clearance forms. Since May, Kushner has added over 100 names of foreign officials he had contact with last year. In his defense though, it appears Kushner’s lawyers found the email thread and turned the emails over.
  6. The Russian lawyer they met with says the meeting was always about sanctions, though the emails say otherwise.
  7. We still don’t have a complete list of all who attended the meeting, though the list of Russians keeps growing. We now know a Russian lobbyist and an interpreter were there as well, and possibly two more people.
  8. Trump Sr. says the Secret Service vetted the meeting. The Secret Service says that didn’t happen.
  9. Trump Sr. denies knowledge of this meeting, but after the meeting ended, he tweeted out a dig about Hillary’s emails. Two days before the meeting, he said he’d give a speech the following week that would tell all about the Clintons. That speech didn’t happen.
  10. It turns out that the White House crafted Trump Jr.’s initial statement about the meeting, which turned out to be untrue.
  11. A democratic representative files the first formal articles of impeachment against Trump over obstruction of justice in the firing of Comey.
  12. According to the Wall Street Journal, our intelligence agencies saw evidence of Russians attempting collusion with the Trump campaign in 2015, even before he officially declared his candidacy.
  13. Kushner’s digital campaign program is under investigation to find out if they assisted the Russians in targeting specific voter markets during the election meddling. Intelligence officials are pretty sure they had U.S. help.
  14. Trump backs off on the idea of a joint U.S. and Russia cybersecurity force saying that it can’t happen.
  15. Democratic lawyers from the Obama camp sue Trump over invasion of privacy. They allege that the campaign was involved in what has been seen as a Russian operation, but which now seems to include campaign members. This operation resulted in the dumps of tens of thousands of emails that included private information.
  16. After passing nearly unanimously in the Senate, the Russian sanctions bill stalls in the House while the White House continues pressure to soften the bill.
  17. Mike Pence’s spokesperson refuses three times to answer whether Pence has had any undisclosed meetings with Russians.
  18. According to a coroners report, Peter Smith asphyxiated himself. Smith died 10 days after an interview with the Wall Street Journal where he described his plan to work with Trump’s campaign to get dirt on Clinton. It’s not known whether Trump’s campaign was aware of Smith’s effort.
  19. People start comparing the DNC getting opposition information from Ukraine sources with Trump Jr.’s effort get oppo on Clinton. Right now it looks like comparing a traffic ticket with totaling your car, but more info will come out on both.
  20. Some of the memos Comey wrote summarizing his conversations with Trump contain classified information, but not the one that he leaked to the press. Comey said they were his personal memos, but the FBI now says they are FBI property and Trump accuses Comey of breaking the law. So now we’re looking at an investigation into Comey’s handling of the memos. Full. Circle.

Courts/Justice:

  1. Jeff Sessions takes credit for last week’s Medicare and Medicaid fraud bust saying it’s part of the administration’s effort to get tough on drugs. It turns out Medicare fraud is a huge thing, and all presidents since Clinton have funded task forces to crack down on it. They’ve recovered tens of billions of dollars since the 1990s.
  2. Twitter users blocked by Trump sue, saying that since Sean Spicer said Trump’s tweets are official statements, Twitter users can’t be barred from viewing them.

Healthcare:

  1. The Senate Republicans’ revised health bill increases insurance subsidies and keeps some of the ACA taxes.
  2. This new version allows insurance companies who do sell ACA-compliant policies to sell policies that don’t include all the mandated coverages as well.
  3. It also opens the door to insurance companies being able to deny people with pre-existing conditions access to certain healthcare plans.
  4. The latest version of the bill doesn’t change the cuts to Medicaid and keeps it as a block grant with per capita spending caps. It also includes $1 billion in Medicaid funding that only Alaska qualifies for, largely seen as a bribe for Lisa Murkowski’s support.
  5. With teen pregnancy at its lowest rate in recent history, the Trump administration cut $213.6 million in research and programs aimed at preventing teen pregnancy (this includes funding for Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles and Johns Hopkins University, along with almost 80 others).
  6. Governors from both parties come out strongly against the new healthcare bill at their annual summer meeting. They don’t issue a joint statement, though, because they all have different reasons.
  7. Mitch McConnell delays the healthcare vote until John McCain comes back from what was deemed minor surgery. He’s expected to recover in a week, but health experts think it could be more like two weeks. This gives the bill an even slimmer chance of passing.
  8. Lindsay Graham also comes up with a healthcare plan, which basically gives more power to the states.
  9. From Politico’s talks with legislators: “Republicans REALLY want to wrap up the health care discussion. Sure, they want to repeal Obamacare. But the conversation they’re having now is how many people are going to get booted off their insurance. That’s not good politics.” Also it’s kind of heartless.
  10. Burglars break into Senator Dean Heller’s office in Las Vegas. Probably not related, but Heller was among the first Senators to say he wouldn’t approve the healthcare bill.

International:

  1. Trump celebrates Bastille Day in Paris with President Macron.
  2. Rex Tillerson heads to Qatar and then other Mideast countries to try to patch things up. Qatar agrees to stop funding terrorists.
  3. It turns out that the UAE was behind the cyberattacks that planted fake news stories and social media posts about Qatar’s empire, leading to the four-nation boycott and a new quagmire in the Mideast. It was originally thought that Russia was behind it. Now U.S. intelligence thinks it was part of a larger plan by the UAE to destabilize the area.
  4. If Tillerson can fix this, it will be his first major diplomatic accomplishment. If it backfires, it will strengthen Qatar’s relationship with Iran.
  5. Trump appears to support Saudi Arabia over Qatar in this standoff, but Saudi is known for funding terrorists as well.
  6. While Trump takes credit for sparking the Qatar standoff, some allege that this is more on Kushner. Kushner tried and failed to get a $500 million loan from a Qatari businessman, and then allegedly pushed Trump to take a hard stance on Qatar.
  7. Trump delays his state visit to the UK until next year.
  8. Steve Bannon and Jared Kushner look at proposals to use private mercenary firms to fight in Afghanistan.
  9. Iran has been stepping in to fill the void left when U.S. troops departed from Iraq. They’ve been giving aid, working with the government, and shipping food and supplies.
  10. Civilian casualties from U.S. airstrikes in the Mideast are on pace to more than double under Trump.

Legislation/Congress:

  1. The White House wants Congress to take care of these items before the August recess:
    • Repeal the ACA
    • Raise the debt ceiling
    • Agree on a general outline of tax reform
    • Clear remaining nominations

    Note: It’s almost August already.

  2. Mitch McConnell delays the August recess in order to take care of some of the above items. He blames the delay on lack of cooperation from Democrats, but with the Republican majorities in both houses, he doesn’t need Democrats’ cooperation.
  3. The bill to overhaul and privatize air traffic control stalls in the House.
  4. As a part of the effort by Everytown for Gun Safety, six states (Louisiana, Nevada, New Jersey, North Dakota, Tennessee and Utah) pass gun restrictions for domestic abusers, bringing the total number of states with such laws to 23.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. After a huge public outcry, Trump intervenes to grant visas to the all-female Afghanistan robotics team so they can come here and compete. Very cool.
  2. Trump plans to delay or eliminate a rule to let foreign entrepreneurs come here to start companies. Business leaders and organizations are quick to criticize the move.
  3. Jeff Sessions speaks to the Alliance Defending Freedom, a group accused of being an anti-LGBTQ hate group.
  4. In a move to restore some of the protections for workers that one of Trump’s executive orders rescinded, the House unanimously passes a nondiscrimination bill.
  5. A federal judge in Hawaii rules that the administration’s definition of bona fide relationships in regard to the travel ban is too narrow. He ruled that the definition includes broader family ties, like grandparents, grandchildren, brothers-in-law, sisters-in-law, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, and cousins of people in the U.S.
  6. Trump shortens his requirement for the border wall from 2,000 miles to just 900, and says he wants it to be somewhat transparent so we can see people on other side throwing over bags of drugs. We don’t want Americans getting hit on the head by bags of drugs.
  7. The number of bullying incidents where the bully uses Trump’s words and slogans continues to rise in schools. The incidents are primarily based on religious or racial prejudice.
  8. Trump and some of his aides are working with two conservative senators (Tom Cotton and David Perdue) to draft legislation drastically curbing legal immigration. The legislation would cut legal immigration in half. Why is this important? Because economists say that the only way Trump can achieve his predicted economic growth is if the immigrant population doubles.

Climate/EPA:

  1. A chunk of ice nearly the size of Delaware breaks off from Antarctica’s Larsen C ice shelf. The iceberg’s water volume is about twice Lake Erie’s. I mention it because some attribute this to global warming, but scientists are still looking at whether it’s related.

Budget/Economy:

  1. The White House objects to parts of both the House and Senate version of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2018. Specifically they object to a prohibition on the Base Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC) process (base closures). They also object to greater private audits of the Pentagon.
  2. In Senate testimony, Janet Yellen says, “I believe we have done a great deal since the financial crisis to strengthen the financial system and to make it more resilient.” She also indicates that some of the recent rollbacks passed by the House could lead to another crisis. She’s willing to consider changes to the regulations though.

Elections:

  1. The DoJ sends a letter to all states requesting information about voter rolls and related processes. States take this to indicate that the DoJ is looking to purge voter rolls and roll back some portions of the National Voter Registration Act, which sought to streamline the process of registering and make it easier for eligible voters.
  2. After running up against a slew of legal challenges, Trump’s voter fraud commission tells states not to send them any of the information they requested for now.
  3. The White House publishes all the comments they’ve received so far on the voter fraud commission’s request for information on a government website. The comments weren’t vetted and the now-public information includes commenters’ names, emails, addresses, and more. Some are pretty profane and some include links to porn.

Miscellaneous:

  1. The spin about Trump’s slow nomination process is giving me whiplash. Democrats have requested cloture on many more Trump nominees than were requested for Obama’s. But Trump is also way behind in nominating candidates, and often sends them over without the correct paperwork.
  2. Trump has an off-the-record talk with reporters on air force one, but then wonders why it wasn’t covered, so it becomes on the record.
  3. Paul Ryan puts the kibosh on holding any more townhalls, saying they’re just becoming screamfests.
  4. The FCC gives phone companies leeway to jack phone rates for prisoners, which were capped under Obama. Prisoners now have to pay more to phone home.
  5. Christopher Wray took questions in the Senate around his confirmation as FBI director to replace Comey.
  6. Trump’s personal attorney responded to an email from a critic with a series of profanity-laced emails.
  7. Both Mike Pence and Justin Trudeau join the governors meeting in Providence, RI. Trudeau is the first foreign head of state to attend, likely because renegotiations for NAFTA are about to begin.
  8. Highlighting the tepid relationship between AZ Senator Jeff Flake’s and the White House, the White House meets with three possible challengers to his seat in next year’s election. Trump isn’t afraid to bring in the big guns against lawmakers who disagree with him.
  9. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, our most powerful lobbying group, is not only losing power, but some of its largest members consider pulling out. Members disagree on a number of issues facing us right now.

