Good morning, AlterNet America family.
Welcome to the Saturday Wrapup, where I give you my thoughts on the week’s biggest news as I consume my caffeine with you.
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If the Secret Service actually wanted to tear it down, they would have told him not to.
In a 75-minute interview with TIME magazine published this week, Trump said Secret Service officials approached him with a proposal to tear down the Oval Office and build a replacement. In a reversal of other recent events, Trump claimed he was the one who refused.
Trump said he caught agents inspecting the room and asked what they were doing. One of them reportedly told him, “Sir, we think the Oval Office should be taken down, and we’ll build a new one, sir.” Trump said he rejected the plan and called the Oval Office “a beautiful room that nobody should be allowed to rip down.”
Four former Secret Service officials said the agency has suggested to past administrations ways to improve security around the Oval Office, but has never recommended knocking it down. The Secret Service did not respond to questions about Trump’s recent remarks.
Trump has already made sweeping changes to the White House in his second term. He swapped the Rose Garden for a Mar-a-Lago-like patio, the East Wing for a 90,000-square-foot ballroom, and decked the Oval Office in gold.
A recent Washington Post/Ipsos poll found that 65 percent of Americans have a negative view of his renovation projects, suggesting Trump’s comments could be an effort to save face before the midterms. Speaking of…
The Comstock Act has waited 152 years. It can wait until November 4.
A senior administration official told the Washington Sun that Trump Chief of Staff Susan Wiles directly ordered Attorney General Todd Blanche to refrain from any legal action related to abortion before the November elections. Wiles reportedly warned that acting on abortion before the midterms would cost the party votes.
Since then, Blanche has urged federal judges to pause lawsuits seeking to block access to the abortion pill mifepristone as the FDA reviews its safety. When a 5th Circuit judge asked DOJ lawyers what the administration’s real position on the drug is, they would not say.
Leaders of the anti-abortion movement said they heard the same message from the administration. Tom McClusky of CatholicVote said he has heard “the same thing from every agency I talk to and from members of Congress,” adding that nothing is going to happen until after November.
One source with White House connections said the administration plans to enforce the Comstock Act, a set of 1873 laws that would ban mailing abortion pills nationwide, after the midterms. Another source said DOJ officials are “actively working on it.”
Politico reported that Blanche told faith leaders during a private call in August that the administration was working to make abortion illegal “in every single state.” The last time he said the word “abortion” on the record was during his confirmation hearings.
Neither rain nor snow nor your reasonable expectation of privacy.
The United States Postal Service is testing a pilot program that places cameras in roughly 100 delivery vehicles in the Washington, D.C. area, according to a labor-relations letter obtained by 404 Media. The cameras, made by Nextbase, scan roads, signage and sidewalks along delivery routes constantly.
Some USPS vehicles are already equipped with 360-degree exterior cameras for limited, incident-based recording. This pilot is different, because the cameras are recording from the moment the truck shifts into drive until it gets back to the facility.
The USPS said the cameras are used to gather data on road conditions and what it calls “community safety.” The agency responded to privacy concerns in a letter to the postal workers’ union, saying its trucks already drive down every street in every community.
Nextbase cameras can film up to 4K resolution and capture license plate details. The pilot doesn’t employ automatic license plate reader software, but the agency hasn’t disclosed how long footage is stored or who has access to it.
Tom Tiffany has more billionaire backers than original policy positions.
Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany has raised more than $26 million in his bid to become Wisconsin’s next governor, and more than 90 percent of that money came from just three donors.
Between August and September, Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, the billionaires behind the Uline packaging and shipping company, each gave $11 million to the Republican Party of Wisconsin. Diane Hendricks, the co-founder of ABC Supply Co. and the state’s largest conservative political donor, gave a large sum of her own. The state party then funneled more than $24 million of that money into Tiffany’s campaign.
The transfers gave Tiffany an enormous cash advantage in the final weeks of the race. His Democratic opponent, Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, raised just $10 million in the same period.
Wisconsin eliminated limits on individual donations to political parties in 2015, but no candidate had ever been bankrolled by so few people until now. Before the change, individuals were limited to $10,000 a year to a state party committee.
Right-wing billionaires are quietly gobbling up more media outlets, while smaller outlets unable to keep up shut down on a nearly daily basis. If left unchecked, the rich and well-connected get to do their dirt in the dark and escape all accountability. But AlterNet America doesn’t answer to them. We only answer to you, and that means we can cover these stories the way they need to be covered. But our editorial independence is only possible with the support of our paying subscribers.
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