Ronald Reagan

Nov. 7 (UPI) — A 4% reduction in flights took effect Friday after Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy ordered the reduction to ease stress on air traffic controllers during the federal government shutdown.

About 1,000 flights across 40 airports were canceled Friday. There also are delays amid controller shortages with flight reductions at the mandated airports by the Federal Aviation Administration. A 10% reduction is planned for next Friday.

Through Friday night nationwide, there have been 1,494 cancellations and 5,543 flight delays, according to FlightAware. The most cancellations were at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport: 83 departures at 18% and 75 arrivals at 16%. This includes ones not linked to tower staffing issues, such as equipment problems or weather.

Flights were delayed an average of four hours tonight heading to Reagan, according to the FAA. There were 148 arriving delays, or 32% of flights, and 204 departure delays, or 45%.

United Airlines and American Airlines announced they have cut their flights by 4% for Saturday. This means 220 for American, which has the most flights, and 168 for United the third-biggest airline.

Delta Airlines, with the second-most flights, didn’t announce plans but canceled 170 on Friday.

And Southwest Airlines said about 100 flights will be canceled Saturday.

Control towers at several airports Friday are facing staffing shortages, including in San Francisco, Atlanta and others, CNN reported.

On Friday, there were staffing shortages at nine towers; 12 at TRACONs, which handle flights arriving or departing airports; and eight at the Air Route Traffic Control Center that handle flights at high altitudes.

USA Today reported that Duffy told Democrats who criticized his decision to cut flights, “Open the damn government.”

The federal government has been closed since Oct. 1, and the shutdown is now the longest in history at 38 days.

The staffing shortage is getting worse because air traffic controllers are quitting, said Nick Daniels, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, to CNN.

“Controllers are resigning every day now because of the prolonged nature of the shutdown,” Daniels said. “We’re also 400 controllers short – shorter than we were in the 2019 shutdown.”

Daniels told CNN that controllers have to be “perfect” at work, and financial concerns can cause issues with their concentration.

“We are always being used as a political pawn during a government shutdown,” Daniels said. “We are the rope in a tug-of-war game.”

In one city, pilots have stepped in to help. At North Las Vegas Airport, a group of pilots delivered food and supplies for controllers and their families.

“I’ve been in the situation where I’ve had an in-flight emergency, and the air traffic controllers make a difference,” pilot Jeffrey Lustick told CNN affiliate KTNV. “They help you get to the ground safely. They alert people that you need help … air traffic controllers save lives.”

The pilots have made two deliveries to the controllers.

“The relationship between air traffic controllers and pilots is one of trust … they have to be able to survive, and we want them to stay here and continue to provide support to our community,” he said.

Airlines will decide which flights to cancel based on revenue, Michael Taylor, senior travel advisor at JD Power, told USA Today.

“All these airlines have shareholders, and their job as managers is to maximize revenue and margin and profit to the airline sales and keep your airline stock up,” Taylor said. “So they’re going to start first at looking – if you want 10% reduction in number of aircraft, well then we will cut those markets out that we’re not going to make the most money.”

There are other considerations, such as crew and aircraft placement, Taylor said. But the money is the bottom line.

“It won’t seem to travelers that there’s any rhyme or reason to it at all. It’ll seem random, but what’s really driving it is someone in corporate headquarters saying, ‘OK, you want the number of aircraft lowered? Fine. I’ve got to keep my revenue high. I’m going to take out the ones I don’t make any money on. It’s as simple as that,'” Taylor added.

Some travelers are making multiple backup plans, including different days and routes.

“What I’m worried about is getting to Houston in time for a procedure that’s been scheduled for quite some time and there’s some urgency,” Neil Lyon told CNN about flying from Santa Fe, N.M. I’m dealing with this, and I’m just thinking about the tens of thousands, or millions, who are dealing with other really serious circumstances that are impacted by what the situation is.”

Nov. 1 (UPI) — Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Saturday said he apologized to U.S. President Donald Trump for a TV ad by the Ontario Province’s government against U.S. tariffs.

