Latest news with #U.S.Senate
Hamilton Spectator
3 days ago
- Politics
- Hamilton Spectator
Trump picks right-wing lawyer and podcaster who promoted 2020 election lies as watchdog agency head
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's pick to lead a federal watchdog agency is a former right-wing podcast host who has praised criminally charged influencer Andrew Tate as a 'extraordinary human being' and promoted the false claim that the 2020 election was rigged. If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Paul Ingrassia would lead the Office of Special Counsel, an agency dedicated to protecting whistleblowers that is also responsible for enforcing the Hatch Act , which restricts the partisan political activities of government workers. Trump described Ingrassia in a social media post on Thursday as a 'highly respected attorney, writer and Constitutional Scholar.' Ingrassia was most recently working as the White House liaison for Homeland Security after briefly serving in the liaison position at the Justice Department. Ingrassia called his nomination the 'highest honor.' Ingrassia didn't immediately respond to a message on Friday. 'As Special Counsel, my team and I will make every effort to restore competence and integrity to the Executive Branch — with priority on eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal workforce and revitalize the Rule of Law and Fairness in Hatch Act enforcement,' Ingrassia wrote on social media. Ingrassia worked for a law firm whose clients included Andrew and Tristan Tate, the influencer brothers charged in Britain and Romania with rape and human trafficking. Ingrassia has described Andrew Tate, the former professional kickboxer and self-described misogynist, as an 'extraordinary human being' and 'the ancient ideal of excellence.' 'It is for this reason that he and his brother have become public enemies number one and two in the eyes of the Matrix, the deep state, and the satanic elite that attempt to systematically program and oppress all men from womb-to-tomb – a form of communism that not even Karl Marx, in his wildest dreams, could have imagined,' Ingrassia wrote in a 2023 social media post. Ingrassia that same year published a Substack post titled 'Free Nick Fuentes,' criticizing then-Twitter's decision to suspend the account of the far-right activist who has used his online platform to spew antisemitic and white supremacist rhetoric. Ingrassia was seen in 2024 at a rally where Fuentes spoke, The Intercept reported . Ingrassia previously told NPR that he did not intend to go the impromptu Fuentes rally, which was near another event, adding: 'I had no knowledge of who organized the event, observed for 5-10 minutes, then left.' The day after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, Ingrassia wrote on social media: 'This 'war' is yet another psyop to distract Americans from celebrating Columbus Day.' Days later, he wrote: 'I think we could all admit at this stage that Israel/Palestine, much like Ukraine before it, and BLM before that, and covid/vaccine before that, was yet another psyop.' Ingrassia has also promoted the lie that the 2020 election was stolen, publishing a piece in November that argued that Trump's win over Kamala Harris proved 'beyond all doubt' that the 2020 race was 'fraudulent.' The Office of Special Counsel is an independent agency separate from Justice Department special counsels, who are appointed by the attorney general for specific investigations, like Jack Smith . Trump in February fired the previous special counsel, Hampton Dellinger, leading to a legal battle. A federal judge in Washington initially ruled that Dellinger's firing was illegal, but a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit later ruled that the Trump administration could replace Dellinger while the legal battle played out. Dellinger ultimately abandoned his fight to get his job back, acknowledging that he was facing likely long odds before the Supreme Court. Error! Sorry, there was an error processing your request. There was a problem with the recaptcha. Please try again. You may unsubscribe at any time. By signing up, you agree to our terms of use and privacy policy . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google privacy policy and terms of service apply. Want more of the latest from us? Sign up for more at our newsletter page .