Polls:

  1. Since 2015, Republicans who have a positive view of education has dropped from 54% to 36%. 58% of Republican say colleges and universities have a negative effect on the U.S.
  2. 54% of Americans think Trump did something wrong or illegal in regard to Russia. 58% think one of his campaign members did. 67% think Russia’s 2016 hacking poses a future threat.
  3. 82% of Americans say large businesses, lobbyists, the wealthy, and Wall Street have too much power in D.C. 75% say people like themselves don’t have enough power, and another 3% say people like themselves DO have too much power. Who are these altruistic 3%?
  4. An Iowa poll puts Trumps disapproval rating at 59%.

 

Week 22 in Trump

Posted on June 26, 2017 in Politics, Trump

Russia, Russia, Russia. The Washington Post published a timeline of events in the Russian hacking probe, so this week’s recap is pretty full of all things Russia. But then the Senate finally released their super-secret healthcare bill, so between those two, this week’s post is pretty long.

Russian Investigation:

  1. We now know that Russian hackers launched cyber attacks last year on at least 21 state election servers, that they changed at least one voter roll, and that they stole voter records. Russian military intelligence also hacked a voting software vendor and sent spear-phishing emails to local election officials. Voting systems weren’t affected as far as we know.
  2. Congressional committees are investigating whether any of the hacked data ended up with the Trump campaign.
  3. We also know that even though senior government officials knew that Flynn was a security risk, they continued to give him security briefings.
  4. The Washington Post timeline of events shows that Putin led the Russian meddling op and that his specific goals were to defeat or harm Clinton and help elect Trump.
  5. We learn that partisanship slowed down our reaction at all levels.
    • Obama received intelligence about Russia meddling in a CIA report in August and wrestled with what to do. He didn’t want to be seen as swaying the election, leading Republicans opposed publicizing it, intelligence agencies were slow to move on it.
    • Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson (who also testified to Congress this week) tried to launch an effort to secure systems at a state level. However, he faced resistance from state officials who saw it as a federal takeover.
    • The bipartisan Congressional Gang of 8 was slow to schedule a meeting, though intelligence tried repeatedly.
  6. Here are a few things that were done to address the problem:
    • Obama had a three-point plan: assess Russia’s role and intent, strengthen areas of vulnerability, and get bipartisan support from congressional leaders and states to accept federal help.
    • The Obama administration warned Putin several times, increased sanctions, closed down two Russian facilities in the U.S., and sent dozens of Russian agents packing.
    • Last fall there was a surge in requests for special visas for Russians with highly technical skills to work at Russian facilities. They were denied until after the election.
    • Obama approved planting cyber weapons in Russia’s infrastructure, which could be triggered if things escalate between our countries. It’s up to Trump to decide whether to use this.
  7. Russia’s interference is unprecedented and mostly successful, though they were found out fairly quickly. So far, Russia hasn’t faced consequences proportionate to the damage caused by the attack.
  8. Intelligence officials voice concern that the State Department is being too lax with Russian diplomats and say we should crack down on their travel in the U.S. since the evidence shows the diplomats are taking advantage of lax enforcement to continue running intelligence ops.
  9. Bipartisan lawmakers complain that the administration is trying to delay their efforts to get tough on Russia.
  10. Democratic representatives say Kushner’s security clearance should be suspended. They also criticize the White House for allowing Michael Flynn to have security clearance for three weeks while they knew of his Russian activities.
  11. Jeff Sessions hires outside counsel.
  12. Trump admits he doesn’t have and didn’t make recordings of his conversations with Comey. Ironically, if he never would have brought it up, Comey might not have released the memo and Trump might not be under investigation for obstruction.
  13. Trump indicates that he bluffed about the tapes to influence Comey’s testimony. Note that this is witness tampering even if he was only trying to get Comey to be truthful.
  14. Trump blames Obama for not taking enough steps to protect us from Russia’s meddling. In blaming Obama for not doing more,Trump inadvertently admits that Russia did meddle, something he has until now mostly denied.
  15. Trump blames White House counsel Donald McGahn for letting the Russia probe spin out of control.
  16. Trey Gowdy, who ran something like 8 hearings on Benghazi, says he won’t hold any hearings on Russia’s meddling nor on Jared Kushner’s security clearance. His predecessor on the oversight committee, Jason Chaffetz, held hearings.
  17. The Kremlin calls Ambassador Sergey Kislyak back to Russia and will likely replace him with deputy foreign minister Anatoly Antonov.
  18. It turns out that Europe has been working on ways to fight meddling from the Russians for years. They’ve been using the same tactics—spreading disinformation, hacking, and trolling—across the continent. Europeans feel they have a better handle on it than we do here, and say looking at us is like watching ″House of Cards.″
  19. Spicer says he hasn’t talked to the president about Russia interference in the elections. Seriously?
  20. More troubles for Michael Flynn. He didn’t report a trip to Saudi Arabia where he represented U.S., Russian, and Saudi interests. His former business partner is also under investigation around payments from foreign clients.
  21. Tillerson has a plan for future relations with Russia: warn them about any more aggressive actions, work together on strategic interests, and emphasize stability.
  22. The administration debates withdrawing from the INF treaty with Russia, a disarmament pact that bans a class of nuclear missiles. Welcome to the new arms race.

Courts/Justice:

  1. Last week wasn’t a big week for courts, but this coming week will be. Last week, the Supreme court agrees to hear Wisconsin’s gerrymandering case. This could have long-reaching implications on how district lines can be drawn.

