The Obama Administration maintained a White House staffed public comments line as well as a staffed switchboard message number for people to call the White House. As of this week, neither number is functioning. Callers get a recorded message telling them to contact the Trump Regime via the official Trumpanzee Facebook page or the official White House Facebook page, neither of which accepts messages. So people are calling Trump hotels and other Trump businesses and leaving messages for him there-- a great ideal in my opinion.According to DCist, Trump's new Trumpanzee International in the Old Post Office "lost more than $1 million in net income during its first two months of operation and its revenues were $2 million less than estimates it provided to the General Services Administration, which owns the historic building." It's a low-end luxury hotel with the same kind of mediocre services all Trump properties provide. Trump's hotels are doing so badly in general that the new ones are not using the now toxic Trump brand in their names. New hotels are being branded as "Scion." But for now, people who want to contact the Trumpist Regime and are getting a run-around, have been calling Trump hotels, most of which are suffering from very low occupancy rates. I liked at the 5 star hotels in the cities where Trump has one of his joints. Let's start with Las Vegas. The Trump hotel is still rated as a 5-star but it's the cheapest one to get a room in. The rack rate is in line with the other 5-stars but, because the occupancy rate is so much lower than the other hotels, the prices they offer are much less. Here are the Vegas hotels with the rack rate first and the deal currently on offer:
Mandarin Oriental- $2,715... $1,0454 Seasons- $2,436... $1,318Encore- $1,967... $1,128Wynn- $1700... $830Bellagio- $1,342... $822Trump- $1,129... $506InterContinental- $1,054... $822Delano at Mandarin Bay- $1,061... $739
Same in DC:
Rosewood- $3,577... $2,292Four Seasons- $3,345... $1,642St. Regis- $3,063... $1,626Ritz-Carlton, Georgetown- $2,967... $1,302Mandarin Oriental- $2,338... $1,241Trump International- $1,989... $473The Watergate- $1,983... $1,241Park Hyatt- $$1,746... $1,552The Jefferson- $1,577Ritz-Carlton- $1,393... $1,257The Willard Intercontinental- $1,060
In Chicago, Trump tries squeezing his hotel guests for $1,190/night... but Hotels.com, Hotwire.com, Booking.com, and GetARoom.com all offer the same room for $142. The ad above is from Trump's own website. Everything is a negotiation with the sleazy, greedy Trumpanzee.In any case, these are Trump's hotels in the U.S. with the phone numbers for anyone who wants to leave Señor Presidente Trumpanzee a message.Chicago- 312.588.8000- reservation- 877.458.7867Las Vegas- 702.982.0000, res- 866.939.8786Miami- 305.592.2000, res- 800.713.6725NY- 212.299.1000, res- 888.448.78671 Central Park WestSoho, NY- 212.842.5500, res- 877.828.7080246 Spring StreetWaikiki- 808.683.7777, res- 877.683.7401DC- 202.695.1100, res- 866.660.9426Or you could try to leave him a message at his so-called "modeling" agency, Trump Model-- 212-924-0990.Women might be especially unhappy today because the Republicans just passed another one of their ugly anti-Choice bills. It passed the House 238-183, every single Republican + 3 pf the worst Blue Dogs-- Collin Peterson (MN), Henry Cuellar (TX) and Dan Lipinski (IL)-- voting to screw with women's constitutional rights. In the past when Republicans have passed this kind of crap, we had Obama to pull out his veto pen. Now, we have Trump-- a perfect reason why his hotels should be flooded with phone calls. Trump also issued an Executive Order, a "Global Gag Rule, far worse than what George Bush did. Bush' disastrous restrictions, according to UNDispatch.com "were limited exclusively to NGOs that receive US government assistance for family planning and reproductive health, like contraception" and they prevented the NGOs "from counseling women that abortion is an option or lobbying foreign governments to liberalize their abortion laws." But Trump's order goes further. "Rather than applying the Global Gag Rule exclusively to US assistance for family planning in the developing world, which amounts to about $575 million per year, the Trump memo applies it to 'global health assistance furnished by all department or agencies.' In other words, NGOs that distribute bed nets for malaria, provide childhood vaccines, support early childhood nutrition and brain development, run HIV programs, fight ebola or Zika, and much more, must now certify their compliance with the Global Gag Rule or risk losing US funds. According to analysis from PAI, a global health NGO, this impacts over $9 billion of US funds, or about 15 times more than the previous iteration of the Global Gag Rule which only impacted reproductive health assistance... This is a profound expansion of what was already a harmful policy."Pramila Jayapal, the Democratic freshman from Seattle pointed out that "just days after Americans took to the streets in solidarity with women across the globe, Republicans launched another assault on women’s health care. Cementing a law that restricts abortion coverage for women of color and low-income women is bad enough, but restricting how women use their own money to purchase private comprehensive health care insurance is reprehensible. The so-called 'No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act' codifies the Hyde amendment, permanently banning federal dollars, including Medicaid funding, for women who wish to purchase comprehensive health care plans that cover abortion-- disproportionately harming women of color and low-income women. Additionally, this legislation imposes tax penalties on small businesses that choose private health plans that cover abortion. It bans coverage of abortion services for women insured by multi-state health plans under the Affordable Care Act. Make no mistake. This isn’t a health care issue. It’s part of an extreme, right-wing political agenda that puts women’s rights on the chopping block. This bill creates even more barriers for women of color trying to access quality healthcare at a time when we should be focused on legislating equity, not codifying disparity. It is nothing more than politicians trying to control women’s bodies."And, needless to say, it wasn't just women angered by the Republicans' unconstitutional explosion of misogyny. Ted Lieu (D-CA):
Today, just two days after the 44th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court ruling that protects the rights of women to control their own bodies, House Republicans have once again taken up a vote attacking the constitutionally-protected reproductive rights of women all across the nation. As if this past weekend’s Women’s March on Washington (which was far more attended than President Trump’s inauguration) didn’t signal anything to our elected leaders, President Trump took the GOP’s war on women’s rights and health a step further by signing an executive order reinstating the ‘global gag rule’ and blocking foreign aid for international non-governmental organizations that provide basic reproductive health services globally. This decision not only increases abortion rates, it will cause more maternal complications, injuries, and unintended pregnancies and provide less information on HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment programs worldwide.Republicans continue their shameful, radical assault on women’s reproductive health with today’s vote on H.R. 7, a discriminatory bill that among other things would prohibit the use of federal funds to pay for any abortion services. Despite the fact that current law already requires that federal funds not be spent on abortions, this bill would prohibit individuals and small businesses from claiming tax credits for any private insurance plans obtained through the ACA Marketplace that include abortion coverage. Families buying their insurance in the Marketplace would also be ineligible to receive a premium tax credits if they enrolled in a health plan that covers abortion, likely resulting in no abortion coverage policies being offered in the Marketplaces. Furthermore, it undermines the District of Columbia’s home rule, which allows D.C. to use it’s own Medicaid funds to offer abortion services. This is despite the fact that 17 states, including California, are currently allowed to do so.Women should be able to make their own decisions about reproductive health care with dignity and respect, without the interference of politicians or their employers. We should not be in the business of telling women what they can and cannot do with their own bodies. Today’s vote is just another step forward in the Republican party’s plan to Make America Sick Again and take away the comprehensive care women deserve.
There are only 6 House incumbents who Blue America has endorsed so far-- and Jayapal and Lieu are two of them. They deserve support for what they've been doing to lead the resistance to Trumpism: