The Drumbeat To Rid The EPA Of Scott Pruitt Is The Loudest I Ever Heard

Friday evening the Washington Post ran an editorial, Scott Pruitt Is Unfit To Serve. That should surprise anyone. He was unfit to serve as Oklahoma Attorney General and many people think he was Trump’s worst cabinet pick, or tied for worst with Betsy DeVos. But he’s getting hammered not for his earth-destroying agenda but for his swampy ethical problems. He thinks he’s president or king and behaves that way. “The blizzard of ethical questions, surrounding Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt,” wrote The Post editors, “has become a Category 5 storm. Already facing big questions about his wasteful spending and relationships with lobbyists, Mr. Pruitt intensified his problems by dishonestly blaming his staff for one major ethical failure. Then the New York Times revealed that staffers who tried to rein in Mr. Pruitt’s unnecessary spending were punished. More than ever, it is clear that Mr. Pruitt is unfit to serve.”

Mr. Pruitt, who has eschewed contact with mainstream media in favor of sympathetic conservative outlets, took to Fox News on Wednesday to defend himself. But under questioning from Fox News’s Ed Henry, Mr. Pruitt was unable to explain how two of his favorite staffers got massive, unauthorized pay raises that the White House had previously rejected. The administrator claimed he did not know who on his staff was responsible for the end run around the White House and that he only heard about the raises the previous day. Yet The Post’s Juliet Eilperin, Brady Dennis and Josh Dawsey reported subsequently that Mr. Pruitt had, in fact, ordered the raises. It is still unclear how involved he was in circumventing the White House’s rejection of those raises, but his total denial of responsibility on Fox News does not square with the reported record.

Meanwhile, the New York Times revealed Thursday that five EPA staffers who questioned Mr. Pruitt’s lavish spending were reassigned or demoted. These staffers raised concerns about first-class travel, costly security upgrades, and expensive office furniture and renovations. One of them fought buying Mr. Pruitt a $100,000-per-month charter aircraft membership, spending $70,000 to replace two office desks and wasting $43,000 on a soundproof booth in the administrator’s office. Another objected to using flashing lights and sirens to shuttle Mr. Pruitt through Washington traffic-- including to dinner at the French restaurant Le Diplomate. Several of the staffers raised concerns about Mr. Pruitt flying first class, a habit the administrator indulged in more often after one of them was sidelined. An EPA spokesman claimed that Mr. Pruitt was unaware of some of these extravagant outlays and rejected the notion that concerned staffers had been punished, but the administrator has already shown what his denials are worth.

Capping off the week, EPA ethics officers walked back their clearance of Mr. Pruitt’s sketchy condo rental deal, revealing that they had not been given all the relevant information necessary to make a reasonable call. The administrator rented a room in a Capitol Hill condo for $50 a night-- but only paid for the nights he spent in residence, and his daughter was allowed to use a second bedroom. He got this sweetheart deal from the wife of a prominent energy and environmental lobbyist whose clients obtained favorable treatment from the EPA while Mr. Pruitt was staying at the condo.

In any normal administration, Mr. Pruitt would be gone. Instead, even as revelations about Mr. Pruitt piled up this week, Mr. Trump was reportedly still entertaining the idea of installing Mr. Pruitt as attorney general, a position for which his primary qualification may be willingness to squelch the Russia investigation. An ideologue who has arrogantly abused his position, Mr. Pruitt does not deserve a promotion. He deserves to be fired.

64 members of Congress sent a letter to Trump making the case for firing Pruitt. It’s a long letter so there is no chance whatsoever that he will read it. They should have made it into a coloring book.

Dear President Trump:

We formally request that you ask Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt to resign. Scott Pruitt’s unethical behavior, wasteful use of taxpayer money, and his efforts to undermine the EPA’s core mission to protect our environment and public health demand an appropriate response: his resignation or his firing.

Unethical Behavior

Pruitt worked out a special deal on housing rent with the wife of an industry lobbyist who represents companies regulated by the EPA and who was an active contributor to his political career. More specifically, Pruitt paid just $50/night for a Capitol Hill condominium, and only for the nights he used a bedroom in the townhouse, a sum well below the market value. Pruitt’s daughter also stayed in the townhouse in a separate room, at no added cost.

More concerning to us are the conflicts of interest involved with his condominium arrangement. Companies represented by his lobbyist-landlord received EPA approval during his stay in the townhouse—the extent of which we do not fully know yet. The townhouse is also a known GOP fundraiser site, and several fundraisers were held during the timeframe that Administrator Pruitt was staying there. Pruitt did not report the details of this concerning arrangement to ethics counsel at the EPA, nor to the public, beforehand.

Separately, this past March, the White House Presidential Personnel Office denied Administrator Pruitt’s request to substantially increase the salary of two of his staffers, who came from Oklahoma with him to DC. Seemingly unwilling to take “no” for an answer,  Pruitt used an obscure provision of the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) and “ordered” EPA to give those two Oklahoma staffers salary increases of $28,130 and $56,765-- another issue the EPA IG is now investigating. In an interview after reports of the pay raises surfaced this week, Administrator Pruitt denied any knowledge of the matter. According to press reports, one of those staffers was also responsible for securing his personal housing arrangements. Pruitt also used this obscure legal provision to hire several industry lobbyists, a loophole that allows him to avoid having those hires sign your ethics pledge.

Administrator Pruitt has also engaged in potential anti-lobbying violations: the Government Accountability Office is investigating his appearance in a National Cattlemen’s Beef Association video urging farmers to comment on proposed changes to the Clean Water Rule; and, the IG is already reviewing Pruitt’s call for a mining group to lobby on the Paris climate agreement.

Administrator Pruitt also continually refuses to recuse himself on issues under EPA consideration. As Attorney General (AG) of Oklahoma, Pruitt sued the EPA 14 times, and in 13 of those 14 cases, regulated industries were also parties. Mr. Pruitt and his affiliated Political Action Committees received campaign contributions from co-parties like Murray Energy, Peabody Energy and Southern Power Company. It was also found that Mr. Pruitt lied during his confirmation hearing by saying that he never used private email as AG, although private emails surfaced between AG Pruitt and Devon Energy, directly disputing his statement.

The core mission of the EPA is to protect the environment and human health. Yet, Administrator Pruitt spent most of his first year in office meeting with his industry stakeholders-- meetings that undoubtedly influenced his policy directives and decision-making at the EPA. According to a Washington Post analysis of his public schedule, Pruitt held 218 meetings in 2017 with representatives of industries he regulates, while only meeting a dozen times with environmental and public health groups. In one case, just hours after meeting with the CEO of a foreign mining company, the Pebble Limited Partnership (PLP), EPA Administrator Pruitt directed his staff to withdraw from a plan to protect the watershed of Bristol Bay, Alaska under the Clean Water Act’s 404(c) process in order to push forward a controversial proposal to build one of the world’s largest open pit copper and gold mines there.

Administrator Pruitt has actively stacked the EPA with friends and industry insiders. An analysis by the Associated Press found that one-third of 59 new EPA political appointee positions it tracked were registered lobbyists or lawyers for fossil fuel producers, chemical manufacturers or other corporate clients. Pruitt also installed unqualified friends in EPA positions that don’t require Senate confirm­ation. To lead the EPA’s Superfund Task Force, Pruitt hired his friend Albert Kelly, who had previously provided three loans to Pruitt through his bank before being barred from the banking industry for life by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).  The FDIC determined in May 2017 that it “ha[d] reason to believe that [Kelly] violated a law or regulation, by entering into an agreement pertaining to a loan by the Bank without FDIC approval” and in July determined that he was unfit to serve in any banking or banking-affiliated position, though did not publicize further specifics as to why.

