Discover Top Posts Tagged with #stephen schwarzman

A Top Financier of Trump and McConnell Is a Driving Force behind Amazon Deforestation

The Blackstone Group is an enormously powerful real estate investor. Between 2013 and 2017, it provided more than $400 million to the troubled real estate projects of Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

Blackstone Group has been “wreaking havoc” through excessive rents and “aggressive evictions.” It’s considered one of the worst players in the global housing affordability crisis.

Stephen Schwarzman is the billionaire co-founder and CEO of Blackstone Group, one of the largest corporate landlords in the world.

“Blackstone’s and its subsidiaries’ business model is pushing low-income, and increasingly middle-income, people from their homes,” United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Housing Leilani Farha and UN Working Group Chairperson Surya Deva wrote in a recent letter to Schwarzman.

The typical system in Brazil and in all Amazonian countries is that people cut down trees and then leave the area to dry out for about two or three months before setting it on fire in order to clear the land for agricultural purposes.

The companies have wrested control of land, deforested it, and helped build a controversial highway to their new terminal in the one-time jungle, all to facilitate the cultivation and export of grain and soybeans.

https://www.transcend.org/tms/2019/09/a-top-financier-of-trump-and-mcconnell-is-a-driving-force-behind-amazon-deforestation/

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/05/style/stephen-schwarzman-catholic-church-met-gala.html

https://www.dw.com/en/brazil-forest-fires-rage-as-farmers-push-into-the-amazon/a-50116455

https://www.housinghumanright.org/housing-is-a-human-right-exposes-billionaire-landlord-stephen-schwarzman/

#blackstone #stephen schwarzman #amazon fires #housing crisis

Steve Schwarzman is the CEO of the Blackstone Group, which partially owns a Brazilian firm that is helping transform the Amazon from jungle to farmland.

weird how the destruction of the planet seems to be so directly tied to fascists (or conservatives or capitalists, whatever you want to call them)

#amazon fires #Stephen Schwarzman #blackstone #mitch mcconnell #trump

The effort to transform the Amazon from a rainforest into a source of agribusiness revenue is central to the conflict, and linked to the fires raging out of control today. The leading edge of the invasion of the jungle is being cut by grileiros, or “land-grabbers,” who operate outside the law with chainsaws. The grileiros then sell the newly cleared land to agribusiness concerns, whose harvest is driven on the highway to the terminal, before being exported. Bolsonaro has long called for the Amazon to be turned over to agribusiness, and has rapidly defanged agencies responsible for protecting it, and empowered agribusiness leaders intent on clearing the forest. The land-grabbers have become emboldened.

Ryan Grimm in The Intercept. A Top Finacier of Trump and McConnell Is a Driving Force Behind Amazon Deforestation

TWO BRAZILIAN FIRMS owned by a top donor to President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are significantly responsible for the ongoing destruction of the Amazon rainforest, carnage that has developed into raging fires that have captivated global attention.

#environment #amazon #stephen schwarzman #plutocrats

President Trump has been repeatedly told by aides that his cellphone calls are not secure from foreign spies. But he has refused to heed the warnings to stop talking.

Republicans, China and Russia are eavesdropping on Trump — NOT Obama #Mythbuster

Dotard Trump is a clear and present danger to America’s National Security. Congress do something.

When President Trump calls old friends on one of his iPhones to gossip, gripe or solicit their latest take on how he is doing, American intelligence reports indicate that Chinese spies are often listening — and putting to use invaluable insights into how to best work the president and affect administration policy, current and former American officials said.

Mr. Trump’s aides have repeatedly warned him that his cellphone calls are not secure, and they have told him that Russian spies are routinely eavesdropping on the calls, as well. But aides say the voluble president, who has been pressured into using his secure White House landline more often these days, has still refused to give up his iPhones. White House officials say they can only hope he refrains from discussing classified information when he is on them.

“Mr. Trump’s use of his iPhones was detailed by several current and former officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity so they could discuss classified intelligence and sensitive security arrangements.”

American spy agencies, the officials said, had learned that China and Russia were eavesdropping on the president’s cellphone calls from human sources inside foreign governments and intercepting communications between foreign officials.

Two of Trump’s friend identified:

Stephen A. Schwarzman, the Blackstone Group chief executive who has endowed a master’s program at Tsinghua University in Beijing

Steve Wynn, the former Las Vegas casino magnate who used to own a lucrative property in Macau.

Explore The Influencers: Donald Trump’s allies in the Paradise Papers

❤️ the interactive visualization created by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists

The Billionaire Influencers

Rex Tillerson

Wilbur Ross

The Koch Brothers

Paul E. Singer

Sheldon G. Adelson

Stephen Schwarzman

Steve Wynn

Thomas J. Barrack Jr.

Gary Cohn

Robert Mercer

Carl Icahn

Geoffrey Palmer

Randal Quarles

#MAGA #Plutocracy #TaxCutsForRich #TaxEvasion

Stephen Schwarzman: Basic answer

“When people ask me how I succeed, my basic answer is always the same: I see a unique opportunity, and I go for it with everything I have. And I never give up.” —Stephen Schwarzman.

#Stephen Schwarzman