HIGHLIGHTS
JUMP: EDUCATION | INFRASTRUCTURE | PUBLIC SERVICES | THE REST
First, the Good News
1) National: Writing in LA Progressive, Peter McLaren says right wing efforts to gut public education have failed before and will run into massive resistance. “History has long been an unyielding gatekeeper, standing watch over the ruins of past ambitions. Others have tried and failed to shutter this bastion of public education, only to find that the machinery of governance, however battered, does not bend so easily to the whims of a single ruler. Whether Trump’s second reign will rewrite that history—or simply join the annals of thwarted authoritarian dreams—remains the question looming over this moment, heavy as an unsentenced verdict. Previous attempts to dissolve or merge the Department of Education have crumbled, their ambitions dashed even when the political winds seemed ripe for such a transformation.”
Nevertheless, Trump’s efforts to gut government are running rampant. Peter Green, who has been following the failures of the charter school movement for years, has a good agency by agency survey piece in Quartz on “Donald Trump’s playbook for privatizing America’s government.” His bottom line: “Fully privatizing the institutions would put some cash in federal coffers, but would likely decrease oversight, increase risk, and make lending more expensive—and decidedly less expansive. Moody’s economist Mark Zandi estimated that full privatization of Fannie and Freddie would cost the typical American taking out a new mortgage between $1,800 and $2,800 per year, with people with lower incomes and credit scores paying the most. The government is there to provide services that the private sector can’t or won’t provide at a price that keeps them accessible to citizens, who are effectively the shareholders of the country. As Rep. Gerry Connolly, the Northern Virginia Democrat who is the ranking member on the House Oversight Committee, tweetedrecently, ‘When you go private, the profit motive is everything.’”
2) National: As Black History Month begins, Jesse Hagopian, whose new book is titled Teach Truth: The Struggle for Antiracist Education, joined Democracy Now! for a two part discussion of Trump’s attack on education (Part 1, Part 2): “Here’s the thing: You cannot ban your way to knowledge. You can’t ban your way to truth and justice and freedom. Right? We have to allow school to be a place of critical inquiry, of creativity and imagination. And to do that, we have to defend students’ right to learn.” See also his excellent piece in The Nation, “The Far Right’s Plan to Force Teachers to Lie About Race.” But people are standing up. Hagopian writes, “James Whitfield provided insight on the power of a deeply connected and loving classroom during his May 19, 2022, testimony to the House Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. He was invited to testify at the ‘Curriculum Sabotage and Classroom Censorship’ congressional hearing addressing the ongoing initiatives aimed at restricting discourse on American history, race, and LGBTQ+ issues in public K–12 classrooms, as well as the punitive measures targeting educators who teach truthfully about these subjects.”
3) National/Washington: Reuters reports that the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in a 2-1 decision “said that while GEO operates a Tacoma, Washington, detention center under a contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, it does not enjoy the immunity from state minimum wage laws afforded to the federal government. GEO was appealing a $17.3 million jury verdict for detainees who were paid $1 a day to cook, clean, perform repairs, and staff a barber shop and library at the detention center, and a separate $6 million award for the state. Washington had sued GEO for unjust enrichment for not paying detainees the minimum wage. The Washington Supreme Court, in response to certified questions from the 9th Circuit, ruled in 2023 that the detainees were GEO’s employeesunder state law and had to be paid the minimum wage. That left the federal court to consider GEO’s claim that because it was operating a government detention center, it was shielded from state wage laws just like the federal government.
