More Than 7 Million Jobs Created Since The Election
In January of 2020, there were about 152 million nonfarm jobs in the country about seven million more than existed in January of 2017, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But the number of jobs has been growing since 2010. In fact, the country gained more jobs about eight million between 2014 and 2017, the last years of the Obama administration. And since the pandemic began, between 10 million and 20 million jobs have been lost.
‘putting Democracy To The Test’
Kathryn Brownell is a history professor at Purdue University, focusing on the relationships between media, politics, and popular culture, with an emphasis on the American presidency.
What’s Trump’s key legacy?
Broadly speaking: Donald Trump, and his enablers in the Republican Party and conservative media, have put American democracy to the test in an unprecedented way. As a historian who studies the intersection of media and the presidency, it is truly striking the ways in which he has convinced millions of people that his fabricated version of events is true.
What happened on 6 January at the US Capitol is a culmination of over four years during which President Trump actively advanced misinformation.
Just as Watergate and the impeachment inquiry dominated historical interpretations of Richard Nixon’s legacy for decades, I do think that this particular post-election moment will be at the forefront of historical assessments of his presidency.
What else stands out to you?
Kellyanne Conway’s first introduction of the notion of “alternative facts” just days into the Trump administration when disputing the size of the inaugural crowds between Trump and Barack Obama.
Trump harnessed the power of social media and blurred the lines between entertainment and politics in ways that allowed him to bypass critics and connect directly to his supporters in an unfiltered way.
Us Election : Has Trump Delivered On His Promises
It’s been four years since Donald Trump made a string of promises during his long 2016 campaign to be the 45th president of the United States. Four years later, his supporters often cite “promises made, promises kept” as a reason why they’re backing him again.
Many of them made headlines – from banning all Muslims entering the US, to building a border wall paid for by Mexico.
But others went a little under the radar, like his pledge to eliminate the national debt.
So how has he done in keeping his promises?
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These Are The 3 Levels Of Classification The Government Uses To Protect Information
From CNN’s Katie Lobosco
The US government has a formal system of protecting information that, if disclosed, could hurt national security.
The system can apply to documents regarding intelligence activities, foreign relations, military plans and programs for safeguarding nuclear materials, for example. By classifying information, the government restricts who can see the documents and where he or she can see them.
The Justice Department recently removed some classified documents from former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence while executing a search warrant for possible violations of the Espionage Act and other crimes.
There are three basic levels of classification, based on the damage that could be done to national security if the information was leaked:
Top Secret: This is the highest level of classification. Information is classified as Top Secret if it “reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security,” according to a 2009 executive order that describes the classification system.
A subset of Top Secret documents known as SCI, or sensitive compartmented information, is reserved for certain information derived from intelligence sources. Access to an SCI document can be even further restricted to a smaller group of people with specific security clearances.
Some of the materials recovered from Trump’s Florida home were marked as Top Secret SCI.
Learn more about the classification system here.
Some Documents Taken From Mar
Joshua Skule, a former FBI executive assistant director of intelligence, told CNN there is a hierarchy of security levels when it comes to how documents are classified by the government, with one of the highest classification being “top secret/SCI.” SCI stands for Sensitive Compartmented Information.
The FBI recovered 11 sets of classified documents from its search of Mar-a-Lago earlier this week, including some materials marked with that top secret/SCI” distinction, according to documents from the search warrant that were released Friday.
Skule said top secret/SCI is one of the nation’s most highly sensitive material.
“These could be code-worded documents as well which provides an additional level of protection and frankly, some of those programs are very selective in the number of people that can be read on to them,” he told CNN’s Victor Blackwell.
Other classification levels include “secret” meaning the information may cause “serious damage to national security” and “confidential,” both which gauge national security concern, retired Lt. General Mark Hertling told CNN, adding classifications are defined by legal definitions.
He said “top secret/SCI” is restricted to not only people who have top secret clearance, but also a “need-to-know of certain details.”
The warrant receipt didnt detail what these classified documents were about.
CNN’s Marshall Cohen and Katelyn Polantz contributed reporting to this post.
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Fair And Reciprocal Trade
Secured historic trade deals to defend American workers.
Took strong actions to confront unfair trade practices and put America First.
- Imposed tariffs on hundreds of billions worth of Chinese goods to protect American jobs and stop Chinas abuses under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 and Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974.
- Directed an all-of-government effort to halt and punish efforts by the Communist Party of China to steal and profit from American innovations and intellectual property.
- Imposed tariffs on foreign aluminum and foreign steel to protect our vital industries and support our national security.
- Approved tariffs on $1.8 billion in imports of washing machines and $8.5 billion in imports of solar panels.
