The Tap: Wednesday, January 18, 2017

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The Tap covered election news, public policy, and other noteworthy events from February 2016 to February 2022.

Review of the day

The excerpts below were compiled from issue #49 of The Tap, which was published on January 21, 2017. READ THE FULL VERSION HERE.

Federal

Tom Price Confirmation Hearing

• Rep. Tom Price (R), Trump’s nominee to head the Department of Health and Human Services, is an orthopedic surgeon and a six-term House member from Georgia. He has been a critic of Obamacare and began offering alternatives to the law as early as 2009, when it was first being debated in Congress. Last June, at an American Enterprise Institute event, Price said, “They believe the government ought to be in control of healthcare. We believe that patients and doctors should be in control of healthcare.” Read more about Price’s policy stances here.

• Price appeared before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) is the chair of the committee, and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) is the highest-ranking Democrat. The committee has 12 Republicans and 11 Democrats. At the hearing, Price discussed his philosophy on federal healthcare policy; his views on repealing and replacing Obamacare, Medicare, and Medicaid; and telemedicine. Read more here.

Scott Pruitt Confirmation Hearing

• Scott Pruitt is Trump’s nominee for administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). He has been the attorney general of Oklahoma since 2011 and has been a critic of environmental policy under the Obama administration, once calling himself a “leading advocate against the EPA’s activist agenda.” Read more about his policy stances here.

• Pruitt appeared before the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) is the chair of the committee, and Sen. Thomas Carper (D-Del.) is the highest-ranking Democrat. Eleven Republicans and 10 Democrats serve on the committee. Pruitt discussed his views on issues such as climate change, the role of the states in environmental policy, and his past involvement with litigation against the EPA. Read more here.

Wilbur Ross Confirmation Hearing

• Commerce secretary nominee Wilbur Ross is a billionaire investor and chairman of the private investment firm WL Ross & Co. Throughout the 2016 campaign, he was a supporter of both Trump and his views on the U.S. economy and international trade. In August 2016, for example, he echoed Trump’s criticisms of trade agreements like NAFTA and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, saying, “Free trade is like free lunch, there is no free lunch. Somebody wins and somebody loses and unfortunately we’ve been losing with these stupid agreements that we’ve made.” Read more about Ross’ policy stances here.

• Ross appeared before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) is the committee’s chair, and Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) is the highest-ranking Democrat. Fourteen Republicans and 13 Democrats sit on the committee. He discussed his views on trade, specific trade deals like NAFTA, tariffs, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the Department of Commerce’s data gathering programs. Read more here.

Nikki Haley Confirmation Hearing

• Trump announced his intent to nominate South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations on November 23, 2016. Haley’s experience with international relations comes largely from her economic and environmental initiatives as governor. Read more about her policy stances here.

• Her confirmation hearing took place before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, which has 11 Republicans and 10 Democrats and is chaired by Bob Corker (R-Tenn.). Ben Cardin (Md.) is the committee’s highest-ranking Democrat. She discussed issues such as the conflict between Israel and Palestine, UN Resolution 2334, Russia, and U.S. funding for the United Nations. Read more here.

Super PAC Expansion

• Priorities USA Action announced it had hired two high-profile operatives from Bernie Sanders’ and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaigns. Priorities, the largest Democratic-leaning super PAC, supported Clinton throughout the 2016 election. Fallon, who served as Clinton’s national press secretary, will officially join the organization as a senior advisor. Meanwhile, Bernie Sanders’ press secretary, Symone Sanders (no relation), will be a strategist for communications and political outreach.

Secretary of Agriculture Pick

• Trump chose former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue as his pick for secretary of agriculture. Perdue served on Trump's advisory committee on agriculture during the 2016 presidential election. Perdue won a Georgia State Senate election in 1992 as a Democrat. He switched to the Republican Party in April 1998. Upon his inauguration as governor in January 2003, Perdue became the first Republican governor of Georgia since Benjamin Conley at the end of Reconstruction in the 1870s. Perdue is the first cousin of Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.). Perdue's confirmation hearing will be held before the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.