Additionally, Pruitt has worked to ensure that the EPA is cloaked in secrecy rather than being transparent and accountable to the American public. Within weeks of his arrival, the EPA’s public affairs office stopped responding to many reporters’ questions and sharing his complete schedule. EPA staff reported not being allowed to take notes in meetings or carry their cellphones, limiting the paper trail that can be requested under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). One FOIA request found that Pruitt's Superfund Task Force, chaired by his friend the FDIC-banned Albert Kelly, took no minutes of its meetings and produced just one document-- a list of final recommendations. When EPA was mishandling its emergency response of Superfund sites, Pruitt’s press office proactively challenged accounts of disarray.

Wasteful Use of Taxpayer Money

Administrator Pruitt is under several EPA Inspector General (IG) investigations for his wasteful use of taxpayer money. The IG is investigating Pruitt’s decision to enter the EPA into a contract for a new $43,000 secure phone booth inside his office, despite the fact that two secure facilities already exist in the same building. It is also investigating his extravagant travel habits.

As has been widely reported, Pruitt spent more than $105,000 on airline travel in his first year as Administrator, including questionable trips to his home state of Oklahoma, $58,000 on chartered and military flights over the summer, $120,000 for a trip to Italy for an environmental summit, and nearly $40,000 on a trip to Morocco where he promoted natural gas exports, seemingly more relevant to his future political aspirations in gas-rich Oklahoma than the statutory responsibilities of the EPA. Pruitt has also almost exclusively flown first class when on commercial flights, along with at least some of his security detail, and often stays at expensive luxury hotels. Pruitt’s defense of these extravagant spending habits on the taxpayer’s dime was his personal security; however, when questioned about these lavish arrangements, he switched tacks saying he would fly coach from now on, calling into question the legitimacy of his “security” arguments.

Additional wasteful spending issues have emerged in press reports. In 2017, Pruitt reportedly issued a $120,000 no-bid contract to a Republican opposition research firm to track journalists and EPA employees. The contract was immediately canceled after media exposure, but its initial existence raises serious questions about transparency at the EPA under Pruitt’s leadership.

Pruitt has also spent excessively on ensuring secrecy at the EPA: he spent roughly $9,000 on his personal office security, including, the addition of biometric locks for his office and, at his request, a $3,000 sweep of his office to ensure it wasn’t bugged-- again, in a no-bid contract. Administrator Pruitt has not, to date, justified to Congress or the public the extreme secrecy and security on which he has expended to many taxpayer dollars.

Acting Counter to the Mission of the EPA

The EPA’s mission is to protect human health and the environment. Administrator Pruitt has repeatedly directed the agency to act counter to that mission.

Pruitt has taken efforts to weaken the agency of its scientific expertise. He has marginalized staff experts, refusing to meet with them, and actively worked to reduce the size of the agency. Some 700 employees have left the agency and another 2,000 positions may be eliminated. These moves, combined with draconian budget cuts, would shrink staffing levels to those of the Reagan administration, before Congress expanded EPA's responsibilities under the 1990 Clean Air Act and other laws.

The EPA has two major independent scientific advisory boards, the Science Advisory Board and the Board of Scientific Counselors, to ensure the agency’s policies reflect the best available science. Administrator Pruitt has taken steps to remove independent scientists from the Agency’s science advisory panels and stock these panels with industry representatives and scientists financed by industry interests.

Administrator Pruitt has intentionally censored or drummed up public confusion around climate science, which the EPA has stated threatens human health. He personally oversaw the scrubbing of climate change references from the EPA website and has stated that he doesn’t think humans are a “primary contributor” to global warming. Despite near-universal consensus from the global scientific community that climate change is real and caused by humans, Pruitt also attempted the creation of a “red team, blue team” debate over climate science to legitimize outlier voices.

Also notable, though not surprising considering Pruitt’s hiring decisions and extensive personal security requirements, EPA enforcement has dropped precipitously during Pruitt’s tenure. According to the Environmental Integrity Project, Pruitt has slashed the number of civil cases filed against polluters by 44 percent and civil penalties have fallen by almost half, compared with averages from the Obama, Bush, and Clinton administrations. Lax enforcement of our environmental laws directly undermines EPA’s core mission of protecting public health and the environment.

Equally concerning is Pruitt’s politicization of the grant-making process, assigning political aide John Konkus to review all EPA grants. Traditionally, scientific experts-- not political appointees-- review EPA grants awards. Konkus has no scientific background or expertise, ensuring that grants will be judged by political criteria rather than on their scientific and technical merits. Konkus’ impartiality is called into question because, in addition to signing off on EPA grants, he is consulting for private clients part-time.

Similarly, the regulatory mission of the EPA is in danger. Pruitt has moved to rollback or review nearly 50 existing regulations protecting the air, water, and climate, many of which would help prevented tens of thousands of premature deaths and saved billions of dollars in public health benefits.

A snapshot of the regulations is as follows:

• Pruitt initiated the repeal of the Clean Power Plan, which would limit  carbon pollution, and also reduce emissions of other harmful pollutants from power plants that can adversely affect public health.
• Pruitt rescinded the Clean Water Rule, critical for safeguarding the drinking water that more than 117 million Americans.
• Pruitt withdrew a 1995 Clean Air Act guidance that protects people against cancer-causing air pollutants. This change will increase hazardous air pollution from major industrial polluters on nearly 200 pollutants, including arsenic, lead, and mercury.
• Pruitt has failed to enforce a rule that strengthened limits on ozone pollution, which causes smog.
• Pruitt recently moved to roll back federal fuel efficiency standards for cars and light trucks, which will lead to more harmful air pollution and less efficient vehicles, forcing consumers to pay more at the pump.
• The EPA is delayed, and is expected to propose to weaken, limits on chemicals like arsenic, lead, and mercury that power plants dump into waterways.
• Pruitt withdrew a proposed ban on, chlorpyrifos, a commonly used pesticide that can damage the nervous system, despite the EPA's own scientists arguing risks to human health.
• Pruitt granted an industry request to reconsider the coal ash rule, which set national standards for the disposal of toxic coal residue, and has proposed to weaken those standards.
• The EPA plans to revise an Obama-era rule that prevents farmworkers younger than 18 from applying dangerous pesticides, threatening the health of children.

For these reasons, we ask that you fire Scott Pruitt from the Environmental Protection Agency immediately. A man under numerous investigations both for ethical concerns and wasteful spending, who has actively moved to undermine environmental rules and regulations at industry request, is antithetical to the job of EPA Administrator. Mr. Pruitt needs to go.

At the same time, Liam Stack at the NY Times, was developing a compendium of what makes Pruitt unfit to serve. Stack’s story is all about private jets and first-class flying (including a 5 day $40,000 boondoggle for himself and some aides to Morocco; expensive furniture, some of it bulletproof; an expanded, 20 member, 24 hour security detail; flashing lights and sirens for his motorcade (unlike any other Cabinet members); and an office security booth.

“He wanted to be treated like he was the president,” said David Schnare, a prominent conservative lawyer and climate change skeptic, who served on the Trump administration transition team at the E.P.A., after an earlier 30-year stint at the agency that started in the late 1970s.

Kara Eastman in the progressive Democrat running for Congress in Nebraska's second district (Omaha) Even if the incumbent, Don Bacon is clueless, Kara understands exactly why Pruitt is a danger to her community. "Omaha," she told us this morning, "is the largest residential Superfund site in the nation as a result of lead contamination from a refinery. I have seen first-hand how an entire community and its children can be affected by industry when left to its own devices. We need and deserve ethical, strong leadership from the EPA and Pruitt has proven himself to be unfit."

