Tag Archives : Build House

White House declares monkeypox a public health emergency

The Biden administration on Thursday officially declared monkeypox a public health emergency, a move that’s aimed at freeing up emergency funding and improving distribution of vaccines and treatments.

“We are prepared to take our response to the next level in addressing this virus, and we urge every American to take monkeypox seriously and to take responsibility to help us tackle this virus,” Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said during a briefing.

The announcement comes amid intense criticism that the Biden administration failed to recognize the severity of the outbreak, leading to shortages of vaccine doses and diagnostic tests even as demand has soared.

Some public health experts fear the U.S. lost its opportunity to contain and even eliminate the virus.

The administration has been under pressure to declare a public health emergency from health advocates and congressional Democrats who represent some of the hardest hit states.

A public health emergency won’t ease the shortages of vaccines, but it could expedite the approval process for new treatments and provide more flexibility for federal agencies to respond to the outbreak.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, known monkeypox infections top 6,600, nearly all among men who have sex with men. New York state is the epicenter of the outbreak with almost a third of all cases, followed by California. 

The administration’s announcement comes after New York, Illinois and California all declared their own public health emergencies.

The World Health Organization declared a global health emergency over the outbreak on July 23.

Source: TEST FEED1

Secret spending by the weapons industry is making us less safe

Two thousand, four hundred. That’s how many expensive and dysfunctional F-35 fighter planes American taxpayers are paying to have built, as part of a defense system that may never be fully ready for combat.

Two hundred billion dollars. That’s how much American taxpayers would save if Congress decided to end this program now. That’s $200 billion that could go toward things that make us safer — like public health measures to prevent the next global pandemic or deal with the epidemic of gun violence.

Unfortunately, many members of Congress – on both sides of the aisle – are beholden to the military-industrial complex. The Pentagon’s budget keeps climbing, year after year, and Americans are no safer. Why is that? And what can we do about it?

The three main drivers of excessive spending on the Department of Defense are strategic overreach, pork-barrel politics and corporate lobbying. A 2021 report from Open Secrets reveals that, over the last 20 years, the defense sector has dropped $285 million in political donations and $2.5 billion on lobbying to influence Congress and the federal government.

Lockheed Martin, the corporation that makes the F-35, spends roughly $7 million per year on campaign contributions and $13 million a year on lobbying. In the U.S. House of Representatives, there is even an F-35 caucus that organized a letter – signed by 132 members, both Democrats and Republicans – calling for more F–35s than the Defense Department had requested in its fiscal year 2022 budget proposal. And this year key committees in both houses have voted to add F-35s beyond what the Pentagon even asked for, pushing the annual cost for the system to nearly $12 billion — more than the entire discretionary budget of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

So, for about $20 million in campaign cash and lobbying expenses, Lockheed Martin has convinced Congress to buy even more defective and obsolete fighter planes than the notoriously wasteful Pentagon had claimed to need.

But it’s not just the campaign money or the armies of lobbyists that help major contractors cash in. It’s also their exaggerated claims about jobs in key states and congressional districts. Lockheed Martin even has an interactive map on its website that shows its version of how many jobs the F-35 creates in each state. But its claims that the F-35 creates jobs almost everywhere are simply false. A lot of the states listed on the map have only a handful of jobs related to the F-35, and over half of the jobs are in just two states — Texas and California. 

And another thing Lockheed Martin doesn’t want you to think about is that virtually any other expenditure of the same funds would create more jobs — 40 percent more for infrastructure or green energy, one and one-half times as many in health care, and nearly twice as many in education. Wasting money on dysfunctional aircraft instead of spending it on things we need actually costs jobs.

As for the millions the weapons industry spends on campaign contributions and lobbying, that’s just the political spending we know about. Corporations like Lockheed Martin also write big checks to trade associations under the guise of paying “dues” to these groups.

These organizations, such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Business Roundtable and the National Defense Industrial Association, function effectively as money laundering machines to do the dirty political work that corporations don’t want their shareholders or the public to know about. And the major contractors also fund Pentagon spending advocacy groups like the Air Force Association, the Navy League and even the Submarine Industrial Base Council, not to mention state and local groups that lobby for more Pentagon spending for their communities.

