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NotedDC — How the Jan. 6 hearings are affecting state-wide races

The Jan. 6 hearings on Capitol Hill are having ripple effects in state-wide races, with Democrats seeking to leverage the hearings to defeat Trump-backed candidates.

In Pennsylvania, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Josh Shapiro has gone after GOP rival Doug Mastriano, citing testimony from former Attorney General Bill Barr debunking the state senator’s claims of election fraud.

“Bill Barr means: Doug Mastriano lied to everyone in an attempt to undermine our elections,” Shapiro tweeted last week. “This cannot be Pennsylvania’s new normal.”

Following Tuesday’s hearing, Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D) also took aim at candidates — such as her GOP rival Kristina Karamo, who she didn’t explicitly name — who have pushed the theory that the 2020 election was stolen.

“Those unhappy with the results of the 2020 presidential election – and now, political candidates courting their support and coveted endorsements – have perpetuated an unprecedented, dangerous, egregious and false campaign,” Benson wrote.

Republicans who previously backed Trump’s false election claims have seen state-wide gains across the country this year, including recently in Indiana and Nevada.

And in Arizona, state Rep. Mark Finchem (R), who was subpoenaed by the Jan. 6 committee, also has a chance of being the GOP nominee for secretary of State.

But Democratic strategist Tony Cani predicted Finchem’s platform of denying the results of the 2020 election would backfire in a general election.

“In the general election, independent and Republican voters who switched to vote for [President] Biden and [Sen. Mark] Kelly [D] in 2020, they’re going to be frustrated with the focus that these folks [Republicans] are making on election integrity,” Cani said.

Matt Grossmann, director of the Institute for Public Policy and Social Research at Michigan State University, noted that it’s unclear to what extent the evidence uncovered against Trump and his allies will impact state-level races.

“The relationship between votes for governor and president and the votes for offices, like secretary of State and attorney general, are going up over time across states,” Grossmann said. 

“I don’t necessarily think that’s about lack of caring, it’s about the increasing partisanship and polarization of the electorate,” he said. 

After the first three public hearings by the Jan. 6 panel, an ABC News/Ipsos poll found that 58 percent of Americans said Trump should be criminally charged, though the same poll found only 34 percent of Americans were following the hearings.

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Takeaways from Tuesday’s hearing 

The House committee probing the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot turned its focus to former President Trump‘s efforts to pressure local officials in its fourth public hearing.

Hear are four takeaways from Tuesday’s hearing:

1. Arizona House Speaker refutes Trump claims

Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers (R) rejected Trump’s claim that the election in the state was stolen.

• Bowers emotionally detailed being pressured by Trump’s team to lie about the 2020 election results.
• “You’re asking me to do something against my oath, and I will not break my oath,” Bowers recalled telling Trump’s team.

The committee has repeatedly shown evidence suggesting that Trump lied about his conversations with people, including Vice President Pence, just before the Jan. 6 riot.

“[Giuliani] said ‘We’ve got lots of theories, we just don’t have the evidence.'”

– Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers (R) on remarks from Rudy Giuliani, who advised Trump following the 2020 election.

2. State leaders, witnesses talk about being doxxed

Pennsylvania House Speaker Bryan Cutler (R) testified via video about how his family was targeted by people online.

• “All of my personal information was doxxed online,” he said in taped testimony.
• “It was my personal email, my personal cellphone, my home phone. In fact, we had to disconnect our home phone for about three days because it would ring all hours of the night and fill up with messages.”

3. Schiff takes lead in questioning witnesses

The select committee let Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) lead the questioning on Tuesday, part of a rotation of leaders during the public hearings.

• Schiff, chair of the House Intelligence Committee, has been a frequent foe of Trump, leading the first impeachment inquiry into the former president.
• Trump has labeled him “shifty Schiff” and “Pencil Neck,” among other insults. As recently as last week, Trump referred to him as “Watermelon Head.”

4. Poll workers recount harassment

Former Georgia election worker Wandrea “Shaye” Moss gave perhaps the most emotional testimony of the hearing Tuesday.

• Moss spoke about her family being harassed after they became direct targets of Trump’s effort to overcome the election results in the Peach State.
• She said she and her mother received death threats after they were targeted by false claims of election fraud.

The panel’s next hearing, set for Thursday, will focus on Trump’s influence over the Justice Department, according to Committee Chair Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.).

Trump looks to boost primary scorecard

Former President Trump’s hold on the GOP will be tested again Tuesday as his endorsed candidate Katie Britt takes on Rep. Mo Brooks in an Alabama runoff.

