Latest / 5 minute updates on the latest Trump actions by Prof Christina Pagel / 10 days behind the headlines in Trump's America:

Transcript

10 days behind the headlines in Trump's America: · 5 minute updates on the latest Trump actions by Prof Christina Pagel

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  So this week,
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  I'm going to cover attacks on civil rights and institutions,
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  SPEAKER_00: immigration and detention, science and the environment and press freedom.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then I'll end on something completely different.
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  So let's get into So starting with attacks on civil rights and
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  institutions.
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  SPEAKER_00: on the 3rd of June, Trump signed an executive order designed to strip
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  SPEAKER_00: job protections from a large group of senior federal workers.
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  The director of the Office of Personnel Management was quite
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  blunt about saying
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  that if federal employees allow their views to interfere with
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  carrying out
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  SPEAKER_00: the administration's directives, this order provides a mechanism
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  SPEAKER_00: to remove them efficiently at will.
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  So,
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  you know,
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  although it sounds fine,
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  what it really is about is replacing
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  SPEAKER_00: independent civil service with people who will do what Trump wants,
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  SPEAKER_00: without question.
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  SPEAKER_00: And the consequences of that are already quite visible.
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  SPEAKER_00: So two days later, news emerged that FBI Director Kash Patel had fired
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  SPEAKER_00: five FBI employees who were tied to a 2023
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  SPEAKER_00: internal intelligence document about Catholic extremism in the US.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now, conservatives claimed it was anti-Catholic.
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  SPEAKER_00: Former federal law enforcement officials have said that actually
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  SPEAKER_00: these firings amount to a purge of independent civil servants.
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  SPEAKER_00: And again, they were warning that what this is doing is turning law
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  SPEAKER_00: enforcement into an ideologically driven arm of the presidency.
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  SPEAKER_00: Trump also told acting Director of National Intelligence Bill Pulte to
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  begin firing a large number of employees across the
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  intelligence community.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now on Pulte himself, Trump has now formally appointed him as
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  acting director of national intelligence,
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  which gives Pulte oversight of all US
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  SPEAKER_00: intelligence agencies.
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  But the issue is that Pulte has no known background in
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  intelligence,
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  military
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  SPEAKER_00: or national security.
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  SPEAKER_00: Congressional statute says that the Director
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  of National Intelligence should have “extensive national
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  security expertise”.
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  SPEAKER_00: So what's going on?
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  SPEAKER_00: Well, Pulte does have a track record as one of the most aggressive
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  advocates for prosecuting Democrats and others that Trump sees
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  as enemies.
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  SPEAKER_00: Separately, Kurt Olsen, who was a White House official
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  SPEAKER_00: who helped Trump try to overturn the 2020 election, has now joined
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  SPEAKER_00: the Justice Department as a senior attorney, and he's reporting
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  to a prosecutor building a criminal case against Trump's
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  perceived enemies.
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  SPEAKER_00: So the pattern is kind of clear.
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  SPEAKER_00: Trump wants to make it easier to fire long serving professionals.
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  SPEAKER_00: And effectively, what he's doing is installing loyalists wherever he can.
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  SPEAKER_00: Moving on.
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  SPEAKER_00: The Pentagon has cut the number of recognised religious identities
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  for military service personnel down to just 33,
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  of which 22 were Christian.
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  SPEAKER_00: The Pentagon has just called it an administrative exercise.
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  SPEAKER_00: But remember that back in March, Defense Secretary Hegseth claimed
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  SPEAKER_00: that the military's Chaplain Corps had “infected by political correctness
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  SPEAKER_00: and secular humanism”.
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  SPEAKER_00: So this kind of seems like more like an attempt by Hegseth
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  SPEAKER_00: to turn the Pentagon into an explicit Christian Nationalist institution.
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  SPEAKER_00: Also this week Hegseth blocked the promotions of at least seven
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  SPEAKER_00: Navy officers who had been selected by a board of senior Navy admirals.
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  SPEAKER_00: The decision disproportionately affected women and minority officers,
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  SPEAKER_00: and really appeared to be driven by the administration's anti diversity
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  SPEAKER_00: stance, rather than any assessment of merit.
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  Speaking of which,
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  Hegseth also indicated last week that he wants to appeal
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  SPEAKER_00: a federal court ruling restricting his ban on transgender troops.