The 60-second ran during the World Series on Fox TV in the United States and on Sportsnet in Canada.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced the ad would be paused starting last Monday “so that trade talks can resume.”

“I did apologize to the president,” Carney told reporters Saturday in South Korea. “I told Ford I did not want to go forward with the ad.”

Carney said he spoke to Trump at a dinner hosted by South Korea’s president on Wednesday.

Trump told reporters that the Canadian prime minister had expressed his remorse.

“I have a very good relationship,” Trump said. “I like him a lot, but what they did was wrong. He was very nice. He apologized for what they did with the commercial.”

Trump has said he had a “very nice” conversation with Carney.

The ad first ran during Game 1 of the World Series on Oct. 24 between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Los Angeles Dodgers. It featured remarks in 1987 by former President Ronald Reagan that were critical of tariffs, but they were edited.

“You know why President Trump is so upset right now? Because it was effective,” Ford said of the ad. “It was working, it woke up the whole country.”

Trump called it “FAKE,” although Reagan’s words were not changed in the commercial.

In response to the ad, he ended trade talks and later raised the tariffs another 10% from 25% on most Canadian imports that do not comply with the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

There also is a 50% tariff on most steel, aluminum, copper products as have been put in place for other nations.

The ad included a clip of Reagan during a radio address in his second term saying that “when someone says, ‘Let’s impose tariffs on foreign imports,’ it looks like they’re doing the patriotic thing by protecting American products and jobs. And sometimes for a short while, it works, but only for a short time.”

The White House objected, noting that the ad omitted another part of Reagan’s address.

“As I’ve often said, our commitment to free trade is also a commitment to fair trade,” the former president also said in the remarks.

In a post on X on Oct. 23, the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute said the ad “misrepresents” the late president’s radio address.

The next morning, Trump posted on Truth Social that Canada “fraudulently” used a “FAKE” advertisement.

“TARIFFS ARE VERY IMPORTANT TO THE NATIONAL SECURITY, AND ECONOMY, OF THE U.S.A.” Trump wrote. “Based on their egregious behavior, ALL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH CANADA ARE HEREBY TERMINATED.”

After the ad ran again on Friday, Oct. 24, Trump posted on Truth Social while en route to Asia that “Reagan LOVED Tariffs for purposes of National Security and the Economy, but Canada said he didn’t!”

“Their Advertisement was to be taken down, IMMEDIATELY, but they let it run last night during the World Series, knowing that it was a FRAUD. Because of their serious misrepresentation of the facts, and hostile act, I am increasing the Tariff on Canada by 10% over and above what they are paying now,” he continued in the post.

On Oct. 23, Carney appeared with Ford at an announcement for a $3 billion investment in a new nuclear facility next to the Darlington power plant.

Ford said the two leaders were the “same page” and he supports the prime minister “1,000 percent.”

“It might be a little easier for me to sit here, and say what I say, but it’s a little tougher when someone is sitting across from Donald Trump, and he has a big hammer in his hand,” Ford said.

President Donald Trump frowned on Ontario, Canada, running an anti-tariff ad featuring edited comments by President Ronald Reagan during the World Series opener on Friday night and announced an additional 10% tariff on Canadian goods. Photo by Francis Chung/UPI | License Photo

Oct. 25 (UPI) — President Donald Trump on Saturday said he will add a 10% tariff to Canadian goods after the airing of a controversial ad featuring former President Ronald Reagan during the World Series.

As the Toronto Blue Jays were on their way to winning the opening game by an 11-4 score over the Los Angeles Dodgers, an anti-tariffs ad featuring edited comments made by Reagan regarding his tariffs on Japanese goods.

The ad spurred Trump to follow through on an earlier threat to increase the tariff on Canadian goods exported to the United States.

“Canada was caught red-handed, putting up a fraudulent advertisement on Ronald Reagan’s speech on tariffs,” Trump said Saturday in a Truth Social post.

“The sole purpose of this fraud was Canada’s hope that the United States Supreme Court will come to their ‘rescue’ on tariffs that they have used for years to hurt the United States,” the president said.