Paul Clements is running in MI-06, in southwestern Michigan. A longtime environmental activist, he also feels that Pruitt is as unfit to serve as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, as Trump is unfit to serve as President of the United States. “But why, should Pruitt,” he asked, “be fired? Is it the unethical behavior, the waste of taxpayer money, or subverting the mission of the EPA? Okay, this is a little like asking how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, but bear with me. Unethical behavior shows that he is personally unfit to serve in a position of such responsibility. When leaders fail to maintain ethical standards, it is not only the harm to victims of the wrong decisions. It’s that ethical standards cannot be maintained in society. What about that $40,000 desk? Well, it’s outrageous. It probably isn’t going to harm the EPA’s ability to carry out its mission, but the other side of this self-aggrandizing egotism is contempt for citizens. These are, however, symptoms. Al Capone was jailed for tax evasion, and that was good enough, but Eliot Ness brought him down because he was a murderous gangster. Pruitt is unfit to serve because the EPA is our federal agency for environmental protection, and Pruitt is undermining its capacity to carry out its mission. The environment is suffering due to Pruitt. It just so happens that at this moment, global climate change is coming at us like a slow-moving tsunami. At this particular moment, the consequences of Pruitt’s specific incompetence happen to be apocalyptical. We need him gone. Okay, and it is the President’s job to promote the interests and well-being of the people of the United States, and to defend the Constitution. Robert Mueller is working on the Russia investigation. That’s good enough for me.”

Politico had something funny to add Friday. It turns out that the lobbyist who was allowing Pruitt to live in her condo, says he overstayed his welcome and she had to kick him out and change the locks! He was only supposed to be living in the Capitol Hill digs while he got settled in Washington, 6 weeks. But he refused to leave when his lease ended, “instead asking the lobbyist couple who became his disgruntled landlords to revise his lease several times.”

Prior to Pruitt’s arrival in Washington, Steve Hart-- an energy lobbyist who, like Pruitt, is a native Oklahoman-- had been a friend and supporter of the EPA administrator. He and his wife, a health care lobbyist, viewed the six-week living arrangement as a favor for a friend.

They drew up a lease running from February through April 1, 2017, said the people familiar with it, in order to make sure neither they nor Pruitt ran afoul of ethics rules, which prohibit political appointees from accepting gifts from lobbyists. Under the terms of that lease, Pruitt paid a cut rate of $50 per night to stay in the condominium.

That favor turned into a headache for the couple when Pruitt repeatedly asked to extend his lease. “There were gentle questions regarding, OK, when are you going to leave and what have you ... and they even started sending him ads of places close by that he could rent,” said the first person.

“Scott Pruitt is the Kato Kaelin of Capitol Hill. He is the long-term house guest who takes advantage of his hosts and refuses to take a hint about when it’s time to leave,” the second person said.

… The Harts eventually told Pruitt, who had to be reminded repeatedly to pay his rent, that they had plans to rent the room to somebody else-- and that he needed to find another place to live, according to the people familiar with events. They also informed him in early August that they were changing the locks on their door.

The topper came in a report yesterday from the Wall Street Journal that Trumpanzee’s Chief of Staff, John Kelly, told Señor T last week that he should fire Pruitt but… “Though Mr. Kelly and other White House aides have concluded Mr. Pruitt should leave, the president is not ready to fire him… Mr. Trump welcomes the deregulatory measures taken by Mr. Pruitt and also values him as a strong advocate for the president’s agenda.”

Where Trumpism And Pretend Christianity Meet-- A Danger To America

The Last Supper by Nancy Ohanian

This morning, the NY Times reported that "While Republicans have been bracing for months for a punishing election in November, they are increasingly alarmed that their losses may be even worse than feared because the midterm campaign appears destined to turn more on the behavior of the man in the White House than any other in decades... As much as gun control, immigration, the sweeping tax overhaul and other issues are mobilizing voters on the left and the right, the seamy sex allegations and Mr. Trump’s erratic style could end up alienating crucial blocs of suburban voters and politically moderate women who might be drawn to some Republican policies but find the president’s purported sex antics to be reprehensible."

Right after Stormy's 60 Minutes show-- with its 22 million eye-popping ratings-- Washington Post reporters Andrew Whitehead, Joseph Baker and Samuel Perry asked "Why are white Christians sticking so closely to Trump, despite these claims of sexual indiscretions? And why are religious individuals and groups that previously decried sexual impropriety among political leaders suddenly willing to give Trump a ‘mulligan’ on his infidelity?" They pointed to a Pew Research Poll from earlier this month about values. The poll shows that "Sizable shares of Americans say that those with views different from their own about how Donald Trump is handling his job as president also probably don’t share many of their other values and goals. Just over half (54%) of the public disapproves of the job Trump is doing, while fewer (39%) say they approve of his job performance... Among those who disapprove of Trump, 65% of self-identified Democrats say they don’t think those with a different view of Trump share their other values and goals... By 60%-34%, self-identified Republicans who approve of Trump say those with a different view of him probably do not share their other values and goals."

Among those who approve of the job Trump is doing as president, 51% say that those who feel differently about him probably do not share many of their other values and goals, while 44% say they probably do share their other values and goals.

Among those who disapprove of Trump-- the larger share of the overall public-- 56% say that those who approve of him probably do not share their other values and goals; fewer (39%) say that they probably do.

...Wide differences in views of Trump by educational attainment also persist. By 71% to 26%, those with a postgraduate degree disapprove more than approve of Trump’s performance. Similarly, nearly two-thirds of those with a bachelor’s degree (64%) disapprove.

By contrast, adults with a high school degree or less education are divided in their views: While 49% approve, about as many (46%) disapprove of Trump.

Among religious groups, white evangelical Protestants continue to be solidly supportive of the president’s job performance: 78% approve today, while just 18% disapprove. By comparison, white mainline Protestants are divided in their views on Trump, while black Protestants express overwhelming disapproval. A majority of Catholics disapprove of Trump’s job as president (57%), as do 68% of those who are religiously unaffiliated.

Back to Whitehead, Baker and Perry, but not to The Post, but to a sociology of religion podcast they did, Make America Christian Again: Christian Nationalism and Voting for Donald Trump in the 2016 Presidential Election. "Why," they asked, "did Americans vote for Donald Trump in the 2016 Presidential election? Social scientists have proposed a variety of explanations, including economic dissatisfaction, sexism, racism, Islamophobia, and xenophobia. The current study establishes that, independent of these influences, voting for Trump was, at least for many Americans, a symbolic defense of the United States’ perceived Christian heritage. Data from a national probability sample of Americans surveyed soon after the 2016 election shows that greater adherence to Christian nationalist ideology was a robust predictor of voting for Trump, even after controlling for economic dissatisfaction, sexism, anti-black prejudice, anti-Muslim refugee attitudes, and anti-immigrant sentiment, as well as measures of religion, sociodemographics, and political identity more generally. These findings indicate that Christian nationalist ideology-- although correlated with a variety of class-based, sexist, racist, and ethnocentric views-- is not synonymous with, reducible to, or strictly epiphenomenal of such views. Rather, Christian nationalism operates as a unique and independent ideology that can influence political actions by calling forth a defense of mythological narratives about America’s distinctively Christian heritage and future." And of course, none this has anything whatsoever to do with Jesus Christ or his teachings.

