PRELUDE
Jen Kerns summed it up nicely:
The Left lied blatantly claiming that the President was appointing “more white and male than any first cabinet since Reagan.” Rep. Nancy Pelosi whose credibility is sub-zero cried that Trump only valued the opinions of “guys named Steve” and the New York Times "reported" a week before Trump took the oath of office that he preferred men over women for senior roles.
There was no follow-up story relating the impressive women appointed to key roles across the entire White House operation.
One of the greatest successes of President Trump’s first year in office has been the empowerment of women.
Certainly, there have been plenty of other successes in the first year of the Trump administration — a record stock market surpassing 25,000, unemployment at a 17-year low, illegal border crossings lowered by 76 percent, a unanimous United Nations resolution against a nuclear North Korea, and more than 1 million bonuses given to American workers in just the last three weeks thanks to Trump’s leadership on tax reform.... So, why have the mainstream media given him no credit? Why haven’t the glossy magazines – who pride themselves on empowering women in the workplace — given him credit where credit is due?
If Hillary Clinton were president, they would be touting her accomplishments.
The answer is because Trump is a republican. It’s accurate to state that he is just not their guy.
...Only seven percent of journalists recently identified as republican during the last presidential election cycle; that’s right, ninety-three percent of journalists said they were not republican in 2015....
The Center for Public Integrity ...revealed through its analysis of the 2016 elections that journalists “overwhelmingly donated” to Hillary Clinton. So much for independently refereeing the match.
However, just because Trump doesn’t receive credit for his hiring of women doesn’t mean it’s any less significant...most of the women listed below will convene for a “Conversation with the Women of America” to discuss economics, health care, national security and how in their respective roles they intend to continue helping “Make America Great Again” during the second year of the Trump administration.
If liberals today had any shred of intellectual honesty left among them, they would admit that Trump’s placement of women in senior level positions is impressive and establishes a precedent that helps their own daughters and granddaughters. .. the left will never admit it.
Regardless of what one thinks of Trump the man, there is no denying the numbers of women he has placed in power in the West Wing. As we commemorate the one-year anniversary of his inauguration this week, I predict that history will eventually reveal the complete story – that Trump’s actions are not only a small step for a male republican president but a giant leap for all of womankind, regardless of political party.
[Emphasis added.]
Jen Kerns in the second cite sets out a list of impressive women appointed by the President. Most are profiled in this issue.
Here is a partial list of talented and accomplished women appointed by President Trump to key positions to advance important policies of his Administration:
Nikki Haley, Ambassador to the United Nations
Betsy DeVos, Secretary of Education
Kirstjen Nielsen, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security
Sarah Sanders, White House Press Secretary
Heather Wilson, Secretary of the Air Force
Elaine Chao, Secretary of Transportation
Neomi Rao, Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs
Kellyanne Conway, Counselor to the President;
Linda McMahon, Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration;
Kelly Sadler, Director of Surrogate & Coalitions Outreach
Seema Verma, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Hope Hicks, Communications Director
Heather Brand, Associate Attorney General;
Dina Powell, Deputy National Security Adviser
Katy Talento, White House Healthcare Adviser
Jovita Carranza, U.S. Treasurer
Mercedes Schlapp, Senior Communications Adviser
Here is more information about them and their impressive credentials. Each profile includes early years, adult experience , personal notes and defining quotes.
NIKKI HALEY
Ambassador to the United Nations
In January, 2017, President Trump appointed Nikki Nimrata Haley United States Ambassador to the United Nations.
She was a three term governor of South Carolina, the first female and the first Sikh to hold that office.
Haley's parents were born in India, moved to Canada and then to South Carolina. There her mother, started a clothing store. At age 12, Haley began helping with the bookkeeping for her mother's business, Haley credited that with giving her "an extreme watchfulness about overheads and a sharp aversion to government intrusion, how hard it was to make a dollar and how easy it was for the government to take it away." [Emphasis added.]
A daughter of immigrants, she believes the immigration laws should be enforced, immigrants should carry documentation to show they are legal, and photo identification should be required at the polls.
As Governor of South Carolina, she implemented a plan in which teachers' salaries would be based, on qualifications, seniority and job performance, as determined by evaluations and reports from principals, students, and parents. She supported school choice and charter schools.
She stopped legislators from collecting legislative pensions while in office.
Haley signed an "Arizona-style" law cracking down on illegal immigration because the federal government was not doing the job.
She is pro-life and supported legislation to restrict abortion rights.
"I'm not pro-life because the Republican Party tells me, I’m pro-life because all of us have had experiences of what it means to have one of these special little ones in our life."
Haley appointed Bobby Hitt the State's Secretary of Commerce. Under their leadership, the state announced the recruitment of more than 85,000 new jobs and $21.5 billion in capital investment. In inviting business to move to South Carolina:
What I'm saying is, if you come to South Carolina, the cost of doing business is going to be low here. We are going to make sure that you have a loyal, willing workforce and we are going to be one of the lowest union-participation states in the country.
Haley indicated she would not support legislation introduced by the South Carolina State Senate which would require transgender individuals to use restrooms based on biological sex instead of gender identity.
Y’all haven’t reported on anything...when I look at South Carolina, we look at our situations, we’re not hearing of anybody’s religious liberties that are being violated, and we’re, again, not hearing any citizens that feel like they are being violated in terms of freedoms.”
Aa strong supporter of Israel, she signed a bill to stop efforts to boycott and sanction Israel, the first of its kind on a statewide level. [N]owhere has the UN’s failure been more consistent and more outrageous than in its bias against our close ally Israel .
In 2012, Mitt Romney considered her for his vice-presidential running mate. Haley said that she would turn down any offer, "I'd say thank you, but no, I made a promise to the people of this state. And I think that promise matters. And I intend to keep it."
NOTE: In 2016, Haley, critical of Trump during the election, supported first Rubio and then Cruz. When Trump became the Republican finalist, she said that she would vote for him, but was "not a fan".
A few months later, he appointed her U.S. Ambassador. In that role, she has become a no-holds bar advocate for America. Details are found in
,
Personal notes:
- Parents, born in India, father Ajit Singh Randhawa,a professor, later earned PhD in Canada,
mother, Raj Kaur Randhawa, had law degree and later an M.A. in education
- Brothers- Mitti, a retired member of the United States Army Chemical Corps who served in Desert Storm, and Charan, a web designer. She has one sister, Simran, a radio host
- degree from Clemson in accounting
- Husband Michael, an officer South Carolina Army National Guard who served in Afghanistan
- Children, Rena, Nalim
- Private sector: worked for FCR Corporation, a waste management and recycling company, entered family business, an upscale clothing firm, Exotica International, where she was controller/CFO
- Published an autobiography, Can’t Is Not an Option: My American Story
Our decisions on immigration policies must always be made by Americans and Americans alone. We will decide how best to control our borders and who will be allowed to enter the country... [This]... annual debate is 'political theater' and a waste of time meant 'to deflect attention from the regime that is actually responsible for the suffering of the Cuban people. Let’s be honest about what we really see going on here,...This assembly does not have the power to end the US embargo. It is based in US law, which only the United States Congress can change.' Noting that Washington under then-President Barack Obama abstained on last year’s vote, she explained, 'To those who are confused as to where the United States stands, let me be clear: As is their right under our Constitution, the American people have spoken.That is, they have chosen a new president, and he has chosen a new ambassador to the United Nations. [Emphasis added.]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikki_Hale
[Taking a liberty to interject here - my money is on Nikki Haley becoming the first woman President of these United States.]
BETSY DeVOS
Secretary of Education
In January, 2017, President Trump appointed Elisabeth Prince DeVos to be United States Secretary of Education.
She was confirmed in February, 2017, after Vice President Mike Pence cast his vote to break a 50-50 tie.
Democrats were furiously opposed. Devos had, and has, a reputation as a true believer in core-Republican issues and leaves no one in doubt on where she stands. Not a single Democrat voted for her confirmation.
Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney respectively called DeVos an "outstanding pick" and a "smart choice". Senator Ben Sasse said she "has made a career out of standing up to powerful and connected special interests on behalf of poor kids who are too often forgotten by Washington". The Chicago Tribune wrote that "DeVos has helped lead the national battle to expand education opportunities for children". [Emphasis added.]
Devos was raised in Holland, Michigan in a very wealthy family. Her future husband, Richard Marvin "Dick" DeVos Jr., was and is extremely wealthy as well, heir to the Amway fortune. They have been very generous in contribution to philanthropic causes.
