Trump Administration

President’s Comments Should Inspire Press, Not Intimidate It

May 17, 2017 Staff, www.rcfp.org Resist! Media, Press, Trump Administration

By Staff of RCFP - The New York Times has published a story with details of a memo written by former FBI Director James Comeydocumenting a conversation he had with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office in February. The memo was shared with senior FBI officials and close associates of Comey, and read to Times reporters. According to the story, the president told Comey that he should consider putting reporters in prison for publishing classified information. Reporters Committee Executive Director Bruce Brown made the following statement: "The comments attributed to President Trump cross a dangerous line. But no president gets to jail journalists. Reporters are protected by judges and juries, by a congress that relies on them to stay informed, and by a Justice Department that for decades has honored the role of a free press by spurning prosecutions of journalists for publishing leaks of classified information. "Comments such as these, emerging in the way they did, only remind us that every day public servants are reaching out to reporters to ensure the public is aware of the risks today to rule of law in this country. The president’s remarks should not intimidate the press but inspire it."

Trump On His Way To Becoming Largest Weapons Dealer In World History

May 17, 2017 Jason Ditz, www.news.antiwar.com Educate! Donald Trump, Trump Administration, weapons

By Jason Ditz for Anti-War - The Pentagon has issued a statement today confirming that the US State Department has signed off on a $2 billion sale of US-made Patriot missiles to the United Arab Emirates, adding to the tiny Gulf nation’s ever growing military arsenal. The sale includes 65 PAC-3 interceptors and 100 GEM-T missiles. It is unclear when the UAE intends to do with all these missiles, though the State Department was willing to sign off on it being in the “national security” interest of the US to make the sales. That process virtually goes without saying at this point, as for years the US has been signing off on growing sales of arms across the Middle East, and anything but an immediate approval is extremely rare, and usually extremely temporary. The UAE has shown interest in increased military operations abroad in recent years, both regionally and into Africa. It’s unclear what, if any, military value such massively expensive missiles would have in such operations, however.

Jeff Sessions’ Department Of Injustice

May 17, 2017 Marjorie Cohn, www.truth-out.org Educate! Injustice, Jeff Sessions, Trump Administration

By Marjorie Cohn for Truthout - Motivated by his deep-seated biases and those of President Donald Trump, Attorney General Jeff Sessions is pursuing a draconian agenda on voting rights, immigration, crime, policing, the drug war, federal sentencing and the privatization of prisons. Sessions, now head of the Department of Justice, which is charged with enforcing the Voting Rights Act, once called the act "intrusive." In 2013, after the Supreme Court issued a decision in Shelby County v. Holder that struck down the section of the act that established a formula for preclearance of jurisdictions with a history of racial discrimination, Sessions called it "a good day for the South." Sessions and Trump tout the existence of what the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University Law School calls a "phantom crime wave." While this administration scaremongers about high crime rates, in reality, national crime and murder rates are at a near-historic low: 50 percent less than they were at their peak in 1991. Trump's campaign mantra was "law and order," a euphemism for tolerating excessive force by police officers, often against people of color.

Jeff Sessions Doubled Down On Immoral, Racist, And Counterproductive War On Drugs

May 15, 2017 Udi Ofer, www.aclu.org Educate! Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, Trump Administration

By Udi Ofer for ACLU - So when most Americans learned that the incarceration rate in the United States began to decrease and that overall crime rates were at historic lows, they cheered the news. Advocates on the right and left called it a good beginning, the dawning of a new era of a smarter and more equitable criminal justice system, while at that same time recognizing that there is much more work to be done. President Donald Trump and his attorney general don’t like this new direction, and they’re doing everything in their power to paint a disturbing and even apocalyptic vision of America — one that is now being used to justify draconian policies that will lead to more Americans in prison. Listening to Attorney General Sessions and to President Trump, you would think that America is living through a crisis of crime. Sessions constantly talks about a crime epidemic, selectively using statistics in a way that is misleading, and sometimes even outright lying. In his swearing in, Attorney General Sessions talked about a "dangerous permanent trend" of increasing crime. Yet that was a lie. There is no evidence of a national crime wave, as right now we’re living at a time when the crime rate is historically low.

