Blackwater Guards Get Christmas Pardon From Trump
Four employees of the security firm Blackwater have been pardoned just in time for Christmas by President Donald J. Trump. The four guards were convicted of a massacre of civilians in Iraq while they were providing security for State Department employees. Another win for President Trump in pardoning these four men, but there is much more to the story.
The four security guards are Paul Slough (Army), Nicholas Slatten (Army), Dustin Heard (Marines), and Evan Shawn Liberty (Marines) and are all prior service and were employed by Blackwater. Blackwater was hired by the State Department to provide security in Iraq. While the State Department does have 2500 members in its own Diplomatic Security Service, it is more cost effective to hire out for additional security. That is how these four men ended up in Iraq at that time.
USA TODAY
WASHINGTON – More than 70 cadets at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point were accused of cheating on a math exam, the worst academic scandal since the 1970s at the Army s premier training ground for officers.
Fifty-eight cadets admitted cheating on the exam, which was administered remotely because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Most of them have been enrolled in a rehabilitation program and will be on probation for the remainder of their time at the academy. Others resigned, and some face hearings that could result in their expulsion.
The scandal strikes at the heart of the academy s reputation for rectitude, espoused by its own moral code, which is literally etched in stone: