August 17, 2018

Trump Planning Revenge on Bruce Ohr Just Because He Can

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From the Washington Post:

BREAKING NEWS: Trump says he plans to revoke security clearance for Justice Department official Bruce Ohr “very quickly”

Bruce Ohr used to be an associate deputy attorney general and presumably still has a job at that level—although DOJ refuses to say exactly what he does. It’s likely that he can’t operate without security clearance, which means that Trump is basically firing him from his current job. Maybe demoting him too, since I’m not sure anyone at that level can operate without security clearance.

Trump clearly has no excuse for this except for his threadbare theories about the involvement of Ohr and his “beautiful wife” in the FBI’s Russia investigation. Ohr was in occasional contact with Christopher Steele of “Steele dossier” fame during 2016 and 2017, thanks to the fact that he already knew Steele because they had both worked on organized crime issues. Beyond that, it’s not clear that he did much of anything since the FBI was aware of the Steele dossier well before Steele ever mentioned it to Ohr.

But it doesn’t matter. Trump is obsessed with him and considers him an enemy to be retaliated against. Will any Republican complain about this?¹ Or will they just shrug as usual? I guess my money is on shrug as usual.

That is, any Republican actually running for office in November.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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