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For Immediate Release
June, 08 2020, 12:00am EDT
Contact:
Jayson O’Neill, (406) 200-8582
62% Of Big Oil, Gas, And Mining Corporations Score Small Business Bailout Funds
Trump’s small business administration releases new data underscoring sector’s success.
Helena, MT.
A new analysis by Accountable.US finds that over 62% of 'Mining' corporations that include oil and gas, and related activities have received nearly $4.5 billion in Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) funds through the Trump administration's Small Business Administration (SBA).
"The PPP was supposed to help small businesses keep their doors open and their employees on payroll through the pandemic. While more than 100,000 of those small businesses have shuttered, the Trump administration has bailed out Big Oil and polluting corporations - many of which have long track records of environmental violations or worse and are compensating their CEOs millions of dollars," said Jayson O'Neill, Accountable.US spokesperson.
The new SBP report on approvals under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) showed $4,467,023,832 going to 20,389 or 62% of the 'Mining' corporations operating in the United States, including oil and gas, and related activities. The number of private 'Mining' establishments is estimated to be 32,795 as of the 3rd quarter of 2019 according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' most recently available data.
The number of corporations in the sector that had been approved for relief funds intended for small businesses nearly doubled since the last SBA report. A previous analysis by Western Values Project, an Accountable.US project, found that 34% of the sector had cashed in on some $3.9 billion from the program.
A former member of the board of governors of the Federal Reserve's recent opinion piece published in the New York Times openly questioned the Trump administration's insistence on bailing out Big Oil, coal, and other polluting industries. The piece cited a survey of more than 200 finance ministers, central bankers, and economists that unequivocally recommended investments in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
The Trump administration is doing the exact opposite by handing out billions to these polluting corporations through not only PPP funds but also tax credits, royalty cuts, lease suspensions, and soon low-interest loans through the Federal Reserve. And, the Trump administration is adding insult to injury by superseding state and tribal rights, gutting regulations, and fueling unchecked natural resource development. Legislation introduced by Senate and House lawmakers that would prohibit the Trump administration from bailing out big oil corporations has been thus far ignored by leadership in both chambers.
The ongoing tracking project by Accountable.US at TrumpBailouts.org documents the billion-dollar corporations and other large corporations that have received taxpayer assistance under the CARES Act, and what advantages and assets they had going into the COVID-19 crisis that most small businesses could never access.
Previous, controversial PPP grantees include a foreign-owned uranium mining corporation with ties to the Trump administration, oil corporations that spent millions on stock buybacks, an Indiana-based coal corporation with a former Trump official as its lobbyist, at least two companies that market their ability to ship U.S. manufacturing jobs overseas, major luxury hotel chains, a fashion model agency, and even the L.A. Lakers.
Learn more about the special interests fueling the Trump administration at Accountable.US and the administration's ongoing efforts to carve out more big oil and coal bailouts at WesternValuesProject.org, an Accountable.US project focused on public lands conservation.
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'Evidently Hoping to Sabotage' US-Iran Deal, Israel Bombs Beirut
Iran's chief negotiator accused the Trump administration of giving the Israeli government a "green light" to continue attacking Lebanon and undermining diplomatic talks.
Jun 14, 2026
The Israeli military bombed the southern suburbs of Beirut on Sunday just as Iranian and US officials voiced optimism that a diplomatic agreement is in reach, prompting accusations that the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is trying to derail the negotiations.
Israel's strikes reportedly targeted a five-story apartment building, killing at least three people, according to Lebanese authorities. Netanyahu said the bombing was a response to Hezbollah rocket fire into northern Israel.
The latest bombing of Beirut came hours after US President Donald Trump said he expected a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to be signed as early as Sunday, potentially setting the stage for negotiations to end the illegal war Trump started in late February. Iranian officials have pushed back on the US president's claim that the MOU will be signed Sunday, but Iran's foreign minister said Friday that an agreement had "never been closer."
The Associated Press reported Sunday that Israel's new strikes on Beirut "threatened to hamper negotiations over a deal, which in its current form is a deep disappointment to Israel’s government."
"The last time Israel struck the Beirut suburbs a week ago, it set off the most serious escalation of fighting between Iran and Israel since the tenuous ceasefire took hold April 7," AP added.
Kenneth Roth, former executive director of Human Rights Watch, wrote on social media that "as a US-Iranian deal seems like it might be closer, Israel predictably bombs the Beirut suburbs, evidently hoping to sabotage the deal."
"Why does Trump put up with this and continue to arm and fund such obstructionism?" Roth asked.
Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran's chief negotiator and speaker of parliament, said Israel's strikes indicate that the US "either does not have the will or the ability to fulfill its obligations."
"You cannot gain concessions by giving [Israel] a green light," he added. "The good cop, bad cop routine has become old. If you do not have the will or the ability to fulfill your commitments, then there is no basis for talking about continuing down this path."
As the US & Iran reportedly near a deal that includes ending the war in Lebanon, Israel is attacking Beirut again.
Either Trump can't restrain Netanyahu, or the deal is already being violated before it's signed.
Either way, it undermines the deal's value for Iran. pic.twitter.com/v08c21i7wa
— Sina Toossi (@SinaToossi) June 14, 2026
While the MOU that's reportedly under consideration has not been released in full, its broad outlines have been reported in media outlets and divulged by Iranian and US officials in recent days. Reuters reported Sunday that "a final draft of the memorandum of understanding with the US covered a range of issues, from Tehran’s nuclear work to reopening the Strait of Hormuz and US waivers on oil sanctions, with a final deal to be discussed in the 60 days following agreement by the two sides."
