Toxic slime and gassy trees: 3 ways Christmas is busting the planet
Feeding livestock also requires vast tracts of land to be cleared to grow the soy, corn and other grains that fatten up your Christmas turkey or your celebratory loin of beef.
An open letter to the public administration and public management communities
Ten careerists in the Homeland Security Department were listed on a “watchlist” of “America’s most subversive immigration bureaucrats.” Individual employees are finding themselves called out by name in an effort to “putthem in trauma.”
Government efficiency vs. performance: How federal employees can drive change from within
Under a new arrangement that civil servants in the Defense Logistics Agency conceived, the government sampled a range of commercially available items and bought more or fewer depending on what soldiers ate.
Trump names financial tech CEO to lead Social Security
The American Federation of Government Employees SSA General Committee took a measured approach in a statement Thursday, defending the workforce’s recent progress on customer service metrics and offering to work with Bisignano if he is confirmed.
Despite critical report, Biden hasn’t taken disciplinary action against DHS watchdog
Confirming these diverse and highly qualified individuals is of paramount importance at a time when the incoming administration has made clear through its words and deeds a desire to skirt the ethical guardrails designed to prevent unlawful behavior,” the letter signatories wrote.
Lawmakers want to enhance HHS cyber engagement with health care orgs
The growing number of cyberattacks targeting the U.S. health care sector in recent years has pushed a bipartisan group of senators to propose legislation that seeks to bolster institutions’ security practices and enhance engagement with federal agencies.
As Trump’s teams get set to deploy to agencies, concerns remain over his transition approach
After an extended standoff in which Trump refused to sign memoranda of understanding with various parts of the Biden administration, the former and future president last week reached an agreement with the White House that will allow his landing teams to physically enter federal offices.
Musk’s government roles create ‘clear avenues for serious conflicts of interest’
Musk’s reported behavior could pose serious risks to national security, and as CEO of a company with billions of dollars in sensitive defense and intelligence contracts, warrant reconsideration of SpaceX’s outsized role in DoD’s commercial space integration,” the letter to Kendall read.
Lawmaker wants the FCC to create an AI tool for identifying scams
“This legislation harnesses the power of AI to address evolving scam tactics,” Curtis said in a statement, adding that the online platform “would provide a secure, user-friendly tool to help individuals quickly determine whether a communication they’ve received could be fraudulent.”
Elon Musk brands UK a ‘tyrannical police state’
LONDON — Elon Musk fired the latest shots in his war with the British government over the weekend, branding the U.K. a “tyrannical police state,” boosting a petition calling for a fresh general election, and sharing a documentary by a jailed far-right activist to his millions of X followers.
GOP pollster says survey data shows Americans would not support Trump’s efforts to reinstitute Schedule F
As part of his new administration, President-elect Donald Trump has said he wants to revive Schedule F — an ultimately unsuccessful effort from the end of his first term that sought to remove civil service job protections for potentially tens of thousands of career federal employees.
DHS releases guidance for AI in critical infrastructure
Given that the report’s contents are voluntary, Mayorkas noted that he expects board members to help evangelize the guidance into practice across their industries, especially ahead of an incoming Trump administration that stands to change current tech and AI policy.
EU prosecutors target Camorra, Cosa Nostra in half-billion-euro fraud probe
Accused criminals issued invoices worth more than €1.3 billion to trade goods through a fraudulent chain in which companies would claim reimbursements from national tax authorities in a scheme known as “VAT Carousel fraud.”
Feds brace for return of Trump personnel policies
“During President Trump’s first term, his administration attempted to gut many of our negotiated union contracts, downsize and relocate federal agencies at great disruption and cost to taxpayers and replace tens of thousands of nonpartisan civil servants with political appointees who would blindly do his bidding.
Harris concession opens agencies to Trump—if he opts in
There remains a significant hurdle to that process, however: Trump has still not signed an agreement with the Biden White House, nor the General Services Administration, the federal agency that manages the presidential transition, that would allow those landing teams to deploy.
Beefing up Border Patrol is a bipartisan goal, but the agency has a troubled history of violence and impunity
Under Swing’s command, the immigration agency launched the derogatorily named Operation Wetback: Agents rounded up over 500,000 Mexican workers, in many cases beating them, stripping them of their property and forcing them to board trains and buses headed south.
PepsiCo and Coca-Cola Face LA County Suit Over Plastic Pollution
It further asserts that the companies are influencing consumers to falsely believe that purchasing Pepsi and Coca-Cola products in single-use plastic bottles is an environmentally sound choice.