However, today's installment focuses on Ebola -- more precisely, the post-dismantling of USAID in Africa. Recently, Trump's two sons were awarded a significant stake in a public company that mostly sells beauty spa treatments at airport store-fronts: waxings and chakra beds. [That company recently acquired a COVID-19 testing subsidiary, but dozens of more capable Ebola testing options exist on the ground in Africa as a legacy, from WHO and the former USAID outreaches.]
By dint of the now-all-too-familiar Orange Magic, with Trump's sons in tow, this company has been awarded over $40 million in US government contracts, to open on the ground testing locations inside the DRC -- for Ebola. The CEO himself admits it is far from clear that the company is capable of doing this. INSANE.
From ProPublica's fine reporting, then:
. . .The company, XpresTest, has years of experience monitoring for COVID-19 and other diseases for the government at U.S. airports. That makes its parent, XWELL, an unusual hybrid, selling both spa treatments and biosecurity services. Last year, it made most of its money from waxing salons and airport spas that offer manicures, massages and “chakra beds.”
The contracts are the latest example of the president’s family benefiting financially from his administration’s actions. And the stakes for these deals are particularly high. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, an Ebola outbreak has killed more than 5,000 people this year, and the federal government is trying to stop the pathogen from coming to the U.S.
XpresTest has never worked with Ebola or provided biosecurity services abroad, let alone in the kind of volatile locales it’s now expected to work in. The CEO of its parent company, Ezra Ernst, said XpresTest won both contracts in a competitive bidding process and pointed to its years of experience doing screening for COVID-19 and other pathogens at American airports. But even he acknowledged that working internationally is “a new thing for us” and expressed uncertainty about being able to complete the work in the Democratic Republic of Congo. . . .
“This is a risky contract. I’m not sure we can do it,” Ernst said in an interview. . . .
Under previous administrations, the U.S. government addressed international disease outbreaks in partnership with the World Health Organization. But Trump withdrew from the group last year, dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development, which handled much of this work, and dramatically scaled back the global presence of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
At the same time, the State Department launched the America First Global Health Strategy, which calls for the U.S. to use aid to foreign countries to “promote American companies and American innovations abroad.” This March, the State Department announced it would be giving up to $4.5 billion in funding for various purposes, including responding to infectious disease outbreaks.
Under that program, XPresTest was awarded $20 million. . . .
The CDC also awarded XPresTest a contract, for $18.8 million.
The Trump sons’ connection to XWELL was established in February, when a fund called American Ventures invested in the company. The fund was launched by Dominari Holdings, a small financial firm with offices inside Trump Tower in New York. The leaders of Dominari hired the Trump sons as advisers after their father was elected to a second term and granted them a stake of more than 10% in Dominari.
That means XWELL, the company that the Trump-linked investment fund took a stake in, will benefit financially from the Trump administration contracts if the sale closes, even though it won’t be involved in doing the work for the government.
XWELL said in a public filing that the sale was part of an effort “to pursue a new direction in the national security sector.” Ernst said he didn’t know the exact plans but thought the parent company might be looking to work with the Department of Defense. . . .
Yes, indeed, Hakeem Jeffries -- we also need state level (NY, CO, IL, CA) indictments, and impeachment moves (in Congress) -- up the chain -- to the Manchurian Cantalope's level, as well.
नमस्ते
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