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Why I’m Voting For Barack Obama

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To tell you why I’m voting for Barack Obama, I first have to explain to you why I’m a Democrat. I was very, very young when my mother explained the differences between the parties to me. It was 1983, and I was six. Walter Mondale was running against impossible to defeat incumbent Ronald Reagan. My class was holding a fake election, and we were asked to pick a candidate to support. I was eating at the kitchen table, my mother was doing dishes, and as I did with almost everything I didn’t understand, I voiced my random concerns to her out of the blue.

“Mom,” I asked, “Am I a Republican or a Democrat?”

“We’re Democrats.” She replied.

“Why are we Democrats?” I never had just one question. You know the sort of kid who asks one thousand questions a day about everything in the entire universe, until anyone within earshot wants to smack him or her with a whiffle ball bat? I was that kid.

“Because we’re poor, and Republicans don’t like poor people. Democrats do. Now finish your sandwich.” Fair enough, I thought, and dutifully went back to my bologna and american cheese with yellow mustard on white bread.

Of course, that isn’t the whole story. To imply that a single conversation cemented my political views would be overly simplistic. It was millions of things over the years.

In my family, we watched the news every night. Not a single weekday went by where Peter Jennings didn’t explain the daily global happenings to us while we ate dinner. My mother insisted that we be informed, and I payed very close attention to everything. As I watched strings of impossibly grown up tie wearers discuss the events of the day, I began to develop the characters. Republicans were always trying to stop things, or to take things away from people, or say no to something. Democrats seemed to be trying to move us along, ineptly most of the time, but in earnest. They were trying to protect people, and fight for more rights rather than less, to watch out for the little guy, and no guys were littler than my family.

I was born into the middle class, with the ranch style three bedroom and the stay at home mom. All of that changed at age nine when my father emptied our bank account and disappeared. Abandoned, we went from a standard issue, Reagan-approved nuclear family, to one with tremendous debt, less than zero dollars, and absolutely nowhere to go.

Mom didn’t work at my father’s insistence, as she took care of myself and my two sisters, the house, and just about everything else. Her job was harder than most as much of her time was spent caring for my severely mentally disabled sister, the middle child, who had Down syndrome, hadn’t ever spoken in her life, was prone to self-inflicted violence, and required constant monitoring. Now destitute, we were forced onto welfare and moved into government subsidized housing.

There we were. A Republican’s worst nightmare. Were we living in the sort of high rolling paradise of work free, taxpayer subsidized opulence smug GOP politicians, looking to sew a little quick public resentment like to describe? No. Not by a long shot. Our neighborhood was tough, and the government stipend was only barely enough to survive. Sometimes less than enough.

But it was somewhere other than the street, which was the only rung lower on the list of possible family options. We hated welfare, but had no choice but to accept it. Without it, we would have had nothing. My family had no wealthy grandparents, no Romney fortune and connections to tap into. We had each other, and the lifeline of public assistance. The first time I heard the phrase “Welfare Queens” I was eating government paid for food in a government subsidized home. I looked around and thought “Wow. Republicans have no idea what this is like. They aren’t living in the real world. To call what is going on here fit for royalty is insulting.” Do some people cheat on welfare? I’m sure they do. People cheat on their taxes too. The country is filled with all sorts of terrible people. But for those of us who absolutely needed it, it was the Democrats who were there for us, while all Republicans wanted to do was insult us and take our tiny, tiny lifeline away.

 


Democrats fought for the programs that kept our family alive. Republicans spent most of that time bitching about having to pay a slightly higher tax rate. My sympathy for them remains limited.


 

It took us over eight years to dig ourselves out of the hole we had been forced into, and our return to solvency was only accomplished through hard work and perseverance. In the end, when we looked back at our struggle and made a list of who was there for us, and who had stood in our way, all the rhetoric and bluster meant less than nothing. Democrats fought for the programs that kept our family alive. Republicans spent most of that time bitching about having to pay a slightly higher tax rate. My sympathy for them remains limited.

