Washington DC

Subterms

    More stories

    • 138 Shares129 Views

      in US Politics

      Outcry as White House starts dictating which journalists can access Trump

      by

      The Trump administration announced it will take control of the White House press pool, stripping the independent White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) of its longstanding role in deciding which journalists have access to the president in intimate settings.The move has immediately triggered an impassioned response from members of the media – including a Fox News correspondent who called it a “short-sighted decision”.The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, made the announcement during Tuesday’s press briefing, framing the move as democratizing access to the president.“A group of DC-based journalists, the White House Correspondents’ Association, has long dictated which journalists get to ask questions of the president of the United States,” Leavitt said.“Not any more. Today, I was proud to announce that we are giving the power back to the people.”The announcement upended more than 70 years of protocol of journalists – not government officials – determining which rotating reporters travel with the president on Air Force One and cover events in the Oval Office or Roosevelt Room.“Moving forward, the White House press pool will be determined by the White House press team,” Leavitt said. She added that while legacy outlets would still be included, the administration would be “offering the privilege to well-deserving outlets who have never been allowed to share in this awesome responsibility” – notably podcasters and rightwing media.As the media reeled from the attack on the press pool, the three main wire services that routinely report on the US presidency released a joint statement protesting Donald Trump’s decision to bar the Associated Press from official events.Reuters and Bloomberg News joined AP in decrying Trump’s move to restrict AP’s access to the president. The top editors of each of the wires said the unprecedented action had threatened the principle of open reporting and would harm the spread of reliable information to individuals, communities, businesses and global financial markets.“It is essential in a democracy for the public to have access to news about their government from an independent, free press,” the three editors said.The standoff between Trump and AP began on 14 February when the White House announced it was indefinitely barring AP reporters from the Oval Office and Air Force One. Officials said the step had been taken to punish AP for refusing to amend its style guide to change the Gulf of Mexico to the “Gulf of America”, as Trump had dictated.AP immediately sued over the restriction, but on Monday a federal judge declined to restore the wire service’s access to presidential events in the short term. Another hearing in the case, which is ongoing, is scheduled for next month.The White House wasted no time implementing the new policy over the composition of the press pool, ejecting a HuffPost reporter from Wednesday’s press pool rotation and removing Reuters from its traditional spot – just one day after the announcement. Also on Wednesday morning, Trump mused on legal action against journalists and publishers in a Truth Social post.“At some point I am going to sue some of these dishonest authors and book publishers, or even media in general, to find out whether or not these ‘anonymous sources’ even exist,” Trump posted, adding: “maybe we will create some NICE NEW LAW!!!”The announcement triggered immediate alarm among journalists who argue that the role of the WHCA is to make sure Americans who use any of the major mediums – including radio, television, print, wires and photography – are able to get the same access to Trump’s world.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“This move does not give the power back to the people – it gives power to the White House,” posted Jacqui Heinrich, a Fox News senior White House correspondent and WHCA board member. “The WHCA is democratically elected by the full-time White House press corps.”Heinrich added: “WHCA has determined pools for decades because only representatives FROM our outlets can determine resources all those outlets have – such as staffing – in order to get the President’s message out to the largest possible audience, no matter the day or hour.”In a separate missive on X, Heinrich also pointed out the press corps “from across a broad spectrum of tv, radio, print, stills, wires and new media” cover the White House full-time.“This is a short-sighted decision, and it will feel a lot different when a future Democratic administration kicks out conservative-leaning outlets and other critical voices,” she wrote.The WHCA president, Eugene Daniels, said the move “tears at the independence of a free press in the United States” and “suggests the government will choose the journalists who cover the president”. He noted the White House did not consult with the WHCA before making the announcement.Later on Wednesday, the White House denied reporters from Reuters and other news organizations access to Trump’s first cabinet meeting in keeping with the administration’s new policy regarding media coverage.The White House denied access to an Associated Press photographer and three reporters from Reuters, HuffPost and Der Tagesspiegel, a German newspaper. More