4) National: Lutheran groups are pushing back on Elon Musk’s allegation tax dollars were used for “illegal” activity. “Global Refuge, affiliated with the liberal mainline denomination Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, pushed back on the insinuation that its organization engaged in illegal activity in a statement published on Sunday. ‘Global Refuge condemns, in the strongest possible terms, the false accusations lodged against our humanitarian work. As a faith-based nonprofit, we have faithfully walked alongside legally admitted refugees and immigrants for more than 85 years.’ Funds given to Global Refuge, include nearly $4.2 million in 2024 for group homes for unaccompanied illegal immigrant children. From 2022-2025, the organization received separate awards totaling more than $76 million and nearly $23.4 million for transitional foster care and shelter for unaccompanied illegal immigrant children. (…) ‘We also remain committed to caring for unaccompanied children forced to flee unimaginable circumstances in their home countries to seek safety in the United States,’ the Global Refuge statement added. ‘Across Democratic and Republican administrations, we have partnered with the U.S. government to protect vulnerable children, safeguard them against human trafficking, and safely reunify them with their parent(s) or guardian.’”
Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, President and CEO of Global Refuge, said, “The refugee program is not just a humanitarian lifeline through which the U.S. has shown global leadership. It represents the gold standard of legal immigration pathways in terms of security screening, community coordination, and mutual economic benefit.” Clint Schnekloth responded, “I don’t know if facts matter much anymore but I guess I’ll still just share some basic facts. When Musk and Flynn begin targeting Lutheran Social Service and Catholic Charities, labeling the payouts in the federal government as ‘illegal,’ this is just crazy talk, but crazy talk with consequences. (…) These attacks aren’t just reckless rhetoric; they undermine the social fabric that makes communities stronger. If the goal is a healthy, self-sufficient society, then supporting organizations like LSS is not just smart policy—it’s essential.”
5) Florida: The Florida Education Association says “In honor of #BlackHistoryMonth, we are proud to spotlight some of our incredible members from across the state. Today, we celebrate Sandra Scott, a longtime educator in Lake County and a proud member of the Lake County Education Association! #FEAProud.” Check out their feed. “Mary McLeod Bethune (1875-1955): A fierce educator and activist, she championed Black workers’ rights, education, and economic empowerment.”
6) Pennsylvania: Pittsburghers will have an opportunity this spring to block privatization of their water and sewer infrastructure. The question will appear on the May 20 primary election ballot. “‘Shall the Pittsburgh Home Rule Charter be amended and supplemented by adding a new Article 11: RIGHT TO PUBLIC OWNERSHIP OF POTABLE WATER SYSTEMS, WASTEWATER SYSTEM, AND STORM SEWER SYSTEMS, which restricts the lease and/or sale of the City’s water and sewer system to private entities?’ This question gives voters the opportunity to prohibit Pittsburgh Water (formerly the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority) from privatizing. At this time, Pittsburgh Water has indicated that they do not intend to privatize, but if voters approve this measure, it would prohibit them from doing so in the future. The authority would not be able to lease or sell the water and sewer systems to private companies.”
7) Wisconsin: Wisconsin Watch and WPR report that residents are organizing to keep county nursing homes public. “During years of debate over the Portage County Health Care Center’s fate, organizers successfully landed two referendums on the ballot to increase its funding, both of which voters approved. And after Roppe and her colleagues in 2024 highlighted the poor reputation of one potential buyer, the board chose not to accept its offer. Several grassroots campaigns across Wisconsin aim to halt the privatization of county-owned nursing homes, which tend to be better staffed, have higher quality of care and draw fewer complaints than facilities owned by for-profits and nonprofits, as WPR and Wisconsin Watch previously reported. Portage County, whose nursing home holds a perfect 5-star federal rating, was one of at least five Wisconsin counties last year that considered selling, started the sales process or sold their county-owned nursing homes citing budgetary concerns. Proponents of keeping nursing homes in county hands have created social media pages, yard signs, T-shirts, and petitions and led protests—all dedicated to slowing and stopping sales.”