Then, as I grew older and came to the realization that I was gay, it was again Republicans playing the role of villain. I had Ronald Reagan allowing his bigotry to inform his public policy, while millions died of AIDS. That’s something I can never forgive him for. I had the Moral Majority missing no opportunity to tell me how depraved I was. Know a lot of depraved 13-year olds? Apparently they do. It’s hard to imagine now if you weren’t there, but in the days before “Will And Grace” and It Gets Better and NPH, gay people were still painted as unhinged bridge dwellers, skulking parks in Freddie Mercury mustaches looking to, well, I’m not sure what, but believe me, Republicans made it sound horrible. Forget marriage equality, Republicans wanted to put me in jail, or mental institutions, or both, for being gay. I was to be run out of polite society forever. Barred from employment. Shunned. Shamed. Attacked with impunity. With every step made toward equality — steps not possible without the leadership of the Democratic party – a histrionic outcry from Republicans could be expected.

Only Democrats have a record of supporting those cast aside by Republicans. While Republicans whine about taxes, or proselytize about morality, the rest of humanity has to survive, and only the Democratic Party has been consistently trying to help. They fail all the time, no one fails better than a Democrat, but when they succeed, they literally save people’s lives. Failures vanish. Do you have any idea how many different programs FDR tried before he landed on a few that worked? Loads. Democrats aren’t afraid to try to help, and fail trying. Republicans just fail to help.

Once their working days were over, it was programs like Social Security and Medicare that allowed my grandparents to retire with some modicum of dignity. Do you work for a living? Then you have Democrats, and the unions they have for so long supported, to thank for OSHA and the 40-hour work week. When my mother was finally able to go back to work, after the Democrat supported mental health infrastructure came to help my family with my sister, who did we discover behind the effort to establish the minimum wage she got that made that transition possible? Democrats. When I went to college, it was Democratic Party championed Pell grants, and government subsidized loans that made it possible. Democrats made it possible for me to attend public school, and eat while I was there. They championed PBS, which helped teach me how to read, and helped foster my love of science. These are just a few examples, and every one of these things has been, or is being currently, opposed by the Republican party.

So why do I vote Democrat? Because I am grateful. Because they’ve earned it. Because it’s the right thing to do. Without their leadership and endless push back against a Republican party that would have seen me jailed for my sexuality, my family broken apart and cast to the streets with no support whatsoever, and my grandparents reduced to abject poverty in their golden years, the details and quality of my life would be drastically different than they are today. I could go on. I really could.

So, why Barack Obama specifically? This one is easy.

Barack Obama is a great president.

 


President Obama ended the war in Iraq, ended Bush’s shameful policy of torturing prisoners, boosted fuel efficiency standards, nominated a couple of brilliant women to the Supreme Court (becoming the first president to place two women on the bench), quietly reorganized the priorities of the military industrial complex by reducing military spending and getting rid of the stupid Star Wars missile defence thing that never worked ever, managed to handle the largest oil spill in history, helped lead a successful military effort in Libya that unseated brutal wackadoo Muammar Gaddafi, restored funding for stem-cell research, began a draw down of forces in Afghanistan, launched more initiatives to help stimulate the economy than are even reasonable to name here, oh yeah, and for good measure, tracked down and killed Osama Bin Laden.


 

Is he the dashing, inspirational figure he sold everyone back in 2008? A little yes, but mostly no. What he has proved to be is far more important. Rather than become the empty suit with the rhetorical gift that nay-saying Republicans warned us about in 2008, Obama has instead spent his time throwing himself into his work. He has worked non-stop on one major, earth changing initiative after another since the moment he took office. He had hardly unpacked before signing the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the first bill he signed as president, which helps prevent employment compensation discrimination based on gender, and hasn’t stopped since. I am voting for Barack Obama, not just because he is a Democrat, but because he is a really good one. He has worked tirelessly to help restore economic stability, best demonstrated by his extremely brave bailout of the auto industry, a move that at the time was a political disaster and which proved to be among the most important things he would do as president. Just that one thing, risking his presidency to save one of the nation’s most important and historic assets, should be enough to get high schools in Detroit named after him.

