In Trumpland, Nepotism Is the New Black

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Nick Kristof tells me something I didn’t know:

The announcement that Trump has recruited Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn as national security adviser is particularly alarming….Flynn had a brilliant military career….Then President Obama nominated Flynn to become director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, and he began to unravel….Flynn’s former fans have been bewildered at his raging denunciation of Islam, including calling it a “cancer.” In February, Flynn also tweeted and asked others to forward a viciously bigoted video that argued that there could be no such thing as Islamophobia.

….For his chief of staff, Flynn chose his son, who is a looney on social media, calling President Obama a communist and fascist, tweeting racially insensitive comments and sharing absurd conspiracy theories.

The chief of staff for the National Security Council will be Flynn’s son? Well, why not? Donald Trump has set the tone on nepotism from the top, and it’s obvious that he not only tolerates it, but positively revels in it.

DONALD TRUMP & DEMOCRACY

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DONALD TRUMP & DEMOCRACY

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And we need your support like never before, to fight back against the existential threats American democracy faces. Fundraising for nonprofit media is always a challenge, and we need all hands on deck right now. We have no cushion; we leave it all on the field.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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