The Dick & Betsy DeVos Family Foundation The Foundation's giving "is centered in cultivating leadership, accelerating transformation and leveraging support in five areas", namely education, community, arts, justice, and leadership. The Foundation has donated large amounts to hospitals, health research, arts organizations, Christian schools, evangelical missions, including Christian organizations, Michigan's Foundation for Traditional Values, Center for Individual Rights, Acton Institute, Institute for Justice, Center for Individual Rights, Michigan's Pregnancy Resource Center, Right to Life Michigan Educational Fund, and Baptists for Life.
Betsy Devos lost no time in asserting conservative values as she toured schools, often being met by demonstrators. On one occasion, a mob blocked her from entering a D.C. public middle school. She was calm and undeterred, and found a side entrance to the school.
In March, 2017, she spoke at the Brookings Institution regarding choice policies directed toward children as individuals and criticizing the Obama administration's additional funding of $7 billion for the nation's worst performing schools as "throwing money at the problem".
Thereafter, she undid Obama administration policies in order to "create a student loan servicing environment that provides the highest quality customer service and increases accountability and transparency for all borrowers, while also limiting the cost to taxpayers".
Three months after her confirmation, DeVos announced the Trump administration was offering "the most ambitious expansion" of school choice within American history.
In January. 2018, Devos continued her plain speaking, pointing out the American Federation of Teachers [AFT] found that "60 percent of its teachers reported having moderate to no influence over the content and skills taught in their own classrooms.
DeVos believes education in the United States should encourage the proliferation of charter schools and open up private schools to more students via financial assistance programs, often called vouchers, and she has stated that education is "a closed system, a closed industry, a closed market. It's a monopoly, a dead end." DeVos believes that opening up the education market will offer parents increased choice:
The status quo in education is not acceptable...I am not a supporter [of the Common Core] -period. I do support high standards, strong accountability, and local control. …along the way, it got turned into a federalized boondoggle.…the only way that real education choice is going to be successfully implemented is by making it a bipartisan or a non-partisan issue. …that hasn’t been the case. Most of the Democrats have been supported by the teachers’ unions ...
[Emphasis added.]
Note:
During the Republican Party presidential primaries for the 2016 election, DeVos donated to Jeb Bush and Carly Fiorina before supporting Marco Rubio. She described Donald Trump as an "interloper"who "does not represent the Republican Party."
On November 23, 2016, President-elect Trump stated he would appoint DeVos to be United States Secretary of Education.
Personal notes:
- Parents, mother Elsa (Zwiep) Prince, farther Edgar Prince, founder of Prince Corporation, an automobile parts supplier
- Degree in business economics from Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan
- Husband Richard
- Children, Andrea, Elizabeth, Richard, Ryan
- Private sector: - Windquest Group, a privately held operating group that invests in technology, manufacturing, and clean energy; Neurocore, brain performance centers offering biofeedback therapy for disorders such as depression, attention deficit disorder, autism, and anxiety
- Her brother, Erik Prince, a former SEAL, is the founder of Blackwater USA
- With her husband produced Broadway show Scandalous: The Life and Trials of Aimee Semple McPherson
- U.S. Marshals Service, after a threat evaluation, determined she needed additional security from sometime violent protests as she toured schools; the protests did not deter her.
We expect to foster a conservative governing philosophy consisting of limited government and respect for traditional American virtues…I am very excited to get to work…on making American education great again........traditional public schools …in many cases, ... are failing. That’s helped people become more open to reforms like vouchers, tax credits, and education savings … educational choice … virtual schools, magnet schools, homeschooling, and charter schools.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betsy_DeVos
Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security
In 2017, President Trump appointed Kirstjen Neilsen Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.
Previously, she served as Principal Deputy White House Chief of Staff to President Donald Trump from September 6, 2017 to December 5, 2017. She has informally performed the role of Deputy Chief of Staff since Kelly became White House Chief of Staff on July 31, 2017.
She was Kelly's Chief of Staff at the Department of Homeland Security.
Nielsen had served as Administrator of Transportation Security Administration's Office of Legislative Policy and Government Affairs and was a senior member of the Resilience Task Force of the Center for Cyber & Homeland Security committee at George Washington University. Neilsen formerly served George W. Bush as special assistant and as senior director for prevention, preparedness and response at the White House Homeland Security Council. She had held positions at the Transportation Security Agency and the U.S. Senate.
Mr. Kelly urged her selection, making a personal appeal to Mr. Trump during the search for a replacement. A bipartisan group of former Homeland security officials also endorsed her nomination, including two former secretaries of the department, Tom Ridge and Michael Chertoff, both Republicans who served under Mr. Bush.
“Ms. Nielsen has been engaged in counterterrorism, all-hazard risk mitigation, critical infrastructure protection and response policy from the earliest days of what we now know as homeland security.”
Former colleagues agreed Ms. Nielsen was well qualified. Michael Allen, who worked with Ms. Nielsen during the Bush administration.
“She’s an experienced manager, she’s an implementer, she knows how to get under the hood and figure out what needs to be connected to what.”
Frances Townsend, her boss at the White House during the Bush administration:
She is tough as nails, competent and has rightly earned the president’s respect.
In a January, 2018, Senate hearing Neilsen calmly deflated a ranting Democrat Senator Booker, leaving him looking foolish.
Nielsen is an internationally recognized expert in risk management, security and resilience. She has worked in the homeland and national security sectors for more than two decades. Working at the crossroads of policy, strategy, risk, and operational environments, she has a unique blend of operational and enterprise perspective on policy and strategy development, mission execution and the role of technology as an enabler and force multiplier.
She was appointed Chair of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Risk and Resilience and served as a civilian expert for NATO, advising on cyber security and the creation and use of public-private partnerships to address transglobal risks.
Nielsen warns of the threat of cyber attacks.
While each aspect of the Department’s mission is important, I believe one of the most significant for our nation’s future is cyber security and the overall security and resilience of our nation’s critical infrastructure. The scope and pace of cyber attacks against our federal networks and the control systems that run our critical infrastructure are continually increasing, with attacks growing evermore complex and each more sophisticated than the last. Cyber criminals and nation states are continually looking for ways to exploit our hyperconnectivity and reliance on IT systems.
Personal notes:
- Undergraduate degree Georgetown School of Foreign Service and law degree from University of Virginia School of Law; she studied at the Nanzan University Center for Japanese Studies in Nagoya, Japan
- Private sector: General Counsel, Civitas Group, LLC consulting firm, corporate attorney handling a broad range of transactional law issues; founder and former President of Sunesis Consulting, awarded government contracts under President Obama's administration
Our Nation has a long history of welcoming immigrants who came to this country in search of freedom and opportunity. Providing lawful permanent resident status based primarily on merit —not solely on family connections —would promote assimilation, financial independence, and upward mobility for immigrants. By establishing a points-based system for merit-based migration, the predominant system in most developed countries, we can attract the highest-caliber immigrants, and begin to roll back decades of policies that have suppressed wages, contributed to income disparities, fueled unemployment, and strained state and federal resources.
I will work every day to enforce the law, secure our borders, our coasts and our waterways, and to protect Americans from dangerous criminals, terrorists, cyberattacks, and all the other threats.
Benefits for millions of illegal immigrants instead of paying Americans who put their lives at risk daily to protect ours? I don’t think so. Most Americans don't either.
White House Press Secretary
In July, 2017, President Trump appointed Sarah Huckabee Sanders to be White House Press Secretary.
Previously, in January, 2017, President Trump had appointed her Deputy White House Press Secretary in his new administration. She soon became known for her blunt assessments.
On May 5, 2017, she held her first White House press briefing. On June 27, during a press briefing, Sanders criticized the media, accusing them of spreading 'fake news' against Trump and suggested they watch a video, which featured CNN's health and medical producer, John Bonifield, saying that CNN's coverage of the Trump campaign's alleged links to Russia are 'mostly bullshit' and driven by ratings.
In the press conferences, she firmly corrects mischaracterizations by the reporters.
Sanders's introduction to politics began as a child, when her father first ran for governor of Arkansas in 1992. Describing the unsuccessful campaign to The Hill, "He didn't really have much of a staff, so our family has been very engaged and very supportive of my dad. I was stuffing envelopes, I was knocking on doors, I was putting up yard signs." Her father described her childhood, "I always say that when most kids are seven or eight years old out jumping rope, she was sitting at the kitchen table listening to political commentators analyze poll results."
Sanders got her start in politics as a field coordinator for her father's 2002 re-election campaign for governor of Arkansas. She was a regional liaison for congressional affairs at the U.S. Department of Education under President George W. Bush and worked as a field coordinator for President Bush’s re-election campaign in Ohio in 2004.
