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Trump Issues Order To Block Broadcom's Takeover of Qualcomm (bloomberg.com)

Bloomberg reports that President Donald Trump issued an executive order today blocking Broadcom from acquiring Qualcomm, "scuttling a $117 billion deal that had been subject to U.S. government scrutiny on national security grounds." From the report: The president acted on a recommendation by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., which reviews acquisitions of American firms by foreign investors. The decision to block the deal was unveiled just hours after Broadcom Chief Executive Officer Hock Tan met with security officials at the Pentagon in a last-ditch effort to salvage the transaction. "There is credible evidence that leads me to believe that Broadcom Ltd." by acquiring Qualcomm "might take action that threatens to impair the national security of the United States," Trump said in the order released Monday evening in Washington.

6 of 230 comments (clear)

  1. Y'know, I have to wonder.... by mark-t · · Score: 5, Insightful

    .... this is the 2nd time in about as many weeks as I've seen the US president invoke an argument of "national security" on a matter that impacts commercial enterprise, and using that argument as a basis for immediate action that bypassed any of the ordinary measures which might otherwise be required.

    It has become apparent to me that the man uses the expression to mean whatever he thinks it ought to mean, and has no bearing on the actual definition of the term.

  2. Re:Racism at work by Luckyo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Broadcom is a Singaporean company that decided to pretend to be US company by moving headquarters specifically to help seal this deal.

    Also, anti-chinese sentiments are nationalist, not racist. Conflating the two is a rather basic error.

  3. Re:Not going to mention by stephanruby · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Ok, I'll bite. Here are the direct quotes of Conaway (a Republican):

    "Bottom line: Russians did commit active measures against our elections in '16, and we think they'll do that in the future," Conaway said. "It's clear they sowed discord in our elections. ... But we couldn't establish the same conclusions the CIA did that they specifically wanted to help Trump."

    Is that what you meant by "entirely false"? Plus, that doesn't really explain why the Republican majority shut down their investigation so quickly (unless they're trying to hide something). After all, nobody tried to shut down the 911 commission prematurely, when no evidence was found that US officials had colluded with Bin Laden. After all, the investigation was started to investigate "Russian Meddling", not specifically "Trump Collusion".

    I wonder, when did that change for the Republicans?

    And just to put things in perspective, even if you don't think that an attack on our leadership process an act of war (which is kind of silly if you don't think that), the 9/11 attack at the time cost us ~3,000 casualties, but in the case of Crimea, the Russian incursion has already cost our ally ~10,000 lives.

    And please notice the weasel word "specifically" in "that [the Russians] specifically wanted to help Trump." Of course, we already know that's not true. The Russians were trying to help both Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump (although Donald Trump is the only one that retweeted their stories).

    And of course, that still doesn't explain why they'd shut down their own investigation so quickly, when everybody else, the Mueller team, Trump's own Justice Department, the FBI, the CIA, etc. are raising even more alarms than ever before at a more frequent rate than ever before.

  4. Re:Not going to mention by quantaman · · Score: 5, Interesting

    "The investigation is being closed with nothing found."

    Cite?

    " completely ignore the news that broke today that the whole "Russian hacked the election" and "Russia colluded ..."

    All I see is some partisan republicans on a house commitee releasing a statement to that effect. Nobody else seems to be buying it; including the Democrats on that same committee. Nevermind the statement from the CIA etc.

    In other words: shut up comrade.

    After the memo I've been wondering if the Republicans on the house intelligence committee could be charged with obstruction of justice.

    I mean if they're deliberately trying to tarnish the investigation and Mueller in order to give Trump cover to shut it down then that's pretty much the definition of obstruction.

    --
    I stole this Sig
  5. Re:Jokes aside I gotta kind of wonder by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Are the Republican voters just living in a perfect bubble or do they really just not care as long as it doesn't have a D next to it's name?

    Modern republicanism has all the symptoms of being a cult religion. What is worse is they blatantly ignore facts that don't fit into their world view. Their usual method of doing so is by bringing up some possibly true, possibly not bit of data from the opposition and justifying their decision to support their party by saying, well at least it is not that.

    The really fun thing is the only thing they seem truly conservative about is conservation of excuses. They will use the same excuses, time, and time, and time again. Trump could be sleeping with ten different porn stars a night, and have kids with six of them and they would still justify or excuse it by pointing to Bill Clinton who hasn't been president for over 17 years.

    Instead of setting a higher bar, ethics only matter if their opponent may not be squeaky clean. They are fine with their guy being a low life scum as long as he is their low life scum. Hillary was flat out guilty for her actions defending her husband and should never be president, at the same time Trump's people were paying off porn stars to shut up. Now I don't support Infidelity in any shape or form but a spouse has the right to defend the other spouse. End of story, well unless your a democrat I guess.

  6. Re: Not going to mention by PopeRatzo · · Score: 5, Informative

    *We pretend that Bill Clinton never happened.*

    I don't think you fully understood what I said. Because of the criminal activity around Richard Nixon's Committee to Re-elect the President (CREEP) there were sixty-nine indictments and forty-eight convictions. People went to the federal penitentiary for years. Nixon resigned from the presidency and had to be pardoned by his (second) vice-president. And it all started with a burglary and a cover up. There were actually seventy-six indictments and fifty-five convictions during the Nixon Administration, but only 48 of those convictions were directly connected to crimes committed in relationship to Watergate break-in.

    This is what you said in your previous comment:

    "Please cite electoral criminal activity by national level republicans running for office.

    Oh wait... you can't. Because it's never happened."

    Now, do you want to apologize to the class?

    *We pretend that Bill Clinton never happened.*

    Clinton got a blowjob and lied about it. Nobody went to prison. Nobody was indicted. Nobody was convicted.

    During the Obama administration, there were zero indictments, zero convictions, even though the House GOP conducted investigations that went on twice as long as the current House Intelligence Committee's. The came up with nothing. There have been already been 22 indictments during the Trump investigation and five convictions. That's convictions. Not allegations. Not accusations. Convictions. As in "guilty". As in felony. And we're not anywhere near the end. Mueller hasn't even gotten to interview Trump or his failsons or Ivanka yet. There are lots and lots of witnesses left to talk to.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.