Though it's becoming harder and harder to prove it by the weekend ALL THINGS CONSIDERED, NPR can still do journalism on the weekends. For example, today on WEEKEND EDITION SATURDAY:
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
And it has been a tumultuous week at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. NPR's Laurel Wamsley has been following all the twists and turns at the bureau this week. Laurel, thanks so much for being with us.
LAUREL WAMSLEY, BYLINE: Hey there, Scott.
SIMON: Catch us up. What's been happening with this agency?
WAMSLEY: Well, there's been a lot of layoffs this week. That's part of Trump's plan to massively reduce the federal workforce. At CFPB, some 150 employees lost their jobs. That's about 9% of the staff. Those cuts were largely folks who'd been at the bureau for less than four years. One of the employees who lost her job this week was Johanna Hickman, who was an attorney in the bureau's enforcement division. She received her termination notice at 9 p.m. on Tuesday. And because her work e-mail had already been turned off, it came to her personal e-mail.
JOHANNA HICKMAN: You know, it's heartbreaking. I think we do exceptional work at the bureau, and I have been honored to serve in this role for the last, you know, over a year and a half. I expected to be here for another 15 years. And it's shocking. It's unlawful, for one thing, and extraordinarily disappointing.
WAMSLEY: And right now, essentially, all of CFPB's work has been halted. Employees have been locked out of the building and told they can't do any work. And Elon Musk's team, meanwhile, has been given access to the building and to its systems.
SIMON: And where does that leave events now this weekend?
WAMSLEY: Well, staff are bracing for even further cuts. According to a legal complaint by CFPB's union, they're expecting that perhaps 95% of all employees could be fired. A reporter asked President Trump on Monday whether his goal was to have CFPB totally eliminated, and Trump said yes. But for now, a federal judge ruled yesterday that they can't conduct layoffs at CFPB, at least through March 3, when a hearing is scheduled, and they can't delete any agency data either.
SIMON: And, Laurel, remind us - the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created in 2008, and why?
WAMSLEY: That's right. That's when millions of Americans lost their homes due to lax lending standards, and it brought the global economy tumbling with it. The Dodd-Frank Act established the bureau to prevent such a disaster from happening again. At a high level, what the bureau supposed to do is that it's been tasked by Congress to regulate consumer financial products and services, like credit cards, mortgages, et cetera. So consumer protection responsibilities are now unified under one agency that's tasked with being on the side of the consumer, against big banks and financial services companies. And it's really done a lot.
I mean, just in recent months, it's made rules capping credit card late fees and overdraft fees. It sued the payment app Zelle and the banks that operate it, saying they didn't protect consumers from fraud. And it sued Capital One for advertising a high-yield checking account that paid close to zero in interest.
Donald Chump and Alien Musk continue their attack on the US government. Foreign born Alien prefers to destroy the US system because he misses the apartheid he embraced in South Africa and Donald Chump is just too stupid to know what he's doing.
Chump demonstrated that stupidity again today. Doina Chiacu (REUTERS) explains Chump posted to social media today, "He who saves his Country does not violate any Law." No, that's not true, it's never been true. Chiacu also notes that Chump is claiming that he survived an assassination attempt because God wants him to save the country.
No.
If God's involved at all in any of this, Chump is cancer. Chump is the disaster that destroys lives and lead people to cry out, "Why? Oh why!" He's a test that God hands out to see what people are made of.
Chump continues to attack the US government -- the one he was supposed to represent.
Mike Snider and Joey Garrison (USA TODAY) report on Chump's attacks:
In a flurry of activity at the end of the week, the Trump administration fired more than 10,000 federal workers across multiple agencies as part of its "large-scale reductions" in the government workforce.
This is likely just the beginning of the job cuts, as President Donald Trump and top White House aide Elon Musk seek to continue slashing agency budgets.
[. . .]
A federal judge on Friday blocked the dismissal of any more workers at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, according to multiple reports. More than 100 employees were laid off before the pause, NPR reported. A court challenge was filed by a union representing workers seeking to block Trump's efforts to eliminate the CFPB.
Termination notices were sent to more than 60 probationary employees across multiple work groups, including the offices of general counsel, special education and rehabilitation services, and federal student aid. Dozens of employees have been put administrative leave, multiple outlets including the New York Times and Washington Post reported, amid the Trump administration's efforts to remove diversity, equity and inclusion positions from the government.
We do realize, right, that he's not only refused to lower the prices of eggs (they are at least double what they were when Joe was president) and other groceries, but that he's destroying the economy while also attempting massive lay offs? We do realize lay offs lead to increased unemployment, right?
Did those fools of you who voted for him actually vote for him to cause a recession?
If not, what you think his tariffs and firings are going to result in?
Josephine Harvey (HUFFINGTON POST) notes:
President Donald Trump seems to expect Americans to take his word for it that his tariffs plan will work out well for them.
