Tag: Trump pettiness

Why Donald Trump’s Refusal to Give Biden Keys to Office Space Matters

As Joe Biden stood on stage on Saturday night and watched the drones dance overhead, spelling out B-I-D-E-N and P-R-E-S-I-D-E-N-T E-L-E-C-T, a different kind of tango was taking place here in Washington. A political appointee answerable to President Donald Trump appeared unwilling to give the next commander-in-chief the keys to basic office space as required by law.

The General Services Administration is the federal government’s de facto real-estate firm. It provides incoming administrations with the basics — like office space and computers — to make the transition between election results and Inauguration Day as easy as possible. But the current head of the GSA, a former senior aide on Capitol Hill who was appointed by Trump, has said she has not seen any certification outside of the media that Biden won, thus she has no obligation to contradict her boss, who says he has. GSA aides say they are merely following precedent set in 2000, when there was a dispute and a recount.

That means the Biden team could be without a physical base in the capital until the Electoral College votes on Dec. 14. More importantly, it suggests that staffers in the Trump Administration may not start talking to their successors until every last effort can be made by Trump to stay in power through litigation. So far, most Republicans seem unwilling to openly break with Trump and acknowledge that their former Senate colleague and the former Vice President has prevailed. Although Trump is going to be a one-term President, he still amassed 70 million votes, making him a powerful voice inside the GOP for the rest of his days. Continue reading.

Trump fires Defense chief Mark Esper

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President Trump on Monday announced he had fired Defense Secretary Mark Esper, a stunning move that comes days after Joe Biden was projected to have won the presidential race. 

“I am pleased to announce that Christopher C. Miller, the highly respected Director of the National Counterterrorism Center (unanimously confirmed by the Senate), will be Acting Secretary of Defense, effective immediately,” Trump said in a series of tweets. “Chris will do a GREAT job! Mark Esper has been terminated. I would like to thank him for his service.”

Esper had long been seen as out the door, regardless of who won the election. But firing him now gives Trump a chance to flex his executive powers at a time he is trying to project strength amid his electoral defeat. Continue reading.

Trump posts full ’60 Minutes’ interview showing him walking out

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President Trump on Thursday posted his full interview with “60 Minutes” ahead of its scheduled air time in an apparent attempt to undercut the news program after he walked out on the interview, bristling at questioning from journalist Lesley Stahl.

The president posted the nearly 40-minute sit-down to his Facebook page with the caption: “Look at the bias, hatred and rudeness on behalf of 60 Minutes and CBS.”

“Tonight’s anchor, Kristen Welker, is far worse!” Trump added, referencing the NBC News anchor who will moderate the presidential debate in Nashville, Tenn. Continue reading.

Trump’s hostility to cities threatens to worsen the recession

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President Trump’s hostility to cities may help him politically, but it threatens to worsen the recession because metropolitan regions are the engines of the nation’s economic growth, officials and analysts say.

The risk arises not just from the president’s rhetoric criticizing urban unrest. Trump and his Republican allies in the Senate are also rejecting fresh financial aid to state and local governments and to public transit systems in a second coronavirus relief package.

That shortchanges areas such as the Washington region and is a recipe for deepening and prolonging the economic slump. About 1.3 million state and local government employees have lost their jobs since March, and economists project that number will more than double in the next 18 months without help from Congress and the White House. Continue reading.

Trump administration finalizes plan to open up Alaska wildlife refuge to drilling

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The Trump administration announced Monday it would open up 1.5 million acres of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil and gas drilling.

A document signed by Interior Secretary David Bernhardt would open up the entire 1.56 million-acre area of the refuge’s Coastal Plain. The whole refuge is 19.3 million acres. 

The administration argues the decision will lead to jobs, but green groups and opponents for years have warned of a devastating environmental effect from opening up the area to drilling.  Continue reading.

Trump reportedly made unexpected first pitch announcement out of irritation with Fauci

Washington Post logoPresident Trump reportedly caught both White House aides and the New York Yankees by surprise when he said Thursday at a White House coronavirus briefing that he was accepting an invitation by the team to throw out a ceremonial first pitch and would do so on Aug. 15.

Trump backtracked from that plan Sunday, saying in a tweet that he would not be able to throw out the pitch that day because a “strong focus on the China Virus, including scheduled meetings on Vaccines, our economy and much else” would prevent him from traveling to New York at that time.

By that time, White House staff had informed the Yankees that Trump had an unspecified prior engagement on Aug. 15, according to a report Monday in the New York Times. Trump did have a standing invitation to throw out a first pitch from Yankees President Randy Levine, whom he called a “great friend,” but nothing specific had been arranged. Continue reading.

White House officials sent document to Pentagon criticizing Vindman after impeachment testimony

The Pentagon got the document as Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman was on track to be promoted to colonel. Sources said the accusations could block a promotion if found to be true.

WASHINGTON — The National Security Council sent a list of allegations about Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman to the Pentagon after he testified before the House in impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump, according to a person who has seen the document and two others who were briefed on it.

The Pentagon received the document, which alleged that Vindman created a hostile work environment at the NSC, as he was on track to be promoted to colonel. The accusations outlined in it, if substantiated, would have kept him from moving up a rank in the Army, the people familiar with the document said. They said it was not the typical evaluation that military officers serving on the NSC are given when their temporary positions end and they are set to return to the Defense Department, as Vindman was scheduled to do about six months after the document was sent to the Pentagon.

The NSC is housed in the White House and chaired by the president, although it’s managed day to day by the national security adviser. Continue reading.

Trump’s Food Aid Program Swindles Hard-Hit Northeast States

President Donald Trump’s signature food aid program is sending less relief to New York and New England than other parts of the country, even though the Northeast has the most coronavirus cases. Some states — Maine and Alaska at least — have been left out completely so far.

The regional imbalances are an unintended side effect of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s strategy in hiring private contractors to distribute food, the agency said. It is now looking for ways to reach areas that were passed over.

“USDA is evaluating how we might expand access to the program in areas that are underserved,” the agency said in a statement. Continue reading.

‘Trump is caught in a box’: Reporter details how the president made the US an ’emblem of global incompetence’

AlterNet logoWhat President Donald Trump had to say about coronavirus in April and the first half of May was considerably different from what he had said about it in January and February. But journalist Edward Luce, in a Financial Times article, stresses that even though Trump’s tone has changed, his response to the crisis has continued to be erratic and unfocused — seriously damaging the United States’ credibility as a world leader.

In early March, Luce recalls, Trump claimed that “within a couple of days, (infections are) going to be down to close to zero.” And after 15 cases had been reported in the U.S., Trump said, “One day, it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”

Trump, Luce notes, later acknowledged how dangerous COVID-19 was, but his response to the crisis was inadequate. Luce writes that for his article, he interviewed “dozens of people,” from Trump associates to World Health Organization officials — and found that “the story that emerged is of a president who ignored increasingly urgent intelligence warnings from January, dismisses anyone who claims to know more than him and trusts no one outside a tiny coterie.” Continue reading.

White House portrait ceremony may be the latest casualty of the political divide

The traditional White House portrait unveiling may be skipped for the first time in decades amid bad blood between Trump and Obama.

WASHINGTON — It’s been a White House tradition for decades: A first-term president hosts a ceremony in the East Room for the unveiling of the official portrait of his immediate predecessor that will hang in the halls of the White House for posterity.

Republican presidents have done it for Democratic presidents, and vice versa — even when one of them ascended to the White House by defeating or sharply criticizing the other.

“We may have our differences politically,” President Barack Obama said when he hosted former President George W. Bush for his portrait unveiling in 2012, “but the presidency transcends those differences.” Continue reading.