Over at The Washington Post, Eugene Robinson catalogs all the broken promises:
Remember how the president promised a $1 trillion program to rebuild the nation’s roads, bridges, airports and railroads? Well, he claims to be doing even more — $1.5 trillion in infrastructure spending over the next decade. But the promise comes with little or no new federal money, which means it barely qualifies as an idle wish. Trump says he wants to spend just $200 billion over 10 years on infrastructure, with cities and states providing the rest. But mayors and governors don’t have $1.3 trillion lying around; ask them, if you don’t believe me. And since the $200 billion is supposed to come from savings elsewhere in the budget, Trump effectively plans to give with one hand and take away with the other.
Dana Milbank:
Remember Trump’s promise that “I’m not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid” and his boast about being “the first and only potential GOP candidate to state there will be no cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid”?
That promise has gone up, up and away. Trump proposes to cut more than $500 billion together from Medicare — health care for old folks — and Medicaid, which provides health care to the poor.
At USA Today, Rep. Peter DeFazio explains why Democrats have a better infrastructure plan:
This is not a real infrastructure plan; it’s simply another scam, an attempt by this administration to privatize critical government functions and create windfalls for Wall Street. This fake proposal will not address the serious infrastructure needs facing this country, so our potholed roads will get worse, our bridges and transit systems will become more dangerous, and we will pay more tolls. [...]
Last week, House Democrats released “A Better Deal to Rebuild America” — an infrastructure plan that is five times bigger than President Trump’s proposal.
Our proposal provides $1 trillion in federal funding to rebuild our crumbling roads, bridges, transit systems, ports, harbors, airports and schools; extend high-speed Internet to every family in America; and put more than 16 million people to work.
Switching topics, Colbie Holderness, first wife of former White House staff secretary Rob Porter, has written an op-ed about her experience:
For me, living in constant fear of Rob’s anger and being subjected to his degrading tirades for years chipped away at my independence and sense of self-worth. I walked away from that relationship a shell of the person I was when I went into it, but it took me a long time to realize the toll that his behavior was taking on me. (Rob has denied the abuse, but Willoughby and I know what happened.)
Over at The Cut, Mimi Kramer explains how Donald Trump “sees himself in every man accused”:
Most striking, though, about Trump’s Saturday tweet on the departing White House abusers is the way it turns the scenario on its head: It is the men’s lives that are “shattered” and “destroyed.” [...] That this protective, almost loving side of Trump should be brought out by the figure of an accused abuser of women is a bizarre development, more startling, perhaps, even than what the verbiage of his two statements this weekend suggest about the utter valueless-ness and invisibility of women in his own mental landscape. It shares something too, with the morning-after-abuser’s seductive contrition. He is sober here, controlled, even subdued — because he knows this scenario himself.
On the topic of an out-of-control ICE, Jonathan Blitzer at The New Yorker explains how Trump’s agency is tearing families apart:
Last year, amid reports of newly unfettered ice activity, John Kelly, who served as the Secretary of Homeland Security before becoming Donald Trump’s chief of staff, vocally defended ice officers. “If lawmakers do not like the laws they’ve passed and we are charged to enforce, then they should have the courage and skill to change the laws,” he said. “Otherwise, they should shut up and support the men and women on the front lines. My people have been discouraged from doing their jobs for nearly a decade.” [...]
A month after assuming office, Trump cancelled all of the enforcement priorities instituted by the Obama Administration, and he encouraged ice officers to arrest as many people as they could. As a result, any immigrant who is undocumented is now at risk of being arrested and deported. “It feels like we’re on a totally different level than in previous Administrations, both Democrat and Republican,” Escobar, the former Obama aide, told me. “From the rhetoric that’s out there, from the policies—they have the staff at ice to do what they want. The will is there. The resources are there. It’s unprecedented.”
On a final note, don’t miss this piece by John Nichols at The Nation on the hopefully growing trend of unionizing campaign staff:
Under the groundbreaking contract, the eight members of the [Randy] Bryce campaign staff secured a 1 percent pay raise and reimbursements for health-insurance premiums. In addition, the contract provides for a formal grievance process and a third-party reporting system for sexual harassment. [...]
“If I’m talking about the importance of unions on the campaign trail, it makes sense that the people who work on the campaign should have representation,” says Bryce, who encourages other candidates to get to know about the efforts of the Campaign Workers Guild to assure that campaign staffers are treated with respect. That goes for the campaigns of Democrats and Republicans, says Bryce.
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