How tone deaf is the Felon President Trump.A totally cruel malevolent luddite with no concept of the danger fossil fuels increasingly threatens the longevity of Planet Earth.
The rainstorm season is about to hit San Francisco.
Out of some warped sense of political animus Trump wants to dismantle and destroy one of the premier weather monitoring agencies. The National Center for Atmospheric Research.
Why? It’s based in Blue Colorado. An American State which has vigorously battled the Felon Trump.It is mind boggling that the spineless Republicans continue to bow down before this abhorrent man.
Excerpted from The Hill 12.18.2025
A Democratic senator involved in the negotiations over passing a five-bill package of appropriations bills before Christmas said that Donald Trump’s attempt to dismantle a premier weather and climate center based in Boulder, Colo., was like a “stick of dynamite” that exploded any chance of a bipartisan breakthrough on spending.
A potential deal to fund large swaths of the federal government, including the Departments of Defense and Health and Human Services, collapsed on Thursday night after Colorado senators demanded that Congress stop President Trump’s efforts to dismantle a key climate agency.
Out of some warped sense of political animus Trump wants to dismantle and destroy one of the premier weather monitoring agencies. The National Center for Atmospheric Research.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), a leading Democratic voice on climate issue, called the research a “global crown jewel of science” that “helps us learn a great deal about whether which matters a great deal to everyone.”
Colorado Sens. Michael Bennet (D) and John Hickenlooper (D) objected to moving forward with the so-called minibus spending package that, if enacted into law, would result in 85 to 90 percent of the federal government being funding through September of 2026.
But Bennet and Hickenlooper took the lead in bringing the package to a dead halt by objecting to an agreement to set up date and amendment votes on the Senate floor.
I have followed Seymour Hersh writing for decades. I became transfixed when I read his classic “The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House” published in 1984.A compendium of the treacherous foreign policy instituted by President Nixon and carried out enthusiastically by Henry Kissinger.Countries in the Western Hemisphere to the near East and Asia, specifically Vietnam and Cambodia, were in their Machiavellian sights.
Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet who overthrew the democratically elected President Salvador Allende on 9.1.1.1973 shakes hands with Henry Kissinger. The story of Nixon and Kissinger’s involvement in the coup is written about in detail in Sy Hersh’s book.
The soon to be released documentary “Cover-up” is must viewing for those who want to know what genuine, honest investigative reporting is all about in the era of Donald Trump and his relentless assaults on the media. A mainstream media which has been cowed and compliant. Enabling this liar to attack the core of American democracy.
As “Cover-Up” reveals, the key lesson of Seymour Hersh’s career is that when it comes to crucial stories of corruption, just about every situation is layered, booby-trapped, woven with deception. The movie is called “Cover-Up” because cover-up is the metaphysical state we live in. The true reporters, like Hersh, are those who dare to expose what they’re told not to.
When Hersh, in the documentary, talks about how American media works, how it’s too cozy with power, he can sound a lot like the Noam Chomsky of “Manufacturing Consent.” But part of what’s so compelling about “Cover-Up” is that Hersh, in his heyday, wasn’t a pie-in-the-sky purist agitator like Chomsky; he was a regular guy who simply wanted the truth to get out there.
The film captures how he sort of fell into journalism, after helping to run his family’s dry-cleaning business on the South Side of Chicago. He was originally a crime reporter, and got his big break in 1963, when he went to work for the Associated Press. Assigned to cover the Pentagon, he would walk out of the scripted press briefings and, instead, wandered the halls and used his sports chatter to befriend high-ranking officers.
That’s how he got wind of the My Lai story, when an officer referenced what was going on with Lt. William Calley (without actually naming him). “Cover-Up” takes us inside the process of how this complex story was brought to light.
That’s how he got wind of the My Lai story, when an officer referenced what was going on with Lt. William Calley (without actually naming him). “Cover-Up” takes us inside the process of how this complex story was brought to light.
A false mythology of the massacre lives on to this day (that American soldiers went “crazy” with violence in the jungles), but the far uglier truth is that the murder of Vietnamese civilians had been ordered as a way to inflate the casualty numbers (which was the Army’s yardstick of success). My Lai wasn’t the only My Lai — far from it.
The story, which Hersh broke in 1969, made his name.
Looking afar from the West Coast of America to most Americans Europe seems far away and inconsequential. Only as a tourist destination and photo op.
The reality is that Europe is an integral bastion economically and culturally for the United States.
