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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
Summary
Donald Trump’s transition team plans to grant sweeping security clearances to cabinet picks before traditional FBI background checks, delaying vetting until the new administration takes over the bureau and installs its own officials.
This move could bypass FBI scrutiny and delay classified briefings until Trump’s January 20 inauguration.
The approach reflects Trump’s distrust of the FBI, rooted in its role during the Russia investigation, and mirrors past controversies like Jared Kushner’s delayed clearance, which Trump overrode despite FBI and CIA concerns.
Critics warn this could undermine vetting and create potential security risks.
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Does “blackmailed and owned by a dictator” not count as “foreign donation”?
I read “inmate”
Is this draining the swamp?
Is this draining the swamp?
Draining it directly into the white house.
This is just a slow coup by foreign actors at this point, isn’t it?
Yes, and they’ve succeeded.
Can’t get Russian operatives into the White House if you don’t break a few eggs.
If the security has exceptions, it’s not security.
The president should not have the power to forego the clearance process to begin with.
President always had that capability, as head of the executive branch. It wasn’t used often (dire situations may apply, like needing to get an expert cleared quickly to be brought into a highly sensitive project – in this case the request is likely following a chain-of-command and the individual likely has a positive public or professional reputation that proceeds them), because it’s shady as fuck and everyone knows it. Certainly not on a large scale for an incoming cabinet.
But ultimately, security clearance is on the approval of the president, just delegated through the state department.
Basically he already knows his picks are susceptible to foreign influence, because many are already under foreign influence, so background checks would just complicate things. He doesn’t care about protecting national secrets as evidenced by him stealing them and storing them in his resort without much security.
He almost certainly didn’t just store them. There were folio’s with missing classified documents. He sold US national secrets.
We get that HE doesn’t care, but why tf doesn’t America? Why would these vetting institutions just waive the standard?
A lot of us do but are stuck in a state of learned helplessness.
What are we supposed to do, anyway? We don’t share France’s strong history of activism. Every large protest in the US has been suppressed and oppressed within my lifetime. And we’re wage slaves. We can’t leave work or we lose our income, our health insurance, leading to loss of our housing and everything else.
We’re slaves. People just have been lulled into this idea that they’re not.
Their foreign connections are probably part of why he chose them.
It’s 2024, Democrats are fiscally responsible and tough on Russia while Republicans are subversive deviants with criminal tendencies and Russian leanings
I feel like I was born in a virtual universe contrived by the telling of a weird joke that will cease to exist as soon as the punchline arrives.
Nah. The rich just realized they can buy off the only two options.
That’s why since Bill Clinton both parties have moved to the right, deregulated political donations, and suddenly they need over a billion dollars each election, even though no one you’ve ever met has been influenced by a political ad.
They don’t need that much money, they just say they do to rationalize why they keep moving right.
If we ran a candidate that agreed with Dem voters, we’d never need to spend close to a billion to beat trump.
And to clarify neither party is “fiscally responsible” now a days, if they were they’d plan long term and invest in things like education. But both parties prefer dumb voters who blindly vote straight ticket.
Yet one of the parties is trying to invest in long term things like education, climate, infrastructure, trying to bring manufacturing back to the US, strengthen unions……
If my government is going to be irresponsible with money, I’d much rather it be for long term investments than lining the pockets of the wealthy or connected
Well at least they say they’re “trying” on paper. Unfortunately, they’re either lying or incompetent because they sure as hell aren’t succeeding at any of this and keep letting Republicans win elections by being so ineffective.
It’s not too different than your boss telling you that they’re “really trying to get you a raise” year after year as you fall deeper and deeper into the hole meanwhile you see him buying his 14th house.
Sssshhhhh…
How have you forgotten?
We give neoliberals credit when they say they’ll fix something, not when they actually do it.
If we only gave them credit for things they’ve done, people are going to ask why we’ve devoted 30 years of the Dem party to Jimmy Carvil’s best cryptkeeper impression?
What a delight. You might be right though
That would be cool
You have stepped into… The Toilet Zone
That wasn’t it. Keep trying.