SCOTUS Watch

• The Supreme Court concluded its January sitting with arguments in four cases.
  • In Lee v. Tam, the court reviewed a case of patent and trademark law. Simon Shiao Tam attempted to register his band's name with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) for trademark protection. The PTO refused, citing a provision of the Lanham Act, a federal trademark law that prohibits extending trademark protection to anyone registering what it considers scandalous, immoral, or disparaging marks. The Federal Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the PTO's claim, holding that the provision of the Lanham Act used to deny Tam's request violated his rights of free expression under the First Amendment.
  • The court also heard arguments in three consolidated appeals from a decision of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which held that the respondents in these cases—a class of litigants illegally detained pursuant to investigations of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001—proved there were sufficient grounds to bring their claims to trial. The consolidated cases were Ashcroft v. Abbasi, Hasty v. Abbasi, and Ziglar v. Abbasi. Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan recused themselves due to their previous involvement in the cases as an appellate judge (Sotomayor) and as U.S. solicitor general (Kagan).

• The court issued one opinion on Wednesday, unanimously reversing the judgment of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Lightfoot v. Cendant Mortgage Group. The Ninth Circuit had held that a provision of Fannie Mae's charter granted federal courts exclusive jurisdiction over any lawsuit in which either Fannie Mae or its subsidiaries was a party. In a unanimous decision by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the court reversed the Ninth Circuit’s ruling, holding that Fannie Mae's charter gives jurisdiction to both state and federal courts with authority to hear cases on issues involving Fannie Mae. The opinion in Lightfoot was Justice Sotomayor's second opinion for the court this term, and it was the third opinion this term in which the court ruled on an appeal from the Ninth Circuit.

• For the first time since his nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court in March of 2016, Chief Judge Merrick Garland returned to the bench as a panelist on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was joined by Judges Brett Kavanaugh and Sri Srinivasan, hearing arguments in three cases.

Straightening Out the PACs

• Donald Trump appeared at a fundraising dinner honoring Mike Pence in Washington, D.C., where he briefly discussed immigration reform and the topic of campaign finance. He said that the immigration system should be partially merit-based, and he criticized super PACs. "People get very rich running PACs," Trump added, “I think we ought to straighten out the PACs – right, folks?” He also compared his political rise to the nationalist movement ushered in by Andrew Jackson in the 19th century.

State

South Carolina’s Next Lieutenant Governor

• The South Carolina Supreme Court ruled that Amendment 1 (2012) does not take effect until 2018, meaning the state Senate’s current president pro tempore would become the state’s next lieutenant governor. Hugh Leatherman (R) made it clear that he would rather remain a state senator when Henry McMaster (R) is sworn in to replace outgoing Gov. Nikki Haley (R). Haley, President-elect Trump’s pick for United Nations ambassador, could be confirmed and leave her gubernatorial post this month. Fellow State Sen. Tom Davis (R) filed a suit, asking the court to clarify whether or not Leatherman would be required to assume the new position. In a statement, Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey (R) said he agreed with the court’s ruling. “This is exactly what we expected the outcome to be because this is the only reasonable interpretation of what the General Assembly passed and what the voters approved,” he said. South Carolina is currently one of 25 states with a Republican trifecta.

New York State Senator Sentenced

• Former New York State Sen. John Sampson (D) was sentenced to five years in prison as the result of an embezzlement scandal. The former Senate minority leader was arrested and charged with two counts of embezzlement, five counts of obstruction of justice, and two counts of making false statements in May 2013. The charges stemmed from an investigation over the sale of foreclosed properties in Brooklyn, where Sampson was alleged to have stolen over $400,000 while acting as a court-appointed referee. He was removed from the chamber after his conviction on July 24, 2015, on one count of obstruction of justice and two counts of making false statements. Although Democrats currently have a 32-31 numerical majority in the state Senate, a coalition gives Republicans a majority in the chamber.

Texas State Representative Indicted

• Texas State Rep. Dawnna Dukes (D) was indicted on 13 felony counts of tampering with public records and two misdemeanor counts of abuse of official capacity. The corruption charges stem from an alleged use of legislative staff for personal purposes and accusations that the legislator converted campaign expenditures to personal use. If convicted on all charges, Dukes could serve up to 28 years in prison. On September 26, 2016, Dukes announced her resignation to deal with medical issues related to a 2013 car crash. Her resignation was effective January 10, 2017, but days before her resignation became official, she decided to serve another term, saying she had overcome those medical issues. Republicans currently hold a 99-50 majority in the chamber.