- Blocked illegal timber imports from Peru.
- Took action against France for its digital services tax that unfairly targets American technology companies.
- Launched investigations into digital services taxes that have been proposed or adopted by 10 other countries.
Historic support for American farmers.
Colossal Rebuilding Of The Military
Rebuilt the military and created the Sixth Branch, the United States Space Force.
- Completely rebuilt the United States military with over $2.2 trillion in defense spending, including $738 billion for 2020.
- Secured three pay raises for our service members and their families, including the largest raise in a decade.
- Established the Space Force, the first new branch of the United States Armed Forces since 1947.
- Modernized and recapitalized our nuclear forces and missile defenses to ensure they continue to serve as a strong deterrent.
- Upgraded our cyber defenses by elevating the Cyber Command into a major warfighting command and by reducing burdensome procedural restrictions on cyber operations.
- Vetoed the FY21 National Defense Authorization Act, which failed to protect our national security, disrespected the history of our veterans and military, and contradicted our efforts to put America first.
Defeated terrorists, held leaders accountable for malign actions, and bolstered peace around the world.
Addressed gaps in Americans defense-industrial base, providing much-needed updates to improve the safety of our country.
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When He Nominated A Climate Change Sceptic To Chair The Committee Advising The White House On Environmental Policy
We cant say that Donald Trump doesnt take climate change seriously but we can say that he withdrew from global commitments to tackle the issue, once tweeted about needing a little of that good old fashioned Global Warming!, and nominated climate change sceptic Kathleen Hartnett White to be his top environmental advisor.
So, you do the math.
When He Attacked Former Prisoner Of War John Mccain As A Loser
There was no love lost between late Republican Senator John McCain and Donald Trump.
But Trump certainly got in some low blows against his rival.
Upon McCains death in 2018, from a brain tumour, it was reported by witnesses that Trump was angered by his funeral being officially commemorated.
“Were not going to support that losers funeral, witnesses claimed the president said.
However, Trump then denied hed ever called McCain a loser.
The only problem was that footage from Trumps 2015 campaign run shows him clearly slamming McCain as just that.
“He lost, he let us down… I never liked him as much after that because I don’t like losers, Trump says during the clip.
He follows it up by denying McCain deserves the epithet of war hero.
“He is not a war hero Trump said.
He is a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.
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Undercutting Key Worker Protection Agencies By Nominating Anti
Trump has appointedor tried to appointindividuals with records of exploiting workers to key posts in the U.S. Department of Labor and the National Labor Relations Board . DOL is supposed to promote the welfare of job seekers, wage earners, and retirees by, among other things, protecting them from hazards on the job and ensuring they are paid for their work. The NLRB is charged with protecting the rights of most private-sector employees to join together, with or without a union, to improve their wages and working conditions. Nominees to critical roles at DOL and the NLRB havein word and deedexpressed hostility to the worker rights laws they are in charge of upholding.
On January 20, 2017his very first day in officeTrump failed workers when he nominated Andrew Puzder, then-CEO of CKE Restaurants , to be secretary of the Department of Labor. Puzder has opposed raising the minimum wage and the overtime salary threshold, criticized paid sick time proposals and health and safety regulations, and was CEO of a company with a record of violating worker protection laws and regulations. While his nomination was ultimately withdrawn due in great part to intense pressure from workers rights advocates, Trumps original selection made a powerful statementthe president was prepared to support a labor nominee who is hostile to policies that would benefit the nations workers.
Did Trump Damage American Democracy
Did Trump permanently damage American democracy? This question has spawned a veritable cottage industry of hand wringing over the state of American democracyunderstandably so. Never before have we had a president who schemed to overturn legitimate election results, who attacked the press and the civil servants who worked for him, who admired dictators, who blatantly profited from his public office and who repeatedly lied to the public for his own selfish purposes. But while Trumps four years of rhetoric have been a shock to democratic norms, did they inflict permanent damage on our democracy? My answer is a qualified no. The guardrails of democracy held. The institutions designed to check autocracy are intact.
Successful democratic systems are not designed for governments composed of ethical men and women who are only interested in the public good. If leaders were always virtuous there would be no need for checks and balances. The Founding Fathers understood this. They designed a system to protect minority points of view and to protect us from leaders inclined to lie, cheat and steal. Fortunately, we havent had many of those in our 200-plus years of history, which is why the Trump presidency sent such shock waves through a large part of the body politic.
Did Trump weaken the powers of Congress? No.
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Failure: Iran Syria And Afghanistan
Trump’s decision to unilaterally withdraw the US from the 2015 nuclear deal in May 2018 has induced chaos throughout the Middle East.