8) National: Salon senior writer Amanda Marcotte says Trump’s MAGA takeover of education may backfire with parents: Trump forgets the lesson of Moms for Liberty and orders schools to replace education with right-wing propaganda. “Even in deep-red states, the efforts to remake public education in MAGA’s image have been getting a lot of pushback. In Oklahoma, the Trumpified state superintendent keeps pulling stunts like trying to force students to pray for Donald Trump or mandating Bible study in the classroom. Often, these stunts fall flat, such as when the Oklahoma state attorney general blocked the mandatory prayer and local school districts simply refused orders to hold Bible study in class. In Texas, the state tried to bribe school districts into adopting the Bible curriculum by offering more money to school districts that use it. But with state civil rights and education groups threatening to sue, districts will likely see it’s not worth the relatively small kickback, even if they were tempted. Georgia also tried to lure schools into offering Bible study classes. But there was almost no student interest, so most school districts didn’t bother. Only 10% of the schools offered the classes. And out of over a half-million Georgia high school students in 2019, only 740 took the class. The likeliest response of most school districts will be to ignore Trump’s ‘order.’”
9) National: Randi Weingarten, AFT’s president, says “The Dept of Education helps kids—including 26m in Title I schools, 7.5m getting assistance through IDEA, 13m with PELL grants, and 5.5m learning English as a second language.” Watch the interview with Weingarten (about 6 minutes). Weingarten told Capital & Main that Critical Race Theory bans are a front for school privatization. Last week Trump issued an “Executive Order” banning CRT in K-12 schools.
10) California: Benjamin Balthaser, Associate Professor of English at Indiana University, says “California State University—the largest public system in the country w 23 campuses – announced it is now ‘AI powered.’ All while laying off hundreds of faculty and shuttering whole depts due to yet another (Democratic Party I should add) austerity budget.”
11) District of Columbia: Writing in The American Prospect, Hassan Ali Kanu shines a light on the danger facing public schools in the nation’s capital. “Now, as Donald Trump re-enters the White House, private school vouchers are poised to have another banner year. That includes the distinct possibility that advocates could effectively and fully voucherize the whole public school system in the only jurisdiction with an existing, federally funded voucher program, which is also the only one subject to direct control by Congress: deep-blue Washington, D.C.”
12) Florida: Writing in the Tallahassee Democrat, Sierra Bush Rester, a special education public-school teacher in Leon County, special needs parent, and lifelong Floridian, writes public or private, school choice was designed to segregate. “Today, these programs still reinforce segregation by allowing privileged families to opt out of struggling public schools while leaving their underprivileged neighbors in underfunded schools. So, while public school choice does keep public funds in public schools, it is also guilty of normalizing the idea that parents should abandon “certain” public schools, thus paving the way for the real Trojan horse of privatization: vouchers. Now, in 2025, because of the bills being introduced in this legislative session it is more evident than ever, school choice (in all its forms) was never about giving parents options; it was and still is about dismantling the public schools’ system so it can be privatized and resegregated. Don’t believe me? Then, keep reading.”
13) Utah: Brittinie Gleave, of Murray, declares keep public education public: Guard against the privatization playbook. “People pack the Senate Revenue and Taxation Committee hearing at the Capitol to discuss H.B. 267, a bill aimed at banning collective bargaining for public labor unions in Utah, in Salt Lake City on Wednesday, Jan 29, 2025. Despite wide support for our public schools, some Utah lawmakers use each legislative session to launch unpopular bills designed to undermine schools and diminish their capabilities. Stripping collective bargaining rights from public employee associations is an obvious next step in the privatization playbook. Following manufactured outrage against a host of nonissues, from critical race theory to indoctrination, the idea of school choice was used to ram through a voucher bill that voters had previously rejected. Further weakening was attempted with Amendment A, sponsored and supported by state senators, to remove the constitutional earmark for education, despite consistent polling data that voters support increased funding. The Utah Education Association has been a consistent hurdle to these uncalled-for actions. Their advocacy for quality working conditions is advocacy for quality learning environments. Declawing unions by removing their right to collective bargaining is an unfair play to remove the hurdles.”
14) National: Inside Climate News reports that “this week in Nairobi, Kenya, a group of international humanitarian, business and government partners met to discuss an initiative to use renewable energy to provide power and internet access to medical facilities in sub-Saharan Africa that currently struggle to keep the lights on. The program, called the Health Electrification and Telecommunications Alliance (HETA), aims to use solar panels and battery storage to ensure reliable power and communications access to 10,000 facilities in 11 countries that provide care for about 1.9 million people. But the staff of the U.S. Agency for International Development, the lead agency bringing partners together to complete the project, wasn’t there. As USAID is put under existential threat by the Trump administration, projects like HETA are thrown into jeopardy. Staff have been instructed not to show up to work, computer systems are disabled and international personnel are being recalled home.” [BTW, Inside Climate News is hiring]
15) National: A directive from Trump’s new interior secretary weakens public land protections to push fossil fuels. “Alan Zibel, research director at Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization, said the Interior Department under Burgum ‘appears inclined to shrink or sell off public lands to fossil fuel interests and mining companies, while making expansion of renewable energy more difficult. This isn’t technology-neutral ‘energy abundance,’ it’s a blatant giveaway to the fossil fuel interests who were generous benefactors to Trump’s campaign.’ Stripping Protections from Public Lands. At risk under Burgum’s order are public lands that have been withdrawn from mining, oil and gas development—including the nation’s national monuments, which, despite being extremely popular with the American public, have elicited scrutiny from Republicans in recent years for their protection of wide open spaces and culturally significant sites from development.”
16) National: Is Tesla Elon OK with this? “A new federal order that freezes a Biden-era program to build a national network of electric vehicle charging stations has confounded states, which had been allocated billions of dollars by Congress for the program. In interviews on Friday, some state officials said that as a result of the memo from the Trump administration, they had stopped work on the charging stations. Others said they intended to keep going. In Ohio, where Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, has welcomed federal money to build 19 E.V. charging stations, Breanna Badanes, a spokeswoman for the state’s Transportation Department, said Friday that ‘it’s safe to say we’re not sure’ how or whether the state will build more.”
17) National: The Bond Buyer reports, “Confusion caused by a funds freeze enacted and then rescinded by the White House is causing ongoing consternation amongst lawmakers and transportation officials counting on federal reimbursements for infrastructure projects approved by a bipartisan Congress. ‘We simply cannot have a situation in which Congress comes together in bipartisan fashion, agrees on a measure, and a president who has taken an oath to faithfully execute those laws, instead picks and chooses among them,’ said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, the Democratic ranking member of the Environment and Public Works Committee.
“The comments came during an American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials conference on Tuesday. Although the temporary freeze of funds from the federal government to state and local governments was rescinded, Whitehouse described the situation in Rhode Island as still not sorted out. (…) State transportation departments are juggling several other long-term concerns such as the fact that funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is set to end in September 2026. Lawmakers and policy makers are wrestling with reauthorizing another all-encompassing infrastructure bill that includes airports and broadband as compared to something simpler and more traditional. ‘We are very focused on surface transportation as traditionally defined as highways, transit, highway safety, passenger rail,’ said Joung Lee, the director of policy and government relations for AASHTO.”
18) National: The New York Times has a primer on what the privatization of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would mean for the mortgage system. “Fannie and Freddie underpin the nation’s $12 trillion mortgage market, so they need to be handled with care. Scott Bessent, the Treasury secretary, said last month that any plan for ending the so-called conservatorship of the two firms ‘should be carefully designed and executed.’ (…) As the housing crisis worsened in 2008, bond investors and investors in shares of Fannie and Freddie panicked. Eventually, the federal government had to step in with a $187 billion bailout to prevent the firms from filing for bankruptcy, which might have led to a full-fledged depression.
“Laurie Goodman, founder of the Housing Finance Policy Center at the Urban Institute, a Washington think tank, said that though the conservatorship might be unpopular, the current arrangement was largely working. She said a rushed decision could make mortgages more expensive and bring about other unintended consequences.” She tells the Times, “Some of the most vocal proponents of putting Fannie and Freddie back in private control are hedge fund managers and wealthy investors, who still own shares of the companies even though they’re government controlled. That’s because shares of Fannie and Freddie have continued to trade largely in anticipation that the government will eventually release the companies. Shares of both companies most recently traded around $5. These investors—many of whom snapped up shares and related securities at deeply discounted prices—are hoping to cash in and make billions if Fannie and Freddie are allowed to become independent, publicly traded companies. One of the more outspoken is Mr. Ackman, the hedge fund manager, who has argued for years that the conservatorship should be ended. Last month, he prepared a 104-page presentation called The Art of the Deal that lays out his case for ending the conservatorship. (The presentation’s title is an allusion to Mr. Trump’s book of the same name.)”