    • 175 Shares139 Views

      in US Politics

      ‘He believes he is the law’: anti-Maga conservatives view Trump as threat to constitution

      by

      Michael Fanone, the former police officer who defended the US Capitol on 6 January 2021, looked out at the attendees of the Principles First summit and denounced Donald Trump in the strongest possible terms for pardoning roughly 1,500 people who participated in the insurrection.“He pardoned them because he wants people to know that if you commit crimes on his behalf, he’s got your back,” Fanone said on Saturday. “They are operating under the assumption that, if they commit violent criminal acts on Donald Trump’s behalf, that he will pardon them for future violence.”Fanone’s words appeared prescient later that afternoon, when he and three other officers were confronted by Enrique Tarrio, the former leader of the far-right Proud Boys group. Tarrio received a prison sentence of 22 years for seditious conspiracy and other charges related to his role in the insurrection, but Trump pardoned him last month. In a video that Tarrio shared on social media, he taunted Fanone and the other officers – Daniel Hodges of the Metropolitan police department and former Capitol police officers Aquilino Gonell and Harry Dunn – as “fucking cowards”.The intimidation continued the next day at the summit, when an email account bearing the name “Enrique T” sent a bomb threat to the organizers of the conference. The threat specifically named several summit speakers, including Fanone, as the targets of four pipe bombs. Tarrio denied any involvement in the incident, which turned out to be a false alarm, but still forced attendees to evacuate the conference room hosting the summit for about two hours as police officers conducted a security sweep.The threats underscored a message shared by nearly every speaker at the Principles First summit, which is considered a center-right alternative to the Conservative Political Action Conference. One by one, speakers took the stage to voice their shared belief that Trump represents a fundamental threat to the rule of law and the integrity of the US constitution.“President Trump has diminished the rule of law in America,” Asa Hutchinson, a former Republican presidential candidate, said on Saturday. “President Trump, because the supreme court gave him immunity, believes he is the law.”Multiple speakers cited Trump’s recent clash with Janet Mills, the Democratic governor of Maine, as evidence of his autocratic tendencies. In a combative exchange that went viral online, Trump asked Mills, who was attending a White House event alongside other governors, whether she intended to comply with his executive order on transgender athletes.“I’m complying with state and federal laws,” Mills replied.Trump responded: “We are the federal law.”Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey who served as a close adviser to Trump before becoming one of the president’s most vocal Republican critics, described that comment as “the most important thing he has said in the last two weeks because that tells you exactly what he thinks”.“He believes that the attorney general of the United States is his personal lawyer,” Christie said at the Principles First summit on Saturday. “He believes the Department of Justice is to do what he instructs them to do.”Even as summit speakers warned of the serious threat that Trump and his allies pose to the foundations of US government, they implored attendees to stand up for their principles.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“I know these people. They are cowards,” said Tim Miller, a writer for the Bulwark and communications director for Republican former presidential candidate Jeb Bush. “Speaking out right now is a good in itself … Our job is to say no to this, to stand up to them and to not be afraid because they want you to be afraid, and you have no reason to be fearful of these little men.”Multiple speakers predicted Trump will eventually violate court orders and they urged any American who supported a robust democracy to protest the president’s unconstitutional acts when they occur.“People need to be in the streets. People need to be strongly reacting against it,” said Gregg Nunziata, executive director of the Society for the Rule of Law. “We really do need conservatives and Republicans to be in that number for this to work.”Mark Cuban, the billionaire entrepreneur who is considered a potential presidential candidate in 2028, but who told the conference on Saturday he does not plan on running, suggested that the “chaos” unleashed by Trump’s first month in office may provide an opening for the president’s critics to present an alternative vision for the country’s future.“The opportunity for the Democrats and businesspeople, and you for that matter, is to stand up and look for ways to create calm and order out of chaos,” Cuban said. More

