March 16, 2017

Help Me Out With the Great Wiretap Hunt

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Last night I read Donald Trump’s comment that he had read the word “wiretap” in the New York Times on January 20, so he figured that made it OK on March 4 to accuse President Obama of wiretapping him. I vaguely wondered what article he was talking about, but it was late and life is short, so I went to bed instead of searching for it.

Today, though, I wondered yet again. Here’s what the Times search engine tells me:

I also tried “wire tap” and “wire-tap.” No dice. Does anyone have a clue what he was talking about?

And how about the Bret Baier report “the day previous where he was talking about certain very complex sets of things happening, and wiretapping”? I can’t find that either.

Do either of these things exist? Or is Trump just making stuff up to cover for the fact that he read about it in a Breitbart News summary of a Mark Levin radio rant?

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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