While American “civil religion” and “Christian nationalism” are closely connected in that both present a narrative and origin myth that expresses purpose and unites those who adhere to it, there are important differences between the two. Civil religion, on the one hand, often refers to America’s covenantal relationship with a divine Creator who promises blessings for the nation for fulfilling its responsibility to defend liberty and justice. While vaguely connected to Christianity, appeals to civil religion rarely refer to Jesus Christ or other explicitly Christian symbols. Christian nationalism, however, draws its roots from “Old Testament” parallels between America and Israel, who was commanded to maintain cultural and blood purity, often through war, conquest, and separatism. Unlike civil religion, historical and contemporary appeals to Christian nationalism are often quite explicitly evangelical, and consequently, imply the exclusion of other religious faiths or cultures. Also paralleling Old Testament Israel, Christian nationalism is often linked with racialist sentiments, equating cultural purity with racial or ethnic exclusion.

Unlike civil religion, contemporary manifestations of Christian nationalism can be unmoored from traditional moral import, emphasizing only its notions of exclusion and apocalyptic war and conquest. Trump represents a prime example of this trend in that he is not traditionally religious or recognized (even by his supporters) to be of high moral character, facts which ultimately did little to dissuade his many religious supporters. In this way, the Christian nation myth can function as a symbolic boundary uniting both personally religious and irreligious members of conservative groups. In this respect Christian nationalism, while more common among white conservative Protestants, also provides a resilient and malleable set of symbols that is not beholden to any particular institution, affiliation, or moral tradition. This allows its influence to reach beyond the Christian traditions of its origins.

During his candidacy, Trump at times explicitly played to Christian nationalist sentiments by repeating the refrain that the United States is abdicating its Christian heritage; however, Trump’s appeals to Christian nationalism were typically overlooked in media coverage of the campaign, which focused more on whether a relatively nonpious candidate could win the vote of the Religious Right. For example, in a speech to a crowd at Liberty University on January 18, 2016, Trump infamously quoted a Bible verse as being from “two Corinthians” rather than the customary “second Corinthians.” News coverage of the event focused on whether this gaffe displaying lack of knowledge about the Bible would hurt Trump with religious voters. Overlooked was the fact that immediately following his faux pas, Trump successfully made a direct appeal to Christian nationalism:

But we are going to protect Christianity. And if you look what’s going on throughout the world, you look at Syria where they’re, if you’re Christian, they’re chopping off heads. You look at the different places, and Christianity, it’s under siege. I’m a Protestant. I’m very proud of it. Presbyterian to be exact. But I’m very proud of it, very, very proud of it. And we’ve gotta protect, because bad things are happening, very bad things are happening, and we don’t-- I don’t know what it is-- we don’t band together, maybe. Other religions, frankly, they’re banding together and they’re using it. And here we have, if you look at this country, it’s gotta be 70 percent, 75 percent, some people say even more, the power we have, somehow we have to unify. We have to band together... Our country has to do that around Christianity (applause).

Similarly, at a campaign stop at Oral Roberts University, Trump announced that “There is an assault on Christianity... There is an assault on everything we stand for, and we’re going to stop the assault.” Later that year, on August 11 in a meeting with evangelical pastors in Florida, Trump claimed:

You know that Christianity and everything we’re talking about today has had a very, very tough time. Very tough time…. We’re going to bring [Christianity] back because it’s a good thing. It’s a good thing. They treated you like it was a bad thing, but it’s a great thing.

Similarly, to those gathered at Great Faith Ministries International on September 3, 2016, Trump said, “Now, in these hard times for our country, let us turn again to our Christian heritage to lift up the soul of our nation.” Finally, there were a number of instances where Trump used the Johnson Amendment restricting political speech by nonprofit organizations as a foil, claiming that the Amendment singled out Christians and trampled on their right to freedom of speech.

While Trump directly referenced the Christian nation myth periodically, his various supporters and endorsers also made the connection between voting for Trump and the United States as a Christian nation. This was especially prevalent among various conservative Christian leaders. Many times the connection was made by arguing that Hillary Clinton would make the United States godless and potentially lead to an apocalyptic future. Christian author and media personality Eric Metaxas claimed that “God will not hold us guiltless” if Clinton were elected instead of Trump. James Dobson, founder of the evangelical ministry Focus on the Family, wrote that “If Christians stay home because he [Trump] isn’t a better candidate, Hillary will run the world for perhaps eight years. The very thought of that haunts my nights and days.” In another interview Dobson highlighted the importance of the Supreme Court vacancy and how “unelected, unaccountable, and imperialistic judges have a history of imposing horrendous decisions on the nation. One decision that still plagues us is Roe v. Wade.” He went on to share how religious liberty, religious freedom, and all religious institutions in America would be under siege if Clinton were elected.

Trump’s Christian nationalist rhetoric also expressed a particular eschatology of America’s future, emphasizing how America was once a great nation, but had rapidly disintegrated under the influences of Barack Obama, terrorism, and illegal immigration. Trump’s promise was to restore America to its past glory, a point he made most clearly with his ubiquitous slogan emblazoned upon red hats. The catchphrase has even been refashioned into a Christian hymn.2 Those supporting Trump, like Sarah Palin in her endorsement speech at Oral Roberts University, also implicitly aligned with a Christian nationalist eschatology: “In this great awakening, you all who realize that, man, our country is going to hell in a handbasket under this tragic fundamental transformation of America that Obama had promised us, know what we need now is a fundamental restoration of America.” The 2016 election was repeatedly labeled as conservative Christians’ “last chance” for citizens to protect America’s religious heritage and win back a chance at securing a Christian future. As Trump told conservative Christian television host Pat Robertson, “If we don’t win this election, you’ll never see another Republican and you’ll have a whole different church structure … a whole different Supreme Court structure.” Pining for America’s distinctively Christian past and insecure about her Christian future, all fomented by Trump’s apocalyptic campaign rhetoric, we hypothesize that Americans adhering to Christian nationalist ideology were more likely to vote for Trump.

It is critical to clarify that we are hypothesizing that the influence of Christian nationalism on the 2016 Presidential election is distinct from, even as it is closely related to, other cultural factors influencing voting for Trump. Christian nationalism has been linked to attitudes opposing economic regulations, welfare, and affirmative action, as well as gender equality and gay rights. And even more research has demonstrated that Christian nationalism is a strong predictor of antipathy toward racial boundary crossing, non-white immigrants, and non-Christians, especially Muslims. Consistent with its earlier racialist connotations, Christian nationalism can serve as an ethno-nationalist symbolic boundary portraying nonwhites and Muslims as threatening cultural outsiders. Indeed, in light of the strong role that Islamophobia was shown to play in shoring up support for Trump, and because Islam is often framed as the antithesis of both Christian and American identities, we would expect Trump support, Christian nationalism, and Islamophobia to be closely related.

Despite these close connections with economic views, sexism, racism, xenophobia, and Islamophobia, however, Christian nationalism is not synonymous with or reducible to any or all of these. Rather, Christian nationalism operates as a set of beliefs and ideals that seek the national preservation of a supposedly unique Christian identity. Voting for Donald Trump was for many Americans a Christian nationalist response to perceived threats to that identity. Stated more formally, we hypothesize that Christian nationalism will predict voting for Donald Trump even after these other important and interrelated factors have been held constant, as well as under empirical contexts that allow for the potential interplay between Christian nationalism and various forms of ethnic resentment.

If these fake Christians overlook Trump's violation of Biblical proscriptions and injunctions, does anyone think they care at all about his Regime's blatant violations of ethical rules? Yesterday Public Citizen filed 30 ethics complaints against the regime. Lisa Gilbert an officer of Public Citizen explained that “The bottom line is that neither Trump nor his administration take conflicts of interest and ethics seriously. 'Drain the swamp’ was far more campaign rhetoric than a commitment to ethics, and the widespread lack of compliance and enforcement of Trump’s ethics executive order shows that ethics do not matter in the Trump administration.”