Winnipeg Free Press
3 days ago
- Politics
- Winnipeg Free Press
Trump picks right-wing lawyer and podcaster who promoted 2020 election lies as watchdog agency head
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's pick to lead a federal watchdog agency is a former right-wing podcast host who has praised criminally charged influencer Andrew Tate as a 'extraordinary human being' and promoted the false claim that the 2020 election was rigged. If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Paul Ingrassia would lead the Office of Special Counsel, an agency dedicated to protecting whistleblowers that is also responsible for enforcing the Hatch Act, which restricts the partisan political activities of government workers. Trump described Ingrassia in a social media post on Thursday as a 'highly respected attorney, writer and Constitutional Scholar.' Ingrassia was most recently working as the White House liaison for Homeland Security after briefly serving in the liaison position at the Justice Department. Ingrassia called his nomination the 'highest honor.' Ingrassia didn't immediately respond to a message on Friday. 'As Special Counsel, my team and I will make every effort to restore competence and integrity to the Executive Branch — with priority on eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal workforce and revitalize the Rule of Law and Fairness in Hatch Act enforcement,' Ingrassia wrote on social media. Ingrassia worked for a law firm whose clients included Andrew and Tristan Tate, the influencer brothers charged in Britain and Romania with rape and human trafficking. Ingrassia has described Andrew Tate, the former professional kickboxer and self-described misogynist, as an 'extraordinary human being' and 'the ancient ideal of excellence.' 'It is for this reason that he and his brother have become public enemies number one and two in the eyes of the Matrix, the deep state, and the satanic elite that attempt to systematically program and oppress all men from womb-to-tomb – a form of communism that not even Karl Marx, in his wildest dreams, could have imagined,' Ingrassia wrote in a 2023 social media post. Ingrassia that same year published a Substack post titled 'Free Nick Fuentes,' criticizing then-Twitter's decision to suspend the account of the far-right activist who has used his online platform to spew antisemitic and white supremacist rhetoric. Ingrassia was seen in 2024 at a rally where Fuentes spoke, The Intercept reported. Ingrassia previously told NPR that he did not intend to go the impromptu Fuentes rally, which was near another event, adding: 'I had no knowledge of who organized the event, observed for 5-10 minutes, then left.' The day after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, Ingrassia wrote on social media: 'This 'war' is yet another psyop to distract Americans from celebrating Columbus Day.' Days later, he wrote: 'I think we could all admit at this stage that Israel/Palestine, much like Ukraine before it, and BLM before that, and covid/vaccine before that, was yet another psyop.' Ingrassia has also promoted the lie that the 2020 election was stolen, publishing a piece in November that argued that Trump's win over Kamala Harris proved 'beyond all doubt' that the 2020 race was 'fraudulent.' The Office of Special Counsel is an independent agency separate from Justice Department special counsels, who are appointed by the attorney general for specific investigations, like Jack Smith. Trump in February fired the previous special counsel, Hampton Dellinger, leading to a legal battle. A federal judge in Washington initially ruled that Dellinger's firing was illegal, but a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit later ruled that the Trump administration could replace Dellinger while the legal battle played out. Dellinger ultimately abandoned his fight to get his job back, acknowledging that he was facing likely long odds before the Supreme Court.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Trump picks right-wing lawyer and podcaster who promoted 2020 election lies as watchdog agency head
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's pick to lead a federal watchdog agency is a former right-wing podcast host who has praised criminally charged influencer Andrew Tate as a 'extraordinary human being" and promoted the false claim that the 2020 election was rigged. If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Paul Ingrassia would lead the Office of Special Counsel, an agency dedicated to protecting whistleblowers that is also responsible for enforcing the Hatch Act, which restricts the partisan political activities of government workers. Trump described Ingrassia in a social media post on Thursday as a 'highly respected attorney, writer and Constitutional Scholar.' Ingrassia was most recently working as the White House liaison for Homeland Security after briefly serving in the liaison position at the Justice Department. Ingrassia called his nomination the 'highest honor.' Ingrassia didn't immediately respond to a message on Friday. 'As Special Counsel, my team and I will make every effort to restore competence and integrity to the Executive Branch — with priority on eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal workforce and revitalize the Rule of Law and Fairness in Hatch Act enforcement,' Ingrassia wrote on social media. Ingrassia worked for a law firm whose clients included Andrew and Tristan Tate, the influencer brothers charged in Britain and Romania with rape and human trafficking. Ingrassia has described Andrew Tate, the former professional kickboxer and self-described misogynist, as an 'extraordinary human being' and 'the ancient ideal of excellence.' 'It is for this reason that he and his brother have become public enemies number one and two in the eyes of the Matrix, the deep state, and the satanic elite that attempt to systematically program and oppress all men from womb-to-tomb – a form of communism that not even Karl Marx, in his wildest dreams, could have imagined,' Ingrassia wrote in a 2023 social media post. Ingrassia that same year published a Substack post titled 'Free Nick Fuentes,' criticizing then-Twitter's decision to suspend the account of the far-right activist who has used his online platform to spew antisemitic and white supremacist rhetoric. Ingrassia was seen in 2024 at a rally where Fuentes spoke, The Intercept reported. Ingrassia previously told NPR that he did not intend to go the impromptu Fuentes rally, which was near another event, adding: 'I had no knowledge of who organized the event, observed for 5-10 minutes, then left." The day after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, Ingrassia wrote on social media: 'This 'war' is yet another psyop to distract Americans from celebrating Columbus Day.' Days later, he wrote: 'I think we could all admit at this stage that Israel/Palestine, much like Ukraine before it, and BLM before that, and covid/vaccine before that, was yet another psyop." Ingrassia has also promoted the lie that the 2020 election was stolen, publishing a piece in November that argued that Trump's win over Kamala Harris proved 'beyond all doubt' that the 2020 race was 'fraudulent.' The Office of Special Counsel is an independent agency separate from Justice Department special counsels, who are appointed by the attorney general for specific investigations, like Jack Smith. Trump in February fired the previous special counsel, Hampton Dellinger, leading to a legal battle. A federal judge in Washington initially ruled that Dellinger's firing was illegal, but a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit later ruled that the Trump administration could replace Dellinger while the legal battle played out. Dellinger ultimately abandoned his fight to get his job back, acknowledging that he was facing likely long odds before the Supreme Court.
Toronto Star
3 days ago
- Politics
- Toronto Star
Trump picks right-wing lawyer and podcaster who promoted 2020 election lies as watchdog agency head
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's pick to lead a federal watchdog agency is a former right-wing podcast host who has praised criminally charged influencer Andrew Tate as a 'extraordinary human being' and promoted the false claim that the 2020 election was rigged. If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Paul Ingrassia would lead the Office of Special Counsel, an agency dedicated to protecting whistleblowers that is also responsible for enforcing the Hatch Act, which restricts the partisan political activities of government workers.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Ohio's Cleveland Clinic faces questions over booming subsidies
A medical exam room. File photo from Federal officials are raising questions about exploding drug discounts under a program meant to fund services for low-income patients, and Ohio's Cleveland Clinic is at the center of some of them. Over a 38-month period ending in June 2023, the massive nonprofit hospital received nearly $1 billion from the program. However, the clinic didn't cut drug prices for any of its low-income patients, instead plowing the money into its general budget. Officials at the clinic told congressional investigators that they used the money in other ways to help poor patients. Yet in 2023, the nonprofit hospital had enough money to pay 22 of its executives more than $1 million and another 30 over $500,000 — and still finish the year with nearly $1 billion in 'net income.' A private business would call that 'profit.' For its part, the clinic pointed out that its operating income was much smaller than that, and that it spent almost as much on free or discounted care in 2023. Cleveland Clinic was one of two hospitals to come under scrutiny as part of a U.S. Senate investigation of a drug-discounting program known as 340B. It requires drugmakers who want to sell their products to Medicaid patients to also sell them to qualifying hospitals and clinics at deep, legally defined discounts. The hospitals and clinics then sell them at much higher prices and pocket the difference — notionally, to provide care to people who can't afford it. When it was created in 1992, 340B was intended to free up money and make federal resources go further for providers who cared for a heavy mix of low-income and underinsured patients. But after the Affordable Care Act passed in 2010 and the 340B rules were changed, the amount of discounts provided under the program exploded — from $5 billion a year to nearly $67 billion in 2023. That's not free money, and the discounts to 340B providers are made up by other payers — including the poor, said Antonio Ciaccia, a Columbus-based drug-pricing analyst. As the amount of that money grew 13-fold in as many years, the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee wanted to know whether 340B was really fulfilling the program's goal to 'stretch scarce Federal resources as far as possible.' The multi-year investigation focused on two hospitals. 