Sessions: Shameful And Stupid On Street Crime, Soft On Corporate Crime

May 13, 2017 Robert Weissman, www.commondreams.org Educate! Attorney General, Trump Administration

By Robert Weissman for Common Dreams - The Sessions approach will throw thousands of people – especially Americans from communities of color or with low-incomes – into prison needlessly, sabotaging their life chances and increase post-release criminality. It is shameful and stupid. Shameful because there is overwhelming empirical evidence that this approach unfairly targets and damages young people of color. And stupid because there is, equally, overwhelming empirical evidence that it will create a cycle of crime. At the same time that Sessions is announcing a clampdown on nonviolent, low-level offenders, Session’s Department of Justice is expected to announce resolution of a longstanding major corporate crime case: allegations of a massive Wal-Mart bribery scheme in Mexico and perhaps other countries. If news reports of the settlement are accurate, the settlement will involve a slap-on-the-wrist fine; no individual prosecutions; and a non-prosecution agreement with the Wal-Mart company, in which the company avoids prosecution in exchange for a promise not to break the law in the future – a meaningless commitment since the company is required to follow the law with or without an agreement with the Department of Justice.

Jeff Sessions Orders Harsher Sentences, Taking U.S. Policy Back To 1980s

May 13, 2017 Elisabeth Garber-Paul, www.rollingstone.com Educate! Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, Trump Administration

By Elisabeth Garber-Paul for Rolling Stone - On Thursday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions issued a memo ordering Justice Department staff to charge criminal suspects – specifically low-level, non-violent drug offenders – with the most severe crime possible and pursue the toughest sentences allowed, rolling back progress made under the Obama administration. The two-page memo, released to the public Friday morning, requires federal prosecutors to pursue the toughest possible charges and sentences against suspects. "It is core principle that prosecutors should charge and pursue the most serious, readily provable offense," he wrote. "This policy confirms our responsibility to enforce the law, is moral and just, and produces consistency." This rolls back the 2013 directive from former AG Eric Holder, known as the Holder Memo, which advised federal prosecutors to use their discretion when building a case against non-violent drug offenders, as a way to reserve harsh mandatory minimum sentences only for violent or high-level drug crimes. Under the new order, there is still room for prosecutors to decide to pursue less severe charges – but those decisions must be cleared with Sessions' office, which presumably will be a difficult process.

5 Stories Being Ignored While Media Implodes Over Trump Firing Comey

May 13, 2017 Carey Wedler, www.theantimedia.org Educate! Media, Trump Administration

By Carey Wedler for Anti-Media - (ANTIMEDIA) A power hungry president has kicked a power player out of office, and the mainstream media is having a field day. Headlines have obsessively focused on Trump’s termination of FBI Director James Comey and the implications that come with it, drawing comparisons to Richard Nixon’s Watergate scandal and questioning Trump’s decision to fire the man who was leading an investigation into the president’s own alleged misconduct. While the drama currently unfolding will certainly have profound implications for the present and future, the theatrics playing out on telescreens around the country are hardly representative of the bigger picture in the United States. As millions of Americans fix their eyes and minds on the ongoing developments, other stories are lurking behind the curtain — and reveal far more about the struggles we face. Though they have received some coverage from corporate and establishment outlets, these stories are being forced out of the conversation by round-the-clock coverage of political figureheads warring in Washington.

Graduating Students Boo Betsy DeVos During Commencement Speech

May 12, 2017 Andrew Emett, www.nationofchange.org Resist! Betsy DeVos, Education, Trump Administration

By Andrew Emett for Nation of Change - During a university commencement speech on Wednesday, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos received a cold reception as hundreds of graduating students stood up and turned their backs to her while booing throughout her speech. Trump adviser and former contestant on NBC’s “The Apprentice,” Omarosa Manigault also received boos from the students in protest against the Trump administration. While attending the graduation ceremony at Bethune-Cookman University in Daytona Beach, Director of Communications for the Office of Public Liaison Omarosa Manigault briefly stood up on stage when hundreds of students began booing and shouting in disgust. In Omarosa’s defense, university President Edison Jackson rebutted, “You don’t know her. And nor do you know her story.” As Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos approached the podium to deliver her commencement address, approximately half of the graduating class immediately stood up to turn their backs to her while booing her speech. The crowd could also be heard cheering at one point after a man reportedly pumped his fist in the air as security escorted him out of the building.