A key provision of the ethics order prohibits former lobbyists from being appointed without a waiver to governmental positions that oversee the same specific issue area they lobbied within the past two years. In a report titled The Company We Keep, Public Citizen identified dozens of appointments throughout the Trump administration that appear to violate this rule and has sent letters to the respective designated agency ethics officers requesting that they investigate and explain 30 such lobbyist appointments.

“These 30 apparent violations of Trump’s own ethics rules are only the tip of the iceberg,” said Craig Holman, co-author of the report and lobbyist for Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division. “We looked at only a quarter of all presidential appointees because records were not readily available at the time. I suspect the real number of potential violations is fourfold.”

About a week into his term, on a Saturday afternoon, Trump issued an ethics executive order designed to implement his campaign pledge to “drain the swamp.” The ethics order came as a surprise to many and borrowed some key provisions from President Barack Obama’s earlier ethics executive order. One such clause reads in part:

• “If I was a registered lobbyist within the 2 years before the date of my appointment, in addition to abiding by the limitations of paragraph 6, I will not for a period of 2 years after the date of my appointment participate in any particular matter on which I lobbied within the 2 years before the date of my appointment or participate in the specific issue area in which that matter falls.”

Public Citizen identified 36 lobbyists who have been appointed to positions that oversee the same specific issue areas they recently lobbied, with only six of those appointees having received publicly disclosed waivers from the ethics rule. Violations of Trump’s ethics rules by the remaining 30 former lobbyists would occur if they are in any way involved in influencing official actions on the matters that they had recently lobbied in the private sector and have not received a waiver.

The Swampiest Regime In History? Oh, Yes

Early Sunday morning, The Atlantic published a Ron Brownstein piece, Donald Trump's Tilt Toward Convention, going through not just the campaign promises he's reneging on but the very premises for his entire presidency. "Trump’s march to the GOP nomination last spring," he wrote, "demonstrated there’s a substantial audience within the party’s rank and file-- particularly among older and blue-collar Republicans-- for the nationalist movement’s insular themes of resistance to trade, immigration, and foreign alliances, and embrace of government spending that benefits economically strained workers and retirees. But Trump’s tumultuous first months in office have shown with equal clarity that such an agenda has extremely little institutional support inside the GOP beyond a constellation of sympathetic media outlets (like Breitbart News) and talk-radio and cable-television hosts (such as Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity). Lacking many champions in Congress, think tanks, conservative interest groups, or the business community, many of the movement’s most distinctive ideas-- say, confronting China over trade or protecting the mostly white older population from budget cuts-- have been rapidly losing ground to more conventional GOP interests and priorities."

Both GOP wings agree on several fronts, from reducing federal regulation to cutting taxes to advancing conservative social priorities, like expanding gun-owners’ rights. But where the two camps diverge, Trump in recent weeks has consistently tilted away from his nationalist campaign rhetoric and toward more conventional GOP positions on a stunning list of issues. As Wehner put it, Trump in just weeks has hurtled “from Bannon-esque, apocalyptic, racial nationalism to Goldman Sachs, conventional, elite liberalism with nothing in between.”

...The key to party change will be Trump’s success in mobilizing the grassroots elements of the GOP coalition open to a nationalist message, argued J. Hogan Gidley, a longtime GOP communications strategist. Gidley advised the presidential campaigns of both Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee, who pioneered many of the blue-collar conservative themes that Trump championed. He also advised the pro-Trump political action committee founded by Robert and Rebekah Mercer, the conservative megadonors close to Bannon.

Gidley acknowledged there is little institutional backing inside the GOP for the views all of those figures have touted. Asked where the Trump administration’s nationalists could turn for support beyond supportive media voices like Hannity, Ingraham, or Ann Coulter, Gidley said: “I don’t know that they have anywhere to turn.”

But, he argued, Trump can topple that power structure. “That’s what he was elected to do, to shake things up,” Gidley said. “I think he is going to make deals with Republicans, with the [House] Freedom Caucus, with Democrats when he has to. Donald Trump, because he commands the bully pulpit of the White House, can reshape much of the Republican Party.”

But many others question whether Trump has the skill, tenacity, or even the interest to engage in the sort of sustained struggle to redirect his party that Bill Clinton undertook. Wehner cautioned that even Trump’s turn back to more conventional conservative thinking in recent weeks probably isn’t the last bend in the road.

“What he will end up doing is what he thinks will be in the best interest of Donald Trump,” Wehner said. “During the campaign, he believed the best interest of Donald Trump was to inflame some of the darker impulses of America and say things that are outrageous and fan conspiracy theories. Now I suspect he is seeing the Bannon approach isn’t working and will lead to a failed presidency, and he’s thinking about jettisoning that. I really think he’s ideologically rootless and could end up anywhere.”

Eric Lipton, writing for the NY Times had already written over the weekend of exactly where all the DC factions come together-- in the swamp, the place Trump, by nature and nurture, is most comfortable anyway. Did anyone ever doubt that Trump was destined to sit atop the most corrupt and ethics-free administration in American history? (OK, OK, I know about Harding and am reminded about Andrew Jackson's "spoils system" every time I see a picture of Trump's newly decorated Oval Office... but you get the point.) "Trump," wrote Lipton, "is populating the White House and federal agencies with former lobbyists, lawyers and consultants who in many cases are helping to craft new policies for the same industries in which they recently earned a paycheck." The potential conflicts arising are virtually endless. "In at least two cases, the appointments may have already led to violations of the administration’s own ethics rules. But evaluating if and when such violations have occurred has become almost impossible because the Trump administration is secretly issuing waivers to the rules."

One such case involves Michael Catanzaro, who serves as the top White House energy adviser. Until late last year, he was working as a lobbyist for major industry clients such as Devon Energy of Oklahoma, an oil and gas company, and Talen Energy of Pennsylvania, a coal-burning electric utility, as they fought Obama-era environmental regulations, including the landmark Clean Power Plan. Now, he is handling some of the same matters on behalf of the federal government.

Another case involves Chad Wolf, who spent the past several years lobbying to secure funding for the Transportation Security Administration to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on a new carry-on luggage screening device. He is now chief of staff at that agency-- at the same time as the device is being tested and evaluated for possible purchase by agency staff.

There are other examples. At the Labor Department, two officials joined the agency from the K Street lobbying corridor, leaving behind jobs where they fought some of the Obama administration’s signature labor rules, including a policy requiring financial advisers to act in a client’s best interest when providing retirement advice.

This revolving door of lobbyists and government officials is not new in Washington. Both parties make a habit of it.

But the Trump administration is more vulnerable to conflicts than the prior administration, particularly after the president eliminated an ethics provision that prohibits lobbyists from joining agencies they lobbied in the prior two years. The White House also announced on Friday that it would keep its visitors’ logs secret, discontinuing the release of information on corporate executives, lobbyists and others who enter the complex, often to try to influence federal policy. The changes have drawn intense criticism from government ethics advocates across the city.

Mr. Trump’s appointees are also far wealthier and have more complex financial holdings and private-sector ties than officials hired at the start of the Obama administration, according to an Office of Government Ethics analysis that the White House has made public. This creates a greater chance that they might have conflicts related to investments or former clients, which could force them to sell off assets, recuse themselves or seek a waiver.

...[I]n several cases, officials in the Trump administration now hold the exact jobs they targeted as lobbyists or lawyers in the past two years.

