Did Trump's workforce chaos cause the tragic air disaster?
The air traffic controllers were understaffed the week that Trump fired top federal managers, called for an employee buyout, and ended DEI policies.
Just days after Donald Trump and Elon Musk threw the federal workforce, including air traffic controllers, into chaos, the country suffered its first major air disaster in more than 15 years. Trump first issued an executive order that froze federal spending in numerous essential agencies, causing confusion and chaos among federal workers before the courts stopped it and Trump rescinded the order. Then, a Musk directive offered buyouts to all federal employees, implying that there would be large scale firings in the near future. Trump also issued a directive ending all DEI programs in the federal government, leaving thousands of workers uncertain about their jobs. During their first week, Trump and Musk fired senior management throughout government.
News organizations are reporting that Trump is blaming DEI and, while they say he has no evidence, they aren’t treating the statement as if he’s lying, either. Conservative media outlets will lend credibility to Trump’s claims while pretending to show some sort rationality. The right-wing social media ecosystem is probably already ablaze with conspiracy theories as to how Biden was responsible for the accident.
According to a New York Times report, staffing was below normal at the time of the crash. “The internal report reviewed by The New York Times said the controller who was handling helicopters in the airport’s vicinity on Wednesday night was also instructing planes that were landing and departing from its runways — jobs typically assigned to two different controllers.” If anybody is at fault, it’s Donald Trump not Joe Biden.
Did the chaos that Trump and Musk created contribute to the crash on the Potomac? Were employees distracted by disruption of operations and routines? Did the FAA have the leadership it needed? It’s certainly as plausible as the DEI policies that Trump and his administration are blaming.
The media should be investigating Trump’s role in the tragedy, not his baseless accusations. He’s in charge now. When something breaks, he owns it.
Less than two weeks ago, we had a peaceful transfer of power, but only because Donald Trump won. If Kamala Harris had defeated Trump, he would have declared the election rigged. Conservative media would have suggested his complaints were valid. The traditional media would have covered Trump as if his accusations deserved scrutiny instead of dismissing him as a would-be authoritarian.
This week, Trump’s new press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, stood in front of the media and announced that the Biden administration had funded $50 million in condoms for Gaza. It was an outright lie. However, instead of covering the story that the spokesperson for the President of the United States is blatantly lying to the American public, the Washington Post repeated the claim in a question, “$50 million for condoms in Gaza? There’s no evidence for the White House claim.” CNN had a similar framing. The headline should have read, “Press secretary begins tenure lying to the media.” The story got barely noticed, but I’m sure it fueled a right-wing social media fire.
Trump also announced that he “turned the water on” in California, implying that he was stopping the fires and sending water from the north to Southern California. It’s another bogus claim. Instead of telling the public that the statement is ridiculous on its face, news organizations said that “California water regulators deny Trump’s claim” giving at least a veneer credibility to the liar in the White House. Trump set up the latest lie by falsely claiming California’s water policies were to blame for a lack of water to combat the fires. The headline for these accusations should read, “Trump lies about California water policy,” not regulators deny his claim. His falsehood is verifiable. The story is that the President of the United States is deliberately misleading the American people.
If Trump is going to make spurious accusations about Democrats, then Democrats should make similar accusations about Trump. They should demand the media covers their accusations just as they’ve covered Trump’s lies—giving them at least the possibility of truth. Republicans have changed the rules about veracity. News organizations have failed to keep up. Democrats need to play by the new rules.
Hegseth is responsible for the worst aviation disaster in recent history. This may not be entirely true, but it was a military helicopter and he is in charge of the military. That's exactly what they would say although there would be no qualifiers. Thomas, thanks for calling a lie a lie.
Today, Trump attributed the tragic accident that claimed sixty-seven lives to the hiring practices of Biden and Obama, despite lacking evidence to support his claim. In other words, he misled the American people. This isn't new for Trump, considering his thirty-four felony convictions related to covering up an affair with a porn star. This is why government and private employers avoid putting people with a criminal history involving crimes of moral turpitude in positions of responsibility—they tend to repeat the behavior that got them in trouble.
Trump just exposed his weakest point to us: his inability to tell the truth. He lied about a horrible event to make political points at a time when this country should be showing respect. We do not need to respond in kind, as Trump’s conduct speaks for itself. If folks cannot figure this out for themselves, they do not deserve to live in the greatest nation in the history of the world.