News Releases

The Intercept reports: “Trump’s Transition Team Colluded With Israel. Why Isn’t That News?”

On Dec. 23, 2016, Al Jazeera reported: “Trump convinced Sisi to withdraw U.N. resolution.”

AARON MATÉ, aaronmate at therealnews.com, @aaronjmate

Maté is a host/producer for The Real News. He just wrote the piece “The Trump Team Definitely Colluded with a Foreign Power — Just Not the One You Think“, for The Nation.

He writes: “Friday’s indictment of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn has confirmed that Donald Trump’s inner circle colluded with a foreign power before entering the White House — just not the foreign power that has been the subject of our national fixation for the past year. To be sure, the jury is still out on Russia, though there are new grounds for questioning the case for a plot tying the Kremlin to Trump Tower. But with Flynn’s plea, we can now say for certain that the Trump team did collude — with Israel. …

“There are no editorials or opinion pieces denouncing Israel’s ‘Plot Against America,’ or ‘War on America,’ or warnings that ‘Odds Are, Israel Owns Trump,’ or explorations of ‘What Israel Did to Control the American Mind.’ … In fact it is more than likely that going forward, the media will give Israelgate the same treatment as cable’s top Russiagate sleuth, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, gave during her exhaustive Flynn coverage so far, which is to not even mention it.”

STEPHEN ZUNES, zunes at usfca.edu, @szunes
Professor of politics and coordinator of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of San Francisco, Zunes just wrote the piece: “Why Democrats Don’t Want to Talk about Flynn’s First Meeting with the Russians,” for The Progressive, which states: “Democrats have been reluctant to call attention to another meeting held one week earlier, in which Flynn encouraged the Russians to postpone a scheduled vote at the United Nations until Trump came to office. Having a top advisor of a president-elect clandestinely meet with a representative of a foreign power to undermine the policies of a sitting administration is highly problematic, if not illegal. While this might have otherwise given the Democrats a welcome political opportunity to underscore the perfidy of the Trump team, they are hindered by the fact that the majority of Congressional Democrats opposed Obama and supported Trump’s position on the vote. …

“Less than two weeks later, in the first foreign policy vote of the newly convened 115th Congress, a majority of House Democrats joined virtually every Republican in voting for a resolution that criticized the U.S. refusal to veto. It declared U.N. opposition to Israel’s illegal colonization efforts as being ‘anti-Israel.’

“In the Senate, 30 out of 46 Democrats signed on as co-sponsors of a similar bill.

“The decision by the majority of Congressional Democrats to side with Trump over a sitting Democratic president is striking, particularly since moderate pro-Israel groups including J Street and Americans for Peace Now supported Obama’s decision not to use U.S. veto power.”

Al Jazeera reports Tuesday: “Trump tells Abbas he will move U.S. embassy to Jerusalem.”

Journalist Aaron Maté tweeted Tuesday: “Compare Russian policy victories under Trump to Israel: before inauguration, Trump tried to subvert a UNSC vote on Israel’s behalf; is using coercion to force Palestinians to accept Israel’s bantustan ‘peace’ plan; and is now reportedly moving U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. #Israelgate” See Maté’s recent segment on The Real News: “Flynn Plea Shows Collusion With … Israel?”

ALI ABUNIMAH, director at electronicintifada.net, @AliAbunimah
Abunimah is co-founder of the Electronic Intifada website. His books include The Battle for Justice in Palestine.

He recently wrote the piece “Israel lobby billionaire praises Kushner for collusion with Netanyahu,” which states: “President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner received public praise on Sunday from a billionaire Israel lobby financier for his possibly illegal attempts to derail a UN Security Council vote condemning Israel’s settlements a year ago.

“This came as news broke that Kushner failed to disclose in government ethics filings his role as director of a family foundation that funded Israeli settlements.

“Kushner, a senior adviser to Trump, is in charge of efforts to revive the so-called peace process.

