#FIVETHINGS — ISSUE NO. 7
1) TRUMP CAMPAIGN POSSIBLY COORDINATED WITH RUSSIA
Most have now read at least part of the shocking dossier that Buzzfeed published with details about the years-long Russian campaign to cultivate the President-elect and generate materials to blackmail him. While the idea that any of this is true is incredibly concerning, most unacceptable is the credible notion that members and associates of the Trump campaign were receiving information from and coordinating with Russian Intelligence. This must be thoroughly investigated and Congress must do everything possible to get to the bottom of this.
Read details about this at BBC.
2) PRESIDENT-ELECT’S BOGUS PLAN TO AVOID CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
The only way for Trump to successfully avoid conflicts of interest in his presidency is to divest from his businesses. Instead, Trump has announced he will still retain full ownership of his businesses, but step away from a leadership role. This means that Trump’s personal finances will be affected by the dealings of his businesses during his presidency, dealings that can potentially be affected by his presidency. A solution to this conflict of interest would be to place his businesses in a blind trust. Instead, Trump is putting them in the hands of his two sons, meaning there is no limit to the role he can play behind the scenes. In short, Trump will have the power to make business deals at the same time he carries out acts as President (the potential for political corruption is astronomic.)
“What I’m going to be doing is my two sons, who are right here, Don and Eric, are going to be running the company. They are going to be running it in a very professional manner. They are not going to discuss it with me.” — Donald Trump 1/11/17.
Read more about this at Think Progress.
Read more about this at CNN.
3) TRUMP’S SON-IN-LAW TO SERVE IN ADMINISTRATION
Donald Trump this week named his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, to a senior White House advisory position. Many experts believe this violates federal anti-nepotism laws. Kushner says he’ll forgo a salary and divest his family real estate business holdings, but worth tracking here is the already troubling overlap between Kushner Companies and Jared’s newfound White House rolodex. Keep your eyes on China.
Read more about Kushner’s conflicts of interest at The New York Times.
Read more about Jared Kushner at New York Magazine.
4) DISMISSAL OF NUCLEAR SECURITY ADMINISTRATORS
While every new president has the right to appoint their own administration, many positions that are important to continuity of government are typically asked to stay until their replacements can be confirmed. This has not happened with the National Nuclear Security Administration — the federal agency that maintains nuclear security and safety. On January 20th, this organization will have no leaders and the President-elect has not nominated anybody for these roles. The confirmation process for these roles can take so long, that a Bush appointee was the NNSA Administrator for the entirety of Obama’s first term. The likelihood that this agency will be without leadership for years is dangerous.
Read more about this at Gizmodo.
5) THE PRESIDENT-ELECT’S PRESS CONFERENCE
Wednesday morning included one of the more bizarre excuses of a press conference in recent memory. Not only did the President-elect barely address his conflicts of interest OR answer questions about contact his campaign might have had with Russian officials, but the President-elect filled the room with cheering sycophants while he peddled false employment numbers and belittled the press. At one point, he refused to take a question from a CNN reporter by saying, “you are fake news” before taking a question from a reporter representing noted white nationalist website (and Trump propaganda purveyor) Breitbart. This is what the destruction of press freedom looks like.
Read more about his press conference at The Ringer.
Sleeping Giants has started a campaign to combat the proliferation of fake and inflammatory news. To do this, they are using social media to notify companies who are advertising on Breitbart News. Because of the way programmatic advertising works, most of these companies DO NOT KNOW that their ads are appearing on this white nationalist website. Many advertisers will stop making payments to Breitbart just by being made aware of where their advertising money is going. This can be stopped.
Read more about how to help Sleeping Giants here.
Following delays from several of the President-elect’s cabinet appointments in completing the requisite ethics forms for the Office of Government Ethics, the Senate delayed the hearings for four potential cabinet members — Betsy DeVos (Education), Andrew Puzder (Labor), Mike Pompeo (CIA), and Wilbur Ross (Commerce). This is a good thing. While Senate Republicans had been looking to do as many hearings as possible in as short of time as possible to discourage citizen oversight, pressure from the OGE and Senate Democrats will help to ensure that all choice are thoroughly vetted.
Read more about this at The New York Times.