Trump on Thursday announced he was imposing reciprocal tariffs on trade partners, a plan that could easily backfire and drive up prices for American consumers.
President Donald Trump seems to expect Americans to take his word for it that his tariffs plan will work out well for them.
Trump on Thursday announced he was imposing reciprocal tariffs on trade partners, a plan that could easily backfire and drive up prices for American consumers.
What magical land is your brain residing in that allows you to escape basic economic and market place realities?
AP's Fatima Hussein notes, "The IRS will lay off thousands of probationary workers in the middle of tax season, according to two sources familiar with the agency's plans, and cuts could happen as soon as next week." MAGA fools, we don't need IRS workers right now? At the height of tax season? Julia Ainsley (NBC NEWS) explains, "The Department of Justice fired multiple immigration judges on Friday, according to two sources familiar with the decision and a statement from one of the judges on LinkedIn. The move threatens to throw sand in the gears of an already strained immigration system as the Trump administration moves to rapidly reshape the federal workforce. " Again, he's stupid, too stupid for the job. Liam Archacki (THE DAILY BEAST) reports on more firings -- re DEI, were in phase two with phase three set to start shortly. You can also refer to Tom Boggioni's report at RAW STORY on the same topic.
Already, some of the firings have come back to bite Chump and Alien in their nasty, unwashed asses. Niamh Kirk (IRISH STAR) reports:
Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) hastily backtracked after dismissing top nuclear experts, a blunder that became apparent when The National Nuclear Safety Administration had to rehire them urgently. The firings were reversed on Friday following DOGE's oversight in not realising the agency's role in managing America's nuclear weapons before letting the employees go on Thursday.
Rookie mistake No. A sign of stupidity. You don't fire the nuclear experts. Chump is an incompetent who has put a non-American in charge of our government. Alien Musk is first a citizen of South Africa -- home of his father and his birthplace. Via his mother he is a citizen of Canada. Late in his adult life, he lies and breaks immigration rules to become a US citizen -- without denouncing his citizenship he already holds in two other countries. That's not an American citizen and it's not what the founders ever intended citizenship to be. He's not a US citizen.
Meanwhile Greg Sargent (THE NEW REPUBLIC) reports:
Shockingly, it turns out that empowering the richest human being on the planet to maliciously and gratuitously heap additional misery on that planet’s most poor, hungry, and desperate people might—just might—pose a niggling political problem to President Donald Trump.
There seems to be a split in Trumpworld these days. Some seem to think Trump can get away with anything, no matter how devastating it is to the most vulnerable or how corrupt an abuse of power it represents. Others seem aware that there are limits—that at some point, Trumpworld might push things too far and suffer a public backlash, and that this might actually matter.
A new internal memo circulating inside the U.S. Agency for International Development neatly captures this split. The Washington Post reports that the memo warns USAID employees not to communicate with the press about the shocking disruptions in humanitarian assistance that are being caused by the Trump-Musk attack on the agency, which are already producing horrific consequences. The memo said this transgression might be met with “dismissal.”
The memo claims to be correcting a “false narrative in the press” about the disruptions to that assistance. It notes that Secretary of State Marco Rubio last month issued a waiver to “lifesaving humanitarian assistance,” allowing it to continue despite the Trump-Musk freeze in agency spending. This has meant that this assistance has “continued uninterrupted and has never paused,” the memo claims, while warning recipients against any “unauthorized external engagement with the press.”
This is highly disingenuous at best and mostly nonsense at worst. As The New York Times reports, some senior USAID officials recently received an email explicitly directing them to hold off on approving some of this assistance, pending more directives from on high. What’s more, according to the Times, while some of this assistance did continue due to Rubio’s waiver, much of it has encountered serious obstacles.
This past weekend, Elon Musk called me cruel, mean and deceitful. Two and half years ago I called him a welfare queen. You decide. www.profgalloway.com/elon-musk-we...
— Scott Galloway (@profgalloway.com) February 14, 2025 at 5:17 PM
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Thanks to Elon Musk and DOGE, our adversaries now have access to sensitive information about one of our intelligence agencies. Elon Musk and DOGE staff should NOT have access to sensitive national security information. www.huffpost.com/entry/elon-m...
— Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett (@repjasmine.bsky.social) February 14, 2025 at 3:39 PM
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Protestors outside of Tesla in Austin, Texas. (📷 @jennakingtv) "Elon stop taking over, you are not President" "Love Your Neighbors" "Musk is the Fraud" "Deport Musk" "Drive Musk out" "No Nazis in my city." #3E #EndOligarchy #TeslaTakeover #TeslaProtests
— Anonymous (@youranoncentral.bsky.social) February 15, 2025 at 1:01 PM
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If Elon Musk truly cares about being "maximally transparent," he should release the forms showing his financial interests. Americans deserve to know how Elon Musk will profit from his role in the Trump Administration. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
— Elizabeth Warren (@warren.senate.gov) February 14, 2025 at 2:51 PM
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