In 2008, Sanders was field director for her father's 2008 presidential campaign.She met Bryan Chatfield Sanders, hired as a media consultant. In 2010, they were married.
In 2014, she was an adviser to Tom Cotton in his successful Senate campaign.
In 2016, after managing her father's presidential campaign, she signed on as a senior advisor for Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, handling the Trump campaign's communications for coalitions.
Personal notes:
- Parents, Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, and Janet Huckabee.
- Husband Bryan
- Children, Scarlett, Huck and George
- Brothers Mark, and David, a mortgage broker
- Obtained undergraduate degree from Ouachita Baptist University, Arkansas
- Private sector: with husband, formed political consulting firm Second Street Strategies; also vice president of Tsamoutales Strategies; national campaign manager for the ONE Campaign, an international organization aimed at ending global poverty and preventable diseases
- Only the third woman to hold the role of White House Press Secretary.
- known for forceful refutations of media’s "fake news”
What I think is really mentally unstable is people that don't see the positive impact that this president is having on the country.
Note: In the history of our country, the posts of UN Ambassador, Secretary of Education, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and White House spokesperson have never been held all by women simultaneously.
HEATHER WILSON
Secretary of the Air Force
In May, 2017, President Trump appointed Heather Wilson Secretary of the Air Force
Wilson grew up around aviation. Her father and grandfather were pilots. Her paternal grandparent, born in Scotland, flew for the Royal Flying Corps in World War I; he emigrated to America where he was a barnstormer and airport operator. He served as a courier pilot during World War II and started the New Hampshire Civil Air Patrol. Her father started flying at age 13 and enlisted in the United States Air Force.
Wilson received an appointment to the United States Air Force Academy.
An Air Force officer for seven years, Wilson was a negotiator and political adviser to the U.S. Air Force in England, and a defense planning officer for NATO in Belgium, where her work included arms control negotiations. She was chosen to serve as director for European Defense Policy and Arms Control on the National Security Council staff, advisers to President George H. W. Bush.
After leaving government, Wilson founded Keystone International, Inc. in New Mexico to promote business development in the United States and Russia.
New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson appointed Wilson to be Cabinet Secretary for Children Youth & Families Department, where she led efforts to reform child welfare laws, modernize the juvenile justice system, and improve early childhood education; she found ways to improve Medicare and Medicaid to ensure the health of the American people and the American healthcare industry. She also was the architect of the governor's education agenda, including charter schools.
Wilson resigned her cabinet post in 1998 and ran for Congress representing New Mexico. She was elected 6 times; she was the first woman to hold that position in New Mexico since the 1940s. During her tenure, she voted for using military force against Iraq and for legislation to make the United States Environmental Protection Agency [EPA] a cabinet department.
In 2008, she left the House to run for the Senate but was defeated in the primary. After leaving Congress, she founded, a consulting firm.
.
Personal notes:
- Parents: Martha Lou, nurse, and George Douglas "Doug" Wilson, a commercial pilot and member of the Experimental Aircraft Association.
- Grandfather, George Gordon "Scotty" Wilson, started the New Hampshire Civil Air Patrol
- Obtained her undergraduate degree as Distinguished Graduate, [magna cum laude equivalent] from United States Air Force Academy where she was the first woman to be Vice Wing Commander.
- Earned a Rhodes Scholarship to jesus College, Oxford, obtaining a M.Phil. and D.Phil. in International Relations
- Husband, Jay Hone, private practice lawyer; retired as a Colonel in the New Mexico Air National Guard
- Children, Scott, Joshua, Caitlin
- Private sector: Authored International Law and the Use of Force by National Liberation Movements; founded consulting firm Heather Wilson & Company; started Keystone International, Inc. to promote business development in the United States and Russia
- Award: her book won the 1988 Paul Reuter Prize of the International Committee of the Red Cross for a major work in the sphere of international humanitarian law.
Border security is a safety issue…I support legal immigration. I don't support amnesty because it is not fair to people standing in line at consulates around the world...
ELAINE CHAO
Secretary of Transportation
In January, 2017, President Trump appointed Elaine Chao to be the United States Secretary of Transportation.
Previously in 1986, Chao became Deputy Administrator of the Maritime Administration in the U.S. Department of Transportation. From 1988 to 1989, she served as Chairwoman of the Federal Maritime Commission. In 1989, President George H. W. Bush nominated Chao to be Deputy Secretary of Transportation, serving from 1989 to 1991. From 1991 to 1992, she was Director of the Peace Corps. She was the first Asian Pacific American to serve in any of these positions.
She expanded the Peace Corps' presence in Eastern Europe and Central Asia by establishing the first Peace Corps programs in Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and other newly independent states of the former Soviet Union. She restructured departmental programs and modernized regulations. Office of Management and Budget cited the agency for having exhibited excellence in budget management practices in every area.
Chao served as United States Secretary of Labor. For the first time in more than 40 years, the Department updated the labor union financial disclosure regulations under the Landrum–Griffin Act of 1959, creating more extensive disclosure requirements for union-sponsored pension plans and other trusts to prevent embezzlement or other financial mismanagement. The Department issued revisions of the white-collar overtime regulations under the Fair Labor Standards Act.
Personal notes:
- Born in Taipei, Taiwan, to Chinese parents who had left mainland China in 1949, emigrated when 8
- First Chinese American appointed to a President's Cabinet.
- Parents, Ruth Mulan Chu Chao, a historian, and James Si-Cheng Chao, shipping company chairman
- Undergraduate degree Mount Holyoke College; MBA, Harvard Business School
- Eldest of six sisters, Jeannette, May, Christine, Grace, and Angela
- Husband, Majority Senate Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky
- Private sector: director of corporate and non-profit boards, Wells Fargo, New York–Presbyterian Hospital, News Corp,[ Dole Food Company, Protective Life Corporation; contributor to Fox News .
- Woodrow Wilson Award for Public Service
As I looked up at the Statue of Liberty, I thought at that time, 'What a wonderful country.'...Never far from my thoughts are memories of being a little girl in Queens, N.Y., our family of five crowded in a small one-bedroom apartment, struggling to learn English and survive a new life in a new country, America…
The President' plans are to transform our country’s infrastructure, accelerate economic growth and productivity, and create good paying jobs …
What we are seeing is obviously technology outstripping the consumer ability to accept and understand the technology. It behooves all of us, … understand the benefits, the limitations… Even if it's a national issue, the federal government cannot provide all the answers....The greatest job creation is driven by entrepreneurs and young businesses… At a minimum, government policies must not stifle the innovation
The pursuit of excellence is a continuous process through life. [Emphasis added.]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elaine_Chao
NOEMI JEHANGEHABGI RAO
Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs
In April 7, 2017, President Donald Trump nominated Noemi Jehangehabgi Rao to be the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs [OIRA] within the Office of Management and Budget.
Rao is an American lawyer, academic, and government official who previously was an associate professor of law and the founding director of the Center for the Study of the Administrative State at George Mason University's Antonin Scalia Law School. Her research and teaching focused on constitutional and administrative law.
Former OIRA Administrator Susan Dudley described Rao as "an excellent choice to lead OIRA...In addition to a sharp legal mind, she brings an openness to different perspectives and an ability to manage the competing demands of regulatory policy."
Legal commentator and law professor Jonathan H. Adler wrote that "Trump's selection of Rao suggests the administration is serious about regulatory reform, not merely reducing high-profile regulatory burdens."
Rao began quickly implementing the President's goals
"So far the administration has imposed four new rules and eliminated ten."
See details of later impressive numbers in
https://www.ireallymissreagan.com/single-post/2017/12/10/HE-SAVED-US-FROM-HILLARY- TRUMPING-THE-LEFT
Personal notes:
- Emigrated from India
- Parents, Mother Zerin Rao and Father Jehangir Narioshang Ro, both Parsi physicians,
- Husband, Alan Lefkowitz
- Children, Isabella, Ezra
- Obtained undergraduate degree from Yale University with highest distinction in ethics, politics, economics, and philosophy, and earned J.D. degree from the University of Chicago Law School
- Clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas
- Private sector: practiced public international law and arbitration at London law firm
Many commentators have suggested there is a link between these reform efforts and economic growth.
"I think one of the advantages of what is happening now is that individuals and businesses aren't fearing the constant perpetuation of new regulatory burdens without any notice or due process...From my perspective, a lot of this is linked to individual freedom... when the government is interfering less in people's lives, they have a greater opportunity to pursue their goals.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neomi_Rao
KELLYANNE CONWAY
Counselor to the President
In January, 2017, President Trump appointed Kellyanne Elizabeth Conway [née Fitzpatrick] to be White House Counselor to the President.
