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re: TRUMPS' Lawyer:Ex Security Chief Must Be Taken Out & Shot
Mark Esper Fired as Pentagon Chief After Contradicting Trump. Trump Fired Defense Secretary Mark Esper by Tweet
Defence secretary resisted deployment of active-duty troops-Esper was criticised for joining Trump at controversial photo op
Barr Tells Prosecutors to Pursue 'Clear' Fraud Claims, Without Evidence
Ivanka Trump Will Lose White House Status and Job
The Guardian UK, 10 NOV 2020.
Mark Esper's Firing May Be the Beginning of Donald Trump's Post-Election Reckoning
The post-election period got off to a raucous start Monday when President Donald Trump fired Defense Secretary Mark Esper by tweet, a decision that tossed Pentagon leadership into tumult with just 72 days before transitioning to a new administration.
Donald Trump has fired his defence secretary, Mark Esper, in the latest sign that the transition to a new Biden administration in January is going to be turbulent on both domestic and foreign fronts.
Esper was fired by tweet on Monday afternoon, with the president declaring he was “pleased to announce that Christopher C Miller, the highly respected director of the National Counterterrorism Center (unanimously confirmed by the Senate), will be acting secretary of defense, effective immediately.
“Chris will do a GREAT job! Mark Esper has been terminated.
Esper had been at odds with Trump on a number of issues, most importantly his insistence at the height of the Black Lives Matter protests in the summer that there were no legal grounds to deploy active-service troops on the streets of US cities.
He was also working with Congress on legislation to rename US army bases named after Confederate generals. In a final interview Esper predicted that he would be followed by a “yes man”, adding “And then God help us.”
In a coolly worded final letter to the president, Esper wrote: “I serve the country in deference to the Constitution, so I accept your decision to replace me.” He left the Pentagon quietly on Monday without the “clap-out” from staff traditionally accorded to a departing secretary.
Miller arrived at the Pentagon on Monday amid questions about the legality of his appointment. By law, the deputy secretary of defence, currently David Norquist, would become acting secretary in the event of a sudden departure at the top. Furthermore, the law requires that a secretary of defence to have been out of active duty military service for seven years. Miller, a former Green Beret, only left the military in 2014.
The law can be sidestepped by a vote in Congress, as was done for Esper’s predecessor James Mattis, a retired marine.
Barr Tells Prosecutors to Pursue Claims of Irregularities Despite Lack of Evidence
William Barr, rhe US attorney general, has told prosecutors across the country to pursue “clear and apparently-credible allegations of irregularities” in the voting system, despite a lack of evidence that such fraud is occurring.
In a memo obtained by the Associated Press, Barr – who has not shied away from violating norms in his efforts to prop up Donald Trump – told attorneys that investigations “may be conducted if there are clear and apparently-credible allegations of irregularities that, if true, could potentially impact the outcome of a federal election in an individual State”, the AP reports.
States have another month to resolve election disputes before members of the electoral college finalize the outcome on 14 December.
Ivanka Trump Will Lose White House Status and Job – What Will She Do Next?
Ivanka Trump isn’t just losing her status as first daughter with her father Donald Trump’s defeat to Joe Biden – she’s also losing her job.
In her father’s White House, Ivanka Trump works as “advisor to the president”, purportedly focusing on “the education and economic empowerment of women and their families as well as job creation and economic growth through workforce development, skills training and entrepreneurship”.
Before that, she “oversaw development and acquisitions” for her father’s real estate company, the Trump Organization, and had a fashion clothing line. She also appeared as a boardroom judge on Trump’s reality show, The Apprentice.
But her role in the White House, and the fact that virtually her entire professional history is tied to her father, raise the question: What will she wind up doing?
While Ivanka could probably return to the Trump Organization, it may not be the most stable workplace when her father leaves office. The Manhattan district attorney’s office is seeking Trump’s tax returns in a “complex financial investigation”, previously citing public reports on “extensive and protracted criminal conduct at the Trump Organization” in their request.
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