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  Finally,
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  in the section on health care and homelessness,
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  the Trump administration
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  SPEAKER_00: has issued a final rule requiring most Medicaid beneficiaries
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  between 19 and 64 to prove that they're either working,
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  doing community service
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  SPEAKER_00: or participating in a work program to keep their Medicaid coverage.
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  SPEAKER_00: The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that nearly 5 million
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  people will lose access to Medicaid over the next decade
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  because of this rule,
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  SPEAKER_00: and that includes many people who are already working
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  SPEAKER_00: but just can't meet the requirements to prove that they are.
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  SPEAKER_00: The administration has also issued a revised plan on its homelessness
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  SPEAKER_00: strategy, and what it's doing is shifting $1.2 billion
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  SPEAKER_00: away from the long established Housing First program,
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  which has a really strong evidence base for reducing
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  homelessness,
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  towards time
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  SPEAKER_00: limited programs focused on treatment for mental illness and addiction.
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  SPEAKER_00: Housing First is not a controversial policy among housing researchers.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's been proven to work
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  time and time again,
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  but the Trump administration is dismantling it anyway.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then on to kind of Immigration and Detention, where
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  SPEAKER_00: the civil rights of immigrants and detainees are also being undermined.
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  SPEAKER_00: The Treasury Department has called on US banks to tighten surveillance
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  SPEAKER_00: and reporting of account holders not authorised to work in the US.
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  SPEAKER_00: So that follows an executive order from last month directing financial
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  SPEAKER_00: institutions to increase scrutiny of non-citizens’ banking activities.
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  SPEAKER_00: what people are worried about for this
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  SPEAKER_00: is that it's effectively turning the banking system into an immigration
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  SPEAKER_00: surveillance tool, and that creates kind of a climate of fear
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  SPEAKER_00: for immigrant communities, regardless of their legal status.
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  SPEAKER_00: Inside detention facilities, conditions remain really troubling.
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  SPEAKER_00: Detainees at Florida's Alligator Alcatraz Immigration Center
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  have said that guards were denying them food and fresh water
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  until they signed
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  SPEAKER_00: documents presented to them in English that they didn't understand.
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  SPEAKER_00: Last week also saw the 50th death
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  SPEAKER_00: in ICE detention since the start of the second Trump presidency.
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  A 43 year old Georgian immigrant died in a detention facility
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  in Louisiana.
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  SPEAKER_00: ICE said he was taken into custody in February
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  SPEAKER_00: during an operation targeting commercial vehicle drivers.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then a memo from the acting ICE director has ordered the agency
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  SPEAKER_00: to stop reporting the deaths of newly released detainees to Congress.
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  SPEAKER_00: So this is rescinding a Biden era policy that's required
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  ICE to report and investigate any deaths occurring within 30
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  days of release.
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  SPEAKER_00: we know there are bad conditions.
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  SPEAKER_00: We know people are dying in ICE and now they're trying to reduce
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  SPEAKER_00: the amount of scrutiny that deaths related to ICE detention get.
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  SPEAKER_00: On science in the environment.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's also been a pretty bruising week So firstly, Trump has used
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  SPEAKER_00: wartime presidential authority, the Defense Production Act,
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  SPEAKER_00: to hands $700 million to cold fired power plants.
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  SPEAKER_00: Coal is the dirtiest fossil fuel.
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  SPEAKER_00: Even though Trump's called it “clean, beautiful coal”.
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  SPEAKER_00: And the US Bureau of Land Management has also announced plans to auction
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  SPEAKER_00: almost 700,000 acres of oil and gas leases in Alaska's Arctic
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  SPEAKER_00: National Wildlife Refuge.
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  SPEAKER_00: So that's one of the most ecologically
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  SPEAKER_00: sensitive areas in North America that's now being opened up for drilling.
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  SPEAKER_00: The administration has also agreed to strip endangered species protection
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  from a lizard whose habitat overlaps with the largest oil
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  producing region
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  in the US,
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  which settles a lawsuit brought by Texas Attorney General Ken
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  Paxton.
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  SPEAKER_00: So effectively, the lizards existence was somewhat inconvenient.
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  SPEAKER_00: That has now been resolved.