Previously, Conway was an American pollster, political consultant [The Polling Company]. She was appointed in August 2016 to be Donald Trump's campaign manager. She is the first woman to have run a successful US presidential campaign.
Conway credits her experience as a youth, working for eight summers on a blueberry farm in New Jersey, for teaching her a strong work ethic. "The faster you went, the more money you'd make...Everything I learned about life and business started on that farm."
Conway became friends with consultant Frank Luntz on a year abroad at Oxford University which led to the founding of her own firm.
Conway earned a reputation of not taking guff from anyone. In December, 2016, Conway appeared with senior aides of the Trump campaign at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, for a forum on the 2016 presidential race. Sitting across from Conway were senior Clinton campaign aides, including Clinton's campaign manager. During one exchange, a Clinton strategist said
"The fact of the matter is that more Americans voted for Hillary Clinton than for Donald Trump."
Conway, looking at the Trump aides: "Hey, guys, we won. You don't have to respond. He was the better candidate. That's why he won."
There was also a report that, at an Inauguration Ball, two men were fighting. In an attempt to break up the scuffle, Conway stepped between them but they would not stop. So, Conway punched one of them in the face.
Then there was the hilarious incident on TV when Conway discussed a department store's decision to drop products supplied by Ivanka Trump's business.
"Go buy Ivanka's stuff is what I would tell you...It's a wonderful line. I own some of it. I'm going to give a free commercial here: Go buy it today, everybody. You can find it online".
That provoked various complaints and even threats of prosecution for violating a law prohibiting use of a federal position for endorsement of a product. There followed weeks of liberal politicians, law professors, former Obama aides and talking heads calling for her scalp. Proving beyond any doubt that liberals really don't have any sense of humor.
Conway has become a surrogate Trump for the Libs to target with all kinds of weird allegations including one claim she violated federal law by criticizing a Democrat candidate and another complaint about the way she sat of a couch in the Oval Office!
Conway is pro-life: "We grew up with sonograms. We know life when we see it."
NOTE:
Conway initially endorsed Ted Cruz in the 2016 Republican presidential primary and criticized Trump.
On July 1, 2016, Trump announced that he had hired Conway for a senior advisory position on his presidential campaign, then named her campaign manager.
Personal notes:
- Parents divorced when she was 3, raised by her mother, grandmother and two unmarried aunts
- Parents, father, John Fitzpatrick,owned a small trucking company, mother worked at a bank;
- Undergraduate degree in political science magna cum laude from Trinity College, D.C., law degree with honors from George Washington University Law School ]
- Husband, George T. Conway III, lawyer
- Children, twins Claudia and George IV, Charlotte, and Vanessa.
- Private sector: president and CEO of The Polling Company, Inc, a consulting firm, clients included Vaseline, American Express and Hasbro; TV commentator
- Received the Washington Post's "Crystal Ball" award for accurately predicting the outcome of the 2004 election
- Won the New Jersey Blueberry Princess pageant as teen
- chose "Blueberry" as her Secret Service code name
Nothing creates a winner quite like earning it, not just inheriting it. Pro-lifers believe there are two victims in an abortion: the unborn child and the woman who felt that that was her best option.
[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kellyanne_Conway
Linda McMahon
Administrator of the United States Small Business Administration
In January, 2017,President Trump appointed Linda Marie McMahon [nee Edwards] Administrator of the U.S. States Small Business Administration.
Linda has a tremendous background and is widely recognized as one of the country's top female executives advising businesses around the globe.... Linda is going to be a phenomenal leader and champion for small businesses and unleash America's entrepreneurial spirit all across the country.
Linda McMahon: Honored to be appointed by President-Elect to serve as head of SBA ...advocating for our small businesses & entrepreneurs .
Linda McMahon married Vince McManon, rhe two met in church when Linda was 13 and Vince was 16.
The couple co-founded WWE, which has a market capitalization of $1.5 billion.
Linda became President and CEO. The company's explosive growth and transformation of the wrestling industry caused observers to label her and her husband "business geniuses".
One of Linda's major interests was product merchandising. She negotiated many of the company's business deals with vendors, establishing the company's first line of action figures, Wrestling Superstars, . It was a first in the wrestling industry and helped expand the company's popularity to children.
In 2012, she ran for the US Senate in Connecticut but lost to a Democrat who had served 7 terms ias a congressman. Her campaign slogan was "Not a career politician".
Her campaign themes resonate well today: Prevent tax increases; stop anti-growth tax policies across the board;. move to reduce the corporate tax rate. When state and federal taxes are combined, America has the highest corporate tax structure in the world. Reducing the corporate income tax rate will make the nation be more competitive with the rest of the world.
We need professionals from different walks of life,......What we don't have in Washington are business people.... help fix the country's economic and deficit problems created by longtime politicians. [They]have been part of the issue of killing jobs, not creating jobs...What we need to see in Washington are senators who have not been there and been part of the mess...
Charitable donations - the McMahons have made substantial donations to many organizations including the Fishburne Military School, Sacred Heart University, East Carolina University, and the Special Olympics.
Note:
McMahon criticized Donald Trump in the past.
President Trump chose her to run the Small Business Administration.
Personal notes
- Parents, Father Henry Edwards, Mother Evelyn Edwards
- Husband, Vince McMahon, professional wrestling promoter, commentator, announcer, film producer, actor, and professional wrestler
- Children, Shane Brandon McMahon and Stephanie McMahon Levesque, both involved in family business
Private sector: with husband, founded WWE
- Received her undergraduate degree from East Carolina University
Like all small-business owners, I know what it's like to take a risk on an idea, manage cash flow, navigate regulations and tax laws, and create jobs...small business people are people with goals and values that can't be calculated on a profit and loss statement...I've made a payroll. I know what it's like to execute a business plan. I know what it's like to expect the proper return on investment... and I know you can't spend your way out of debt...
I have learned it's not how you fall but how you get up that truly matters.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_McMahon
. [if !supportLineBreakNewLine]KELLY RIDDELL SADLER
Special Assistant to the President [endif]
In April, 2017, President Trump appointed Kelly Riddell Sadler to be the Special Assistant to the President.[endif]
Sadler is an American journalist, reporter and columnist. She was a former deputy opinion editor at The Washington Times,and wrote Water Cooler, a daily political blog for the Times website.
In her final column, Sadler wrote about the President’s flagging job approval numbers:
So long as Mr. Trump continues to spur the economy and people’s confidence in it, what they think of him will fall to the wayside.
In 2015, Riddell broke two major news stories:
that political donor George Soros had given at least $33 million in one year to support activist groups during the Ferguson protests, and
that the Clinton Foundation had collected $26 million in donations from a fund-raising arm in Sweden at the same time the country was lobbying Clinton's State Department to forego sanctions that threatened business connections with Iran.
The report received the Society of Professional Journalists’ Robert D. G. Lewis Watchdog Journalism Award for the entry that “best exemplifies journalism aimed at protecting the public from abuses by those who would betray the public trust.”
Quotes from Sadler's columns prior to her joining the Administration displaying her straight talking, eloquently and accurate skewering the media for their bias and mendacity.
You can call it the Trump effect. For the first time since the economic crisis, more Americans feel positive about the economy than negative about it...It’s the most positive people have felt about the economy since 2007 - a year before the economic crisis - and only the second time that half or more of those surveyed have given the economy a thumbs-up...Driving the higher scores ...and their trust that President Donald Trump will improve lagging GDP growth, invest in infrastructure and tax reform, all of which will spur economic prosperity and improve job opportunities and wage growth.
Trump Derangement Syndrome is real, folks. The latest example is the liberal reaction to first lady Melania Trump’s official portrait, which was unveiled on Monday. Cosmopolitan Magazine declared the photo was heavily airbrushed...Cosmo, of all sources, which heavily airbrushes many of its scantily clad cover models every month ...Mrs. Trump’s face 'appeared to be heavily airbrushed,' ...adding a bit of snark: 'This soft lighting is like only the classiest ‘90s mall glamour shot photo could offer.'
...a bombshell report that that former President Barack Obama’s right hand woman, Susan Rice ... asked dozens of times for intelligence agencies to unmask the names of Trump associates. ...the mainstream media is predictably providing her cover. Instead of investigating the report, the press corps is calling it a “distraction” from the real story of potential Trump administration collusion with Russia.
Let’s be clear. There are two stories worth pursuing.
One is the FBI’s investigation into any collusion between the Trump administration and Russia. So far, no evidence has been provided that there was any.
The second is why did Ms. Rice seek this unmasking and was it done for political purposes – in other words, did the Obama administration actively seek to spy on the incoming Trump administration?
The second story doesn’t interest the mainstream media – which instead of investigating, immediately aimed to discredit.