Donald Trump’s Ajit (Pai)-Prop

May 12, 2017 Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan, www.truthdig.com Educate! FCC, Trump Administration

By Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan for Truth Dig - “You’re fired!” When Donald Trump ousted FBI Director James Comey Tuesday night, it was more than just another of Trump’s shocking executive actions. Comparisons to Watergate are chillingly relevant; Comey was investigating potential collusion between the Russian government and Trump’s presidential campaign. Just days earlier, Comey asked the Justice Department, run by Trump crony Attorney General Jeff Sessions, for more resources for the investigation. Trump’s termination of Comey echoed President Richard Nixon’s firing of the special prosecutor investigating Watergate, Archibald Cox, in what was called “The Saturday Night Massacre.” Amidst the daily deluge of scandal, one detail remains crystal clear: Donald Trump understands the power of the media, and he wields that power relentlessly. From the announcement of his Supreme Court nominee in a suspenseful event that could have been drawn from reality TV, to his incessant and inflammatory tweeting, Trump manipulates the media and, more often than not, controls the news cycle. His unpredictable pronouncements have captured the attention of the corporate media, almost to the point where very little else is covered.

Could FOIA Force Trump Administration To Restore Missing Climate Data?

May 11, 2017 Nicholas Kusnetz, www.insideclimatenews.org Resist! Climate Change, FOIA, Trump Administration

By Nicholas Kusnetz for Inside Climate News - As Donald Trump's administration continues to strip climate change information from federal websites, two advocacy groups and a conservation biologist are using a novel technique to try to force the government to republish the pages. A new provision in open records law, added by Congress last year, requires agencies to publish electronically any information that is requested at least three times through the federal Freedom of Information Act, so long as that information is not otherwise exempt from disclosure. Last week, the advocacy groups and the biologist submitted identical requests for climate change information, hoping to trigger that provision, and they just might succeed. "The law is pretty explicit," said Aaron Mackey, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes transparency. "The law just says, if you get three, then you have to affirmatively disclose it. This should work." The effort by the Center for Biological Diversity, the Center for Media and Democracy, and Stuart Pimm, a professor at Duke University...

Journalist Arrested For ‘Yelling Questions’ At HHS Secretary Tom Price

May 11, 2017 Ed Mazza, www.huffingtonpost.com Resist! health, Trump Administration

By Ed Mazza for The Huffington Post - The complaint claimed that Heyman “was aggressively breaching” Secret Service protection for Price and Conway and “was causing a disturbance by yelling questions at Ms. Conway and Secretary Price.” Price commented on the arrest Wednesday, saying “that gentleman was not in a press conference.” Asked by a STAT reporter whether Heyman should have been arrested, Price said, “That’s not my decision to make.” Valerie Woody, who was on the scene with the West Virginia Citizen Action Group, said Heyman was simply trying to get Price’s attention as his entourage moved quickly through the capitol. “I saw nothing in his behavior, I heard nothing that indicated any kind of aggressive behavior or anything like that,” she was quoted as saying by Public News Service. “Just simple, you know, trying to get somebody’s attention and ask them a question. It seems to me there was no violation of anyone’s space, or physicality, other than the arrest itself.”

Trump And Trade

May 11, 2017 John Feffer, www.fpif.org Educate! Donald Trump, Trade, Trade Deal, Trump Administration

By John Feffer for Foreign Policy In Focus - If you want to understand why Donald Trump has been changing his position on trade, one place to start is pork. I’m not talking about the pork that goes into congressional sausage making. I’m talking the real stuff, the kind that comes from Smithfield Foods, the Virginia-based company responsible for one out of every four American pigs. As a result of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) — which Ronald Reagan dreamed of, George H.W. Bush negotiated, and Bill Clinton signed into law in 1993 — Smithfield Foods was able to make significant headway into the Mexican market. U.S. sales of pork to Mexico went from under $200 million in 1994 to nearly $1.2 billion in 2013. Smithfield employs 50,000 people. It makes a ton of money. And it doesn’t want the United States to pull out of NAFTA, because then it would see a major decline in sales. Mexico, after all, was the largest pork purchaser by volume in 2015. Also, after NAFTA went into effect, Smithfield purchased a Mexican operation, CGM, that became a cornerstone of its global empire on the basis of cheaper labor and laxer environmental regulations south of the border.

