January, 06 2017, 01:15pm EDT
CorporateCabinet.org Tracks Trump Cabinet Picks
New Website Highlights Corporate Ties, Potential Conflicts of Interest of Top Political Appointees
WASHINGTON
Media, activists, nonprofits, policymakers and others can now track the corporate ties of President-elect Donald Trump's Cabinet picks and other top political appointees at CorporateCabinet.org.
Public Citizen today unveiled the website to expose corporate ties, corrupting influences and conflicts of interest in Trump's Cabinet, which threatens to be more entangled with corporate interests than any Cabinet in recent memory. The site, which will be updated regularly, will eventually include other top officials such as deputy secretaries.
Many of the nominees have connections with corporations whose profit-driven interests are directly at odds with the federal agencies Trump has selected them to lead.
"Donald Trump, the candidate who ran against corruption, cronyism and insider dealmaking, is handing control of the government over to corporate chieftains," said Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen. "Trump's corporate Cabinet nominees have staggering conflicts of interest, and if confirmed will drive forward policies to advance the interests of Big Business, not the American people. We're facing the prospect of a government literally of the Exxons, by the Goldman Sachses and for the Kochs."
The site has key information about:
- Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who has strong ties to Koch Industries and raked in eye-popping sums from the finance sector, construction industry, pharmaceutical industry and chemical industry;
- Rex Tillerson, Trump's secretary of state pick, who made his career at Exxon Mobil;
- Steven Mnuchin, treasury secretary nominee and longtime Goldman Sachs executive who was steeped in the investment banking industry long before it became a poster child for economy-wrecking, foreclosure-inducing Wall Street greed, and who later helped run a failed bank accused of duplicitous foreclosure practices;
- General James Mattis, being considered for secretary of defense, who has served on the board of General Dynamics, a multinational military contractor;
- U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), under consideration for attorney general and a darling of the finance, insurance and real estate industries, among others;
- Betsy DeVos, named to be education secretary, who is a billionaire scion and whose husband is heir to the Amway fortune;
- Elaine Chao, up to run the U.S. Department of Transportation, who served on the board of directors of Wells Fargo during the cross-selling scandal;
- Former Goldman Sachs executive Gary Cohn, slated to head the National Economic Council, who led Goldman Sachs as it profited off the housing market collapse in part by misleading its own clients;
- Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, Trump's pick to the run the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, who has a deep affinity for fossil fuel companies;
- Steve Bannon, a special adviser to Trump who once ran Breitbart.com, a far-right website, and is a former Goldman Sachs executive;
- Linda McMahon, picked to run the Small Business Administration, who as World Wrestling Entertainment CEO helped ensure the wrestling industry remained largely unregulated, putting the health and safety of wrestlers at risk;
- Fast-food mogul Andy Puzder, who is to head the U.S. Department of Labor and whose companies are known for being anti-worker and anti-union; and
- Wilbur Ross, a billionaire whose firm has profited from buying distressed firms and cutting workers' benefits, who is under consideration for secretary of the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Public Citizen is a longtime watchdog that has called for measures to curb corporate influence over government.
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization that champions the public interest in the halls of power. We defend democracy, resist corporate power and work to ensure that government works for the people - not for big corporations. Founded in 1971, we now have 500,000 members and supporters throughout the country.
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Trump Order Ramps Up Assault on Union Rights of Federal Workers
One labor leader called it "another clear example of retaliation against federal employee union members who have bravely stood up against his anti-worker, anti-American plan to dismantle the federal government."
Aug 28, 2025
In the lead-up to Labor Day in the United States, President Donald Trump on Thursday escalated his attack on the union rights of federal employees at a list of agencies with an executive order that claims to "enhance" national security.
Trump previously issued an order intended to strip the collective bargaining rights from hundreds of thousands of government employees in March, provoking an ongoing court fight. A federal judge blocked the president's edict—but then earlier this month, a panel from the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit allowed the administration to proceed.
Government agencies were directed not to terminate any collective bargaining agreements while the litigation over Trump's March order continued, but some have begun to do so, according to Government Executive. On Monday, the 9th Circuit said in a filing that it would vote on whether the full court will rehear the case.
