Chuck Darwin on Nostr: #David #Shulkin, whom Trump had appointed to head the V.A., made multiple visits to ...
#David #Shulkin, whom Trump had appointed to head the V.A.,
made multiple visits to Palm Beach to consult with the troika that officials came to call “the Mar-a-Lago crowd.”
“There probably weren’t too many times I met with the President when he didn’t say,
‘What’s happening with Ike?’ ”
Shulkin once said.
When Perlmutter visited Washington, Shulkin told me,
“I would get a call
—‘Could you come over to the White House?
Mr. Perlmutter’s here with the President.’ ”
Shulkin was fired by Trump, in March of 2018, amid a controversy over an expensive trip to Europe that Shulkin had taken at taxpayers’ expense.
Within hours, he went public with accusations that the story had been hyped by Trump political appointees who were intent on privatizing many of the V.A.’s services.
Shulkin told me that he never fully understood why Perlmutter,
who had not served in the U.S. military or even visited a V.A. hospital until Shulkin took him to one,
had been given such power over the agency.
He described Perlmutter as “a private-sector guy” whom Trump admired as a self-made man,
someone who “had started with very little and built empires.”
The problem, as Shulkin saw it, was that Perlmutter had little idea of what he was doing.
“Because he never worked in government, he didn’t understand government,” Shulkin told me.
“Part of my role was always trying to translate
—‘That isn’t the way we could do things in this organization.’ ”
Perlmutter, however, has remained close to Trump.
He and his wife gave $21 million to a super pac supporting Trump’s bid in 2020,
and, in 2024, they bankrolled a new pro-Trump super pac,
"Right for America",
donating another $25 million.
By September, Right for America had raised some $70 million,
which it has spent on an advertising blitz this fall.
The venture drew support from other longtime members of Mar-a-Lago,
including the Newsmax founder #Christopher #Ruddy, who gave $100,000,
and #Anthony #Lomangino, a South Florida waste-management mogul,
who donated $7.85 million.
#Scott #Bessent, another hedge-fund executive often mentioned as a possible Trump Treasury Secretary,
also contributed $100,000.
🆘 Perlmutter’s highly unusual role in the first Trump Administration appears to have become something of a template for outside influence in a second term.
In March, when #Elon #Musk met with Trump at Peltz’s house for breakfast,
they discussed a broad advisory gig for the tech billionaire on such matters as immigration and the economy
—“in the mold of the role” that Perlmutter had played at the V.A.,
according to the Wall Street Journal.
By August, after publicly endorsing Trump,
Musk had fleshed out the idea.
During a lengthy live-streamed conversation with Trump,
Musk suggested that a commission was needed to investigate how to rein in government spending.
Such a panel, Musk posted on X, “would unlock tremendous prosperity for America.”
Weeks later,
during a speech at the Economic Club of New York,
Trump formally announced his support for a
“government-efficiency commission”
that would
“conduct a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government.”
He proposed that Musk,
despite having received billions of dollars in government contracts and subsidies for his ventures SpaceX and Tesla,
should chair the effort.
Soon, Trump was calling Musk his future
“Secretary of Cost Cutting.”
It sounded like a more ambitious version of a project that Trump had launched early in his Presidency,
when he named the billionaire investor #Carl #Icahn as a special adviser in charge of overhauling federal regulations.
Icahn left the role less than a year later,
when an article in this magazine raised questions about potential conflicts of interest.
made multiple visits to Palm Beach to consult with the troika that officials came to call “the Mar-a-Lago crowd.”
“There probably weren’t too many times I met with the President when he didn’t say,
‘What’s happening with Ike?’ ”
Shulkin once said.
When Perlmutter visited Washington, Shulkin told me,
“I would get a call
—‘Could you come over to the White House?
Mr. Perlmutter’s here with the President.’ ”
Shulkin was fired by Trump, in March of 2018, amid a controversy over an expensive trip to Europe that Shulkin had taken at taxpayers’ expense.
Within hours, he went public with accusations that the story had been hyped by Trump political appointees who were intent on privatizing many of the V.A.’s services.
Shulkin told me that he never fully understood why Perlmutter,
who had not served in the U.S. military or even visited a V.A. hospital until Shulkin took him to one,
had been given such power over the agency.
He described Perlmutter as “a private-sector guy” whom Trump admired as a self-made man,
someone who “had started with very little and built empires.”
The problem, as Shulkin saw it, was that Perlmutter had little idea of what he was doing.
“Because he never worked in government, he didn’t understand government,” Shulkin told me.
“Part of my role was always trying to translate
—‘That isn’t the way we could do things in this organization.’ ”
Perlmutter, however, has remained close to Trump.
He and his wife gave $21 million to a super pac supporting Trump’s bid in 2020,
and, in 2024, they bankrolled a new pro-Trump super pac,
"Right for America",
donating another $25 million.
By September, Right for America had raised some $70 million,
which it has spent on an advertising blitz this fall.
The venture drew support from other longtime members of Mar-a-Lago,
including the Newsmax founder #Christopher #Ruddy, who gave $100,000,
and #Anthony #Lomangino, a South Florida waste-management mogul,
who donated $7.85 million.
#Scott #Bessent, another hedge-fund executive often mentioned as a possible Trump Treasury Secretary,
also contributed $100,000.
🆘 Perlmutter’s highly unusual role in the first Trump Administration appears to have become something of a template for outside influence in a second term.
In March, when #Elon #Musk met with Trump at Peltz’s house for breakfast,
they discussed a broad advisory gig for the tech billionaire on such matters as immigration and the economy
—“in the mold of the role” that Perlmutter had played at the V.A.,
according to the Wall Street Journal.
By August, after publicly endorsing Trump,
Musk had fleshed out the idea.
During a lengthy live-streamed conversation with Trump,
Musk suggested that a commission was needed to investigate how to rein in government spending.
Such a panel, Musk posted on X, “would unlock tremendous prosperity for America.”
Weeks later,
during a speech at the Economic Club of New York,
Trump formally announced his support for a
“government-efficiency commission”
that would
“conduct a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government.”
He proposed that Musk,
despite having received billions of dollars in government contracts and subsidies for his ventures SpaceX and Tesla,
should chair the effort.
Soon, Trump was calling Musk his future
“Secretary of Cost Cutting.”
It sounded like a more ambitious version of a project that Trump had launched early in his Presidency,
when he named the billionaire investor #Carl #Icahn as a special adviser in charge of overhauling federal regulations.
Icahn left the role less than a year later,
when an article in this magazine raised questions about potential conflicts of interest.