The Nugget Newspaper - News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon

A Washington Post/ABC poll taken during the 2016 presidential election showed that the priority for voters was to "cleanup" the corruption in Washington. Many that voted for Trump admitted he was not qualified for the job, but because he assured the voters that he would "pick the very best and brightest" people to advise him and run the agencies, they overlooked this. He campaigned to "drain the swamp."

In fact, Trump has selected more inexperienced and corrupt criminals for his cabinet and agencies than any president in recent history.

Many of these have been fired or indicted.

Many other good people resigned.

Twenty people hired by Trump who were later fired or resigned include: Stephen Bannon (White House Senior Advisor), Reince Priebus (White House Chief of Staff), Rex Tillerson (Secretary of State), Gary Cohn (National Economic Council Director), Sebastian Gorka (Counter-Terrorism Advisor), Hope Hicks (Communications Director), Anthony Scaramucci (Communications Director), Omarosa Manigault-Newman (Public Liaison), Rob Porter (Staff Secretary), Josh Raffel (Deputy Communications Director), K. T. McFarland (Deputy National Security Advisor), Sean Spicer (Press Secretary), Katie Walsh (Deputy Chief of Staff), Dina Powell (Deputy National Sec.

Advisor for Strategy), Michael Dubke (White House Communications Director), Lt.

Gen.

H. R. McMaster (National Security Advisor), David Shulkin (VA Secretary), Don McGahn (White House Counsel) and Michael Short (Senior Asstistant Press Secretary).

Tom Merino withdrew as pick for Drug Czar when 60 Minutes showed that he authored legislation to protect the drug companies from the opioid crisis.

Two congressmen that endorsed Trump early in the campaign, Chris Collins and Duncan Hunter, have both been indicted for federal crimes. Collins by the SEC for insider trading, Hunter for misuse of $250,000 in campaign funds for personal use.

Several Trump agency picks have been fired or resigned for misuse of funds. Tom Price (Secretary of Heath and Human Services) took charter flights ($400,000) and military planes ($500,000) at taxpayer expense, took vacations in Europe including Wimbledon, and cruises on the Thames. He used his position to get more than $700,000 from physicians, hospitals and drug companies and bought biomedical stock in a company that would benefit from the "Century Cures" bill, a conflict of interest.

Scott Pruitt (EPA Adminitrator) spent taxpayer dollars on lavish office décor, soundproof phone booths, tactical pants, radios, holsters, leased vehicles and personalized pens costing $1,560. He took first-class flights and had round-the-clock security costing $3.5 million. He rented an apartment unusually cheaply in D.C. from a fossil-fuel lobbyist. Wilbur Ross (Secretary of Commerce), who is still employed, paid $120 million settlement for defrauding investors in his private equity fund.

The Special Council and Southern District of New York investigations resulted in indictments of five Trump appointees.

George Papadopoulos (Trump campaign foreign policy advisor) is cooperating for lying to the FBI. Rick Gates (White House aid and campaign assistant) is cooperating because he faces 22 bank and tax fraud charges.

Michael Cohen (Trump personal lawyer) has pleaded guilty to eight felony counts including bank fraud and tax fraud and is cooperating.

Paul Manafort (Trump campaign chairman) has been convicted of eight felony counts including bank fraud and tax fraud.

Michael Flynn (National Security Advisor) has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about Russian contacts and is cooperating.

Trump has set the standard for unethical behavior by making weekly trips to his golf courses, catering to diplomats in his hotels and allowing family to make trips abroad on the taxpayer to further their businesses.

It's obvious that Trump has added significantly to the swamp. Electing people who are competent, ethical and honest helps to ensure that other key positions in the government get filled with people that are also competent, ethical and honest. The midterm elections are our opportunity to fix this.