Healthcare:

  1. Senate Democrats invite Senate Republicans to a sit-down over healthcare, “so we can hear your plans and talk about how to make healthcare more affordable and accessible…” Mitch McConnell says that Democrats refuse to participate. Democrats, it seems, just called his bluff.
  2. Democrats hold the Senate floor overnight. At one point, Schumer tried to get McConnell to agree to at least 10 hours of debate, but he didn’t bite. The ACA had about 26 days of debate.
  3. The Senate releases their version of the ACA replacement, The Better Care Reconciliation Act, with a CBO score expected sometime this week. The Senate promised a top-to-bottom rewrite of the House bill, but it’s similar to the House version; and though it’s a little more modest, it’s still mean. Like the House bill, it’s expected to raise premiums, lower coverage, and cut Medicaid.
  4. Here are the basics of the Senate bill:
    • Caps and reduces Medicaid expansion, eliminating the expansion by 2024 (this insured 14 million people under the ACA).
    • States can implement a work requirement for able-bodied Medicaid recipients.
    • Reduces the number of people eligible for healthcare coverage subsidies.
    • Provides $50 billion to states over four years to help offset costs.
    • Provides $62 billion over 10 years to a fund that would help states offset gaps in coverage.
    • Keeps protections for people with pre-existing conditions.
    • Ends employer and individual mandates.
    • Lets states define mandated coverages.
    • Cuts funding to Planned Parenthood (or any other medical facility that provides abortions).
    • Repeals all taxes, but the Cadillac tax on employer plans would return in 2025.
    • Provides $2 billion to help fight the opioid epidemic.
  5. Whether or not there are enough votes, and right now there aren’t, it seems the Senate plans to vote on the bill before the July 4 recess.
  6. Even Republicans complain about the rush to bring this bill to vote and the secrecy in which it was developed.
  7. The AARP and AMA weigh in against the bill, citing concerns about older citizens and the disabled. Even insurance companies hate this bill, predicting a 25% shortfall in covering the actual cost of care.
  8. On the day the new bill is released, protestors outside McConnell’s office are forcibly removed for demonstrating, many of whom were disabled—using wheelchairs and other assistive devices.
  9. The following senators say they won’t vote for the bill in its current form: Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, and Ron Johnson. A 5th, Dean Heller of Nevada, later comes out against the bill. Others, like Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Ben Sasse, and Bill Cassidy, are on the fence.
  10. Obama makes a rare policy statement and slams the Senate healthcare bill as inhumane.
  11. Sean Spicer says that Trump is “committed to making sure that no one who currently is in the Medicaid program is affected in anyway, which is reflected in the Senate Bill and he’s pleased with that.” This makes me think Trump doesn’t know what’s in the bill.
  12. Trump slams Democrats for opposing the healthcare bills, but it’s his own party really holding this up since they have a majority. Republicans on the Hill know that they now own healthcare as a political issue.
  13. As soon as Dean Heller comes out against the healthcare bill, America First Policies (a group Mike Pence fundraised for), goes after him with an ad campaign. They did this so quickly, they must have been prepared for it. Heller’s seat is one of the least safe Republican seats in 2018, but even so, the campaign aims to punish Heller and to force his vote, an act of retaliation that is making senior Republicans nervous.
  14. California’s bill for single payer is shelved for now. Speaker Anthony Rendon says it needs to be fleshed out before they can pass it.

International:

  1. An armed attacker drove into police on the Champs Elysees, but was killed before he could do much damage. Less that 24 hours later, police foil a suicide bomber attack in a Brussels train station, with the attacker killing only himself.
  2. Saudi security forces disrupt a planned terrorist attack near the Grand Mosque in Mecca, and the suicide bomber ends up blowing himself up, killing only himself and injuring 11.
  3. Canada’s plan to deal with the new administration’s protectionist tendencies is to organize a network of American officials, lawmakers and businesses in order to cultivate relationships beyond the White House. Canadian officials have been speaking with mayors, governors, members of Congress, and business leaders, circumventing the White House.
  4. Talks between the U.S. and Asian countries left delegates more pessimistic than ever about issues with North Korea, with North Korea leaving no room for negotiation.
  5. Turkey bans teaching evolution in schools and police fire rubber bullets into an LGBTQ pride parade there. This is what a burgeoning authoritarian regime looks like.
  6. An oil tanker explodes in Pakistan, leaving at least 148 dead and 50 more in critical condition.
  7. Some Trump advisors push for regime change in Tehran, with war a possibility. Tillerson would like to work with Iran towards a ″peaceful transition of that government.″ Iran is not amused.
  8. Tillerson plans to remove Iraq and Myanmar from the list of worst offenders of the use of child soldiers, and refuses to add Afghanistan. This goes against recommendations of experts and senior diplomats, and indicates human rights is not a big concern.

Legislation:

