News
‘Undisguised Corruption’: Critics Slam Trump for ‘Selling the White House’ to Big Oil
Donald Trump is promising CEOs of oil and gas conglomerates he will dismantle the climate protections President Joe Biden has installed, and he will green light their policy wishlists including gutting support for electric vehicles if they donate $1 billion for his presidential campaign, according to reporting from Politico and The Washington Post.
“You all are wealthy enough, he said, that you should raise $1 billion to return me to the White House,” reports The Post, describing Trump’s conversation “with some of the country’s top oil executives at his Mar-a-Lago Club last month.”
“At the dinner, he vowed to immediately reverse dozens of President Biden’s environmental rules and policies and stop new ones from being enacted, according to people with knowledge of the meeting, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a private conversation,” The Post added. “Giving $1 billion would be a ‘deal,’ Trump said, because of the taxation and regulation they would avoid thanks to him, according to the people.”
Meanwhile, Politico is reporting the “U.S. oil industry is drawing up ready-to-sign executive orders for Donald Trump aimed at pushing natural gas exports, cutting drilling costs and increasing offshore oil leases in case he wins a second term, according to energy executives with direct knowledge of the work.”
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“The effort stems from the industry’s skepticism that the Trump campaign will be able to focus on energy issues as Election Day draws closer — and worries that the former president is too distracted to prepare a quick reversal of the Biden administration’s green policies. Oil executives also worry that a second Trump administration won’t attract staff skillful enough to roll back President Joe Biden’s regulations or craft new ones favoring the industry, these people added.”
But Trump is promising Big Oil that “on Day 1” of his second term, if he wins the White House in November, they will get at least some of their wishes fulfilled.
“You’ve been waiting on a permit for five years; you’ll get it on Day 1,” Trump told the energy company executives, according to The Post. “At the dinner, Trump also promised that he would scrap Biden’s ‘mandate’ on electric vehicles — mischaracterizing ambitious rules that the Environmental Protection Agency recently finalized, according to people who attended. The rules require automakers to reduce emissions from car tailpipes, but they don’t mandate a particular technology such as EVs. Trump called them ‘ridiculous’ in the meeting with donors.”
The oil industry “got a great return on their investment during Trump’s first term, and Trump is making it crystal clear that they’re in for an even bigger payout if he’s reelected,” Alex Witt, a senior adviser for oil and gas with Climate Power, told The Post.
“With Trump, Witt said, ‘everything has a price.'”
Politico reveals how special interests, including but not limited to Big Oil, see a second Trump administration as an opportunity to literally write their own policies, in part because they don’t believe an incoming Trump administration will attract experts.
“We’re going to have to write exactly what we want, actually spoon feeding the administration. There’s 27-page drafts moving around Washington,” one energy company lawyer said. “Supportive industries are going to have to prop up a second Trump administration with expertise.”
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In an interview with Politico, Matthew Davis, vice president of federal policy at the League of Conservation Voters and a former EPA scientist, “said it’s a fairly widespread norm for outside groups to write policy proposals and white papers to inform an incoming administration’s policies. But an industry writing exact language for an incoming president to sign is ‘beyond the pale.'”
“It is not shocking, but perhaps a little bold and gross that the oil industry is writing text for executive orders,” Davis said.
Biden campaign spokesperson James Singer via social media commented, “Donald Trump is selling out Americans and our planets future to big oil. They get huge tax breaks while screwing over consumers and making record profits.”
Critics with backgrounds in government, law, the environment, and communications appeared stunned at the reporting from Politico and The Washington Post.
“Just straight up, undisguised corruption,” Aaron Fritschner, deputy chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA), remarked, pointing to both articles.
“Trump is putting the power of the presidency up for sale to his rich buddies,” attorney Charles DeLoach remarked.
“The Republican Party is more than just funded by the fossil fuel industry to do its bidding. Increasingly it looks like the fossil fuel industry in the US IS the Republican Party – the most shocking global example of total political capture by the industry,” commented Ed Matthew, Campaigns Director at the independent climate think tank E3G.