“New details of Kushner’s Saudi-backed plan reported Sunday confirm that it would require nothing less than a complete capitulation by the Palestinians to Israel’s demands, leaving them with a state in name only.”

Abunimah also recently wrote the piece “Trump aide Flynn pleads guilty to lying about effort to help Israel.”

Also, see from the Guardian: “Were other Trump aides lobbying for Israel illicitly alongside Michael Flynn?”

The New York Times recently reported: “Mr. Mueller’s investigators have learned through witnesses and documents that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel asked the Trump transition team to lobby other countries to help Israel, according to two people briefed on the inquiry. Investigators have learned that Mr. Flynn and Mr. Kushner took the lead in those efforts.”

There’s evidence the Trump team’s efforts on behalf of Israel appear to have paid off. On December 27, 2016, the Times of Israel wrote: “Russia: We had doubts about UN draft, tried to delay vote.” In April, the Times of Israel stated: “In an unexpected, unprecedented and curious move, Moscow on Thursday said it considers West Jerusalem to be Israel’s capital, making Russia the first country in the world to extend such a recognition to any part of the city.”

RICHARD SILVERSTEIN, richards1052 at comcast.net, @richards1052
Silverstein writes on security and other issues for a number of outlets and blogs at Tikun Olam. He recently wrote the piece “Flynn Pleads Guilty to Lying About Trump Sabotage of Security Council Resolution Against Israel Settlements.”

RICHARD L. KAPLAN, rkaplan at illinois.edu
Kaplan holds a chair at the University of Illinois School of Law and is a leading expert on taxation. Kaplan’s books include Advanced Taxation and Elder Law.

He said today: “A leading principle of these tax ‘reform’ bills — both the House and Senate versions — is clearly to reward donors to the Republican party. It lessens taxes on businesses, especially capital intensive rather than labor intensive business.

“The corporate income tax cut from 35 to 20 percent is steep, but through a series of mechanisms — some call them loopholes — corporations are now paying about 19 percent. Those leakages are mostly staying in place, so the effective rate after this act will be much lower.

“Significantly — and this is too rarely discussed — this keeps in place the system of taxing capital gains at substantially lower rate than labor. Warren Buffett and Mitt Romney get taxed at a lower rate on their investments than people do for their actual work. This legislation is effectively doubling down on a war on work.

“The one major innovation is creating a new tax-favored category of income called ‘pass-through’ income received from partnerships and personal businesses. This change will set up very serious compliance challenges for the IRS to demarcate wage-like income from profits received as business-owners.

“The cuts to the estate and gift taxes are huge, as is the complete write-off for depreciation.

“In contrast, people who work for a living are not seeing much benefit, in some cases, they may see increases, especially because of the end of state and local taxes write-offs.

“Medicare and Medicaid could get cut down the line as a result of this proposed law because of the resulting federal deficits and might trigger existing provisions that require reductions of Medicare’s expenditures.

“Workers are also hurt by how medical expenses are treated in the House version and how educational assistance is handled. There’s been some attention to how graduate school assistants would have a dramatic rise in taxes, but it’s more widespread than that. The legislation effectively disincentivizes educating workers generally.”

The New York Times is reporting: “The Honduran government imposed a curfew on Friday and ordered security forces to move against protesters blocking roads and bridges, escalating a political crisis over the disputed count of votes from the presidential election last weekend.

“The announcement late Friday came after what began as peaceful demonstrations by supporters of the opposition candidate, Salvador Nasralla, turned violent in some places. The government said the curfew would go into effect for 10 days, during which time anyone found outdoors between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. could be arrested.

“The move by the government of President Juan Orlando Hernández, who is seeking a second term, prompted fears that he might try to find a way to stay in office even if the final vote count went against him.

“Edmundo Orellana, a former justice and defense minister, said on Twitter that to issue such a decree while votes are being counted was ‘the same thing as a coup d’état.'”