  1. A draft of an executive order to address drug prices actually doesn’t reduce prices and even allows pharmaceutical companies to charge higher prices abroad and to stop selling to hospitals in need at discount prices.
  2. After the Missouri Senate passed the anti-abortion bill SB 5, the House amended it to be even more misogynistic. It now preempts a St. Louis ordinance that bans landlords from discriminating based on your method of birth control, whether you’re pregnant, or whether you’ve had an abortion.
  3. Trump signs into law a bipartisan bill to reform the VA system. The bill makes it easier to fire and discipline problem employees, and is a result of the problem with wait times for patients.
  4. As the Senate bill imposing harsher sanctions on Iran and Russia goes to the House, the White House lobbies the House to weaken the bill. The bill restricts the president’s ability to weaken Russia sanctions.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. Trump has yet to comment on the act of terror committed in London by a white guy against Muslims leaving a mosque.
  2. Following the Philando Castile case, another officer, Dominique Heaggan-Brown, is found not guilty of first-degree reckless homicide. She was on trial for fatally shooting Sylville Smith during a foot chase.
  3. Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, and Austin (so far) join together in suing the state of Texas over the recently passed sanctuary cities bill, SB 4.
  4. A federal appeals court lifts an injunction on a Mississippi law that lets individuals and government employees discriminate against members of the LGBTQ community on religious grounds. The law is likely to remain blocked through the appeals process, though.
  5. California restricts state employees from taking business trips to Texas, Alabama, Kentucky, and South Dakota after those states pass bills that allow discrimination against LGBTQ (and other) parents in adoption and foster care cases or that allow school groups to ban LGBTQ members. Kansas, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Tennessee were already barred for similar reasons.
  6. The State Department restarts the Countering Violent Extremism program, but cancels funding for Life After Hate (whose purpose is to de-radicalize neo-Nazis and stop white extremism). Life After Hate has seen a 20-fold increase in requests for help since the election.

Climate/EPA:

  1. DOE Secretary Rick Perry says he doesn’t believe the primary driver in global warming is CO2 and implies that the oceans might have something to do with it instead. This is refuted by conclusions of the EPA, NASA, and NOAA, to name a few. However, it does match what the head of the EPA, Scott Pruitt, has said.
  2. Scott Pruitt says he won’t renew the contracts of 38 scientists currently on the Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC). He also plans to lay off 1,200 people from the EPA.
  3. Secretary of the Interior, Ryan Zinke, plans to cut at least 4,000 jobs in his department.
  4. India joins other members of BRICS (a group including Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) in nudging the U.S. back into the climate agreement and in asking developed countries to fulfill their commitments.
  5. The Trump administration removes the Yellowstone grizzly bear from the endangered species list. Depending on who you talk to, this is either a prime example of how well the endangered species program works or a dangerous step for grizzlies.
  6. OSHA rolls back some Obama-era protections for workers in the maritime and construction industries around exposure to beryllium, a potentially deadly mineral.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Economists say the only way to hit the 3% GDP growth projected in Trump’s budget is to increase the workforce. The only way to do that is to double the immigrant population.
  2. The Department of Labor won’t enforce the Fiduciary Rule created under Obama. This rule would make retirement plan managers provide unbiased investment advice instead of advice that would line their own pockets.
  3. The House Subcommittee on Health, Labor, Employment and Pensions discusses three anti-union bills.
  4. Boeing and Carrier, both companies that Trump previously negotiated with to keep jobs in the U.S., announce layoffs and additional moves to manufacturing abroad.
  5. Trump’s proposed budget would cut HUD programs to shelter the poor and fight homelessness, but the federal housing subsidy that pays him millions of dollars a year wouldn’t be affected.
  6. In a rally, Trump says he’s for the poor people, but that he doesn’t want any poor people in his cabinet. And poor people cheered.

Elections:

  1. Republican Karen Handel defeats Democrat Jon Ossoff in the Representative runoff in Georgia’s 6th (Tom Price’s seat). Republican Ralph Norman also defeats Democrat Archie Parnell in South Carolina’s 5th (Nick Mulvaney’s seat). These lead to much over-analysis and reading too much into it from both sides.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Members of the Congressional Black Caucus reject an invitation to meet with Trump, saying they’re pessimistic after their last visit and don’t want to be a part of another photo op.
  2. A man stabs a police officer at the Flint, Michigan, airport while allegedly yelling “God is great!” in Arabic.
  3. Rumor is that Trump hopes to nominate Sam Clovis, a talk show radio host, as Chief Scientist at the Department of Agriculture (USDA). In fairness, Clovis does have a PhD in Public Administration, but he’s no scientist.
  4. Deep Root Analytics, a Republican data analytics firm, accidentally stores personal information on 198 million American voters out in the open on an unsecured server. The ID for each voter exposed enough data points to pull together an incredible amount of private information for each name.
  5. Trump holds his 5th political rally since taking office, this time in Iowa. He makes more misstatements than I can include here, but here are a few.
    • He promises to pass a law that would ban immigrants from getting welfare benefits until they’ve been here five years, which has been law since the 1990s.
    • He criticizes wind energy in a state that gets a third of its energy from wind.
    • He denounces the wars in the Mideast even though he just authorized additional forces to Afghanistan.
    • He calls the Paris agreement binding, though he called it non-binding in his Rose Garden speech a month ago. Hint: it’s non-binding.
    • He derides trade deals, though the Iowa economy partly relies on exports.
    • He says the U.S. is one of the highest taxed nations. We rank 31st in order of highest taxes paid in developed countries (or 4th lowest), and we’re well below the average for developed countries.
  6. Trump selects Jerry Falwell Jr. to head an education reform task force charged with reducing student protections mandated by the Department of Education, including certain Title IX rules on reporting and investigating sexual assault on campus.
  7. Trump appoints lobbyist Richard Hohlt to the President’s Commission on White House Fellowships. Hohlt is a registered agent of Saudi Arabia, and was paid nearly a half million dollars to lobby on their behalf.
  8. Jane Sanders (Bernie’s wife) retains a lawyer to represent her in a fraud investigation around the loans she received for the Vermont college she was once president of.
  9. A judge sanctions Kris Kobach for deceptive conduct in a court case brought by the ACLU over voter rights. Kobach withheld subpoenaed documents containing proposed changes to the National Voter Registration Act, saying they weren’t relevant to the case. The judge determined that to be a lie. Kobach is Trump’s pick to head his voter fraud commission.
  10. Mike Pence officiates Steve Mnuchin’s wedding.
  11. The Koch network works to influence the Trump administration after first giving them the cold shoulder, starting with a meeting with Mike Pence. The Kochs announce plans to spend $300-$400 million in the next election cycle with the goals of influencing tax reforms, rolling back protections, and pushing for a more conservative healthcare bill.
  12. An AP analysis concludes that the most recent partisan gerrymandering efforts mostly benefitted the GOP. Redistricting has been so blatant that many states have spent years fighting over their district lines in courts.
  13. Matt Mika, a victim of the baseball practice shooting, is released from the hospital.

