With all of Washington, D.C.'s political intrigue -- the commercialization of the White House, the administration's mysterious connections to Russia, and President Trump's ability to be both landlord and tenant on a government property -- why is U.S. Rep. Jason Chaffetz so curious about the planning and forethought that goes into a Twitter tweet?
No, the Utah Republican is not sifting through the president's Twitter feed. Rather, his attention was caught by a seemingly innocuous tweet from Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah, where the staff was thrilled on December 29 to welcome the country's two new national monuments, Gold Butte in Nevada and Bears Ears in Utah.
Was that tweet simply a spur-of-the-moment shout-out, as many tweets are, or did the park staff have advance notice of the designations by President Obama? And if they did, wonders Congressman Chaffetz, how much advance notice?
We're not talking state secrets here. But hey, none of the other national parks in Utah tweeted the news on December 29, although the Traveler did the day before, when the announcements were made. And while the writing was clearly on the wall regarding the new monuments, we didn't get advance word.
The issue with Rep. Chaffetz is that this tweet could be evidence that the Obama White House lied to Utah Gov. Gary Herbert when it wrote him to say that as of December 15 "no decision had been made about Bears Ears."
Could it be that the White House really was planning as of December 15 to designate those two monuments, as it did on December 28, and that Bryce Canyon officials were in the loop?
"When was a Bears Ears map slot created in the Bryce Canyon National Park's front desk national parks and monuments map area?" Rep. Chaffetz wrote to acting Bryce Canyon Superintendent Sue Fritzke on January 19 (attached below).
"Who made the decision to create a Bears Ears map slot in the Bryce Canyon National Park's front desk national parks and monuments map area," he added in a follow-up question.
Finally, the congressman wondered, "(W)hen did you become aware of the Bears Ears National Monument designation and from whom?"
Bryce Canyon's celebratory tweet, Rep. Chaffetz explained in his letter, "created the appearance that officials at Bryce Canyon coordinated with the White House prior to this most recent designation."
Beyond being curious about the map slot for the new monuments, the committee chairman asked the superintendent to "identify any employees of Bryce Canyon National Park consulted regarding the Bears Ears National Monument Designation. For each employee, identify the communications, that is, when did those conversations occur and with whom?"
Why is Rep. Chaffetz, who has issues of national security to investigate, so concerned about Bryce Canyon's tweeting habits? True, the designation of Bears Ears National Monument went against plans that the congressman and his fellow Utah Republican, Rob Bishop, had for the landscape involved.
But polling shows Utahns were in favor (47+ percent for and 32 percent against) the Bears Ears designation, and a strong majority (60 percent) have no interest in seeing monuments decommissioned. And Rep. Chaffetz made a quick reversal last month when legislation he drafted to transfer 3 million acres of federal lands to the states was soundly criticized by hunters and anglers.
At day's end, we'd like to think taxpayer dollars could be better spent than on investigating a harmless 24-word tweet.
Comments
"This isn't normal, and it's not OK":
http://www.commoncause.org/take-action/act/jason-chaffetz-trump-ethics-t...
Chaffetz really is embarrassing himself these days.
Chafe is merely helping the White House distract gullible Americans from what's really going on.
Rep. Chaffetz is a total POS that has no interest in the enviroment. The people of Utah need to vote him out.
Can he be re-called? I know his district hates his guts and have for years. People have wondered how he's been re-elected, because of how much people in the Cottonwood Heights area hate him.
Just out of curiosity, how gerrymandered is his district?
"I know his district hates his guts and have for years."
And that is why he won by a 47 point margin in the last election? There may be people that hate him, but as a whole, it would appear the district loves him.
Amelia and Mega, Utah's gerrymandering has been cited as some of the worst in the U.S. Using computerized voter registration data, the GOP was able to carve out district boundaries that snake up and down streets, between back yards and in any way that can jam as many registered Republicans into a district as possible. In one case in Salt Lake, a boundary includes two buildings in a six unit apartment complex and then dodges across the street to take in one building out of several there. Portions of Salt Lake have been parceled out into each of the four districts. Salt Lake County is the "most liberal" and great pains have been taken to neutralize opposition voting there. Somehow they make it work despite the fact that something like 60% of Utah voters are registered as "unaffiliated."
Add to that the fact that Utah has a long history of just about the lowest voter turnout in the entire U.S. (A quick check just showed that in the past election, Utah's turnout was the third lowest in the nation.)
This is from an article in the Salt Lake Tribune: "
Only 28.8 percent of the voting-age population actually cast ballots.
That was 577,973 voters out of the estimated 2,004,283 Utahns age 18 or older, according to the state's final voter canvass and census data.
Utah tied with New York for the third-lowest turnout. Even worse were Indiana (28 percent) and Texas (28.5 percent), according to the United States Election Project, an ongoing academic study of voter turnout."
http://www.sltrib.com/news/1873023-155/utah-had-3rd-lowest-voter-turnout...
It's terribly frustrating because so many people tell us that they simply don't vote because they feel it's just a waste of time if they are not Republicans. Add to that the fact that in a majority of races, there are no other candidates on the ballot. My big pitch to people is that if all who don't vote would just get out and do it, we'd certainly hand the predominent party a big surprise. But Apathy is powerful.
Even among what the state calls "active voters," the percentage was less than 50%. (An "active voter" is one who has voted in recent past elections.)
In the case of the recent 3rd Congressional district voting, Chaffetz did win by about 70% of votes cast. But the number of voters casting ballots in that district was only about 26% according to the Hinkley Institute of Politics. That was actually a little higher than usual, but this time he was not running unopposed. His opponent was a business executive in a company called Overstock.com. At the time of the election, there were a number of charges of problems with the company and assertions that Stephen Tyron, Jason's opponent, was being manipulated by the company's owner.
So, I guess the simplest answer to your question is that too many Utah voters have simply given up hope that their votes will count for much of anything.
It's downright pathetic. But some of us keep hoping and keep working to convince our more sensible neighbors that their votes just might really count -- IF they'd just get out and cast them.