“Ronald Reagan loved tariffs for the purpose of national security and the economy, but Canada said he didn’t,” Trump added.

The president said Canada was supposed to immediately cease airing the ad and remove it, but “they let it run last night during the World Series, knowing that it was a fraud.”

“Because of their serious misrepresentation of the facts and hostile act, I am increasing the tariff on Canada by 10% over and above what they are paying now,” Trump added.

Reagan made the comments during an April 25, 1987, radio address to defend his tariff policy, but the Ontario government used and edited them without permission from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute.

The Ontario ad runs for a minute and edits the former president’s comments, which Trump and others have called “misleading.”

Ontario Premier Doug Ford said the ad’s intent is to “initiate a conversation” with U.S. officials and to reach “U.S. audiences at the highest levels,” CBS News reported.

The U.S. imposes a 10% tariff on Canadian energy, energy resources and potash and 35% for all other products that are not exempted by the United States-Mexico-Canada trade agreement, according to the ReedSmith Trump 2.0 Tariff Tracker.

Oct. 23 (UPI) — President Donald Trump late Thursday terminated all trade negotiations with Canada over an ad campaign using a speech on tariffs by former U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

In the statement on his Truth Social media platform, Trump said, “TARIFFS ARE VERY IMPORTANT TO THE NATIONAL SECURITY, AND ECONOMY, OF THE U.S.A. Based on their egregious behavior, ALL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH CANADA ARE HEREBY TERMINATED.”

In the 1-minute ad, excerpts of Reagan’s April 25, 1987, radio address are heard.

“When someone says, ‘Let’s impose tariffs on foreign imports,’ it looks like they’re doing the patriotic thing by protecting American products and jobs,” Reagan is heard saying in the commercial over scenes of people working on farms and in cities.

“And sometimes it looks like it works, but only for a short time. But over the long run, such trade barriers hurt every American worker and consumer.”

The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute took exception to the commercial and said the Ontario government did not seek permission to use and edit the former Republican president’s remarks.

Editing omitted the context of Reagan’s comments, which was to defend tariffs that he placed on Japanese imports, according to CNBC.

“The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute is reviewing its legal options in this matter,” it said in a statement.

CNBC published transcripts of the ad and Reagan’s original comments in their entirety for comparison.

In unveiling the reportedly $53.5 million ad campaign, Ontario Premier Doug Ford said, “Using every tool we have, we’ll never stop making the case against American tariffs on Canada. The way to prosperity is by working together.”

Ford on Friday morning took to social media to quell the controversy.

“Canada and the United States are friends, neighbors and allies,” Ford said in a post on X.

“President Ronald Reagan knew that we are stronger together,” he continued. “God bless Canada and God bless the United States.”

Relations between the close trade allies have been greatly strained under the Trump administration over the president’s tariffs as well as remarks about making Canada the 51st state.

Trade tensions between the two have intensified, with the trade negotiations that Trump severed intended to bring stability and calm to their partnership.

Last week, the government of Ontario, Canada’s most populated province and home to its largest city, Toronto, unveiled a new ad campaign that uses Reagan’s words to criticize Trump’s tariffs.

Oct. 8 (UPI) — Government shutdowns are the mark of some of the most tumultuous times on Capitol Hill in the United States, grinding government operations to a halt as lawmakers reach an impasse over funding.

Last week, the U.S. government was shut down after Congress failed to pass an appropriations bill or continuing resolution to continue funding employees and programs.

Republicans and Democrats stand apart on funding for Medicaid after the Republican majority and President Donald Trump passed a plan to cut access for an estimated 15 million people.

It is the third time the government has shut down during a Trump presidency.

In the last 50 years the government has come to at least a partial shutdown 11 times. Some have lasted a day or more. Others have stretched into weeks.

The Civiletti opinions

The U.S. government has faced a number of funding gaps that did not result in government shutdowns. Between 1976 and 1979, there were six funding gaps that lasted eight days or more. Government agencies continued to function.