...the mainstream media is breathlessly reporting President Donald Trump’s first 100 days in office is officially the worst ever.'When you add up the totality of it … I actually think this may be the worst hundred days we’ve ever seen in a president,' CNN’s David Gergen declared.The LA Times editorial board decided to do a four-part series on our 'dishonest president' nothing prepared us for the magnitude of this train wreck.' Vanity Fair published an article last month: 'The Trump presidency is already a joke'...
Of course, all of this is absurd — and predictably over the top from a press corps that has never approved of his candidacy, let alone his presidency. Nothing prepared the Times for the magnitude of 'this train wreck?' Really? The Washington Post likened Mr. Trump to Adolf Hitler several times, the Huffington Post ...calling him a 'racist' and 'xenophobe' and The New York Times defended its reporters’ bias in covering Mr. Trump, because, Mr. Trump was a 'demagogue playing to the nation’s worst racist and nationalistic tendencies.'Vanity Fair: 'The Trump presidency is already a joke' ...
The only support President Donald Trump has in Washington, D.C. is from his voters....[they] are still with him...The mainstream media — or Trump opposition party as they’re more aptly called — want nothing more than to report news of how Mr. Trump is losing his base. .. That the once 'deplorables' have now come to their senses. But they haven’t been able to find one Trump voter to testify to this — ...[they]... 'like what he is doing'... 'I wanted someone who was not a politician, and I am very satisfied with how he has conducted business in Washington when it comes to getting things done,' ... 57 percent of Republicans say Mr. Trump is a 'very strong' leader and 74 percent are 'optimistic' about the future ....
Personal notes
- Husband, Frank Sadler, Republican political and public affairs consultant and lobbyist.
- Three children
- Undergraduate degree in Broadcast Journalism from Northwestern University; earned Masters Degree from Johns-Hopkins SAIS, earned degree in Chinese Study from Hamilton College
- Private sector: columnist, the Washington Times, Newsmax, Fox News, RT, The Daily Mail, the New York Daily News and The Daily Beast
Mr. Trump has taken on illegal immigration. Undocumented border crossings are down 40 percent in his first month. He’s cracking down on sanctuary cities — where only 35 percent of Americans say they’d like to live — to restore law and order to Middle America. The stock market has reached record highs, and unemployment is shrinking, with manufacturing job creation at its fastest pace since late 2014. Mr. Trump has gone on a deregulation binge, axing Obama-era rules, with the promise of creating more economic growth....
.
T
Seema Verma
Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
In March, 2017, President-elect Donald Trump nominated Seema Verma to be Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Health Department agency that oversees the Obamacare insurance markets.
One of her first actions was to send a letter to the nation's Governors urging them to impose insurance premiums for Medicaid, charge Medicaid recipients for emergency room visits, and encourage recipients to get jobs or job training.
Verma was a participant in the Republican Governor's Public Policy Committee on Medicaid reform. She contributed to the report A New Medicaid: A Flexible, Innovative and Accountable Future. Verma has also presented to the Medicaid Task Force of the Committee on Energy and Commerce and provided testimony before the U.S. House Energy Subcommittee on Health.
Verma had worked for the Health & Hospital Corporation of Marion County as vice president of planning and at the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials in Washington, DC.
In 2001,she founded the health policy consulting firm SVC Inc., offering, security consulting services to Federal, State and local governments, instrumental in assessing the legislative and policy landscape for companies who are looking to enter the homeland. SVC worked with state insurance agencies and public health agencies in preparation for the implementation of the Affordable Care Act [Obamacare], and assisted Indiana and Kentucky, as well as other states, in the design of Medicaid expansion programs under the ACA.
In her work with Indiana, Ohio, and Kentucky, she developed Medicaid reform programs with the use of the Section 1115 waiver process. The 1115 waiver, which needs to be approved by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services [CMS] allows states to pursue customized programs that diverge from the standard program under ACA statutory guidelines. Verma and SVC have worked with companies such as Electronic Data Systems (EDS), Hewlett Packard Enterprises (HP), Milliman, HighPoint Global, Roche Diagnostics, Health Management Associates (HMA), and Maximus.
Verma established her reputation with her work on Indiana's redesigned Medicaid program. She worked with lndiana Governors Daniels and Pence in creating the related "Healthy Indiana Plan 2.0", an alternative Medicaid expansion that utilizes the 1115 waiver. Designed for people with low income, the plan requires participants to pay into a health savings account and has high deductibles. Verma:
...you have to make your contribution every month, with a 60-day grace period. If you don't make the contribution, you're out of the program for 12 months. It's a strong personal responsibility mechanism.
Medicaid, a federal-state collaboration, covers more than 70 million people, or about one in five Americans.
The Trump administration announced that it will open the door for states to impose work requirements for Medicaid recipients. Under current law, people are not legally required to hold a job or to be employed to receive Medicaid benefits, but states can request federal waivers to test new ideas for the program.
Verma said the agency has received demonstration project proposals from 10 states: Arizona, Arkansas, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Utah and Wisconsin.
The test programs …could make work, skills training, education, job search, volunteering or caregiving’ a requirement for Medicaid for able-bodied, working-age adults. It would not apply to those getting benefits due to a “disability, elderly beneficiaries, children, and pregnant women....Under the new policy, states must fully comply with federal disability and civil rights laws to ensure that disabled individuals have the necessary protections to ensure they are not inappropriately denied coverage. States will be required to offer modifications to individuals with disabilities and will be required to exempt individuals determined to be ‘medically frail’ or having an ‘acute condition’ that would prevent them from complying with the new requirements.
The Trump administration has been vocal about adding the new requirements. The Kaiser Family Foundation conducted a poll in 2017, which revealed 70 percent of the public support allowing states to impose work requirements on Medicaid beneficiaries.
Personal notes
- Husband, Sanjay, a child psychiatrist with a medical practice through the Indiana Health Group.
- Children, Maya and Shaan
- Received undergraduate degree in Life Sciences from the University of Maryland, earned a Master's Degree in Public Health with a concentration in health policy and management from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health
- Private sector: founded the health policy consulting firm SVC Inc.
- Graduate of the Richard G. Lugar Excellence in Public Service Series, she was also selected for the American Enterprise Institute's Leadership Network.
Medicare works with the Department of Justice, taking aim squarely at would-be thieves. In the largest law enforcement action against criminals fraudulently targeting the Medicare, Medicaid and Tricare programs, 412 people around the country, including 115 doctors, nurses and other licensed medical professionals, were charged in 2017 with bilking U.S. taxpayers out of $1.3 billion. The next big fraud-fighting push is well underway -- and its focus is protecting the personal information of seniors.
HOPE HICKS
White House Director of Communications
In 2017, President Trump appointed Hope Charlotte Hicks White House Director of Communications.
Donald Trump: Sean, Hope, Jason and Dan have been key members of my team during the campaign and transition...I am excited they will be leading the team that will communicate my agenda that will Make America Great Again.
Sean is Sean Spicer, the former communications director and chief strategist for the Republican National Committee. Jason is Jason Miller, who worked for Ted Cruz during the Republican presidential primary before joining Trump's team ahead of the general election campaign. And Dan is Dan Sorvino, a Trump loyalist who started running the campaign's social media operation early on.
But Hicks, 28, was one of Trump's first campaign staffers, going back to his announcement in June 2015. She worked for a small New York City public relations firm that represents Trump, became close friends with Trump's eldest daughter, Ivanka who hired Hicks away in 2014. Hicks became an employee of the Trump Organization. Hicks met patriarch Trump and quickly "earned his trust," said Ivanka.
In August 2014, she joined The Trump Organization full-time. In October, 2014, she began working directly for Donald Trump.
In January, 2015, Trump called Hicks into his office on the 26th floor of Trump Tower and told her she was joining his presidential campaign: I think it’s 'the year of the outsider.' It helps to have people with outsider perspective.
Until that time, she had never worked in politics, nor volunteered on a campaign. After Trump's first primary victories, Hicks chose to stay on as press secretary.
During the campaign, Hicks spent most of her days fielding reporters' requests and questions — even taking dictation from Trump to post his tweets.
In December, 2016,Trump named her his Assistant to the President and Director of Strategic Communications.
It's been said she can act as a sort of Trump whisperer, understanding his many moods and professionally executing what needs to be done. She still only calls him "Sir" or "Mr. Trump."
Hicks was born in Greenwich, Connecticut, on the southwest tip of Connecticut that's a favorite spot for hedge-fund headquarters. She was a model, actress, and champion lacrosse player as a child, before getting her English degree at Southern Methodist University.