It remains one of Trump’s most unpopular decisions in the global arena, and has been condemned by top US allies who were also signatories to the deal.
The former president failed to thwart Iran’s aggressive behavior in the region through a maximum pressure campaign, meant to squeeze Tehran into negotiating a more stringent version of the pact.
After a series of incidents in the Persian Gulf region in 2019, tensions between Washington and Tehran reached historic heights and sparked fears of war. These fears were exacerbated after Trump ordered a strike that killed Iran’s top general, Qassem Soleimani, in early January 2020. The strike led Iran to retaliate and fire on US troops in the region, and dozens were seriously injured.
Iran also abandoned the 2015 nuclear deal, which was designed to prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Trump’s decision to pull US troops out of northern Syria in October 2019 was also among his most disastrous foreign policy moves. In doing so, Trump effectively abandoned US-allied Kurdish forces who bore the brunt of the US-led campaign against ISIS to a Turkish military invasion.
The withdrawal induced a humanitarian crisis and created a security vacuum that Russia, Iran, and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, an accused war criminal, all benefited from.
Trump Increased Funding For Historically Black Colleges And Universities By More Than 14%
Krystal L. Williams, an assistant professor at the University of Alabama College of Education who has studied federal funding of H.B.C.U.s, points to publicly available data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System on this matter. The data suggest an increase of about 6 percent in federal appropriations, grants and contracts from the 2016-2017 academic year to 2017-2018, the most recent year for which such data is available.
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Policy Issues Under The Trump Administration
| Cabinet White House staff Transition team |
| Policy positions |
| Polling indexes: Opinion polling during the Trump administration |
In his contract with American voters, President Donald Trump outlined his administration’s domestic, economic, and foreign policy objectives. Explore what Trump has done during his time in office and how it compares to what he said he would do before taking office by clicking on the policy tiles below.
Blocking Workers From Access To The Courts By Allowing Mandatory Arbitration Clauses In Employment Contracts
In 2017, the Trump administrationin a virtually unprecedented moveswitched sides in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court and is now fighting on the side of corporate interests and against workers. When the Supreme Court was first considering Murphy Oil v. NLRB in 2016, the Obama Justice Department sided with workers. If, as expected, the now-Trump-backed plaintiffs prevail, companies will be able to continue to require employees to sign arbitration agreements with class action waiversforcing workers to give up their right to file class action lawsuits, taking them out of the courtrooms and into individual private arbitration when their rights on the job are violated. And employers use of such agreements is likely to increase if the court rules in favor of the plaintiff.
Forced arbitration is a tool employers use to prevent their employees from seeking justice in court when disputes arise in the workplace. American employers are increasingly requiring workers to sign arbitration agreements in order to get, or keep, their jobs. Arbitration is like a private, for-profit court system, in which the employer usually gets to pick the judge.
Among private-sector nonunion employees, 56.2 percent are subject to mandatory employment arbitration procedures. This means that 60.1 million American workers no longer have access to the courts to protect their legal employment rights and instead must go to arbitration.
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President Trumps Legacy Of Corruption Four Years And 3700 Conflicts Of Interest Later
Heres what you need to know:
As president, Donald Trump has flouted all kinds of norms, starting with his decision not to divest from his business interests while in office. That set the stage for an administration marked by self-interest, profiteering at the highest levels and more than 3,700 conflicts of interest.
Next week marks the end of Donald Trumps term as President. In his wake, he will leave behind a legacy of profound corruption and egregious conflicts of interest, the repercussions of which will echo for years after he is gone. In the last four years, Trump has flouted all kinds of norms set by previous presidents, starting with his decision not to divest from his business interests while in office, setting the stage for what became an administration marked by placing self-interest and profiteering at the highest levels above the public interest and culminated in a deadly insurrection that was rooted in the same self-serving ethos.
Visits to Trump properties
Weeks after President Trump swore hed have no involvement with his businesses as president, he decided to pay one a visit, traveling to Mar-a-Lago for the first weekend in February 2017. The ambassadors of Switzerland, Hungary, Afghanistan, Italy, Denmark, Peru, Colombia, and Sweden had the same idea that weekend.
Political and special interest spending
When He Cut A Pandemic Early Warning Program In 2019
1. Trump fired the pandemic response unit created by Obama after Ebola.2. Trump cut CDC funding3. During H1N1, https://t.co/Yx6LlFp2H4 Dan Pfeiffer 1584107262
Now the president doesnt have to be Mystic Meg but it does seem to show a worrying lack of forethought that Trump cut a program that would issue early warnings of pandemics in September 2019.
The first known reported case of coronavirus occurred just two months later.
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