Keystone Cops DC Style: The 1st Hundred Days
Have you ever seen any Keystone Cops episodes? This was a slapstick film series popular in theatres over a hundred years ago, good for a lot of laughs. The Keystone Cops were bumbling, incompetent fools, their attempts to keep law and order ending in a series of disasters. Hmmm, that sounds familiar. The second Trump administration is a group of bumbling, incompetent fools, but without the benefit of jocularity.
This post covers only some of the goofs, oops, screw ups, mistakes, blunders and “adminstrative errors” made by the Trump administration in the first hundred days. I’d have to write a book to cover all of them!
One of his first actions after the inauguration, Trump ordered a freeze on federal grants and loans. Then less than 2 days later he had to walk that back, while the White House scrambled to explain themselves.
Brian Driscoll accidentally became the FBI acting director after the White House identified the wrong agent. Robert Kissane was supposed to fill that role, while Driscoll was to be the deputy director. Rather than correct the mixup the two agreed to swap roles until Kash Patel was confirmed.
The CIA accidentally sent the White House an unclassified email listing all employees they had hired in the last two years.
Trump created chaos at USPS when he ended the de minimis exemption. He quickly reversed that decision. But wait! He decided to implement it after all.
Elon’s DOGE staff decided it was a good idea to fire the experts at the National Nuclear Security Administration. These are the people who ensure that we maintain a safe, secure, and reliable nuclear stockpile by maintaining and modernizing weapons and facilities, monitor the submarines, ballistic missiles, and aircraft that deliver them, dispose of aging weapons, and all the other dangerous tasks that must be managed. Elon quickly realized this was a disastrous decision and scrambled to locate the workers and hire them back.
DOGE accidentally fired the USDA Bird Flu Response Workers, then had to rehire them. DOGE sure has a lot of accidental firings, don’t you think?
Trump ended free covid testing, then had to reinstate it.
The Trump Administration halted legal aid for unaccompanied migrant children, then rescinded the order 3 days later. Then a month later, they reinstated the halt. This resulted in a lawsuit by non-profits and lawyers who were working with these children. Many of these are babies and toddlers who somehow got separated from their families. They need the representation so the courts can figure out how to find relatives, or what to do with them if their families can’t be located. So now what is to become of these innocent little ones?
The Trump Administration halted funding to 9/11 health programs that provide support to 9/11 responders and survivors who have developed permanent health problems as a result of the 9/11 attack. Trump then reversed course in response to the ensuing uproar.
Elon offered the Deferred Resignation Program, also known as “Fork in the Road,” allowing eligible federal employees to resign and continue receiving pay and benefits until September 30, 2025. This disaster deserves it’s own post, but I’ll just mention that Elon sent these emails via a private server rather than a secure government one, which resulted in a lawsuit. Elon then demanded that the remaining federal employees must answer an email detailing what they accomplished the prior week. If they didn’t reply, they would be fired. Some US agencies told workers not to reply to the email, sparking confusion. To add to the turmoil, DOGE had locked many workers out of their email accounts, meaning they couldn’t answer the email if they wanted to.
After Trump’s directive to federal agencies to fire thousands of probationary employees, he abruptly did an about-face.
The Trump administration decided it was a good idea to cut 83000 jobs in the Veterans Administration (including hundreds of doctors and nurses) and massive amounts of funding, resulting in reduced medical care for veterans with cancer, disabilities and other health challenges. After briefly halting the cuts, he decided even more cuts are warranted. DOGE also fired Veterans Crisis Line staff.
DOGE “accidentally” cut funds for preventive measures combatting Ebola, then reversed a few hours later. Elon then claimed that was due to an administrative error.
Watchdog groups have closely monitored the DOGE website data. In spite of Elon’s claims of cutting many billions from government spending, DOGE has repeatedly, quietly, deleted hundreds of billions of dollars worth of reputed savings as Elon’s minions have discovered they were mistaken in their information and calculations. Hoping, or pretending, that nobody has noticed that, Elon carefully doesn’t mention the mistakes and continues to claim massive savings in government spending. One of those mistakes was a claim of $8 billion saved by canceling one government contract, when it was actually only $8 million. The de facto amount of “savings” that DOGE is claiming has slowly shrunk to $160 billion, though analysts say it’s much lower than that. The irony is, all the firings will cost taxpayers MORE than the meager savings. In other words, Elon hasn’t cut government spending, he has added to it!