    • 188 Shares129 Views

      in US Politics

      Bomb threat sent to anti-Trump conference singles out officer who tangled with ex-Proud Boys leader

      by

      Attendees of a center-right political conference in Washington DC were forced to evacuate on Sunday, after someone claiming to be Enrique Tarrio, the former leader of the far-right Proud Boys group who was convicted and then pardoned for his role in the January 6 insurrection, allegedly emailed in a bomb threat against the event. Tarrio denied any involvement in the incident.Organizers of the Principles First summit, which is considered a center-right alternative to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), confirmed the bomb threat after they abruptly asked attendees to clear the room hosting the conference.“We have received a credible bomb threat from an account claiming to be ‘Enrique T.’ ‘To honor the J6 hostages.’ Yesterday, the recently pardoned leader of the Proud Boys who was sentenced to 22 years in prison for seditious conspiracy and the attack of January 6th came to the Summit and harassed the J6 police who were speaking,” organizers said in a social media post.“Hotel security, private security, and MPD have made the decision to evacuate Summit floor so that the area can be secured,” the note added, referring to Washignton’s Metropolitan police department. “We intend to reconvene and continue with the Summit once the area has been secured.”As the situation unfolded, Tarrio shared a social media post denying any connection to the incident and threatening Principles First organizers with legal action for accusing him.Jim Acosta, the former CNN host, posted what he said was a copy of the threatening message on social media. The message claimed that four pipe bombs had been deployed against political enemies of “Emperor Trump” who “all deserve to die”, including attendees at the conference, Michael Fanone, a former US Capitol police officer, Fanone’s mother and John Bolton, Donald Trump’s former national security adviser.After police officers completed the security sweep of the hotel, Heath Mayo, founder of Principles First, confirmed that organizers received a threatening email with the subject line “explosive surprises” from an account belonging to “Enrique T”.Mayo commended the police officers and security officials who responded quickly to the threat, telling summit attendees: “We are not going to be cowed … It would have been easy to go home and write this off and let these threats win. But this is what America is all about, and America’s democracy – the way that our government works – cannot be cowed by threats like this or people like this.”The crowd responded with loud applause.The incident comes one day after Tarrio appeared at the Washington hotel hosting the summit to insult a group of police officers who protected the US Capitol on January 6, one of whom was receiving a “profile in courage” award from Principles First.In video shared by Tarrio on social media on Saturday, he was seen following the officers and mocking them as “fucking cowards”.“You were brave on Twitter,” Tarrio said to the officers. “You guys were brave at my sentencing when you sat there and laughed when I got 22 fucking years. Now you don’t want to look in my eyes, you fucking cowards.”Fanone, the former police officer, then turned to Tarrio and said: “You’re a traitor to this country.”Aquilino Gonell, a former Capitol police sergeant, acknowledged the confrontation with Tarrio as he accepted his “profile in courage” award from Principles First on Saturday.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“A few moments ago, we were upstairs, and Enrique Tarrio and the Proud Boys were upstairs,” Gonell told conference attendees. “How they got into the building, I don’t know, but it’s insane that we had to be subjected to their harassment now because they feel emboldened and empowered because of the pardons that they received.”“We shouldn’t be harassed for doing the right thing, for telling our story, for telling the truth, for speaking against them in court and in public. They’re the traitor. They’re the one who attacked the Capitol,” he added.Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in prison for seditious conspiracy and other charges related to his role in the January 6 attack, but the president pardoned him and roughly 1,500 other insurrectionists after taking office last month.Organizers received the threatening email from “Enrique T” on Sunday at 12.15pm, Mayo said, when attendees were on their lunch break. As the audience started trickling back in to the conference room, expecting to hear next from Bolton, an organizer asked everyone to exit and proceed to the upper levels of the hotel.The summit was able to resume about two hours later on Sunday afternoon. As they started making their way back to the conference room, attendees applauded the police officers who assisted with the security sweep and then broke out into chants of “USA! USA!” More