Former campaign manager, Paul Manafort:
Hope Hicks is incredible...she has shown incredible depth and breadth. I would never know this [was] her first campaign. She has an incredible skill set in dealing with the media.
Hicks had trained at Hiltzik Strategies...Suddenly, she found herself a near-constant presence by Mr. Trump’s side, flying in his jet, living rent-free in a Trump-owned apartment and attending to his mercurial moods. She is arguably the least credentialed press secretary in the modern history of presidential politics.
Hillary Clinton employs a half-dozen battle-hardened media handlers who field hundreds of daily requests. Trump has Hicks.
But for journalists who cover the campaign, she is sometimes the Jekyll to Mr. Trump’s Hyde, emailing angry complaints from her media-bashing boss (“dishonest”) ...: “Best, Hope.”
Seemingly unfazed by her boss’ outbursts, she can detect the best moments for reporters to make requests - knowing, for instance, not to bother Mr. Trump while he is watching a major golf tournament. veteran Republican adviser in charge of the campaign said:
Her most important role is her bond with the candidate..She totally understands him.
Friends of Hicks dismiss concerns that her ties to Mr. Trump could damage her nascent career. She believes in him, his leadership and abilities, and she’s thrown herself completely into this.
But some say they are alarmed that Ms. Hicks is promoting, and defending, a candidate who has been denounced as a demagogue, a racist, a misogynist and even a fascist.
In fact, Hicks is the third generation of her family to represent a powerful but highly controversial client. Her grandfather led public relations for Texaco during the 1970s oil crisis. Her father, Paul B. Hicks III, represented a major tobacco company in Connecticut and later was the top communications executive for the National Football League, where he dealt with scandals over player safety and the Patriots’ deflated footballs.
Her establishment pedigree aside, Hicks does not fit the part of the typical campaign press secretary. Among journalists, Ms. Hicks is not known to wrangle, cajole or mingle, serving as more of a conduit for her intensely media-savvy boss, who likes to act as his own chief spokesman.
Unlike her Clinton counterparts, who take pains to shape their candidate’s image, Ms. Hicks is not active on Twitter and does not show up on cable talk shows. Contacted for this article, she declined to be interviewed, insisting that she did not want to draw attention away from her candidate.
Reporters praise Ms. Hicks for her poise amid a chaotic campaign. But some say that she can be unresponsive to questions, a habit so pervasive that it spawned a mocking, anonymous Twitter account, @HicksNoComment.
On the trail, political reporters say Hicks rarely interacts with them at rallies, preferring to communicate by text or telephone. Hicks, perhaps the only campaign press secretary to have been photographed as a teenager by the fashion photographer Bruce Weber, favors Burberry trench coats and heels, a break from the scruffy ranks of harried campaign operatives. One reporter recalled staggering into a New Hampshire rally after a snowstorm, soaked in water and ice, only to find Hicks dressed impeccably, her makeup unmussed.
During the campaign, she played the role of gatekeeper to press members who wanted to speak with Trump, handling over 250 requests a day, and deciding which reporters would be allowed to speak with him. Hicks also took dictation from Trump for his tweets, and then sent the text to another person in the Trump organization who actually sent out the tweets from Trump's official account.
...Hicks is a friendly, if disciplined, presence — Southern charm by way of Fairfield County. And she is unfailingly deferential to her employer, whom she refers to only as “Mr. Trump” or “sir.”
People close to her describe Hicks as a friendly, loyal fighter. She has an incredible work ethic.
Personal notes
- Parents, father, Paul B. Hicks III, mother, Caye Cavender Hicks
- Father, managing director of the Glover Park Group, Regional CEO; Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, executive vice president of communications; executive, National Football League; a former town selectman honored for his philanthropy,
- Mother, a former aide to a Democratic congressman
- Sister, Mary Grace, paramedic
- Undergraduate degree in English from Southern Methodist University
- Private sector: Hiltzik Strategies, the Trump Organization
- Youngest White House Communications Director in history
- Face of the Hourglass Adventures novels about a time-traveling 10-year-old,she her sister were teenage models, having posed for a Ralph Lauren campaign
- If the acting thing doesn’t work out I could really see myself in politics. Who knows?
President Trump has a magnetic personality and exudes positive energy, which is infectious to those around him. He has an unparalleled ability to communicate with people, whether he is speaking to a room of three or an arena of 30,000. He has built great relationships throughout his life and treats everyone with respect. He is brilliant with a great sense of humor ... and an amazing ability to make people feel special and aspire to be more than even they thought possible.
There is just no way that a camera or an episode or a documentary could capture what has gone on. There is nothing like it...It is the most unbelievable, awe-inspiring thing.
http://www.townandcountrymag.com/society/politics/news/a9056/hope-hicks-facts/
RACHEL BRAND
United States Associate Attorney General
In May, 2017, President Trump appointed Rachel Lee Brand U. S. Associate Attorney General for the Office of Legal Policy. Her appointment was confirmed 52–46 by the U.S. Senate. As the No. 3 person in the Department of Justice, she is responsible for overseeing the lawyers who deal with civil rights, environmental, and antitrust issues.
Prior to her appointment as Associate Attorney General, Brand had been an associate professor at Antonin Scalia Law School.
Neal Katyal, former acting solicitor general in the Obama administration who had worked with Brand:
She’s a top-notch analytic lawyer and really good at figuring out what is the art of the possible,...
She was questioned in her confirmation hearing in the Senate by Democrats who criticized her for her experience representing corporate interests, charging that she would have a conflict of interest.
She pointed out that, whether representing a private client or representing the United States,in each instance, the lawyer's duty would be to be pursuing the client's interests.
Rachel Lee Brand is an American lawyer, academic, and government official. After graduating from Harvard Law School, Brand clerked for Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy.
Brand was appointed by President Barack Obama to serve on the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board and was an Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Policy in the George W. Bush administration. In that capacity, Brand served as chief policy adviser to the Attorney General, handling a broad range of national security, law enforcement, and civil justice issues. She also oversaw the development of all regulations promulgated by the Department of Justice and managed the Department's role in selecting federal judges.
She had been part of the legal team representing George W. Bush during the 2000 United States presidential election recount in Florida,and also served briefly as associate counsel in Bush's transition team.
Thereafter, Brand represented the Chamber of Commerce in litigation, where she was responsible for challenging Obama administration regulations issued by agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Labor Department. The Chamber filed amicus briefs in about 100 cases a year and also engage in its own litigation.
Brand : Some ...cases are very high-profile; others are not as high-profile, but they’re important to members and have an economic impact...There’s a perception that we file a new lawsuit a week. That’s not true. We’re judicious, but we’re not afraid to litigate when it’s necessary.
Brand was on the Chamber's brief for respondent Noel Canning in the landmark Supreme Court decision NLRB v. Noel Canning.
Brand’s most high-profile victory at the Chamber was when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit invalidated several recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board.
Brand has extensive experience in the Justice Department and working in the private sector, focusing primarily on corporate, business, and antitrust cases. She lacks criminal law experience which might be required if she is charged with taking over the Russian investigation.
At the Department of Justice, Brand worked on the re-authorization of the Patriot Act. She testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the the benefits of using administrative subpoenas in terrorism investigations. She dissented from several recommendations regarding the report on the NSA's bulk metadata collection program. She did not agree that the program was illegal as a statutory matter and argued that, in policy terms, it struck a justifiable balance between privacy and national security and should not be discontinued. The recommendation, however, was for termination.
Personal notes
- Parents, father Ivan, mother Ruth
- Husband, Jonathan Cohn, lawyer
- Children, William, Gerrit
- Obtained undergraduate degree from the University of Minnesota, earned J.D., cum laude, Harvard University
- Private sector: private law firm; Chamber of Commerce; Heritage Foundation
- First woman to serve as Associate Attorney General
When I was at the Chamber of Commerce, I had a client, the Chamber of Commerce, and, as a litigator there, my job was to file lawsuits and file amicus briefs on behalf of that client. ... If I’m confirmed to this position [Associate Attorney General], of course, I’ll have a very different role. ... My client will be the United States, and my role will be to serve the public interest and the interest of justice, representing that client as best I can.
DINA POWELL
Deputy National Security Adviser
Adviser.
Dina Habib Powell is a non-profit executive, philanthropist, and U.S. policymaker. She is is an Egyptian-American and Coptic-American. She is also Assistant to the President and Senior Counselor for Economic Initiatives, a position that she continues in and spends about 20 percent of her time on.
Prior to accepting these White House positions, Powell was a managing director and partner at Goldman Sachs and president of its non-profit subsidiary, the Goldman Sachs Foundation. In the latter capacity, she ran the Foundation's 10,000 Women program.