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  while that's kind of been going on,
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  the administration has also said it's now
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  SPEAKER_00: dismantling a $368 million deep ocean observation system
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  SPEAKER_00: that's been monitoring coastal environments, marine ecosystems
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  SPEAKER_00: and the powerful currents that affect global climate for over a decade.
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  SPEAKER_00: So what the administration has basically done this week is it's
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  SPEAKER_00: lent more heavily into fossil fuels and reduced our ability
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  SPEAKER_00: to measure the consequent damage on the climate.
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  SPEAKER_00: On reproductive health.
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  SPEAKER_00: The Food and Drug Administration, or the FDA, has launched
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  SPEAKER_00: a safety study of mifepristone, which is the abortion pill.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now, the FDA's actions are being called by abortion
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  rights advocates as the biggest threat to abortion access in
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  the US right now,
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  SPEAKER_00: because mifepristone is used in around two thirds of all US abortions.
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  So while a safety study doesn't sound alarming on its surface,
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  in this context,
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  SPEAKER_00: it's really being seen as laying the groundwork for restricting
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  SPEAKER_00: how that drug is distributed and used in the US, and
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  SPEAKER_00: kind of aligns with the administration's anti-abortion agenda.
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  SPEAKER_00: And finally,
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  you know,
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  SPEAKER_00: and speaking as a scientist who writes about Trump
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  SPEAKER_00: and goes to conferences, I find this really dark.
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  SPEAKER_00: Distinguished scientists at the annual conference of the American
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  SPEAKER_00: Diabetes Association were removed by police after
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  SPEAKER_00: they handed out copies of an editorial they'd had published criticising
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  SPEAKER_00: the Trump administration's changes to US biomedical research.
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  The last kind of area I want to cover this week is on Attacks
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  on Press Freedom.
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  SPEAKER_00: Firstly, the Pentagon has barred journalists from entering its press
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  office,
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  declaring the space a “Sensitive Compartmented Information
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  Facility”.
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  SPEAKER_00: Basically, they've made it classified, so reporters
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  now can no longer walk into the room where they have always
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  been able to ask
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  SPEAKER_00: questions of Pentagon officials.
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  SPEAKER_00: So this is a kind of
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  SPEAKER_00: very deliberate restriction on press access to the military.
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  SPEAKER_00: The new editor in chief of CBS News is Bari Weiss.
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  SPEAKER_00: She's considered a pretty loyal Trump ally.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then last week, long time CBS 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley,
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  SPEAKER_00: who was fired after clashing with the new management,
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  SPEAKER_00: he issued a public statement where he's accused CBS executives
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  SPEAKER_00: of instructing him to “inject falsehood and bias” into his reporting.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that follows CBS also firing its executive producer,
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  executive editor and two correspondents last week,
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  all without explanation.
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  So that is kind of exactly what media capture by loyalists
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  would look like.
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  Trump also attacked CNN journalist Caitlin Collins this week
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  during a press
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  SPEAKER_00: briefing, where he accused her of having “hatred in her eyes”
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  SPEAKER_00: and called CNN “crooked as hell” and “a very corrupt organisation”.
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  SPEAKER_00: Trump ally David Ellison, who’s son of Trump's
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  SPEAKER_00: friend and major donor, Larry Ellison, is currently in the process
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  of buying Warner Bros,
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  which includes CNN,
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  through Ellison's company Paramount.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then finally, Trump
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  SPEAKER_00: walked out of an interview with NBC's Meet the Press last week after host
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  SPEAKER_00: Kristen Welker repeatedly asked Trump
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  SPEAKER_00: to provide evidence for his claim that the 2020 election was rigged.
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  SPEAKER_00: Trump didn't provide any evidence.
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  He just called her and the network “crooked” and walked out of
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  the interview.
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  SPEAKER_00: And finally, on the 6th of June, which was the 82nd anniversary of D-Day,
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  SPEAKER_00: when Allied forces landed on the beaches of Normandy
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  SPEAKER_00: in one of the most significant military operations in history,
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  SPEAKER_00: Trump marked the occasion on social media with an AI
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  SPEAKER_00: generated video of himself riding a lion, and a photo
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  SPEAKER_00: portraying the Obama Presidential Library as a dustbin.
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  SPEAKER_00: So all these actions are more available at TrumpActionTracker.info.
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  SPEAKER_00: See you in a week or two.