    • 163 Shares159 Views

      in US Politics

      Enrique Tarrio follows and insults officers who defended US Capitol on January 6

      by

      Enrique Tarrio, the former leader of the far-right Proud Boys group who was convicted and then pardoned for his role in the January 6 insurrection, confronted a group of police officers who defended the Capitol during the attack, accusing one of them of being a “coward”.A video shared by Tarrio on social media on Saturday showed him following the officers, Michael Fanone, Harry Dunn and Aquilino Gonell, through the lobby of a Washington hotel that was hosting the Principles First summit, a conference where one of the officers received a “profile in courage” award.In the video, an unidentified woman with the officers tells Tarrio: “You guys are traitors, just back off.”“You were brave on Twitter,” Tarrio said to one of the officers as he continued to follow them. “You guys were brave at my sentencing when you sat there and laughed when I got 22 fucking years. Now you don’t want to look in my eyes, you fucking cowards.”Fanone, a former Capitol police officer, then turns and tells him: “You’re a traitor to this country.”In 2023, Tarrio received a sentence of 22 years in prison for seditious conspiracy and other charges related to the January 6 attack. Donald Trump pardoned Tarrio and roughly 1,500 other insurrection participants when he took office last month, an act that prompted outcry from many lawmakers, including some Republicans.Gonell, a former Capitol police sergeant who defended the Capitol on January 6, acknowledged the confrontation with Tarrio as he accepted his “profile in courage” award from Principles First. A spokesperson for Principles First, which is considered a center-right alternative to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), did not immediately respond to the Guardian’s request for comment on the confrontation with Tarrio.“A few moments ago, we were upstairs, and Enrique Tarrio and the Proud Boys were upstairs,” Gonell told conference attendees, prompting surprised gasps from the crowd. “How they got into the building, I don’t know, but it’s insane that we had to be subjected to their harassment now because they feel emboldened and empowered because of the pardons that they received.“We shouldn’t be harassed for doing the right thing, for telling our story, for telling the truth, for speaking against them in court and in public. They’re the traitor. They’re the one who attacked the Capitol.”The confrontation at the conference came one day after Tarrio was arrested near the Capitol for simple assault after he allegedly struck the cellphone and arm of a woman who was protesting an event he was attending with other January 6 insurrectionists.At a panel discussion held at the summit a couple of hours before the confrontation with Tarrio, four police officers who protected the Capitol on January 6 – Daniel Hodges of the Metropolitan police department and former Capitol police officers Gonell, Fanone and Dunn – expressed outrage over the pardons offered to the insurrectionists.“He pardoned them because he wants people to know that, if you commit crimes on his behalf, he’s got your back,” Fanone said.Fanone described far-right groups like the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, who played an instrumental role in executing the January 6 attack, as “Donald Trump’s personal brownshirt militia”, referring to the German Nazi party’s paramilitary storm troopers of the 1920s and 1930s.“They are operating under the assumption that, if they commit violent criminal acts on Donald Trump’s behalf, that he will pardon them for future violence,” Fanone said. “These are insurrectionists, let’s be very clear.”A member of the audience appeared to agree with Fanone’s assessment, yelling in response to his comment: “Traitors!”Fanone replied: “Yes, fucking traitors.”He later urged conference attendees to forcefully push back against Trump’s “Make America Great Again” political movement, telling them: “That is what we are up against: the indecency, the cruelty, the inhumanity of this movement that needs to be purged – purged – from America.”Dunn, who moderated the discussion, applauded his fellow officers for keeping a spotlight on the January 6 attack, reminding the audience: “History is going to remember us for what we did or did not do.” More

