Beltway Insider: Trump/DOGE, DEI Shrinks, Gaza, NTSB, DOJ Resignation/Adams, Kennedy Center/Blowback

Details: Category: Beltway Insider; Published on Sunday, 16 February 2025 07:07; Written by Janet Walker

President Trump and DOGE Administrator Elon Musk addressed the media this week, as Trump signed an additional executive order granting the temporary agency more comprehensive powers to assist in reducing government waste, and spending and streamlining bureaucracy.

The President's job approval rating, according to the website Fivethirtyeight.com for the period ending February 16, 2025, remained consistent at 49.0% of those polled who those polled approve of his effectiveness as President and those who disapprove of his effectiveness increased by 1.5% to 45.7% of those polled. A slight 3% of the population polled have no opinion. Ratings are calculated weekly.

Beltway Insider: Trump/Cancel Culture, Trans Rights, Security Details, DOGE, Bird Flu, Sweden, Ellen Greenberg

DOGE Plows Through Agencies

The Executive Order halting Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs in the federal government signed by President Trump 27 days ago has become one of his most contested and concerning visions enacted by the president immediately upon his return to the Oval Office.

“The order ending so-called DEI programs will direct the Office of Management and Budget and Office of Personnel Management to work with federal agencies to eliminate any programs that hire or promote people based in part on characteristics like race or disability status, as well as sensitivity training based on those topics,” reported The Wall Street Journal.

The Elon Musk led Department of Government Efficiency, (DOGE) received a boost from the president this week, who signed an additional executive order provided the Tesla CEO with broad and comprehensive reach in his task to undercover fraud, and wasteful spending, across the sprawling government ecosystem, giving him the power to axe programs and departments.

With a laser focus on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion hiring, the president has ordered Musk and his team, to search specifically for those employees hired within those parameters. As of January 22, 2025, Trump ordered all federal employees hired under DEI programs to be placed on paid leave and eventually terminated. He has stated he intends to reinstate merit-based hiring.

Many Americans believed that DEI programs helped facilitate merit-based hiring and equality across the board. That, however, is not the case. Qualified workers, who did not satisfy these requirements, were often passed over so companies could “check the boxes,” for DEI resulting in financial incentive.

Trump Closes Out Federal Employee Buy-Out

Trump’s Deferred Resignation Program, which aimed at shrinking the vast 2.3 million civilian workforce, which had been halted by a Massachusetts Judge, U.S. District Judge George A. O’Toole Jr., who reviewed the program to determine if the case, filed by the nation’s largest unions, had any merit.

This week, the judge “lifted his pause on the federal government’s deferred resignation program, prompting the Trump administration to swiftly declare victory as it closed the offer to any more workers who might still have been mulling it,” reported The Washington Post.

Before the halt, Trump officials have estimated that 75,000 employees had opted into the program. The number of employees who did opt in is small compared to Trump’s next phase vision, which is to deepen these cuts, and restructure the government employees hiring system, and reduce redundancies.

Section 3, of the Executive Order, signed February 11, 2025, “Reforming the Federal Workforce to Maximize Efficiency and Productivity, defines the Hiring Ratio structure, “Pursuant to the Presidential Memorandum of January 20, 2025 (Hiring Freeze), the Director of the Office of Management and Budget shall submit a plan to reduce the size of the Federal Government’s workforce through efficiency improvements and attrition (Plan). The Plan shall require that each agency hire no more than one employee for every four employees that depart, consistent with the plan and any applicable exemptions and details provided for in the Plan.”

More legal challenges are expected on the President’s plan to reduce the workforce, when he initiates direct cuts, especially to those employees protected by Unions. While he believes his powers are broad, and legally approved, and this effort to reduce government waste, spend, and redundancy is what the people want, in addition to targeting individuals based on DEI, the broad sweeping powers given to DOGE allows for an intimate information gathering of employee practices and private associations, including voter registration and allows DOGE to take terminated employment, essentially retaliation for personal choices.