19) California: Water unexpectedly released from dams on Trump’s order didn’t help farms or L.A., the Los Angeles Times reports. “Acting on an order from Washington, the corps allowed irrigation water to flow down river channels for three days, into the network of engineered waterways that fan out among farm fields in the San Joaquin Valley. Coursing from rivers to canals to irrigation ditches, much of the water eventually made its way to retention basins, where it soaked into the ground, replenishing groundwater. ‘It’s been recharged to the ground,’ said Tom Barcellos, president of the Lower Tule River Irrigation District and a dairyman and farmer. That sounds good, except farmers in parts of the San Joaquin Valley typically depend on water from the two dams to irrigate crops in the summer. In other words, the release of water this time of year, when agriculture usually doesn’t require it, means that growers are likely to have less water stored in the reservoirs this summer, during a year that so far is among the area’s driest on record.”
20) National: Forbes’ Thomas Brewster has a long piece on the billion-dollar private prison companies capitalizing on Trump’s immigration crackdown. “Though their detention centers have been plagued by allegations of negligence and poor conditions, GEO Group and CoreCivic are poised to make bank off Trump’s immigration crackdown. But can they handle millions of new detainees?” he asks. “As the Trump administration ramps up what it claims will be the largest mass deportation effort in U.S. history, Carhuanchos’ allegations and others like them raise questions about how an already overtaxed system will handle what will likely be an unprecedented influx of new detainees. A Forbes review of over 20 lawsuits filed against GEO and its chief competitor CoreCivic in the last year and interviews with former staff found repeated allegations of mismanagement, understaffing and dangerous conditions at their facilities (all the cases are ongoing, bar one that was settled out of court). And a recent American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) report into fatalities at ICE detention centers between 2017 and 2021 noted that of the 52 total immigrant deaths reported, 18 occurred at CoreCivic properties, and 13 at Geo facilities. The report found 95% were preventable.”
Meanwhile the Trump administration has announced it is accepting into BOP facilities thousands of immigrants detained by the Homeland Security Department, which Government Executive says “raises significant legal and logistical questions.” Can we call them prisoners instead of detainees now?
21) National: Government Executive reports that “The U.S. Postal Service’s plan to reform its operations and fix its finances is defective, overly optimistic and will severely damage its performance, a regulator with oversight of the agency found in a new review. The negative impacts of Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s Delivering for America plan have been felt since it was first implemented in 2021, the Postal Regulatory Commission said in an advisory opinion, and years later is still not ready for implementation. USPS is likely to realize little benefit from the proposals, PRC said, while worsening service and negatively impacting certain mail products and communities. DeJoy and postal management have repeatedly said all of his steps to overhaul the Postal Service are necessary for the survival of the agency and anyone standing in his way would hasten its demise. ‘The commission urges the Postal Service to reconsider whether the speculative, meager gains from this proposal outweigh the certain downgrade in service for a significant portion of the nation,’ PRC wrote.”
The American Postal Workers Union (APWU) submitted rebuttal testimony to the commission, which can be found hereon pages 49-51.
