Horsemen of the Trumpocalypse

  The Secretary of Gentrification: The Hill reported November 15, 2016, that “Carson [is] not interested in serving in Trump administration.” The Los Angeles Times announced the same day that “Former presidential candidate Ben Carson says he won’t join Trump’s Cabinet because he has no government experience.” CNN reported November 12, 2015, that “Trump likens Carson’s ‘pathology’ to that of a child molester.” Mike Huckabee’s claim that Carson had lived in public housing was clarified on December 7, 2016, with a report headlined “Ben Carson didn’t live in public housing.” Trevor Noah reflected on Carson’s Senate testimony on the January 12, 2017, edition of Comedy Central’s The Daily Show. The always brilliant professor Peter Dreier, who has written extensively about HUD and housing issues, penned a very fine piece for the American Prospect: “Why Trump Picked Ben Carson as HUD Secretary: Donald Trump’s “edifice complex” explains his ill-­advised choice of the completely inexperienced Ben Carson to head the Department of Housing and Urban Development.” The Washington Post assessment, published December 5, 2016, was “HUD job to pit Carson ideology against long-standing housing policy.” The National Low Income Housing Coalition issued its “Statement from Diane Yentel, President and CEO of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, on President-elect Trump’s Appointment of Ben Carson to Lead the Department of Housing and Urban Development” on November 23, 2016. Dr. Ben Carson wrote about housing policy in a July 23, 2016, piece for the Washington Times: “Experimenting with failed socialism again: Obama’s new housing rules try to accomplish what busing could not.” The Atlantic’s Alana Semuels explored the same issues more deeply, and more sensitively, in her November 29, 2016, article, “The Future of Housing Segregation Under Trump: The president-elect is skeptical about many of the Obama administration’s attempts to give minorities access to better homes.” Seema Agnani wrote about “The President as Developer-in-Chief” on January 13, 2017, for ROOFLINES, the Shelterforce blog. Toshio Meronek has written ably about poverty issues and the piece “Privatizing Public Housing: The ‘Genocide of Poor People,’” published March 13, 2015, by Truthout is just one example of this. Right to the City’s “#GentrifierInChief” assessment appeared December 7, 2016, on Medium. Andrea Shapiro wrote about HUD and housing issues in a December 2016 essay, “Housing Under Trump: Bizarre and Scary,” that appeared on the Metropolitan Council on Housing website: http://metcouncilonhousing.org.

  The Oopsing of Nuclear Waste Disposal: The Washington Post report from November 10, 2011, summed things up: “Rick Perry stumbles badly in Republican presidential debate.” The video is worth a another viewing (ABC News, November 9, 2011, “Rick Perry’s Debate Lapse: ‘Oops’—Can’t Remember Department of Energy”): http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2011/11/rick-perrys-debate-lapse

  -oops-cant-remember-department-of-energy/. The Texas Observer has been all over the nuclear disposal story, with pieces like “Is Rick Perry Cheerleading for a Nuclear Trans-Texas Corridor?” (April 4, 2014) and “Get Ready, America: Rick Perry’s Environmental and Energy Record Is Awful: During his 14 years as governor, Perry attempted to fast-track permits for 11 coal plants and supported building a radioactive waste facility in West Texas” (December 14, 2016). The New York Times picked up on the nuclear waste debate in a January 18, 2017, piece: “‘Learning Curve’ as Rick Perry Pursues a Job He Initially Misunderstood.” You’ll find lots about nuclear waste at www.energy.gov and in DOE assessments like “The Path Forward for Nuclear Waste Disposal” (March 24, 2015). The March 2, 2017, “Sierra Club Statement on Rick Perry’s Department of Energy Confirmation” does a good job of detailing concerns about Perry’s new role, as does the Friends of the Earth statement from the same day: “Perry unfit to serve as Secretary of Energy.” The Texas Tribune site featured the April 28, 2016, Medill News Service story by Marisa Endicott: “West Texas Site Applies for Nuke Waste License: The company operating a low-level nuclear waste dump in West Texas on Thursday applied for a license to begin accepting highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel.” A Public Citizen statement, “License Application for Dangerous West Texas High-Level Radioactive Waste Dump Is Now Open for Public Input,” was issued January 30, 2017.

