NYTimes Editorial: Money Talked Loudest at Trumps Inaugural-Coal, oil, gas and chemical industries

[riversedge]

Money Talked Loudest at Trump’s Inaugural

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD APRIL 24, 2017


Bob Murray, one of the coal industry’s loudest voices, spent $300,000 on President Trump’s inauguration and got a lot more than good seats.

Mr. Murray — whose Murray Energy is a serial violator of federal health and safety rules — demanded that Mr. Trump gut regulatory oversight and pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement in his first three months.

“I’m not a patient man,” warned Mr. Murray, who earned infamy when he falsely insisted that the 2007 collapse of his Crandall Canyon mine, which killed six miners, was due to an earthquake, not dodgy mining practices. “I’m going to be watching that things happen as fast as they can.”


They did. After Mr. Trump’s inauguration Mr. Murray, his son Ryan and Kevin Hughes, Murray Energy’s general manager, stood beaming in the White House as Mr. Trump signed a law killing a rule banning coal mining waste from waterways.

Coal, oil, gas and chemical industries, technology and pharmaceutical companies contributed a big chunk of the record $107 million collected to pay for the inauguration, according to numbers released by the inaugural committee last week. That’s more than double the $53 million President Obama raised in 2009, for bigger festivities that drew many more attendees. If Mr. Trump had divided his inauguration cash among the Americans who stood on the National Mall for his swearing-in, each one would have gotten about $699.

The inaugural committee says any money not spent will be given to charity — but Mr. Trump’s record of lying about his philanthropy puts that in doubt.

...............................
.................

Mr. Trump, as a real estate mogul campaigning for president, often bragged about buying political influence. In office he has dutifully done the bidding of donors who have been brazen in demands for regulatory favors, while failing to make any progress on the health insurance, jobs and middle-class tax cuts he promised to his working-class base.

AT&T gave more than $2 million in cash, plus in-kind donations..............................

[justhanginon]

1. Always good to get in on a buyer's market. They obviously recognized

that this was really more of an investment in future deregulation than a cost to bear and would pay off handsomely. Trump has a record of rewarding those he deems supporters whether it be in the guise of governmental positions or favorable legislative support. A win win for these corporations and probably cheap in its future value.