In 1980 and 1981, everything changed. U.S. Attorney General Benjamin Civiletti penned a series of opinions that outlined how and why a government shutdown would happen.

Charged with interpreting the Antideficiency Act, a law passed by Congress in 1870, Civiletti determined that government agencies are not allowed to spend funds without approval under congressional appropriations unless “necessary for the safety of human life or the protection of property.”

Based on this interpretation, most federal employees would be furloughed during a funding gap.

Civiletti loosened his interpretation slightly in a third opinion, stating that agencies can do what is necessary to shut down in an orderly manner.

Since Civiletti’s opinions, funding gaps have resulted in government shutdowns.

Reagan administration

The federal government had funding gaps on eight occasions during the presidency of Ronald Reagan, leading to at least some government agencies shutting down. It is the most shutdowns under a single president.

Three times during Reagan’s presidency, federal employees were furloughed.

In November 1981, the government shut down for two days after Reagan vetoed an emergency resolution put forward by Congress because he sought deeper funding cuts to domestic spending while maintaining defense spending.

The House, under a Democratic majority, sought to cut defense spending, and protect spending on social safety-net programs domestically.

On Nov. 23, 1981, Congress passed a joint resolution with broad support to make continuing appropriations. Reagan signed the bill that in effect bought time for the two sides to work out a longer term funding strategy.

In 1984, Reagan and Congress sparred over a crime bill, the Comprehensive Crime Control Act. It resulted in a two-day shutdown with about 500,000 federal workers being furloughed.

Reagan wanted the bill to impose stricter penalties and limit the efficacy of the insanity defense. Democrats sought to reverse a U.S. Supreme Court decision that peeled back Title IX protections.

Democrats also wanted to approve funding for local clean water projects, which Reagan opposed.

Democrats ultimately did not get the provisions they wanted in the final bill. Reagan meanwhile achieved his goal of installing stricter sentencing guidelines such as mandatory minimum sentences for drug-related crimes and no-bail detentions. The bill also raised the standard for defendants to prove insanity.

The third shutdown during Reagan’s presidency lasted about two days. On Oct. 16, 1986, a continuing resolution that averted a shutdown earlier expired.

Welfare was at the center of the disagreement between House Democrats and Reagan. Democrats again attempted to protect and enhance social safety nets with an expansion of welfare access for families with dependent children.

Reagan’s vision was starkly different. He framed welfare as a tool that made people dependent on government support.

Democrats yielded on their push to expand welfare access with a promise that it would be discussed again in the future.Congress passed an omnibus spending bill after two days of a shutdown.

The debate over welfare in 1986 set the stage for the Family Support Act of 1988, a bipartisan bill that established the Job Opportunities and Basic Skills Training program and created a new framework for child support payments, including wage withholding.

The 1990s

The first government shutdown of the 1990s was under the watch of President George H.W. Bush. The president wanted a funding bill that included a plan to reduce the federal deficit.

Democrats had a majority in the House and Senate.

On Oct. 5, 1990, government operations halted as Bush threatened to veto any bill that did not include the federal deficit plan he wanted. He vetoed such a bill the day after the shutdown began.

Two days later, the House and Senate passed a continuing resolution that was effectively the same as the bill they proposed just days earlier. Congress had the votes to sustain Bush’s veto this time, passing a bill to open the government.

The first of two shutdowns under President Bill Clinton began on Nov. 13, 1995, but the battle at the center of it caused a second shutdown to follow just weeks later.

Clinton and the Republican majority in the U.S. House, led by Speaker Newt Gingrich, were apart on spending cuts. Republicans were seeking cuts to Medicare as well as agenda items Clinton favored such as public health, public education and environmental programs.

Republicans put forward a spending proposal that included the cuts Clinton opposed. Gingrich said the House would not raise the debt limit either. After five days, the shutdown ended when Congress agreed to a stopgap funding bill.

On Dec. 15, the stopgap funding expired and a long-term agreement had not been made. The longest government shutdown to that point commenced through the holiday season, lasting 21 days.