“Trump signed an executive order Tuesday that called for agency leaders to “promptly undertake preparations to initiate large-scale reductions in force (RIFs), consistent with applicable law.” [ . . .]The Trump administration last week promised widespread layoffs would take place among federal employees who did not take the deferred resignation offer, which has been paused by a federal judge,” reported CNN.

World News: Trump and Putin Seek to Resurrect the Iron Curtain

Trumps Proposed Gaza Take Over Alarms Palestinians

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met this week with President Trump, who continues to surprise the world with his restricting ideas, which are now limited to the United States government.

“The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip,” Trump said during a press conference alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House. “I do see a long-term ownership position, and I see it bringing great stability to that part of the Middle East, and maybe the entire Middle East,” reported The Wall Street Journal.

As the 16-month war, between Israel and Palestine, has reached a moment of simmering peace, and both sides are seeing the release of their hostages.

On October 7, 2023, the Palestinians breached Israel borders, attacking on multiple fronts, and slaughtering 1,200 citizens, across primarily the Southern border. Israel retaliated and to date nearly 48,000 Palestinians have been killed and the Gaza Strip, which in 2024 was home to 2.1 million residents has been decimated.

The long-term U.S. policy has remained a two-state solution, where both Israelis and Palestinians, live in peace. Trump’s suggestion of the U.S. taking over the Gaza Strip, which is a break from policy, will upset the delicate balance of peace in the Middle East, as neighboring nations, where these civilians will be forced to immigrate, are unlikely to willingly open their borders for permanent relocation.

Forcing the Palestinians to relocate to East Jerusalem, which is part of the West Bank, creates the potential for a massive, large-scale assault on Jerusalem, by the Palestinians, who support Hamas, and are supported by Iran.

For Trump to interject his restructuring plan which includes forcing all Palestinians out of Gaza, and allowing Israel to reannex the strip, could be the predicate act in which Hamas and other terror organization rebuild and are reenergized to carry out attacks against the U.S. and out allies.

DOJ Prosecutors Resign After Ordered to Cease Adams Investigation

Pressure from the Trump Administration appointed U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, to drop the corruption charges investigation into New York City Mayor Eric Adams has caused five Department of Justice prosecutors to resign rather than comply.

“On Thursday, six lawyers — the Trump-appointed acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and five prosecutors in Washington — resigned rather than accede to Mr. Bove’s demands. On Friday, a seventh stepped down, writing in his resignation letter that only a “fool” or a “coward” would sign off on the dismissal.’ reported The New York Times.

The demand to drop the investigation exposed what is becoming a common, instead of the law governing the politicians, the citizen, the politicians are reshaping the legal system to benefit both their corrupt actions and their political ambitions.

Democracy holds that no man is above the law, and yet we, the citizens, continue to witness an increasing number of those who consider themselves above the law, through position, dictate a caveat to democracy in which a few, those covered by special privileges, are provided coverage by the same governors who evangelize that democracy holds that no man is above the law. So which is it?

World News: Trump and Risk Diplomacy

Coronavirus Total

At the order of the President of the United States, the U.S. no longer recognizes the value of The World Health Organization. The CDC has recommended every person from age six months, including senior citizens should receive at least one shot of an updated COVID-19 vaccine, annually. The death toll from Covid-19 has dramatically decreased, as has transmission of the virus. Even as confirmed new cases continue each week, fewer are dying from the newer variants. A recent outbreak of the virus across the European continent has caused the World Health Organization to issue a warning.

For the seven days ending February 16, 2025, the total number of confirmed coronavirus cases reported by the World Health Organization increased by 19,844 confirmed cases totaling 777,368,929. The total worldwide death toll increased by 1,098 to 7,087,731 deaths. The United States has stopped providing Covid data to the World Health Organization. (Data updated February 2, 2025, from the World Health Organization).

World News: Populism, Trump and Greenland

Trump Appoints Self to Kennedy Center Board

President Trump is dismantling the Board of Directors, all Biden appointees, at the famed John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and restructuring it and placing himself as the Chairman.