It’s shocking to read that Donald Trump is striving to turn this centuries long relationship on its head as he seeks to solidify his indecipherable relationship with Vladimir Putin. Trump’s not so secret goal is to let Europe fend for itself while he withdraws into Fortress America.
Excerpted from The Wall Street Journal 12.6.2025
Nathalie Tocci, director of the Institute for International Affairs in Rome and a former EU diplomatic adviser, said the document lays out a fairly coherent vision of a world dominated by three big powers—the U.S., China and Russia—who have areas of cooperation and zones of influence.
“I think it’s fairly clear that Europe is seen by the administration as being on the colonial menu” for domination by either the U.S. or Russia, she said. “So to me, the real question is: ’What else needs to happen for us Europeans to wake up to this?’ ”
For years, the U.S. government has published an annual National Security Strategy that lays out how Washington sees the world and its approach to dealing with looming threats, from China to Russia to drug-traffickers in Latin America.
Flags of the European Union.
This week, the Trump administration’s version seemed to reserve its harshest tone for a new target: America’s closest allies in Europe.
The 30-page document painted European nations as wayward, declining powers that have ceded their sovereignty to the European Union and are led by governments that suppress democracy and muzzle voices that want a more nationalistic turn.
It says the continent faces “civilizational erasure” through immigration that could render it “unrecognizable” in two decades—as well as turning several North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies into majority “non-European” countries. It concludes the region could grow too weak to be “reliable allies.”
Trump has castigated the European countries for not spending sufficiently on the military. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_Germany. The German government now is considering reinstituting compulsory military service. Germans are protesting.
The document underscores how radically the Trump administration is reshaping traditional American foreign policy, and it is likely to deepen divisions in the trans-Atlantic alliance, which has largely kept the peace in Europe since World War II and promoted Western values across the world.
The document landed like a bucket of cold water in European capitals. European leaders reading the document need “to assume that the traditional trans-Atlantic relationship is dead,” said Katja Bego, a senior researcher at Chatham House, a think tank in London.
More seriously—more sinister—the White House has just put up a wall-of-shame webpage tracking media outfits and reporters who “misrepresent” or “lie” about the administration. Names are named, outfits identified and shamed. All this is meant to intimidate; it institutionalizes attacks on the media and, considering the broader context, potentially prompts and gives permission to unstable people who might want to act in the president’s supposed defense. The webpage, paid for by taxpayers as part of the White House website, looks not like an insult but part of a sustained campaign. It is a threat. It should be taken down.Peggy Noonan in Wall Street Journal 12.6.2025 – https://www.wsj.com/opinion/were-in-an-era-of-political-violence-cc359449?mod=hp_opin_pos_3
Donald Trump is a Clear and Present Danger to democracy.
I don’t know what’s more distressing.
The White House launching a Media Offenders Website titled ‘Hall of Shame’ https://www.whitehouse.gov/mediabias/ or the general silence with few exceptions from the American media whose First Amendment rights are being trampled.
The shock of all this is that the publishers should be at the proverbial barricades. Press freedom and the First Amendment are under attack.Journalists, editors and publishers must be aware that when Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933 he destroyed the free press in Germany.If they’re not unaware they’re deluding themselves.
‘Art of Catastrophe’ – Charlotte Salomon
Trump will never get that far. But his intimidation tactics using the power of the Federal government is sending a chilling message
Trump’s genuine Nazi like assault on the media. Utilizing the White House to intimidate journalists
Excerpted from Deutsche Welle 12.5.2025
A new government website lists journalists and media outlets that Donald Trump’s administration considers liars. Experts say the move endangers free media ― and thus erodes democracy in the US.
The website set up by the Trump White House amounts to threatening media outlets, Jonathan Katz, a fellow in governance studies at the think tank Brookings Institution, says, too.
“It can have a chilling effect on free speech, on independent media,” Katz told DW. “We’re watching carefully to see how this affects press freedom in the United States.”
And in a press briefing on Monday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt talked about how much of her job is taken up by dealing with what she labeled inaccurate characterizations published by White House correspondents.
“The fake news that we see pumped out of this building on a day-to-day basis — it’s honestly overwhelming to keep up with it all,” she said.
In response to what Leavitt said were “fake news and … attacks” being spread by reporters, the White House has created a website that lists media outlets and reporters who, according to the government, publish false, biased or misleading stories.
The new “Media Offenders” website includes featured “Offenders of the Week” as well as a “Hall of Shame” that consists of four pages (at time of publication) of media reports the White House has sorted into the categories bias, lie, false claim, malpractice, omission of context, mischaracterization, circular reporting, failure to report and left-wing lunacy.
