Trump administration rescinded 'Courage Award' for woman who criticized Trump

[brooklynite]

Source: Washington Post

The Trump administration rescinded an award recognizing the work of a journalist from Finland last year after discovering she had criticized President Trump in social media posts, then gave a false explanation for withdrawing the honor, according to a report by the State Department’s internal watchdog.

The report tracks how the discovery of the journalist’s remarks worried senior U.S. officials and prompted a decision to withdraw the honor to avoid a possible public relations debacle.

The report’s release is likely to worsen tensions between the department’s leadership and the inspector general’s office, which has undergone several shake-ups following the firing of Inspector General Steve Linick in the spring at the request of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

“The Inspector General’s report is another somber example of how fear and partisanship have permeated our nation’s foreign policy and diplomacy under the Trump administration,” said Sen. Robert Menendez, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who along with seven other senators requested the investigation.


Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/trump-administration-rescinded-courage-award-for-woman-who-criticized-trump-and-gave-false-explanation-for-decision-watchdog-finds/2020/09/25/255bc880-fecd-11ea-830c-a160b331ca62_story.html

[groundloop]

1. We can't tolerate some furrin' jurn-list criticizing our Dear Leader.

[Turbineguy]

2. Any award from trump

has a certain unpleasant odor to it.

[Cracklin Charlie]

3. What a giant baby!

My 1.5 year old grandgirl is more mature.

[mdbl]

4. he can rename it the courage of propaganda award and give it to mush limbaugh

morons.

[R Merm]

5. So let me get this stright, you took away a courage award from someone who showed courage by

criticizing you.

[TomVilmer]

6. The woman has been harassed for years now...

... and then also by the White House.

Her articles on Russian disinformation had little to do with the US election in 2016, and most does not even mention Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. The information war in Europe is mostly about Ukraine, and all kind of people are involved, not just paid trolls.

A different pattern can be seen in all of the roughly 3,500 Facebook ads on Facebook in the US, which were planted by the most active troll factory, the Russian Internet Research Agency during the 2016 presidential election. These were overwhelmingly focused on creating clicks through political division by racial issues. Only about 100 of them overtly mentioned support for Donald Trump or opposition to Hillary Clinton.

[lagomorph777]

7. I imagine she's pleased not to have an endorsement from the Turd.

[niyad]

8. So they did this to avoid a pr disaster??? Ooooops!

[CaptYossarian]

9. In his upside-down, backward thinking, it's going to Susan Collins.

[Javaman]

10. in other news: the orange asshole takes his ball and goes home. nt

[riversedge]

11. Menendez said. "The State Department owes Ms. Aro an apology."

Pompeo is a nasty man.


......................After the State Department withdrew Aro’s invitation and the story became public in a report by Foreign Policy, the department’s press office told reporters that Aro had been “incorrectly notified” that “she’d been selected as a finalist. This was an error. This was a mistake.”

The department also told Congress that Aro “ultimately was not selected to receive the award, due to the highly competitive selection of candidates.”

But the IG ultimately found that the decision to give her the award was not a mistake and was included in a memo approved by Pompeo.

It also noted that the decision to withdraw the award was because of the discovery of the social media posts despite public claims otherwise. “Every person OIG interviewed in connection with this matter acknowledged” that had her social media posts not been flagged, “Ms. Aro would have received the IWOC Award,” the report said.


Critics of the department’s handling say the actions of U.S. officials contradicted the spirit of the Courage awards, which since 2007 have honored women who “have demonstrated exceptional courage and leadership in advocating for peace, justice, human rights, gender equality, and women’s empowerment, often at great personal risk and sacrifice,” according to the State Department’s website.

“Secretary Pompeo should have honored a courageous journalist willing to stand up to Kremlin propaganda. Instead, his department sought to stifle dissent to avoid upsetting a president who, day after day, tries to take pages out of Putin’s playbook,” Menendez said. “The State Department owes Ms. Aro an apology.”