• Trump initially backed Brooks in the House race but flipped his support to Britt earlier this year as Brooks struggled in polling.
• Brooks is running on a MAGA platform but told AL.com ahead of the runoff: “It’s quite clear that Donald Trump has no loyalty to anyone or anything but himself.”

Britt, a former Senate aide, came in first place in the initial primary with 45 percent of the vote compared to Brooks’s 29 percent.

An Emerson College-The Hill poll conducted earlier this month showing Britt leading with support of about half of likely voters heading into the runoff.

The Hill’s Max Greenwood has more on the seven races to watch Tuesday.

FLORES TAKES OFFICE

Rep. Mayra Flores’s win in the special election for Texas’ 34th District last week is being heralded by Republicans as a signal of growing strength for the GOP among Hispanic voters.

Flores, who was sworn into office on Tuesday, shared a picture of her new office’s name plate: “My very first day in office and it’s a memorable one for sure. This is what dreams are made of; faith, family, and hardwork.”

Dems grapple with gas tax holiday

President Biden is set to decide by the week’s end whether the federal government will temporarily adopt a gas tax holiday to combat skyrocketing fuel costs.

“The president’s looking at an array of options to figure out how to give relief to the American public,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters Tuesday.

The move would require congressional approval — a heavy lift in the evenly divided Congress during a critical midterm election year.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) previously rejected the idea, though vulnerable Democrats have urged the Democratic leader to reconsider.

The idea isn’t without controversy. Notably, then-President Obama, when Biden was his vice president, called the concept a “gimmick” in a spring 2008 speech.

“For us to suggest that 30 cents a day for 3 months is real relief – means we are not tackling the problem,” Obama said. “We are offering gimmicks.” 

Under current prices, a tax holiday would save drivers about 18 cents a gallon when they fill up.

The national average gas price on Tuesday was $4.97 per gallon on Tuesday, according to AAA’s gas prices tracker. 

BIDEN CELEBRATES VAX MILESTONE

President Biden visited a D.C. vaccination clinic after the Food and Drug Administration authorized COVID-19 vaccines for children under the age of 5.

Read more from The Hill’s Peter Sullivan on the pandemic milestone.

That’s it for today. Stay with TheHill.com for the latest and recommend NotedDC to others: thehill.com/noted. See you tomorrow.

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Live results: Alabama, DC, Georgia, Virginia

The Associated Press is following the runoff elections in Georgia and Alabama, and primary elections in Virginia and Washington, D.C.

Follow the live results below.

Georgia

Virginia

Alabama

Washington, D.C.

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House passes bill revising US code to clarify that women, LGBTQ individuals can be president

The House passed a bill on Tuesday that seeks to revise federal law and clarify that women and LGBTQ Americans can be president of the United States.

The legislation, dubbed the 21st Century President Act, passed by voice vote. It also passed the House by voice vote in the last Congress.

The bill specifically takes issue with a portion of U.S. code that pertains to threats against presidents, former presidents and certain other individuals. As currently written, the statute defines “immediate family” as “the wife of a former President during his lifetime, the widow of a former President until her death or remarriage, and minor children of a former President until they reach sixteen years of age.”

But under the legislation that passed on Tuesday, that language would change to “the spouse of a former President during a former President’s lifetime, the surviving spouse of a former President until the surviving 10 spouse’s death or remarriage.”

While the U.S. has never had a female president, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton became the first woman to lead a major-party ticket in 2016.

The U.S. has also never had an LGBTQ president. In 2020, however, former South Bend, Ind. Mayor Pete Buttigieg was a popular candidate in the Democratic Primary, winning the coveted Iowa caucus before dropping out of the race. Buttigieg is now serving as Transportation secretary.

The U.S. did break barriers last year when then-Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) became the first female vice president, and her husband, Doug Emhoff, became the first second gentleman of the United States.

During remarks on the House floor Tuesday, Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) said the language in the federal code “disregards the fact that a president may be female and the president’s spouse may not be,” adding “this does not reflect the progress we’ve made in this country.”

“Although we still have a long way to go, both in equality and representation, our country’s government is growing closer to finally representing our nation’s brilliant diversity. Our laws must reflect the fact that a president and their spouse can be of any gender,” Cicilline said.

“That concept may have seemed impossible a few decades ago, but today it is thankfully a true and real possibility,” he went on to say.

Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wisc.), a sponsor of the bill, said the change to the federal code “is long overdue.”

“Federal law hasn’t caught up to where progress in this country is, specifically when it comes to who a future president can be,” he said on the House floor.

“Without this change to the U.S. code, for example, the law that makes it a crime to threaten, kill, kidnap or inflict bodily harm upon the president or the president’s family would fail to include a future female or gay president and their potential spouse,” he added.

The congressman said the change is “critically important” because the U.S. could eventually see a female or gay president. He gave a shoutout to some of his colleagues.

“Some day there could be a President Kamala Harris, or Elizabeth Warren, or Amy Klobuchar, or Tammy Baldwin, or Pete Buttigieg, or President Nikki Haley or Kristi Noem or Liz Cheney,” he said.

“The words in law matter. It is critically important that federal law recognizes that we could have a president who is not a man or even a straight man and that they and their families deserve equal protection under the law,” he added.

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) expressed support for the measure, saying “this change makes sense,” noting that both major parties have had women run for president.

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Cuellar narrowly defeats Cisneros in Texas House primary

Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) was projected to win his closely watched primary against progressive challenger Jessica Cisneros on Tuesday.

The Associated Press called the race on Tuesday evening after the Texas Democratic Party declared Cuellar the winner, following a recount that showed Cuellar leading by 289 votes.

Cisneros conceded the race after the state party’s announcement.

DEVELOPING

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Generation Z ‘extremely concerned’ about LGBTQ+ rights, survey says

Nearly two-thirds of Generation Z is worried about the future of LGBTQ+ rights, including a quarter who say they are “extremely concerned,” according to new survey data from the market research firm Toluna.

The survey, which collected responses from more than 1,000 Generation Z between the ages of 18 and 25, found that most young people in the U.S. are deeply anxious about the state of LGBTQ+ rights, which some have speculated could be in jeopardy as the Supreme Court appears prepared to overturn Roe v. Wade.

The data also comes during what is shaping up to be the worst year in recent history for state legislative attacks on LGBTQ+ people, with more than 300 bills introduced in state legislatures this year that directly target the rights of LGBTQ+ Americans, according to the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBTQ+ advocacy organization.

Some of those bills have already become law. In Florida, the Parental Rights in Education law, known to its critics as the “Don’t Say Gay” law, is set to take effect July 1. Public school teachers under the measure will be barred from addressing sexual orientation or gender identity in the classroom.

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In Alabama and Arizona, legislation was passed to restrict access to gender-affirming health care for transgender youth. And in nine states this year, transgender athletes have been banned from playing on sports teams consistent with their gender identity.

That Generation Z, in particular, has expressed elevated concern for LGBTQ+ issues is not entirely surprising. In a highly publicized Gallup poll published in February, it was revealed that roughly 21 percent of Generation Z born between 1997 and 2003 identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT).

That’s nearly double the proportion of Millennials identifying as LGBT, according to the Gallup poll, and close to five times the share of Generation X who say they are LGBT. Just 2.6 percent of Baby Boomers identify as LGBT, according to Gallup.

A recent report from the Williams Institute, a public policy think tank researching issues related to sexual orientation and gender identity, found that nearly one-in-five people who are transgender are between the ages of 13 and 17, doubling another Williams Institute estimate from 2017.

In a June report, researchers at the Pew Research Center found that adults under 30 are more likely than older adults to identify as transgender or nonbinary. They’re also more likely to know someone who is transgender, according to the report, making them more likely to support policies that benefit transgender people and oppose policies that negatively target them.

Despite mounting concern over the future of LGBTQ+ rights in the U.S., this year has seen some movement in advancing LGBTQ+ equality.

Last week, President Biden signed an executive order addressing recent anti-LGBTQ+ legislation and introducing new safeguards for inclusive health care and housing. The Biden administration this year also made gender-neutral passports widely available to nonbinary Americans.

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Biden budget prioritizes space sector

Policy continuity across administrations is rare. But in a relatively small corner of the federal government, efforts are underway within the Department of Commerce to build upon a foundational 2018 National Space Council initiative.   

In March, the Biden administration proposed a budget of $87.7 million for the Department of Commerce’s (DOC) Office of Space Commerce — $77.7 million above the fiscal year 2021 enacted level. This sizable increase is specifically slated to accelerate development and eventual deployment of a Space Situational Awareness (SSA) capability. Back in 2018, Space Policy Directive 3 (SPD-3) formalized the transition of SSA functions from the Department of Defense (DOD) Space Command’s 18th Space Control Squadron to the DOC. Implementation was slow, until now.  

At the core of this budget increase is funding for a program known as the Open Architecture Data Depository (OADR) which will develop and deploy a space tracking system so companies and governments can share a single operational picture, in order to avoid collisions. After 65 years of spaceflight, low-Earth orbit (LEO) is littered with a half a million fragments of old rockets and satellites circling our planet that are larger than 1 centimeter in size, which can cause critical, if not catastrophic, damage upon impact.

