DL Open Thread: Tuesday, April 8, 2025

Someone asked the names and positions of those on Gov. Meyer’s staff.  Here ya go.  Which reminds me–has the Senate officially received Meyer’s Port board nominations yet?  If so, when will they consider said nominations?  If not, what’s the hold-up?

Death By 1000 Cuts.  NEH Grants.  Automated Translation Weather Alerts.  They do stuff like this every day.  It adds up.  Revenge of the Stoopid White Guys.  Oh, almost forgot:

U.S. Navy Vice Admiral Shoshana Chatfield, who holds a senior position in NATO, has been fired as part of what appears to be an expanding national security purge of top officials by the Trump administration, three sources told Reuters on Monday.

Chatfield, the U.S. military representative to the NATO Military Committee, is one of only a handful of female Navy three-star officers and was the first woman to lead the Naval War College, a job she held until 2023.

The firing, which was first reported by Reuters, is the latest to rock the Pentagon after Thursday’s removal of General Timothy Haugh, the head of the National Security Agency and U.S. Cyber Command.

For the Navy, it follows the firing of its top officer, Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to become Chief of Naval Operations.

Over the weekend, as Elon Musk launched into a barrage of social media posts criticizing one of the lead White House advisers for President DonaldTrump’s aggressive tariff plan, Musk was going over that same official’s head — andmaking personal appeals to Trump.

Musk’s break with Trump over a signature administration priority marks the highest-profile disagreement between the president and one of his key advisers, who poured nearly $290 million into backing him and other Republicans in last year’s electionsand has been leading the U.S. DOGE Service’s cost-cutting efforts since January. Musk has also disagreed with other members of Trump’s coalition on issues such as H1-B visas for skilled immigrants and on DOGE’s approach to government spending.

On Saturday, Musk took aim at the administration official who has been key to developing the tariff plans, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, lighting into his credentials.

“A PhD in Econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing,” Musk wrote.

There was an attempt by State Rep. Frank Burns (D-Newark) to change the effective date to the day the new changes were signed into law as to not effect any ongoing books and records request, but that amendment ultimately failed.

During debate on the House Floor, Rep. Burns noted the amendment was largely drafted out of concern for the ongoing books and records requests made by Meta — the parent company of Facebook and Instagram — shareholders, as reported by CNBC, and worried that those probes could be hindered.

“I am aware of two actions against Meta where books and records discoveries were going on, and they can continue, but what they were looking into can now never be brought to bear under the SB 21 rules,” Rep Burns said during debate.

The bill’s sponsor, State Rep. Griffith (D-Fairfax) explained the date of Feb. 17 was “very carefully considered” and did not support the amendment along with the majority of her colleagues.