January 19, 2020

Trump to City: Mop Dead

The president tells New Yorkers to “get mops & buckets ready” to deal with massive storm surges.

A maintenance worker mops the lobby of Trump Tower in 2016.Bryan R. Smith/Getty Images

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Yesterday, President Donald Trump tweeted his take on a proposal to build a barrier to protect his hometown from storm surges like the one that killed 44 people and caused $19 billion in damage and economic losses during Hurricane Sandy in October 2012:  

In other words, mop dead. 

The sea barrier proposal is in its preliminary stages—the Army Corps of Engineers says the final structure will take 25 years to build. And there is debate over its environmental impact and how effective it will be against rising sea levels. 

Needless to say, the president loves other kinds of multibillion-dollar walls, even when they don’t work. And he’s not entirely opposed to sea walls when he’s the one (figuratively) left holding the mop. In 2016, he applied for a permit to build one to protect his Irish golf course from rising sea levels. (They were approved in 2017.)

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In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

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