Government & Communications

The White House has asked the likes of Apple, Amazon, Oracle and Qualcomm to lend some of their digital expertise to Washington (DC) in the coming months to help the Trump administration rethink the way that federal agencies use technology. On a private call with those and other major tech companies Aug 3, top advisers to the president, including Jared Kushner, announced the White House would be forming small “centers of excellence,” teams focused on reducing regulation while trying to get federal agencies to embrace cloud computing and make more of their data available for private-sector use, apprently. As part of those centers, Kushner and his aides with the Office of American Innovation asked the tech industry for its help — potentially through a system where leading tech engineers can do brief “tours of duty” advising the U.S. government on some of its digital challenges.

For now, the effort is still early, but the huddle marks the next step for Kushner’s effort to modernize government after Trump convened the chief executives of Apple, Facebook, Google and other Silicon Valley staples at the White House in June — part of the administration’s push that month with “tech week.”

President Donald Trump touted a new program to increase veterans' electronic access to medical care as part of a broader tele-health push at the Department of Veterans Affairs. The initiative connects veterans with health providers via mobile phones or computers, and is intended to improve medical care especially for those needing mental health and suicide prevention services, President Trump said. “It will make a tremendous difference for the veterans in rural locations in particular,” President Trump said at the White House with VA Secretary David Shulkin. The application allows veterans to schedule appointments via their smart phones. Shulkin also previewed a regulation allowing VA providers to provide tele-health services to veterans anywhere in the country.

A February tweet from President Donald Trump in which he said he had a “very civil conversation” with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has resurfaced in the wake of the call’s recently released transcript showing President Trump calling the call “unpleasant.”

“Thank you to Prime Minister of Australia for telling the truth about our very civil conversation that FAKE NEWS media lied about,” Trump tweeted last February, amid reports he lashed out at his Australian counterpart over the phone. The tweet’s resurfacing comes after The Washington Post obtained the transcript of the call, which shows a heated interaction between the leaders of the two traditional allies. “I have had it,” Trump told Turnbull in the January 28 conversation. “I have been making these calls all day, and this is the most unpleasant call all day.” President Trump said his conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin “was a pleasant call” by comparison.

[Commentary] Journalists are facing the challenge of covering one of the most unusual and unreliable governments in modern history: President Donald Trump disseminates lies, twisted facts, and changes in policy in real time through his Twitter account. His advisors send contradictory messages on sensitive national topics and change policies at the last minute, surprising even Cabinet members. Federal data vanishes from the “thin cloud” on matters such as climate change and the environment. Despite—or perhaps because of—all of this, investigative journalism is flourishing and growing as it did during the Watergate days. However, this time, journalists are much better equipped for finding the truth independently, thanks to data and technology. The challenge for journalists is to thoroughly and selectively grasp the power of technology while upholding the profession’s core journalistic mission. To that end, the Columbia Journalism School is launching a Master of Science in Data Journalism that we hope will advance data journalism education and contribute to building the next generation of newsroom leaders.

[Giannina Segnini is director of the Master of Science in Data Journalism program at the Columbia Journalism School.]

Even critics of President Trump seem to agree: The leakers have gone too far. Many in Washington are expressing alarm that the transcripts of Trump’s phone calls with foreign leaders were leaked to The Washington Post, warning that the action could undermine the U.S. government and imperil national security. “This is beyond the pale and will have a chilling effect going forward on the ability of the commander in chief to have candid discussions with his counterparts,” said Ned Price, a former National Security Council official under President Barack Obama. “Granted, the White House contributed to this atmosphere by welcoming the free-for-all environment, where anonymous leaks are commonplace. But we must draw the line somewhere.”

[Commentary] Leaking the transcript of a presidential call to a foreign leader is unprecedented, shocking, and dangerous. It is vitally important that a president be able to speak confidentially—and perhaps even more important that foreign leaders understand that they can reply in confidence.

Aug 3’s leak to The Washington Post of President Trump’s calls with the president of Mexico and the prime minister of Australia will reverberate around the world. No leader will again speak candidly on the phone to Washington (DC)—at least for the duration of this presidency, and perhaps for longer. If these calls can be leaked, any call can be leaked—and no leader dare say anything to the president of the United States that he or she would not wish to read in the news at home.

[David Frum is a former speechwriter for President George W. Bush.]

President Donald Trump made building a wall along the southern US border and forcing Mexico to pay for it core pledges of his campaign. But in his first White House call with Mexico’s president, President Trump described his vow to charge Mexico as a growing political problem, pressuring the Mexican leader to stop saying publicly that his government would never pay. “You cannot say that to the press,” President Trump said repeatedly, according to a transcript of the Jan 27 call obtained by The Washington Post.

President Trump made clear that he realized the funding would have to come from other sources but threatened to cut off contact if Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto continued to make defiant statements. The funding “will work out in the formula somehow,” President Trump said, adding later that “it will come out in the wash, and that is okay.” But “if you are going to say that Mexico is not going to pay for the wall, then I do not want to meet with you guys anymore because I cannot live with that.”

[Commentary] First, it is shocking to see presidential conversations released in this way. Some in the executive branch, as Anthony Scaramucci aptly put it, are intent on protecting the country from President Trump. This is a good thing, by the way. White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly has obviously failed to plug the flood leaks, and one wonders whether a leak this egregious is meant to signal that the White House will remain dysfunctional.

And that brings us to the next point: Trump is frighteningly obsessed with himself and his image to such an extent that he cannot fulfill the role of commander in chief. Third, President Trump’s narcissism leaves him open to flattery and threats (to reveal embarrassing material, for example). That’s the worry in the Russia investigation — namely, that Vladimir Putin has “something” on Trump, which compels Trump to act in ways inimical to U.S. interests. President Trump’s interests are paramount, so a cagey adversary can easily manipulate him.

After lagging behind other courts for years, the Supreme Court is finally catching up on a key technological feature that will be a boon to researchers, lawyers and analysts of all kinds. It's moving to adopt electronic filing. The change will allow the public to access legal filings for all future cases — free of charge. Beginning Nov 13, the court will require “parties who are represented by counsel” to upload digital copies of their paper submissions. Parties representing themselves will have their filings uploaded by the court's staff. All those submissions will then be entered into an online docket for each case, and they will be accessible from the court's homepage. The move brings the Supreme Court fully into the Internet age.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) collects and maintains personal data on millions of individuals, including data related to security clearance investigations. In 2015, OPM reported significant breaches of personal information that affected 21.5 million individuals. The Senate report accompanying the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, 2016 included a provision for GAO to review information security at OPM. GAO evaluated OPM's (1) actions since the 2015 reported data breaches to prevent, mitigate, and respond to data breaches involving sensitive personnel records and information; (2) information security policies and practices for implementing selected government-wide initiatives and requirements; and (3) procedures for overseeing the security of OPM information maintained by contractors providing IT services. To do so, GAO examined policies, plans, and procedures and other documents; tested controls for selected systems; and interviewed officials. This is a public version of a sensitive report being issued concurrently. GAO omitted certain specific examples due to the sensitive nature of the information.

GAO is making five recommendations to improve OPM's security. OPM concurred with four of these and partially concurred with the one on validating its corrective actions. GAO continues to believe that implementation of this recommendation is warranted. In GAO's limited distribution report, GAO made nine additional recommendations.