    • 100 Shares119 Views

      in US Politics

      Anti-Trump conservative summit charts alternative to CPAC Maga-fest

      by

      While Donald Trump and his acolytes take a victory lap at the Conservative Political Action Conference this week, some of the president’s staunchest right-leaning critics will convene for their own event just 10 miles away.The Principles First summit, which will be held in Washington from Friday to Sunday, has become a venue for anti-Trump conservatives to voice their deep-seated concerns about the “Make America great again” faction of the Republican party, and the gathering has now grown in size and scope. As its organizers confront another four years of Trump’s leadership, they are stretching beyond party lines with speakers such as the billionaire Mark Cuban and Jared Polis, the Democratic governor of Colorado, to craft their vision for a new approach to US politics.That vision looks quite different than it did six years ago, when the conservative attorney Heath Mayo founded Principles First. At the time, Mayo, formerly a rank-and-file Republican who supported the presidential campaigns of Mitt Romney and Marco Rubio, hoped to present an anti-Trump alternative to fellow conservatives.“It started as disgruntled Republicans and conservatives, but that was back in 2019 when that objective seemed to be perhaps more realistic or people were holding out hope that the party would come to its senses,” Mayo said. “Over the years, it’s grown.”The group’s first summit attracted just a couple of hundred attenders in 2020, but the guest count at this year’s sold-out event has increased to about 1,100.“We’ve been surprised actually with the number of people that have signed up to come,” Mayo said. “I think it’s this hunger for new spaces in our politics – new ideas, new faces.”Those new faces include Cuban, who plans to address the summit on Saturday as his name has been floated as a potential presidential candidate in 2028. A vocal supporter of Kamala Harris’s campaign for the White House last year, Cuban might seem like an unorthodox choice for a presidential candidate, as he has never served in public office, but the same was said of Trump 10 years ago.“Clearly we live in a moment of disruption. Things are changing really fast … Democrats may have learned that lesson the hard way in November,” Mayo said. “That’s what I hope the weekend will be – a time for people to set aside the party labels and really ask where we’re going as a country.”The summit’s list of speakers reflects that mission, ranging from John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, to Polis, the Colorado governor who has occasionally clashed with fellow Democrats over how to navigate the new Trump era. Other speakers include Chris Christie, the former Republican governor of New Jersey who has become a fierce critic of Trump, and four of the police officers who responded to the Capitol on 6 January 2021, as a group of the president’s supporters attempted to disrupt the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s electoral victory.View image in fullscreen“I feel like character and integrity are two non-negotiable, key components of Principles First,” said Rich Logis, founder of a group called Leaving Maga and a speaker at the summit. “If you look at the attendees, it’s a large, diverse swath of authors, thinkers and former elected officials. It doesn’t skew rightwing. It doesn’t skew leftwing. But what they all share in common is that they’re devoted to truth, democracy, liberal democracy and the rule of law.”Kyle Sweetser, another speaker at the summit and a former Trump supporter who voted for Harris in November, hopes that the event can offer an example of productive political discourse to fellow voters.“I think it’s more crucial than ever to offer some sort of platform, at least to reaffirm our commitment to core democratic values and principles,” Sweetser said. “And I’m really looking forward to some good discussion and hopefully some exchange of ideas that will strengthen our democracy.”Sweetser knows firsthand how difficult it can be to reach Trump supporters who have embraced the Maga movement. He voted for Trump twice before starting to question that loyalty, prompting him to diversify his media diet and seek out more information about the president’s record. He considers himself proof that Trump supporters can change their ways, a message he wants to bring to the Principles First summit.“I want some of the Democrats to understand that there’s a lot of Republicans out there that are good people, and if Democrats work for those people, then they will be able to pull some of those people over to their side,” Swisher said. “But unfortunately, it’s going to be a heavy lift. It’s going to take a lot of work, and it’s going to take patience.”Sweetser and Logis both predicted that Trump’s eventual failure to follow through on key campaign promises, like addressing the high inflation seen in recent years, would chip away at the president’s base and perhaps spur some of his supporters to reconsider their political identity.Some early examples of this trend may already be emerging. In Sweetser’s home state of Alabama, about 250 customers of a public utility company based in Huntsville just learned they would see a $100 surcharge on their energy bills after one of Trump’s executive orders paused a program aimed at lowering heating costs for low-income households.“I am wagering a bet that many in the Maga community right now are going to realize that the president is not going to fix anything for them,” Logis said. “When the scales start to fall a bit from the eyes, I want them to know that there’s an exit ramp.”That exit ramp eventually brought Logis to the Democratic national convention, where he was featured in a video explaining his transformation from a diehard Trump supporter to a Harris voter. Harris may not have been successful in November, but Mayo still sees a potential path to victory for a pro-democracy candidate who can unify the ideologically diverse group represented at Principles First.“There’s still a broad coalition out there that can be assembled, and it has got to be constructive. It’s got to have ideas and solutions for the challenges that Americans face, like the affordability crisis,” Mayo said. “At a time when it feels hopeless, it feels like there is a reason to be hopeful when you see that many people coming together to talk about these things.” More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      Trump administration can continue mass firings of federal workers, judge rules