Religious Garb in Nebraska Classrooms

• Jim Scheer (R), speaker of the Nebraska State Legislature, proposed a bill to repeal the state’s ban on public school teachers wearing religious garb in the classroom. The law, passed in 1919, made wearing religious garb a misdemeanor offense. Under the law, first-time offenders are suspended from teaching for a year, and any subsequent offenses are punished by a lifetime ban from teaching. Thirty-four other states have repealed similar laws, and only Nebraska and Pennsylvania still have such laws. Nebraska is currently one of 25 Republican trifectas.
  • The legislation was a response to the situation of Sister Madeleine Miller of the Missionary Benedictine Sisters in Norfolk, Nebraska. Her religious order’s rules require that she wear a head covering nearly any time she is in public. When she tried to teach at a public school district, she was told she could not wear the religious garb. As a result, she moved and began teaching at a Catholic school out of state.

Hawaii Starts Their Session

• The state legislative session began in Hawaii. Hawaii is currently one of six Democratic trifectas. The state’s 76 legislators—a number that represents 1.0 percent of the 7,383 state legislators across the country—are back to work. All told, by this point, 82.3 percent of legislators are in session and working for 2017.

Local

The Expensive Los Angeles Unified School District Elections

• The race for the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Board of Education is becoming one of the nation’s most expensive school board elections. The District 4 incumbent and LAUSD board president, Steve Zimmer, faces three challengers in his bid for re-election to a third term. If he wins, this term will be his last due to term limits. As of the most recent reporting deadline for financial activity through December 31, 2016, the total amount of campaign contributions for all four candidates was reported to be $492,440. That amount for the District 4 race accounted for over 60 percent of campaign contributions in a school district with a total of 13 candidates running for three seats, and it continued to rise over the first half of January. Earlier in the month, local teachers union United Teachers Los Angeles formally endorsed Zimmer and contributed $150,000 to an independent campaign on his behalf. On January 17, former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan (R), who served from 1993 to 2001, made a $1 million contribution to an independent campaign backing one of Zimmer’s challengers, Nick Melvoin. These two donations brought the estimated campaign contributions in the District 4 race to over $1.6 million. A primary election will be held on March 7, and the general election will be held on May 16.
  • These large donations highlight the role unions have previously played in LAUSD board elections. According to the Los Angeles Times, Riordan has often been at odds with the teachers union, dating back to his time as mayor. Riordan and billionaire-philanthropist Eli Broad donated big money in the 2013 LAUSD election to defeat union-backed candidates. During the elections in 2015, a political action committee controlled by the California Charter Schools Association Advocates served as the pipeline for contributions to candidates without union support. That year, three of the four candidates backed by the pro-charter organization won election to the board. Scott Mark Schmerelson was the only union-backed candidate to win, defeating incumbent Tamara Galatzan by over 3,000 votes. Zimmer was backed by unions during his campaign in 2013, and his supporters successfully framed the large donations made by billionaires to defeat Zimmer as positive points for his re-election. The Los Angeles Unified School District is the largest school district in California and served 646,683 students during the 2014-2015 school year—approximately 10 percent of all public school students in the state.

Ethics Violations in Philadelphia

• The Philadelphia Board of Ethics fined District Attorney Seth Williams for multiple ethics violations. According to a report released by the board, Williams failed to disclose five separate income sources and 89 gifts on city financial statements between 2010 and 2015. It is not illegal for city officials to accept most gifts, but officials must disclose the receipt of any gift that exceeds $200. Additionally, city officers cannot accept gifts that exceed $99 from a person or entity with a financial interest the officer has the power to affect. Williams received several prohibited gifts, including $690 in sporting event tickets and $750 in gift cards from a criminal defense lawyer handling cases prosecuted by the district attorney’s office. The penalty levied against Williams—the largest ever handed down by the ethics board—totals roughly $65,000. The ethics board filed a stipulated judgment in the Court of Common Pleas to ensure that the full amount of the fine will be repaid to the city by 2022. The judgment automatically placed a lien on Williams’ home. Williams addressed his actions in a statement released on January 17. “These mistakes are my own and I accept full responsibility for my failure to do everything that was required of me as a public official,” he said. “I apologize to the people of Philadelphia, the hardworking and talented staff of the District Attorney’s Office, my supporters, the friends who supported me.” Philadelphia is the largest city in Pennsylvania and the fifth-largest city in the U.S. by population.

