Mega-rich Trump cabineteer Wilbur Ross can't buy a clue on shutdown pain

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, seen in 2018, said Thursday that furloughed federal workers should take out a loan to tide them over during the government shutdown. Credit: AFP / Getty Images / Saul Loeb
He: A loan can fix it
Wilbur Ross, who made a fortune from investment banking before joining Donald Trump's cabinet as commerce secretary, is puzzled why federal employees who have been off the payroll for five weeks are lining up at food banks.
“I know they are, and I don’t really quite understand why,” Ross said on CNBC. He said they should just borrow money to tide themselves over until the shutdown ends and they can get back pay. "There's no real reason why they shouldn't be able to get a loan against it." (Here's the video clip.)
Ross did acknowledge, "True, the people might have to pay a little bit of interest" but “there really is not a good excuse why there really should be a liquidity crisis.” While some banks and credit unions are offering loans to federal employees, many workers are leery of taking on thousands of dollars in debt when there is no way to know when they could pay the money back and potentially imperiling good credit ratings, if they have them.
Ross also said "while I feel sorry for the individuals that have hardship cases," 800,000 federal workers is "not like it’s a gigantic number overall."
How tone-deaf was that? Trump told reporters Thursday afternoon: "Perhaps he should have said it differently." But Trump also suggested the workers' local "grocery store" will "work along" and let them run up a tab.
But it's not just Ross. Top economic adviser Kevin Hassett has compared the shutdown to a paid vacation. Lara Trump, the president's daughter-in-law and campaign aide, said this week that for the furloughed workers, "it is a little bit of pain, but it's going to be for the future of our country."
Democrats unsurprisingly pounced on Ross' remarks. "Is this the 'Let them eat cake' kind of attitude?" said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. "Or call your father for money?" Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Ross' comments "reveal the administration's callous indifference toward the federal workers" and added: "Secretary Ross, they just can't call their stockbroker and ask them to sell some of their shares."
Roger Stone's long-awaited perp walk
Longtime Trump confidant Roger Stone was finally arrested as expected early Friday — charged in a seven-count indictment with witness tampering, obstruction and false statements about his interactions related to the release by WikiLeaks of hacked emails during the 2016 presidential election.
He's due for arraignment in Florida on Friday.
During the campaign, Stone privately told associates that he was in contact with Julian Assange and that WikiLeaks had material that would be damaging to Hillary Clinton, as The Washington Post recounts, The Post's phrasing: "In an October 2016 email to Trump’s then-chief campaign strategist Stephen K. Bannon, Stone implied he had information about the group’s plans."
The president's "no collusion" claim seems to be getting tested.
Food bank business booming
Long Island Cares, which typically provides food to about 1,200 clients per month, now has aided 121 unpaid federal workers, up from 85 last week, according to its chief executive, Paule Pachter.
"This is uncharted territory for most of them; we hand them a gift card and they just burst into tears," said Robin Amato, a spokeswoman for the group, said by telephone.
Timothy McLaughlin, national representative of the American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal employee union, told reporters at the nonprofit food bank's Huntington Station location: "Our members are angry, confused, scared and they are desperate." See Newsday's story by Joan Gralla.
Pass fails
Here's how the shutdown didn't end Thursday:
The Senate voted on competing Republican and Democratic bills that would have funded the government — one with wall money, one without. As expected, both failed to pass.
Next, Schumer and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell met in a new search for compromise. One idea floated by a bipartisan group of lawmakers would temporarily reopen shuttered agencies for the next three weeks as border-security negotiations continue.
At the White House, Trump said he would consider a "reasonable" compromise but suggested he'd want it to include a "prorated down payment" for the wall.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters: "The president just said that if they come to a reasonable agreement, he will support it. I hope it doesn't mean some big down payment for the wall."
Friday will be the shutdown's 35th day. For more, see Newsday's story by Laura Figueroa Hernandez.
Janison: Mr. Wall hits the bricks
While federal workers are locked out or working without pay, Trump seems to be the one on strike, writes Newsday's Dan Janison.
He keeps banging the proverbial table demanding his $5.6 billion in border wall money. But for more than a month, Trump hasn't managed to assure his government has the resources to operate. It's just as he promised: "I'll be the one to shut it down."
Turbulence in the skies
Pilots, air traffic controllers and flight attendants warned in a joint statement that because of the shutdown, aviation safety is "deteriorating by the day" and there's no telling when "the entire system will break."
Paul Rinaldi, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, said he's “starting to see routine mistakes in clearances being made because controllers are distracted.” The Washington Post reported that unpaid controllers are waiting tables and driving for Uber in the time left over from 10-hour shifts tracking the position and speed of aircraft to prevent collisions.
“This is a stressful work environment,” Rinaldi said. “What this shutdown is doing is putting the stress on steroids."
An FAA spokesman said "the traveling public can be assured that our nation's airspace system is safe."
Cohen still headed to Hill?
A day after begging off a voluntary appearance before the House oversight committee, former Trump fixer Michael Cohen received a subpoena to testify before the Senate intelligence committee and said he would comply. The hearing will likely be private.
The House panel may subpoena Cohen, too. Cohen has cited "threats" against his family by Trump and lawyer Rudy Giuliani as making him fearful to appear. Cohen lawyer Lanny Davis called on the House to censure Trump "as a step before an impeachment investigation" and pushed for a criminal investigation of Giuliani, accusing them of obstruction, witness intimidation and witness tampering.
Trump, who has denounced his ex-sidekick as a "rat" for turning against him, tweeted Thursday morning: "So interesting that bad lawyer Michael Cohen, who sadly will not be testifying before Congress, is using the lawyer of Crooked Hillary Clinton to represent him."
What else is happening:
- Trump now says Pelosi's move to postpone his State of the Union address until after the shutdown was "actually reasonable." Pelosi said, “I’m glad we have that off the table because it was about the least important thing we had to talk about."
- Senate Republicans are feeling the heat of following Trump's lead in the shutdown.
- Mick Mulvaney, the White House chief of staff is asking for lists of high-impact federal programs that could be affected if the shutdown goes into March.
- Some federal officials are using Twitter to communicate with furloughed employees who can't access their government email accounts, Politico reported.
- The State Department has called all employees back to work and found money to pay them for two weeks, but operations remain sharply curtailed or, as a department representative put it, "constrained," ABC News reports.
- John Kelly was still White House chief of staff when the shutdown began. Now a private citizen, he joined four other former Homeland Security secretaries who served Democratic and Republican presidents in calling for the department's funding to be restored so its "critical national security functions continue without compromise."
- Ross said Thursday that the United States and China are still "miles and miles" away from a trade deal. A day earlier, Trump said, "We’re doing very well in our negotiations with China.”
- The conservative Koch political network, long a big funder for Republican campaigns, has told donors that it plans to once again stay out of the presidential race and will not work to help re-elect Trump in 2020, The Washington Post reported.
- Politico reports Democratic 2020 hopeful Sen. Elizabeth Warren is preparing to propose a new “ultra-millionaire” tax on the richest Americans — those worth $50 million or more.
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