Section 4.1: Department of Commerce
“The Economic Development Administration’s grant programs, which are among a broad set of duplicative and overlapping federal economic development grant programs, should be consolidated with other programs and/or eliminated.”
This recommendation leaves out the unique role of the EDA. The EDA is specifically tasked with promoting job creation in distressed areas. Its programs target economically disadvantaged regions and provide assistance to communities suffering from long-term economic stagnation or the loss of a major industry. While other agencies may offer similar grants, the EDA’s focus on regional economic development is distinct.
Eliminating or consolidating programs could reduce the ability to tailor economic development efforts to specific needs. The EDA’s grants are often used for infrastructure improvements, innovation clusters, and workforce development, which require specialized knowledge of regional conditions.
That having been said, the EDA is not above criticism, and has been spending without Congressional authorization since 2008.
Chris Edwards for the Cato Institute writes, “The EDA does not have special skills for boosting economic growth that the states and private sector do not have.” [Source]
Well. Except money, of course. The EDA has resources that states don’t, and the private sector is unwilling to provide in many cases if the project is not profitable.
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) should be dismantled and many of its functions eliminated, sent to other agencies, privatized, or placed under the control of states and territories.”
This would have severe public safety consequences. NOAA operates key systems such as the National Weather Service (NWS) and various satellites that provide real-time data for weather forecasting, severe storm warnings, and climate monitoring. Eliminating or privatizing these functions could reduce access to high-quality, reliable data.
NOAA plays a critical role in issuing early warnings for hurricanes, tornadoes, and other severe weather events. If these functions were privatized or handed over to states or territories, there could be inconsistencies in the quality and timeliness of warnings, leading to greater risks for communities during natural disasters.
If weather services were privatized, the general public and industries (e.g., agriculture, aviation, shipping) might have to pay for what are currently publicly funded services. This could increase costs, especially for smaller entities or states with limited budgets.
If states don’t have the budget and private entities aren’t able to do it as well, what happens? Blindsided by natural disasters!
Further, NOAA is a leader in climate science, conducting research on global warming, ocean acidification, and sea-level rise. Eliminating or reducing NOAA’s research functions could hinder efforts to understand and mitigate climate change, leaving gaps in the scientific knowledge used for global environmental policy.
Spoiler: That’s the part they care about. That’s why they want to dismantle the NOAA. THEY WANT TO PRETEND CLIMATE CHANGE DOESN’T EXIST, and they think that if we stop researching it or talking about it, it will simply go away. (See: The Bruno Strategy.)
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“BIS should additionally designate app providers (such as WeChat and Byte Dance/TikTok) known for undermining U.S. national security through data collection, surveillance, and influence operations, to the Entity List. This listing would prevent app users from program updates, which would quickly make these apps non-operational in the United States.”
Some U.S. lawmakers believe that TikTok is an urgent threat to National Security. The Biden Administration even threatened to ban it4 unless TikTok’s Chinese owners sell their stakes. Is it truly a threat, though? Evidence is unclear.
“It’s not that we know TikTok has done something, it’s that distrust of China and awareness of Chinese espionage has increased,” said James Lewis, an information security expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “The context for TikTok is much worse as trust in China vanishes.”
“Security experts say these scenarios are a possibility based on what’s publicly known about China’s laws and TikTok’s ownership structure, but stress that they are hypothetical at best. To date, there is no public evidence that Beijing has actually harvested TikTok’s commercial data for intelligence or other purposes.”
“Multiple privacy and security researchers who’ve examined TikTok’s app say there aren’t any glaring flaws suggesting the app itself is currently spying on people or leaking their information.”
“We did not find any overt vulnerabilities regarding their communication protocols, nor did we find any overt security problems within the app,” Lin said. “Regarding privacy, we also did not see the TikTok app exhibiting any behaviors similar to malware.”
Any such policy would not, then, be evidence-based.
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“Together, these form a colossal operation that has become one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity.”
This is more arguing for dismantling the NOAA / National Weather Service. So, I called it when I said before that the climate change thing is why they’re mad at the NOAA. As I have pointed out numerous times on this website, climate change is not speculative. More in the analysis.
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“Withdraw the 30×30 Executive Order and Associated America the Beautiful Initiative.”
The 30×30 initiative was introduced through Biden’s EO 14008 in January 2021, which calls for conserving 30% of U.S. lands and waters by the year 2030. The goal is to protect biodiversity, address climate change, and ensure long-term sustainability of ecosystems. It emphasizes collaborative efforts with states, local governments, tribes, and private landowners to achieve the conservation targets.
The America the Beautiful initiative is the broader framework for implementing the 30×30 goal. Launched in May 2021, it outlines a locally-led and voluntary approach to conservation. It aims to restore degraded ecosystems, expand access to nature for communities, support rural economies, and enhance resilience to climate change, while also respecting private property rights. This initiative stresses inclusive and equitable conservation efforts across the U.S.