Santa Ana City Council Removes City Manager

• The Santa Ana City Council voted 4-2 to remove city manager David Cavazos from his position. Cavazos’ termination came several weeks after he was placed on paid administrative leave. Concerns about his performance had been raised and Cavazos was publicly censured in June 2016 for having a relationship with a subordinate employee. The termination was described as amicable, and Cavazos will receive a severance package of roughly $315,000. Because Cavazos’ salary was already part of the city’s 2017 budget, city councilman Jose Solorio said the severance will not significantly affect the city’s costs for the year. Santa Ana is the 11th-largest city in California and the 57th-largest city in the U.S. by population.

Preview of the day

The excerpts below were compiled from issue #48 of The Tap, which was published on January 14, 2017. READ THE FULL VERSION HERE.

Federal

Confirmation Hearings

• Four of Donald Trump’s Cabinet nominees have confirmation hearings scheduled for January 18.
• Position: Secretary of Commerce
• Nominee: Wilbur Ross
• Time: 10:00 a.m., Eastern Time
• Committee: Commerce, Science, and Transportation

• Position: EPA Administrator
• Nominee: Scott Pruitt
• Time: 10:00 a.m., Eastern Time
• Committee: Environment and Public Works

• Position: U.N. Ambassador
• Nominee: Nikki Haley
• Time: 10:00 a.m., Eastern Time
• Committee: Foreign Relations

• Position: Secretary of Health and Human Services
• Nominee: Tom Price
• Time: 10:00 a.m., Eastern Time
• Committee: Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

SCOTUS Watch

• The Supreme Court will hear four cases on Wednesday, with three cases consolidated into one argument.
  • In Lee v. Tam, the court will review a case of patent and trademark law. Simon Shiao Tam, the founder of a rock band called THE SLANTS, attempted to register the band's name with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) for trademark protection. The PTO refused, citing a provision under the Lanham Act, a federal trademark law, that prohibits extending trademark protection for anyone registering scandalous, immoral, or disparaging marks. The Federal Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the PTO's claim, holding that provision of the Lanham Act violated rights of free speech under the First Amendment.
  • The court will hear arguments from three related appeals over a decision of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which held that the respondents in this case, a class of litigants illegally detained pursuant to investigations of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, had plausibly alleged their various claims against the petitioners such that the parties could proceed to a trial on the merits. Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Justice Elena Kagan have recused themselves in these cases based on their prior involvement as a Second Circuit judge and U.S. solicitor general respectively. The consolidated cases are:
    • Ashcroft v. Abbasi
    • Hasty v. Abbasi
    • Ziglar v. Abbasi

State

South Dakota Expected to Put Recreational Marijuana On The Ballot

• New Approach South Dakota is expected to submit a proposal that would put an initiated measure on the 2018 ballot to legalize the recreational use of marijuana. Once the proposal is submitted to the attorney general’s office, the attorney general will release a summary statement for the measure. The group announced that they would begin collecting signatures immediately following the summary’s release. South Dakotans have voted on medicinal marijuana twice in the past, but never on recreational marijuana. Initiative 4 (2006) and Initiative 13 (2010) were both defeated at the polls. So far in 2017, there are six statewide proposals pending across the country relating to marijuana legalization.

Hawaii Starts Their Session

• The state legislative session is scheduled to begin in Hawaii. Hawaii is currently a Democratic trifecta. The state’s 76 legislators—a number that represents 1.0 percent of the 7,383 state legislators across the country—will be back to work. All told, by this point, 82.3 percent of legislators will be in session and back to work for 2017.