#nnsa

Thanks to the MAGA Trump government shutdown, nuclear safety has taken a back seat to tariff diatribes and demolition of the White House.

Most federal workers staffing the agency tasked with protecting the United States’ nuclear arsenal were off the job as the government’s 22nd shutdown crept closer to a fourth week.  Once the government reopens, 1,400 of the 1,800 employees of the National Nuclear Security Administration will go back to work. These employees were told to stop working earlier this month, and the furloughs hit the NNSA’s Y-12 Field Office in Oak Ridge, where 70 of 78 federal employees are waiting for the government to reopen.  None of the contractors who support NNSA’s missions – which include managing the U.S. nuclear weapons complex and storing bomb-grade uranium – are out of a job at this point. Work is continuing, an NNSA spokesperson told Knox News, but Energy Secretary Chris Wright has warned layoffs could come if Congress can’t seal a deal on funding. 

A number of House Democrats have sent a letter to Trump's supine Energy Secretary condemning the move.

Let's remember that the shutdown is all about Trump and MAGA Republicans attempting to remove subsidies for healthcare.

GOP grows uneasy over voters’ health care premiums amid shutdown standoff

Between the Trump transition team’s infighting, incompetence, and high-profile resignations, any decisions that signaled even a modicum of stability for the country would come as a relief at this point.  Unfortunately, the nascent Trump Administration isn’t inclined to calm anyone’s nerves. According to an official within the Department of Energy, this past Friday, the President-elect’s team instructed the head of the National Nuclear Security Administration and his deputy to clean out their desks when Trump takes office on January 20th.

The NNSA is the $12 billion-a-year agency that “maintains and enhances the safety, security, and effectiveness of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile.”  It’s unclear when the two officials will be replaced.

Traditionally, all political appointees of an outgoing presidential administration turn in resignation letters effective on noon of inauguration day, January 20.  But appointees in key positions — like the people who make sure our nukes work — are often asked to stay on in their roles until a replacement can be found and confirmed by the Senate, helping ensure a smooth transition and allowing our government to continue functioning. In fact, for the entirety of Obama’s first term and into part of his second, the NNSA Administrator remained a Bush appointee.

Trump, however, appears determined to immediately push out everyone who was appointed by Obama, regardless of whether or not he has anyone in line for the job.  Or, as our source put it: “It’s a shocking disregard for process and continuity of government.”

Just as with Obama’s soon-to-be-removed international envoys, Trump has ordered Under Secretary for Nuclear Security Frank Klotz and his deputy, Madelyn Creedon — both Obama appointees — to leave their posts, even if it means no one is in charge of maintaining the country’s nuclear weapons.  According to our Energy Department source, Trump’s team has yet to nominate anyone to succeed them. Since both positions require Senate confirmation, if could be months before their chairs are filled.  And the vacancies may extend beyond the leadership roles.

“There are scores more appointees within the department,” our source told us.  “Secretarial and administration appointments that don’t require Senate confirmation, mostly performing policy, liaison, and strategic advisory capacities in support of the agency they’re at.  They serve at the will of the head of their agency.  Those people are, theoretically, also out on inauguration day unless otherwise directed, which hasn’t happened yet to my knowledge.”

The source later added, “I’m more and more coming around to the idea that we’re so very very fucked.”

As far as I can tell, this is unprecedented — January 20 will mark  the first time in the NNSA’s 17-year history that it will exist wholly without its appointed leadership.  According to Bob Rosner, the Co-Chair of the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and the former director of Argonne National Laboratory, the leadership vacuum won’t prevent the agency from fulfilling its essential duties.  But it will leave it  without an advocate as it tries to secure a budget from Congress, and unable to tackle any new initiatives whatsoever.

“To some extent, what we’re talking about is the political leadership, the leadership appointed by each administration,” Rosner told Gizmodo.  “The department is really run by its civil servants.”

Still, while those career civil servants will continue on with their current directives, they’re effectively barred from embarking on anything new.  That’s because the legislation authorizing the NNSA specifically prohibits non-NNSA officials from managing NNSA employees — agency staffers are only allowed to take orders from Klotz and Creedon or their (nonexistent) replacements.

Usually, in the first few months of a new presidential administration, the NNSA defends its new budget to Congress.  But without any leadership in place, that’s next to impossible, even as Trump has made big, vague promises of nuclear expansion.

“When it comes to the budget negotiations, the fact is that without political leadership they will be struggling for money,” Rosner told Gizmodo.  “If [Trump] says he wants to invest heavily in the nuclear weapons program, and they don’t have anyone to defend the program, that’s going to be a pretty big problem for him.”

That’s just the first layer to Trump’s self-created nuclear problem.  Even if he had prepared appointments to fill the soon-to-be vacant roles, how exactly they would go about fulfilling Trump’s repeated promises to “expand [U.S.] nuclear capacity” is another issue altogether.

Rosner noted that the Obama Administration has already essentially begun rebuilding the nuclear program, making Trump’s promised expansion “a perfect example of Trump basically being clueless.”

“He didn’t understand that we have a refurbishment program,” Rosner said.   “He didn’t understand that, under Obama, that we’d rebuilt the entire production complex.  So exactly what he would mean by ‘strengthening the nuclear program,’ it’s a bit of a mystery.  I don’t know what he’s talking about.  We’ve done it already.”

So did Trump simply not realize that a considerable portion of the Department of Energy is dedicated to building and protecting our nuclear arsenal?  That would certainly explain his appointment of Rick Perry as secretary, and why he just left the agency responsible for safeguarding our nuclear infrastructure without any leadership for the foreseeable future. Neither Trump nor the NNSA have returned our requests for comment.

In the meantime, if you know anything at all about Trump’s transition efforts (or anything else that you think the world should be aware of), please do let us know.

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Trump administration officials fired more than 300 staffers Thursday night at the National Nuclear Security Administration — the agency tasked with managing the nation’s nuclear stockpile — as part of broader Energy Department layoffs, according to four people with knowledge of the matter. Sources told CNN the officials did not seem to know this agency oversees America’s nuclear weapons. An Energy Department spokesperson disputed the number of personnel affected, telling CNN that “less than 50 people” were “dismissed” from NNSA, and that the dismissed staffers “held primarily administrative and clerical roles.” The agency began rescinding the terminations Friday morning. Some of the fired employees included NNSA staff who are on the ground at facilities where nuclear weapons are built. These staff oversee the contractors who build nuclear weapons, and they inspect these weapons. It also included employees at NNSA headquarters who write requirements and guidelines for contractors who build nuclear weapons. A source told CNN they believe these individuals were fired because “no one has taken anytime to understand what we do and the importance of our work to the nation’s national security.” Members of Congress made their concerns about the NNSA firings known to the Energy Department, a Hill staffer told CNN. A person with knowledge of the matter told CNN that senators visited Energy Sec. Chris Wright to express concern about the NNSA cuts. “Congress is freaking out because it appears DOE didn’t really realize NNSA oversees the nuclear stockpile,” one source said. “The nuclear deterrent is the backbone of American security and stability – period. For there to be any even very small holes poked even in the maintenance of that deterrent should be extremely frightening to people.”[...]

In addition to overseeing America’s nuclear weapons, the NNSA also helps secure nuclear material nationwide. Sources told CNN it’s a critical mission, pointing to the Russian drone attack on a Chernobyl power plant reactor in Ukraine on Thursday. “NNSA maintains sensors in Ukraine to help track nuclear risks, whether intentional or unintentional,” a source said, adding the layoffs are “frightening.”

(full article)