DOGE Catch-All

[nycfan]

“ .. “Simply put,” the officials added, “we are quickly heading toward an environmental and life-threatening catastrophe.”

They received no response from Washington, according to three people familiar with the situation.

… Instead, Rubio and Peter Marocco, another top Trump appointee, have not only ordered the work to stop, but they also have frozen more than $1 million in payments for work already completed by the contractors the U.S. hired. The company overseeing the project is Tetra Tech, a publicly traded consulting and engineering firm based in the U.S., and a Vietnamese construction firm has been tasked with the excavation work.

Then, on Feb. 26, Rubio and Marocco canceled both companies’ contracts altogether before apparently reversing that decision about a week later, agency records show. As of Thursday, the companies had not been paid.

…
Now, after losing several weeks because of the administration’s orders, the companies are scrambling — at their own expense — to secure the Bien Hoa site before it starts raining, according to documents reviewed by ProPublica and several people familiar with the current situation.

The USAID officials who would typically travel to the air base to provide oversight have been placed on administrative leave or prevented from traveling to check on the work. They’ve also been forbidden from communicating with the Vietnamese government or the companies working at the base, sources say, though they believe that directive was lifted after the contracts were recently reinstated. The confusion has left many at both the embassy and in Washington in the dark about where the situation stands. …”

 

[Healing]

"Almost 90 percent of voters in this Appalachian county in Kentucky’s southeastern corner voted for Trump,"

 

[nycfan]

“ .. “Simply put,” the officials added, “we are quickly heading toward an environmental and life-threatening catastrophe.”

They received no response from Washington, according to three people familiar with the situation.

… Instead, Rubio and Peter Marocco, another top Trump appointee, have not only ordered the work to stop, but they also have frozen more than $1 million in payments for work already completed by the contractors the U.S. hired. The company overseeing the project is Tetra Tech, a publicly traded consulting and engineering firm based in the U.S., and a Vietnamese construction firm has been tasked with the excavation work.

Then, on Feb. 26, Rubio and Marocco canceled both companies’ contracts altogether before apparently reversing that decision about a week later, agency records show. As of Thursday, the companies had not been paid.

…
Now, after losing several weeks because of the administration’s orders, the companies are scrambling — at their own expense — to secure the Bien Hoa site before it starts raining, according to documents reviewed by ProPublica and several people familiar with the current situation.

The USAID officials who would typically travel to the air base to provide oversight have been placed on administrative leave or prevented from traveling to check on the work. They’ve also been forbidden from communicating with the Vietnamese government or the companies working at the base, sources say, though they believe that directive was lifted after the contracts were recently reinstated. The confusion has left many at both the embassy and in Washington in the dark about where the situation stands. …”

“… To ascertain the current status of the work, ProPublica hired a reporter to visit the air base on Friday.

Workers are laboring in 95 degree heat, surrounded by toxic soil. The site has a skeleton crew of less than half of what they previously had, according to workers and documents reviewed by ProPublica. Some staffers found new jobs during the suspension. People working at the site told the reporter they are worried about completing the work before the rainy season descends and are terrified the U.S. will pause the work again.

Since 2019, the U.S. government has collaborated with Vietnam’s Ministry of Defense to clean up the Bien Hoa air base and agreed to spend more than $430 million for the project.

Unlike other foreign aid programs, addressing Agent Orange is more akin to restitution than charity because the U.S. brought the deadly substance there in the first place.

“The dioxin remediation program is one of the core reasons why we have an extraordinary relationship with Vietnam today,” a State Department official told ProPublica, “a country that should by all rights hate us.” …”

 

[korgguy1971]

"Almost 90 percent of voters in this Appalachian county in Kentucky’s southeastern corner voted for Trump,"

They were hoist(ed) by their own petard.

 

[BlooVooDoo]

I can understand their frustration. Why didn’t the Democrats adequately warn them?

 

[altmin]

While Trump slashes jobs, his golf trips are costing taxpayers millions | Mohamad Bazzi

The US president is condemning ‘waste’ and firing workers – while cashing in by traveling to his own resorts

www.theguardian.com

It’s no secret that Donald Trump loves to golf, especially at his own resorts. But Trump’s habit is costing US taxpayers tens of millions of dollars – even as he decries fraud and claims to slash waste in federal spending.