22) National: When is a contract not a contract? Government Executive reports that OPM now claims agencies can ignore union telework contracts. “Suzanne Summerlin, an independent labor attorney and former Biden-era nominee to be general counsel at the Federal Labor Relations Authority, said that the memo disregards basic definitions of terms outlined in federal labor law. For instance, the concept of ‘management rights’ is an assertion made in response to a specific proposal at the bargaining table. An agency then argues that the proposal is nonnegotiable, but only the FLRA can rule whether a proposal excessively infringes upon management rights. ‘Proposals that “excessively interfere” with management rights is not permitted to be bargained over, but that doesn’t mean management rights can’t be bargained at all,” Summerlin said. ‘[But] in this case, they appear to be going after anything that “impedes” management rights, but that isn’t the legal standard.’ Matt Biggs, president of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, responded to the news by citing an excerpt from Title 5 of the U.S. Code that states that the enforcement of a presidential policy or regulation that conflicts with a union contract constitutes an unfair labor practice.”
23) National: Red states are mimicking Musk’s tactics in an effort to slash local government. “The Texas House of Representatives recently announced plans for a 13-member Delivery of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, committee that will examine state agencies for inefficiencies, and Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said a DOGE bill would be one of his top legislative priorities. GOP leaders in Kansas, Missouri, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oklahoma and Wisconsin have recently announced similar ventures. “But “‘We have someone who has a whole office whose job is to work on this,’ said [Iowa] Democratic state Rep. Adam Zabner. ‘I think we’re more likely to find efficiencies through the state auditor who Iowans elected to that role than we are through a major supporter of the governor’s campaigns.’ Zabner serves on the legislature’s long-standing government efficiency review committee, which examines state government operations every two years. Zabner said it’s unclear how much true savings were realized from Reynolds’ realignment, as the state previously had hundreds of unfilled jobs. And he said those cuts haven’t necessarily improved the delivery of state services.’”
24) National: CoreCivic’s fourth quarter 2024 profit report webcast is at 11 am EST tomorrow. Listen here. GEO Group’s report is on February 27.
25) National: As we have long reported at In the Public Interest, antigovernment, for-profit corporations have greedily eyed NOAA and dreamed of privatizing the federal agency so they could swoop in and make money by ratcheting up fees. Well, they finally see their chance. “DOGE Ransacks NOAA, Raising Fears About Privatization of Climate Data,” Mike Ludwig reports in Truthout. “When DOGE barged into the offices of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) this week, the scrutiny from Musk’s unelected and unaccountable team added to fears that the collection of agencies the nation relies on to manage fisheries, track climate change, forecast hurricanes and issue severe weather warnings will be gutted and privatized under Trump. Musk reportedly staffed DOGE with young, inexperienced engineers from Silicon Valley. (…) NOAA includes the National Hurricane Center and National Weather Service (NWS), which provide forecasts and data to researchers and the public as well as private companies that are eager to control weather data and sell it for a profit. As a global leader in climate science, NOAA is also under pressure from far right climate deniers who accuse the agency of promoting a political agenda by making its constantly updated data on climate change available for free. With labs that measure global temperatures, melting Arctic ice, and levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, NOAA provides indisputable evidence that the climate crisis is real, which flies in the face of Trump’s pro-fossil fuel agenda. Timothy Whitehouse, director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), which protects civil servants, especially whistleblowers, working on environmental issues, said NOAA’s labs are at risk of being defunded and transformed into a commercial venture that sells data to private industry, rather than a public service meant to warn everyone about heat waves and intensifying storms.”
26) National/Washington: GEO Group, the private, for-profit prison company, has sued to block the state Department of Labor & Industries from releasing the inspection materials in response to a public records request from Cascade PBS. “GEO Group also named Cascade PBS as a party in its filing in Pierce County Superior Court and emailed Cascade PBS a copy of the court filing. Court records show L&I had concluded that approximately 215 unique images from its July 2024 workplace inspection were subject to disclosure under state records law. GEO Group later argued that releasing photos from the inspection could undermine the security of the immigration enforcement detention center and L&I had conducted its inspection under improper authority. (…) As outlined in previous Cascade PBS coverage, GEO Group has repeatedly pushed back against a 2023 state law that reinforced state oversight of private detention facilities.”