Obama however, has made a habit of taking politically risky moves in the interest of the American people. Even if you don’t like him, and plenty of people don’t, you have to admit that he has consistently put his work before his popularity. He thought health care was so important, that he spent nearly a quarter of his Presidency working to pass it, despite massive resistance from almost every side of the issue. Did he do that so that he would sail through re-election? Obviously not. It damaged his chances greatly, as everyone knew it would, but he thought it was so important that he was willing to spend every last dime of his political capital on making it happen. Republicans were more than happy oblige, spending the remainder of his term impersonating lead weights, forcing the President to drag them around from one policy initiative to another in hopes of engineering a failed Obama Presidency that would be easier for their eventual nominee to run against. Charming, right? You see Romney trying to execute that part of the plan during every one of his stump speeches. Unable to win a fight on their strength of their ideas alone, Republicans resorted to trying to rig the game, hoping no one would notice.

And that was it for the Obama administration, right? Hardly. Despite the shameful and damaging efforts of the Republican party to stall his every attempt at progress, his work continued uninterrupted.

President Obama ended the war in Iraq, ended Bush’s shameful policy of torturing prisoners, boosted fuel efficiency standards, nominated a couple of brilliant women to the Supreme Court (becoming the first president to place two women on the bench), quietly reorganized the priorities of the military industrial complex by reducing military spending and getting rid of the stupid Star Wars missile defence thing that never worked ever, managed to handle the largest oil spill in history, helped lead a successful military effort in Libya that unseated brutal wackadoo Muammar Gaddafi, restored funding for stem-cell research, began a draw down of forces in Afghanistan, launched more initiatives to help stimulate the economy than are even reasonable to name here, oh yeah, and for good measure, tracked down and killed Osama Bin Laden. I expect there are quite a few #2 leaders of Al-Qaeda who wake up in the middle of the night with cold sweats, swearing they hear the low hum of Obama’s flying robot death machines.

Then there is his record on gay rights. Never in the history of the country has the LGBT community had a greater friend at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue than President Barack Obama. If you are a lover of equality, or even equality curious, you have to be impressed with his record on gay rights. He repealed Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Stopped defending DOMA. Worked for and passed serious hate-crimes legislation, and became the first President in history to publicly affirm support for marriage equality. Those are just the highlights. The real list is massive. Here is a good one.

In short, I like Obama because he’s a fantastic president, and a great Democrat. I’m not filled with as many reassuring warm fuzzies as I expected from his presidency, but it appears that he’s just been too busy solving our nation’s problems to get around to boosting my self esteem. He has always tried to treat the country as if it were filled with adults, so it’s a little hard for me to fault him for not spending his time reading me bedtime stories and tucking me in at night. I want him back in the White House because his work isn’t finished, and from what I’ve seen so far, he’s likely to have plenty of hustle left to expend in the interest of the American People. I see no reason not to give him that chance. He’s earned it.

Images: President Obama addresses a crowd of supporters in Tampa, Florida, October 25, 2012 (top), and President Obama in the Oval Office (middle).

Benjamin PhillipsBenjamin Phillips is an Essayist, Web Developer, Civics Nerd, and all around crank that spends entirely too much time shouting with deep exasperation at the television, especially whenever cable news is on, and proudly serves as Director of Development for The New Civil Rights Movement. He lives in St. Louis, MO and spends most of his time staring at various LCD screens, occasionally taking walks in the park whenever his boyfriend becomes sufficiently convinced that Benjamin is becoming a reclusive hermit person. He is available for children’s parties, provided that those children are entertained by hearing a complete windbag talk for two hours about the importance of science education, or worse yet, poorly researched anecdotes PROVING that James Buchanan was totally gay. If civilization were to collapse due to zombie hoards or nuclear holocaust, Benjamin would be among the first to die as he has no useful skills of any kind. The post-apocalyptic hellscape has no real need for homosexual computer programmers who can name all the presidents in order, as well as the actors who have played all eleven incarnations of Doctor Who.

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News

‘Unconstitutional Threat’: Trump Border Czar Under Fire Over AOC DOJ Request

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Concerns are growing after President Donald Trump’s “border czar,” Tom Homan, announced he has requested that the U.S. Department of Justice investigate whether U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) violated federal law by hosting a webinar informing undocumented immigrants of their civil rights under the U.S. Constitution.

