monitoring Trump and relevant contemporary events

WASHINGTON – A federal employee union sued the Trump administration Monday over the government shutdown, claiming it is illegal for agencies to force employees to work without pay.

The American Federation of Government Employees announced the lawsuit as the partial government shutdown began a second week. Hundreds of thousands of workers have been furloughed or are on the job without pay during the shutdown.

“Our members put their lives on the line to keep our country safe,” said J. David Cox Sr., the union’s national president. “Requiring them to work without pay is nothing short of inhumane.”

The partial shutdown began on Dec. 22 after President Donald Trump and congressional Democrats failed to come to an agreement over White House demands for increased border security money. Trump has called for as much as $5 billion in additional funding to pay for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

AFGE, one of the largest federal employee unions, sued the government on similar grounds following the 16-day shutdown in 2013. A U.S. Court of Federal Claims judge ruled in 2017 that some 25,000 employees who were required to work without pay during that period were entitled to double pay as damages.

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Federal Employees work for the Federal Government and are not to be used to fetch drycleaning or lobby for a poltical appointee’s spouse to get a fried chicken franchise. Its called misappropriation, its grounds for dismissal.

Oh My! Trump should be impeached for appointing her. Again who cares, fire her.

You a pretty foolish man arent you?

The late Michael Crichton figured out 15 years ago that the climate change juggernaut is a Leftist faith, intended to rework the economy, not true science.

“We’re not going to debate climate change, the existence of it… Human activity is a major cause, period. We’re not going to give time to climate deniers. The science is settled, even if political opinion is not.”

Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton bid farewell to 2018 on Instagram Monday by calling the previous 365 days "a dark time for our country."

MontereyJack: The country.has said repeatedly,we do NOT want the wall.

coldjoint:The majority did not want Obamacare, did that stop it?

Oh My! Trump should be impeached

Watcher of Weasels dot org where everything is made up including the "facts"!!!

The Trump administration’s policies are leading to wholesale destruction of certain birds and other wildlife. This fact has escaped most public notice amid the broader damage the Cabinet is causing to the environment. Among other measures, regulatory agencies have been working to lift protections on endangered animals, open up vast animal habitats for drilling, encourage more trophy hunting, and repress treatment standards for farm animals.

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US Strategic Command, which oversees America's nuclear arsenal, has apologised for a tweet that said it was ready to "drop something much, much bigger" than New York's Times Square ball.

The message, posted on New Year's Eve, was accompanied by a video showing a B-2 bomber dropping weapons.

Strategic Command later deleted the tweet, saying it was "in poor taste", and replaced it with an apology.

The incident sparked outrage online.

Rescuers in the central Russian city of Magnitogorsk have pulled an 11-month-old baby from the rubble of an apartment block, which was destroyed by an explosion on Monday.

The infant is in critical condition and is being taken to hospital, Tass news agency quotes officials as saying.

Eight bodies have been found so far in the ruins of the building, amid fears the death toll will rise.

Officials in the Urals region city blamed a gas leak for the blast.

Around 36 people are still missing.

Rescuers earlier announced they had halted their search for survivors until the unstable building could be secured.

It will take about 24 hours to secure the building, the BBC's Sarah Rainsford said on Tuesday.

Authorities are in a race against time to find survivors, as the daytime temperature in the industrial city is around -17C, falling further overnight.

The building was home to 120 people, and 48 flats collapsed in the blast.

"I woke up and felt myself falling," one witness told Russian television, according to news agency AFP. "The walls were gone. My mother was screaming and my son had been buried."

Another witness spoke of a "wave of fire" which followed the explosion.

Russia's Vesti news channel says more than 50 of the block's residents have been accounted for, including the victims.

At least 16 survivors have been evacuated from the scene, including seven children. Officials say five injured people, including two children, were taken to hospital.

The blast, at 06:02 local time (01:02 GMT) is thought to have ripped through the first floor, which houses some offices, and the seven storeys above then collapsed. Nearby flats were also damaged.

A criminal investigation has been opened into the disaster.

The city of Magnitogorsk is about 1,695km (1,053 miles) east of Moscow.