Under the MOU, Iran would immediately reopen the Strait of Hormuz and the US would end its illegal blockade of Iranian ports, according to Reuters. The US would also agree to waive oil sanctions on Iran and release $25 billion in frozen Iranian assets, while Iran would agree to "maintain the current status of its nuclear program, refraining from further uranium enrichment and expansion of nuclear facilities."
Abbas Araghchi, Iran's foreign minister, said in a television interview on Friday that the MOU's proposed 60-day ceasefire extension would include Lebanon.
Axios reported that Netanyahu has "found himself in the dark" as US-Iran negotiations have progressed in recent days, "calling allies close to the Trump administration to try and gather information."
Following Sunday's strike on Beirut, Trump told Axios' Barak Ravid that Netanyahu "has no fucking judgment."
"I passed this message on to him—that I am very unhappy with the attack in Beirut," said Trump, whose administration has approved billions of dollars worth of weapons sales to the Israeli government.
Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, warned that "Israel will do more sabotage unless Trump imposes a cost on Israel."
"Netanyahu knows exactly what he is doing and is judging that an attack on Beirut—rather than southern Lebanon—is exactly what's needed to derail the pending US-Iran deal," Parsi argued.
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"Now in its third consecutive year of famine, Sudan received nothing."
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Elon Musk's vault to trillionaire status following the public debut of his rocket company SpaceX came on the heels of an analysis showing the devastating impact of his destruction of the US Agency for International Development on millions of people in countries facing or on the brink of famine.
The analysis, authored by Council on Foreign Relations expert and longtime aid worker Sam Vigersky, noted that Musk's targeting of USAID during his tenure as head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) resulted in the transfer of the Food for Peace program to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), an agency "without international humanitarian or disaster-response expertise."
Vigersky found that the USDA this year chose just seven countries to receive American grain under the Food for Peace program: the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Haiti, Kenya, El Salvador, and Rwanda. The latter two countries, Vigersky noted, "do not meet an emergency threshold" for assistance.
"Meanwhile, the country facing the largest hunger crisis in the world—Sudan—did not make the list. Now in its third consecutive year of famine, Sudan received nothing. In fact, more than 40% of Sudan’s community kitchens, a lifeline for the displaced, have closed in the past six months as funding dried up, according to Islamic Relief," Vigersky reported. "Afghanistan, Lebanon, and Yemen were also passed over. Millions of people in those countries live one step from famine, according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), the UN-backed monitoring system that uses a standardized five-point scale (five being famine) to measure the severity of food insecurity."
Experts assessing the global impact of USAID's decimation at the hands of billionaire US President Donald Trump and the world's first trillionaire, who bragged publicly about "feeding USAID into the wood chipper," estimate that hundreds of thousands of people have already died as a result of the large-scale loss of humanitarian assistance—and millions more will die in the coming years if swift action is not taken to restore aid.
"The impacts of the cuts were immediate and tragic," Nicholas Enrich, a former USAID employee who became a whistleblower, wrote in The Boston Globe on Friday. "Health clinics and emergency ambulance services shuttered overnight. Clinical trials were deserted. Thousands of healthcare workers lost their jobs. Lifesaving food and medicine was left to expire in warehouses. According to conservative estimates, in the year since USAID was dismantled, 750,000 people have died as a result of the cuts. For the first time in a generation, more children died in one year — 2025—than in the previous year."
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Trump claimed on social media that a diplomatic agreement would be signed on Sunday, but Iran's Foreign Ministry pushed back on that timeline.
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President Donald Trump claimed Saturday that the US and Iran are on track to sign a diplomatic agreement this weekend, but added that "we have the ultimate alternative" if the process doesn't "work out."
"The 'ultimate alternative' sounds a lot like a nuclear threat," Sina Toossi, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, wrote in response to the president's Truth Social post. "Not the first time Trump has hinted at it."
The agreement Trump referenced is believed to be "memorandum of understanding" that's expected be fleshed out in "technical talks" that could begin next week, according to Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who is mediating the negotiations.
"We are closer to a peace deal than ever before," Sharif wrote on social media, echoing Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who said on Friday that "the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding has never been closer."
"Pending its finalization, the media should refrain from entering speculation about its content," Araghchi added. "In line with our responsible and transparent approach, all details will be shared with the public in due course."
On Saturday, a spokesperson for the Iranian Foreign Ministry cast doubt on the timeline put forth by Trump and Sharif.
"We will have to wait and see about the exact date of the signing of the memorandum of understanding, although it will not be tomorrow,” said Esmaeil Baqaei, as reported by Iranian state media. “The possibility of this happening in the coming days cannot be ruled out. However, due to the hesitation of the other side, we must be cautious in making any comments about this process.”
In his Truth Social post on Saturday, Trump declared that the Strait of Hormuz will be "OPEN TO ALL" immediately after the deal is signed—a condition that Iran has not confirmed.
"We look forward to working with Iran, and the entire Middle East, long into the future," Trump added. "Hopefully, this process will all work out quickly, easily, and smoothly. If it doesn’t, we have the ultimate alternative, hopefully never to be used again!"
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