27) International/South Africa: Who is behind Trump’s effort to intimidate South Africa by cutting off U.S. funding support for vital public services like HIV/AIDS initiatives and for research at South African universities? Writing in Vrye Weekblad, veteran South African Afrikaner journalists Max Du Preez and his colleague Flip Buys have the receipts. “Pres. Donald Trump’s bizarre, fact-free threat against South Africa did not just arise in the back of his head last week. It is the initiative of alt-right ex-South Africans in America and like-minded people here who are urging them on: the Solidarity Movement, perhaps even elements in the DA, writes Max Du Preez. Solidarity is even on its way to the White House, says Flip Buys. ‘The hand of the South African-born super-rich entrepreneur Elon Musk, Trump’s ‘First Buddy,’ can clearly be detected in the latest saga and he was also engaged in a verbal fight on his Twitter/X with [SA President] Ramaphosa’s spokesperson this week about “all the racist laws.” Musk has aligned himself with far-right political parties and movements in Britain, Germany and elsewhere in the last few months. The other person involved is the man on the shortlist for ambassador to South Africa, Joel Pollak. As senior editor at the alt-right propaganda paper Breitbart News, he is very influential in MAGA circles and regularly writes about South Africa.’”
28) Revolving Door News: Palantir’s revolving door with government is spurring huge growth, reports the Financial Times. “Palantir is profiting from a ‘revolving door’ of executives and officials passing between the $264bn data intelligence company and high level positions in Washington and Westminster, creating an influence network who have guided its extraordinary growth. The U.S. group, whose billionaire chair Peter Thiel has been a key backer of Donald Trump, has enjoyed an astonishing stock price rally on the back of strong rise of sales from government contracts and deals with the world’s largest corporations. Detailed findings by the Tech Transparency Project (TTP), which analyzed transparency disclosures and dozens of job moves, as well as U.S. and U.K. public records obtained by the Financial Times, show how Palantir has hired extensively from government agencies critical to its sales. The analysis reveals the US group’s sprawling influence network which includes: deep ties with largest client, the Department of Defense; a six-fold increase in lobbying spending in the U.S. in the past decade; and creating a non-profit foundation to fund academic research and shape policy discussions.” [Sub required]
29) National/Useful Resource: The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) publishes a daily digest of news stories on immigration issues with legal ramifications. Registration is now open for this year’s annual conference and webcast
30) National: “Did Trump Quietly Kill a Sensitive Pentagon Probe into Elon Musk?” The New Republic’s Greg Sargent asks. “Now that Trump is president and controls the executive branch—including the Defense Department—it’s time to raise what appears to be a forgotten question: What exactly is going on with these government reviews into Musk? Have they continued? Or are they effectively dead? When Trump fired over a dozen independent inspectors general last month, one of them was the Defense Department IG, Robert Storch. We don’t know whether the Musk probe was a reason for this firing, but it now seems awfully convenient for the SpaceX billionaire, who is known to be enraged about having to face regulations and oversight while enjoying immensely lucrative contracts with the federal government. Now Democrats fear that Trump’s firing of the Defense Department IG has had the effect of closing down the IG’s investigation into Musk. And they’re demanding that the Pentagon clarify its status.”
31) National: “The Treasury Department was warned in a confidential assessment that U.S. DOGE Service access to a sensitive payment network represented an ‘unprecedented insider threat risk,’ according to internal correspondence reviewed by The Washington Post. (…) A Treasury employee told The Post that the threat center is run by Booz Allen Hamilton, a large federal contractor. The company confirmed it runs the threat center, which it said is embedded within Treasury. Late Friday, after this article appeared, Booz Allen said it had ‘removed’ a subcontractor who wrote the warning and would seek to retract or amend it. ‘The draft report was prepared by a subcontractor to Booz Allen and contained unauthorized personal opinions that are not factual or consistent with our standards,’” company spokesperson Jessica Klenk said. Booz Allen won more than $1 billion in multiyear U.S. government contracts last year.”
32) National: Well surprise, surprise. Right on time, just as the Trump administration moves to privatize government agencies such as NOAA, the National Contract Management Association publishes a how-to article on “Acquisition Planning.”