Fearing a "public relations nightmare," Trump's White House and the Environmental Protection Agency, under the reign of Scott Pruitt, blocked the release of a major water contamination story. Journalists, members of Congress, environmental and public health advocates, and water experts are all calling on the Trump administration to "immediately" release the report.
Government exists to protect its citizens and improve their lives. It does not exist to serve corporations, unless of course, Republicans are in power.
The House on Tuesday [May 8th] passed a measure to roll back guidance on auto lending issued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The guidance, issued in 2013, was intended to limit discriminatory practices in the auto loan business.
Trump's swamp is full of appointees we will never hear anything about who are doing awful things everyday to harm our nation, our world, and our future. They do so on behalf of an evil ideology fed by money received from corporate interests. Sometimes figuring this out is not difficult - they actually publicly brag about what they're doing!
Ajit Pai, the FCC Chairman who is owned by the telecom and cable industry, is pushing closer to grant their wishes. Named by Trump in January 2017, Pai has been working every day since then to repeal rules that classify internet service as a utility. Under the Pai plan, high-speed internet service will no longer be treated like a public utility with strict rules, as it is now. Instead, he said, the industry "should largely be left to police itself.”
Democrats in the Senate are fighting back and have a shot to win.
Congressional Republicans have fought unrelentingly for years to weaken the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, put into place under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010. The purpose of the CFPB is to promote fairness and transparency for mortgages, credit cards, and other consumer financial products and services. The CFPB was created to provide a single point of accountability for enforcing federal consumer financial laws and protecting consumers in the financial marketplace.
UPDATE 7/5/18: Wheeler is now the acting head of the EPA following Pruitt's resignation.
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Scott Pruitt now has a #2 at the EPA that might be as bad as him. When our loud resistance and smart dissent pushes Pruitt out of power, we now have Andrew Wheeler to worry about destroying our globe.
The Senate confirmed Andrew Wheeler to be the No. 2 official at the Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday [April 12th].... The vote was 53-45.
As we have said dozens of times, Scott Pruitt is in charge of the Environmental Protection Agency yet he would love nothing more than to erase it from existence. He's living out his wildest fantasy with this sadistic opportunity to destroy it from the inside while exhibiting corruption at a level not previously imaginable. In Pruitt's mind, nothing, even the future our the one planet we have, should stand in the way of corporations doing whatever they want to maximize profits.
If there's one thing we can count on from Trump and his flunkies, it's that they will repeatedly staff departments with people who hate the very existence of the group they're nominated or appointed to lead. The examples are endless and infuriating. The one described herein is among the worst.
Susan Combs, a former Texas state official who compared proposed endangered species listings to “incoming Scud missiles” and continued to fight the Endangered Species Act after she left government, now has a role in overseeing federal wildlife policy.
As usual but to unimaginable extremes, Republicans and Trump and working daily on behalf of corporate interests instead of the American workers. THIS IS THE SWAMP. Hundreds of recent lobbyists on corporate payrolls are now running our government agencies that exist to work ON OUR BEHALF.
Five expert committees advised the federal government on ways to improve workplace safety and enhance whistleblower protections. Under Trump, their work has stopped and their recommendations are now stalled.
Ryan Zinke, the abomination of a Secretary of Interior, has created a new advisory board to rewrite federal rules for importing the carcasses of dead animals killed by trophy hunters. That board is filled with trophy hunters themselves and Trump's friends and family.
A new U.S. advisory board created to help rewrite federal rules for importing the heads and hides of African elephants, lions and rhinos is stacked with trophy hunters, including some members with direct ties to Trump and his family.