In a statement released on December 1, the White House said by creating the website, it “dropped a flamethrower on the Fake News Media.”
Adolf Hitler addressing fellow Nazis – The crushing of the press in Nazi Germany is something Donald Trump would like to do in America
It’s no surprise that Felon Trump is best buddies with Russian thug war mongering president Vladimir Putin. The former KGB agent who has no problem with his compliant courts jailing Russian journalists and political foes.
Vladimir Putin with his KGB ID circa late 1980’s
What Putin does to journalists in Russia is something that Felon Trump would like to do in America.
And not to only journalists. Felon Trump wants to prosecute his political foes. Trump has been successful in 2025 in making the once independent Department of Justice led by his flunkie Attorney General https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pam_Bondi a revenge sledge hammer.
Excerpted from Deutsche Welle 12.4.2025
A Moscow court on Thursday upheld five-and-a-half year prison sentences for four Russian journalists, including two former Deutsche Welle reporters who previously worked for the organization’s Moscow bureau.
Konstantin Gabov and Sergey Karelin, along with Antonina Favorskaya and Artyom Kriger, were convicted in April on charges of participating in an “extremist organization” — a reference to the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK), an NGO founded by opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Navalny, a prominent critic of President Vladimir Putin, died in February 2024 while imprisoned in an Arctic penal colony.
Russian authorities classified the FBK as an extremist organization in 2021, a designation that has since been used to prosecute journalists, activists and opposition figures associated with Navalny’s movement.
Prosecutors said the group created materials for the FBK YouTube channel. All four journalists denied the charges, saying they did not work for the foundation but merely reported on its activities.
Following Thursday’s judgment, the group is now expected to be transferred from pre-trial detention centers to penal colonies to serve their sentences.
Their conviction has sparked international criticism and raised concerns about press freedom in Russia.
Konstantin Gabov and Sergey Karelin, along with Antonina Favorskaya and Artyom Kriger, were convicted in April on charges of participating in an “extremist organization”
The local media has bowed down and stopped critical reporting of police abuse in San Francisco.
Instead the print and broadcast media have become enthusiastic cheerleaders and hopped on Mayor Lurie’s law and order bandwagon.
Meet the new Chief Derrick Lew. Same as the outgoing (temporary) Chief Paul Yep.
It should be obvious to anyone paying attention to San Francisco politics that Mayor Daniel Lurie had two major goals in the selection of a new Chief of Police
Keep the focus on fighting pervasive drug crime by selecting a Chief at the forefront of the battle;
Maintain a solid relationship with the powerful and increasingly outspoken Chinese community.
Mayor Lurie and Derrick Lew surrounded by local legislators.
One critical voice in all the cheerleading has been former Supervisor Rev. Amos Brown. In late November The San Francisco Chronicle published a long piece about Derrick Lew’s involvement in an incident during which Lew was shot at and ended in the shooting death of former Mayor London Breed’s cousin by SFPD.
Rev. Brown wrote a letter to the editor decrying the sensationalism of the piece. And maintaining it exacerbated tensions between the Black and Chinese communities.
Deputy Chief Derrick Lew has today been named chief of the San Francisco Police Department by Mayor Daniel Lurie, succeeding interim chief Paul Yep and former longtime chief Bill Scott.
Lew is a 22-year veteran of the department. He joined the SFPD in 2003 and served at Taraval Station covering the Westside. In 2006 he was nearly killed by a cousin of Mayor London Breed in Silver Terrace; Lew’s partner then shot and killed Charles Breed, who had earlier allegedly shot and killed two people.
He is a 52-year-old city native and, like fire chief Dean Crispen, is a graduate of St. Ignatius College Prep — meaning both the police and fire chief are St. Ignatius grads.
Lew has had a rocket-like trajectory after being promoted to commander in July 2024. Police sources said he was the right leader to reflect the department’s current priorities, which have shifted away from street patrols and toward larger, more coordinated investigations: “He is more about quality rather than quantity.”
