Few people in the progressive Oregon that voted for Hillary Clinton misread the conservative campaign priorities of candidate Donald Trump: He’d shouted them out. But few Oregonians, like many across the country, could foresee the daily carnival attending the implementation of executive orders and directives from President Donald Trump.
Thousands across Oregon have protested and otherwise derided Trump as a self-aggrandizing ignoramus whose degradation of women, ban on Muslims and estrangement of international allies, among other things, push the country in the direction of chaos. Disruption often brings chaos. But as a steady state, chaos is dangerous.
Portland and Oregon watch warily. With the exception of Republican Congressman Greg Walden, who has Trump’s ear, Oregon’s congressional delegation has taken a pitched stand against Trump’s actions so far and many of his cabinet nominees. Separately, Gov. Kate Brown last Thursday issued her own executive order to strengthen Oregon’s sanctuary laws while requesting that the state’s attorney general find ways to sue the White House to find remedies to resist the travel ban.
It’s good we have such scruples. But are they handled in such a way as to make good government? Oregon lumbers forward facing a $1.8 billion hole in its budget and the need to fund transportation upgrades and to address the money-eating Public Employees Retirement System. A beset Legislature just convened.
Yet some dots do connect. Oregon found itself off Trump’s list of states provisionally approved for transportation project funding. That could change, and millions of infrastructure dollars are viewed not only as bringing capital improvements to Oregon but jobs and revved-up economic activity.
Enter Walden. Brown publicly described Walden as “very well-placed to deliver to Oregon and Oregonians, and we will work very closely with our federal delegation to make sure Oregon gets its fair share of federal dollars.” No pressure, Walden, but the governor’s assertion came as the Oregon delegation hammered the Trump White House as doing nothing less than pose a threat to democracy. Meanwhile Brown, in a moment of misplaced attention, allowed her campaign folks to launch a social-media-driven call for a “Social Action Team” to resist Trump – as if votes for her reelection are to be found in the Trump-news-is-trending moment.
Walden met for more than an hour with Trump in the Oval Office last week, mainly on the subject of reducing the high cost of pharmaceuticals. But he snagged the president at the end of the meeting to suggest forest management was a particular challenge at home, in Oregon. A Walden spokesman told The Oregonian/OregonLive Editorial Board last week that Trump told Walden that once Montana Rep. Ryan Zinke is sworn in as Secretary of the Interior, the three of them should sit down and discuss more intensive management of forests nationally and in Oregon. That sounds like code speak for increased logging on public lands.
But it could suggest other things, too. Last year Walden unsuccessfully advocated in Klamath Basin legislation for the transfer of federally owned forests to counties; Zinke, however, has a record of opposing the transfer or sale of federally owned lands. In any event, it means Walden, a leading voice against Obamacare, is a trusted voice in the White House. Tactical snag: Official Oregon, for the most part, hates and fears Trump. Tactical question: Should Oregon lean on Walden to make deals with the person its leaders deride as being bent on destabilizing the nation?
Complication extends to Portland, a sanctuary city whose budget features millions of federal dollars. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency this year called for a $1 billion-plus cleanup of Portland Harbor under Superfund regulation. The EPA’s plan was 16 years and more than $100 million in the making. But will it actually happen? Will the health threat driven by river-bottom toxics ever be reduced?
Oregonian editorials Editorials reflect the collective opinion of The Oregonian/OregonLive editorial board, which operates independently of the newsroom. Members of the editorial board are Laura Gunderson, John Maher, Helen Jung, Mark Katches and Len Reed. To respond to this editorial: Post your comment below, submit a commentary piece, or write a letter to the editor. If you have questions about the opinion section, contact Laura Gunderson, editorial and commentary editor, at 503-221-8378 or lgunderson@oregonian.com.
Portland officials have no clue. An EPA official in Seattle told the editorial board the agency had heard nothing. Retiring Washington Sen. Don Benton, formerly Clark County’s director of environmental services and now senior adviser to Trump on the EPA’s transition under a new director, told the editorial board only that the agency would likely reduce costs and regulation while improving results. Whatever that means.
Things are so foggy in governance that this much is clear: Reaction will no longer do. Elected leaders at cross-purposes can hurt. City and state leaders must join with the congressional delegation in forging a new conversation in which all parties are equally informed in real time – and in which the Trump spectacle can be separated from the difficult business of government. Leaders need to be as smart as they are angry, as wise as they are surprised, as considered as they can be impetuous.
All Oregonians deserve a government that withstands even the most difficult of tests and finds the resources necessary to support its best purposes.
-The Oregonian/OregonLive Editorial Board
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