2033, Saudi Arabia and Iran began to purchase modern warplanes, artillery, and tanks from China and Russia. The Saudis ended its long-running cooperation and training with the United States Air Force and Army National Guard and began training pilots in China, as did Iran. China secretly sold about fifty nuclear weapons and mid-range missiles to Saudi Arabia. In early 2034, the two countries approached Pakistan to join their coalition. Afterwards, Pakistani scientists were working in Saudi Arabia with Iranians to expand the group’s nuclear capability. These planning activities continued through the beginning of 2035. Israel picked up some indicators of these efforts, but American intelligence had few human assets and had not picked up any of these activities. The Americans persuaded the Israelis that what they saw were innocent activities or coincidences.
On January 31, 2034, the Army Corps of Engineers reported that the Powers Border Wall was now 70% complete. Economic reports released in February showed that the American economy was slowly declining in many metrics. The Senate was routinely confirming nominees for vacancies in federal courts, most of the names approved by the President as recommended by his Chief Policy Officer, Stephen Schmidt.
In March 2034, the secret negotiations with Japan and Korea continued. Both countries told the United States that they had no desire to possess nuclear weapons, were prepared to determine various levels of security that the United States desired to provide, and negotiate how much that would cost. Talks continued.
BATTLES WITH THE COURTS (APRIL - OCTOBER 2034)
Various organizations had filed tens of thousands of legal suits in federal district courts to challenge the new Powers laws and regulations, or his usage of (known) executive orders. Several were declared unconstitutional by district courts, but then reversed at either the appeals court level or at the Supreme Court.
But sometimes, the Supreme Court would agree with lower court findings and declare something unconstitutional. Three key findings by the United States Supreme Court were to invalidate the law allowing libel and defamation suits against the press, the executive order to put the United States back on the gold standard, and the executive orders and laws rolling back regulations and rules of the Clean Air and Water Acts.
We in 2178 find it strange that there were no court challenges on the banning of Muslims from immigration and visas; the surveillance of Muslims, blacks, and other groups; and the usage of military commissions to try terrorists. This is probably due to the usage of security classifications by the Powers Administration to prevent or limit public knowledge of these abuses. Looking back, the courts were anemic in challenging many acts of the President or Congress during this time period; that would be later declared unconstitutional in later years or suspended by the next administration. We will say that the number of legal cases occurring were unprecedented and consumed millions of dollars and hours by the Department of Justice and other federal agencies, and much of the President’s and Vice President’s time.
On April 28, 2034, the Army Corps of Engineers reported that the Powers Border Wall was now 80% complete. The Border Patrol reported the detention of border crossers in the dozens each month from [its claims] previous numbers in the thousands. We know that illegal border crossings had severely declined during the Eric Trump Administration.
On May 12th, economic reports were issued citing the transportation infrastructure projects with creating over 215,000 new jobs and adding $35 billion into the economy. However, the American economy had suffered over the last year due to higher federal deficits, lowered trade, a 7% unemployment rate, lower wages, a decline in manufacturing productivity, a scarcity of skilled labor that had the required technical skills, and a 15% increase in those living in poverty. Employers were pleading with the Administration and Congress to reverse the support in higher and technical education. The coal industry was almost dead except for mining to support specialty steel making. Most coal power plants were receiving fuel from coal shipped from other countries, because it was much cheaper.
During May, there were suspicious fires started against black churches, mosques, Native American community colleges, and synagogues. The FBI had leads on several small white nationalist groups, but then the Department of Justice deputies requested FBI leaders to reprioritize resources to the massive surveillance activities underway. An article in April 2035 by the Washington Post estimated over two thousand attacks in 2034 on non-white places of worship or education institutions, with many of the attacks supported or instigated by secret white nationalist groups, based upon statements on their websites.
Three young men, journalism majors at Boston University, noticed this article and one in 2033 from The New York Times. Finishing their studies and graduating without full-time jobs, they began researching on the activities of the white nationalists and similar groups suspected of being involved in attacks on minorities. They were stringers to separate newspapers in their home cities, but kept in touch after graduation. All three were classic Aryan youth, blonde, blue eyes, around six-foot tall. During an online conversation in late 2035, someone suggested they quietly and covertly infiltrate separate nationalist groups to find out what was going on. It took Smith, Jones, and Brown, their alias they reported on, as we never found out who they really were, about six months to over a year to be fully vetted with the nationalist groups they joined. They kept secret notes of their activities, day by day, while remaining undercover until May 2037 when they published their stories.
On July 31, 2034, the Army Corps of Engineers reported that the Powers Border Wall was now 90% complete. As the Mexican government refused to pay for the wall, this expenditure merely added dollars to the national debt, except for the few import duties paid for Mexican goods.
In August 2034, the United States provided information on three levels of security and what each level would cost each country, through its negotiators in secret talks on the security of Japan and Korea. Talks continued, with the countries asking for details on the proposed levels of security.
On September 28, 2034, the Army Corps of Engineers reported that the Powers Border Wall was now 95% complete. The Department of Transportation reported that it had issued grants for 85% of the funding to all states, and that these generated almost 400,000 jobs and added $65 billion to the economy. Unemployment had jumped to 9%, and wages continued to stagnate. The last coal mine in the United States closed and over 150 coal power plants shut down. The electric power industry had grown with natural gas powered plants plus wind and solar farms, so there was still adequate power supplies.
The Department of State announced that it had issued 2 million visas and allowed 25,000 legal immigrants into the United States during the last fiscal year. This compares to almost 15 million visas and two million legal immigrants in 2032. The Department of Justice reported that the number of sanctuary cities had declined from 61 in 2030 to six in 2034 (San Francisco, Los Angeles, Berkeley, San Jose, Santa Anna, and Oakland, all in California).
On October 15th, a tropical storm hit New Orleans with minor damage, and then traveled up the Mississippi River valley towards Minnesota before moving eastward. Four days later, cities in Iowa were hit by flooding, killing 17 and causing $400 million in damages.
PERSONNEL REPLACEMENTS AND ANOTHER NUCLEAR WAR (NOVEMBER 2034 - APRIL 2035)
President Powers was very happy with the elections of November 8, 2034. Because of the large number of Progressive Senators running for office, the Conservatives were able to gain four seats while losing only one, thus making the United States Senate’s Conservative majority 53-47. The House of Representatives lost a net of two seats, though the Conservatives still had a majority of 222-213. The number of Alt-Right supported candidates elected expanded in the House to 172.
The Vice President was somewhat happy, as this would make it easier to pursue legislation in Congress. But he was hearing from many of the Cabinet Secretaries of their unhappiness. Some were frustrated by leading a large government bureaucracy and
the lack of urgency in leadership and management ranks, as most of them came from the business world. Others were not happy with some of their Alt-Right leading deputies that Stephen Schmidt had thrust on them, as they had been pursuing policies that disenfranchised minorities. Others were suffering from the low government salaries ($415,700) and the restrictive conflict of interest rules that technically prevented them from financially benefiting from being in government, though several media reports suggested that most had little regard for conflicts of interest.
But the major reason was the President himself, who took credit for literally every success made by anyone in his administration, and promptly bragged publicly of how he and only he could get things done. Mitchell had spoken to the President on this issue, but Powers blew him off in thinking that he could always get others to fill his Cabinet. The Vice President had warned for over a year that some Secretaries would likely be leaving soon, as had the Secretary for Health and Human Services (Dr. Steve Johnson was actually fired by Powers as the presidential papers revealed years later) after the defeat of the privatization efforts for Social