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SUYAPA PORTILLO, [in Honduras] lavidagris at gmail.com, @SuyapaPV

Portillo observed the election in Honduras. She is an assistant professor at Pitzer College. Upon returning to the U.S. earlier this week, she appeared on the program “Democracy Now.”

On Friday, a letter Portillo helped organize, signed by scores of academics including Miguel Tinker Salas and Dana Frank, was released: “We have followed Sunday’s elections closely and with optimism for fair and evenhanded proceedings to set the course for Honduras’ future. We are, however, concerned that the TSE’s [Supreme Electoral Tribunal] actions, particularly since the polls closed and as votes were tallied, have been secretive, lacking in transparency and accountability.

“The TSE has kept the Honduran people in the dark as to vote-counting procedures and progress. It is unclear, for example, where vote tallies are coming from and what are the outcomes in various jurisdictions where vote totals have already been counted.”

MARK WEISBROT, via Dan Beeton, beeton at cepr.net, @ceprdc
Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, D.C. Weisbrot appeared on The Real News on Friday.

Also on Friday, the group released a statement: “Given the lack of transparency and credible allegations of irregularities in tabulating results from Sunday’s elections, Honduran electoral authorities should commit to a full recount of all the votes in order to restore credibility to the electoral process,” Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) co-director Mark Weisbrot said.

“Weisbrot noted that after the first 57 percent of the votes showed opposition candidate Salvador Nasralla winning by about 5 percentage points, the next 38 percent of the votes split 47 percent to 35 percent in favor of incumbent president Juan Orlando Hernández. The chances of this occurring, had the first 57 percent been drawn as a random sample of tally sheets, is next to impossible.”

Journalist Marcy Wheeler tweeted this morning: “The big news is that Flynn lied to F.B.I. about [Israeli] settlements vote. This is not just RU [Russia], folks. Never has been.”

The New York Times reports in “Michael Flynn Pleads Guilty to Lying to the F.B.I.” that: “In one of the conversations described in court documents, the men discussed an upcoming United Nations Security Council vote on whether to condemn Israel’s building of settlements. At the time, the Obama administration was preparing to allow a Security Council vote on the matter.

“Mr. Mueller’s investigators have learned through witnesses and documents that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel asked the Trump transition team to lobby other countries to help Israel, according to two people briefed on the inquiry. Investigators have learned that Mr. Flynn and Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, took the lead in those efforts. Mr. Mueller’s team has emails that show Mr. Flynn saying he would work to kill the vote, the people briefed on the matter said.”

RICHARD SILVERSTEIN, richards1052 at comcast.net, @richards1052
Silverstein writes on security and other issues for a number of outlets and blogs at Tikun Olam. He tweeted this morning: “Michael Flynn expected to plead guilty to lying to the F.B.I. about Trump administration lobbying for Israel against UN settlements resolution. This is BIG!”

He just wrote the piece “The curious case of Jared Kushner and the Israel lobby.”

ELI CLIFTON, [in NYC] eliclifton at gmail.com, @EliClifton
Clifton is a Nation Institute fellow and regular contributor to the foreign policy analysis website LobeLog. He just wrote the piece “Did Trump Greenlight Neoconservative Takeover Of State Dept. And CIA?”

Clifton writes: “Donald Trump is likely to replace Secretary of State Rex Tillerson with CIA Director Mike Pompeo and choose Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) to take over the intelligence agency, according to ‘senior administration officials’ who spoke to The New York Times. That move would mark an elevation of two neoconservative Iran hawks to the most influential positions in national intelligence gathering and diplomacy. It is also a striking departure from Trump’s campaign rhetoric denouncing previous administrations who saw the U.S. as ‘policeman of the world’ and the George W. Bush administration’s invasion of Iraq as based on a ‘lie.’