Since he took office, Trump has fired tens of thousands of federal workers and tried to shut down agencies, part of his effort to unilaterally dismantle the government. He has also made seven trips to Florida and the golf courses he owns there.


This weekend, Trump made his seventh visit to Florida and his sixth to his waterfront mansion and private club at Mar-a-Lago since his inauguration on 20 January. As Richard Luscombe noted in the Guardian last week, Trump’s frequent trips to his own properties not only cost taxpayer funds, but they benefit him directly – his businesses have charged the US government to house Secret Service agents and other White House staff. In other words, American taxpayers pay the Trump Organization for the right to protect Trump and his family.

During Trump’s first term, his properties had a history of overcharging the Secret Service, by as much as 300% beyond the authorized government hotel rates, according to a report issued by Democrats in Congress last year. The report found that the Trump Organization charged the Secret Service as much as $1,815 a room per night to stay at the Trump International hotel in Washington DC – billing the US government significantly more than the hotel did for “rooms rented by the Qatari royal family and Chinese business interests”.

...

The cost to US taxpayers for Trump’s jaunts to Mar-a-Lago, which he calls his “winter White House”, far exceeds renting rooms for the president’s security entourage. A 2019 report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which examined four trips that Trump took to his Palm Beach resort during his first term, put the total cost at $13.6m, or about $3.4m for each visit. That includes flying Air Force One, along with a separate cargo plane that carries the presidential motorcade, between Washington and the Palm Beach international airport. With seven trips so far into his current term, the US government has likely already spent more than $23m on Trump’s golf outings.

...

The Palm Beach county sheriff, Ric Bradshaw, has said that his department spends $240,000 a day to help the Secret Service protect Trump. Bradshaw recently asked county commissioners for $45m in additional funds to provide security for Trump’s visits through the rest of this year – and the county is asking Congress to reimburse those costs.

 

[lawtig02]

Sad. That’s a whole bunch of people who will never leave Harlan alive.

 

[Healing]

While Trump slashes jobs, his golf trips are costing taxpayers millions | Mohamad Bazzi

The US president is condemning ‘waste’ and firing workers – while cashing in by traveling to his own resorts

www.theguardian.com

It’s no secret that Donald Trump loves to golf, especially at his own resorts. But Trump’s habit is costing US taxpayers tens of millions of dollars – even as he decries fraud and claims to slash waste in federal spending.

Since he took office, Trump has fired tens of thousands of federal workers and tried to shut down agencies, part of his effort to unilaterally dismantle the government. He has also made seven trips to Florida and the golf courses he owns there.


This weekend, Trump made his seventh visit to Florida and his sixth to his waterfront mansion and private club at Mar-a-Lago since his inauguration on 20 January. As Richard Luscombe noted in the Guardian last week, Trump’s frequent trips to his own properties not only cost taxpayer funds, but they benefit him directly – his businesses have charged the US government to house Secret Service agents and other White House staff. In other words, American taxpayers pay the Trump Organization for the right to protect Trump and his family.

During Trump’s first term, his properties had a history of overcharging the Secret Service, by as much as 300% beyond the authorized government hotel rates, according to a report issued by Democrats in Congress last year. The report found that the Trump Organization charged the Secret Service as much as $1,815 a room per night to stay at the Trump International hotel in Washington DC – billing the US government significantly more than the hotel did for “rooms rented by the Qatari royal family and Chinese business interests”.

...

The cost to US taxpayers for Trump’s jaunts to Mar-a-Lago, which he calls his “winter White House”, far exceeds renting rooms for the president’s security entourage. A 2019 report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which examined four trips that Trump took to his Palm Beach resort during his first term, put the total cost at $13.6m, or about $3.4m for each visit. That includes flying Air Force One, along with a separate cargo plane that carries the presidential motorcade, between Washington and the Palm Beach international airport. With seven trips so far into his current term, the US government has likely already spent more than $23m on Trump’s golf outings.