“The Kennedy Center is an American Jewel and must reflect the brightest stars on its stage from all across our nation,” he wrote. “We will soon announce a new Board, with an amazing Chairman, Donald J. Trump!” In the same post, he criticized the center for holding “drag shows specifically targeting our youth,” reported The Wall Street Journal.

The dismantling of the board has been called unprecedented, and the appointment of a board aligned with the current administration is clear evidence of Trump’s manipulative powers, which are unstoppable. The restructured board overwhelming elected Trump as Chairman of the Board. The President’s DEI initiative and in line with his administration policy on gender identification, extends to the Kennedy Center for the Arts

The move has resulted in a choice among many artists who were scheduled to perform, many have decided to cancel their scheduled dates. Many of the artists scheduled to perform were people of color or those who identified as LGBTQ. This has been called an attack on free speech.

Even as the entertainment community has made hard choices that align with an inclusive, and equal, nation, realigning the Kennedy Center board is just the beginning of Trump’s move to define gender, and narrow or negate rights of many disenfranchised populations.

NTSB Holds Family Briefing on AA Flight 5347

The National Transportation and Safety Board held a briefing this week with family members of the American Airlines Flight 5342 providing information on what they discovered to this point in the investigation of the collision between the Black Hawk military helicopter and the descending American Airline’s jet that killed 67.

“About 17 seconds before the helicopter and plane collided, air traffic control had directed the Black Hawk’s crew to “pass behind the CRJ,” referring to the type of American Airlines regional jet that was approaching Reagan National Airport. Jennifer Homendy, NTSB’s chairman, said Friday that “ ‘pass behind the’ may not have been received by the crew,” based on its review of the Black Hawk’s cockpit voice recorder, which did not capture those words,” reported The Washington Post.

Investigators explained to the families that from preliminary date has appeared the Black Hawk did not receive these critical instructions seconds before the crash. The investigators also explained there were other possible reasons the Black Hawk did not take evasive action, even as the Black Box recorders indicate knowledge of the jet, with a verbal recognition, investigators believe this is an indication of a second jet, further in the distance, as the airmen were apparently wearing night vision goggles which hampered their vision and their ability to judge long distance.

Investigators have also not addressed the Black Hawk’s flight altitude, which was above the 200-foot ceiling and in commercial air space. Runway 33, the designated landing strip for flight 5342, is in a direct flight path for military helicopters.

The American Airlines jet was carrying many members of the U.S. Figure Skating team, their coaches and parents, who had been returning from a regional championship.

Hollywood Week: FireAid Raises $100M, Critics’ Choice, Grammys, Super Bowl LIX

LA Fires Relief

For those needing immediate assistance FEMA has activated it Critical Needs Assistance program which provides a one-time payment of $750 to survivors so they can quickly purchase critical items, like water, formula, gasoline, and prescription drugs. All survivors should go to DisasterAssistance.gov or call 1-800-621-3362.

The LA County Department of Mental Health (DMH) is providing 24/7 support and resources through its help line at (800) 854-7771 or via the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Resources on the LA County website include a variety of wildfire disaster mental health resources and downloadable tip sheets for the City of Los Angeles and Ready LA County.

The California Lawyers for the Arts have posted an extensive resource list. It can be found here.

For more information on President Donald Trump: Whitehouse.gov.

Janet Walker is the publisher, founder, and sole owner of Haute-Lifestyle.com. A graduate of New York University, she has been covering international news through the Beltway Insider, a weekly review of the nation's top stories, for more than a decade. A general beat writer/reporter and entertainment/film critic, she is also an accomplished news/investigative news/crime reporter and submitted for Pulitzer Prize consideration "Cops Conspire to Deep Six Sex Assaults" in the Breaking News Category and was persuaded to withdraw the submission. Ms. Walker has completed five screenplays, "The Six Sides of Truth," "The Assassins of Fifth Avenue," "The Wednesday Killer," "The Manhattan Project," and the sci-fi thriller "Project 13: The Last Day." She is completing the non-fiction narrative, "Unholy Alliances: A True Crime Story," which is expected to be released in early 2025. She is a member of the Los Angeles Press Club, the National Writers Union, and a former member of the International Federation of Journalists.