http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39099 ... rade-moves
The World Trade Organization (WTO) advanced trade complaints from the European Union and Canada against the United States on Wednesday after President Trump announced he would move ahead with steep tariffs on imported steel and aluminum.
...Should the WTO rule that Trump’s tariffs are illegal, the EU is planning to impose another $4.2 billion in tariffs on American goods, though those would not take effect until 2021.
Critics of Trump’s tariffs have warned that his aggressive trade actions could spark a trade war, in which the U.S. and its trade partners volleyed tariffs back and forth, hurting exporters and consumers.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... broken-wto
The president’s top economic adviser on Wednesday implied that the U.S. may not abide by any rulings from the World Trade Organization (WTO), a tough signal ahead of a G-7 summit this weekend where Trump is expected to face a backlash from allied leaders over his protectionist trade agenda.
“International, multilateral organizations are not going to determine American policy,” White House National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow told reporters at a press briefing organized to preview President Trump’s trip to Canada for the G-7.
...Far from backing away from the tariffs, Trump may consider threatening new trade barriers at the meeting, according to the Washington Post. He is in the process of evaluating steep tariffs on automobiles under section 232 of the trade law, the same approach he took for the aluminum and steel tariffs. The section 232 law allows the president to put tariffs in place for national security concerns.
...A study by the Coalition of American Metal Manufacturers and Users released Wednesday calculated that the combination of U.S. tariffs, foreign retaliation, and self-imposed quotas from allies Trump has struck trade deals with would lop 0.2 percent off American GDP each year, and destroy over 400,000 jobs.
Kudlow, a former CNBC commentator who had frequently criticized tariffs before joining the White House, vigorously defended Trump’s trade actions on Wednesday, insisting that he was the “strongest trade reformer of the last 20 years.”
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... ada-report
The White House is discussing additional economic penalties against Canada in response to the country's threat to impose retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products, according to The Washington Post.
The Post offered no details on what kind of penalties the administration is considering against Canada, which plans to levy tariffs on about $13 billion of U.S. products in response to U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum.
http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/s ... -authority
Senators are moving forward with legislation that would curb President Trump's authority on tariffs, despite opposition from the White House.
"If the president truly believes invoking Section 232 is necessary to protect the United States from a genuine threat, he should make the case to Congress and to the American people and do the hard work necessary to secure congressional approval," Corker said in a statement announcing the bill. In addition to Corker, Sens. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.), Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), Mark Warner (D-Va.), Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Mike Lee (R-Utah), and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) are supporting the bill.
The bill would require Trump to submit tariffs implemented under Section 232 of the trade law for approval to Congress. Any approval legislation would then be fast-tracked through both chambers
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... ns/561974/
A top aide to Scott Pruitt, Millan Hupp, resigned from the Environmental Protection Agency...Hupp, who worked as the director of scheduling and advance, has been entangled in many of the scandals dogging EPA Administrator Pruitt. In March, she was one of two aides who received hefty salary bumps, even after the White House refused Pruitt’s request for raises. And as The Washington Post reported on Monday, she recently testified to the House Oversight Committee that she regularly spent her days doing personal tasks for Pruitt, from hunting for housing to calling the Trump Hotel in Washington, D.C., in order to inquire about purchasing a used mattress.
According to one top EPA official, the 26-year-old was “tired of being thrown under the bus by Pruitt,” and weary of seeing her name constantly appear in headlines about the agency.
...Hupp’s closeness with Pruitt was often a point of contention among officials; many staffers grumbled that she and others in the “Oklahoma posse,” as they were called, received special treatment, as the March raises seemed to imply.
When reached by phone, Jahan Wilcox, an EPA spokesperson, would not comment. He said: “You have a great day, you’re a piece of trash.”
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... e-of-trash
A spokesperson for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) derided a reporter for The Atlantic as a "piece of trash" as he ended a phone call with her.
...Wilcox did not immediately respond to an email from The Hill seeking comment on the reported remark
.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... -to-pruitt
President Trump reaffirmed his support for embattled Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chief Scott Pruitt on Wednesday, saying that under him the agency is "doing really, really well."
"Thank you Scott, very much. EPA is doing really, really well,” Trump told Pruitt while praising Cabinet officials during a meeting at the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
More from that Cabinet meeting, in Trump's inimitable style:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... m-at-least
Trump Praises His Cabinet Members at FEMA. Most of Them, at Least
Some samples:
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke
“Keeping very busy, I know that, Ryan, it’s good, it’s good for you, keeping busy and opening up those lands so people can use and enjoy them. Largest landlord in the world, Ryan, nobody knows that. But you’re the largest by far, the largest landlord, it’s almost half the United States if you think about it. So, great job you’re doing.”