Polls:

  1. 81% of Americans don’t want Trump to interfere with Mueller.
  2. Trump’s approval rating in the CBS News Poll is at a new low of 36%, with a 57% disapproval rating.
  3. 18% of Americans support withdrawing from the Paris climate accord, while 70% are concerned that it will hurt the country’s standing in the world.
  4. 64% of Americans disapprove of the administration’s handling of global warming; 34% approve.
  5. Americans believe Comey more than Trump 2-to-1.
  6. 16% of Americans think the House healthcare plan is good; 48% say it’s bad.

Week 21 in Trump

Posted on June 19, 2017 in Politics, Trump

AP Photo/Alex Brandon

The big news this week was, of course, the shooting at the baseball field. Republican or Democrat, those were our elected representatives just out there doing their thing, and suddenly finding themselves sitting ducks at the hands of one lone shooter. Had Scalise not been there, I don’t even want to think about how much worse this could’ve been. It inspired Trump to give a unifying speech, and we saw the best of him and Melania that day.

Maybe we can all just try to be a little bit nicer, to stop believing BS conspiracy theories and propaganda, and to understand the other side better even if we still disagree.

Here’s a little inside look from Politico that gives me hope that things in D.C. aren’t as bad as they sometimes sound:

“Capitol Hill reporters were shaken up [by the shootings], as well. First of all, dozens of reporters work in the Capitol every day. And unlike the White House — which regularly dumps all over reporters and decries their work product as phony — lawmakers on the Hill are generally cordial with journalists in the Capitol and respect the job we do. We spend years covering lawmakers up close and oftentimes develop an easy rapport with people like Scalise — savvy pols who successfully make their way up the leadership ladder. Scalise shows up at off-the-record happy hours for reporters at the annual Republican retreat. His office, like others, throws cocktail receptions to get to become better acquainted with Capitol Hill reporters. That doesn’t mean the relationship isn’t adversarial at times — it most definitely is. It means building a personal relationship — getting to know each other as human beings — is important to both sides. We know Scalise, Paul Ryan, Kevin McCarthy, Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer as politicians, but most of us have had many occasions to talk to them on a personal level, as well.”

Russia:

  1. A district court judge orders Jeff Sessions to make his clearance form public. This is the form that should’ve listed his contacts with Russian officials.
  2. Rumors abound that Trump is considering firing special prosecutor Mueller. Trump’s representatives in the media start discrediting Mueller, even those who previously called Mueller a superb choice (which is most of them, but I’m looking at you, Newt Gingrich). They’re likely just testing the waters while giving Trump plausible deniability.
  3. The investigation into Russian hackers discovers that the hackers tapped 39 states in their hacking efforts. They breached campaign finance data and voter data, and they tried to change or delete information in at least one voter database.
  4. Jeff Sessions testifies in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee, but doesn’t reveal much except for that he has a pretty lousy memory. He defended himself heartily, refused to answer questions about conversations with Trump (citing a non-existent guideline), contradicted himself a few times, and used “I don’t recall” throughout most of the hearing.
  5. An American lobbyist for Russian entities contradicts Sessions’ testimony, saying that he himself attended two dinners with Sessions and Republican foreign policy officials.
  6. Some Democrats call for Sessions to step down, saying that his refusal to appear before the Judiciary Committee indicates that the Russia probe is preventing him from doing his job.
  7. Special Counsel Mueller interviews senior intelligence officials for more information about whether Trump attempted to obstruct justice. His group also starts looking into whether Trump associates committed any financial crimes. The focus of the Russia investigation has been mostly about Russia meddling in our elections; but since Comey’s firing, the focus seems to be expanding.
  8. So to recap, here’s what Mueller’s investigating: 1) Russia meddling in the election, 2) possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, 3) possible obstruction of justice by Trump, and 4) possible financial crimes around any of the above. The House committee might also investigate the obstruction question, but the Senate committee is leaving it to Mueller.
  9. Trump associates who are being investigated for financial and business dealings now include Jared Kushner as well as Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and Carter Page.
  10. Trump acknowledges in a tweet that he’s under investigation in the Russia probe for firing Comey, and seemed to blame Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein for what he calls a “witch hunt.” Later in the week, one of Trump’s lawyers walks that back, saying Trump is NOT under investigation for obstruction. But that was after he complained that Trump WAS being investigated for firing Comey even though the DOJ had recommended it.
  11. Rosenstein faces pressure to recuse himself from the Russia investigation after the above tweet, and he acknowledges it could happen. This would definitely be unprecedented.
  12. Rosenstein urges caution about believing information coming from unnamed sources.
  13. Trump’s long-time personal attorney, Michael Cohen, retains a lawyer for himself.
  14. Alexis Navalny, Russia’s opposition leader, is arrested just before an anti-corruption protest and receives a 30-day sentence for illegally staging anti-government rallies. Tens of thousands of Russians join the protest across the country. Side note: Navalny will likely run against Putin in the next election.
  15. Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak hosts Washington insiders and diplomats to celebrate Russia Day. He seems to be trying to mend frayed relations between our countries, handing out pamphlets that talk about our close relationship, including this: “As an American, I love Russia because if not for Russia, there may not have been a United States of America.”
  16. Paul Manafort continues to try to lure business partners with promises of access to Trump.

