May 12, 2016

87-Year-Old Billionaire Endorses Trump: “Just in Case It’s a Mistake, I’ll Be Gone.”

“I’m ready to take a chance on it.”

Jim Urquhart/Reuters/ZUMA

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Of all the reasons to endorse Donald Trump for president, betting on one’s own imminent death in case all the most dire predictions of a Trump presidency come true may be the worst. Nevertheless, that appears to be at least part of the so-called reasoning behind 87-year-old oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens’ announcement on Wednesday that he was backing the real estate magnate.

“I’m ready to take a chance on it,” Pickens said at the SALT economic conference in Las Vegas. “And just in case it’s a mistake, [I’ll] be gone.”

The billionaire, who previously supported Trump’s rivals Jeb Bush and Carly Fiorina, declined to offer an alternative for the hundreds of millions, and future generations, of Americans who will outlive him.

At the same conference, Pickens also said that he approved of Trump’s call to bar all Muslims from entering the country, at least temporarily, until “we can vet these people.” His support for the ban came on the same day Trump made his first comments walking back the controversial plan, calling it “just a suggestion.”

“Yes, I’m for Donald Trump,” Pickens said. “I’m tired of having politicians as president of the U.S. Let’s try something different.”

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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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