“Donald Trump told top oil executives to raise $1 billion for his reelection and said he would immediately reverse environmental rules issued by President Biden. That’s a perfect example of our corrupt system and why campaign finance reform is needed now,” commented Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) President Noah Bookbinder.
Political commentator and former Obama spokesperson Tommy Vietor, pointing to The Post’s report, called it “one of the most overtly corrupt fundraising pitches I have ever heard and underscores the stakes in this election.”
“You won’t read a more important story today,” Philadelphia Inquirer national opinion columnist Will Bunch remarked on The Post’s report. “Trump is willing to literally destroy the planet for $1 billion.”
Strategist and communications director Josh Schwerin, who has worked for Democrats and Democratic groups, remarked: “Quid pro quo. Pay to play. Bribery. You decide the label, the result is the same. Trump is selling the White House to the highest bidders, in this case it’s oil CEOs.”
Climate Power, which calls itself a “strategic communications organization focused on winning the politics of climate,” responded to The Post’s report: “While Joe Biden has take more than 300 climate, conservation, public health, and clean energy actions, Donald Trump is selling our climate future for $1 billion. It’s not just climate champion vs. climate arsonist—it’s decency vs. evil.”
End Climate Silence’s founding director Dr. Genevieve Guenther, an expert in climate communication and fossil-fuel disinformation, remarked, “it’s nauseating on so many different levels, but I have to stay: remember the climate stakes of this election. Biden means we have a chance. Trump means full-bore fossil-fuel development and an incinerated adulthood for the kids in our homes today.”
Richard Stengel, the MSNBC political analyst, former U.S. Undersecretary of State, former TIME Magazine managing editor, and former chief executive of the National Constitution Center seemed to sum up The Post’s report on Trump: “He is the swamp.”
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House Oversight Republicans held a contempt of Congress hearing for Attorney General Merrick Garland while lawmakers allegedly were drinking alcohol and acting “pretty ugly” during Thursday night’s proceedings. Now, they are the ones accused of behavior “embarrassing to our institution” by Ranking Member Jamie Raskin (D-MD), who wants an investigation.
“Members of the panel ultimately advanced a contempt of Congress resolution against Attorney General Merrick Garland on a party-line vote, but the far more striking takeaway was the personal attacks and theatrics lobbed between lawmakers in both parties — as Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) struggled unsuccessfully to gain control for more than an hour,” Politico reported Friday, adding: “both Republicans and Democrats acknowledged some members had been drinking that evening.”
Who was drinking remains a secret.
“A House Republican described the hearing as ’embarrassing’ and ‘a four -alarm dumpster fire,'” Axios reported. “The session quickly devolved into chaos, with Democrats blasting the GOP for postponing the hearing so several members could visit former President Trump’s trial and Republicans heckling them in response.”
One Democrat during the hearing spoke up.
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Ranking Member Raskin “said it was ’embarrassing to our institution’ and that he ‘constantly’ instructs his members to maintain a ‘high level of dignity and respect and decorum.'”
“We have some members in the room who are drinking inside the hearing room … who are not on this committee,” alleged Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-NM).
The Hill adds that Congressman Raskin said, “I didn’t see the drinking,” and that “the gentlelady from New Mexico, Melanie Stansbury raised it, she said there are members drinking in the room, and that’s something that is worth investigating if there was in fact drinking taking place.”
One unnamed House Republican told Axios, “This place is so stupid.”
The evening’s events quickly took a bad turn when U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), violating decorum, interrupted Ranking Member Raskin barely 30 seconds into his remarks.
Watch below or at this link.
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The State of New York’s prosecution of Donald Trump is nearing it end, as Judge Juan Merchan announced late Thursday afternoon final arguments could begin on Tuesday. But one question remains: Will the ex-president who is facing 34 felony charges in the election interference, falsification of business records, and hush money cover-up case, testify in his defense?
Just over one month ago Trump was asked that question. He quickly responded, “Yeah I would testify, absolutely.”
Reporter: “Do you plan to testify at your trial?”
Trump: “Yeah, I would testify, absolutely, it’s a scam.” pic.twitter.com/00uKFjeWhl
— Los Angeles Magazine (@LAmag) April 12, 2024
Trump appeared resolved.