More seriously—more sinister—the White House has just put up a wall-of-shame webpage tracking media outfits and reporters who “misrepresent” or “lie” about the administration. Names are named, outfits identified and shamed. All this is meant to intimidate; it institutionalizes attacks on the media and, considering the broader context, potentially prompts and gives permission to unstable people who might want to act in the president’s supposed defense. The webpage, paid for by taxpayers as part of the White House website, looks not like an insult but part of a sustained campaign. It is a threat. It should be taken down. Peggy Noonan in Wall Street Journal 12.6.2025 – https://www.wsj.com/opinion/were-in-an-era-of-political-violence-cc359449?mod=hp_opin_pos_3
Donald Trump is now utilizing the extensive power of the federal government to clamp down on First Amendment free speech rights. Make no mistake. Trump is a master of the media. Now, with all the levers of power at his disposable, this convicted felon, racist, misogynist is shredding the media.
People need only to look at Hitler’s Germany, Putin’s Russia for guidance on how to suppress the media. Dictators are Trump’s favorite leaders and he is utilizing their perverse playbook to quash free speech.
Where is the American media in reporting this real threat to First Amendment and its own livelihood?
Deutsche Welle 11.30.2025
The Trump White House launched a new page on its website on Friday called “media offenders,” listing news sites, reporters, and stories it claims misled the public.
US President Donald Trump calls lawmakers’ actions “seditious” and “treason.”
This week, Trump called a female reporter from The New York Times “ugly” after she co-wrote a data-driven report about the president showing signs of aging.
The president, who is 79, drew fire two weeks ago after telling a Bloomberg reporter to be “quiet, piggy” when she tried to ask a follow-up question about disgraced financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s emails.
The top publications cited as “media offenders of the week” were the Boston Globe, CBS News, and the Independent. Reporters from those outlets were singled out for stories about a controversial video released last week by six Democratic lawmakers.
The lawmakers, all of whom are military veterans or former intelligence officials, reminded service members they are not obligated to follow illegal orders.
In a video posted online last week, the lawmakers said, “Right now, the threats to our Constitution aren’t just coming from abroad, but from right here at home.”
“Our laws are clear: You can refuse illegal order. … You must refuse illegal orders. No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution,” they added.
What the ‘media offenders’ page looks like
The page included an “offender hall of shame” with a list of stories the White House considers mistruths.
Each story is explained and categorized under labels such as “lie,” “omission of context,” or “left-wing lunacy.”
The White House described the site as “a record of the media’s false and misleading stories flagged by The White House.”
The page also features a leaderboard of news sites the administration claims reported stories incorrectly.
The Washington Post tops the list, followed by MSNBC (recently rebranded as MS NOW), CBS News, CNN, The New York Times, Politico, and The Wall Street Journal.
There’s also a section with “repeat offenders” with outlets that the Trump administration objects to.
Trump administration escalates fight with media outlets
All outlets on the leaderboard, along with others, turned in their Pentagon press badges last month after rejecting new rules imposed by the Department of Defense.
The rules would leave journalists vulnerable to expulsion if they reported information, classified or otherwise, that had not been approved by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for release.
Trump has also been involved in court battles against The New York Times, CBS News, ABC News, The Wall Street Journal, and the Associated Press over the past year.
Trump widens hostilities against female reporters
The administration’s broader conflict with media outlets has also taken a personal turn. In recent weeks, Trump has faced criticism for insulting female reporters.
Why does the American public let Felon Trump continue to get away with his misogynistic attacks on female journalists? These verbal assaults are being dutifully reported but where’s the outrage and disgust coming from the American public?
America writ large is so tranquilized by the abhorrent Felon Trump that this 79 year old racist abuser of any woman, particularly a journalist, who calls him out continues toget away with this despicable behavior.
Felon Trump, who incited a gang of thugs to besiege Washington on January 6, 2021 to overturn the 2020 election continues his personal and political assaults without suffering the consequences. Due to a sycophant like majority on the Supreme Court the Felon is a free man. Trump should be in prison.
The Felon deserves the fate of Bolsonaro in Brazil. A country which knows how to enforce the law even at the highest levels. Bolsonaro just began serving a 27 year prison term for inciting the mob and overturn his election defeat.
America is a democracy on the decline. The country has disgraced itself by putting this insurrectionist abuser in power, again.
“[T]he Radical Left Lunatics in the soon to fold New York Times did a hit piece on me that I am perhaps losing my Energy, despite facts that show the exact opposite,” the 79-year-old raged over Tuesday’s story. “They know this is wrong, as is almost every thing that they write about me, including election results, ALL PURPOSELY NEGATIVE. This cheap ‘RAG’ is truly an ‘ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE.’”
Trump then rounded on Times White House correspondent Katie Rogers, who co-authored the story and who the president claimed “is assigned to write only bad things about me [and] is a third rate reporter who is ugly, both inside and out.”