President Biden has the power to stop the hidden payoffs and secretive spending that juice out-of-control Pentagon budgets. With the stroke of his pen, Biden can issue an executive order to require all government contractors that receive more than $1 million for federal projects to disclose every last penny of their political spending, including six-figure checks to trade associations that pressure members of Congress and prop up their preferred candidates. More transparency would take the power out of the hands of defense contractors and give it back to the people.

We can all agree that secret money in politics has been the norm for too long, but it doesn’t have to stay this way. It’s time for President Biden to use his executive power to pull the curtain back on hidden political spending by those who benefit from government contracts.

Maybe then Congress will stop buying fighter planes, like the F-35 with its 800 unresolved defects and costs that are going through the roof.

Janiyah Williams is a fellow in the Inclusive Democracy Program at Rethink Media. William D. Hartung is a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.

Source: TEST FEED1

Five ways China appears to be retaliating against Taiwan over Pelosi visit

China has expressed anger after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) touched down in the island nation of Taiwan earlier this week.

Pelosi made the trip despite warnings from the Biden administration and threats from Beijing that a visit to Taiwan, which China claims as its own, could fuel U.S.-China tensions. 

Pelosi touched down in Taipei on Tuesday after kicking off her congressional delegation tour Monday in Singapore. Malaysia, South Korea and Japan are also on the itinerary.

The island, which calls itself the Republic of China, has been self-governed since 1949 — but the People’s Republic of China considers it part of its mainland under its “one-China” unification policy. 

The U.S. has remained strategically ambiguous about its position on Taiwan. It’s committed to aiding the island in defending itself against Beijing, but has also accepted the one-China policy. 

Chinese officials said Pelosi flouted warnings and ignored potential consequences after she became the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit the island since 1997.

Since then, China has made moves to express its unhappiness with the visit. Taiwan has also experienced cyberattacks from unknown actors coinciding the the speaker’s trip.

Here are five things that occurred around Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan:

Military drills

On Thursday, China began firing missiles throughout the Taiwan Strait waters and deploying planes and warships in the area. 

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army is set to run live-fire military drills in the waters and skies around Taiwan for several days, effectively creating a blockade around the island.

Taiwan has condemned the drills as “military intimidation” that threatens the island’s sovereignty. 

China’s Ministry of National Defense spokesman Wu Qian said that Pelosi provoked the drills. 

“The Chinese People’s Liberation Army is on high alert and will take a series of targeted military operations in response to resolutely safeguard China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and resolutely thwart the interference by external forces and the separatist schemes for ‘Taiwan independence,’” Wu said.

Import bans 

China has also levied trade restrictions against Taiwan Wednesday, banning key imports like citrus and fish and halting the export of sand, a crucial construction material.

The bans halted imports from as many as 100 Taiwanese companies, Bloomberg reported, impacting a $328.3 billion bilateral trade exchange. 

The Chinese government claimed that they were responding to certain contaminants in the shipments, Al Jazeera reported.

The restrictions didn’t cover processor chips — of which Taiwan dominates production and produces half the world’s supply. The semiconductors are necessary for China to assemble and produce electronics like smartphones.

Two-way trade between the countries reportedly rose 26 percent last year. China is Taiwan’s largest trading partner. 

Cyberattacks

Hours before Pelosi landed on the island, the Taiwanese President’s office was struck by cyberattacks, according to a statement from a spokesperson for President Tsai Ing-wen. 

Ing-wen said his office experienced distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS), a type of cyber attack meant to overwhelm systems. 

DDoS attacks have recently been used by Ukrainians attempting to overload Russian systems as they stave off Moscow’s invasion in their country. 

The websites of Taiwan’s National Defense and Foreign Affairs Ministries were also reportedly attacked, as well as the island’s largest airport. 

The Ministry of National Defense was hit with a similar onslaught of attacks Thursday, after Pelosi’s departure.