Amid that court fight, Trump issued Thursday's order, which calls for an end to collective bargaining for unionized workers at the Bureau of Reclamation's hydropower units; National Aeronautics and Space Administration; National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service; National Weather Service; Patent and Trademark Office; and US Agency for Global Media.
Like the earlier order, this one cites the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978. As Government Executive reported Thursday:
Matt Biggs, national president of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, whose union represents a portion of NASA's workforce along with the American Federation of Government Employees, suggested that the administration's targeting of NASA—IFPTE's largest union—was in retaliation for its own lawsuit challenging the spring iteration of the executive order, filed last month.
"It's not surprising, sadly," Biggs said. "What is surprising is that on the eve of Labor Day weekend, when workers are to be celebrated, the Trump administration has doubled down on being the most anti-labor, anti-worker administration in US history. We will continue to fight in the courts, on the Hill, and at the grassroots levels against this."
Everett Kelley, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), which also sued over the March order, said that "President Trump's decision to issue a Labor Day proclamation shortly after stripping union rights from thousands of civil servants, a third of whom are veterans, should show American workers what he really thinks about them."
"This latest executive order is another clear example of retaliation against federal employee union members who have bravely stood up against his anti-worker, anti-American plan to dismantle the federal government," Kelley declared, taking aim at the president's so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
"Several agencies including NASA and the National Weather Service have already been hollowed out by reckless DOGE cuts, so for the administration to further disenfranchise the remaining workers in the name of 'efficiency' is immoral and abhorrent," the union leader said. "AFGE is preparing an immediate response and will continue to fight relentlessly to protect the rights of our members, federal employees, and their union."
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Smotrich Proposes Annexing Gaza and Carrying Out Trump Ethnic Cleansing Plan
The far-right Israeli finance minister's remarks follow comments last week in which he said: "Whoever doesn't evacuate, don't let them. No water, no electricity; they can die of hunger or surrender."
Aug 28, 2025
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich on Thursday proposed the systematic annexation of Gaza over the coming months if Hamas keeps fighting, as well as the implementation of US President Donald Trump's plan to ethnically cleanse the Palestinian enclave.
Smotrich, who leads the far-right Religious Zionism party, announced his plan to "win in Gaza by the end of the year" during a press conference in Jerusalem.
Israel "must completely hold control of the entire strip, forever," he said.
The minister explained that "an ultimatum will be presented to Hamas between two options," surrendering, disarming, and returning all hostages kidnapped during the October 7, 2023 attack, or "gradual annexation of areas of the Gaza Strip and reduction of the enemy's territory, and implementation of the Trump plan for voluntary emigration of the strip's residents."
"Voluntary emigration" is widely viewed as a euphemism for ethnic cleansing, given most Palestinians' unwillingness to voluntarily abandon their homeland. Most Gazans are descendants of survivors of the Nakba, the ethnic cleansing of more than 750,000 Palestinians during the creation of Israel in 1948. Some are actual Nakba survivors.
Smotrich also called for a tightening of the siege on Gaza—which has caused the starvation of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians—in order to "starve and dehydrate Hamas fighters to death."
The minister's remarks followed comments last week in which he said that "whoever doesn't evacuate, don't let them. No water, no electricity; they can die of hunger or surrender. This is what we want."
Earlier this year, Smotrich said: "We conquer, cleanse, and stay until Hamas is destroyed. On the way, we annihilate everything that still remains."
Last month, the Israeli Knesset hosted an annexation conference at which Smotrich declared that "we will occupy Gaza and make it an inseparable part of Israel."
Smotrich's annexation plan comes as the Israel Defense Forces carries out Operation Gideon's Chariots 2, a campaign to conquer and occupy Gaza and ethnically cleanse around 1 million Palestinians. Trump said earlier this year that he wants to transform Gaza into the "Riviera of the Middle East."
Some critics, including the Israeli jurist Itay Epshtain, said Smotrich's comments will surely be noticed by the International Court of Justice (ICJ)—which is currently weighing a genocide case against Israel—and International Criminal Court (ICC), which last year issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder and forced starvation.
The ICC has also reportedly prepared arrest warrants for Smotrich and Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir for the crime of apartheid related to their Trump-backed plans to expand illegal settler colonies in the West Bank and annex the occupied territory.
Last year, the ICJ issued an advisory opinion that Israel's occupation of Palestine is an illegal form of apartheid that must end as soon as possible.
Over the past 693 days, Israeli forces have killed at least 63,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. However, experts say the actual death toll is likely much higher. More than 158,600 Palestinians have been wounded, and thousands more are missing and presumed dead and buried beneath rubble. A growing famine engineered by Israel has claimed at least hundreds of lives and is threatening hundreds of thousands more.
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Sanders Demands Congress 'Immediately' Investigate Firing of CDC Director
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. "must testify," and the CDC officials who were fired and resigned in protest also should be invited to do so, said the senator.
Aug 28, 2025
In the wake of a "Wednesday night massacre" at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and related resignations, Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday called for an immediate congressional probe.
Just weeks after the Senate confirmed President Donald Trump's pick to lead the CDC, Dr. Susan Monarez, the director was forced out on Wednesday after reportedly clashing with Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Her ouster led to calls for firing Kennedy, four other officials resigning in protest, and a related walkout by agency staff.
Sanders (I-Vt.) serves as ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, and in a letter, he asked Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), the panel's chair and a physician, to "immediately" call a hearing.
"I am very disturbed that the Trump administration apparently made this reckless decision because Director Monarez refused to act as a rubber stamp to implement Secretary Kennedy's dangerous agenda to substantially limit the use of safe and effective vaccines and undermine the confidence that the American people have in scientific achievements that have saved millions of lives," Sanders wrote to Cassidy.
RFK Jr. is pushing out scientific leaders who refuse to act as a rubber stamp for his dangerous conspiracy theories and manipulate science. Today, I am calling for a bipartisan congressional investigation into the firing of CDC Director Dr. Monarez.
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— Senator Bernie Sanders (@sanders.senate.gov) August 28, 2025 at 1:30 PM
"We need leaders at the CDC and HHS who are committed to improving public health and have the courage to stand up for science," he argued, "not officials who have a history of spreading bogus conspiracy theories and disinformation that will endanger the lives of the American people and people throughout the world."
Sanders—who previously served as the panel's chair—asked Cassidy to launch a "bipartisan probe" and stressed that "as part of that investigation, Secretary Kennedy must testify at a hearing in the HELP Committee as soon as possible. We should also invite Dr. Monarez and the senior CDC officials who resigned to testify as well."
Noting that Cassidy on Wednesday "called for oversight of the firings and resignations at the agency," Sanders made the case that "as a start, the American people should hear directly from Secretary Kennedy and Dr. Monarez and every member of our committee should be able to ask questions and get honest answers from them."
The senator also took aim at the HHS chief, writing that "it is absolutely imperative that trust in vaccine science not be undermined. The well-being of millions of people are at stake. In just six months, Secretary Kennedy has completely upended the process for reviewing and recommending vaccines for the public."
"Enough is enough," he declared. "We have got to make it clear to Secretary Kennedy that his actions to double down on his war on science and disinformation campaign must end. Too many lives are at stake."
In a statement released later Thursday, after the walkout, Sanders applauded CDC workers "for standing up for science and protesting the reckless decision of Secretary Kennedy to push out leading scientists from the agency."
"Speaking up takes real courage," he said. "Now is the time for all of us—whether you are a Democrat, Republican, independent, progressive or conservative—to come together and say enough is enough. Vaccines are one of the greatest public health achievements of the 20th century. We will not stand by silently as Secretary Kennedy takes them away."
"Let us be clear: We are witnessing a full-blown war on science, on public health, and on truth itself," Sanders emphasized. "In just six months, Secretary Kennedy has dismantled the vaccine review process, narrowed access to life-saving Covid vaccines, and filled scientific advisory boards with conspiracy theorists and ideologues. "
Slamming the reported reasons for Monarez's ouster as "outrageous and unacceptable," the senator concluded that "history will not look kindly on those who stayed silent in the face of this assault on science. We have a moral responsibility to act now."
This article has been updated with Sen. Bernie Sanders' statement on the walkout at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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