Tag: Trump White House

Intel chief Ratcliffe declassifies transcripts of Flynn calls

The Hill logoDirector of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe on Friday announced that he has declassified the transcripts related to Michael Flynn’s conversations with a Russian diplomat during the presidential transition.

Ratcliffe, who was sworn in Tuesday, said it was his decision to declassify the documents relating to the former national security adviser in an effort to provide “transparency” while protecting sources and methods.

“As I stated throughout the confirmation process, transparency is vital to allowing the American people to have confidence in the Intelligence Community. As the Director of National Intelligence, it is my obligation to review declassification requests with the overarching priority of protecting sources and methods, while also providing transparency whenever possible,” Ratcliffe said in a statement. Continue reading.

Trump Press Secretary Admits She Has Voted 11 Times By Mail

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany made the case for allowing more people to vote by mail during the November election when she defended her decision to cast absentee ballots 11 times in the past 10 years.

“Absentee voting has the word absent in it for a reason,” McEnany said in a press statement on Wednesday. “It means you’re absent from the jurisdiction or unable to vote in person.”

Health experts have warned that in-person voting during this pandemic inevitably means a high risk of infection, making it difficult or impossible for many people to do it. Continue reading.

Kayleigh McEnany’s latest briefing is a case study in gaslighting, whataboutism and false claims

Washington Post logoWhite House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany held her latest news briefing Tuesday. And as with her previous ones, she put the “brief” in “briefing” — it ran only about 20 minutes.

But that was plenty of time for McEnany to engage in some massive false claims, gaslighting and whataboutism.

Early in the briefing, McEnany was asked about President Trump apparently ridiculing his probable 2020 opponent, Joe Biden, for how he looked in a mask during a Memorial Day ceremony in Delaware on Monday. Continue reading.

‘How the Trump White House sees you’: President’s economic adviser slammed for calling workers ‘human capital stock’

AlterNet logoIn a remark critics characterized as further evidence that the Trump administration views workers as nothing more than disposable tools of economic growth and corporate profit, White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett on Sunday nonchalantly referred to laid-off employees as “human capital stock” as he pushed people to return to their jobs amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

Voicing optimism about the potential for a speedy economic recovery even as U.S. unemployment surges to levels not seen since the Great Depression, Hassett told CNN Sunday that “our capital stock hasn’t been destroyed, our human capital stock is ready to get back to work, and so that there are lots of reasons to believe that we can get going way faster than we have in previous crises.”

Rolling Stone‘s Peter Wade wrote Monday that “the way Hassett used the term so casually lines up with the lack of empathy shown to the victims of the coronavirus by Trump’s administration and Republicans since the crisis began months ago.” Continue reading.

White House Press Secretary: Golf Is Not OK While U.S. Mourns (Trump Exempt)

Kayleigh McEnany was talking about Barack Obama, not Donald Trump. And she was referring to the death of journalist Daniel Pearl in 2002, when Obama was an Illinois state senator.

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany once weighed in on an American leader golfing while Americans are mourning: It’s inappropriate.

But she wasn’t talking about President Donald Trump golfing as the nation edges closer to a 100,000 death tally from COVID-19.

She was complaining in 2017 about former President Barack Obama golfing after the murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002. Obama was a state senator in Illinois when Pearl was kidnapped and later beheaded by terrorists in Pakistan. Continue reading.

Chris Wallace Slams Kayleigh McEnany: ‘I Never Saw A W.H. Press Sec. Act Like That’

The Fox News anchor went after the White House press secretary for her behavior at Friday’s press briefing.

Fox News anchor Chris Wallace took aim at White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany on Sunday, slamming her for going after reporters about their religious faith and for telling them what questions they should be asking.

McEnany had on Friday accused journalists of “desperately” wanting churches and places of worship to stay closed after she was questioned about President Donald Trump’s claim he would “override” governors who ignored his demand to immediately reopen churches amid the COVID-19 pandemic. A reporter was asking what legal authority the president has to do so.
“I spent six years in the White House briefing room covering Ronald Reagan. I have to say, I never — and in the years since too — I never saw a White House press secretary act like that,” Wallace said to a panel on “Fox News Sunday.” Continue reading.

The Feds Gave a Former White House Official $3 Million to Supply Masks to Navajo Hospitals. Some May Not Work.

Zach Fuentes, former deputy chief of staff to President Trump, won the contract just days after registering his company. He sold Chinese masks to the government just as federal regulators were scrutinizing foreign-made equipment.

A former White House aide won a $3 million federal contract to supply respirator masks to Navajo Nation hospitals in New Mexico and Arizona 11 days after he created a company to sell personal protective equipment in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Zach Fuentes, President Donald Trump’s former deputy chief of staff, secured the deal with the Indian Health Service with limited competitive bidding and no prior federal contracting experience.

The IHS told ProPublica it has found that 247,000 of the masks delivered by Fuentes’ company — at a cost of roughly $800,000 — may be unsuitable for medical use. An additional 130,400, worth about $422,000, are not the type specified in the procurement data, the agency said. Continue reading.

PompeoGate: The First Scandal Of Campaign 2024

Do you remember Mike Pompeo?

Not the Pompeo who now serves as secretary of state, and who liked to boast that he had restored the “swagger” of the diplomatic corps (even as he served up his own Ukraine ambassador to a White House smear campaign). And no, not the sleazy character who induced the firing of the State Department’s inspector general in order to bury an investigation of his own misconduct. This Secretary Pompeo is a flunky of President Donald Trump who lives happily inside the president’s ethical vacuum.

But just a few years ago, there was a representative from Kansas by the same name. He was a West Point graduate who oozed religious righteousness — and a congressional scourge who felt obliged to express his white-hot anger in a separate and furious postscript to the House Select Committee on Benghazi report in 2015. Continue reading.

Pompeo is the latest Cabinet official accused of misusing taxpayer funds

Multiple Trump administration officials have resigned in disgrace for abusing taxpayer dollars.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is the latest Trump administration official caught up in an ethics scandal, following a report from NBC News that he used taxpayer dollars to host lavish dinners at the State Department for guests who had nothing to do with the department’s mission.

Since taking the helm of the department in 2018, Pompeo has invited 500 guests to the dinners, with the vast majority being wealthy business leaders, Republican political figures, and conservative media personalities, according to NBC’s report.

The news comes after Trump fired the State Department’s internal watchdog at the behest of Pompeo. The department’s inspector general was investigating Pompeo’s use of government employees to run personal errands, and according to NBC’s report, may have been looking into the elaborate dinner parties Pompeo was holding. Continue reading.

Senate confirms Ratcliffe to be Trump’s spy chief

The Hill logoThe Senate on Thursday confirmed Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-Texas) to be President Trump‘s next spy chief. 

Senators voted 49-44 on Ratcliffe’s nomination to the director of national intelligence(DNI), a position that has been filled in an acting capacity since former DNI Dan Coats stepped down in August.

The vote is one of the final items on the Senate’s to-do list before the chamber leaves town for a weeklong Memorial Day recess. And it comes only days after the Senate Intelligence Committee advanced Ratcliffe’s nomination along party lines. Continue reading.