In the Fog
The Manafort trial went to the jury yesterday. Over the next few days, jurors will be examining four hundred pieces of evidence and hundreds of hours of testimony. Former Presidential aide Omarosa is being sued by the Trump Campaign for violating a non-disclousure agreement, and will probably release another recording to upset their apple cart. The President is using his powers to attack “enemies,” notably former CIA Director John Brennan.
There is a “fog” of activity around the Trump Administration, generated by tweets and Giuliani and Huckabee-Sanders, that is covering the significant changes to our world they are making. Here’s what’s going on this week, underneath cover.
The Department of Interior modified the endangered species act, allowing for animals whose conditions have improved to be removed form protection. The state of Wyoming’s Fish and Wildlife Commission will allow a “big game” grizzly hunt next month, killing as many as twenty-two bears. It costs $15 for a hunting license, but $600 for a Wyoming resident and $6000 for a non-resident to get a tag to kill a bear. Wolves, also removed from protection, are hunted in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming.
The Environmental Protection Agency is allowing industry to apply to use known carcinogen asbestos in newly developed products. While previous administrations had followed a trend towards banning all uses of asbestos to reduce its cancer causing effects, the Trump EPA is allowing it. In addition, they have re-written the safety rules to state that previous cancer causing uses of asbestos, like asbestos insulations, cannot be used showing proof of future dangers. The current safety studies must create whole new evidence.
The Education Department has put new guidelines into effect for educational institutions using Federal funds. The changes to rules for Title IX alter how schools, in particularly colleges and universities, deal with sexual offenses. Under President Obama, schools were required to investigate charges of sexual offenses, hold hearings on the results of the investigation, and follow a “preponderance of the evidence” standard in reaching conclusions (preponderance of the evidence means that of the evidence is given a percentage scale, the side with more than 50% of the evidence wins.)
Under the new “DeVos” rules, schools can now offer to “mediate” sexual offenses rather than treat them as student conduct offenses. If the school does investigate, it now must use a “clear and convincing evidence” standard in reaching conclusions (clear and convincing is a higher standard, more of a 75% standard but still less than the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard of criminal law.) Formerly both sides in an investigation could appeal the outcome, under the new rules now only the accused can appeal the outcome.
The overall effect of these changes will make it harder for sexual offense victims to get justice, and easier for offenders to “get away” with it, especially in “date rape, he-said/ she-said” situations.
Education Secretary DeVos has also cut $13 billion from the fund to help students repay loans used for “for profit” schools that ultimately were fraudulent. This leaves thousands of students holding the bag for loans that were granted by the Federal government to use at schools that were giving worthless degrees.
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE) has been using the Citizenship and Immigration Services Agency (CIS) to trick illegal immigrants into coming to meetings where they are arrested. The immigrants, following a government program that creates a path for them to become legal, come to scheduled meetings at CIS. ICE officers then come to the meeting, and arrest the immigrants for deportation.
An ICE officer who helped schedule and implement these arrests stated: “…They are typically the easiest to remove, they have the shortest average length of stay, and at the end of the day we are in the removal business and it’s our job to locate and arrest them.”
The goal of the CIS program is for an illegal immigrant to be granted legal status and gain a “green card.” In effect then, CIS is baiting those immigrants by offering a path to legality, then ICE is capturing and deporting them.
So as we focus on the sad circus that has become the Trump Administration, we shouldn’t miss the steady drumbeat of change in American government. Whether we are baiting bears or immigrants, or leaving victims in our educational systems hanging, or risking further poisoning our citizens: the Trump Administration is constantly demonstrating coldness, cruelty, and a bias towards profit. Under cover of the fog of the daily craziness, they are quietly changing our world.