Trump White House officials had over 300 recent corporate clients and employers, including Apple, the giant hedge fund Citadel and the insurance titan Anthem, according to a Times analysis of financial disclosures. (The White House has released disclosures for only about half of its roughly 180 current senior political employees.) And there are more than 40 former lobbyists in the White House and the broader federal government... Trump also made it easier for former lobbyists in the government to get waivers that would let them take up matters that could benefit former clients.

...The lobbyist loophole in Mr. Trump’s executive order may have allowed the Labor Department to hire Geoffrey Burr as a special assistant. The department is familiar ground to Mr. Burr, who was a lobbyist for the Associated Builders and Contractors, which pressed the agency on its overtime pay rule, wage requirements for government contracts and an additional half-dozen or so other regulations. Under Mr. Obama’s ethics order, Mr. Burr would probably not have been able to join the Labor Department.

Such potential conflicts are showing up across the federal government.

Executives at Analogic Corp. had tried to sell its carry-on baggage security equipment to the T.S.A. with Mr. Wolf’s help when he was a lobbyist. They were pressing the agency to conduct formal tests of its computed tomography devices, known as CT scans, which are already used broadly in the medical field and on checked baggage. The company now wants the T.S.A. to use them in the nation’s 2,400 airport checkpoint security lanes, a move that could be worth at least $500 million in equipment sales.

The tests are underway, and at one point during an interview with The Times, company executives said they had reached out to Mr. Wolf to discuss the matter after he joined the T.S.A., listing his name among a series of agency officials they had recently contacted. But when asked again about Mr. Wolf, they would not give details from the conversation, at one point contradicting themselves and saying they had not spoken with him. Then one of them, Mark Laustra, a vice president at Analogic who leads the company’s efforts to sell the screening devices, said, “Our interaction with Chad since he joined T.S.A. has been next to nothing.”

Mr. Wolf’s Twitter account on Friday still identified him as a lobbyist and displayed posts from last year urging the T.S.A. to buy the devices. “Positive developments from TSA on upgrading checkpoint scanners,” a post from July said. “CT tech is the future.”

A T.S.A. spokesman agreed to arrange an interview with Mr. Wolf-- who worked at the agency during the Bush administration before becoming a lobbyist-- but canceled it when told about the topic in detail.

“I’m afraid Mr. Wolf isn’t going to have any available time in his schedule today,” said Mike England, the spokesman, who then declined several follow-up requests over a one-week period. He later added, in a statement, that Mr. Wolf’s “duties have not required a waiver” of the ethics standards Mr. Trump adopted in January, although Mr. England would not discuss the matter further.

The Department of Health and Human Services has become another source of potential conflicts.

Lance Leggitt, who serves as chief of staff to Tom Price, the health and human services secretary, worked last year as a lobbyist for 10 different health care companies, including United States Medical Supply and Advanced Infusion Services. He focused largely on lobbying the agency related to Medicare billing rules, as well as rules for health care supplier accreditations, lobbying disclosure reports show. All these issues are routinely handled by the agency he helps oversee.

Dr. Scott Gottlieb, the nominee to lead the Food and Drug Administration, received more than $350,000 in payments in 2014 and 2015 from nearly a dozen different pharmaceutical companies, including Vertex Pharmaceuticals, whose two approved drugs are seen as breakthrough treatments for cystic fibrosis. (They carry list prices of more than $250,000 a year.) Dr. Gottlieb, who has never been registered as a lobbyist but has served as the director of eight pharmaceutical companies and one laboratory company, wrote in a letter that he was prepared to recuse himself as necessary to avoid any conflicts.

The Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to a request for a comment.

Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, said the sheer number of potential conflicts-- which will require recusals, necessitate waivers or result in violations of the ethics rule-- is disturbing, particularly given the secretive approach the administration is taking on the issue.

“This is not a matter of just checking a box-- this is about protecting the integrity of the operation of federal government,” Ms. Brian said. “But our worst fears are coming true: We know people coming in who have conflicts, and we cannot see what restrictions they are under, if any.”

The result, she predicted, might serve no one particularly well. Even if the rules are enforced, so many senior officials will be required to recuse themselves that “they will have a hard time getting their job done.”

At The Nexus Of America's Worst Culture Of Corruption: Trumpy-the-Clown And His Family

Earlier today we saw how vulnerable the U.S. is to China because of the culture of corruption that is at the center of the Trump Regime's DNA-- and that especially includes his family. Not just includes, features! This morning Eric Lipton at the NY Times reported on the double-edged sword of Trumpy-the-Clown family members Ivanka and Kushner-in-law working at the White House. "[T]he financial disclosure report released late Friday for Mr. Kushner," wrote Lipton, "which shows that he and his wife still benefit financially from a real estate and investment empire worth as much as $740 million, makes clear that this most powerful Washington couple is walking on perilous legal and ethical ground, according to several prominent experts on the subject."

Unlike Mr. Trump, who is exempt from conflict of interest laws, both Mr. Kushner and Ms. Trump-- who took a formal White House position this past week-- are forbidden under federal criminal and civil law to take any action that might benefit their particular financial holdings.

“Donald Trump can evade legal responsibility even if the conflicts of interest remain,” said Noah Bookbinder, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a liberal nonprofit group. “His daughter and son-in-law don’t have that escape hatch.”

Mr. Kushner did resign from more than 200 positions in the partnerships and limited liability companies that make up the family-run multibillion-dollar real estate business. But the financial disclosure report shows that Mr. Kushner will remain a beneficiary of most of those same entities.

...[R]eal estate projects like the Kushner Companies’ deals have become a magnet for opaque foreign money — often from parts of the world that present thorny policy questions, such as China, where Mr. Kushner’s company has actively sought investors, as well as the Middle East and Russia. As part of his exceptionally broad portfolio in the White House, Mr. Kushner has been a crucial figure in arranging the visit of the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, on Thursday in Florida.

The mystery behind many real estate investments involving foreigners prompted the Treasury Department last year to push for additional disclosures as a way to combat money laundering.

While Mr. Kushner may face a potential ethical minefield, the disclosure form makes it difficult to determine exactly where those mines might be situated. The form, which runs 54 pages and lists hundreds of entities, reveals few details about the underlying investments that make up the Kushner empire, such as the addresses of buildings, sources of financing and names of partners.

John Pudner, a conservative who has helped elect Tea Party candidates to Congress and now runs a nonprofit group called Take Back Our Republic, said that Mr. Kushner and Ms. Trump, if they wanted to serve in the White House, would have been better off if they had taken the difficult step of liquidating their holdings.

“A win-win for the president’s family and everyone else is if there were no question anytime a decision is made that it’s being done for the good of the country,” he said.

...The federal ethics regulations formally prohibit federal employees from being involved in any “particular matter that will have a direct effect on a financial interest, if there is a close causal link between any decision or action to be taken in the matter and any expected effect of the matter on the financial interest.”

But Mr. Painter said that most administrations had interpreted the law more broadly, so that officials who own stakes in individual industries do not participate in even broad policy decisions affecting that sector, unless they seek a formal ethics waiver, as certain officials did during the first George Bush administration, given that they owned energy industry stocks and were participating in the decision to enter the war against Iraq over its invasion of Kuwait.

Federal employees, under ethics rules that Mr. Trump imposed, are also prohibited, for at least two years after they arrive in the government, from working on particular matters that involve former employers or clients, even if these actions do not directly financially benefit the federal employee.

The disclosures by Mr. Kushner and other White House officials released on Friday demonstrate just how complicated it is going to be to police these rules, given the vast and extremely complex financial assets not only within the Trump family but also among dozens of aides they have selected.

Shouldn't Senators Who Took Big Contributions From Trump Nominees Recuse Themselves From Confirmation Hearings?