...

The Palm Beach county sheriff, Ric Bradshaw, has said that his department spends $240,000 a day to help the Secret Service protect Trump. Bradshaw recently asked county commissioners for $45m in additional funds to provide security for Trump’s visits through the rest of this year – and the county is asking Congress to reimburse those costs.

So, he’s on pace to cost American’s something in the neighborhood of $570 million in golf outings. This is his pace less than two months in. Do you think his commitment to “work” will improve as he hits 80 and further cements his authoritarian control, or worsen?

I’m sure his resident white/sanewashers will do their thing, but no one looking at this rationally thinks this is anything short of kleptocratic/oligarchic Orbanism, with a dread inducing hint of Reich.

 

[nycfan]

DOGE Cuts Reach Key Nuclear Scientists, Bomb Engineers and Safety Experts

Firings and buyouts hit the top-secret National Nuclear Security Administration amid a major effort to upgrade America’s nuclear arsenal. Critics say it shows the consequences of heedlessly cutting the federal work force.

www.nytimes.com

“They handled the secure transport of nuclear materials — dangerous, demanding work that requires rigorous training. Four of them took the Trump administration’s offer of a buyout and left the National Nuclear Security Administration.

A half-dozen staff members left a unit in the agency that builds reactors for nuclear submarines.

And a biochemist and engineer who had recently joined the agency as head of the team that enforces safety and environmental standards at a Texas plant that assembles nuclear warheads was fired.

In the past six weeks, the agency, just one relatively small outpost in a federal work force that President Trump and his top adviser Elon Musk aim to drastically pare down, has lost a huge cadre of scientists, engineers, safety experts, project officers, accountants and lawyers — all in the midst of its most ambitious endeavors in a generation.

The nuclear agency, chronically understaffed but critically important, is the busiest it has been since the Cold War. It not only manages the nation’s 3,748 nuclear bombs and warheads, it is modernizing that arsenal — a $20-billion-a-year effort that will arm a new fleet of nuclear submarines, bomber jets and land-based missiles. …”

 

[nycfan]

DOGE Cuts Reach Key Nuclear Scientists, Bomb Engineers and Safety Experts

Firings and buyouts hit the top-secret National Nuclear Security Administration amid a major effort to upgrade America’s nuclear arsenal. Critics say it shows the consequences of heedlessly cutting the federal work force.

www.nytimes.com

“They handled the secure transport of nuclear materials — dangerous, demanding work that requires rigorous training. Four of them took the Trump administration’s offer of a buyout and left the National Nuclear Security Administration.

A half-dozen staff members left a unit in the agency that builds reactors for nuclear submarines.

And a biochemist and engineer who had recently joined the agency as head of the team that enforces safety and environmental standards at a Texas plant that assembles nuclear warheads was fired.

In the past six weeks, the agency, just one relatively small outpost in a federal work force that President Trump and his top adviser Elon Musk aim to drastically pare down, has lost a huge cadre of scientists, engineers, safety experts, project officers, accountants and lawyers — all in the midst of its most ambitious endeavors in a generation.

The nuclear agency, chronically understaffed but critically important, is the busiest it has been since the Cold War. It not only manages the nation’s 3,748 nuclear bombs and warheads, it is modernizing that arsenal — a $20-billion-a-year effort that will arm a new fleet of nuclear submarines, bomber jets and land-based missiles. …”

“… Since the last year of the first Trump administration, the agency has been desperately trying to build up its staff to handle the added workload.

Though it was still hundreds of employees short of what it had said it needed, it had edged up to about 2,000 workers by January.

Now, with the Trump administration’s buyouts and firings, the agency’s trajectory has gone from one of painstaking growth to retraction.

More than 130 employees took the government’s offer of a payout to resign, according to internal agency documents obtained by The New York Times that have not previously been reported. Those departures, together with those of about 27 workers who were caught up in a mass firing and not rehired, wiped out most of the recent staffing gains.

…
Among the departures: At least 27 engineers, 13 program or project analysts, 12 program or project managers, six budget analysts or accountants, five physicists or scientists, as well as attorneys, compliance officers and technologists, according to internal lists.