At 2pm on March 4, the Trump admin announced 443 federal properties would go up for sale; everything from toll booths and research labs to the headquarters of major government agencies, like the Department of Agriculture, the DOJ, and several more. By the next morning, none of the properties were any longer up for sale. No explanation for the reversal was given. It was as though Trump was pretending it never happened.
DOGE decided it was a good idea to stop Social Security telephone services, forcing people to visit offices in person to apply for benefits or update their cases. Never mind the many disabled and elderly who are unable to do so. Oh, they then partially walked back that requirement – some updates can be made online only, phone calls not allowed. Never mind many disabled and elderly have no internet access. Oh, they changed their mind again – most services available by phone before DOGE will be available by phone again after all.
The Trump administration initiated mass layoffs of about 10,000 employees working at agencies intended to protect the public health, including the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), and the National Institutes of Health (NIH). As with firings at other agencies, many employees did not know they were fired until they showed up for work. The admin then decided they fired too many and rehired some of them, at least temporarily. Employees who felt they were unfairly fired were directed to contact Anita Pinder, director of the Office of Equal Opportunity and Civil Rights. Ummm, make that former director. She died last year and isn’t so easy to contact.
Not understanding what DEI actually means, Elon ordered thousands of webpages be removed from government websites that celebrated the accomplishments of women and people of color, as well as anyone who advanced the causes of civil and social rights. A few of these included the Underground Railroad, the Navaho Code Talkers, various women who excelled in the science fields, and Jackie Robinson. After a public outcry, some pages were republished.
The Trump administration cut funding to life-saving UN food programs, then said OOPS, we made a mistake.
You probably heard about the letter to Harvard. The White House waited an entire week to say that letter was sent by mistake. They declared they didn’t really mean to send that letter. Sure, like anyone with any sense believes that.
The Trump administration decided to eliminate the research arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, close all weather and climate labs and eviscerate its budget. You know, the people who warn us about the bad weather heading our way so we can get prepared.
Remember the tariff chart Trump held up for the TV cameras? In case you haven’t heard, the tariffs attributed to various countries that were listed on that chart weren’t just wrong- they were grossly exaggerated. I found a YouTube video that explains in such simple terms how the math was manipulated, that anyone except the Trump Administration can understand it.
Continuing with the “Liberation Day” tariffs, I’m sure you know about the tariffs being imposed against Antarctic islands populated by penguins. I saw MAGAs explaining this away by claiming it was to prevent China from bypassing tariffs by detouring through the the Heard and McDonald Islands, and claiming the goods came from there. This ignorant claim could be cleared up with a few internet searches.
Ship traffic is regulated by the International Association of Marine Aids and the International Maritime Organization. These international agencies make sure ships travel safely along their designated lanes. A ship that wants to travel to Antarctic waters must be issued a special permit by the signatories of the Antarctic treaty. A cargo ship would never be allowed to obtain one of these permits. But pretend for a moment it’s issued one. After traveling a few extra thousands of miles out of it’s way, a cargo ship encountering those ice floes would promptly sink, because it’s not an icebreaker. Even the cruise ships traveling to the Antarctic are icebreakers, and they are very limited in how much they can carry. An icebreaker would never be able to carry commercial containers of merchandise.
One more point to make concerning the tariffs: On April 7, Trump claimed on Truth Social that, due to the new tariffs, the USA is now bringing in billions of dollars a week. During his April 10 cabinet meeting, he claimed $2 billion a day, probably $3.5 billion a day. On April 14, he claimed $3 billion a day.
Who believes that baloney? According to Treasury Dept records, as of April 15, the U.S. had received about $156 million per day in tariffs so far for the month. That’s pocket change compared to a couple of billion. But now, the number of cargo ships entering US ports is shrinking daily – and shrinking and shrinking. That daily $156M will soon be down to practically nothing. Analysts say if this trend continues, consumers will be seeing empty shelves in the stores before the end of May. Of all the Trump Administration calamities, the tariff situation will hit people first and the hardest.
Thousands of layoffs are an inevitable result- starting with port workers and truck drivers. As the available amount of merchandise continues to shrink, warehouse workers and store employees will face cut hours or complete loss of their jobs.
I’ve typed out plenty. Below are links to a few more Trump Admin disasters. Of course there are many more, but I’m not trying to write a book!
US judge blocks $11 billion Trump administration health funding cuts
Trump’s Cuts Signal End to Government Work on Terrorism Prevention
Trump Administration Fires Nearly Half of Education Department Staff
Trump wants states to handle disasters. States aren’t prepared
