It's not about the books: Trump and the congress library fights

Washington (AP) – it's not really about the books.

President Donald Trump abrupt shooting of Top officials of the Congress library and just as suddenly attempt to appoint a number of loyalists as a replacement Instead, has turned into an enormous struggle for the separation of powers when the White House tries control over what has been a legislative facility for centuries.

It is a Power struggles with potentially big consequences. The congress library not only stores the world's largest collection of books, but also an office that monitors the tons of copyrighted material of the indescribable value.

There is a research institute that has long been protected from outside influence. The servers accommodate extremely sensitive information Claims for violations at the workplace on the Capitol Hillas well as payments and other financial data for the more than 30,000 legislative employees. There is even speculation that the entire matter is associated with an ongoing debate about whether Large technology companies can use copyrighted material For artificial intelligence systems.

For this reason, the struggle for the control of the congress library caused the Republican leaders on the Capitol Hill to achieve a rare setback against a president who has forced to expand the limits of his own power in order to issue its priorities. Majority leader of the Senate John Thune And other Republicans spoke to the White House about a possible way to relax.

The library left the library in a bizarre purgatory state.

At the moment, Trump's decisions for interim library leaders are above all Todd Blanche, Deputy Attorney General Who had represented the president His criminal proceedings – I did not seem to challenge the library's claim that one of his experienced officials would be the acting head. According to experts, it would be unknown that an executive department such as Blanche serves in the legislative department at the same time.

In the meantime, the agency's department has tried to get access to legislative industry offices.

“This outrageous presentation in the legislature by the executive is only unjustified and we believe that they are unprecedented,” said New York Rep. Joe Morelle, the Supreme Democrat in the House Administration Committee, who monitors the congress library.

One shot, then another … then ask about who comes

The controversy began to develop publicly last week, as a librarian of the congress Carla Hayden was fired In a short e -mail from an official of the White House. She only had a year in her 10-year term.

Then Blanche was tapped by the White House as a preliminary librarian this week, and two other officials from the Ministry of Justice were selected for other senior library posts. These officials, Brian Nieves and Paul Perkins, tried unsuccessfully on Monday to enter the U.S. Urheberrecht office, but went voluntarily after the library officers had called the Capitol police.

Thune told the Associated Press that the congress was “not completely” consulted before Trump's dismissal of Hayden.

The legislator would like to ensure that “shares in the Congress Local Location industry are protected,” said Thune. He speculated that the discussions with the White House would bleed to solve the patient situation next week.

The White House said that Trump was in his authority to reject, Hayden, a former head The library systems in Baltimore. It quoted “rather worrying” behavior of Hayden, which included diversity, justice and inclusion efforts as well as books for children who found the White House inappropriate.

A copy of practically every book published in the USA is sent to the copyright office, then the library decides whether it should be included in the main collection. Nobody under the age of 16 can receive a reader card to access the collection.

Existing regulations and previous practices require that an incumbent librarian comes from the current ranks of the Congress library when there is a vacancy. However, the White House has argued that a law on the federal government applies, although the 1998 law deals with the executive department, two people familiar with the discussions.

When Nieves and Perkins appeared on Monday, they held a letter that, according to one of the population, referred to the free law on leisure.

The Senator of Oklahoma, Markwayne Mullin, who leads the committee that monitors the financing of the Congress Library, argued that the librarian is not an employee of the legislative in practice and says: “It is a appointment of the United States President because we have to confirm it.”

Concerns about research services, information about employees and more

However, the legislator and the helpers for an unjustified penetration of the administration into the library of the congress and their operations are very important concerns.

Potential for them is potentially a interference in the congress research service, which is known as an impartial think tank of Capitol Hill. Every year it contains around 75,000 inquiries from members of the congress, research, legal knowledge and other information that is of crucial importance for the political decision.

The discussions between legislators and the congress research service are so sensitive that they are protected according to the speech or debate clause of the constitution that the congress members seemed to be about official legislative files before the survey.

The service of the service “Supply and trustworthiness would be significantly undermined if these inquiries were not protected or the administration would make the answers to reflect their priorities,” said Hope O'keeffe, a former Associate General Counsel of the Library of Congress.

It stores financial information about the legislative employees, which include not only those in the Congress library, the legislator and its helpers, but also the employee of Capitol Police, the architect of Capitol and the office of government responsibility. The library also houses the office of congress at the workplace, which acts as a personnel office of the legislative department and submits symptoms of harassment, discrimination and other violations at the workplace.

According to e -mails received from the AP, the officials from Doge contacted the job office this week to discuss the assignment of one of his team. The office immediately denied Doges and found that it was a legislative branch and was not subject to the government's executive regulation to tighten the government, as the e -mails show. According to other e -mails and letters seen by the AP, Dogge asked similar inquiries this week as in GAO.

Robert Newlen, the deputy librarian, told the library employees shortly after Hayden's dismissal that he would act as a reigning librarian. He said in a note this week that the White House, although the White House has appointed its own acting librarian, “has not yet received any instruction from the congress of how we should go forward”, which points out that the library of Trump's wishes defies.

The Senator of California, Alex Padilla, the top democrat in the Senate rules, said this week that Newlen is the incumbent librarian of the congress. When asked whether Blanche respected this, Padilla said: “This is my understanding.”

But an official of the White House emphasized on Thursday that Trump selected Blanche as a acting librarian. The officer, who granted anonymity due to the ongoing private discussions with legislators, said Trump chose Blanche because the president appointed “highly qualified people who are all my heart to promote American agenda”. The Ministry of Justice did not answer a request for a comment.

The library drama could be associated with the AI ​​debate

Some suspect that the copyright office is the real goal of the administration. The office is located in the Congress library with a guide selected by the librarian and every year accepts millions of copies of copies of copyrighted material such as books, works of art and music.

Shortly before the The director of the office, Shira Perlmutter, was releasedHer office published a report in which it was questioned whether it was legal for the Tech industry to use copyright -protected material in order to “train” its artificial intelligence systems. Tech company claims that this is legal if it is used for educational or research purposes or creates something new. Perlmutter's report said that under certain circumstances this would go beyond fixed limits of fair use if the content of the ai-generated content competes with creative works by humans.

The material there is extremely valuable. For example, the copyright injury damage for the existing collection of the office – if, for example, technology companies are scraped off the material for AI purposes and later liable for copyright infringement – would probably exceed 1.5 trillion US dollars, according to a person who is familiar with the calculations.

Morelle noticed that the shot “came a day later, and I doubt that this is a coincidence about it, a report that is in many ways of what Elon Musk wants to do with regard to intellectual property and copyright”. Musk is the billionaire external advisor from Trump, who runs his own AI startup called Xai. The White House did not respond to a request for comments.

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Alanna Durkin Richer, Associated Press author, contributed to this report.