The agency lost not only officials deeply steeped in the weapons modernization program, but also a noted arms control expert at a time when President Trump has said he hopes to restart talks with Russia and China about limiting nuclear arsenals. …”

 

[ChileG]

DOGE Cuts Reach Key Nuclear Scientists, Bomb Engineers and Safety Experts

Firings and buyouts hit the top-secret National Nuclear Security Administration amid a major effort to upgrade America’s nuclear arsenal. Critics say it shows the consequences of heedlessly cutting the federal work force.

www.nytimes.com

“They handled the secure transport of nuclear materials — dangerous, demanding work that requires rigorous training. Four of them took the Trump administration’s offer of a buyout and left the National Nuclear Security Administration.

A half-dozen staff members left a unit in the agency that builds reactors for nuclear submarines.

And a biochemist and engineer who had recently joined the agency as head of the team that enforces safety and environmental standards at a Texas plant that assembles nuclear warheads was fired.

In the past six weeks, the agency, just one relatively small outpost in a federal work force that President Trump and his top adviser Elon Musk aim to drastically pare down, has lost a huge cadre of scientists, engineers, safety experts, project officers, accountants and lawyers — all in the midst of its most ambitious endeavors in a generation.

The nuclear agency, chronically understaffed but critically important, is the busiest it has been since the Cold War. It not only manages the nation’s 3,748 nuclear bombs and warheads, it is modernizing that arsenal — a $20-billion-a-year effort that will arm a new fleet of nuclear submarines, bomber jets and land-based missiles. …”

Ahhhh…THIS must be the thing that those who support “some” of what DOGE is doing are referring to.

 

[nycfan]

Ahhhh…THIS must be the thing that those who support “some” of what DOGE is doing are referring to.

Especially this sort of obvious outcome of the rash buyout proposal:

“… Governmentwide, a disproportionate number of the roughly 75,000 federal workers who have taken the buyouts so far are those whose skills are in demand in the private sector and will be hard to replace, according to Max Stier, the president and chief executive of Partnership for Public Service, a nonprofit organization that studies governance.

… The field office that oversees the agency’s laboratory in Los Alamos, N.M., where plutonium pits are made, lost nine staff members, according to the documents reviewed by The Times. Budgeted for 97 employees in the fiscal year ending last September, it is now operating with 76. Among those who left was the deputy facility operations manager, a top job.

… “Those are such hard jobs to fill, because people could make as much or more money working for the plant or laboratory itself,” said Jill Hruby, who led the National Nuclear Security Administration during the Biden administration.

… Some of the agency’s workers who left were on the verge of retirement anyway. But because the offer to leave came so suddenly, several former officials said, those employees did not get the chance to properly prepare their replacements. Even a junior employee at the agency can take a year to train, officials said.

…The nuclear agency has struggled for years with understaffing, according to the Government Accountability Office, a federal watchdog agency. In a 2022 report, the nuclear agency said it faced “tremendous work-force attraction and retention problems.” One problem is that the agency is competing with the private sector over workers, including the agency’s own contractors. Another is finding people for such highly specialized work.

Officials were so worried about the loss of employees who transport nuclear materials that they denied the buyout to more than half of workers who signed up for it, according to agency documents.

“We were already understaffed there,” said Ms. Hinderstein, the agency’s former deputy. “Because how do you get people with extremely advanced security skills to be able to defend a nuclear weapon on the road and are willing to be long-haul truckers?” …”

 

[ChileG]

Especially this sort of obvious outcome of the rash buyout proposal:

“… Governmentwide, a disproportionate number of the roughly 75,000 federal workers who have taken the buyouts so far are those whose skills are in demand in the private sector and will be hard to replace, according to Max Stier, the president and chief executive of Partnership for Public Service, a nonprofit organization that studies governance.

… The field office that oversees the agency’s laboratory in Los Alamos, N.M., where plutonium pits are made, lost nine staff members, according to the documents reviewed by The Times. Budgeted for 97 employees in the fiscal year ending last September, it is now operating with 76. Among those who left was the deputy facility operations manager, a top job.