It is unclear at this point if the attacks were carried out by China. However, they do coincide with Pelosi’s arrival on the island.

Television screens in Taiwanese 7-Eleven convenience stores reportedly flashed “Warmonger Pelosi get out of Taiwan” in additional cyberattacks on private companies.

Drones

Reuters reported that a pair of Chinese drones flew twice through a restricted area over Taiwan’s Kinmen Island Thursday.

Taiwanese officials, who averted the drones by firing flares at the aircraft, said they expect the flyovers were an intelligence-gathering mission by the Chinese.

Taiwan consists of a number of islands and islets, many of which border the East and South China Seas. Among those, the Kinmen Islands are particularly heavily fortified, located near the Chinese city of Xiamen. 

Summons for U.S. ambassador

The U.S. ambassador in Beijing was summoned the night of Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan to appear before Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Xie Feng.

According to a Wednesday release from China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns was called for an “emergency meeting” to discuss “stern representations and strong protests” about Pelosi’s trip.

The release called the speaker’s trip “a deliberate provocation and a playing with fire” that violated the one-China policy. It also accused the U.S. of deleting phrases like “Taiwan is a part of China” from its State Department website and including Taiwan in its Indo-Pacific strategy. 

“The move is extremely egregious in nature and will have extremely serious consequences. China will not sit idly by. The U.S. government must be held accountable. For quite some time, the United States has said one thing but done the opposite, constantly distorted, altered, obscured and hollowed out the one-China principle…” the release continued.

Xie reportedly told the U.S. ambassador that “the U.S. side must pay the price for its wrongdoings.” 

Source: TEST FEED1

Cheney challenger Hageman takes firm stance on 2020: ‘the election was rigged’

Harriet Hageman, the top primary challenger to Rep. Liz Cheney (R) for Wyoming’s lone House seat, said on Wednesday that the 2020 presidential election was “rigged” against former President Trump, her firmest public stance on the election yet. 

Hageman was asked at a candidate forum whether she believed the election was stolen, as Trump and his allies have falsely claimed.

“I think this question is so interesting because the press just absolutely cannot get over this. The election was rigged,” said Hageman, who has received Trump’s backing in the primary set for later this month. 

Hageman’s comments come after Cheney pressed her to say that the election was not stolen from Trump at debate in late June, according to the Casper Star-Tribune. 

Cheney accused Hageman of avoiding the question because she is “completely beholden” to Trump, per the Star-Tribune.

Hageman said at the debate that “we have serious questions” about the election, but stopped short of saying it was stolen or rigged.

Cheney released a campaign ad last month opening with those comments from Hageman. In the ad, Cheney says the country needs to elect “serious leaders” who will take their oath of office seriously and not just say what they think people want to hear.

Multiple audits of state results have found no evidence of widespread fraud that could have changed the outcome of Trump’s 2020 loss.

State Sen. Anthony Bouchard (R) also said at Wednesday’s forum that the election was stolen, as he did during the June debate. Cheney was not present at the forum.

Cheney had doubled down on her criticism of Trump during the campaign, pointing to her work on the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

She appears to be facing an uphill battle for reelection, as a poll from last month showed her trailing Hageman by more than 20 points. Two-thirds of respondents in the poll said they did not approve of the job Cheney was doing. 

Source: TEST FEED1

Judge rejects federal plans for fossil fuel mining in Powder River Basin

A federal judge on Wednesday night threw out two resource management plans developed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), finding they failed to account for the risk of fossil fuel leasing on public lands in Montana and Wyoming. 

The plans, developed during the Trump administration but defended in court by the Biden BLM, outline how much coal can be mined and burned on public lands in parts of the Powder River Basin, which covers parts of southeast Montana and northeast Wyoming. The basin is the source of more than 85 percent of federally-produced coal in the U.S. In 2018, Judge Brian Morris, an Obama appointee, ruled that the BLM must redraw the plans to factor in the risks of climate change.  