      by

      The Trump administration can for now continue its mass firings of federal employees, a federal judge ruled on Thursday, rejecting a bid by a group of labor unions to halt Donald Trump’s dramatic downsizing of the roughly 2.3 million-strong federal workforce.The ruling by the US district judge Christopher Cooper in Washington DC federal court is temporary while the litigation plays out. But it is a win for the Trump administration as it seeks to purge the federal workforce and slash what it deems wasteful and fraudulent government spending.The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) and four other unions sued last week to block the administration from firing hundreds of thousands of federal workers and granting buyouts to employees who quit voluntarily.The unions are seeking to block eight agencies including the Department of Defense, Department of Health and Human Services, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and Department of Veterans Affairs from implementing mass layoffs.In his 16-page order, Cooper started by acknowledging Trump’s “onslaught of executive actions that have caused, some say by design, disruption and even chaos in widespread quarters of American society”.He went on to add: “Affected citizens and their advocates have challenged many of these actions on an emergency basis in this Court and others across the country.”However, Cooper on Thursday said, he likely lacks the power to hear the case, and the unions instead must file complaints with a federal labor board that hears disputes between unions and federal agencies.Cooper wrote: “NTEU fails to establish that it is likely to succeed on the merits because this Court likely lacks subject matter jurisdiction over the claims it asserts. The Court will therefore deny the unions’ motion for a temporary restraining order and, for the same reasons, deny their request for a preliminary injunction.”Trump has tapped the Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, to lead a so-called “department of government efficiency”, or Doge, which has swept through federal agencies slashing thousands of jobs and dismantling federal programs since Trump became president last month and put Musk in charge of rooting out what he deems wasteful spending as part of Trump’s dramatic overhaul of government. Trump also ordered federal agencies to work closely with Doge to identify federal employees who could be laid off.Termination emails were sent last week to workers across the federal government – mostly recently hired employees still on probation at agencies such as the Department of Education, the Small Business Administration, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the General Services Administration and others.The plaintiffs, which include the United Auto Workers, the NTEU and the National Federation of Federal Employees, said in their lawsuit that White House efforts, including through Doge, to shrink the federal workforce violate separation-of-powers principles by undermining Congress’s authority to fund federal agencies.The unions said that unless the court intervenes, they will be irreparably harmed by lost revenue from dues-paying members who were either fired or retired early to take buyouts.In a statement released last Wednesday, NTEU president Doreen Greenwald said: “We will not stand idly by while this administration takes illegal actions that will harm citizens, federal employees and the economy.”She went on to add: “All of these orders are further evidence that this administration is motivated not by efficiency, but by cruelty and a total disregard for the government services that will be lost.”Most civil service employees can be fired legally only for bad performance or misconduct, and they have a host of due process and appeal rights if they are let go arbitrarily. The probationary employees primarily targeted in last week’s wave have fewer legal protections.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionA judge overseeing a similar case in Boston federal court allowed the buyouts to move forward in a ruling on 12 February, finding labor unions that filed the case did not have legal standing to bring the lawsuit because they had not shown how they would be harmed by the plan.The window to accept buyouts has now closed, and about 75,000 workers took up the administration’s offer, according to the US office of personnel management. That represents about 3% of the total federal workforce.The unions are asking the judge to declare the firings and buyouts illegal and block the government from firing more employees or offering another round of buyouts.In a Monday court filing, the government said the unions did not have a right to sue because they would not be harmed by the firings and buyouts. Granting the unions’ request would also inappropriately interfere with the president’s efforts to streamline the federal workforce, the government argued.More than 70 lawsuits have been filed seeking to block Trump’s efforts to remake the federal workforce, clamp down on immigration and roll back transgender rights.The results have so far been mixed, but judges have blocked some aspects of Trump’s marquee policies, including his bid to end automatic birthright citizenship to children born in the US.On Thursday, the Washington Post reported that the Internal Revenue Service had began firing employees as part of the widespread layoffs.Speaking to the outlet, a person familiar with the decision said that approximately 7,000 employees were expected to lose their jobs, marking 7% of a 100,000-person agency.Reuters contributed reporting More

