February 28, 2017

Once Again, Trump Dissents From His Own Policy

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Hey, Mr. President, where is the money going to come from for that $54 billion increase in the defense budget?

“The money is going to come from a revved-up economy,” Mr. Trump said on Fox and Friends when asked where he would find the budget cuts. “I mean, you look at the kind of numbers we’re doing, we were probably GDP of a little more than 1%. And if I can get that up to three, maybe more, we have a whole different ballgame.”

His words were the latest example of the president offering a conflicting point of view from a member of his cabinet. On Monday, his director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, Mick Mulvaney, said nondefense agencies were being asked to find cuts to offset the boost to defense.

What do you think the strategy is here? Or is there one? I mean, this business of Trump directly contradicting something his staff says—or vice versa—has happened way too often to be a coincidence. Is it designed to confuse everyone so that nobody knows what to protest? Or is it just incompetence? Or is it a clever strategy of always saying the least objectionable thing possible whenever he’s on a TV show watched by his base?

I suppose the smart money is on incompetence. Occam’s Razor and all that. But I’m going with the third option. I think Trump lets his staff dole out bad news, which will show up at the New York Times, but personally presents the same news in the best possible light whenever he’s on friendly TV turf. He won’t be questioned about it, and his base will be reassured that everything is fine. If the eggheads all get into a tizzy over this on their blogs and newspaper columns, who cares?

In any case, what’s really amazing is how much nonsense Trump was able to pack into two sentences:

  • He is directly contradicting the statement of his OMB director less than 24 hours before.
  • He can’t increase the defense budget by $54 billion anyway, since that would violate the Budget Control Act.
  • His plan to get real GDP growth up to 3 percent is a ridiculous fantasy.

Impressive! No wonder he’s so good on Twitter.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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