Year: 2024

‘Zuck’ Sucks Up to Trump with Million-Dollar Donation

Buck Banks

$1 million

Meta donated $1 million to Donald Trump’s fund for his presidential inauguration, a sign the social media giant is taking steps to improve relations with the president-elect, reports MSN. The donation was first reported by The Wall Street Journal, which reported Meta had confirmed the donation. It’s the latest sign that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Trump’s relations are mending, a far cry from Trump’s first term, when the then-president was kicked off Meta platforms.

Christopher Wray Sticks It to Donald Trump

Pensito Editors

Pensito Illustration

By resigning as FBI director prior to the end of his 10-year tenure, Christopher Wray has thwarted Donald Trump’s plans to install the odious Kash Patel as FBI chief.

New York Times: “By stepping down now, as the conservative writer Erick Erickson observed, Wray has created a ‘legal obstacle to Trump trying to bypass the Senate confirmation process.’”

“Here’s why. According to the Vacancies Reform Act, if a vacancy occurs in a Senate-confirmed position, the president can temporarily replace that appointee (such as the F.B.I. director) only with a person who has already received Senate confirmation or with a person who’s served in a senior capacity in the agency (at the GS-15 pay scale) for at least 90 days in the year before the resignation.”

“Kash Patel, Donald Trump’s chosen successor at the F.B.I., meets neither of these criteria. He’s not in a Senate-confirmed position, and he’s not been a senior federal employee in the Department of Justice in the last year. That means he can’t walk into the job on Day 1.”

Biden Criticizes Trump’s Tax, Tariff Plans

Buck Banks

“By all accounts, the incoming administration is determined to return the country to another round of trickle-down economics. On top of that, he seems determined to impose steep, universal tariffs on all important goods brought into this country on the mistaken belief that foreign countries will bear the cost of those tariffs, rather than the American consumer.”

— “President Joe Biden on Tuesday took direct aim at President-elect Donald Trump’s economic agenda, denigrating his plan to impose sweeping tariffs and cut taxes as a ‘major mistake’ that will weaken the economy,” Politico reports.

Now Is Not the Time to Tune Out

Buck Banks

“We are a country that stands on the precipice, just six weeks away from swearing in, for the second time, a wannabe ‘dictator’ with ambitions to wildly reshape our democracy. There is a desire to tune out. … I get it. And while, as a member of the media, I feel a little sheepish making the case to keep reading columns (like this one!), watching the news, and listening to podcasts, it’s a perilous moment for America, and it only serves Donald Trump and his allies to look the other way.”

— Molly Jong-Fast