    • 113 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Elon Musk Is Focused on DOGE. What About Tesla?

      by

      Mr. Musk, one of President Trump’s main advisers, has not outlined a plan to reverse falling sales at the electric car company of which he is chief executive.Elon Musk’s role as President Trump’s cost-cutting czar and his immersion in right-wing politics appears to be diverting his attention from Tesla at a perilous moment for the electric car company.Tesla’s car sales fell 1 percent last year even as the global market for electric vehicles grew 25 percent. Mr. Musk has not addressed that underperformance, and he has offered no concrete plan to revive sales. He has also provided no details about a more affordable model Tesla says it will start producing this year. In the past, Mr. Musk spent months or years promoting vehicles before they appeared in showrooms.And he has spent much of his time since the election in Washington and at Mr. Trump’s home in Florida — far from Austin, Texas, where Tesla has its corporate headquarters and a factory, or the San Francisco Bay Area, where it has a factory and engineering offices.In the past decade or so, Tesla went from a struggling start-up to upending the global auto industry. The company sold millions of electric cars and generated huge profits, forcing established automakers to invest billions of dollars to catch up. Tesla’s success has been reflected in its soaring stock price, which helped make Mr. Musk the world’s richest person.But now, he seems to have lost interest in the grinding business of developing, producing and selling cars, investors and analysts say. That could have serious ramifications for his company and the auto industry, which employs millions of people worldwide.Even before he joined the Trump administration as the head of the Department of Government Efficiency, Mr. Musk’s running multiple companies had led investors and corporate governance experts to wonder whether he was spread too thin. Besides Tesla, Mr. Musk controls and runs SpaceX, whose rockets carry astronauts and satellites for NASA and others; X, the social media site; and xAI, which is developing artificial intelligence. And he wants to colonize Mars.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 163 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Send Us Your Views on Airplane Safety and the D.C. Reagon Airport Crash

      by

      We want to hear your perspective on the circumstances that led to the Jan. 29 midair collision near Reagan National Airport, and on air safety and regulation in general. What works and what does not?The Jan. 29 collision of a passenger jet and a military helicopter close to Washington’s Ronald Reagan National Airport was the worst in nearly a quarter of a century, taking 67 lives. The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the crash, and a combination of flawed communications and congested airspace in the area appear to be part of the explanation.The Reagan National crash was only the first in a string of recent aviation accidents spanning from Philadelphia to Nome, Alaska. On Feb. 17, another U.S. passenger jet crash-landed in Toronto, injuring more than a dozen people.In the interests of educating the public and shining a brighter light on aviation safety, we want to better understand what has happened in Washington and beyond. Are you a pilot who has spotted a detail we haven’t reported on? Are you a passenger who has been affected by the Reagan National crash or others? Maybe you are a current or former government employee with oversight of these matters who has a suggestion for us in our reporting? If any of this sounds like you, we would like to hear your perspective.We’ll read every response to this questionnaire and contact you if we’re interested in learning more about your story. We won’t publish any part of your response without following up with you first, verifying your information and hearing back from you. And we won’t share your contact information outside the Times newsroom or use it for any reason other than to get in touch with you. More