Donald Trump was held in front of the cameras of the White House press room on Thursday to perform a traditional presidential service – chief consoler for a period of tragedy.
He said that the country was in mourning, shared its condolences during “an hour of anxiety” and paid tribute to the first stakeholders and the victims.
Then he brutally pivoted – providing another recall of how his new presidency will be very different.
It will be combative. It will be not scripted. And it will be quick to point your finger of the blame.
“We don’t know what has led to this crash, but we have very strong opinions and ideas,” he said.
He then hypothesized that the reduction of job standards for air traffic controllers at the Federal Aviation Administration during the presidencies of Joe Biden and Barack Obama may have been a catastrophe factor.
Trump and his Republican colleagues regularly attacked the programs of “diversity, equity and inclusion” in the federal government.
His team made the cancellation of such programs a fundamental part of their first days in power, saying that they had divided the Americans and weakened the country.
And less than 24 hours after the first major American air disaster in more than a decade, Trump – as well as his secretaries of transport and defense, and his vice -president – made their point the practices had a role had a link with this particular crash.
Questioned by a journalist how he could blame the diversity programs for the accident when the investigation had just started, the president replied: “Because I have common sense”.
At other times, he recognized that there was no confirmed cause, saying “everything is under investigation”.
Trump said that hiring advice for the FAA diversity and inclusion program included preference for those who have a handicap involving “hearing, vision, missing ends, partial paralysis, complete paralysis , epilepsy, serious intellectual handicap, psychiatric invalidity and navism “.
An archived version of a website for the FAA diversity and inclusion program which seems to have been deleted in December included a similar list. The agency was looking for people with “targeted disabilities” that the federal government favored recruitment at the time.
But we do not know how this desire to make recruitment more diverse may have had an impact on the ranks of air traffic controllers, which, according to President Trump, must all be “naturally talented geniuses”. The FAA has more than 35,000 employees, of which only a fraction play this role.
In response to criticisms on hiring diversity practices last year, the agency published a statement claiming that all new recruits must respond to “rigorous qualifications” which “vary according to the position”.
The agency was faced with criticisms of a long shortage of air controllers, especially after the Cavid-19 pandemic, caused massive disruptions in commercial air travel.
Reports suggest that endowment levels at Reagan airport on Wednesday evening may have been compromised.
In his remarks, Trump specifically blamed the transport secretary of the Biden administration, Pete Buttigieg, whom he described with obscenity and said he directed the department “in the soil”.
Buttigieg defended his record on social networks, calling “despicable” Trump’s comments. “While families cry, Trump should lead, not lying,” he said.
The Senate Democrat, Chuck Schumer, also criticized Trump’s comments.
“It is one thing for Internet experts to offer plots, it is another for the President of the United States to throw inactive speculations because the bodies are always recovered,” said Schumer.
Once he started from his prepared remarks, however, speculation was what President Trump seemed most interested to offer.
In addition to his condemnation of DEI policies, he offered an in -depth discussion on the angles and the elevation during which the two planes flew, the weather conditions on Wednesday evening, the temperature of the potomac and the behavior of the helicopter of the army army .
“We had a situation where we had a helicopter who had the capacity to stop,” he said. “For any reason, it continued.”
But Thursday evening, the White House doubled to blame its predecessors and Dei policies. The president signed a memorandum to put an end to diversity efforts in the aviation sector and to examine all hiring decisions and the changes in the security protocols made to the Biden administration. He also signed an executive decree to appoint a new FAA chief.
Thursday, two things were very clear about Trump’s remarks.
The first is that its eagerness to inject itself into an important new one is not reduced in its new term. And the second is that, in his opinion, it is never too early to inject policy into the national tragedy – and use it to attack opponents and advance its program.
