The Tap: Wednesday, May 18, 2016

   ← May 17

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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 #17 of The Tap, which was published on May 21, 2016. READ THE FULL VERSION HERE.

Federal

• The U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary held hearings on five judicial nominees. The nominees are Paul Abrams, Stephanie Finley, Claude Kelly, Winfield Ong, and Donald Schott. Schott was nominated to the 7th Circuit Court while the others were nominated to district courts in California, Indiana, and Louisiana.

• Judge Rosemary Collyer assumed senior status on the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Judge Collyer’s elevation created a third vacancy on that court. Florence Pan and Todd Edelman were nominated in April 2016 to fill two of the three current vacancies.

• Judges Thomas Hogan and Susan Carter completed their terms of service on the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Judge Hogan was the presiding judge of the court.

• President Obama nominated Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood to another 10-year term on the United States District Court for the District of Guam. Judge Tydingco-Gatewood was first nominated by President George W. Bush in 2006. She is the chief judge of the court.

• The U.S. Department of Labor announced a new rule regarding overtime regulations under the Fair Labor Standards Act. The new rule, which will take effect December 1, 2016, raises the threshold eligibility for overtime pay to cover employees making up to $47,470 per year. This salary threshold will update automatically every three years. Through a press release, the White House projected that the new rule would make an additional 4.2 million Americans eligible for overtime pay and that the expansion will increase wages by $12 billion dollars over the next 10 years.
  • In a statement, Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) criticized the rule. He said, “This regulation hurts the very people it alleges to help. Who is hurt most? Students, nonprofit employees, and people starting a new career. By mandating overtime pay at a much higher salary threshold, many small businesses and nonprofits will be unable to afford skilled workers and be forced to eliminate salaried positions, complete with benefits, altogether. … President Obama is rushing through regulations — like the overtime rule — that will cause people to lose their livelihoods. We are committed to fighting this rule and the many others that would be an absolute disaster for our economy.”

• The Donald Trump campaign released a list of 11 potential successors to replace Antonin Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court. Trump said, “Justice Scalia was a remarkable person and a brilliant Supreme Court Justice. His career was defined by his reverence for the Constitution and his legacy of protecting Americans’ most cherished freedoms. He was a Justice who did not believe in legislating from the bench and he is a person whom I held in the highest regard and will always greatly respect his intelligence and conviction to uphold the Constitution of our country. The following list of potential Supreme Court justices is representative of the kind of constitutional principles I value and, as President, I plan to use this list as a guide to nominate our next United States Supreme Court Justices.” The names released were Steven Colloton, Allison Eid, Raymond Gruender, Thomas Hardiman, Raymond Kethledge, Joan Larsen, Thomas Rex Lee, William Pryor, David Stras, Diane Sykes, and Don Willett.

• Politico reported that the staff disagreements on Donald Trump’s presidential campaign had begun to affect super PACs in support of Trump as well. According to the article, convention manager Paul Manafort and campaign manager Corey Lewandowski disagree on which super PAC is the preferred outside group. Questions of satellite spending are particularly important for Trump, as billionaire donor Sheldon Adelson is believed to be considering spending up to $100 million in support of Trump’s campaign.

• The Trump campaign hired a lawyer, A.B. Culvahouse Jr., to help in the vetting process for potential vice presidential picks. Last week, the campaign announced that campaign manager Corey Lewandowski would be running the vice presidential search. Culvahouse has previous experience with this process, having played a similar role in 2008 when John McCain selected Sarah Palin as his running mate.
  • See also: Donald Trump presidential campaign key staff and advisors, 2016

• Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg met with conservative leaders to discuss accusations that the social media network was suppressing conservative news in its trending topics feed. After the meeting, Zuckerberg wrote in a Facebook post, “I know many conservatives don't trust that our platform surfaces content without a political bias. I wanted to hear their concerns personally and have an open conversation about how we can build trust. I want to do everything I can to make sure our teams uphold the integrity of our products.”

• A second insurer filed a lawsuit against the Obama administration over funds owed to it through the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) risk corridor program. Highmark Inc. claims that it is still owed $220 million to offset its losses in 2014. The risk corridor program is a pool paid into by insurers that have greater than expected profits, with the money being redistributed to insurers suffering losses. Last year, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced it would only be paying out 12.6 percent of the requested funds to insurers. In February, Health Republic Insurance of Oregon also sued the administration for $5 billion for failing to make the risk corridor payments. Health Republic was one of several co-ops established under the ACA that closed after CMS’ announcement.

• House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) introduced H Res 737 - Condemning and censuring John A. Koskinen, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue. According to a press release, “The resolution offers Congressional condemnation and disapproval of Mr. Koskinen for a pattern of conduct inconsistent with the trust and confidence placed in him as an Officer of the United States. The resolution formally censures Mr. Koskinen and urges his resignation or removal. The resolution also requires Mr. Koskinen to forfeit all rights to his government pension and any other federal benefits for which he is eligible.” Chaffetz said, “I view censure as a precursor to impeachment as it allows the House the opportunity to formally condemn Mr. Koskinen.”