Before that, she served in the George W. Bush administration as Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs, Deputy Undersecretary of State for Public Affairs and Public Diplomacy, and an Assistant to the President for Presidential Personnel.
Dina Habib Powell was born in Cairo, Egypt to a middle-class Coptic Christian family. They emigrated to America when she was a child. She knew no English.
The Habib family settled in Dallas, Texas, where they had relatives among the Coptic community there. The parents ran a convenience store. Her father also worked at times as a bus driver and in real estate, while her mother sometimes worked as a social worker. Each of the family members became naturalized citizens.
While Powell quickly learned English at school, her family insisted that she be raised with Egyptian culture and language as well. As a result, she is fluent in Arabic. Of her parents' actions, she later said,
I so desperately wanted a turkey and cheese sandwich with potato chips, and instead I always got grape leaves and hummus and falafel, not even in a cool brown paper bag. And now, of course, I appreciate so much that I did.
She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts, where she enrolled in the Liberal Arts Plan I Honors Program, studying a mixture of humanities, sociology, political science, and criminology.
While in college, Habib worked as a legislative assistant for two Republican Texas State Senators. She had grown up in a family that strongly identified with the Republican Party and had greatly admired Ronald Reagan.
She adopted the same views, later recalling that
... when I started to work with Republicans, I realized that I agree with the views of personal empowerment, of less government involvement, ...I'm definitely a believer that people should spend more of their money and spend it the way they think so and invest it wisely.
[Emphasis added.]
Habib had been accepted by a law school when she received an offer of a one year internship with Texas U.S. Senator, Kay Bailey Hutchinson. Her parents wanted her to become an engineer, doctor, or lawyer, but she deferred school, began a series of jobs and never went to law school.
She worked for four years on the staff of the House Republican Majority Leader, Dick Armey:
We immediately recognized her brains and her ability, and then her charm, and finally, I think somebody noticed she was gorgeous, too.
She became Director of Congressional Affairs with the Republican National Committee, and became involved in the George W. Bush 2000 presidential campaign.
Powell noted the effect on her parents.
It affirmed for them the tough decision to leave everything they knew behind. In what other country could an immigrant family go from risking it all to one day having their daughter work for the president?
Powell served as the Assistant to the President for Presidential Personnel, assisting the President on appointments across the U.S. Government. At age 29, she was the youngest person ever to hold the position. Her experience in that job confirmed her belief that the United States is a meritocracy.
State Department
Working with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Powell obtained foreign policy experience
and became Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs. News of the nomination made her a celebrity in Egypt.
Powell was also designated by Secretary Rice to the office of Deputy Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. Powell established several public-private partnerships between American corporations and foreign entities. She brought about cultural exchanges between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran.
In 2007, she left the White House and government service. She had been the highest-ranking Arab-American in the Bush administration.
A Republican member of Congress:
She was recognized as especially effective: ...because she speaks Arabic and is an Arab woman and can stand up as a role model and as somebody who can defuse some of the misperceptions.
Secretary Rice:
I'm really sorry to lose her. She is fantastic. She had so many ideas. There are people who have ideas but can't execute them. She really executed them.
Goldman Sachs
Powell joined Goldman Sachs as a managing director, she was made partner, achieving one of the most highly sought-after prizes in American finance. She served as president of the Goldman Sachs Foundation beginning in 2010, in addition to her responsibilities as global head of the Office of Corporate Engagement and a member of the Goldman Sachs Partnership Committee.
Goldman Sachs partnered with International Finance Corporation and Overseas Private Investment Corporation to raise 600 million dollars, to provide access to capital for more than 100,000 women worldwide, with Powell working closely with the U.S. State Department.
Powell also led Goldman Sachs Gives, a vehicle to consolidate Goldman Sachs partners’ charitable giving, in support of communities around the world.
The Trump Administration
She had no relationship with Donald Trump or his family until after the 2016, when she got 'an out-of-nowhere' call from Ivanka Trump, who was interested in the metrics by which the success of 10,000 Women was measured. Powell became involved with the incoming administration's transition period, particularly with regard to the empowerment of women and the potentialities of female entrepreneurship. Powell quickly became a trusted adviser.
Starting January, 2017, Powell began serving as Senior Adviser to the President for Entrepreneurship, Economic Growth and the Empowerment of Women. Beyond that role, she was with the President in a a meeting with Saudi Defense Minister Mohammed bin Salman. She shared responsibility for overseeing a $200 billion worth of U.S.-Saudi deals.
Powell's network of contacts in the financial, corporate, and governmental worlds proved a valuable asset for the new administration, all of which led to her appointment in March, 2017, as Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategy.
She had been heavily involved in the planning for the Middle Eastern portion of the President's trip. A story broke purporting to reveal Trump revealed classified information to Russia. She had been in the room. In characteristic form, she immediately set the record straight: This story is false.
She was among the top officials escorting the chief executive on his first foreign trip in May, 2017, with a two-day stay in Saudi Arabia.
Beginning June, 2017, Powell initiated efforts to free American hostages held in countries overseas. Powell was one of the key figures in securing the release of Egyptian aid worker Aya Hijaz.
White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Powell was a "trusted adviser" and, referencing Powell's plans to leave in early 2017, said that Powell would "continue to support the President's agenda and work on Middle East policy."
Personal notes
- Parents, father Onsi Habib, mother Hoda Soliman
- Father worked as a bus driver and in real estate, was Captain in the Egyptian Army
- Mother, a social worker
- Husband, Richard C. Powell, president Teneo, public relations firm firmed by Clinton associates
- Children
- Obtained undergraduate degree in Humanities with honors from University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts
- Private sector: Goldman, Sachs
- Awards, “Outstanding American by Choice” recognizes outstanding achievements of naturalized U.S. citizens.
If we really want... to help create more jobs around the world and insure economic stability, women are a very smart investment... solving big global challenges would be in the form of women being empowered around the world.
KATY TALENTO
White House Healthcare Adviser
In, January, 2017, President Trump appointed Katy French Talento White House Healthcare Adviser to work on health care policy for the White House Domestic Policy Council, which coordinates domestic policy-making. She was most recently legislative director for North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis.
Talento received a degree in Sociology from the University of Virginia, and earned a Master of Science degree in Infectious Disease Epidemiology from Harvard University.
Talento was a research Instructor on the faculty of Georgetown University School of Medicine’s Department of Family Medicine. Her research interests focused on pulmonary disease and the environment, HIV prevention among injection drug users in the U.S. and Russia, dracunculiasis eradication in south Sudan, federal hepatitis C policy, and the association between HIV viral load and metabolic activity.
Talento evaluated Federal substance abuse treatment and prevention programs for a private consulting firm, Caliber Associates. She served for several years as the Program Evaluator and Associate Director of Contracts and Grants for Whitman-Walker Clinic, Inc, the largest, community-based HIV/AIDS service and prevention organization in the U.S
Talento came to Capitol Hill in 2001 as a professional staff member for the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. She advised Chairman Judd Gregg, on public health issues, including biodefense, HIV/AIDS, malaria and other tropical diseases, cancer, women’s health and public health infrastructure in global and domestic settings, and oversight of NIH, CDC, USAID and other State department health programs. She then joined Senator Brownback’s staff as a Senior Policy Adviser, advising the Senator on global and domestic health, foreign assistance, disability and labor issues.
Talento was the Republican Deputy Staff Director for the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. She specifically oversaw the Governmental Affairs team that investigated waste, fraud, and ineffectiveness in government programs at every federal agency.
She was the Staff Director for the Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management and shepherded into enactment global health priorities on HIV/AIDS , World Bank health programs, WHO and Global Fund reform.
Talento has linked some forms of birth control to abortion. In 2015, discussing these links in The Federalist, she raised the questions:
Is chemical birth control causing miscarriages of already-conceived children? What about breaking your uterus for good?
Personal Notes
- Private Sector: Caliber Associates consulting firm, Whitman-Walker Clinic, Inc.
- Education: Obtained undergraduate degree in Sociology from University of Virginia, Master of Science degree in Infectious Disease Epidemiology from Harvard School of Public Health; for two years, Studied to
be a nun
We do violence against human dignity when we agree with someone who has decided that his own body is his enemy. We can not escape our bodies, no matter how aggressively we reject, medicate, poison, mutilate or even kill our bodies, as the sad teenager referred to in The Federalist piece did. In the end, our personhood is an inextricable combination of soul and body. To damage one is to damage them both. To reject one is ultimately a rejection of both and the psychological carnage of this self-rejection can not be avoided. The idea that we can separate our true personhood from our body is an ancient heresy that raises its head in different forms in every age.