It’s typical SF POA behavior to torch any politician who fails to toe the party line.It is a certainty that the powerful cops Union is leaning on Law and Order Mayor Daniel Lurie to not appoint Natalie Gee to the Board of Supervisors.
I am more concerned about Natalie Gee’s desire to dismantle Sunset Dunes Park than I am about her views regarding the San Francisco Police Department.
Look what happened to Joel Engardio. Driven out of office by the car centric entitled District 4 motorists.
Now former Supervisor Joel Engardio, driven from office for taking a courageous stand, speaks at the opening of Sunset Dunes Park – April 12, 2025
It is Natalie’s boss Supervisor Shamann Walton who notoriously described JFK Promenade as “recreational redlining” in 2021. Without a doubt she would bring these car centric views to the Board of Supervisors.
Louis Wong, shown in 2013 as an officer with the San Francisco Police Department, is now president of San Francisco’s police union. He wrote a letter to Mayor Daniel Lurie suggesting Natalie Gee should not be appointed supervisor of the Sunset District. Michael Macor/The Chronicle
Being able to Just Say No to the entitled motorists takes guts in District 4. Natalie would not be the one. Having said that, no D4 politician who wants to survive in office will advocate for Sunset Dunes Park.
It’s her views on this issue which carries more weight than anything Natalie Gee says about the SFPD.
I have been saying for months that “Interim” San Francisco Chief of Police Paul Yep is no “Interim” Chief.
When Mayor Daniel Lurie named Paul Yep as interim chief of the San Francisco Police Department in June, both said the appointment was temporary.
Finally, the mainstream media has laid out the truth. Paul Yep will be the next permanent SFPD Chief.
The search for a new Chief of Police Is it all cosmetic and the Deal has already gone down for Paul Yep?
The entire San Francisco Standard article is printed herein.
Jonah Lamb – 8.25.2025
In less than two months “Interim” San Francisco Chief of Police Paul Yep has made dramatic moves to reshape the department in his own image, appointing a command staff, reshuffling station captains, cutting civilian reform leaders, promoting a raft of officers to the rank of sergeant and lieutenant, and this week announcing a department reorganization that reduced its bloated leadership.
Over the last two weeks, Yep’s dismantling of the Strategic Management Bureau has raised eyebrows among current and former officers. The civilians who led the bureau had been elevated by Scott and led much of the department’s reforms, including increasing transparency and reducing and tracking things such as use of force incidents.
Catherine McGuire, who headed the Strategic Management Bureau, had been with the department foralmost 10 years; Scott had put her in charge of department finances and reform efforts. Yep divided the defunct bureau’s responsibilities among the remaining bureaus.
In an interview, McGuire said gutting her unit will harm the department in the long run. “This reorganization removes the resources that would allow the department to monitor reforms,” she said. “If you have the internal checks and balances you are able to prevent the external scrutiny, and public scandal, which distracts the department from doing mission-critical work.”
Several of McGuire’s former underlings have been demoted or dismissed from the SFPD, including Kara Lacy, who headed constitutional policing, and Diana Oliva-Aroche, who liaised with city politicians and headed the department’s transparency and equity initiatives. Neither responded to a request for comment.
Another former officer said disbanding the reform unit will set the SFPD back after years of progress and millions of dollars meant to transform the department.
Supervisor Jackie Fielder said she is concerned about where the department stands on reforms, how to handle detentions by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and protests against them, and how to address overtime abuse.
“There’s a change-up of leadership in SFPD right now — a cross between [Police Officers Association] and anti-reform people,” Fielder said. “I am confused. Why are changes being made before a real chief is being found?”
Smiles all around.Paul Yep and the man who put him in the Chief’s seat, Mayor Daniel Lurie
The boldness of Yep’s moves suggest to former SFPD command staffers that the chief, who served as an officer for nearly three decades, is interim in name only.
“He came in, and he changed basically the whole upper management of the police department. That doesn’t strike me as the actions of an interim,” former SFPD Commander Rich Corriea said. “Wouldn’t you leave [the] status quo for the next person to set up their command staff? So it suggests to me he will be the next chief.”
Yep maintains that he is only a caretaker, saying the changes he is making will continue reform efforts while setting up the next chief for success.
“As I’ve said numerous times, I’m not a candidate for the permanent position,” he said in a press release. “There is a process for the search for the new chief, and I am confident that the best candidate will be selected.”
