Good morning. It's Saturday, August the 30th. I'm Ali Valshi. We begin this morning with Donald

Trump's tightening authoritarian grip in evidence this week as he undertook a legally dubious firing spree,

attempting to oust the Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook,

sacking the CDC director Susan Monares, and removing the railroad regulator Robert

Primus. These are Senate-confirmed officials chosen precisely to provide independent judgment

insulated from political whims. All three have vowed to remain in their positions, calling their

firings illegal. At the EPA, at least seven employees were fired on Friday for signing a

letter two months ago criticizing the agency's leadership, according to union officials. At the time,

hundreds of engineers, researchers, and emergency responders were suspended for warning that Trump's policies

undermine health and the environment. The firings this week mark a new escalation, what appears to be

an open campaign to crush dissent inside the federal bureaucracy. Over at the CDC, the gold

standard of public health for generations, Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are remaking the

agency into a megaphone for anti-vaccine and anti-science propaganda. According to her attorneys,

Mark Zaid and Abby Lowell, Menares was forced out after refusing to rubber stamp reckless directives.

Dr. Richard Besser, a former acting CDC director who spoke with Monares, said

she told him she had two lines she would never cross. She wouldn't do anything illegal,

and she wouldn't defy science. Besser says she was asked to do both. Behind the scenes,

four senior CDC officials resigned in protest. The chief medical officer, Dr. Deborah

Hoery, who worked at the CDC for over a decade, wrote in her resignation letter, quote,

For the good of the nation and the world, the science at CDC should never be censored or subject to

political pauses or interpretations. Vaccines save lives. This is an indisputable, well-established scientific fact.

Another senior official, Dr. Dmitri Descalakis, wrote, I am not able to serve in this role any

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