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“I’m testifying. I tell the truth. I mean, all I can do is tell the truth. And the truth is that there is no case,” he said, as NBC News reported.
NBC added last week that Trump “told Newsmax two weeks ago that he would testify ‘if necessary,’ and on Tuesday he said in an interview with Spectrum News 1 Wisconsin that he would ‘probably’ take the stand, adding that he ‘would like to.'”
But when Judge Merchan asked Todd Blanche, Trump’s attorney, on Thursday, the answer was very different.
“That’s another decision that we need to think through,” he said, according to the Associated Press.
But Politico’s Erica Orden reported, “Blanche says Trump hasn’t made a final decision about whether to testify.”
Last week, as the question of Trump’s testifying loomed large, U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) insisted he would not.
“It’s over. Donald Trump has a right to not testify. Yet he PROMISED he would. Now it’s clear he won’t. The jury can’t consider this. But you can. He is chickenshit and you should conclude he’s guilty as hell.”
On Wednesday, attorney George Conway addressed the topic, saying, “If he doesn’t testify, it’s because he’s scared.”
He also said, “in a million years, I would never tell him to testify. I would tell him not to testify.”
Watch the video above or at this link.
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A stunning police report reveals how Christian Ziegler, the now-ousted Florida Republican Party chair, would head out to bars to scope out and recruit women as possible three-way sex partners for himself and his stridently anti-LGBTQ wife, Moms for Liberty co-founder Bridget Ziegler.
The disgraced Florida power couple’s ménage à trois sex scandal made national headlines after an accusation of rape against Christian Ziegler came from one of their three-way sexual partners, an allegation he denied. After an investigation no charges were filed.
Christian Ziegler lost his high-paying job as the Florida GOP chairman, but his wife Bridget has refused to resign from her elected position on a school board, as well as from her position on the state board that now oversees the Walt Disney World special district. Bridget Ziegler, who is seen as an architect of Governor Ron DeSantis’ “Don’t Say Gay” law, reportedly is best friends with Florida First Lady Casey DeSantis, and was appointed to the special district role by the Florida GOP governor.
The Sarasota Police Dept. report, according to the Florida Trident, “recounts how Christian Ziegler went ‘on the prowl’ in bars for women to bring home to Bridget, a Sarasota County School Board member who has backed a number of anti-LGBTQ measures at both the state and local level, for threesome encounters. While at the bars, Christian would surreptitiously photograph prospective women and text the photos to Bridget for approval, according to the report.”
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Some of the details are salacious.
“There were numerous text messages between Bridget and Christian where they are on the prowl for a female and Bridget is directing him to numerous different bars in search of a female that they are both interested in,” the report reads, according to The Trident. “During these conversations Christian is secretly taking photographs of women in the bars and sending them to Bridget asking her if she wants this one or that one. Bridget is telling him to pretend to take pictures of his beer, so they don’t see him taking pictures of them. She tells him ‘Don’t come home until your dick is wet.’”
The Zieglers are in court trying to block the release of the text messages and other media, alleging in a lawsuit against the Sarasota Police Dept. and the State Attorney’s Office that “release of those records would cause ‘great humiliation and harm to their individual reputations’ if released and therefore should be destroyed.”
“The suit specifically addresses the contents of Christian Ziegler’s cell phone, his social media accounts, web browsing history, and the video he made of the sexual encounter with the alleged rape victim,” the Trident reports.
Meanwhile, despite her own actions and after months of laying low, Bridget Ziegler is back on her anti-LGBTQ crusade.
“At last week’s school board meeting, Ziegler introduced a highly contentious resolution to ignore protections for LGBTQ students afforded by a new federal Title IX rule,” the Trident also reports. “The resolution, which followed a DeSantis legal challenge to Title IX at the state level, claims the new rule would cause ‘disastrous impacts to girls and women’s safety in restrooms, locker rooms, and sports.’ It passed by a 4-1 vote despite the fact it could lead to a federal investigation, expensive litigation, and the loss to the school district of roughly $50 million in federal funds.”
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