Calling Homan’s remarks “extremely disturbing,” civil rights attorney and longtime public defender Scott Hechinger wrote: “There is nothing more unconstitutional than threatening to punish someone for sharing information about the Constitution.”

And in a video, he added that what Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez is doing is “nothing more than sharing rights, knowledge of rights, knowledge of the Constitution with her immigrant constituents.”

“There is nothing more constitutional than sharing education about the Constitution,” he said. And he declared that the “bottom line is that this is a tactic of fear. This is a tactic of terror.”

READ MORE: Federal Judge ‘Skeptical’ of DOGE: Report

“They’re not only coming for our immigrant neighbors, they’re coming for all of us, and they’re coming for all of us for simply sharing what the Constitution says, because knowledge they know is power, and they want to maintain full and unadulterated power over all of us.”

“What they’re doing by even suggesting that AOC’s conduct or any of our conduct related to sharing rights is illegal in some way, is illegal. It’s unconstitutional. It’s suppression of speech, it’s suppression of truth, and it’s not okay.”

Homan told Fox News on Monday, “I’ve asked DOJ, where where’s that line of impedment?” he said repeatedly, appearing to mean “impediment.”

“Now if someone stands in your way, prevents you from arresting somebody, put your hands on him, that’s impedment.”

“So I’ve simply Department of Justice, give us that line,” he said, claiming he finds it “disturbing” that “any member of Congress wants to educate people how they evade law enforcement.”

“What she in fact is doing is telling people, ‘don’t open your door,’ ‘hide in your home’, ‘don’t talk to ICE,'” Homan said. “We’re talking about people who are in the country illegally, committed a crime, they’re a public safety threat, they’ve been convicted of serious crime, and they’ve been ordered removed by federal judge. So it’s like AOC and others don’t want ICE to enforce the laws that they enacted.”

But ICE is not only arresting undocumented immigrants who have been convicted of serious crime, they are also, according to reports, arresting Americans.

“American citizens, including citizens of Native tribal nations, have been pulled into the vast immigration operations ordered by President Donald Trump in accordance with his campaign vow to conduct mass deportations since Day 1,” NBC News reported late last month. “Those who are getting caught in Immigrations and Customs Enforcement raids are being targeted because of their race or skin color, according to witnesses.”

Homan’s repeated presence on Fox News may also indicate that his public relations efforts are taking precedence, since ICE has not been able to find enough undocumented immigrants to arrest to meet their alleged quotas.

“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is struggling to arrest higher numbers of immigrants and falling far short of the administration’s goals,” The Washington Post reported over the weekend. “ICE arrests have sagged so far this month, according to data provided by the Department of Homeland Security, declining from about 800 per day in late January after Trump took office to fewer than 600 during the first 13 days of February. The administration has stopped publishing daily numbers, and Trump officials said they will release the data on a monthly basis to conserve resources.”

READ MORE: ‘Stupid Beyond Belief’: Musk and Trump Blasted as DOGE Fires ‘Hundreds’ of FAA Employees

Last week, Homan made essentially the same remarks, also on Fox News. He added, “I’m working with the Department of Justice and finding out. Where is that line that they cross? So maybe AOC is going to be in trouble now.”

Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez quickly mocked him.

In a statement to Fox News AOC also said, “I am glad Mr. Homan is checking with the Department of Justice to familiarize himself with the limits of his agency’s authority in entering the homes of everyday Americans without a warrant. And I am proud to offer civil education to everyday Americans to ensure ICE’s compliance with the law, given the numerous reports of agents providing incorrect paperwork in their attempts to enter and search private homes.”

“Since Mr. Homan seems to be vaguely familiar with U.S. immigration law, we also remind him that according to Congressional statute, becoming undocumented in the United States is a civil offense and not a criminal one. I look forward to continuing our work in ensuring the safety of everyday New Yorkers while keeping families together.”

Watch the videos above or at the link.

READ MORE: White House Mum After Classified Info Reportedly Appears on Musk’s DOGE Website

 

Image via Reuters

 

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Federal Judge ‘Skeptical’ of DOGE: Report

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A federal judge reportedly appeared skeptical toward Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” and its ability to act unilaterally, during a Monday hearing on a lawsuit brought to stop DOGE from accessing federal agency data. But the judge did not appear prepared to grant a restraining order, saying the states that brought the case had not provided enough evidence to warrant emergency intervention.

