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'Using Fox as a Staffing Agency,' Trump Taps Sean Duffy for Transportation
"He seems to not believe that climate change is caused by human activity," one researcher said of the nominee. "(Transportation is the greatest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S.)"
Nov 18, 2024
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Monday announced Sean Duffy as his nominee to lead the Department of Transportation—the second Fox News host he has named as a presumptive Cabinet secretary, after picking Pete Hegseth as the future Pentagon chief.
Like the ex-president, Duffy is a former reality television star who shifted into politics. He was initially known for MTV's "The Real World: Boston" and "Road Rules: All Stars," then spent eight years as district attorney of Ashland County, Wisconsin.
Duffy was then elected to represent Wisconsin as a Republican congressman. After resigning from the U.S. House of Representatives in 2019, Duffy joined Fox the following year. His wife, Rachel Campos-Duffy, is also part of the network.
Trump said in a lengthy statement that "during his time in Congress, Sean was a respected voice and communicator in the Republican Conference, advocating for Fiscal Responsibility, Economic Growth, and Rural Development. Admired across the aisle, Sean worked with Democrats to clear extensive Legislative hurdles to build the largest road and bridge project in Minnesota History."
"As a member of the House Financial Services Committee, Sean played a key role in shaping and strengthening Economic policies, and ensuring Transparency and Accountability in Government programs," he continued. "Sean's leadership extended to championing the needs of families, farmers, and small businesses, especially in rural communities."
"He will prioritize Excellence, Competence, Competitiveness, and Beauty when rebuilding America's highways, tunnels, bridges, and airports," Trump added. "He will ensure our ports and dams serve our Economy without compromising our National Security, and he will make our skies safe again by eliminating DEI for pilots and air traffic controllers."
DEI—or diversity, equity, and inclusion—is a term used to describe policies that promote including people of various backgrounds. In recent years, Republicans at all levels of politics have taken aim at such policies, often used by employers and universities.
"Trump is using Fox as a staffing agency. Duffy is the sixth announced administration pick that works or worked at the network," Media Matters for America senior fellow Matthew Gertz said Monday. "Duffy's transportation experience—outside of 'Road Rules'—includes blaming Boeing's ills on DEI."
In a series of social media posts, Yonah Freemark, senior research associate at the Urban Institute's Metropolitan Housing and Communities Policy Center, said that "I am having a hard time finding experience in transportation for Sean Duffy."
Freemark highlighted that based on Duffy's voting record in Congress, he has a 2% lifetime score from the League of Conservation Voters—even lower than the group's 14% score for Lee Zeldin, the former Republican congressman from New York whom Trump has chosen to lead the Environmental Protection Agency.
"He seems to not believe that climate change is caused by human activity," Freemark said of Duffy. "(Transportation is the greatest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S.)"
To actually become transportation secretary, Duffy must be confirmed by the Senate, which is set to be controlled by Republicans—unless Trump goes through with his threats to force through Cabinet members via recess appointments.
As The Associated Pressreported Monday:
The Transportation Department oversees the nation's complex transportation system, including pipelines, railroads, cars, trucks, and transit systems as well as federal funding for highways.
The department includes the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which regulates automakers, including Elon Musk's Tesla. The department sets fuel economy standards for cars and trucks and regulates the airline industry through the Federal Aviation Administration, one of its agencies.
Musk, the richest person on the planet, put significant resources toward electing Trump and has often been seen with him since Election Day. The president-elect announced last week that Musk will co-lead the not-yet-created Department of Government Efficiency with fellow billionaire and campaign supporter Vivek Ramaswamy.
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'He's Not Kidding,' Advocates Warn as Trump Threatens to Defund Schools for Teaching US History
The Republican presidential nominee is threatening funding if teachers "don't teach what he wants," said one teachers union leader. "That's indoctrination and it's dangerous."
Oct 18, 2024
Education advocates implored voters to take Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's latest comments on public schools on Friday after his appearance on the Fox News morning show "Fox & Friends," where he explained how he would punish schools that teach students accurate U.S. history, including about slavery and racism in the country.
Trump was asked by a viewer who called into the show how he would help students who don't want to attend their local public schools, and said he plans to "let the states run the schools" to allow for more "school choice."
"We're gonna take the Department of Education, we're gonna close it," said the former president, explaining that each state would govern educational policy without federal input—a promise of the right-wing policy agenda, Project 2025, that was co-authored by hundreds of former Trump administration staffers.
"Fox & Friends" co-host Brian Kilmeade said the plan was concerning only because it could allow a "liberal city" or state to decide that schools would teach that the country was "built off the backs of slaves on stolen land, and that curriculum comes in."
"Then we don't send them money," replied Trump.
