“The good news for Republicans is that swarms of national media and images of Nancy Pelosi still motivate their base. The bad news for Republicans is that they can’t count on this type of high turnout across the board in November 2018. In fact, it would be shocking if any House race drew a third of the $55 million spent on the GA-06 special election. And that means Democrats’ enthusiasm edge should be wider in most places than it was in GA-06. ” More …
Month: June 2017
GOP ‘Moderates’ Worry Gutting Medicaid During a Public-Health Crisis Might Have Some Downsides
“The GOP has a talent for ignoring the despair of the dis-empowered. But the opioid epidemic concentrated its suffering in white, rural communities that tend to vote Republican. And so, GOP candidates spent much of 2016 decrying Washington’s insufficient efforts to curb the crisis, and promising to do more to help, if voters would only put them in power… The pitch worked. Donald Trump won the presidency (in no small part) by outperforming expectations in regions devastated by opiods. Republicans won competitive Senate races in some of the country’s hardest-hit states. And all across America, rural districts hurt by the epidemic returned GOP incumbents to their House seats. The Republican Party then promptly used its unified control of government to push a health-care bill that cuts one of the nation’s top funding sources for addiction treatment by $834 billion.” More …
Did the Trump Organization Make Money from Eric Trump’s Cancer Charity?
“The not-so-charitable activities of the president’s own Donald J. Trump Foundation are, by now, well-documented. But a new report in Forbes suggests the foundation belonging to the president’s second son, Eric, might have been party to some questionable activities of its own.” More …
Trump’s First 100 Days Have Been a Moneymaking Success Story: He’s Getting What He Cares About
“Trump and his family appear to be making money hand over fist. It’s a spectacle the likes of which we’ve never seen in the United States, and while it may end in disaster for the Trumps someday, for now it shows no real sign of failure.” More …
Sea-Level Rise Poses a Rising Risk to U.S. Shores
“A recent scientific report forecasts that waters could swell as much as seven feet by 2100.” More …
Private Toll Operators Salivate Over Donald Trump’s Infrastructure Plan
“Investors are hoping to seize upon the $1 trillion infrastructure plan proposed by President Donald Trump to transform the nation’s highways, bridges, and tunnels into assets they can monetize by adding tolls and other user fees. The Trump infrastructure plan is centered on the idea of ‘asset recycling,’ which refers to the process of securing new infrastructure spending by leasing the operations of existing public property to private operators.” More …
Infrastructure: Why Trump’s Public-Private Partnership Model Is Good for Wall Street but Bad for America
“Trump’s plan to rebuild America relies heavily on the use of public-private partnerships to finance infrastructure projects with private equity capital. Such financing, whether through private equity or traditional tax-exempt municipal bonds, is repaid by ordinary citizens through a combination of taxes and user fees. Private equity financing is markedly more expensive than traditional government financing, however – by as much as three to six times. Considering the scale of infrastructure development under consideration, that difference could be enormous.” More …
Tourism to the U.S. Has Been in Decline Since Trump Took Office
“Travel to the United States has dropped as much as 16 percent in the months since President Donald Trump took office — and there’s no sign of recovery, according to a new study.” More …
Saudis Spent $270K at Trump Hotel In Lobbying Campaign Against 9/11 Bill
“The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has paid Trump International Hotel nearly $270,000 through its Washington, D.C. lobbying firm over the past several months, new foreign lobbying disclosure filings show. The payments, from Qorvis MSLGroup, were made for hotel rooms and catering services for dozens of U.S. veterans who the lobbying firm recruited as part of an influence campaign aimed at watering down legislation that could put Saudi Arabia on the hook financially for the 9/11 attacks.” More …
Is the Census Heading for a Crisis?
“The triple gap in Census Bureau leadership, along with a funding shortfall that has already forced the cancellation of multiple field tests, leaves observers worried about an impending crisis in the biggest civic project that Washington regularly undertakes—a population count that has profound effects on American business and politics.” More …