While U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan did not seem inclined to order DOGE to immediately stop accessing government computer systems, fire federal employees, or place any restraining order on its operations, she reportedly seemed skeptical of the group’s authority.

“Judge Chutkan still appears disinclined to legally bar Elon Musk and his allies [from] accessing federal agency data, saying the states didn’t [present] enough concrete facts for the extraordinary emergency relief,” Politico’s Kyle Cheney reports.

READ MORE: ‘Stupid Beyond Belief’: Musk and Trump Blasted as DOGE Fires ‘Hundreds’ of FAA Employees

Critically, Cheney adds that Judge Chutkan is “clearly skeptical of DOGE’s operations but said that can be hashed out in further litigation and many of the harms can be addressed later.”

Chutkan “agreed that Musk’s operations” via DOGE “were taking place in troubling secrecy. And she acknowledged that DOGE is operating so swiftly that it is difficult to reach quick conclusions about the legality of its moves,” Cheney reports at Politico.

“DOGE appears to be moving in no sort of predictable and orderly fashion and plaintiffs are obviously scrambling to find out what’s next,” Chutkan said Monday. “I don’t know if that’s deliberate or not.”

MSNBC legal analyst Adam Klasfeld reports on a critical exchange between Judge Chutkan and a government lawyer.

“When asked whether thousands of federal employees were fired last week, a government lawyer responds: ‘I have not been able to look into that independently, or confirm that.'”

“Judge Chutkan responds, incredulously: ‘The firing of thousands of federal employees is not a small or common thing. You haven’t been able to confirm that?'”

Politico also reports that attorneys for the largely blue states “argue that Musk’s influential role in the government violates the Constitution’s appointments clause, which generally requires that powerful officers in the executive branch are formally appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. A separate lawsuit federal employees filed in Maryland makes a similar argument.”

Judge Chutkan, Bloomberg News’ Zoe Tillman reports, “scoffed at DOJ’s claim that Musk has no ‘formal’ authority to make gov’t decisions.”

READ MORE: White House Mum After Classified Info Reportedly Appears on Musk’s DOGE Website

“Nowhere have my friends offered a shred of anything,” a U.S. Department of Justice lawyer said, “nor could they, to show that Elon Musk has any formal or actual authority to make any government decisions himself.”

“I think you stretch too far,” Judge Chutkan replied. “I disagree with you there.”

States are arguing that Elon Musk has effectively been granted “authority to make decisions for the U.S. government,” according to the DOJ’s written argument. MSNBC’s Adam Klasfeld posted a screenshot and highlighted the portion below:

“That premise is of course wrong,” DOJ asserts. “It rests entirely on conflating influence and authority. But an advisor does not become an officer simply because the officer listens to his advice. And stripped of their lengthy rhetoric, the States do not actually cite a single example of where Elon Musk (or anyone at USDS) has been given formal authority to exercise the sovereign power of the United States.”

Klasfeld calls this “a key government defense to the Appointments Clause challenge of DOGE and Elon Musk’s authority.”

“Judge Chutkan’s skepticism on that issue, ultimately, could have more lasting significance than the current battle over the” restraining order.

Cheney adds that “Chutkan said she’ll try to rule within 24 hours. Don’t expect a restraining order, but she has asked for facts from DOJ — details about mass firings that have occurred and may occur in next 14 days — that could lead to an injunction.”

The original lawsuit charged, “Although our constitutional system was designed to prevent the abuses of an 18th century monarch, the instruments of unchecked power are no less dangerous in the hands of a 21st century tech baron,” as ABC News reported.

READ MORE: ‘United States of Extortion’: New Trump Ukraine ‘Shakedown’ Called ‘Cheap Mafia’ Move

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‘Stupid Beyond Belief’: Musk and Trump Blasted as DOGE Fires ‘Hundreds’ of FAA Employees

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Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is reportedly firing hundreds of Federal Aviation Administration employees, according to multiple reports and the FAA workers’ union, even as fatal plane crashes continue to mount under President Donald Trump’s administration — including one as recently as Saturday.

