Stick a Fork in It, the Retirement Buyout Offer is Over

According to The Hill, 75,000 of us feds accepted the deferred retirement offer (here), and we can trust The Hill to be accurate and unbiased about that since it's probably been state-supported media all along.

The figure — 3.75 percent of the nation’s 2 million federal employees — falls short of the projected 5 percent to 10 percent of federal employees the White House expected to take the deal.

Add to that the normal annual attrition of federal employees, which IIRC is just under six percent, and you almost get to the ten percent reduction target by the end of the fiscal year. 

Fans of statistics will object that we aren't correcting those numbers for what proportion of feds were not allowed to take the offer, etc., which if we did, might make that 3.75 number larger. But those guys have probably been laid off by now, so ignore that quibbling. 

As for the other 96.25 percent of us, many were scrambling this past week to document the statutory authority which justifies their function. Frankly, though, crying you will respect muh authoritah! is a thin reed to cling to when the Reduction in Force winds begin to blow. Some of those functions just plain do not align with current administration policies. Some are directly opposed to those policies. 

"Elections have consequences" as another POTUS famously said, and we will see those consequences played out in the next few months.

It may be some comfort to recall that this is not the first time a POTUS has taken an ax to government staffing.

Trump Admin Springs US Citizen Prisoner From Russia

13 years early on his 14 year sentence. https://t.co/a81wtExvia

— TSB (@TweetingTSB) February 11, 2025

Mr. Fogel is breathing the sweet air of freedom tonight, plus all the weed he wants.  

Disaster Assistance Response Team Employee Misses Opportunity To Make the Case For USAID Funding

An American aid worker describes the implosion of the humanitarian mission to support rape and famine victims in Sudanhttps://t.co/EMzWQT89ti

— Rolling Stone Politics (@RSPolitics) February 7, 2025

DART is a small and specialized part of what USAID does, and it represents the agency's most politically defendable and humanitarian mission. The Rolling Stone story is worth the four minutes it will take you to read. 

Here are the first two paras of a transcribed chat:

What is your role with USAID? I work on the Disaster Assistance Response Team for the Sudan Complex Emergency, [funding] partners like WFP, UNICEF, and other international NGOs. I work with impressive, dedicated, honest people who want the same thing: to help alleviate suffering from the most vulnerable. We just found out we have all been terminated; for me, in less than 30 days.

What does that mean for your work? Though we were treated poorly during this, we aren't the real casualties of this political war. The programs we delivered saved lives by providing food and nutrition to SAM (severe acute malnutrition) children, and clean water and health needs for women in Sudan who were raped or impregnated by soldiers and gangs. All down the drain. We have abandoned all of it, as of now. Our NGO partners have laid people off and aid is no longer getting to those most vulnerable. It's a horrible feeling to let all that go. I feel empty and angry, sad, unvalued, confused. It hurts.

You get the sense of it from that snippit. I won't dispute anything the DART guy said. But I will point out that DART delivers all that humanitarian aid by funding its implementing partners - those NGOs and UN programs - who are the parties actually delivering the assistance. 

That being the case, does USAID need much of a field presence other than to audit contract compliance? Probably not. 

And could that necessary presence be provided just as well by DOS instead of USAID? Probably so. 

But notwithstanding all of that, what annoys me about this media piece in defense of USAID is its complete one-sidedness. No mention of the money spent on totally non-humanitarian programs, especially on funding news and opinion media outlets both at home and around the world, which is what brought USAID down. 

The humanitarian mission has public support. Funding the BBC and Politico does not. 

The interviewee and his co-workers could have improved the public perception of USAID's value by objecting to the millions USAID spent on buying media influence and other 'soft power' whim-wham rather than on his starving Sudanese. You know, be whistleblowers instead of whiners.  

That would have been an attractive proposition for MAGA and The Trumpening, I'd bet. But it's an opportunity lost, and from the looks of it, permanently.

Will U.S. Security Sub-Contractors Man a Gaza Checkpoint??

Read about it here, but frankly, I hit my limit for belief at this sentence: "It was unclear what would happen if the Americans were attacked or captured, or which nation's law would govern the contractor's actions." 

All of that has been unclear in every previous incident of armed contractors in war zones, so why would we have any clarity about it this time? It's not like we learn from past experience, after all.  

 

Are we really doing that again? No way, surely. 

WASHINGTON (Reuters)  A small U.S. security firm is hiring nearly 100 U.S. special forces veterans to help run a checkpoint in Gaza during the Israel-Hamas truce, according to a company spokesperson and a recruitment email seen by Reuters, introducing armed American contractors into the heart of one of the world's most violent conflict zones.