Bills & Amendments

• Key vote: The House passed HR 4909 - the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017 by a vote of 277-147. The legislation proposes providing $610 billion for national defense.
  • The House version of the NDAA does not include a requirement for women to register for the draft.
• Key vote: The House passed HR 5243 - the Zika Response Appropriations Act, 2016 by a vote of 241-184. The legislation proposes providing $622 million to combat the Zika virus.
• The U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee voted in favor of a bill that would delay the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) updated ozone rule for up to eight years. The EPA’s ozone rule made the federal standard for ground-level ozone more restrictive. The rule is expected to go into effect in 2025. The committee-passed legislation would require the EPA to consider updated air standards every 10 years, rather than every five years as is currently required under the Clean Air Act; it would also require the EPA to consider the costs of any updated air standard. Republicans on the committee argued that the legislation would allow states more time to comply with the ozone standard. Democrats on the committee argued that the legislation would undermine the Clean Air Act and weaken needed air pollution standards.

State

• The Alaska State Legislature adjourned its extended regular session without passing the budget. The session was originally scheduled to adjourn on April 17, but legislators extended the session to address the state’s $4 billion deficit. Since lawmakers were unable to agree on a state budget and oil taxes, Gov. Bill Walker (I) has called for a special session to begin on May 23. Alaska is one of 20 states under divided government. Republicans control the Senate by eight seats and the House by seven seats. Governor Bill Walker is an independent.
• The Michigan House of Representatives approved a bill to require all signatures for a citizen initiative to be collected within a 180-day window.
  • This would remove a provision allowing petitioners to prove that signatures older than 180 days are valid. Previously, signatures older than 180 days were assumed invalid but could be proved otherwise through a laborious and rarely used process. Senate Bill 776, if signed by Governor Rick Snyder (R), would take effect immediately and apply to initiatives currently being circulated, including a marijuana legalization proposal and an anti-fracking initiative.
  • Most Republicans (who maintain trifecta control of the state government) voted for SB 776, which would not dramatically change the difficulty from the status quo but eliminated the possibility of the process being made easier in the future. Democrats voted to keep the process for validating signatures older than 180 days in place, which would have left open the possibility of the Board of Canvassers voting to make the citizen initiative process easier through the use electronic voter registration records to verify signatures. In the Senate, all Republicans voted “yes” on the bill and all Democrats voted “no.” In the House, all but six Republicans voted “yes” and all Democrats voted “no.”
  • MI Legalize, the group behind the marijuana legalization proposal, urged Gov. Snyder to veto SB 776. Jeffrey Hank, chair of MI Legalize, stated that this bill “changing the rules in the middle of a campaign” could be susceptible to a legal challenge.
• Former Indiana Lieutenant Governor Sue Ellspermann was unanimously voted in as the next president of Ivy Tech, Indiana’s statewide community college system. Ellspermann left the administration of Gov. Mike Pence in February to seek the job and will begin July 1. Ellspermann previously worked in higher education as the founding director of the University of Southern Indiana’s Center for Applied Research and Economic Development.
• A Kentucky judge ruled against Attorney General Andy Beshear (D) in his civil suit against Governor Matt Bevin (R) over an executive order issued by Bevin that cut funding to state colleges and universities by $41 million. Beshear filed the suit in April 2016, claiming that Bevin's order violated the state constitution's distribution of powers article. Franklin County Circuit Judge Thomas Wingate wrote in his decision that the constitution did not prevent Bevin from instructing colleges to spend less money, as he did in the executive order, but rather prevented him from altering the funding they receive. Beshear, son of former Governor Steve Beshear (D) with whom Bevin is also feuding, stated that he plans to appeal the ruling and also hinted at more lawsuits to come over Bevin's cuts for other state agencies.

Local

• Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel (D) proposed a new city ordinance to ban “public accommodations” such as hotels, supermarkets, and other similar businesses from requiring customers to prove their gender via government ID before using their desired bathroom. The proposed ordinance includes no enforcement mechanisms, and the Chicago Tribune stated that no businesses in the city were known to have such requirements in place at the time of the proposal. Mayor Emanuel won re-election to a second four-year term in 2015 with more than 56 percent of the vote. Chicago is the largest city in Illinois and the third-largest city in the United States by population.

Preview of the day

The excerpts below were compiled from issue #16 of The Tap, which was published on May 14, 2016. READ THE FULL VERSION HERE.

Federal

• Rosemary Collyer, a judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, will assume senior status. Judge Collyer’s elevation creates a third vacancy on the district court.

• The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary will hold hearings for Donald Schott, a nominee to the United States Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit. The committee will also hold hearings on four nominees to the United States District Courts. Those nominees are Paul Abrams, Stephanie Finley, Claude Kelly, and Winfield Ong. No nomination hearings have been scheduled for Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland.
  • For more information, see Supreme Court vacancy, 2016: An overview

State

• The Utah State Legislature will begin a special session. The special session will address education funding and anti-monument legislation. Gov. Gary Herbert (R) wants the legislature to restore funding for $4.8 million in education initiatives. He also wants the legislature to consider a resolution that would oppose the establishment of a 1.9 million-acre national monument in southeastern Utah. Gov. Herbert said that it would be "absolutely irresponsible" of the Obama administration to consider a new national monument without the approval of the state’s citizens.

• The Alaska State Legislature is projected to adjourn its regular extended session. The session was originally scheduled to adjourn on April 17, but legislators extended the session to address the state’s $4 billion deficit. Alaska is one of 20 states under divided government. Republicans control the Senate by eight seats and the House by seven seats. Governor Bill Walker is an independent.