  The Secretary of Corporate Agribusiness: The Pew Research Center produced a savvy report on the rural vote, “Behind Trump’s win in rural white America: Women joined men in backing him,” which was released November 17, 2016. The Vox piece, by Matthew Yglesias, appeared March 8, 2017, as “The weird mystery of the Trump administration’s agriculture secretary vacancy: Sonny Perdue’s stalled confirmation, not explained because nobody knows what’s happening.” The New York Times article on the Perdue selection appeared January 18, 2017, as “Sonny Perdue Is Trump’s Choice for Agriculture Secretary.” Modern Farmer reviewed the Perdue nomination in a January 19, 2017, story: “Former Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue nominated as USDA Secretary.” The January 24, 2017, Organic Consumers Association statement was headlined “Trump’s Pick for Ag Secretary Has ‘Bigly’ Ties to Big Ag and Big Food.” The Food Policy Action assessment of January 18, 2017, was issued as “FPA Statement on the Sonny Perdue USDA Secretary Announcement.” Perdue’s May 8, 2014, article for National Review grumbled about how “Conservatives are acting like liberals.” ThinkProgress reported on January 2, 2017, that “Trump could name Agriculture Secretary whose drought strategy was to pray for rain: Former GA Gov. Sonny Perdue is the latest white male with Confederate sympathies to be considered for a cabinet slot.” The Environmental Working Group report “Trump’s Agricultural Nominee Brings the Swamp to Washington” was released March 8, 2017. The New York Times reported on it that day in a front-page story headlined “Ethics Questions Dogged Agriculture Nominee as Georgia Governor.” The Pesticide Action Network statement of the Perdue pick, issued January 19, 2017, declared “Nominee for Secretary of Agriculture is the wrong choice for farmers.” The Grub Street report on Perdue, published January 23, 2017, listed “5 Reasons Why Food Experts Are Worried About Trump’s New Agriculture Secretary.” Kelsey Gee, Jacob Bunge and Jesse Newman wrote a savvy Wall Street Journal report, published January 19, 2017, that was headlined “Agriculture Secretary Nominee Sonny Perdue Known for Promoting Trade: Former Georgia governor has fans in Farm Belt and agribusiness.” William Jennings Bryan delivered his “Cross of Gold” speech to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago on July 9, 1896. Despite what Steve Bannon tries to suggest, it proposed a very different populism from that of Donald Trump.

  The Weed Whacker: I wrote and talked a lot about Trump and the media during the 2016 campaign, and I always tried to keep focused on the structural issues that helped to create an opening for Trump. My March 10, 2016, piece for the Nation, “How We Got Trumped by the Media: They’re so obsessed with “The Donald” that they can barely be bothered to cover the other candidates, much less the important issues,” summed up a lot of my thinking, as did a March 16, 2016, appearance I did on Democracy Now! that was pitched as “Donald Trump & His Enablers: John Nichols Calls Out Trump-Obsessed Media for Wall-to-Wall Coverage.” I share many of the concerns expressed by former FCC commissioner Michael Copps in a piece he wrote March 22 titled “Deconstruction”; it can be found at www.commoncause.org. The New York Times, on February 5, 2017, did a piece: “Trump’s F.C.C. Pick Quickly Targets Net Neutrality Rules.” It was a good, smart take. But the key to understanding Trump’s FCC chair, Ajit Pai, is that he has a broadly pro-corporate agenda that extends well beyond high-profile issues such as net neutrality and media cross-ownership. That’s why I appreciate the serious assessments of all the areas that Pai had meddled in. Free Press, a group I have been involved with since its launch, has I believe done a very good job in examining the broad spectrum of issues. I commend a number of assessments by Free Press staffers and allies, including Dana Floberg’s “New FCC Chairman Ajit Pai Is Off to an Orwellian Start,” which appeared February 7, 2017, and Tim Karr’s “The President’s Attack on Public Broadcasting Puts Him at Odds with the American People,”
from March 16, 2017. Joseph Torres, the senior external affairs director for Free Press, and Malkia Cyril, the executive director of the Center for Media Justice and the co-founder of the Media Action Grassroots Network, wrote an important piece on March 16, 2017: “The Resistance Must Be Digitized.” My piece on Trump’s proposed defunding of public broadcasting, “Trump’s Plan to Eliminate Public Broadcasting Would Hurt Listeners in Trump Country: Stations that serve rural areas neglected by corporate media would lose their funding,” appeared in the Nation on March 16, 2017. There is resistance within the FCC. For a sense of it, read the Variety piece “FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn Blasts Chairman Ajit Pai Over ‘Friday News Dump,’” which appeared February 3, 2017. I wrote about chairman Pai’s assault on net neutrality in the Nation in a piece headlined “Trump’s FCC Has Begun Its Attack on Net Neutrality,” which appeared April 26, 2017. My colleague and friend Victor Pickard is also writing ably on these issues; check out his May 5, 2017, Nation piece: “It’s Not Too Late to Save Net Neutrality From a Captured FCC.” For the latest on the struggle, visit www.freepress.net.