The BLM, then still under former President Trump, finished a revised estimate in 2020, but was again ordered to redo it because Morris ruled it did not properly consider impacts like methane emissions and potential harms from fossil fuel combustion. On Wednesday, Morris again ruled the BLM had not properly complied with the earlier order to review the plans, and that it had not properly considered alternatives with limited or no new coal leasing in the region.  

“The Bureau of Land Management is singularly focused on propping up the dying coal industry at the expense of its legal obligations to consider public health and the climate,” Melissa Hornbein, a senior attorney at the Western Environmental Law Center and one of the plaintiffs in the case, said in a statement. “That a federal judge ordered the Bureau to consider a no-leasing alternative and disclose to the public how many people will be sickened and die as a result of the combustion of federal coal is groundbreaking. The courts recognize the seriousness of the climate crisis and the impacts of fossil-fuel pollution. The BLM must now do likewise.” 

Source: TEST FEED1

Ousted San Francisco district attorney won't run again after recall

Chesa Boudin, the former San Francisco district attorney who was ousted in a June recall vote, announced on Thursday that he will not run again for his old office in November.

In a series of tweets, Boudin cited family reasons. His son, he said, “is on the verge of taking his first step and speaking his first word,” while his father was just recently released from prison after more than 40 years.

“I have devoted my public life to this effort because it makes our communities stronger & safer,” he tweeted. “I’ve also taken stock of the burden that more than three years of nearly non-stop campaigning placed on my family. I’m committed to criminal justice reform; I’m also committed to my family.”

“I am choosing to put my family first: I will not be running for office in 2022,” he added.

Boudin built a reputation as one of the most progressive top prosecutors in the country during his tenure as San Francisco’s district attorney, aggressively pursuing a series of criminal justice reforms including eliminating cash bail and working to reduce the number of people sent to prison.

But his time in office was also defined by frustration among many residents over persistent property crime and public drug use amid the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Those frustrations led to a recall vote in June, in which 55 percent of voters chose to oust Boudin from office. That vote was seen as a rejection of progressive approaches to criminal justice reform by voters in one of the nation’s most liberal cities.

Following Boudin’s removal from office, San Francisco Mayor London Breed (D) appointed Brooke Jenkins, who previously worked as the city’s lead hate crimes prosecutor, as interim district attorney.

Jenkins left her job in the district attorney’s office last year to support the effort to recall Boudin. She is also running in the November special election. A general election for district attorney will be held next year.

Source: TEST FEED1

In the midterm elections, abortion rights are top issue for young voters

Abortion is among the top issues for young voters, with many seeing it as a motivating factor in turning out to vote in the upcoming midterm elections. 

New survey data released by progressive polling firm Data for Progress found that among voters under the age of 45, 82 percent consider abortion rights to be an important issue in deciding how they vote. This demographic of young Americans has spent their entire lives under the protections of Roe v. Wade— until six weeks ago when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled to overturn Roe. 

The fallout from that decision has been significant, with numerous polls from around the country indicating Americans want to keep legal abortion access. 

That’s especially true among Democrats, with Data for Progress finding 22 percent of Democrats are more concerned about legal abortion access over other looming issues such as the rising prices of food and gas.  

Meanwhile, the survey found 85 percent of Democrats said abortion rights are a “very” or “somewhat” important issue in deciding how they plan to vote in the upcoming midterms. That’s compared to 59 percent of Republican voters who say abortion rights are a “very” or “somewhat” important issue come November. 

America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news. 

The public’s disapproval of the high court’s decision to overturn Roe faced its first test this week, with Kansas residents overwhelmingly voting to reject a constitutional amendment declaring the right to an abortion is not protected by the state’s constitution. 

Four more states will take up similar ballot measures asking voters to weigh in on the future of legal abortion access in their upcoming Nov. 8 primary elections. 

Young voters will play a crucial role in the country’s upcoming midterm elections, with an analysis by the Institute of Politics at Harvard Kennedy School finding voters ages 18 to 29 are expected to match 2018’s record-breaking turnout. Notably, they tend to prefer Democratic control of Congress.  