Zinke, of course, has opened up more public lands to (and eased restrictions on) oil drilling and mining, and is systematically loosening restrictions on all forms of hunting, while trying to raise national park entrance fees astronomically.
Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue
“Sonny Perdue and the farms are doing well, and I did the farmers a big favor last night, right? I did a big, big favor for the farmers. We love the farmers and they were happy. I know that Senator Grassley and Senator Ernst were very happy with what we did so thank you for your help, I appreciate it."
(Trump shot down a proposed new policy on biofuels Tuesday.)
btw, as far as the farmers supposedly doing so well:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... -trade-war
The U.S.-China trade war President Donald Trump unleashed may punish the Midwest heartland that helped put him in office.
Hog producers in Iowa have seen their returns plunge in the last month and losses are expected for the full year as China’s retaliatory tariffs on U.S. pork take effect. On average, the farmers will probably see a loss of $4.34 per hog, based on futures prices as of April 2, according to Lee Schulz, an assistant professor who specializes in agricultural economics at Iowa State University.
http://fortune.com/2018/04/18/trump-tar ... upporters/
Farmers helped carry President Donald Trump to White House. But as the former businessman threatens to unleash a global trade war, the same farmers are now forced to come to terms with how up to $150 billion in proposed tariffs on Chinese goods, and subsequent backlash from the Middle Kingdom, could hurt their livelihood.
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... kim-summit
Former White House aide Sebastian Gorka and Fox News host Sean Hannity will be in Singapore during President Trump's summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un next week
...Gorka and Hannity are noted allies of Trump's and frequently support the president and his administration on air. In May, it was reported that Hannity and Trump speak on the phone several times a day. .
Supposedly Gorka and Hannity will be in Singapore to cover the news. As far as I know, neither is a reporter - Gorka was a White House staffer and Bannon ally (until he was forced out, possibly by Kelly
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/ ... gns-242054 ) and Hannity is, of course, an extremist right wing commentator. Which does make you wonder what their true roles in this meeting will be.
An old article from Rolling Stone, back when Gorka still worked at the White House.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/f ... ru-w496912
Renowned for his disdain for the media and his blithe readiness to defend Trump to the last tweet, Gorka – who apparently tools around Washington in a Mustang with a license plate that reads ART [OF] WAR – has become a nearly ubiquitous presence on television and radio as a spokesman for the White House. "Did you see Gorka?" Trump reportedly said after Gorka took part in figurative fisticuffs on CNN. "So great. I mean, really, truly great!"
Gorka began his rise with a 2008 Ph.D. awarded by little-known Corvinus University of Budapest, an institution that several scholars who spoke to Rolling Stone described as having a questionable reputation....Perhaps even more worrisome, Gorka's thesis proposed a dramatic restructuring of the national-security apparatus to create a police state. He suggests a radical reform of "internal barriers between the police force, the army and various intelligence services." This could also be seen as the start of a Gestapo-like, all-powerful national system of repression. "That's about as Nazi Germany- or Soviet Union-like a proposal as I've ever heard," says Patrick Eddington of the conservative Cato Institute. "The net effect would be to suspend the Bill of Rights, if his proposal ever saw the light of day."
The article goes on to describe what seems to be some very unsavory connections.
Also from The Atlantic, the newspaper that has earned a special bit of nastiness from an official government (EPA) spokesperson (the saying "fish rots from the head down" seems particularly apt, these days):
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... -a/562217/
The Astonishing Tale of the Man Mueller Calls ‘Person A’
One of the most shocking revelations from the special counsel’s investigation is the suggestion that Paul Manafort’s longtime aide is a pawn of Russian intelligence.
What everyone close to Paul Manafort already knew, and what The New York Times and other outlets later confirmed, is that Mueller was pseudonymously describing none other than Konstantin Kilimnik. Or to put it even more bluntly than Mueller: Donald Trump’s campaign chairman had a pawn of Russian intelligence as his indispensable alter ego.
Edit to add:
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39107 ... d-shutdown
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) on Wednesday said it is making cuts to three key advisory boards, enraging advocates who say the agency’s acting director doesn't want to engage with dissenting opinions.
The CFPB told members of the advisory boards Wednesday that the bureau would shrink the groups and shift the agency’s external outreach to town halls and roundtables across the U.S., citing cost concerns. CFPB communications director John Czwartacki said that members of the boards had not been fired and that the bureau would “continue to meet its statutory obligation” to convene board meetings. The changes will impact the CFPB’s Community Advisory Board, Community Bank Advisory Council, and Credit Union Advisory Council.
The CFPB told board members in a Wednesday email that the groups wouldn’t meet until the bureau selects their replacements
...CAB members said Mulvaney’s move to reshape the board is meant to silence opponents of the bureau’s new direction.
...CFPB officials downplayed the furor among consumer advocacy groups and insisted that CAB members were only looking out for themselves, not the groups they claim to serve.