'These hospitals were selected for this investigation as a result of media reports alleging abuse of the 340B Program, such as hospitals cutting services to underserved populations and expanding into affluent areas to increase reimbursement rates and subsequent revenue under the 340B Program,' the committee report, which was released last month, said. The other hospital chain, Cincinnati-based Bon Secours Mercy Health, will be the subject of a separate story. Regarding Cleveland Clinic, the Senate report referred to a 2022 Wall Street Journal story. It said the hospital didn't admit enough Medicaid and low-income patients to qualify under the original 340B rules. But under a quirk in the new rules, it was allowed in as a 'rural-referral center' even though it's headquartered in the middle of a big city. In analyzing the data the submitted by Cleveland Clinic, the Senate committee found that between April 2020 and June 2023, the hospital chain received $934 million in benefit from the 340B program. Yet, even though the reason for the program's existence is to support care for people who can't do so themselves, Cleveland Clinic didn't use those funds to directly defray patients' drug costs. 'Cleveland Clinic… explained that it does not pass 340B discounts directly to patients because 'there is no dollar-for-dollar, pass-on requirement to patients under the 340B statute' and the statute 'was intentionally left general to provide safety-net providers with latitude on how they use their savings in the ever-changing health care industry,'' the report said. Instead, Cleveland Clinic said it 'applies its 340B benefit 'to the health system's overall operating expenses and revenues in order to offset the cost of providing health care services to the communities [it] serve[s] and to maintain and invest in programs that enhance patient services and access to care.'' Cleveland Clinic said it didn't track the 340B millions after putting them in the revenue pot. But it said it spends huge amounts underwriting care for low-income Ohioans. In 2023, it provided $261 million in free or discounted care to more than 110,000 patients, a spokeswoman said on background. The clinic is the leading provider of Medicaid services, charity care and mental health services in Ohio, she said. She also pointed out that in 2024, Cleveland Clinic had an operating margin of $276 million, while it spent $261 million discounting care a year earlier. However, that excludes income the tax-exempt nonprofit makes from its sizable investments. When you include that, Cleveland Clinic made $911 million in net income in 2023, Healthcare Dive reported. Also, those narrow operating margins come after paying out hefty salaries. According to Cleveland Clinic's 2023 IRS Form 990, President and CEO Tom Mihaljevic was paid $7 million. That was more than 100 times Ohio's median household income for that year. In all, more than 50 of the top decision-makers at Cleveland Clinic made more than $500,000 as they set and enacted a budget subsidized by hundreds of millions of 340B dollars that are notionally meant to support charity care. 'Cleveland Clinic sets executive compensation in accordance with the process developed by the IRS to ensure that such compensation is determined in a fair and impartial manner taking relevant comparative data into account,' the clinic's spokeswoman said. In its response to the Senate report, Cleveland Clinic claimed the 340B program doesn't cost taxpayers. 'As the cost of providing healthcare continues to rise, the 340B program helps us save resources that would have otherwise been spent on purchasing medications but instead can be directed to providing care, at no additional taxpayer expense,' it said. However, just as others have to pay the taxes nonprofits don't, drugmakers don't simply absorb the tens of billions in discounts they're required to give under the 340B program, said Ciaccia, the drug pricing analyst. In fact, many of the low-income patients the program is supposed to benefit help pay for it. That's because those with private insurance — or who are uninsured — don't pay for drugs on the basis of 340B discounts. They have to pay based on the inflated prices the clinic and its contracted pharmacies charge in order to generate the program's income. Everyone with employer-based insurance also pays because those plans also don't get the 340B discount — or in some cases even a slice of manufacturer rebates they might get in non-340B pharmacy transactions, Ciaccia said. And, as with so many other things, increased insurance costs are usually passed on to consumers. Ciaccia added that as with rebates, mandatory 340B discounts give drugmakers an incentive to increase the list prices of drugs — increases that are felt most acutely by those who are least able to pay. 'In recent years, the list prices for drugs have arguably exploded, creating greater and greater pressure for government programs, employers, and sick patients to access medicines — not through actual affordable prices — but instead through negotiated or mandated discounts off of those bloated prices,' Ciaccia said. 'Programs like 340B double down on our system's addiction to discounts, pressuring the list prices of medicines higher. But instead of passing those discounts through, the end payer gets stuck with a bloated tab at the pharmacy counter. One way or another, the bill always comes due.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
