Trump Reportedly Floated Firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell— Here's Why That's A 'Bad Idea': CFP
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16 minutes ago
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Trump Plans To Force Thousands Of USDA Workers To Leave D.C. Area
The Trump administration plans to push thousands of U.S. Agriculture Department workers out of the Washington, D.C., region by forcing them to relocate to far-away offices if they want to keep their jobs. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced the plan in a press release Thursday, with her office claiming the move would 'better align' the agency 'with its founding mission of supporting American farming, ranching, and forestry.' Rollins said the department employs around 4,600 workers in the D.C. area, but by the time the transition is over, it plans to have 'no more than 2,000' left in and around the nation's capital. It also expects to close most of its buildings in the area, including a major research center. The D.C.-area employees would be transferred to 'hub' locations in Raleigh, North Carolina; Kansas City, Missouri; Indianapolis, Indiana; Fort Collins, Colorado and Salt Lake City, Utah, the agency said. Rollins acknowledged the move would create 'personal disruption for you and your families,' in a video directed at agency employees. 'This decision was not entered into lightly,' she said. Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, a union representing USDA workers, told HuffPost in a statement that the move would damage the agency. He noted that, despite common misperceptions, 85% of federal employees already live outside the Washington, D.C., region. 'But D.C. is the center of our nation's government for a reason, as it facilitates needed coordination between senior leadership and field offices and ensures agencies are at the seat of the table when decisions are made at the White House and in Congress,' Kelley said. He singled out the announced closure of the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center in Maryland as particularly misguided, calling it a 'crown jewel' for critical research. 'I'm concerned this reorganization is just the latest attempt to eliminate USDA workers and minimize their critical work,' Kelley added. The relocation proposal is reminiscent of a similar, controversial plan at the USDA from the first Trump presidency. In 2019, then-Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue announced that two agencies within the USDA would be relocated to Kansas City to save money and place employees in the Heartland. The move crushed morale and prompted many workers to leave rather than upend their families' lives; it also fueled a successful union organizing campaign among USDA staff. Mick Mulvaney, who had served as Trump's budget director, later boasted about how many resignations the plan had spurred. HuffPost reported earlier this year on how that move was still dogging the agency and its mission more than five years later. A USDA economist said the relocation plan appeared to be little more than a mass layoff in disguise. 'We had a lot of people who had spent their careers working on very specific fields — very niche questions,' the economist said. 'And when they left, it was so sudden and abrupt that there wasn't time to bring in the next generation. You had to just leave all of your work and go.' Rollins argued that pushing workers to other states would benefit the agency's work. 'President Trump was elected to make real change in Washington, and we are doing just that by moving our key services outside the beltway and into great American cities across the country,' she said. The proposal aligns with Trump's broader attacks on the federal workforce. Since taking power in January, the administration has gone to great lengths to push federal employees out of the government, either by firing them through legally dubious means, enticing them to leave through early retirement offers or making them so miserable that they decide to quit. More than 15,000 USDA employees took the administration's 'deferred resignation' proposal earlier this year, raising concerns about how it would continue to enforce food safety, administer agricultural programs and conduct critical research. In fact, so many chose to leave that USDA leadership had to encourage some to change their minds. Related... USDA Cuts More Than $1 Billion Earmarked For Local Food In School Lunches More Than 5,000 Fired USDA Employees Just Got Their Jobs Back Trump Has A Plan To Sabotage The Government — And It Worked Perfectly His First Term
Yahoo
16 minutes ago
- Yahoo
US mulls limited authorizations for oil firms in Venezuela, sources say
By Marianna Parraga, Matt Spetalnick and Timothy Gardner HOUSTON/WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump's administration is preparing to grant new authorizations to key partners of Venezuela's state-run oil company PDVSA, starting with Chevron, which would allow them to operate with limitations in the sanctioned OPEC nation, four sources close to the matter said on Thursday. If granted, the authorizations to the U.S. oil major, and possibly also to PDVSA's European partners, would mark a policy shift from a pressure strategy Washington adopted earlier this year on Venezuela's energy industry, which has been under U.S. sanctions since 2019. A senior State Department official said in a statement they could not speak about any specific licenses to PDVSA's partners, but added the U.S. would not allow President Nicolas Maduro's government to profit from the sale of oil. The U.S. might now allow the energy companies to pay oilfield contractors and make necessary imports to secure operational continuity, two of the sources said. "Chevron conducts its business globally in compliance with laws and regulations applicable to its business, as well as the sanctions frameworks provided for by the U.S. government, including in Venezuela," a company spokesperson said. Though Venezuela and the U.S. conducted a prisoner swap this month, relations between the two countries have been tense for years, and the Trump administration has publicly supported opposition leaders who say their candidate won last year's election, not Maduro. Trump in February announced the cancellation of a handful of energy licenses in Venezuela, including Chevron's, and gave until late May to wind down all transactions. The U.S. State Department, which in May blocked a move by special presidential envoy Richard Grenell to extend the licenses, is this time imposing conditions to any authorization modifications, so no cash reaches Maduro's coffers, the two sources added. But Secretary of State Marco Rubio could still decide to ban the move at the last minute or modify the scope of the new authorizations. It was not immediately clear if the terms of the license that could be granted to Chevron would be reproduced for other foreign companies in Venezuela, including Italy's Eni and Spain Repsol, which have been asking the U.S. to allow them to swap fuel supplies for Venezuelan oil. The U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
16 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Trump DOJ sets up ‘strike force' to probe unfounded Obama '16 vote claims
President Donald Trump's Department of Justice has set up a 'strike force' to probe unfounded claims that former President Barack Obama illegally pushed allegations that Russia interfered in the 2016 election to boost Trump. Attorney General Pam Bondi said she's eager to 'investigate potential next legal steps' following the release of a report on the issue from Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard that accused Obama of hatching a 'treasonous conspiracy.' 'We will investigate these troubling disclosures fully and leave no stone unturned to deliver justice,' Bondi said in a statement. Impartial analysts say there is nothing new in Gabbard's dossier and no evidence of wrongdoing by Obama. It doesn't refute the widely accepted fact that Russia sought to influence the 2016 campaign on Trump's behalf and against Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. Critics say administration officials are seeking to gin up new controversies to distract attention from the politically damaging calls for Trump to release more information on the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking case. Trump has no secret of his intent to use federal law enforcement to suit his own personal and political interests, effectively rejecting decades of independence for the Department of Justice. Gabbard has claimed that newly declassified files prove a 'treasonous conspiracy' by the Obama administration in 2016 to politicize U.S. intelligence in service of casting doubt on the legitimacy of Trump's White House win. The intelligence chief cited emails from Obama officials and a 5-year-old classified House report in hopes of undermining the intelligence community's conclusion that Russian President Vladimir Putin wanted to boost Trump and denigrate Clinton. Russia's activities during the 2016 election remain some of the most examined events in recent history. Multiple bipartisan investigations, including one led by now-Secretary of State Marco Rubio, found that Russia sought to interfere in the election through the use of social media and hacked material. The evidence doesn't back the notion that Russia successfully hacked voting machines or rigged voting totals to help Trump and hurt Clinton. But Obama never claimed that it did, and publicly said there was no evidence of vote tampering in December 2020 as Trump prepared to take office for his first term. _____