Oh, look who led us astray... again

California Senator Kamala Harris could set a good example for Republican senators-- maybe even shame them-- by recusing herself from voting on Trump's Treasury Secretary nominee, Steven Mnuchin. Mnuchin, who 2016 saw giving $10,000 pops to a very specific group of state Republican parties-- Mississippi, West Virginia, Louisiana, Tennessee, Virginia, South Carolina and Arkansas-- as well as over $300,000 to the RNC, only donated directly to one U.S, Senate candidate, corporate Democrat Kamala Harris ($2,000 on February 10, 2016). Many people feel certain Mnuchin contributed to the sleaze-tainted Harris to avoid prosecution in relation to shady foreclosures. Unless she recuses herself, Harris will have to vote for or against Mnuchin's nomination.

Similarly, Rex Tillerson singled out just one Republican Senate candidate this year for a big contribution-- Missouri Republican Roy Blunt, who took a $5,400 check from Tillerson on August 31. Chuck Grassely ought to recuse himself from consideration of the Betsy DeVos nomination for Education Secretary since she gave him $2,700 directly on June 6.

Wilbur Ross, whose confirmation hearings have been delayed by the Senate Commerce committee over ethical considerations, didn't give any direct money to any of the Senate candidates this cycle but whoever got Mnuchin to contribute to the state Replublic parties in Mississippi, West Virginia, Louisiana, Tennessee, Virginia, South Carolina and Arkansas seems to have persuaded Ross to make the exact same contributions-- none more, no less. That's no coincidence. Was that Mitch McConnell's office? Paul Ryan's? I wonder what that money was earmarked for.

In his Senate confirmation hearing today, Tillerson lied when he claimed Exxon didn't lobby against Russian post-Crimea sanctions. This report from Open Secrets shows that it absolutely did. This morning there was a report that FEC documents show that the Exxon-Mobil PAC controlled by Tillerson contributed $5,000 each to Jeff Flake (R-AZ) and John Barrasso (R-WY), who are both members of the Foreign Relations Committee. A member of Congress who asked to not be identified told me a few hours ago that both of these guys should immediately recuse themselves or face an ethics investigation.

Does Trump have to worry about ethical considerations at all. A new poll released by Quinnipiac seems to indicate his administration better start paying heed. The "honeymoon" ended even before the leaks about Trump and the golden shower prostitutes started leaking out. Americans seem to have had enough of Trump already! Most Americans now have an unfavorable view of him. His numbers are going in thew wrong direction. After the election 41% of Americans thought he'd be a better leader than Obama, but they number has now shrunk back down to 34%, basically the dumbbells who voted for him. In Quinnipiac's previous poll 40% of the respondents had persuaded themselves Trump's policies worked actually help make their personal; financial situation better. That didn't last long; it's now 27%. And when it comes to issues involved directly with his ethics... not good. 42% saw him as "honest" after the election. After his shenanigans of the last month,that number has sunk down to 39%. And overall, 28% said that watching Trump in action since the election have made them feel more uneasy how his coming presidency while only 23% said his actions have made them feel better.

Fewer people now think he's "level-headed," "strong, "intelligent," "empathetic" and has good leadership skills. As for the two parties, people have unfavorable views of both, more so of the Republicans. Overall, 33% of respondents have a favorable view of Republicans (55% unfavorable) and 37% have a favorable view of Democrats (52% unfavorable).

It now turns out two other Trump crooks nominated for cabinet positions, Betsy DeVos and Andrew Puzder, have had their confirmation hearings delayed for the same ethics questions as Ross. After Trump's press conference today, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) Executive Director Noah Bookbinder released a statement on behalf of his organization:

The only way for Donald Trump to avoid massive conflicts of interest is to sell his business outside the family and place the assets in a true blind trust, where he will not have any way of knowing or influencing how the assets are allocated. By refusing to divest, Trump is breaking decades of precedent, just as he did with his refusal to release his tax returns. He has failed to live up to the ethical standard of past presidents including Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and all others of the past 40 years.

He will continue to own his business, which will continue to have foreign interests. It is absurd to believe he will have no knowledge of his business, when he will continue to own it, and it will be run by his children. He claims that he will only know what he reads in newspapers, but newspapers report which foreign dignitaries are staying at his hotel. His businesses all have his name on them in giant gold letters. He will know what they are and what legislation, regulations, or actions will benefit or hurt them.

He’s not worried about conflicts of interest because the statutes don’t apply to the president. If that sounds familiar, it was the position Nixon took when he told David Frost ‘when the president does it, that means it is not illegal.’ Just because it’s not illegal, does not mean it is right or moral. Every decision he will make as president will be followed by the specter of doubt, and will be questioned as to whether his decision is in the best interest of the American people or the best interest of his bottom line. He will also face questions about whether he is violating the constitution by taking payments from foreign governments on a daily basis. Today was his first test as president. He failed.

After he was done speaking, Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH) didn't seem impressed. "It is clear from President-Elect Trump’s statement and answers today that he will not fully separate himself from his business transactions and potential conflicts of interest. He also has no intention of disclosing his financial interests, as past presidents have done. His response to these legitimate questions was simply 'trust me.' Our democracy and the American people deserve better... The legislation I have cosponsored would apply the ethical standards, norms, and precedents that have been developed over decades to our incoming administration, which refuses to follow them.  I urge Speaker Ryan to put these measures to a vote and pass them with the urgency these critical issues demand."



H.R. 371, the Presidential Conflicts of Interest Act, would require the President, Vice President, their spouses, and minor or dependent children to release their tax returns, divest from all assets that may generate conflicts of interest, and disclose all of their financial interests. It would also force the President-Elect to create a blind trust to manage, oversee, and process the sale and proceeds of his holdings. Currently, the President is exempt from conflicts of interest laws. H.R. 356, To establish the National Commission on Foreign Interference in the 2016 Election, would create a bipartisan commission to investigate and the Russian interference in the U.S. elections. It would aim to provide a full accounting of what happened, why, and how. And H.J.Res. 26 denies congressional consent for Trump to accept any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign state throughout the tenure of his Presidency. The idea of this resolution would is to grant Congress the power to deny transactions that violate the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause.

Nurturing The Swamp... Making It More Dangerous And Powerful

Feeling vaguely sickened by the parade of Wall Street predators Trump has recruited as a cabinet? Did you expect something different? Trump is a man who will be in violation of the Constitution immediately upon taking office since his business empire has a steady flow of money coming if from a myriad of foreign sources, many of which are connected to foreign governments or from individuals connected to foreign governments. That concern is discussed in the video above by Norman Eisen, a co-founder of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and the former U.S. Ambassador to the Czech Republic, and Richard Painter, George W. Bush's former Counsel and chief ethics lawyer, and it's very much worth watching.

Right now I'm more concerned with the parade of shady characters he's populating the highest reaches of government with, most of whom seem as unscrupulous and predatory as he has proven to be himself. Yesterday Michael Arria, writing for AlterNet, pointed out the irony of much of this trash coming into government precisely because Obama never prosecuted the crooks behind the financial crash that Bush left us with on his way out the door-- a financial crash that left much America staggering but further enriched the Wall Street bandits Trump is bringing into government-- the foxes who will be in charge of the hen houses. "Goldman Sachs," he wrote, "one of the major symbols of the crash, has enjoyed a mammoth influence on Washington for years, but its footprint is poised to grow even larger if a couple of notable Trump nominees are confirmed. Gary Cohn, the longtime COO of the finance company, will become director of the National Economic Council; Goldman partner Steven Mnuchin might become secretary of the treasury and former Goldman investment banker Steve Bannon has already become Trump's chief strategist and senior counselor."

