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| Nicolas Ortega |
President Trump’s decision to fire James Comey as FBI director was the latest destabilizing jolt to a core institution of the U.S. government that current and former officials say serves broader Russian interests. While the Kremlin may have hoped for sanctions relief and recognition of its annexation of Crimea from the Trump administration, the tumult in the United States is a welcome alternative.
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| Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, |
Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer were among leaders in both parties requesting that any recordings of White House conversations be turned over for review immediately. Sen. Mike Lee, a former federal prosecutor, said “it’s probably inevitable” that such tapes would be subpoenaed.
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| President Trump’s signature on an executive order. Stephen Crowley/The New York Times |
Workplace violations, climate data, animal welfare and ethics records are among the types of information that has been obscured. In some cases, data that was once easily accessible has moved to locations that are harder to find, while others have entirely vanished.
The administration has deleted or tucked away important information, removed Obama-era webpages and broken with precedent by refusing to disclose even basic public information when it does not help advance Trump's agenda. Juliet Eilperin rounds up some of the startling assaults on transparency:
- Some of the moves lessen public access to information about companies and other employers – shielding them from the so-called “naming and shaming” that federal officials previously used to influence company behavior. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration dramatically scaled back on publicizing fines against firms. The Agriculture Department removed from the web a list of animal welfare enforcement actions, which listed abuses in dog breeding operations and horse farms.
- The administration no longer publishes ethics waivers granted to employees who would otherwise be barred from joining the government because of lobbying activities. Nor is the White House releasing its visitor logs.
- They've removed websites and other material supporting Obama-era policies – such as a White House web page directing prospective donors to private groups that aid Syrian refugees, and websites providing information about climate change.
- Officials removed websites run by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Interior Department that provided scientific information about climate change, eliminating access, for instance, to documents evaluating the danger that the desert ecology in the Southwest could face from future warming.
- The White House also retired the two-year-old Federal Supplier Greenhouse Gas Management Scorecard, which ranks firms with major federal contracts on their energy efficiency and policies to curb carbon output.
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| United States Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley delivers remarks at a Security Council meeting in April. (Stephanie Keith/Reuters |
The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations commented after analysts said North Korea appeared to have tested a new kind of missile with a longer range.
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Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on Sunday that the upper chamber should not vote to confirm a new FBI director until the Department of Justice appoints a special counsel to oversee the investigation into possible collusion between Trump associates and Russian operatives. “I think there are a lot of Democrats who feel that way,” Schumer said on CNN’s State of the Union. “We’ll have to discuss it as a caucus, but I would support that move.” Republican congressional leaders have pushed back at the suggestion of a special counsel, while Democrats have said it is necessary after President Donald Trump abruptly fired James Comey. Schumer added that Trump’s nominee to replace Comey should be nonpartisan and have prosecutorial experience. “If there is interference, or attempted interference, to shut down the investigation, to misdirect it—you need somebody who’s going to stand up,” Schumer said.
—Andrew Desiderio
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Russia, a Victim of the Cyberattack, Voices Outrage
The country was hit the hardest in the first wave of a global hacking effort, with banks, cellphone operators and railroads fending off attacks.