Senate-majority leader Bob Dole, Clinton’s opponent in the 1996 election, urged his side to end the standstill and both sides agreed to a compromised budget bill. The bill included tax increases and restored funding to education, health and environmental programs.

Healthcare and immigration

The Affordable Care Act has been one of the more polarizing pieces of legislation on Capitol Hill in modern history. In 2013, House Republicans attempted to undercut the law by defunding it and delaying its implementation.

The Democratic majority in the Senate rejected attempts by the Republican-led House to strip funding from the ACA on multiple occasions throughout the budget negotiation process. The deadline to pass a budget bill came and went with no resolution and a 16-day shutdown began.

On Oct. 17, Congress passed the Continuing Appropriations Act to fund the government and suspend the debt limit in 2014. The bill did not include the Republican cuts to the ACA.

The first of three shutdowns under Trump began on Jan. 20, 2018. Congress failed to pass a government funding bill due to disputes between Trump’s Republican Party and Democrats over the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy.

The Trump administration attempted to end the Obama-era policy, calling on Congress to replace it within six months. A federal judge thwarted Trump’s plan and the U.S. Supreme Court eventually ruled against the president but the policy remained central to budget negotiations in the months to come.

The shutdown lasted less than three days before Congress passed a continuing resolution. A replacement for DACA was not included and the courts rejected Trump’s attempt to end the program by the time the continuing resolution expired. No protections for dreamers were included either.

Immigration remained a key issue when the government shut down again in late 2018. Trump called for funding for a border wall across the southern border to be included in the next budget bill. He demanded more than $5 billion for the project, saying the shutdown would not end until that funding was approved.

The shutdown lasted 35 days, the longest of any government shutdown in U.S. history. It began on Dec. 21, 2018 and ended on Jan. 25, 2019.

About 800,000 federal workers were furloughed during those 35 days. The Congressional Budget Office estimated it costs the United States about $11 billion in gross domestic product lost.

Trump signed a continuing resolution to open the government back up without any border wall funding included. When the continuing resolution expired, Congress approved $1.375 billion for border fencing, more than $4 billion less than what Trump demanded.

Aug. 29 (UPI) — A federal judge has prohibited the Trump administration from dismissing Voice of America director Michael Abramowitz, handing President Donald Trump a defeat in his effort to dismantle the government-run and federally funded international news organization.

In his ruling Thursday, Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of D.C. stated that the Trump administration cannot fire Abramowitz without approval of the International Broadcasting Advisory Board.

“The applicable statutory requirements could not be clearer: the director of Voice of America ‘may only be removed if such action has been approved by a majority of the vote,'” Lamberth wrote.

“There is no longer a question of whether the termination was unlawful.”

Trump has sought to dismantle Voice of America, a decades-old soft-power tool for the United States that broadcasts news internationally, since returning to the White House in January, stating the broadcaster creates anti-Trump and “radical propaganda.”

On taking office, Trump fired six of the seven International Broadcasting Advisory Board members, and then in March placed Abramowitz and 1,300 other Voice of American employees on administrative leave.

On July 8, the U.S. Agency for Global Media informed Abramowitz that he was being reassigned as chief management officer to Greenville, N.C., and if he did not accept the position, he would be fired.

Before the end of the month, Abramowitz sued.

Then on Aug. 1, USAGM sent Abramowitz a letter stating he would be fired effective the end of this month if he did not accept the Greenville transfer.

The government had argued before the court that Abramowitz’s claims are not valid because he has not yet been fired, and that the rule dictating advisory board approval for hiring and firing a VOA director interfered with Trump’s executive authority.

In response, Lamberth, a President Ronald Reagan appointee, countered that whether USAGM fired Abramowitz or transferred him, he would still be removed from his position without the board’s approval, and if the Trump wished to have a vote on the matter, he could replace the board members he removed.

“To the extent the Board’s current lack of quorum institutes a practical barrier to removing Abramowitz, the Broadcast Act gives the President a straightforward remedy: replacing the removed members,” he wrote.

“The defendants do not even feign that their efforts to remove Abramowitz comply with that statutory requirement. How could they, when the board has been without a quorum since January?”