“Pompeo, who was one of the House’s most consistent anti-Iran voices, was already ‘argu[ing] against the [Iran] deal’ when he took over at the CIA, according to a report in July. The fact that Pompeo was engaging in the administration’s internal debate raises serious questions about the potential politicization of intelligence-gathering and analysis under the Trump administration, echoing the process that led to the false intelligence assessments widely disseminated in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq.

“Pompeo’s appointment as chief spokesperson for U.S. foreign policy makes a virtual certainty that Trump will withdraw the U.S. from the Iran nuclear deal and put the U.S. at odds with its closest European allies.

“And Trump’s apparent willingness to accept intelligence briefings alongside political arguments from Pompeo, and potentially from Cotton, shows a new and more welcoming attitude toward neoconservatives and the network of institutions and funders who played central roles in pushing the Iraq war and advocating for confrontation with Iran over the past decade.

“Cotton is a protégé of neoconservative pundit and Iraq war proponent Bill Kristol. Kristol cultivated Cotton when Cotton was still in the Army, stationed near Washington. ‘Kristol saw a kindred spirt in Cotton’s aggressive national-security hawkishness and the men developed what Kristol describes as a “bond beyond pure policy,”‘ according to a 2014 profile of Cotton in The Atlantic.

“That bond extended to Kristol’s Emergency Committee for Israel making $1 million in ad buys supporting Cotton’s 2014 Senate campaign.

“But Cotton’s ties to influential Iran hawks aren’t limited to Bill Kristol. As a Senate candidate, he enjoyed fundraising assistance from the hawkish Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC).”

PAUL BLAND, pbland at publicjustice.net
LESLIE BAILEY, lbailey at publicjustice.net, @Public_Justice
Bland is executive director of the group Public Justice. Bailey is a staff attorney there; her expertise includes court secrecy.

Bland said today: “Far too often, secrecy agreements — in settlements, in nondisclosure agreements, in forced arbitration clauses — enable sexual predators to evade detection. As a result, in a series of cases, women have been raped, assaulted and harassed by men who had already been caught committing these acts before, but were able to hide their crimes through secrecy clauses. Women injured by sexual predators are often put under enormous pressure to submit to these types of fine print gag orders, and it has had a terrible public cost, only a small part of which has come to light. Public Justice strongly believes that the U.S. Congress needs to take strong steps to ban these abusive provisions.”

Bailey said today: “For every woman speaking out right now about being assaulted or sexually harassed, there are countless others who can’t tell their story without risking legal sanctions — because they had to agree to secrecy as a condition of keeping their job or settling a lawsuit. Seeing several powerful men lose their jobs might make it feel like we’re at a tipping point. But if we’re going to make real systemic change, we first need to do something about the legal tools that allow abusers — including those whose jobs don’t put them in the public eye — to keep getting away with it.”

NANCY ALTMAN, LINDA BENESCH, lbenesch at socialsecurityworks.org, @ssworks
Altman is president of Social Security Works; Benesch is communications director for the group. They recently wrote the piece “The GOP’s tax cut bonanza is a major attack on Medicare,” published by Salon.

The piece states: “Do you trust Paul Ryan to protect your Medicare benefits? How about White House budget director Mick Mulvaney, a former member of the House Freedom Caucus, and like Ryan, a longstanding foe of Medicare?

“If the just-passed House tax bill, its Senate counterpart or some compromise of the two is signed into law, the enactment will put Medicare’s future in the hands of Ryan and Mulvaney.

“According to the Congressional Budget Office, the GOP tax bill will instantly trigger $400 billion in automatic cuts to Medicare in the next 10 years, including $25 billion in the first year after enactment alone.

“These cuts are the result of a law known as Statutory PAYGO. That law requires an automatic cut in spending when Congress increases the deficit. The tax bill is, in Donald Trump’s words, ‘a big, beautiful Christmas present’ — for Trump’s family and other billionaires. If the Republicans are successful in passing a tax bill that increases the deficit by $1.5 trillion, as they intend, the provisions of PAYGO will be activated.