Courts/Justice:

  1. Maryland and D.C. attorneys general sue Trump for his failure to divest sufficiently of his businesses, saying that it violates the emoluments clause.
  2. Almost 200 Democratic members of congress also sue Trump for violations of the emoluments clause.
  3. In a similar case in NY brought by the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), the DOJ argues that Trump can accept payments from foreign governments and also that CREW has no standing to sue.
  4. The Standing Rock Sioux get a small win in court when a federal judge rules that the Army Corps of Engineers didn’t perform an adequate environmental study. The judge didn’t rule that the pipe be shut down—that decision is pending another hearing—so it’s a mixed result for the tribe.
  5. Preet Bharara, fired NY attorney general, says his initial meetings with Trump were strikingly similar to the meetings described by Comey, and that they made him uncomfortable as well.
  6. Jeff Sessions wants to prosecute medical marijuana providers, and asks leaders in congress to remove federal protections for them.

Healthcare:

  1. Trump calls the House healthcare bill “mean.” The same healthcare bill that he lauded in a Rose Garden ceremony last month. The same healthcare bill that he pushed so hard for the House to pass. This slip will likely undo much of the goodwill between him and the representatives who put themselves on the line to get the bill passed.
  2. Six members of the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS resign, saying Trump doesn’t care about the issue. The government website on HIV was taken down after the inauguration and has yet to be replaced, and Trump hasn’t appointed anyone to lead the council.
  3. The Senate committee tasked with creating a Senate version of the ACA replacement bill continues to hold the contents of the bill in secrecy, though senators have said it includes about 80% of what the House bill does (yes, the same bill that would drop 23 million Americans from coverage and grant waivers to states so insurance companies don’t have to provide full coverage and so they can charge higher premiums to older people and people with pre-existing conditions).
  4. Even Senate Republicans are critical of the secrecy and lack of transparency in the healthcare bill process, and caution against rushing it to a vote.

International:

  1. After threatening to dump the entire agreement, Trump rolls back two of Obama’s changes to the Cuba policy, reinstating restrictions on travel and on doing business with military-owned companies there. It’s causing confusion and worry on the island, especially in light of the pre-election rhetoric. Even Republicans criticize this decision, though Marco Rubio was pushing for it.
  2. Theresa May apologizes to the U.K.’s members of parliament for the recent election mess.
  3. Trump gives the Pentagon authority to set the number of troops in Afghanistan. They now have this authority in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, and already plan to send 4,000 new troops to Afghanistan.
  4. Officials say the Turkish guards who attacked protestors outside the Turkish embassy in D.C. a few weeks ago will be charged with misdemeanors.
  5. On the heels of last week’s confusion over whether the U.S. approves or disapproves of four Mideast nations cutting off ties with Qatar, US authorizes the sale over $21 billion in US weapons to Qatar.
  6. Another van drives into a crowd of people in London. This time, it’s a man who says he wants to kill Muslims who drives into a group of Muslims as they were leaving a mosque after finishing prayers during their holy month of Ramadan. Ten are injured and one killed. A suspect is arrested and it’s being handled as a terrorist attack.
  7. The U.S. shoots down a Syrian bomber that dropped bombs on a Syrian militia that is helping us fight ISIS, a move Russia condemns as a “flagrant violation of international law.” Russia says they’ll treat our planes and drones as targets if they’re in the area again and is suspending an agreement that minimizes in-flight incidences in Syrian airspace.
  8. Russian forces claim to have killed ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, but the U.S. hasn’t been able to confirm (it’s not the first time he’s been reported dead).
  9. Otto Warmbier, who was detained in North Korea for over a year for allegedly trying to steal a propaganda banner, returns home in a coma. He’s apparently been in that state for over a year. Late Update: Otto passed away this morning.
  10. A Navy warship collides with a Philippine container ship off the shore of Japan killing seven U.S. sailors.
  11. The Australian Prime Minister is caught on tape making fun of Trump, and later apologizes.

Legislation:

  1. With almost complete bipartisan support, the Senate approves a bill on new sanctions for Russia (over their election meddling) and Iran (over human rights violations and support of terrorists). In an indication that lawmakers are concerned about Trump’s relationship with Russia, the bill requires a congressional review to ease any current sanctions against Russia. The bill also penalizes the hackers who have been carrying out cyberattacks for the Russian government.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. In the second such loss, the ninth circuit court rules against Trump’s travel ban, refusing to lift the stay and calling the ban discriminatory.
  2. The 90-day period ending the travel ban would’ve ended this month had the ban been allowed.
  3. The Commerce Department updates its equal opportunity employment statement by removing gender identity and sexual orientation from the list of protected groups.
  4. Trump issues a memorandum to continue Obama-era programs to protect Dreamers from deportation and to continue providing them with work permits. He makes no promises about the long-term fate of the program though, and formally ends the process started by Obama to protect Dreamers’ parents.
  5. Texas Governor Greg Abbott signs HB 3859 into law, which allows child welfare groups, like adoption and foster care agencies, to deny qualified people who want to adopt a child or care for a child in need. Under this law, these agencies can discriminate against LGBTQ couples, interfaith couples, single parents, someone who was previously divorced… basically any reason they can come up with as a religious objection.
  6. In a series of raids, ICE detains dozens of Iraqi Christians who are now at risk of deportation to a country where they will likely be persecuted. The affected communities are angered because Trump promised to protect them from persecution in the Mideast.
  7. The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights unanimously approves a two-year investigation into how budget and staffing levels affect civil rights offices and how they affect those offices’ ability to enforce civil rights laws. The bipartisan commission voiced concern that marginalized groups are at greater risk of discrimination. They’re also concerned about Betsy DeVos’s refusal to guarantee civil rights to minority groups in schools.
  8. A jury acquitted the police officer who killed Philando Castile last year, leading to large protests in St. Paul, MN. Castile told the officer he had a gun and a license for it, but the officer shot him anyway.
  9. U.S. Park Rangers find a noose hanging outside the National Gallery of Art in D.C., the third one found in recent weeks. The other two were at the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the Hirshhorn Museum.

