Tag: Sharpiegate

These 7 details from the damning Sharpiegate report show it was a dark omen of Trump’s destructive potential

AlterNet logoWhile it was dismissed by some as an overhyped media obsession, the presidential scandal that has come to be known as “Sharpiegate” was, in fact, an early warning sign of the truly catastrophic potential of Donald Trump.

The story arose out of Hurricane Dorian, which began its deliberate march up toward the East Coast of the United States in late August and early September of 2019. It ravaged the Bahamas, and officials feared the damage it could inflict stateside. But then came a Trump tweet on Sept. 1, and later comments to reporters, in which he warned that Alabama was in the storm’s path. He said it was among the states “most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated.”

This wasn’t true, and his false claim set off a series of troubling events. Most infamously, he later showed a weather forecast map that appeared to have been altered with a Sharpie to falsely extend the storm’s path into Alabama — a truly absurd and ridiculous spectacle that earned the president widespread derision. But his tweet also led to the NOAA’s National Weather Service office in Birmingham to tweet out contradictory information, telling readers: “Alabama will NOT see any impacts from #Dorian.” That tweet sparked fury within the administration, and the Commerce Department later rebuked the office in a contentious statement. Continue reading.

Trump Has a Problem as the Coronavirus Threatens the U.S.: His Credibility

New York Times logoEven his allies worry that President Trump has undermined his ability to appear presidential in a moment of national emergency.

For years, experts have warned that Mr. Trump has been squandering the credibility he could need in a moment of national emergency, like a terrorist attack or a public health crisis.

Now, as the coronavirus races across the globe and has begun to threaten the United States, Mr. Trump could face a moment of reckoning. Maintaining a calm and orderly response during an epidemic, in which countless lives could be at stake, requires that the president be a reliable public messenger. Continue reading.

Commerce Department aides knew Alabama hurricane forecasters were not responding to Trump, but still rebuked them

Washington Post logoSenior aides at the Commerce Department forced the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to publicly rebuke its weather forecasters in Birmingham, Ala., for contradicting President Trump’s comments about the threat Hurricane Dorian posed to that state, even after NOAA informed them that the agency’s meteorologists were not aware at the time they were contradicting the president, according to three officials familiar with the matter.

The NOAA officials spoke to The Washington Post on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity surrounding ongoing investigations into the agency’s actions regarding Hurricane Dorian. NOAA and its National Weather Service are part of the Commerce Department.

According to emails released via a Freedom of Information Act request from The Post and other news organizations, Julie Kay Roberts, NOAA’s deputy chief of staff and communications director, was told on Sept. 2 about the motivation behind a tweet that the National Weather Service office in Birmingham had sent at 11:11 a.m. the day before. When forecasters there tweeted that “Alabama will NOT see any impacts from #Dorian,” they were responding to an influx of calls from worried residents and not to an earlier tweet from Trump.

View the complete November 7 article by Jason Samenow and Andrew Freedman on The Washington Post website here.

‘This isn’t just a stupid story, it’s a big story’: An oral history of Sharpiegate

Washington Post logoA hurricane’s path may seem erratic at times, but modern forecasting has turned the chaos of weather into data, patterns, probabilities. No such technology exists to forecast what President Trump is going to do.

While he cannot control the weather, Trump can create pressure systems in his natural habitat: Twitter. Over the course of one Scaramucci (about 10 days), as Hurricane Dorian churned through the Atlantic , a metaphysical storm gathered force, with the president at the center. It swept up all sorts of people who weren’t in Dorian’s path: meteorologists in Alabama, politicians from Texas and Tennessee, even a Baptist pastor in Kentucky.

The hurricane destroyed homes and claimed lives. The deluge of presidential tweets caused a different kind of chaos — superficial to some, serious to others. We compiled an oral history of the two storms. Not everyone went fully on the record, and the White House ignored multiple requests to comment.

View the complete September 13 article by Dan Zak, Caitlin Gibson and Ben Terris on The Washington Post website here.

Commerce chief threatened firings at NOAA after Trump’s hurricane tweets, sources say

WASHINGTON – The secretary of commerce threatened to fire top employees at the federal scientific agency responsible for weather forecasts last Friday after the agency’s Birmingham, Alabama, office contradicted President Donald Trump’s claim that Hurricane Dorian might hit Alabama, according to three people familiar with the discussion.

That threat led to an unusual, unsigned statement later that Friday by the agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, disavowing the National Weather Service’s position that Alabama was not at risk. The reversal caused widespread anger within the agency and drew accusations from the scientific community that the National Weather Service, which is part of NOAA, had been bent to political purposes.

NOAA’s statement on Friday is now being examined by the Commerce Department’s Office of Inspector General, according to documents reviewed by the New York Times, and employees have been asked to preserve their files. NOAA is a division of the Commerce Department.

View the complete September 10 article by Peter Baker, Christopher Flavelle and Lisa Friedman from The New York Times on The StarTribune website here.