Shutdown Spares Federal Park Rangers At Site In Trump Hotel

[appalachiablue]

Last edited Sat Jan 5, 2019, 12:40 AM - Edit history (1)

Source: Associated Press

1 hr. ago. WASHINGTON — Smithsonian museums are closed. There are no federal staffers to answer tourists' questions at the Lincoln Memorial. And across the United States, national parks are cluttered with trash. Yet despite the federal government shutdown, a historic clock tower at the Trump International Hotel remained open Friday for its handful of visitors, staffed by green-clad National Park Service rangers.

"We're open!" one National Park Service ranger declared around lunchtime, pushing an elevator button for a lone visitor entering the site through a side entrance to ride to the top of the 315-foot-high, nearly 120-year-old clock tower.

The Trump administration appears to have gone out of its way to keep the attraction in the federally owned building that houses the Trump hotel open and staffed with National Park Service rangers, even as other federal agencies shut all but the most essential services.

Amanda Osborn, a spokeswoman for the General Services Administration, which owns the building and leases it to the Trump Organization, said in an email that the shutdown exemption for the comparatively little-known clock tower was "unrelated to the facility's tenant" — the Trump business. The agency says the law that put it in charge of the site obligates it to keep it open, even as federal Washington closes around it.

Read more: http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/shutdown-spares-federal-park-rangers-at-site-in-trump-hotel/ar-BBROulr?ocid=HPCOMMDHP15

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This scene at a modest historic site at the Trump hotel in DC, where National Park Service (NPS) staff often outnumber visitors, is the latest instance of Trump's business interests connecting with federal govt. work.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a watchdog group, and frustrated tourists questioned why the govt. shutdown that furloughed thousands of workers and crippled agencies was exempting a site in Trump's family business empire. The Interior Dept. that includes the NPS had mandated idling all but the most influential staff.

The citizens group filed a Freedom of Information Act request to explain why the tower was open, how it continues to be funded, and any communications between the agency and the Trump Organization.



The Old Post Office Pavilion Clock Tower open during the partial government shutdown, is seen above the Trump International Hotel, Fri. Jan. 4, 2019, Wash., DC. Completed in 1899, the Romanesque-style former post office is on the National Register of Historic Places.

The GSA pays for the NPS to run the building's clock tower for visits by the general public. The tower initially closed after the shutdown started. The GSA noticed then that the deal under which the NPS staffs the site had expired, and renewed it, and the park service reopened the tower this week, the agency said.



Visitors look out the windows of the Old Post Office Building.

[DRoseDARs]

1. Raise your hand if this shocks you... nt

[JDC]

2. Figures

[keithbvadu2]

3. Quelle Surprise!

Quelle Surprise!

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

4. Are they being paid?

I'm under the impression that even the workers that have to show up, like the TSA for instance, aren't going to be getting a paycheck. At least not until the shut down ends and Congress votes to pay them for the time. Unless, of course Trump vetoes such a bill. Which he undoubtedly would do.

[RockRaven]

5. Everything about the GSA's handling of this building since before Trump was even elected reeks

of corruption and/or questionable decision making.

If the entire GSA is consistent with their handling of this site, that agency is a clusterf--k in need of bright lights and hard scrubbing, to put it mildly.

[iluvtennis]

8. + agree

[Sunlei]

9. GSA sold or like this post office 20yr leased scores of post offices, light houses, silo sites

over the years. They get snatched up fairly quickly even with the 'historic rules' for places like post office.

[appalachiablue]

17. A real + for business. Old PO/Trump Hotel Wash DC, interior:

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

6. Somethings not right.

Very odd indeed.

[lark]

7. Fucking grifter. Why isn't the media talking about this!

They don't give a shit about the real impacts of the shutdown, just want to make a passion play out of it.

[Sunlei]

10. probably because it fits in the 'rules' as necessary to be manned post for security reasons.

[LiberalLovinLug]

11. And yet this story, such a minor minor scandal compared to his many others, would be devastating

to a Democratic President. Would be enough to have all news channels, not just Fox, be covering it for three days. And in a broader sense, no way in hell a Democratic President would have been just allowed to make money off of his position, as well as his children, for his entire Presidency, starting from using his properties for the inauguration celebrations!

[Vinca]

12. You can't make this stuff up. They grift all day every day.

[DeminPennswoods]

13. Can the grifting be any more obvious?

Really, can it?

[RazzleCat]

14. I am so angry about this abuse

So his stuff stays open. Well on Monday I am taking my husband to Hawaii, one of the reasons was because he has never seen The Pearl Harbor Memorial. Well its shut down. FYI my husband spends his retirement as a volunteer at a WWII museum. So it is a big deal for him, me I have seen it prior.

[appalachiablue]

16. So unfair to you both, and millions of others. Still I hope

you have a pleasant trip to beautiful Hawaii. How great your husband works at the WWII museum.

Went years ago but missed Pearl Harbor, (I'm a museum professional!) on a rushed visit with friends on Kauai. Mom would have loved to see the island sites, esp. since she worked in San Fran & NY when dad was in Europe WWII.

[Yosemito]

18. This is a scandal

Lawsuit should ensue.

[DesertRat]

19. Grifters gonna grift