It’s fine, self-referential meta comedy isn’t for everyone.
I just meant I still exist, so that must not have been the existence-ending punchline.
Hahaha fuck I missed it. Well played, I’ll keep at it
Please and thank you. This simulation is off the rails.
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you extreme vetting.
Does extreme vetting come with knee pads, or do candidates have to bring their own?
Trump’s team has regarded the FBI background check process with contempt for months, a product of their deep distrust of the bureau ever since officials turned over transition records to the Russia investigation during the first Trump presidency, the people said.
Investigate me for colluding with a foreign power once, shame on you. Investigate me twice for colluding with a foreign power…
But delaying FBI vetting could also bring ancillary PR benefits for the Trump team if some political appointees run into problems during a background check, which could upend their Senate confirmation process, or if they struggle to obtain security clearances once in the White House.
This is the actual answer, if somewhat buried. After they’re in place, any blowback will be after-the-fact and treated as “oh well” by the media and public.
“The Trump-Vance transition lawyers continue to constructively engage with the Biden-Harris administration lawyers regarding all agreements contemplated by the Presidential Transition Act. We will update you once a decision is made,” Trump spokesperson Brian Hughes said in a statement.
Let me guess, the decision is coming in two weeks?
Let me check my calendar, … looks like 7 or 8 weeks.
Americans deserve the damage this administration will do to our security. Americans deserve the economic hit we are about to take. Americans deserve the loss of freedoms we are suffering. Americans deserve the lies and gaslighting and false piety and manufactured consent being pumped at us on these screens. Americans deserve the further entrenchment of this new ruling feudal class. Americans deserve to watch the oligarchs flout the same laws that bind everyone else. Americans deserve the avoidable illnesses and untreated suffering that the rest of the world is organized to treat. Americans deserve all the violence that a self-serving authoritarian regime always needs to sustain itself.
Don’t ever let your drooling, bigoted, cowardly compatriots forget that we chose all this. The fuckers didn’t even need to undermine the election. We Americans are stupid enough to just hand our own wellbeing over to these rich assholes willingly.
As humans living in a country called The United States of America, what The People deserve is a form of government that protects its people from lies and disinformation. In the twenty first century, that requires more regulation than the founders of the country had imagined or provisioned for in The Constitution.
The idea that a Free Society is one with less government involvement is a lie. Government exists, ideally, to protect and ensure fair opportunity for The People. The government of the US has, since its inception, always existed to ensure opportunity for the wealthy land and business owners who don’t want to pay taxes.
No person deserves what you’ve claimed. The People have been lied to. They’ve been manipulated and spoken down to. Propaganda and brain washing is not the fault of The People. “Stupidity” (your words) is no excuse for a representative government to take advantage of The People.
Do Not Blame The People.
Blame the founders, blame the courts, blame the corporations, blame Congress, blame Wall Street, blame Reagan, blame Trump, blame Biden. If anyone deserves illness, it’s this group.
What The People of America deserve is a government that represents and works for them. One that ensures equal rights and equity for all. One that earns the trust of The People so when they tell you something good or bad is happening, you believe them. Humans deserve a life free of undeserved obstacles and one free of blatant, verifiably false lies benefiting corporations and political leaders. And, we deserve a free and robust Press.
I second this. I don’t want my government to hurt anyone, even people who are ignorant or hateful.
I certainly didn’t vote for what’s coming, and millions of others didn’t either. Countries that rely on us didn’t vote for it. Our environment didn’t vote for it. And I’m sure most of the people that were duped into voting for it didn’t really want what we’re going to get either. Some dirtbags probably did, but I think they’re still a minority, and I’d still rather those people have a chance to become good people than for them to suffer. I’d still want them to have access to free education and universal healthcare and a full social safety net if I had the power to give it to them.
We won’t be able to walk back a lot of what might happen. We could lose millions of acres of public land to private interest. Untold destruction could destroy our remaining ecosystems irreparably. We’ve got anti-vaxxers that could kill thousands to millions. We’ve got people that want to let Palestinians, Ukrainians, and Kurds die. That stuff can’t be undone, and those people and our planet don’t deserve it because some con artists did a great job on propaganda this last half century.
