It’s so telling in President Trump’s executive orders and Musk’s actions what their values are. The utter disregard, hostility and contempt they have to civil servants is stunning. These are the people we’ve hired to do the work that Congress over many different administrations has mandated. Have they taken time to hear what that work is, who the workers are - many of whom have devoted much of their working lives to the work Congress has legislated? No, just dispose of them like so much trash – the people that we hired to do our work.
A loved one from Maine has worked for 12 years now at the CFPB - most of his working life. One of the cases he pursued was massive fraud perpetrated by a “student debt consolidation” company who defrauded thousands of students out of tens of millions of dollars – students hoping to find a way to pay off their debts who, instead, went deeper into debt. The CFPB successfully prosecuted the case and was able to return all the monies lost to those defrauded. There are thousands of similar success stories. The CFPB are the consumer watchdogs to make sure that the banks don’t charge exorbitant fees, overseeing them so that they don’t bring about another collapse through the temptations of greed. The only people who might see them as the enemy are those who profit from financial deception and don’t want anyone looking over their shoulders.
Similarly with USAID – just one example from a friend in Portland who has worked for almost 25 years with one of the poorest areas of Haiti, sistering Portland, Maine with Cap Haitien to help that community provide basic health care in a country that has been devastated by earthquakes, civil war and hurricanes. He wrote to me:
The Trump administration demanded a work stoppage for all USAID projects, giving one day’s notice. This affected 30 Konbit Sante employees, and a 3 year grant to a fledgling health center that we have been working with. USAID supports 116 health centers in Haiti in whole or in part… all stopped, and unlikely to be restored after the “review”. This is devastating for those employees (there is no safety net there) and their communities. A very snarky memo sent out from the US Secretary of State stated “As Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said, “Every dollar we spend, every program we fund, and every policy we pursue must be justified with the answer to three simple questions: Does it make America safer? Does it make America stronger? Does it make America more prosperous?” It is hard to imagine how providing care to women and children in a slum of 120,000 people in Cap Haitien will be seen as meeting any of those goals.
Trump and Musk only see value in things that belong to them and fit their agenda. Let Congress, the Constitution, the American people and the rest of the world be damned. Just part of the trash.