While many chalk up President Obama's lack of action to business-as-usual in Washington, United States history features notable crackdowns after vast financial scandals. After the crash of 1929, the head of the New York Stock Exchange went to jail and the savings-and-loan scandals of the 1980s produced over 1,000 prosecutions. The reasons behind inaction certainly transcend Obama (who received more money from Goldman Sachs during his first presidential campaign than any other donor) and point to a deep, systemic problem. After spending a year talking to the players involved, Jesse Eisenger wrote about the lack of convictions for the New York Times Magazine in 2014:

Many assume that the federal authorities simply lacked the guts to go after powerful Wall Street bankers, but that obscures a far more complicated dynamic. During the past decade, the Justice Department suffered a series of corporate prosecutorial fiascos, which led to critical changes in how it approached white-collar crime. The department began to focus on reaching settlements rather than seeking prison sentences, which over time unintentionally deprived its ranks of the experience needed to win trials against the most formidable law firms.

The numbers certainly add up. According to a report on the Justice Department's own data, white-collar prosecutions are at a 20-year low. “The decline in federal white-collar crime prosecutions does not necessarily indicate there has been a decline in white-collar crime,” the report's authors point out, “Rather, it may reflect shifting enforcement policies by each of the administrations and the various agencies.”

Those shifting enforcement policies (the "critical changes" as Eisenger called them) are exacerbated by the revolving door between the financial industry and those taxed with policing it. In his 2011 Rolling Stone piece, "Why Isn't Wall Street in Jail?" Matt Taibbi shares a story from SEC investigator Gary Aguirre:

Last year, Aguirre noticed that a conference on financial law enforcement was scheduled to be held at the Hilton in New York on November 12th. The list of attendees included 1,500 or so of the country's leading lawyers who represent Wall Street, as well as some of the government's top cops from both the SEC and the Justice Department.

Criminal justice, as it pertains to the Goldmans and Morgan Stanleys of the world, is not adversarial combat, with cops and crooks duking it out in interrogation rooms and courthouses. Instead, it's a cocktail party between friends and colleagues who from month to month and year to year are constantly switching sides and trading hats.

Perhaps the best symbol of Aguirre's insight could be found with the former Attorney General himself. After leaving the Justice Department, Eric Holder rejoined his old law firm, Covington & Burling, which welcomes a number of clients Holder declined to prosecute.

Would someone like Steve Mnuchin even be available to nominate if Obama had made any kind of effort to change this culture? In a comprehensive New Republic profile on Mnuchin, David Dayen goes beyond some of the more well-known Mnuchin controversies (his career with Goldman Sachs, his connection to the Bernie Madoff scandal and his suspicious departure from a Hollywood production company that tanked) and zeroes in on Mnuchin's time as chairman of OneWest Bank, a noted foreclosure machine that regularly dispossessed the homes of senior citizens and people of color.

In a Nation piece that also details foreclosure frauds of Trump's secretary of commerce pick Wilbur Ross, Dayen explains how Mnuchin's bank purchased predatory lender IndyMac, along with its thousands of failing mortgages. Mnuchin cut a deal with the FDIC to protect the bank from losses, so the FDIC lost $13 billion on the foreclosed homes while OneWest turned $3 billion in profit. As Dayen describes it: 

What that meant for homeowners was they were rubble to be plowed so Mnuchin could profit. Borrowers got few options to modify loans, as OneWest dashed to foreclosure. The bank pursued all of the tricks of the era-- servicer-driven defaults (where servicing companies tell homeowners they must miss payments to get help, and when they do, they move to foreclose), dual tracking (when servicers negotiate modifications and pursue foreclosures at the same time), and more. Activists ended up on this guy’s lawn demanding that the foreclosures stop.

Politico recently reported that OneWest once foreclosed on the house of a 90-year-old Florida woman, Ossie Lofton, because of a 27-cent error. Lofton had taken out a reverse mortgage and a subsidiary of OneWest sent the woman a bill for $423.30. Lofton mailed the bank $423 and then a separate check for 3 cents, not realizing the actual difference was 30 cents. Donald Trump's treasury secretary nominee and his partners then filed for foreclosure on Lofton's house in 2014-- because of the missing 27 cents.

Trump's appointment of Gary Cohn will not require Senate approval, despite the fact he'll be the chief strategist in developing economic policy, and this is probably a good thing for the president-elect. A Senate confirmation would mean lawmakers would be allowed to bring up the two years leading up to the financial crash when Cohn was co-president of Goldman Sachs.

In 2009, McClatchy's Greg Gordon reported on those years and demonstrated how the "Goldman Sachs Group peddled more than $40 billion in securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages, but never told the buyers it was secretly betting that a sharp drop in U.S. housing prices would send the value of those securities plummeting."

To avoid a conflict of interest, Cohn will have to sell his shares at Goldman Sachs. Bloomberg reports that they're worth about $210 million and that he'll be able to defer any capital gains taxes from the sale.

In April of this year the Justice Department announced that Goldman Sachs would pay out over $5 billion in a settlement connected to its sale of residential mortgage backed securities, echoing Eisenger's point about the department looking to reach settlements rather than prison sentences. "This resolution holds Goldman Sachs accountable for its serious misconduct in falsely assuring investors that securities it sold were backed by sound mortgages, when it knew that they were full of mortgages that were likely to fail," declared the statement.

It seems evident that Goldman Sachs will be able to bounce back from this punishment.

In a post at Slate yesterday, Jamelle Bouie wrote about an easily-detected pattern in the Trumpanzee Cabinet choices. "To run the government," he wrote, "he has picked men and women who disdain the missions of their assigned agencies, oppose public goods, or conflate their own interests with that of the public. It’s less a team for governing the country than a mechanism for dismantling its key institutions. And as a cadre of tycoons, billionaires, and generals, Trump’s executive branch is a rebuke to the idea that government needs expertise in governing." And it is one conflicted assemblage of knaves, miscreants, reprobates... and even a mass murderer (who isn't even one of the generals). This is the least populist Cabinet in history despite Trump's empty campaign verbiage. Bouie called it "an ungovernment brought forth by reactionary hostility to the idea of the public, a throwback to the industrial oligarchy that eventually brought American democracy to its knees... Far from 'draining the swamp' of malign influence from billionaires and lobbyists, Trump has placed them in even greater positions of power and influence... a slap in the face to those voters who see Trump as a friend to their concerns, who believe they’ve been harmed by a government that privileges the wealthy over ordinary Americans."

For Treasury, Trump has Steven Mnuchin, an investment banker who made billions off of the housing crisis. For the Department of Labor, he has Andrew Puzder, a fast-food CEO who disdains the minimum wage and backs increased automation in low-wage fields. Robots “never take a vacation, they never show up late, there’s never a slip-and-fall, or an age, sex, or race discrimination case,” he once said. For the Department of Education, he has Betsy DeVos, a billionaire “school choice” supporter who gives millions to vouchers and evangelizes charter schools and private instruction. For the Department of Energy, he has former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who infamously wants to dismantle the agency-- when he can remember its name. For Health and Human Services, he has Georgia Rep. Tom Price, who opposes the Affordable Care Act and wants deep cuts in Medicare and Medicaid.

For the Environmental Protection Agency, he has Scott Pruitt, who describes himself as a “leading advocate” against the agency; and for the Department of Justice, he has Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, who opposes the Voting Rights Act and supports a rollback of federal protection for LGBT victims of hate crimes. For the Department of State, he has Rex Tillerson, CEO of Exxon Mobil, whose interests and wealth are tangled in a web of global relationships, including a close partnership with Russian President Vladimir Putin.