The Maui News - Weekender

Acosta exits; Trump’s Cabinet turnover keeps growing

- By DARLENE SUPERVILLE DEB RIECHMANN

WASHINGTON — Adding to the lengthy list of departures from President Donald Trump’s Cabinet, Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta said Friday he’s stepping down amid the tumult over his handling of a 2008 secret plea deal with wealthy financier Jeffrey Epstein, who is accused of sexually abusing underage girls.

Trump, with Acosta at his side, said Friday he did not ask his secretary to leave and “I hate to see this happen.” The president, who publicly faults the news media almost daily, said Acosta put the blame there, too.

Acosta “informed me this morning that he felt the constant drumbeat of press about a prosecutio­n which took place under his watch more than 12 years ago was bad for the Administra­tion, which he so strongly believes in, and he graciously tendered his resignatio­n,” Trump tweeted later in the day.

Trump said Patrick Pizzella, deputy secretary since April 2018, would succeed Acosta on an acting basis.

Pizzella served in the administra­tions of Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Barack Obama. A coalition of civil rights, human rights, labor and other groups opposed his nomination by Trump to the department’s No. 2 slot, citing Pizzella’s record on labor rights.

Acosta was the U.S. attorney in Miami when he oversaw a 2008

non-prosecutio­n agreement that allowed Epstein to avoid federal trial but plead guilty to state charges and serve 13 months in jail. Similar charges filed against Epstein by federal prosecutor­s in New York this week had put Acosta’s handling of the 2008 agreement with the now-jailed financier back in the spotlight.

Years ago, Epstein had counted Trump and former President Bill Clinton among his friends, but Trump said this week he was “not a fan.”

Acosta said he didn’t want his involvemen­t in Epstein’s case to overshadow the president’s agenda and said his resignatio­n would be effective next week.

“My point here today is we have an amazing economy, and the focus needs to be on the economy,” he said.

Top Democratic lawmakers and presidenti­al candidates had demanded that Acosta resign. But Acosta had defended his actions, insisting at a news conference Wednesday that he got the toughest deal on Epstein that he could at the time.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said he should never have been appointed by Trump and confirmed by the Senate. “Thank God he’s gone,” she said

Acosta had also frustrated some conservati­ves who wanted him gone long before the Epstein uproar. Among their objections were his decisions to proceed with several employment discrimina­tion lawsuits and to allow certain Obama administra­tion holdovers to keep their jobs.

His resignatio­n extends record turnover at the highest levels of Trump’s administra­tion, with acting secretarie­s at key department­s, including the Pentagon and Homeland Security. Roughly two-thirds of the Cabinet has turned over by the two-and-a-half year mark of Trump’s term.

Only the department­s of Treasury, Transporta­tion, Housing and Urban Developmen­t, Education, Energy, Commerce and Agricultur­e continue with the leaders that were first confirmed.

The high rate of turnover also extends to the White House, where 76 percent of those given the title of “assistant to the president” in Trump’s first year had left by the beginning of July 2019, according to Martha Joynt Kumar, director of the White House Transition Project. The percentage­s were substantia­lly lower under Obama (61), Bush (50 percent) and Clinton (42 percent), according to Kumar’s research.

Epstein, 66, reached the plea deal in Florida in 2008 to secretly end a federal sex abuse investigat­ion involving at least 40 teenage girls that could have landed him behind bars for life. He instead pleaded guilty to Florida state charges, spent 13 months in jail, paid settlement­s to victims and registered as a sex offender.

A federal judge has said Acosta violated federal law by keeping Epstein’s victims in the dark about the plea arrangemen­t, and the Justice Department has been investigat­ing. The deal came under scrutiny earlier this year after reporting by The Miami Herald.

Trump had defended Acosta earlier this week while saying he’d look “very closely” at his handling of the 2008 agreement.

Acosta had attempted to clear his name and held a news conference — encouraged by Trump — to defend his actions. In a 50-plus-minute lawyerly rebuttal, he argued his office had secured the best deal it could and had worked in the best interests of Epstein’s victims.

“We did what we did because we wanted to see Epstein go to jail,” he said.

Pressed on whether he had any regrets, Acosta repeatedly said circumstan­ces had changed since then.

“We now have 12 years of knowledge and hindsight and we live in a very different world,” he said. “Today’s world treats victims very, very differentl­y.”

After federal attorneys in New York announced the new charges against Epstein this week, Acosta tweeted that he was pleased by their decision.

“The crimes committed by Epstein are horrific,” Acosta tweeted. “Now that new evidence and additional testimony is available, the NY prosecutio­n offers an important opportunit­y to more fully bring him to justice.”

Acosta took office as the nation’s 27th labor secretary in early 2017, leading a sprawling agency that enforces more than 180 federal laws covering about 10 million employers and 125 million workers. The department also plays a role in combatting human traffickin­g.

Before he was named a U.S. attorney, Acosta was an assistant attorney general for the civil rights division in President George W. Bush’s first term. Before joining the Trump administra­tion, he was dean of the Florida Internatio­nal University law school.

 ?? AP photo ?? President Donald Trump speaks to members of the media with Secretary of Labor Alex Acosta on the South Lawn of the White House on Friday before Trump boarded Marine One for a short trip to Andrews Air Force Base, Md., and then went on to Wisconsin.
AP photo President Donald Trump speaks to members of the media with Secretary of Labor Alex Acosta on the South Lawn of the White House on Friday before Trump boarded Marine One for a short trip to Andrews Air Force Base, Md., and then went on to Wisconsin.

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United States