White House chief of staff John Kelly doubled down on his gross remarks yesterday that the reason why some Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)-eligible immigrant youth didn’t sign up for the program while it was fully active was because they “were too lazy to get off their asses”:
Kelly was confronted by lawmakers in a closed-door meeting about comments he made Tuesday that some immigrants who didn't apply for protections under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program were "too lazy."
Kelly reiterated his sentiment, according to people in the room, and did so with reporters after the meeting, as well, saying "some of them just should have probably gotten off the couch and signed up."
“’Too lazy’? The Dreamers? You clearly have no idea who they are,” Univision anchor Jorge Ramos tweeted in response to Kelly. “The Dreamers are among the most pro-active, engaged, intelligent and relevant Americans I’ve ever met.” And, if Kelly really wants to talk lazy, let’s talk lazy.
According to reports, national security officials have been forced to dumb down the president’s daily security briefing in order to not bore Kelly’s boss:
The classified guidance, which was reviewed by Mother Jones, suggests that President Donald Trump’s daily national security briefing contains far less information than the daily reports presented by the intelligence community to past presidents—and about a quarter of the information President Barack Obama received. The memo sent to certain analysts within the intelligence community notes that the commander in chief’s daily briefing book typically contains reports on only three topics, typically no more than one page each. According to the guidance, Trump’s PDB also includes space for a short update, presumably on matters brought up in previous briefs. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees the process of producing the PDB, declined to comment on the memo. The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
Following the White House releasing the Nunes memo last week, Kelly himself said that the reason why the administration has yet to release the Democratic rebuttal memo is because “it’s pretty lengthy” and Trump hasn’t had a chance to read it yet. But it’s apparently only 10 pages long.
Then for most folks, getting to start the workday at nearly noon is the stuff of vacation and dreams. For the president, that’s a normal day. “The schedule says Trump has ‘Executive Time" in the Oval Office every day from 8am to 11am,” Axios reported last month, “but the reality is he spends that time in his residence, watching TV, making phone calls and tweeting”:
Trump's days in the Oval Office are relatively short – from around 11am to 6pm, then he's back to the residence. During that time he usually has a meeting or two, but spends a good deal of time making phone calls and watching cable news in the dining room adjoining the Oval. Then he's back to the residence for more phone calls and more TV.
According to Axios, “that's far later than George W. Bush, who typically arrived in the Oval by 6:45am.” When it comes to Trump’s nemesis, “Barack Obama worked out first thing in the morning and usually got into the Oval between 9 and 10am, according to a former senior aide.”
Speaking of Obama, Trump spent years criticizing his golf outings. But by December, Trump had spent more than one-third of his presidency at private resorts and one-fourth at his private golf clubs. On Christmas Day, Trump tweeted “back to work in order to Make America Great Again” … and then proceeded to spend the next seven days at his private golf club:
Starting on Dec. 26, Trump’s motorcade was spotted arriving at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, at 9 a.m. on six consecutive mornings, per pool reports. On Jan. 1, the seventh day since his tweet, Trump arrived at the club at around 8:50 a.m., BuzzFeed News reported, just minutes after he tweeted about having “much work” to do.
Not to mention that Kelly—who has shown himself to be mostly Stephen Miller with shiny medals—is perpetuating ugly, dated, and baseless stereotypes once used against his own ancestors:
The harshest comment against Kelly on cable news Tuesday night came from Lawrence O’Donnell on The Last Word on MSNBC.
In that they are about the same age and come from the same culture, O’Donnell explained—as one Irish-American discussing another—that Kelly’s words about lazy immigrants made him just as bigoted as Trump and should have historical resonance.
“That is exactly what some Americans said about John Kelly’s Irish relatives when they arrived in this country as immigrants,” O’Donnell said. “We can no longer be surprised when John Kelly opens his mouth and ugly prejudice and poison comes out.”
Greisa Martinez, a leader with immigrant youth organization United We Dream, fought back on CNN last night, addressing Kelly’s remarks and correcting his lies regarding DACA-eligible youth: