- John Ratcliffe has been nominated to be Director of National Intelligence. He was previously nominated then withdrawn when it came out nearly every instance on his resume involving national intelligence was a lie. Nothing has changed since his last nomination. This may be an intentional tactic as if the Senate rejects him, Trump can simply keep acting DNI Grenell in place, who also has zero intelligence experience.
- In another released of documents due to a FOIA request, Secretary of Defense Esper, Secretary of State Pompeo, and National Security Adviser John Bolton were all against the delay in Ukrainian military aid but said the decision was ultimately up to the president. The executive branch withheld these documents from the House. Their release under FOIA again undercuts the argument that the administration had authority to withhold them in the first place.
- In another batch of released emails, officials at NOAA were mortified over their scientific credibility as the agency tried to support Trump’s false assertion that Hurricane Dorian would be striking Alabama. The president infamously altered a weather map with a Sharpie in the oval office to make it agree with his misinformed tweet.
- The United States and the Taliban, a terrorist organization, have announced a peace deal that would involve releasing 5,000 Taliban prisoners from Afghani custody. Republicans were previously furious when President Obama brokered a prisoner swap involving 5 Taliban prisoners. The deal has already been rejected by the Aghani government and the Taliban has resumed military operations.
- A judge had found that Ken Cuccinelli was illegally appointed as acting director of USCIS. The agency has already sent out notifications undoing actions he took this summer. He remains Acting Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security. Through Trump’s entire term he has abused the Vacancies Reform Act in order to avoid having to go through Senate confirmation of his nominees.
- An upcoming book from David Enrich details the shady transactions taking place at Deutsche Bank. Despite their own internal processes red flagging Trump, the bank continued to loan him massive amounts of money, going so far as to give him a loan to cover another loan they held he had already defaulted on. Coincidentally, the bank was laundering massive amounts of Russian money.
- Mike Pence’s office issued a press release tonight about the coronavirus. The entire press release is just a collection of Tweets praising Trump’s handling of the outbreak.
- In a press event, doctors had to explain to the president that a coronavirus vaccine will not be ready for a year to a year and a half. At a rally tonight, the president said the vaccine will be ready soon. They also had to explain to the president that the flu vaccine will not work against the coronavirus as that isn’t how vaccines work. During the same press event and at his rally tonight the president said they were close to having a treatment that combined a vaccine and something that will make patients better quicker. This is nonsense. It is difficult to understate how little Donald Trump understands about the science involved here.
- At CPAC, Trump said the Taliban, a terrorist group, were great fighters as evidence by their actions against Russia. The Taliban did not fight Russia at any point. He went on to once again say US troops were in Syria to keep their oil, which is a lie and a war crime. He reiterated a frequent quip that televisions don’t work when the wind isn’t blowing in areas using wind energy. This is not true. Trump has a vendetta against windmills after losing a lawsuit to keep them off the coast of his Scottish golf course. He told another frequent lie that he was just joking when he publicly invited Russia to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails, saying the media cuts off the laughter afterwards. There was none. The president stated no one is talking about how there isn’t an estate tax any more. There is.