  The Foreclosure King: The January 19, 2017, New York Times piece pretty much says it all: “Steven Mnuchin, Treasury Nominee, Failed to Disclose $100 Million in Assets.” Oregon senator Ron Wyden was the hero of the hearings on Mnuchin, and the Los Angeles Times report from January 19, 2017, “Sen. Wyden hammers Mnuchin, saying it’s ‘a real stretch’ he’d work for all Americans as Treasury secretary,” gives a powerful sense of why Wyden was so impassioned. The Washington Post report from November 30, 2016, “Trump’s Treasury pick Steven Mnuchin is behind some of Hollywood’s biggest movies,” provides a lot of the Mnuchin backstory. Time did a good report on Mnuchin as the “Foreclosure King” on January 19, 2017: “Here’s Why Treasury Nominee Steve Mnuchin Has Been Called the ‘Foreclosure King.’” The Campaign for Accountability issued its statement on Mnuchin January 6, 2017: “CfA Calls on Federal Authorities to Investigate Steven Mnuchin’s OneWest Bank for Fraud.” ProPublica did an outstanding report, which was published December 27, 2016, with the headline “Trump’s Treasury Pick Excelled at Kicking Elderly People Out of Their Homes: When Steven Mnuchin ran OneWest, the bank aggressively and in some cases, wrongly, foreclosed on elderly homeowners with reverse mortgages. The bank had a disproportionate share of such foreclosures.” The National Consumer Law Center’s “Statement Regarding Nomination of Mnuchin as U.S. Treasury Secretary” was issued November 30, 2016. The California Reinvestment Coalition’s (CRC) strong statement, “CRC Responds to GOP Senators Ramming Through Steve Mnuchin’s Nomination This Morning,” was issued February 2, 2017. More CRC statements on Mnuchin are at http://www.calreinvest.org/news. The Columbus Dispatch report “Trump treasury pick Mnuchin misled Senate on foreclosures, Ohio cases show,” published January 29, 2017, is an example of investigative reporting at its best. Reporters Alan Johnson and Jill Riepenhoff did exemplary work, as did Columbus Dispatch-Washington Bureau writer Jessica Wehrman with her February 4, 2017, piece, “Mnuchin’s denials don’t match record.” The Dispatch’s highlighting of the concerns of former Ohio attorney general Marc Dann regarding threats to banking reforms was especially valuable. The New York Times wrote about the Trump team’s targeting of reforms in a smart, important November 30, 2016, article: “Trump’s Economic Cabinet Picks Signal Embrace of Wall St. Elite.”

  The Fox Guarding the Henhouse: Public Citizen has been in the forefront of the effort to focus attention on Jay Clayton’s corporate connections. See its Clayton profile at http://corporatecabinet.org/. As usual, Matt Taibbi got to the heart of the matter with his January 5, 2017, Rolling Stone piece: “Trump Nominee Jay Clayton Will Be the Most Conflicted SEC Chair Ever: America’s incoming top cop on finance is literally married to industry.” The “Brown Statement on ­President-Elect Trump’s SEC Nominee Jay Clayton,” issued by Senator Sherrod Brown on January 4, 2017, offers an example of how a watchdog senator approaches an unacceptable nominee. Senator Elizabeth Warren’s website features video of her questioning Clayton at: https://www.warren.senate.gov/?p=video&id=1551. It is definitely worth watching. Fox Business reported March 23, 2017, that “Trump’s SEC Pick Clayton Gets Warren Tongue Lashing.” There’s also a fine Politico report on Warren and Senator Bernie Sanders going after Clayton, “Warren, Sanders seize on SEC nominee to attack Trump,” which was published March 22, 2017.

