Search Results for

January 16, 2021
Biden’s Antitrust Minefield
The vast majority of Americans believe that the monopoly power of tech companies is a major problem for the economy and a corrupting political influence. Biden should heed these concerns and avoiding appointing Big Tech insiders and allies of monopolies to head crucial antitrust regulatory posts at the Department of Justice.

January 14, 2021
Joe Biden's Newest Climate Appointees Provide Reason For Cautious Optimism
These personnel additions should leave climate activists cautiously optimistic, and many of these individuals are examples of people we would like to see staffed in every department and agency throughout the federal government.

January 13, 2021 | The American Prospect
Biden Must Close the Revolving Door Between BigLaw and Government
Biden framed his campaign as “Scranton vs. Park Avenue,” promising an end to corporate government. But in order to do that, Biden must seal the revolving door between corporate law firms and the federal government. There is no shortage of brilliant attorneys who have dedicated their careers to serving the public interest and fighting for social justice who are ready to do that work within the new administration.
January 13, 2021 | CODEPINK
WEBINAR: Joe Biden’s BlackRock Cabinet Picks
Our Max Moran joined CODEPINK Campaign Organizer Nancy Mancias to discuss investment management giant BlackRock’s role in influencing President-elect Biden’s executive branch personnel choices.

January 12, 2021
With Bill Burns At CIA, A Hopeful Move Toward Civil Service Revitalization
At the Revolving Door Project, we have frequently emphasized the importance of strengthening the civil service to ensure government works for public service and doesn’t cater to the interest of powerful people and corporations. We warned about how too much reliance on political appointments in the executive branch reduces accountability, citing academic research that political appointees perform worse than career managers. Especially in the Trump era, we have seen numerous examples of political appointees using the government for personal gain. Biden’s selection of William Burns, a career diplomat, as his CIA director should therefore be widely praised by progressives as a step towards restoring the civil service and depoliticizing the American intelligence community.

January 12, 2021
Gary Gensler Would Lead An Un-Captured SEC To New Climate Regs
Gensler’s first order of business at the SEC will be to reverse Trump’s deregulatory agenda and rebuild the agency’s capacity to police American stock-trading. But this should only be a starting point: SEC activity was insufficient even under Obama, and issues linked to the financial system, from climate change to inequality, have worsened in the four intervening years.

January 11, 2021 | Sludge
BlackRock Alum Who Developed Neoliberal Policies for Obama Will Be Harris’ Chief Economist
Michael Pyle, Vice President Harris’ incoming chief economist, is the latest member of BlackRock’s “shadow government” to be hired by the Biden-Harris administration. His record working for austerity advocate Peter Orzsag and TPP-proponent Lael Brainard should be a major red flag.

January 08, 2021
Memo on De-Trumpification
If there is one thing that Wednesday’s events made excruciatingly clear, it is that every additional day that Trump is in office is a dangerous one for our country. The risk is such that, even with only 12 days remaining in the President’s term, many are desperately seeking to remove him from office. Sadly, no matter whether Trump leaves the Oval Office tomorrow or on January 20, we know that many of his associates will remain behind (although just how many is a mystery).

January 06, 2021
Why Progressives Should Care About the Commerce Secretary & Reject Raimondo
As President-elect Joe Biden fills out his Cabinet, progressives have pushed hard on most major positions, save one: Commerce Secretary. Recent reporting on the role frames the Commerce Secretary as a glorified middle-man between C-Suites and the White House.
In fact, the work of the Commerce Department impacts all Americans. Yet for decades, Commerce Secretaries have been chosen not for their policy agenda or experience, but as a reward for their massive campaign contributions and personal loyalty to the President. This practice of selling the Commerce Secretary position to the highest bidder has made it difficult to understand just how valuable a populist Commerce Secretary could be.

January 06, 2021
INTERVIEW: Georgia's Historic Senate Wins And What's Next?
The Revolving Door Project’s Eleanor Eagan joined KPFA’s Hard Knock Radio to discuss Democrats’ historic wins in two Georgia Senate races and what unified Democratic control of the legislative and executive branches means for progressives in 2021 and beyond.

January 05, 2021
Biden's Shadow Transition Director Aided Corporations At Home And Abroad
Gitenstein’s time as Romanian ambassador earned him a walk-on role in Romanian historian and totalitarianism expert Florin Abraham’s post-World War II history of his country.

January 05, 2021
Biden Should Beware The Right-Wing's Revolving Door Attacks
Fresh off defending Donald Trump’s historic corruption, conservatives have begun attacking President-elect Biden for his nominees’ ties to Big Tech, Wall Street, and corporate lobbying. While these attacks are transparently hypocritical, they are not without factual substance and could prove to be a major political liability for Democrats unless they commit to adopting much-needed ethics reforms.

January 04, 2021
A Strong Ethics Pledge Will Pay Political Dividends
At a moment when our country’s divisions seem deeper than ever, there remains one thing on which a consistent majority can agree: corporate America has too much influence over our government. Americans across the political spectrum understand that corporations benefit when people pass in and out of the revolving door between government and the private sector.

December 31, 2020
INTERVIEW: Buttigieg’s DOT Nomination Betrays Biden’s Pledge to Name Competent, Experienced Officials
Biden has nominated Pete Buttigieg to become the nation’s next transportation secretary, despite his having almost no experience in the field. Our Max Moran explains this curious nomination and why it signals a return to a dysfunctional “business as usual” politics.

December 24, 2020
Why Progressives Should Care About The Commerce Secretary
As President-elect Joe Biden fills out his Cabinet, progressives have pushed hard on most major positions, save one: Commerce Secretary. Reporting on this role frames the seat as the liaison to the business community, who can “rebuild relationships” with massive corporations like BlackRock, Goldman Sachs, and Mastercard. (Were relationships ever frayed to begin with?) This framing makes the Commerce Secretary seem like a glorified middle-man between C-Suites and the White House, overlooking the actual functions of their Department, including the Patent and Trademark Office, the Census Bureau, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and crucial components of US trade policy.