Page 8A
NATION/WORLD
East Oregonian
Wednesday, November 23, 2016
Trump backs off climate, Clinton campaign vows
President-elect focuses
on filling Cabinet
By JONATHAN LEMIRE
Associated Press
NEW YORK — Two weeks
after his election victory, Presi-
dent-elect Donald Trump began
backing off campaign promises
Tuesday, including his hard line on
climate change and his vow to jail
“Crooked Hillary” Clinton that had
brought thunderous “Lock her up”
chants at his rallies.
A top adviser said Trump is now
focused on matters that are essential
in setting up his administration, not
on comments he made during the
heat of the campaign.
After a year blasting The New
York Times, Trump submitted to an
interview with reporters and editors
at their Manhattan office. Among
the topics covered, he:
• Pushed back against questions
about conflicts that could arise due
to a lack of separation between
his government post and his many
businesses, declaring that “the law’s
totally on my side, the president
can’t have a conflict of interest.”
• Took his strongest stance yet
against the “alt-right,” a term often
used as code for the white suprem-
acist movement. Though members
are celebrating his victory, he said,
“It’s not a group I want to energize.
And if they are energized, I want to
look into it and find out why.”
• Spoke positively not only of
fellow Republicans in Congress —
“Right now they are in love with
me” — but also of President Barack
Obama, who he said is “looking to
do absolutely the right thing for the
country in terms of transition.”
Trump, who left late Tuesday
to spend Thanksgiving at his
estate in Florida, also continued
to work to populate his incoming
administration, officially asking
GOP presidential rival Ben Carson
to head the Department of Housing
AP Photo/Mark Lennihan
President-elect Donald Trump waves to the crowd as he leaves the New York Times building following
a meeting, Tuesday in New York.
and Urban Development, according
to a person familiar with the offer
who spoke on the condition of
anonymity because the person
was not authorized to discuss the
deliberations publicly. Carson
is expected to respond after the
holiday.
Adviser Kellyanne Conway said
earlier on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”
that Trump is “thinking of many
different things as he prepares to
become the president of the United
States, and things that sound like
the campaign aren’t among them.”
His interview comments on a
possible prosecution of his former
foe Clinton stood in stark contrast to
his incendiary rhetoric throughout
the campaign, during which he
accused her breaking laws with her
email practices and angrily barked
at her that “you’d be in jail” if he
were president.
“I don’t want to hurt the Clin-
tons, I really don’t,” Trump said in
the interview. Sympathetically, he
said, “She went through a lot and
suffered greatly in many different
ways.”
Though he declined to defin-
itively rule out a prosecution, he
said, “It’s just not something that I
feel very strongly about.”
Trump had vowed throughout
the campaign to use his pres-
idential power to appoint a
special prosecutor to probe his
Democratic rival for both her
reliance on a private email server
as secretary of state and what
he called pay-for-play schemes
involving the Clinton Founda-
tion. Adviser Conway signaled to
congressional Republicans earlier
Tuesday that they should abandon
their years of vigorous probes of
Clinton’s email practices and her
actions at the time of the terror
attacks in Libya.
“If Donald Trump can help her
heal, then perhaps that’s a good
thing,” she told reporters at Trump
Tower in New York.
But some of his conservative
supporters strongly disagreed.
If Trump’s appointees do not
follow through on his pledge to
investigate Clinton for criminal
violations he accused her of, “it
would be a betrayal of his promise
to the American people to ‘drain
the swamp’ of out-of-control
corruption in Washington,” said the
group Judicial Watch.
And Breitbart, the conservative
news site whose former head,
Stephen Bannon, is now a senior
counselor to Trump, headlined its
story “Broken Promise.”
FBI Director James Comey has
declared on two occasions there
is no evidence warranting charges
against Clinton. Justice Depart-
ment investigations are historically
conducted without the influence or
input of the White House.
As for global warming, Trump
has repeatedly questioned the idea,
suggesting at times that it is a hoax
perpetrated by the Chinese to hurt
U.S. manufacturers with environ-
mental regulations.
But on Tuesday, he said he would
“keep an open mind” about pulling
the landmark, multi-national Paris
Agreement on climate change
— he’d said in the campaign he
would yank the U.S. out — and
he allowed, “I think there is some
connectivity” between human
activity and climate changes.
Trump, who has yet to hold
the traditional news conference
held by a president-elect in the
days after winning, said his own
businesses are “unimportant to me”
in comparison to the presidency,
but he also said he now believes he
could continue to run them at the
same time if he wanted.
There have been concerns
raised about conflicts of interest
since many of the businesses are
subject to government actions in
the U.S. and abroad. But he said he
would be “phasing” control over
to his grown children, although
“in theory I could run my business
perfectly and then run the country
perfectly. There’s never been a case
like this.”