However, Democratic voters ages 18 to 29 are not happy with President Biden, with a separate New York Times-Siena College poll revealing 94 percent of this demographic want the Democratic party to nominate someone other than Biden in 2024. 

Pushing for abortion access could help retain and keep young Democratic voter support, something Biden has been trying to do. The president signed an executive order Wednesday directing the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to consider working with states to use Medicaid waivers to pay for travel expenses incurred by women that cross state lines to receive abortions. 

Democrats have also tried to codify the right to an abortion into federal law, working with Republicans to introduce a bill aimed at preventing states from enacting laws that impose an “undue burden” on access to pre-viability abortions.  

Source: TEST FEED1

Rep. John Yarmuth tests positive for COVID-19

Rep. John Yarmuth (D-Ky.) tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday, becoming the latest congressional lawmaker to come down with the virus.

Yarmuth, who is fully vaccinated and has received two booster shots, said he is experiencing a light cough.

“This morning, I tested positive for COVID. Thankfully, I am fully vaccinated, double-boosted, and am experiencing no symptoms other than a light cough. I’ll continue to follow CDC guidelines and will be working from home for the remainder of this week. Stay safe, everyone!” Yarmuth wrote on Twitter.

The congressman’s diagnosis comes as the House is out for August recess. The chamber broke for the month on Friday, though lawmakers may reconvene if legislative business is put on the schedule.

A number of senators have tested positive for COVID-19 in recent days, including Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) recently recovered from the virus.

President Biden has tested positive for COVID-19 the past six days following his “rebound” coronavirus infection. On Thursday, his doctor said he was feeling “very well” and only experiencing a “very occasional cough.”

The U.S. reported more than 161,000 new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Source: TEST FEED1

Runaway rents: The law is failing renters

Times are tough for renters. More than a third of American households rent their homes. Housing shortages along with rising mortgage rates mean many people have found themselves locked out of homeownership. At the same time, rents have skyrocketed around the country, and not just in expensive coastal cities. Renters in areas that have long been seen as affordable like the Sunbelt and Mountain West are also facing massive increases in housing costs. In Austin, rents are up 40 percent year-over-year. In Orlando, 30 percent. In Denver, 29 percent. In Phoenix, 25 percent. In Dallas, 24 percent. In Atlanta, 20 percent. If mortgage payments increased by those amounts, one can imagine waves of foreclosures, protests, and non-stop calls to congressional representatives. But existing homeowners aren’t seeing those same increases. Why do homeowners get so much more stability and protection than renters when it comes to housing costs?

While the causes of the affordable housing crisis have been examined elsewhere, what hasn’t been reckoned with is how these double-digit rent hikes reflect deliberate law and policy choices that leave renters behind. Our research has shown that renters and homeowners in the U.S. experience vastly different treatment under our legal system: homeowners benefit from laws and policies providing them with a significant degree of predictability in housing costs and stability, while tenants are left largely unprotected.   

For example, mortgage law has been designed to make low-interest, long-term, fixed-rate mortgages widely available to middle-class Americans. After the overuse of adjustable-rate mortgages helped precipitate the 2008 financial crisis, lawmakers responded with a range of legal and policy reforms to further protect homeowners from predatory lending. And while homeowners may face rising property tax bills (as their property values increase), states have enacted numerous laws to provide homeowners with relief, such as homestead exemptions.

In contrast, the law has left renters largely unprotected from unaffordable and unpredictable increases in housing costs. The majority of states ban rent control and rent stabilization laws entirely, leaving tenants vulnerable to exorbitant and unaffordable housing cost increases. Renters, like homeowners, are consumers, yet state and federal consumer protection laws largely ignore renters. Furthermore, the shortage of multi-family rental housing is exacerbated by local control of zoning, which has led many localities to prohibit the construction of anything other than single-family homes. Some states even give homeowners effective veto power over new development.

Of course, some might argue that the inconsistent legal treatment of renters and homeowners is just a definitional difference: if you want stability and predictability in your housing costs, you should buy a home; if you prefer flexibility, you should be a renter. While there are some for whom the flexibility of renting may be worth the tradeoffs, many people are not renters by choice. For many, the cost of homeownership is simply out of reach. Renters have just 1/89^th the wealth of homeowners. Further, the majority of Black and Latinx families are renters, due in large part to a long history of racist, structural barriers to homeownership. 

At base, the difference in how the law treats tenants and homeowners exists in large part because decisionmakers have adopted laws and policies that tend to value the role of property as commodity and investment vehicle over its role as shelter. We believe it is high time to question and challenge this status quo. This is not to say investors in rental property should never be able to make a reasonable return on their investment or to raise rents with inflation or maintenance costs. But the legal system often allows investors to increase rents as much as the market will bear. Some states and localities have enacted laws addressing these concerns, such as rental registries, good-cause eviction laws, or rent stabilization ordinances. But these types of laws only exist in a handful of locations, leaving most renters in the U.S. exposed to unchecked rent increases and the loss of their home if they can’t afford to pay. 

As we have argued elsewhere, a deep strain of anti-tenancy runs through our legal system. The current housing crisis is further exposing just how vulnerable renters are in a legal system that accords them a second-class status. The law already protects those who own their homes from being subject to unchecked market forces. It’s time for the law to better protect renters too. 

Sarah Schindler is the Maxine Kurtz Faculty Research Scholar and Professor of Law at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law. Kellen Zale is the George Butler Research Professor and Associate Professor of Law at the University of Houston Law Center.

Source: TEST FEED1

Judge rules West Virginia Medicaid must cover gender-affirming medical care

West Virginia’s Medicaid program may no longer exclude coverage for gender-affirming surgical care for transgender beneficiaries, a federal judge ruled this week.

In a decision published Wednesday, District Court Judge Robert C. Chambers wrote that West Virginia Medicaid’s refusal to cover gender-affirming surgeries for the treatment of gender dysphoria “invidiously discriminates on the basis of sex and transgender status.”

Chambers said the categorical exclusion of transgender health care violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Affordable Care Act and the Medicaid Act.

The ruling stems from a class action lawsuit filed in 2020 by Lambda Legal on behalf of two transgender men denied coverage for gender-affirming medical care under the state’s Medicaid program and West Virginia’s state employee health plan.

America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news.

The lawsuit argued that the intentional exclusion of coverage for transgender health care was “unmistakable,” particularly as treatments like hormone therapy were covered under Medicaid for cisgender program recipients that were not using them for “gender transition procedures.”

In 2021, two additional plaintiffs – Shauntae Anderson, a Medicaid recipient, and Leanne James, a public employee and Public Employee Insurance Agency (PEIA) member – joined the lawsuit.

Earlier this year, a settlement with The Health Plan of West Virginia, Inc. led to the removal of the exclusion on coverage for gender-confirming health care in its PEIA plans. The remaining claims involving PEIA were dismissed after the passing of James in February.

“I am excited to finally have access to the healthcare I deserve,” Anderson said Wednesday in a statement released by Lambda Legal. “Gender-confirming care is healthcare, and it is lifesaving.”

Christopher Fain, another plaintiff in the suit, on Tuesday said the decision represented a victory not just for himself but for transgender Medicaid beneficiaries across the state.

“Transgender West Virginians should never feel as if our lives are worth less than others,” he said.

West Virginia had been one of nine states whose Medicaid program explicitly excludes coverage for gender-affirming health care. Exceptions include Ohio, where officials have said the ban is not being enforced, and Arkansas, whose 2021 Medicaid ban only applies to minors.

Georgia’s Department of Community Health agreed earlier this month to include coverage for gender-affirming surgeries in the state’s Medicaid program after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and its Georgia affiliate sued the department.

Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration (ACHA) is currently considering whether to block the state’s Medicaid program from covering gender-affirming medical care including puberty blockers, hormones, gender-affirming surgeries or “any other procedures that alter primary or secondary sexual characteristics” when those interventions are used to treat gender dysphoria.

Source: TEST FEED1