… “Those are such hard jobs to fill, because people could make as much or more money working for the plant or laboratory itself,” said Jill Hruby, who led the National Nuclear Security Administration during the Biden administration.

… Some of the agency’s workers who left were on the verge of retirement anyway. But because the offer to leave came so suddenly, several former officials said, those employees did not get the chance to properly prepare their replacements. Even a junior employee at the agency can take a year to train, officials said.

…The nuclear agency has struggled for years with understaffing, according to the Government Accountability Office, a federal watchdog agency. In a 2022 report, the nuclear agency said it faced “tremendous work-force attraction and retention problems.” One problem is that the agency is competing with the private sector over workers, including the agency’s own contractors. Another is finding people for such highly specialized work.

Yes, several us pointed out at the beginning that this is exactly what would happen with such an idiotic way of downsizing the workforce.

 

[nycfan]

DOGE’s Cuts at the USDA Could Cause US Grocery Prices to Rise and Invasive Species to Spread​

Thousands of US Department of Agriculture employees, including food inspectors and disease-sniffing-dog trainers, remain out of work, leaving food to rot in ports and pests to proliferate.

DOGE’s Cuts at the USDA Could Cause US Grocery Prices to Rise and Invasive Species to Spread

Thousands of US Department of Agriculture employees, including food inspectors and disease-sniffing-dog trainers, remain out of work, leaving food to rot in ports and pests to proliferate.

www.wired.com

“… Dog trainers are just one example of the kind of highly specialized USDA staff that have been removed from their stations in recent weeks. Teams devoted to inspecting plant and food imports have been hit especially hard by the recent cuts, including the Plant Protection and Quarantine program, which has lost hundreds of staffers alone.

…“It’s causing problems left and right,” says one current USDA worker, who like other federal employees in this story asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. “It’s basically a skeleton crew working now,” says another current USDA staffer, who noted that both they and most of their colleagues held advanced degrees and had many years of training to protect US food and agriculture supply chains from invasive pests. “It’s not something that is easily replaced by artificial intelligence.”

“These aren’t your average people,” says Mike Lahar, the regulatory affairs manager at US customs broker behemoth Deringer. “These were highly trained individuals—inspectors, entomologists, taxonomists.”

… Lahar and other supply chain experts warn that the losses could cause food to go rotten while waiting in ports and could lead to even higher grocery prices, in addition to increasing the chances of potentially devastating invasive species getting into the country. These dangers are especially acute at a moment when US grocery supply chains are already reeling from other business disruptions such as bird flu and President Trump’s new tariffs. …”

 

[nycfan]

DOGE’s Cuts at the USDA Could Cause US Grocery Prices to Rise and Invasive Species to Spread​

Thousands of US Department of Agriculture employees, including food inspectors and disease-sniffing-dog trainers, remain out of work, leaving food to rot in ports and pests to proliferate.

DOGE’s Cuts at the USDA Could Cause US Grocery Prices to Rise and Invasive Species to Spread

Thousands of US Department of Agriculture employees, including food inspectors and disease-sniffing-dog trainers, remain out of work, leaving food to rot in ports and pests to proliferate.

www.wired.com

“… Dog trainers are just one example of the kind of highly specialized USDA staff that have been removed from their stations in recent weeks. Teams devoted to inspecting plant and food imports have been hit especially hard by the recent cuts, including the Plant Protection and Quarantine program, which has lost hundreds of staffers alone.

…“It’s causing problems left and right,” says one current USDA worker, who like other federal employees in this story asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. “It’s basically a skeleton crew working now,” says another current USDA staffer, who noted that both they and most of their colleagues held advanced degrees and had many years of training to protect US food and agriculture supply chains from invasive pests. “It’s not something that is easily replaced by artificial intelligence.”

“These aren’t your average people,” says Mike Lahar, the regulatory affairs manager at US customs broker behemoth Deringer. “These were highly trained individuals—inspectors, entomologists, taxonomists.”