  The Government Sachs Swamp: The Economist released the transcript of its interview with President Trump on May 11, 2017. New York magazine assessed the fiasco with a Jonathan Chait piece published the same day: “Donald Trump Tries to Explain Economics to The Economist. Hilarity Ensues.” To learn more about the economic thinking of John Maynard Keynes, which is something Donald Trump really ought to do, consider Keynes’s 1936 book The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money. And check out Paul Krugman’s June 6, 2015, New York Times comment: “Why Am I A Keynesian?” Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren has worked hard to focus attention on the Trump administration’s Goldman Sachs connections; CNN did a good report, “Elizabeth Warren probes Goldman Sachs’ ties to Trump White House,” on February 10, 2017. MarketWatch toted up the Goldman Sachs nominee in a February 13, 2017, report: “Another Goldman Sachs veteran may join the Trump White House, report says.” The Forward’s savvy take, “Gary Cohn Leads White House ‘New Yorker’ Wing Against Team Bannon,” was published March 21, 2017. The inimitable William Greider reported March 17, 2017, for the Nation that “Trump Is Fighting a New Trade War—and This One Is Intramural: A nasty White House battle has broken out between right-wing nationalists and globalist financiers.” On March 10, 2017, Zero Hedge ran the report “‘Civil War’ Breaks Out at White House over Trade… And Goldman Is Winning.” It concluded with the line “In retrospect, those who said Trump will ultimately do Wall Street’s bidding, may have been correct all along.”

  Afterword

  The Jefferson quote is from his letter to John Taylor (June 4, 1798) after the passage of the Alien and Sedition Acts, which is found in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1892). I have covered a number of Canadian campaigns and wrote a good deal about Justin Trudeau’s campaign and formation of a government for the Nation. His book Common Ground (HarperCollins, 2015) gives a good sense of Trudeau’s thinking on many issues. The CBC report “Justin Trudeau begins his bold experiment in ‘government by cabinet,’” by Chris Hall, appeared November 5, 2015. Regarding his centralization of power, Trump angrily rejected the premise of a Saturday Night Live skit that portrayed him as disengaged: “I call my own shots, largely based on an accumulation of data, and everyone knows it,” he tweeted. “Some fake news media, in order to marginalize, lies!” More details about Sebastian Gorka’s Vitézi Rend tie can he found in Lily Bayer’s and Larry Cohler-­Esses’s “What Is Vitézi Rend, The Ally of The Nazis That Sebastian Gorka ‘Joined,’” in the Forward, March 16, 2017. The Saturday Night Live Grim Reaper skit was aired February 4, 2017. The references to Betsy DeVos and Tom Price relate to their long-term advocacy for changes in education and health care policy, especially DeVos’s work with various “choice” groups she has funded. The exchange between Leahy and Gorsuch took place during the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on March 21. A good example of Ralph Nader’s advocacy for a different approach to forming cabinets can be found in Crashing the Party: Taking on the Corporate Government in an Age of Surrender (St. Martin’s Press, 2002). An updated version of Rebecca Solnit’s great book on activist engagement, protest and resistance, Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities, was published by Haymarket Books in 2016. Read everything Rebecca Solnit writes!

  Index

  Aaron, Craig, 301

  Abedin, Huma, 125–127

  abortion rights, 117–122

  Abramowitz, Michael, 141

  abuse of power, 7–8

  Access Hollywood tape, 29, 175

  Ackermann, Josef, 133

  Acosta, Alexander, 199–204

/>   background, 200

  intervention in Ohio’s challenge statute law, 200–202

  responsibilities of secretary of labor, 203–204