Earlier Tuesday, it was
confirmed that Trump’s charity had
admitted it violated IRS regulations
barring it from using its money or
assets to benefit Trump, his family,
his companies or substantial
contributors to the foundation.
According to a 2015 tax return
posted on the nonprofit monitoring
website GuideStar, the Donald J.
Trump Foundation acknowledged
that it used money or assets in
violation of the regulations during
2015 and in prior years. The tax
filing, first reported by The Wash-
ington Post, didn’t provide details.
U.S. court blocks overtime
Father of injured pipeline
protester says she may lose arm expansion pay rule for 4 million
Associated Press
BISMARCK, N.D. — A
New York woman seriously
hurt protesting the Dakota
Access oil pipeline faces
multiple surgeries and could
lose an arm, her father said
Tuesday, and protesters
and law enforcement gave
conflicting accounts about
what might have caused the
explosion that injured her.
Sophia Wilansky, 21, was
listed in serious condition and
was undergoing surgery at a
Minneapolis hospital.
Wilansky’s father, Wayne
Wilansky, said his daughter
was hurt when law enforce-
ment threw a grenade. The
Morton County Sheriff’s
Office maintains authorities
did not use concussion
grenades or any devices that
produce a flash or bang during
a clash late Sunday and early
Monday near the camp
along the pipeline route in
southern North Dakota where
protesters have gathered for
months.
The
sheriff’s
office
suggested in a statement
Monday that an explosion
heard during the skirmish
might have been caused by
small propane tanks that
authorities said protesters had
rigged to explode.
Dallas Goldtooth, a protest
organizer with the Indigenous
Environmental
Network,
did not immediately respond
to a request for comment.
Wayne Wilansky disputed the
claim by authorities, saying
“there’s multiple witnesses
and my daughter, who was
completely conscious, said
they threw a grenade right at
her.”
The
North
Dakota
Highway Patrol in a statement
Tuesday backed up the sher-
iff’s office’s version of events,
saying officers during the
skirmish spotted protesters
with “multiple silver cylinder
objects.”
“It was at this time an
explosion occurred and
several protesters ran to the
area, pulled a female from
under the burned vehicle,
and fled the scene,” the patrol
said.
Officers who investigated
found 1-pound propane tanks
“including one that appeared
to be intentionally punctured,”
the agency statement said.
During the clash, officers
using tear gas, rubber bullets
and water sprays against
AP Photo/James MacPherson
Protesters against the Dakota Access oil pipeline stand
on a burned-out truck near Cannon Ball, N.D., Monday,
that they removed from a long-closed bridge on Sun-
day on a state highway near their camp in southern
North Dakota.
“Multiple witnesses ... said they
threw a grenade right at her.”
— Wayne Wilansky, father of injured protester
protesters who they say
assaulted officers with rocks,
asphalt, water bottles and
burning logs. One officer
was injured when struck in
the head with a rock. At least
17 protesters were injured
severely enough to be taken
to hospitals.
Wayne
Wilansky
denounced the law enforce-
ment tactics, saying “this is
not Afghanistan, this is not
Iraq. We don’t throw grenades
at people.”
Morton County Sheriff’s
office spokeswoman Maxine
Herr on Tuesday said “author-
ities continue to defend our
tactics.”
A GoFundMe account
for Wilansky had raised
more than $194,000 in 18
hours, with more than 7,200
people contributing. It was
the highest trending account
on Monday night, according
to GoFundMe spokeswoman
Kate Cichy.
The $3.8 billion pipeline
to carry North Dakota oil to
a shipping point in Illinois is
largely complete outside of
a stretch under a Missouri
River reservoir in North
Dakota near the Standing
Rock Sioux Reservation.
The tribe and others have
been opposing the construc-
tion for months, saying the
pipeline threatens the tribe’s
drinking water along with
American Indian cultural
sites.
Protests have intensified
as the dispute plays out, with
total arrests since August
reaching 528 on Monday.
North Dakota officials may
need to borrow more money
to police protests, with costs
exceeding the $10 million in
emergency spending autho-
rized by the state.
Total state law enforce-
ment costs related to the
protests
reached
$10.9
million last week, according
to state Emergency Services
spokeswoman Cecily Fong.
Morton County has spent an
additional $8 million.
Fong said it’s “very likely”
officials will go back to the
state’s Emergency Commis-
sion to request more money.
Kelcy Warren, CEO of
pipeline developer Energy
Transfer Partners, told The
Associated Press last Friday
that he made a verbal offer
to reimburse the state for
policing costs during an
earlier conversation with Gov.
Jack Dalrymple.
Dalrymple’s spokesman,
Jeff Zent, said the governor
doesn’t recall Warren making
an offer and that even if
one was made, it’s unclear
whether the state could legally
accept it.