“To be clear: If the tax bill passes the Senate and is signed into law by Trump, nothing more needs to be done to cut Medicare. If the House and Senate do nothing, the cuts take effect immediately after the end of the congressional session and get bigger every passing year. A vote for this tax bill is a vote to cut Medicare.

“These Medicare cuts could be waived if a majority of the House and 60 senators vote to do so. But given the Republican hostility to Medicare, together with Social Security and Medicaid, not acting and then blaming an Obama-era law is much more likely. Paul Ryan readily admits that he has been dreaming of cutting Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security since he was a college student ‘drinking out of kegs.’ There’s no way he would pass up such a golden opportunity.”

GARY RIVLIN, garyrivlin at gmail.com, @grivlin
Available for a limited number of interviews, Rivlin is a reporting fellow with The Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute. A former New York Times reporter, he is the author of six books, including, most recently, Katrina: After the Flood.

He recently co-wrote the pieces “Gary Cohn Is Giving Goldman Sachs Everything It Ever Wanted From the Trump Administration” about the director of the National Economic Council, and “Wall Street Wants to Kill the Agency Protecting Americans From Financial Scams.”

Rivlin wrote: “Like anyone taking a top job in the Trump administration, Cohn was required to sign a pledge vowing not to participate for the next two years in any matter ‘that is directly and substantially related to my former employer or former clients, including regulations and contracts.’ But presidents have sometimes issued waivers to these requirements, and it is unclear whether the Trump administration is making such waivers public. …

“Cohn shared the podium with fellow Goldman alum [Treasury Secretary Steven] Mnuchin (the two made partner there the same year) when the administration unveiled its new tax plan, one that, if the past is prelude, had the potential to save Goldman more than $1 billion a year in corporate taxes. …

“Years of financial disclosure forms confirm that Cohn is indeed very rich. At the end of 2016, he owned some 900,000 shares of Goldman Sachs stock, a stake worth around $220 million on the day Trump announced his appointment. Plus, he’d sold a million more Goldman shares over the previous half-dozen years. In 2007 alone, the year of the big short, Goldman Sachs paid him nearly $73 million — more than the firm paid CEO Lloyd Blankfein. …

“In the wake of the … white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, Cohn confessed to the Financial Times that he has ‘come under enormous pressure both to resign and to remain.’ But the man who the Washington Post has dubbed Trump’s ‘moderate voice’ declared that neo-Nazis would not force ‘this Jew’ to leave his job. ‘As a patriotic American, I am reluctant to leave my post as director of the National Economic Council,’ Cohn told FT. ‘I feel a duty to fulfill my commitment to work on behalf of the American people.’

“Or at least a few of them. The Trump economic agenda, it turns out, is largely the Goldman agenda, one with the potential to deliver any number of gifts to the firm that made Cohn colossally rich. If Cohn stays, it will be to pursue an agenda of aggressive financial deregulation and massive corporate tax cuts — he seeks to slash rates by 57 percent — that would dramatically increase profits for large financial players like Goldman. …

“Goldman received at least $22.9 billion in public bailouts, including $10 billion in TARP funds and $12.9 billion in taxpayer-funded payments from AIG. …

“Yet rather than publicly recuse himself on attempts to undo Dodd-Frank, Cohn has led the charge from inside the White House. On that matter, Cohn is a walking, talking conflict of interest. …

“As federal investigations found, the firm, which still claims ‘our clients’ interests always come first’ as a core principle, failed to disclose that its top people saw disaster in the very products its salespeople were continuing to hawk.

“Goldman still held billions of mortgages on its books in December 2006 — mortgages that Cohn and other Goldman executives suspected would soon be worth much less than the firm had paid for them. So, while Cohn was overseeing one team inside Goldman Sachs preoccupied with implementing the big short, he was in regular contact with others scrambling to offload its subprime inventory. One Goldman trader described the mortgage-backed securities they were selling as ‘shitty.'”