The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) warned, "He's not kidding," pointing to Project 2025, which calls to reduce the role the federal government to "that of a statistics-gathering agency that disseminates information to the states."
"It's in his Project 2025 plan: Trump wants to defund public schools," said the labor union.
The federal government provides public schools with about 13.6% of the funding for public K-12 education. The loss of federal funds could particularly affect schools in low-income communities, resulting in school closures, teacher layoffs, and fewer classroom resources.
Trump's comments touched on the "culture war" promoted by the Republican Party in recent years regarding what they have claimed is the teaching of "critical race theory" (CRT) in public schools. The concept holds that race is a social construct and racism is carried out by legal systems and institutions, through policies like redlining and harsh criminal sentencing laws.
The focus on CRT has resulted in attacks on all "culturally relevant teaching" that takes the experiences of people of color into account and all teachings about the history of the U.S.—particularly about the enslavement of Black people for hundreds of years, Jim Crow laws, the contributions made by racial minorities, and the civil rights movement.
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), said educators' goal is to "teach students how to think, not what to think"—contrary to right-wing claims that the left aims to "indoctrinate" students.
Trump, she said, is "threatening funding if they don't teach what he wants. That's indoctrination and it's dangerous. Our kids deserve better."
Trump is not alone among Republicans in his calls to defund public education. As the Daily Montananreported this week, GOP Senate candidate Tim Sheehy, a multimillionaire who is running to unseat Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mt.) and is leading in recent polls, has spoken about throwing the Department of Education "in the trash can."
Federal funding accounts for 12% of per-student spending in Montana, where nearly 90% of children attend public schools. The state gets $40 million alone to support students with disabilities.
"Fairly significant harm would be implemented in Montana's public schools if we suddenly snapped our fingers and said, 'No more federal funding of education,'" Lance Melton, head of the Montana School Boards Association, told the Daily Montanan.
Lauren Miller, acting communications director for the AFL-CIO, said the former president's comments on Friday fit "a pattern" evident in numerous policies outlined by Trump and Project 2025.
"He'll defund public schools if they don't obey him," said Miller. "He'll fire government workers if they don't obey him. He'll gut the Department of Justice if they don't obey him. He'll deny FEMA funding to states if they don't obey him."
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MSNBC's Chris Hayes Catches Fox News Red-Handed Deceiving Its Audience to 'Clean Up' for Trump
"Do you see what they did there, on their own network?"
Oct 17, 2024
MSNBC's evening news anchor Chris Hayes walked his audience through an overt deception perpetrated by Fox News Wednesday night as the right-wing cable outlet used selective editing of Donald Trump during Bret Baier's primetime interview with Kamala Harris.
The line of questioning from Baier stemmed from recent public remarks Trump made in which he said "the enemy from within" was the most serious danger to the nation and that he would use both the National Guard and U.S. military to go after "radical-left lunatics," which he claimed included Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), a centrist member of the Democratic Party currently running for U.S. Senate in California.
When Harris invoked these comments to criticize Trump for threatening to turn the U.S. military against people who have different political beliefs than him, Baier interrupted her to say that the former Republican president had been asked about those very remarks earlier in the day during a separate town hall-style event, also hosted by Fox.
But in the clip shown by Baier to the television audience and to which Harris was asked to respond, Fox only included a small part of what Trump actually said on the subject during the town hall, leaving out his clear repetition of calling Schiff and others "the enemy from within" who must be dealt with.
As Hayes explains during his examination of what transpired, Baier used a selected "soundbite to try to clear Donald Trump of saying a thing in which he cut out the part where says it."
Watch the segment:
"Do you see what they did there, on their own network?" asked Hayes of the selective editing by Fox producers. "[Trump] said—he repeated—'They are the enemy within... they're sick people... they're evil.' He repeated it! And then Brett Baier's like, 'Let me play you what [Trump] said today,' and just cut out the big chunk."
In her reaction to the clip showed by Baier, Harris said, "Bret, I'm sorry and with all due respect—that clip was not what he has been saying about the 'enemy within' when he has been speaking about the American people. That's not what you just showed."
When Baier tried to explain that he was just trying to show his response to a question, Harris interjected, "You and I both know that he has talked about turning the American military on the American people. He has talked about going after people who are engaged in peaceful protest. He has talked about locking people up because they disagree with him."
"This is a democracy," Harris continued. "And in a democracy, the president of the United States should be able to handle criticism without saying they are going to lock people up for doing it. And this is what's at stake, which is why you have someone like the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff saying what Mark Milley has said about Donald Trump being a threat to the United States of America."
For his part, Hayes said the entire episode—in which Trump refused to climb down from his fascist positions, but Fox still tried to "clean up" for him—represents "the same playbook we see over and over from Fox."
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