Climate/EPA:

  1. The Trump administration rescinded rules protecting whales and sea turtles that get caught up in fishing nets off the West Coast. Ironically, the fishing industry proposed the rules in the first place, and didn’t ask for them to be removed.
  2. Michigan’s attorney general charges five Michigan officials with involuntary manslaughter around the Flint water crisis. Over a dozen people have been charged in this investigation.
  3. The Department of Energy closed the Office of International Climate and Technology, which works on climate change abroad and helps provide technical advice to other nations on how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
  4. Members from both sides of the aisle of the House Appropriations Committee told Scott Pruitt that Trump’s proposed cuts to the EPA would not be approved. Nearly every member opposed reductions to environmental programs and most agreed that climate change still needs to be addressed. Note: This is a bipartisan, Republican-led committee. And they think climate change needs to be addressed.

Budget/Economy:

  1. The Fed raises interest rates again, a sign that the economy continues to do well. Jobs and wages continue their steady growth, and the economy has grown for eight years straight.
  2. Trump signs an executive order promoting apprenticeships as a way for people to get the skills they need for the new economy. He wants to increase the number to more than 10 times what we have currently, but he’s not allocating much more money toward the effort than Obama did in 2016.
  3. The Department of Agriculture finalizes a China trade deal that has been in process since last year. It allows U.S. beef exports into China, promotes U.S. dairy in China, and allows us to import chickens from China.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Trump starts the week off with a meeting of his cabinet members who douse him in praise… until they start to realize that this is being recorded for posterity. It was a very weird moment. For comparison, here’s a tweet from Chris Lu: “I ran 16 Cabinet meetings during Obama’s 1st term. Our Cabinet was never told to sing Obama’s praises. He wanted candid advice not adulation.”
  2. Representative Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) says the Trump administration is worse than the Obama administration at delivering on congressional requests for documents and information. And if you remember, that was a very big complaint about Obama.
  3. File this under “Why Wasn’t This Done Sooner?” Trump officially orders the government to stop reporting on the Y2K bug… which didn’t live up to it’s apocalyptic expectations 17 years ago. Though the reporting requirement wasn’t removed until now, in practice most offices were ignoring this requirement anyway.
  4. A court sentences Greg Gianforte to community service, anger management, and a small fine for assaulting a reporter the day before he was elected.
  5. Washington is extremely shaken this week after a lone gunman attacks Republican members of congress while they practice for a charity baseball game. The gunman is killed and five others are injured, including House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, who was shot in the hip and has been in critical condition, and lobbyist Matt Mika, who was shot in the chest and has also been in critical condition. Two staffers and a D.C. police officer were also injured. Interestingly, lawmakers had expressed concerns about safety the previous week. They’ve felt fairly safe in Washington until now.
  6. The shooting is followed by creepy email threats to Representatives. One of them read: “One down, 216 to go… You sold your soul.”
  7. The charity game goes on as planned, and draws a bigger crowd than ever.
  8. The shooting spurred a lot of reaching out across the aisle. When they heard of the shooting, Democrats practicing on a different field huddled in the dugout to pray for their colleagues on the other side. Members of Congress did media interviews with members of the other side. When they won the game, the Democrats gave the Republicans the trophy to put in Scalises’s room while he recovers.
  9. And then someone blames Bernie and someone blames Obama, and the back and forth starts up again.
  10. A congressional hearing on gun legislation is postponed in the wake of the above shooting. While the measure in question is primarily about recreational shooting, it would make it easier to buy silencers and to transport guns across state lines, and would also ease restrictions on armor-piercing bullets.
  11. On the same day as the ballpark shooting, a gunman opened fire in a UPS facility, killing three and then himself.
  12. Cindy McCain (John’s wife) accepts a position at the state department after being aggressively recruited by Trump. She’ll focus on stopping human trafficking, refugee issues, and humanitarian aid.
  13. The FDA announces that the “added sugar” requirements for nutritional labels are delayed indefinitely, the third such change to Obama’s labeling requirements. These are the changes championed by Michelle Obama, indicating that the effort to erase the Obama presidency doesn’t end with Barack but also extends to Michelle.
  14. Trump appoints Lynne Patton to lead the HUD department in New York and New Jersey. If you don’t recognize the name, it’s probably because she is an event planner for the Trump organization. She claims to have a law degree from Quinnipiac, but the school says she doesn’t.
  15. Trump blocks a slew of Twitter followers who regularly troll him and make him mad, including a veteran’s group.

Polls:

  1. 45% of Americans polled trust Comey to tell the truth compared to 32% who trust Trump.
  2. 50% of CEOs polled give Trump an F for his performance so far, and 21% give him a D. Just 1% give him an A. Over 65% disapprove of pulling out of the Paris agreement, 75% say his budget isn’t sound, and 86% are worried he’s minimizing the impact of Russian influence.
  3. Trump hits the 60% disapproval mark in the Gallup poll.