In context, Gilman is offended that these initiatives close areas of the ocean to commercial fishing, while advancing offshore wind energy development.
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“Modify Regulations Implementing the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act. These acts are currently being abused at a cost to fisheries and Native American subsistence activities around the U.S.”
Again, he’s mad that we’re protecting fish by limiting fishing practices, and imposing catch limits and/or seasonal closures of fishing areas. He’s claiming that this hurts Native Americans who rely on fishing for subsistence. (Native American subsistence activities are often protected by treaties or tribal sovereignty6, so this is a spurious argument.)
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“Ensure Appointees Agree with Administration Aims. Scientific agencies like NOAA are vulnerable to obstructionism of an Administration’s aims if political appointees are not wholly in sync with Administration policy. Particular attention must be paid to appointments in this area.”
More staffing the government with regime loyalists, with the added bonus of replacing scientists with science deniers!
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“A new Administration should work to actively engage with conservative groups and voices to promote response to the decennial census. Promoting response to the decennial census will ensure that the most accurate counts are conducted, leading to a more accurate apportionment of congressional representation and allocation of federal funds. In 2020, lack of conservative participation was one factor in an undercount in some areas of the country, affecting representation of certain states.”
He’s advocating here for staffing the Census Bureau with political appointees to ensure that they “align with conservative principles.” I didn’t realize that collecting a census was a partisan affair, but apparently, the census helps dictate certain things, meaning he wants to juice the results to benefit Republicans. More about that in the analysis.
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“Despite finding that the Trump Administration’s addition of the citizenship question to the 2020 decennial census violated the Administrative Procedures Act, the Supreme Court held that the Secretary of Commerce does have broad authority to add a citizenship question to the decennial census. Any successful conservative Administration must include a citizenship question in the census.”
Historically (prior to 1950), we’ve asked questions like this on the census. But historically, we didn’t have a candidate running who was promising to deport all immigrants, so this feels nefarious. The Constitution requires that the census taken every ten years must be a total “enumeration” and that has long been understood as counting everyone living in America at the time the census is performed – citizens and non-citizens, legal residents and immigrant residents living in the United States without legal permission.
“Critics say it’s a virtual lock that in the current political climate that non-citizens would think twice about taking part in the Census if they had to openly declare their citizenship status. That would exacerbate already significant issues with undercounting minorities that has an impact on funding and representation in past Census efforts.” [Source]
Trump failed to do this in 2020, but won’t again, with our current Supreme Court.
“The Supreme Court’s 5-to-4 ruling last Thursday had not barred the government from asking the question, but did order it to reconsider the plan after concluding that the reason given for it was “contrived” and “pretextual.”
The rationale that Secretary Ross and his aides had given repeatedly, especially in filings in the court cases brought by challengers, was that data gathered by asking the citizenship question would help the Justice Department in enforcing federal voting rights laws. The evidence in the case that went to the Supreme Court, the majority of Justices found, did not support that claim. [Source]
The source continues:
“It is not entirely clear where the idea to add the question originated in the Trump Administration, but there was evidence in the court cases that former White House aide Steve Bannon and a former outside adviser to the President, former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, had pressed Secretary Ross to take the step.”
Yes, I’m sure Steve Bannon wanted all of this information about immigrants for perfectly innocent reasons.
The undercounting also benefits conservatives in other ways – if immigrants are too afraid to report, conservatives get to juice the House of Representatives:
“One of the principal claims of the challengers was that the presence of the citizenship question on census forms would discourage Hispanic households and those of non-citizens from responding, for fear that the disclosures would lead to the deportation of relatives or friends. The argument was that this refusal to respond would result in an “under-count” that might leave out 6 million or more people.
Since Hispanics and non-citizens are concentrated in larger states and larger cities, a significant under-count would probably lead to the loss of seats in the U.S. House of Representatives for states such as California, Florida and New York. Allocation of seats in the House is based, under the Constitution, on each state’s total population as counted in each census.”
Fewer seats in the house = fewer votes in the electoral college as well. This isn’t just me figuring it out – this was 100% the reason they wanted to do this.
Trump’s White House had internal memos circulating that detailed their plans. The House Oversight Committee released them with a report:
“Today’s Committee memo pulls back the curtain on this shameful conduct and shows clearly how the Trump Administration secretly tried to manipulate the census for political gain while lying to the public and Congress about their goals,” says Democratic Rep. Carolyn Maloney of New York, who chairs the House oversight committee and introduced the bill, in a statement. “It is clear that legislative reforms are needed to prevent any future illegal or unconstitutional efforts to interfere with the census and chip away at our democracy.”
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“Government data should be unbiased and trusted—and an incoming conservative Administration should ensure that is the case.”
This is very rich, said right on the heels of a detailed plan to deliberately bias the census data.
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.