We shouldn't be trying to medicate away pregnancy...You don't have to ingest a bunch of carcinogens to plan your family.
JOVITA CARRANZA
United States Treasurer
In January, 2017, President Trump appointed Jovita Carranza to be Treasurer of the United States.
Prior to the SBA appointment, Carranza served as Vice President of Air Operations for United Parcel Service [UPS], worlds largest package delivery in charge of the automated package processing operation.
Previously she served as the Deputy Administrator for the Small Business Administration, appointed by President George W. Bush. She served in that position from 2006-2009. As Deputy Administrator, she helped to manage an agency with more than 80 field offices across the country and a portfolio of direct and guaranteed business loans, venture capital investments and disaster loans worth almost $80 billion. In an effort to improve customer response, Carranza led key operational improvement initiatives and projects.
Currently, Carranza is the founder and president of The JCR Group, a consulting firm serving corporations and NGOs on issues of business development and profit and loss management for corporations and non-profits.
Carranza started her business career with UPS as a part-time, night-shift box handler. She became a full time employee gaining experience and demonstrating her ability. She was made Vice president, managing domestic operations and president of international operations for Latin America and the Caribbean. Before she left UPS , she served as Vice president of Aid Operations.
Active active in the community, Carranza serves on the boards of United Way, National Center for Family Literacy, National Council of La Raza, SCORE, Alverno College and the American Cancer Society Corporate Advisory Council, and nonprofit organizations [e.g.,the National Center for Family Literacy and United Way] as well as in a variety of other civic capacities focused on economic empowerment, business development, education, health & humanitarian relief.
Carranza has been involved in the UPS Congressional Contact program, chaired corporate committees responsible for global strategies and has had experience with public speaking and advisory councils in multiple venues.
Carranza is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including “Woman of the Year” by Hispanic Business Magazine, “Woman of Distinction” by the American Association of University Women and NASPA.
Carranza is a columnist and commentator on political and business issues. She has lectured at Johns Hopkins University.
Carranza earned her MBA from the University of Miami (FL). She has received executive, management and financial training at the INSEAD Business School in Paris, France, the University of Michigan and the University of Chicago.
Personal notes
- Parents born in Chicago, first-generation immigrant Mexican American family.
- Husband Joel Roque
- Child, Klaudene
- Obtained undergraduate degree from California State University, Los Angeles, earned MBA from University of Miami, received executive, management and financial training at the INSEAD Business School in Paris, France, the University of Michigan and the University of Chicago
- Private Sector: President & CEO of JCR Group; Vice president of Operation UPS
The myRA program was created to help low to middle income earners start saving for retirement. Unfortunately, there has been very little demand for the program, and the cost to taxpayers cannot be justified by the assets in the program. Fortunately, ample private sector solutions exist, which resulted in less appeal for myRA. We will be phasing out the myRA program over the coming months. We will be communicating frequently with participants to help facilitate a smooth transition to other investment opportunities.
Senior Communications Adviser
In September,President Trump appointed Mercedes Schlapp to be Senior Communications Adviser.
Mercedes "Mercy" Schlapp [née Viana] is a longtime Washington resident and conservative commentator and columnist. She is the daughter of a Cuban political prisoner and wife of American Conservative Union leader Matt Schlapp. She stated: Honored to serve Donald Trump and the nation.
Schlapp is a first-generation Cuban-American raised in Florida, whose father was jailed for six years by the Castro regime. She is married to Matt Schlapp, since 2014 the chairman of the American Conservative Union. They met in the Bush White House in 2001; he was a Midwesterner in the political department. They have five daughters and attend Catholic church.
Schlapp worked on local and national political campaigns, as well as the 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns for George W. Bush, and was Director of Specialty Media in his administration.
Later, she was a columnist for several publications including U.S. News & World Report and The Washington Times. Together with her husband, Schlapp founded Cove Strategies, a government and public affairs firm based in Alexandria.
Prior to the 2016 election, Schlapp stated:
[Trump] has made it clear where he’s going to go forward on the Supreme Court, and he’s talked issues that are resonating with the American worker...Plus he’s laid out a tax reform plan ...going to cut taxes and cut regulation which we hope will boost the economy.
Schlapp was on the Bill Maher TV show; when the abortion issue was raised, and another guest noted that five million people have been born through in-vitro fertilization since 1978. Schlapp stated: "Babies are babies."
Maher broke in: "I'm always for less (sic) babies being born because we do not have the ..."
Schlapp interupted:-- "That's horrible, Bill. .... I'm the mother of five kids!"
Then this exchange occurred-
Maher :"Well, you shouldn't be!"
Schlapp -- "My poor children! They're awesome!"
Maher -- "Well, that's super selfish in a world ..." In the back-and-forth, Schlapp posited that her kids will be "contributors to our society" and Maher stated her children were "takers" of the world's limited resources.
Schlapp responded that, as the birth rate "continues to decrease...at least the Schlapps are providing some extra kids ..."
The writer of the article, weighed in:
Bringing up five children isn't selfish, it's selfless, providing that the parents, preferably married, possess the wherewithal and fortitude to raise them. Parroting the conventional wisdom about demographics, Maher is off the mark by a country mile. Concerns about overpopulation were widespread in the '60s and '70s, but reality has trumped them in the decades since. Last year, the birth rate in the U.S. dropped to its lowest level in more than a century. It was the sixth straight year of decline and a nearly 10 percent slide since 2007. The fertility rate (average number of children for each woman) now stands at 1.86, well below the replacement rate of 2.1. If not for immigration, the nation's population would be shrinking.
[Emphasis added.] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4878664/Conservative-commentator-Mercedes-Schlapp-joins-White-House.html#ixzz54avdADv0
Personal notes
- Named after the patron saint of political prisoners, Virgin Mercedes, to whom her father prayed after he was arrested for allegedly planning an attempt to assassinate Fidel Castro
- Children, Ava, Viana, Lucia Elissa, Caterina
- Obtained undergraduate degree Florida InternationalUniversity , earned MPA from George Washington University
- Private sector: Cove Strategies; columnist
When she was a "guest" on Bill Maher's TV show, he called her "super selfish" to have "5 kids" Her response:
My ... children...[are] awesome...[and will be] contributors to our society.
IN ADDITION TO CAREER PROFESSIONALS: MELANIA TRUMP AND IVANKA TRUMP
MELANIA TRUMP
First Lady Melania Trump, has stepped up to the plate big time in crises such as Hurricane Harvey.
A majority of Americans now view Melania Trump favorably.
She speaks six languages: Slovenian, French, Serbian, German, Italian and English.
While the general public’s favorable view of Melania is rising, the Left, as usual, lie to find fault. E.g. the Left criticized her for her choice in footwear, on a plane to visit Hurricane Harvey victims in Texas wearing stilettos. The Left did not tell us that she changed into sneakers before arriving. More whining from the Left that the White House Christmas observations were not 'appropriate', and, can you believe this, that her posture was 'rigid' when watching ballerinas perform during preparation for Christmas festivities.
These people are deranged.
http://www.foxnews.co /opiniomn/2018/01/20/first-lady-melania-trump-marks-first-year-with-grace-and-dignity.html
IVANKA TRUMP
Ivanaka Trump is a businesswoman, fashion designer, author, actor and model. She is an advisor to President Trump. She is the first Jewish member of a First Family. She has been an executive vice president of the family owned Trump Organization; starting in late March, 2017, she became an official employee in his administration.
She attended Georgetown University for two years, then transferred to the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania from which she graduated cum laude with a degree in Economics.
CONCLUSION
Yes, Mr. President, Thumbs up indeed,
The foregoing exposes the Joseph Goebel-sized lies of the deranged Left.
Each day,the Left become more shrill and hysterical, undeterred by truth, logic or even simple decency.
The foregoing demonstrates beyond any doubt that President Trump is neither a racist nor a misogynist. Nor is he anti LEGAL immigration. Has any President staffed his agenda with more women in important positions? I doubt it.
The 17 women listed here include those of various ethnicity, some born in foreign countries, others brought to the United States by their immigrant parents. Many experienced serious hardship.
However, certain qualities were common to all:
Exceptional intelligence, significant experience and know-how, absolute dedication, and guts.
As indicated in the profile Note, some campaigned for rival candidates and/or some disagreed with President Trump on various issues. The President made his selections based on merit!
Thanks to your [Republican women] energy and talent, you’ve often been called the foot soldiers of our party. But that description is becoming outdated. You’ve got a good share of generals in your ranks—and that share is growing ...Above all, we must realize that no arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women. It is a weapon our adversaries in today’s world do not have.
Ronald Reagan