Regardless, his actions represent a shift around policing in San Francisco, reversing course on some of the reform efforts that in many ways shaped the career of his predecessor, Bill Scott, according to several former officers. These people, some of whom held high-ranking positions, told The Standard that Yep’s actions indicate that he is auditioning to be the next chief and will return the department to the tough-on-crime model that predated Scott.
At an all-hands meeting soon after taking charge of the department, Yep repeated that he had no interest in taking the job and would not make any major changes to the department, said one person present at the meeting.
“Well, one of those isn’t true,” the witness said, “so I’m not buying the other one either.”
Bill Scott stepped down as SFPD chief in the spring. | Camille Cohen/The Standard
‘Streamlined and efficient’
As soon as he was appointed, Yep moved to replenish a command staff that had been emptied by retirements, elevating four people to deputy chief and eight to commander. Two new deputy chiefs, Derrick Jackson and Derrick Lew, have been rumored to be potential chief candidates.
Yep also elevated outgoing police union boss Tracy McCray to commander, paving the way for the election of a popular longtime cop, Louis Wong, as the new leader of the Police Officers Association.
Yep said the reorganization of his command staff couldn’t wait, and will help to modernize the department. As part of the ongoing reorganization, Yep has reduced the number of bureaus from six to five. He added that his moves will put more cops on the street, but declined to say how many.
“The San Francisco Police Department is more streamlined and efficient than ever,” Yep said early last week in a press release. “These necessary changes will give our officers the support they need to keep our city safe.”
Further down the ranks, Yep has promoted 13 officers to captain, reshuffled all 10 of the station captains, and replaced the head of the police academy. These moves came in addition to a raft of promotions of officers to sergeant and lieutenant, effectively creating a bench of future department leaders hand-picked by Yep.
Even in smaller ways, Yep’s moves have affected the city. He recently assigned additional lieutenants to stationhouses to stabilize leadership, due to the SFPD’s practice of shuffling captains every couple of years.
Not all of Yep’s efforts to shape the department have been successful. In mid-July, his attempt to revert the name of the Community Violence Reduction Team to the Gang Task Force failed after community pressure.
Yep and Mayor-elect Daniel Lurie speak to supporters in November at St. Mary’s Square. | Source:Jason Henry for The Standard
Head coach, interim chief
As interim chief, Yep’s moves are akin to creating a sports team and farm system, then saying he plans to hand the team to another coach. Few insiders buy that he doesn’t want the job of full-time chief.
The last interim chief, Toney Chaplin, who was appointed in 2016 by Mayor Ed Lee, kept much of the department structure in place despite saying he planned a top-to-bottom assessment.
Like Yep, Chaplin initially said he did not want the chief position, only to backtrack and put his name in the running.
After Scott was appointed as chief later in 2016, he expanded the command staff, creating two assistant chief positions, a chief of staff, and a civilian director who was essentially at the same rank and received $350,000 in compensation, equal to a deputy chief. Scott also hired a civilian communications director, Matt Dorsey, who was later elected supervisor for one of the city’s most crime-plagued districts.
Scott’s efforts were focused on shepherding the department through reforms that were only recently completed. The former chief announced his departure in early May, and much of his command staff followed suit. His second in command, Assistant Chief David Lazar, retired that same month.
Happy rank and file, worried reformers
Yep’s changes appear to be popular with the rank and file, who admire his choice of cops with street experience as leaders, according to current and former officers who spoke on condition of anonymity. Many are pleased that Yep has not insulated himself behind a huge command staff, as they believe Scott did. But some former officers worry the department is backsliding on reforms and contemporary policing practices.
One former cop said the promotions were popular among officers, as they involved “real cops,” who are not afraid to get their hands dirty.
A former department leader said Yep’s actions are meant to “right the ship” by getting rid of dead weight and putting into leadership officers who are popular among beat cops. Consolidating responsibilities and getting rid of some civilian leadership is “actually a good thing,” said the former officer.
But others worry Yep’s actions are a step backward, or simply cosmetic. A former department leader said none of the moves made by Yep are fundamentally changing the department: “This is smoke and mirrors.”
As Yep continues to transform the department, the city’s Police Commission is searching for a new chief. It has hired a search firm, Ralph Andersen & Associates, that has released material on the kind of chief the city is looking for, with an emphasis on reform and transparency initiatives and quality-of-life issues like homelessness, the mental health crisis, and open-air drug dealing.
The commission will choose three finalists to put in front of the mayor, who will ultimately decide on the hire. One of those names could very likely be Yep’s.
Lee's Perspective 