“The bottom line is the
governor has not received
a formal (offer), nor are we
seeking one out,” Zent said
adding that “our focus is to
continue to press the Obama
administration to help cover
these costs.”
LAS VEGAS (AP) — A federal court
on Tuesday blocked implementation of a
rule imposed by President Barack Obama’s
administration that would have made an
estimated 4 million more higher-earning
workers across the country eligible for
overtime pay starting Dec. 1.
The U.S. District Court in the Eastern
District of Texas granted the nationwide
preliminary injunction that prevents the
Department of Labor from implementing
the changes while the regulation’s legality
is examined in more detail by the court. The
order comes after 21 states sued the agency
to block the rule before it took effect.
“Businesses and state and local govern-
ments across the country can breathe a
sigh of relief now that this rule has been
halted,” said Nevada Attorney General
Adam Laxalt, who led the coalition of
states fighting the rule and has been a
frequent critic of what he characterized
as Obama Administration overreach.
“Today’s preliminary injunction reinforces
the importance of the rule of law and
constitutional government.”
The regulation sought to shrink the
so-called “white collar exemption” and
more than double the salary threshold under
which employers must pay overtime to
their workers. Overtime protections under
the regulation would apply to workers
making up to $913 a week, or $47,476 a
year, and the threshold would readjust
every three years to reflect changes in
average wages.
Laxalt said the rule would burden private
and public sectors, straining budgets and
forcing layoffs or cuts in working hours.
The court agreed with plaintiffs that the
Department of Labor exceeds its delegated
authority with the rule, and that it could
cause irreparable harm if it was not quickly
stopped.
The Department of Labor had no imme-
diate comment on the order on Tuesday.
U.S. Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez
said after the original lawsuit was filed in
September that he was confident in the
legality of the rule, calling the lawsuit a
partisan and obstructionist tactic. He noted
that overtime protections have receded
over the years. They applied to 62 percent
of U.S. full-time salaried workers in 1975
and just 7 percent today.
“The overtime rule is designed to restore
the intent of the Fair Labor Standards Act,
the crown jewel of worker protections in the
United States,” Perez said in September. “I
look forward to vigorously defending our
efforts to give more hardworking people a
meaningful chance to get by.”
WORLD BRIEFLY
U.S. airstrikes top 1,000
against IS in Iraq and Syria
fighter jets every day that drop on average
10 bombs each or reconnoiter in support of
anti-IS coalition forces.
USS EISENHOWER, Persian Gulf
(AP) — One after another, fighter jets
catapult from the flight deck of the USS
Eisenhower, a thousand-foot (305-meter)
American aircraft carrier, afterburners
glowing amber above the blue Persian Gulf,
on their way northwest to join the fight in
Iraq and Syria against the Islamic State.
The fighter jets refuel on the way before
receiving from coalition partners targets
like convoys, hideouts and mortar positions
in IS-controlled territories such as Mosul
and Raqqa, said Rear Adm. James Malloy,
commander of the Eisenhower carrier strike
group.
From his office aboard the USS
Eisenhower, Malloy described coalition
success around Mosul while cautioning that
victory is close at hand.
“Mosul is the last large city in Iraq that
is held by Daesh, but Daesh is by no means
finished in Iraq, so our mission in Iraq
won’t end as Mosul falls,” he said, using
the Arabic acronym for IS.
While inter-coalition coordination was
“seamless,” communication with Russia
was limited to “deconfliction,” Malloy said.
“There’s no coordination there because the
goals are not the same,” the admiral said.
The carrier’s captain Paul Spedero said
sorties from the Eisenhower have dropped
nearly 1,100 bombs on IS targets since
June when the ship entered the Persian Gulf
after launching strikes from the eastern
Mediterranean.
The ship’s 5,200 sailors arm, repair,
launch and recover 7-20 Super Hornet F18
Turkey fires 15,000 more
people in coup probe
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkey’s
government on Tuesday dismissed a further
15,000 people from the military, police
and the civil service as part of an ongoing
investigation into the failed military coup
in July.
The government also shut down some
500 associations, 19 health establishments
and nine media outlets in the two
government decrees.
Turkey has accused U.S.-based Muslim
cleric Fethullah Gulen of masterminding
the failed July 15 attempt to topple the
government and has launched a large-scale
crackdown on his followers and institutions
said to be run by his movement. Authorities
have arrested close to 38,000 people and
purged more than 100,000 others from
government.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said
Tuesday that the civil service was still not
entirely purged of Gulen’s followers and
vowed to take all measures necessary to
eradicate the group.
“We know that the state is not fully
cleared of this treacherous gang. They are
still within the Armed Forces, they are
still within the police, they are still within
the judiciary and they are still within the
various sections of the state,” Erdogan said.
He added: “We won’t allow them to
destroy this country nor to crush the people.
We will do whatever is necessary.”