Crying out “We do not deserve this!” Or “The world does not deserve this” says nothing against the facts that the American people could see this coming FOR YEARS and nothing was done, it was laughed away weakly as nonsense or misunderstood.
Where was the massive outcry and demand for proper and swift justice for jan 6th?
There should have been enormous (mail in) complaints about the delays and handling of the Trump cases.
Every tv station website or newspaper downplaying Trump’s vile rhetorical speeches should have gotten thousands of complaints, mailbags filled with them.
Millions of posters stuck on walls warning against inherent facism…
Documentaries on Hitler’s rise…
The supreme court should have gotten so much angry mail their front doors were inaccessible…
Once, there were anti-communism boards, now clear signs and evidence of influence is laughed away, where was the outcry over that?
The 500 people that went “oh no, I will write my senator/congressman about this” made an attempt perhaps but that was easily dismissed by the office clerks…
Where were the riots on the streets demanding justice?
None of any complaints on a massive scale happened, everything was almost seen as mild amusement and easily forgotten while the rest of the world held it’s breath.
And by now, even before the new government is in office, everyone seems afraid to even speak up.
Massively demand a recount, at the least! It’s not hard to delay an inauguration, can even retroactively allow new laws to go in effect if the elections were legit if so desired.
Frankly, the US let it all happen through years of inaction and chose this fate, no ifs and or buts about it, and now it has to sit on the blisters.
The only ones not deserving this is the rest of the world, and most likely it will permanently change from this. Since the world is far greater than America it will move on and make the USA an outcast for years to come.
Ofcourse “Communism” will fill the gap quickly and try to consolidate all international power the US loses.
Honestly, I hope, nay dream, the military might wake up at some point and puts a stop to the madness before the destruction is too great, and upholds the constitution, stopping it from being torn up as well. But that branch might have been corrupted too much by now.
It will be really interesting to see how people will think of America to be “Great Again” in 5 to 10 years.
I won’t argue anything you say too much. You seem to be very firm in your opinions, and overall I feel we’d agree on things more than we’d disagree.
With that said, one of the bigger issues I have is what country is currently doing what you feel would be a better path for the US to follow? Europe has often provided a calmer voice to many issues, but it no longer feels to be the case. I’m no expert on world politics, but I can’t think of any country moving leftward as a whole right now. Europe seems to be in the middle of an anti-immigrant shift of its own, and they are helping with Ukraine in what feels on par with the US but not exceeding that aid, and it feels no one is doing much about Palestine.
If there is someone you feel is doing better, I’d like to learn about how it works, but I feel the US is still in one of the top positions to do something. Perhaps not for a few years now, but we all seem to be on the same sinking ship right now. We may have a bigger slice of the responsibility for that, but I’m not seeing anyone else giving a better example.
Things are going to go to shit, compared to the last 4 years, but I think it’s important we keep our heads and continue to make improvements where we can, even if that is much more local than nationally or globally. More blue states already seem to be preparing to fight some of the incoming changes, and we still have the quagmire of a court system to drag down the speed of what the new government can accomplish. A lot of nominees for cabinet roles are also outsiders and have no idea how to mobilize their workforce, and competent people will leave behind the less capable to accomplish their goals.
It is no more time to give up than it was a month ago. Those of us that want change still have the same things to try and accomplish. We might have to figure out new ways to do it, but we’ll still keep trying.
Most people outside political forums aren’t near as knowledgeable or informed as we tend to be, so we still need to educate people on facts and to undo disinformation when they’re ready to be receptive to it. Unless you want to go revolutionary and start hurting people physically, being engaged with your fellow countrymen is still the way forward.
We’re allowed to be angry right now. It’s good we’re angry to an extent. But I’m not here to promote anger. I’m mostly concerned with the environment and human rights, and hate and violence I don’t think are going to help either of those causes.
I DO want magats and those who abstained to hurt though
dont ya just feel safer already
