This has certainly been a week for passengers flying the “friendly skies”. More.
Trump’s Ethics Lobbying Ban Up in Smoke; Mr. Peacock Flies Coop for Business Roundtable
“Senior White House budget adviser Marcus Peacock is leaving President Donald Trump’s administration to become the second in command at a high-profile business lobby group in Washington that’s looking to increase its influence…When he joined the Trump administration, Peacock signed an ethics pledge required by the president that would’ve banned him from lobbying his former office for five years. The White House granted him a waiver from that commitment.” More,,,
Carter Page: ‘Something may have come up in a conversation’ with Russians About Lifting US Sanctions
“Carter Page, a foreign policy adviser to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, said that when he was in Moscow last summer, ‘something may have come up in a conversation’ with Russians about lifting U.S. sanctions. Page traveled to the Russian capital in July 2016 to give a speech at the New Economic School.” More.
FBI Monitored Former Trump Campaign Adviser Carter Page on Russia
“The FBI obtained a warrant to monitor President Donald Trump’s former campaign adviser, Carter Page, last summer on suspicions he knowingly engaged in clandestine intelligence activities on behalf of Moscow.” More.
AP FACT CHECK: Trump Again Out of His Lane on Auto Jobs
“President Donald Trump claimed direct credit for Toyota’s new investment in a Kentucky plant, calling it new evidence of economic improvement in a White House discussion with CEOs. The company says the move was planned long before Trump even announced he was running for president.” More.
Trump’s EPA Scott Pruitt Requests 24/7 Security Detail Amid Massive Budget Cuts
“The Trump administration has proposed whacking the budget of the Environmental Protection Agency by nearly a third, eliminating thousands of employees and scrapping dozens of programs, including climate-change research and cleanup efforts in the Great Lakes and Chesapeake Bay. But a detailed budget plan includes a request to add positions within the agency’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance ‘to provide 24/7 security detail’ for EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt.” More.
U.S. Cost of Betsy DeVos’s Security Detail — Nearly $8 million Over 8 Months
“Federal marshals are protecting Education Secretary Betsy DeVos at a cost to her agency of nearly $8 million over nearly eight months, according to the U.S. Marshals Service.” More.
Betsy DeVos Undoes Student Loan Protections
“Trump’s education secretary wants to limit costs at a time when more than 1 million Americans are annually defaulting.” More.
Wag the Dog: Trump Lavished with Media and Bipartisan Praise for Bombing Syria
“In every type of government, nothing unites people behind the leader more quickly, reflexively or reliably than war. Donald Trump now sees how true that is, as the same establishment leaders in U.S. politics and media who have spent months denouncing him as a mentally unstable and inept authoritarian and unprecedented threat to democracy are standing and applauding him as he launches bombs at Syrian government targets.” More.
Trump Administration Moving Quickly to Build Up Nationwide Deportation Force
“The Trump administration is quickly identifying ways to assemble the nationwide deportation force that President Trump promised on the campaign trail as he railed against the dangers posed by illegal immigration.” More.