… Lahar and other supply chain experts warn that the losses could cause food to go rotten while waiting in ports and could lead to even higher grocery prices, in addition to increasing the chances of potentially devastating invasive species getting into the country. These dangers are especially acute at a moment when US grocery supply chains are already reeling from other business disruptions such as bird flu and President Trump’s new tariffs. …”

“…
The USDA cuts are being felt especially in coastal states home to major shipping ports. USDA sources who spoke to WIRED estimate that the Port of Los Angeles, one of the busiest in the US, lost around 35 percent of its total Plant Protection and Quarantine staff and 60 percent of its “smuggling and interdiction” employees, who are tasked with stopping illegal pests and goods from entering the country. The Port of Miami, which handles high volumes of US plant imports, lost about 35 percent of its plant inspectors.

Navigating the workforce cuts has “been absolute chaos,” says Armando Rosario-Lebrón, a vice president of the National Association of Agriculture Employees, which represents workers in Plant Protection and Quarantine program.

“These ports were already strained in how they process cargo, and now some of them have been completely decimated,” Rosario-Lebrón says. "We could be back to pandemic-level issues for some goods if we don't fix this."

…
Two federal judges and an independent agency that assesses government personnel decisions have already ordered that fired USDA employees be reinstated. Earlier this week, the USDA said that it was pausing the terminations for 45 days and would “develop a phased plan for return-to-duty.” But affected staff remain in the dark about their future, and the Trump administration has signaled it will fight court decisions to reinstate employees, with White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt calling one of the rulings “absurd and unconstitutional.”

As these legal and regulatory battles continue to play out, Hudicka says he anticipates a number of trickle-down effects to happen, such as local market wars over resources, which bigger cities and larger grocery chains will be better equipped for than mom-and-pops and rural communities.

Hudicka says that allowing shipping containers to sit uninspected could also impact other sectors, as the delays will prevent them from being reused for other kinds of goods.

“Those containers are supposed to be moving stuff every day, and now they’re just parked somewhere,” he says. …”

 

[StrangePackage]

“…
The USDA cuts are being felt especially in coastal states home to major shipping ports. USDA sources who spoke to WIRED estimate that the Port of Los Angeles, one of the busiest in the US, lost around 35 percent of its total Plant Protection and Quarantine staff and 60 percent of its “smuggling and interdiction” employees, who are tasked with stopping illegal pests and goods from entering the country. The Port of Miami, which handles high volumes of US plant imports, lost about 35 percent of its plant inspectors.

Navigating the workforce cuts has “been absolute chaos,” says Armando Rosario-Lebrón, a vice president of the National Association of Agriculture Employees, which represents workers in Plant Protection and Quarantine program.

“These ports were already strained in how they process cargo, and now some of them have been completely decimated,” Rosario-Lebrón says. "We could be back to pandemic-level issues for some goods if we don't fix this."

…
Two federal judges and an independent agency that assesses government personnel decisions have already ordered that fired USDA employees be reinstated. Earlier this week, the USDA said that it was pausing the terminations for 45 days and would “develop a phased plan for return-to-duty.” But affected staff remain in the dark about their future, and the Trump administration has signaled it will fight court decisions to reinstate employees, with White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt calling one of the rulings “absurd and unconstitutional.”

As these legal and regulatory battles continue to play out, Hudicka says he anticipates a number of trickle-down effects to happen, such as local market wars over resources, which bigger cities and larger grocery chains will be better equipped for than mom-and-pops and rural communities.

Hudicka says that allowing shipping containers to sit uninspected could also impact other sectors, as the delays will prevent them from being reused for other kinds of goods.

“Those containers are supposed to be moving stuff every day, and now they’re just parked somewhere,” he says. …”

I've got a friend who does exactly this kind of invasive species inspection. I guess I need to check on him and his family.

 

[finesse]

They don't need him since they're going to be able to bring back the really, really effective pesticides and herbicides. Make Amerika Great Again.

 

[Silence Dogood]

 

[Silence Dogood]

 

[Silence Dogood]

If the left was serious about waste and fraud they would have their own plan, numbers, documents, etc. Instead they attack. Its like they don't want the gravy train to end.