UG Solutions - a low-profile company founded in 2023 and based in Davidson, North Carolina - is offering a daily rate starting at $1,100 with a $10,000 advance to veterans it hires, the email said. They will staff the checkpoint at a key intersection in Gaza's interior, said the spokesperson, who confirmed the authenticity of the email. 

Some people have been recruited and are already at the checkpoint, said the spokesperson, speaking on condition of anonymity. He did not say how many contractors were already in Gaza. 

-- snip-- 

Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel on Tuesday told reporters, without naming UG Solutions or the United States, that Israel had demanded that the deal include the use of a private security firm, working with "an Egyptian security company or forces" to help maintain security and humanitarian aid flows in Gaza. 

But, she said, it remained to be seen if the arrangement "actually works." 

--snip--

A separate source familiar with the deal said Israel and unnamed "Arab countries" that worked on the agreement are funding the consortium. The U.S. government had no direct involvement in the decision to include a security company in the ceasefire deal or in the awarding of the contract, the source said.

This genius scheme ought to come undone as soon as the USG acquires some direct involvement in that decision. 

About Those "Military Aged Males" Who Crossed Our Border: Hell No, They Won't Go! Or Will They?

Hey, Tom Homan, you're missing a good one here. It appears there is a new and very large group of alien criminal offenders who are prime for your attention.  

This story may have been lost amid all the other news about immigration enforcement lately, but it points out a surprising deportation predicate that's gone ignored, and, for those of us of a certain age, it's also a blast from the past. 

To wit, the fearsome draft card.

A top government accountability group will send a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the U.S. Selective Service System (SSS) for data on illegal immigrants who did not register for the draft and therefore committed a felony.

By law, all U.S. males aged 18-26 must register with the SSS under penalty of felony conviction and $250,000 fine under the Military Selective Service Act of 1917, Howell’s group noted in their filing.

Additionally, the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952 makes failure to register with the SSS a deportable offense, and the SSS website clearly states undocumented aliens are required to sign up for the draft, Howell noted.

-- snip --

In a Thursday interview, Howell and attorney Kyle Brosnan said SSS registration has been flat during the Biden administration as far as it relates to the obvious uptick in "military-aged males" crossing the border and being "caught-and-released" by federal immigration authorities.

"The absence of such a surge indicates that there is widespread criminal non-compliance by such aliens," they wrote in their FOIA request. "There should be a large increase in [SSS registration] with 10 million illegals that have come over the border in the last four years."

Well, well, well. When the Biden administration was processing and releasing all those male border crossers over the last four years, did it register them with Selective Service?

Rhetorical question, of course.

But if it did not, then what is there to stop the new administration from charging them with a serious crime and expediting their deportation?

SecState Rubio Sends an ALDAC and a Shot Across the Bows

On his first full day as SecState, Mario Rubio delivered a strong message about the priorities and missions of State under the second Trump administration. 

Here's the gist of them:

The State Department will no longer undertake any activities that facilitate or encourage mass migration … [Western Hemisphere priorities will become] stopping illegal and destabilizing migration, and negotiating the repatriation of illegal immigrants.

President Trump issued an executive order eliminating “DEIA” requirements, programs, and offices throughout the government. This order will be faithfully executed and observed in both letter and spirit.

[E]liminating our focus on political and cultural causes that are divisive at home and deeply unpopular abroad.

[S]upport and defend Americans’ rights to free speech, terminating any programs that in any way lead to censoring the American people.

[D]o away with climate policies that weaken America … [and support] a return to American energy dominance.

You can't fault the man for either directness or promptness.

Unfinished Business With Jordan and Justice - Will Trump Make Extradition Great Again?

A year ago, the Conference of Presidents which speaks for America's major Jewish groups wrote an emphatic letter to Sec of State Antony Blinken. He didn't answer. This week, the COP renewed its call, this time to the Trump Administration. It concerns Jordan, justice, the… https://t.co/U7sOYMRbhA pic.twitter.com/SenocSHePC

— Arnold Roth (@arnoldroth) January 21, 2025

Now that we have a new-ish administration, I wonder what appetite it may have for bringing justice to a notorious most wanted terrorist who is hiding in plain sight in Jordan? 

See this old post or this one for details but, trust me, this is exactly the kind of business that ought to interest the Trump administration, or so you would think. 

Al-Tamimi murdered U.S. citizens, so she has an ass-kicking coming to her from the fellow citizens of those victims. 

Will Trump finally act on her now that he has a second chance to run our foreign affairs with his customary heavy hand? No one would deserve that more.