Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) appeared to blame the nefarious “Deep State” for ordering a costly dining set for Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson, the Daily Beast reports.
Said Tenney: “Somebody in the Deep State, it was not one of his people apparently, ordered a table, like a conference room table or whatever it was for a room. And that’s what the cost was. Ben Carson tried to—he said ‘you know how hard it is to turn it back because of the way that the procurement happens?'”
“Newly released emails cast doubt on claims by Secretary Ben Carson and his spokesman that he had little or no involvement in the purchase of a $31,000 furniture set for his Department of Housing and Urban Development dining room,” CNN reports.
“Emails show Carson and his wife selected the furniture themselves.”
“Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC), the chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, on Wednesday requested that Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson turn over all documents and communications pertaining to allegations by a high-ranking civil servant that she was the target of reprisals after sounding the alarm on agency spending,” Politico reports.
“Department of Housing and Urban Development officials spent $31,000 on a new dining room set for Secretary Ben Carson’s office in late 2017 — just as the White House circulated its plans to slash HUD’s programs for the homeless, elderly and poor,” the New York Times reports.
“The purchase of the custom hardwood table, chairs and hutch came a month after a top agency staff member filed a whistle-blower complaint charging Mr. Carson’s wife, Candy Carson, with pressuring department officials to find money for the expensive redecoration of his offices, even if it meant circumventing the law.”
“Newly obtained documents show the extensive involvement that family members of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, especially his son, Benjamin Jr., play in official business, despite strong warnings from agency lawyers,” CNN reports.
HUD Secretary Ben Carson “issued a statement on Friday supporting Roy Moore’s candidacy for the Republican Senate nomination in Alabama, breaking with President Trump’s endorsement of the establishment-backed incumbent Sen. Luther Strange,” the Washington Post reports.
“The extraordinary endorsement in Tuesday’s primary runoff election comes just hours before Trump is set to arrive in Alabama to campaign for Strange.”
Washington Post: “Right before Ben Carson took the stage at President Trump’s rally in Phoenix on Tuesday night, the announcer introduced him. ‘The secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Dr. Ben Carson,’ the voice intoned, prompting cheers from the audience. And, as simply as that, a law was likely broken.”
“Among the prohibitions included in the Hatch Act is one prohibiting Cabinet secretaries from leveraging their positions for a political cause. That means that the head of, say, the Department of Housing and Urban Development can’t appear at a campaign rally in a way that implies he’s doing so in an official capacity. Say, by being introduced with his official title.”
“Let me put it this way,. I’m glad that Trump is drawing all the fire so I can get stuff done.”
— HUD Secretary Ben Carson, quoted by the Washington Examiner.
“I think poverty to a large extent is also a state of mind.”
— HUD Secretary Ben Carson, quoted by the Washington Post.
HUD Secretary Ben Carson, under fire for referring to American slaves as “immigrants,” insisted his remarks were misinterpreted, calling the two experiences “entirely different.” Politico reports.
“But his words to HUD employees on Monday were nearly identical to those he has used over the past two decades.”
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson referred to slaves as “immigrants” dreaming of a better life in a talk with department employees, The Hill reports.
Said Carson: “That’s what America is about. A land of dreams and opportunity. There were other immigrants who came here in the bottom of slave ships, worked even longer, even harder for less.”
Ben Carson would not answer whether President-elect Donald Trump could benefit from Department of Housing and Urban Develop loans during a fierce line of questioning from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) at his confirmation hearing, NBC News reports.
Said Carson: “If there happens to be an extraordinarily good program that’s working for millions of people and it turns out that someone that you’re targeting is going to gain, you know, $10 from it, am I going to say ‘No’?”
Warren responded: “The reason you can’t assure us of that is because the president-elect is hiding his family’s business interests from you, from me, from the rest of America.”
Jonathan Chait: “HUD is traditionally a magnet for scandal under Republican administrations, for two reasons. First, its mission of providing affordable housing for the urban poor is marginal, at best, to the core Republican agenda… Second, the agency’s program structure lends itself naturally to profiteering. HUD works closely with private developers to build affordable housing. Without careful oversight, the agency can easily become a slush fund to distribute sweetheart contracts to the administration’s buddies.”
“There is an additional risk factor in Trump’s administration. The president is planning to continue to run his business empire in office, without disclosing his income. And so Carson, a man with no experience in government but extensive experience in the field of bilking, and a proven loyalist of Donald Trump, will apparently oversee an agency whose mission lends itself to corruption. If Trump’s priority was to ensure the most effective and efficient use of every housing dollar, Carson would make a very strange choice. But that may not be Trump’s priority at all.”
Ben Carson on Facebook:
After serious discussions with the Trump transition team, I feel that I can make a significant contribution particularly to making our inner cities great for everyone. We have much work to do in strengthening every aspect of our nation and ensuring that both our physical infrastructure and our spiritual infrastructure is solid. An announcement is forthcoming about my role in helping to make America great again.
Most speculation suggests Carson will be the next Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.