“The impacted workers include personnel hired for FAA radar, landing and navigational aid maintenance, one air traffic controller told the Associated Press,” the AP reported. The firings also come as the FAA is without a Senate-confirmed administrator, after Musk called for him to resign. In 2023, Michael Whitaker had been confirmed unanimously, 98-0.

The terminations of what are called “probationary” employees can include not only employees hired within the past year, but also long-term employees who have been recently promoted. Air traffic controllers and other employees are a critical segment of the federal government. The FAA’s hiring practices are rigorous and require tremendous training, as a former Federal Aviation Administration official said recently after President Trump strongly suggested the deadly mid-air crash near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport might have been the result of “DEI” hiring.

READ MORE: White House Mum After Classified Info Reportedly Appears on Musk’s DOGE Website

CNN, which first reported DOGE’s mass firings had now hit the FAA, noted that the “exact number of firings is not yet known, but the head of the Professional Aviation Safety Specialists, AFL-CIO, said that ‘several hundred’ workers started getting firing notices on Friday — and that they could even be barred from FAA facilities Tuesday after the federal holiday.”

“The FAA’s system that distributes critical flight safety alerts to pilots failed just days after the crash and forced the agency to rely on a backup system.”

There have been at least six fatal aviation incidents since Donald Trump became president, according to news reports and a search of the National Transportation Safety Board’s (NTSB) database:

January 25, 2025: Charlottesville, VA
January 29, 2025: Potomac River Mid-Air Collision
January 31, 2025: Med Jets Flight 056 Crash (Philadelphia)
February 6, 2025: Bering Air Flight 445 Crash (Alaska)
February 10, 2025: Private Jet Crash in Scottsdale, Arizona
February 15, 2025: Small Plane Crash Near Covington, Georgia

That last crash came “just hours after ‘hundreds’ of pink slips were reportedly handed out at the agency,” The Daily Beast reported.

“Staffing decisions should be based on an individual agency’s mission-critical needs,” said David Spero, national president of Professional Aviation Safety Specialists (PASS) told CNN. “To do otherwise is dangerous when it comes to public safety. And it is especially unconscionable in the aftermath of three deadly aircraft accidents in the past month.”

Critics are blasting President Donald Trump and Elon Musk.

“No president has had more planes crash in their first month in office than Donald Trump,” charged U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) on Monday.

President Trump, meanwhile, amid the firings, on Sunday took a “taxpayer-funded Daytona 500 joyride” at a rained-out NASCAR race “as he guts [the] federal workforce,” The Independent, a UK-based news site, reported.

READ MORE: ‘United States of Extortion’: New Trump Ukraine ‘Shakedown’ Called ‘Cheap Mafia’ Move

Former U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg on Monday morning asked: “The flying public needs answers. How many FAA personnel were just fired? What positions? And why?”

U.S. Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA), a member of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, blasted the FAA firings:

“Mass firings of FAA workers – at a time when they already have serious staffing problems – would be dangerous at any time. Musk and Trump doing this weeks after the deadliest crash in years is stupid beyond belief.”

Professor of Public Policy Don Moynihan charged, “even after a bunch of accidents that highlighted FAA staffing shortages they still went ahead and fired FAA staff. They don’t know what they are doing.”

“You might have noticed that since Trump became President a number of aviation fatalities have occurred,” Moynihan wrote at “Can We Still Govern?”

“This happened after Musk pushed the head of the Federal Aviation Administration to resign, and Trump fired its safety advisory board. This likely had little direct effect on the crash at Reagan airport, but the crash highlighted staffing shortages, causing the Trump administration to tell FAA employees they could no longer apply for deferred resignation offer they had received days earlier. Safety first, it seemed,” he explained. “FAA employees therefore had some reason to believe that they would be exempt from the purge of probationary employees, but this is not the case.”

Jason King, a now-former FAA employee and disabled veteran who was laid off on Friday, told WUSA, “my unit directly with the FAA is directly involved with safety.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Disgust’: Vance’s ‘Disturbing’ Speech Alarms Europe, Sparks Foreign Policy Fears

 

Image via Reuters

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