The FCC & Trump Escalate Media Mergers

May 10, 2017 Michael Corcoran, www.fair.org Educate! Corporate Media, FCC, Media, Trump Administration

By Michael Corcoran for FAIR - This morning Sinclair Broadcast Group, the conservative media behemoth that owns more local news stations than any other company in the country, just got even bigger. It announced it was buying Tribune Mediafor $3.9 billion, creating what Bloomberg (5/8/17) calls a “TV goliath.” The purchase, which gives Sinclair a staggering reach of nearly 69 percent of the US population (Free Press, 5/8/17), would’ve been in violation of ownership restrictions just weeks ago. But last month, the Trump-appointed FCC chair, Ajit Pai, reinstated the “UHF discount,” an outdated loophole that allowed media conglomerates to exceed the nation’s 39 percent cap on ownership (New York Post, 4/20/17). Sinclair made a $420 million deal to buy Bonten Media Group(Baltimore Sun, 4/21/17) the very next day. This sequence of events “sure looks like a quid pro quo,” as Craig Aaron of the media advocacy group Free Press has noted (5/8/17). Months ago, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner told business executives, according to Politico (12/16/16), that “Trump’s campaign struck a deal with Sinclair Broadcast Group during the campaign to try and secure better coverage.”

Jury Convicts Woman Who Laughed At Jeff Sessions During Senate Hearing

May 5, 2017 Ryan J. Reilly, www.huffingtonpost.com Resist! Jeff Sessions, Trump Administration

By Ryan J. Reilly for The Huffington Post - WASHINGTON ― A jury convicted a woman on Wednesday who was arrested during a congressional hearing in January after laughing at the claim that now-Attorney General Jeff Sessions had a record of treating Americans equally. Desiree Fairooz, an activist associated with the organization Code Pink, was found guilty on two counts: one for engaging in “disorderly or disruptive conduct” with the intent to disrupt congressional proceedings and a separate count for parading, demonstrating or picketing. Several jurors who spoke with HuffPost after the verdict emphasized that they were focused on Fairooz’s actions after a rookie Capitol Police officer approached Fairooz when she laughed at Sen. Richard Shelby’s (R-Ala.) claim that Sessions had a clear, well-documented and “extensive record of treating all Americans equally under the law.” A group of jurors spoke to HuffPost on the condition of anonymity. “She did not get convicted for laughing. It was her actions as she was being asked to leave,” the jury foreperson said.

Killing Net Neutrality Is A Horrible Idea

May 5, 2017 Staff, www.record-bee.com Resist! Net Neutrality, Trump Administration

By Staff of Record-Bee - It’s no surprise that new Federal Communications Commission chairman Ajit Pai wants to do away with the basic principle that all Internet data should be treated equally by broadband providers, such as Comcast, Verizon and AT&T. He’s a former Verizon lawyer, as President Trump was well aware. The shock will be if Congress allows the FCC to kill net neutrality, the principle that’s as important to the Internet as the First Amendment is to free speech. The tech industry and consumers have common ground here. They need to join forces to derail the plan. The only alternative is to fight Pai and the FCC in the courts. Pai on Wednesday revealed his proposal to roll back the Obama administration’s rules that ensured what was widely viewed as “the strongest Internet protections” in tech history. Former FCC Chair Tom Wheeler’s order prevented giving broadband service providers a free hand to block or give preference to websites at will. Website and Internet companies, including the likes of Google, Facebook and Netflix, strongly support retaining net neutrality. But it’s the thousands of small startups creating the next wave of Internet innovation that are the chief concern.

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