Days after tragic Texas floods, Trump's NOAA demands public TV stations remove weather alerting equipment from towers

[bigtree]

Ed Markey @SenMarkey
Unbelievable. Just days after the tragic flooding in Texas, NOAA is demanding that public TV stations remove equipment from towers that is critical for these stations to send weather alerts. Trump’s ideological crusade against public broadcasting will cost lives.



...DOGE bot jumped into the twitter thread to claim that 'security' issues necessitated the removal of these critical systems, but pulling them out at the start of hurricane season without ANY replacement ready to go is a criminal grifting sham that will COST LIVES.

However, Trump's focus and concern is on getting cronies billion dollar govt contracts on the lie that these systems aren't sufficient.

Downsizing is part of an effort to privatize the work of such agencies. In several instances, the companies poised to step into the void have deep ties to people tapped by Trump to run weather-related agencies.

Commerce secretary Howard Lutnick oversees the govt’s efforts to monitor and predict the weather. The billionaire also ran a financial firm, which he left in control of his adult sons, that stands to benefit from privatizing government weather forecasting.

Lutnick also played a pivotal role in cultivating Satellogic. He helped raise the capital to take the company public and held a seat on its board until Trump nominated him and holds roughly 13% stake in Satellogic, now billing itself as an emerging weather forcasting contractor.

Trump’s pick to lead the NOAA, Neil Jacobs, was affiliated with Panasonic Weather Solutions and has been a vocal proponent of privatization. The president’s nominee for another top NOAA post, Taylor Jordan, is a lobbyist with a roster of weather-related clients.

Elon Musk, whose SpaceX stands to gain through a new generation of private and federally funded weather satellites that would be carried into orbit on its rockets, directed the cutting of 1/3 of the staff of NOAA’s Office of Space Commerce.

source: https://apnews.com/article/trump-lutnick-weather-service-privatization-conflicts-9892de853c283468e6fb970cfd898d96

thread:

Link to tweet

[TommieMommy]

1. OMG no no no no no

[House of Roberts]

2. Next they will want to disable tornado sirens all over the country.

These traitors want the country to fail in all ways they can imagine.

[Texin]

10. Those sirens aren't just about tornadoes (flooding, etc.), they're also Civil Defense warnings, i.e.,

the old Cold War throwback letting people know that nukes were about to rain down. And, god knows, we're closer to flying nukes now than we were in the way back when I was in grade school.

[eppur_se_muova]

14. I remember Baltimore still tested theirs once a month back in the 80s. Not many tornadoes in Baltimore. nt

[Texin]

15. Up until about February of this year, those Civil Defense sirens were tested in our area(s) Dallas-Forth Worth the

first Tuesday of every month, as they had been since I was girl in grade school back in the 20th Century. Back in the days when they had school drills where we all trooped out to the local bar ditch (as they say here) to duck and cover. If it was raining, we all dove under our desks and covered our heads.

Ahh, the good old days.

[BoRaGard]

3. Evil republicons doing evil thing to Americans

[yorkster]

4. When does the hell no part of this kick in?

Who will take down this equipment? Hired goons or just people doing their jobs, iow obeying orders.
It's not even "people will die" - at least 300 people have died in the Texas floods and elsewhere.
So blatant and unforgivable, like so much else they do.

[Baitball Blogger]

5. That's not going to work in Florida.

[Baitball Blogger]

6. Their pattern is so obvious:

1) Call something inefficient
2) Dismantle it without a proper replacement.
3) Pass the contracts on to close buddies, without exposing how they bid for the projects.

Isn't this what Kristi Noem did that delayed sending FEMA out for three days, that might have helped the Texas flooding victims?

[surfered]

7. This is insane

[TrumanTheTiger]

8. Weather Radio is a primary entry point for the EAS system

It’s been referred to “all hazards radio” instead of just “weather radio” because it also communicates evacuation notices (think fire moving towards a populated area), civil dangers, shelter-in-place (think train derailment with hazardous materials), amber alerts (though those don’t activate the alerting system on the radio), plus weather alerts. It’s also the primary source of the “the Russians are coming” message, aka a Presidential Emergency Message or Emergency Action Notification/Termination: this dates back to the Nixon Administration when weather radio really became a “thing”. The EAN (and EAT) is the only thing within the EAS for broadcasters that has higher priority than a tornado warning.

A primary entry point is one that all other broadcasters “listen” to (there’s a computer—or really a deck—inside every TV and radio station that listens for that buzzing-like noise coming from a primary entry point that tells it to get ready to interrupt programming and what the message is) and then copy it and rebroadcast it.

So, eliminating a primary entry point? Not good.

[Texin]

9. "Trump's ideological crusade against public broadcasting will cost lives".

That's the whole idea. It's apparent that, along with truthful reporting of news and current relevant events, the real bullseye is all about eliminating huge swaths of the populace (and it doesn't stop within the American borders).

[Escape]

11. Their ultimate goal is ...

to kill as many Americans as possible.

Trump, All Republicans, and apparently, their God.......are working on it diligently.

[MadameButterfly]

13. and it turns out he can do it without gas ovens

The numbers will add up just the same

[Ol Janx Spirit]

12. Pure evil... n/t

[Cha]

16. This is for Vlad Putin's Orders to Destroy America

Traitor and Putin 2 fucking pees in a pod.