While the issue is hardly new, little to date has been done globally to address the growing problem of space pollution. But it is not merely the challenge of avoiding existing space junk, it is also the problem of monitoring ongoing impacts between derelict objects that propagate more debris with each successive collision.   

One thing is abundantly clear: Continued access to a benign space operating domain is essential for every citizen, country and company. The numbers reflect that. As of 2022, there are approximately 6,100 active satellites in orbit, but that number is expected to rise to 57,000 by 2030. To ensure safety of operations, information sharing along with transparency are needed to reduce the probability of collisions. Without this, the cost to operate orbital systems will increase ultimately impacting all users of space communications and data.

As articulated by Steve Volz, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) assistant administrator for satellite and information services and acting assistant secretary of commerce for environmental observation and prediction, the OADR will benefit from continuous collaboration with commercial partners. Currently, DOC is in the early stages of the development of the OADR. According to SPD-3, OADR must be able to incorporate data from a variety of government and commercial sources and integrate these data into a single coherent picture to allow users to understand and manage risks for space operations. Volz has stated the goal of procuring data from commercial vendors in the coming fiscal year with initial operating capability for a cloud-based repository targeted for fiscal year 2024.

Key questions remain as to the degree to which the OADR will make use of data provided by commercial SSA companies, as well as the ultimate capability of a government-provided space picture, which is free to users, versus that of a higher-quality tracking system that would come with costs to users. As DOC builds the program, there are tremendous opportunities for the federal government to leverage technology solutions already in the market.

The envisioned OADR capability to provide space tracking capabilities in collaboration with the commercial sector is the first step to a mature orbital operating environment. Soon to follow, rules of the road will be necessary to manage space traffic. No different than the maritime domain, not every vessel is the same and norms of behavior must govern safety of operations by establishing agreed upon rights of way.

Many details remain on how the OADR program will evolve and integrate commercial best practices, but it is clear the Biden administration is committed to the growth of the space economy. While the program is modest by any federal agency scale, the payoff will be enormous. Without the ability to accurately track all orbital objects below 600 kilometers that could threaten human spacecraft including: the International Space Station and planned commercial habitations as well as communication, remote sensing satellites and even pathways to geostationary orbit, virtually none of the expectations of the growth of the space economy will come to pass.

As the leading spacefaring nation with the greatest to gain from a robust space sector, funding the OADR should be an easy decision for Congress.

Christian Zur and Scott Kordella are members of the Commercial Space Initiative (CSI), a non-profit organization dedicated to predictable and sustainable uses of outer space.

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New York Public Library giving out 500,000 free books this summer 

The New York Public Library is giving out half a million books to keep for free as part of its “Summer at the Library” program.  

New York city kids, teens and their families can stop at any of the public library systems’ 92 locations to pick up books in order to start or build on their home libraries.  

The goal of the book giveaway is to help spark a lifelong love of reading and learning, library officials said, and to help fight against “summer slide” when students forget some of what they have learned in school during the months of vacation.

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Some locations will even offer books in Spanish, Chinese and Large Print. 

“New York City students and families have been through so much over the last two years. It’s critical that, during this period of recovery and renewal, our ecosystem of learning do all it can to support and engage them,” said Brian Bannon, the NYPL’s Merryl and James Tisch Director of Branch Libraries and Education, in a statement. 

 “Public libraries are uniquely positioned to do this while students are out of the classroom over the summer months, providing quality, free programs to engage their minds while also getting them excited about books, reading, learning, and their communities. After so much time apart, it’s time to safely come together this summer.” 

In addition to the book giveaway, the New York Public Library, which serves the boroughs of Manhattan, Staten Island and the Bronx, will host pop-up events like outdoor reading rooms and activities within libraries like teen podcasting classes and a citywide summer dance party.  

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Five races to watch in DC’s primary

Washington, D.C. is set to hold its primary on Tuesday, with the results signaling which direction the capital will go in amid growing concerns over crime and housing costs. 

In a city that is overwhelmingly Democratic and where a Republican has never been elected mayor, the Democratic primaries largely determine who will be elected to various offices in November. The last Republican to serve on the D.C. Council left their seat in 2009. 

Early in-person voting runs from June 10 to 19, and all mail-in ballots must be postmarked by Tuesday and received by the Board of Elections by June 28 to be counted. 

Here are five races to watch in D.C.’s primary on Tuesday. 

Mayor 

Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) is running for a third term in office but is facing three challengers, At-Large D.C. Council member Robert White, Ward 8 Council member Trayon White and Ward 5 Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner James Butler. 

Polls have shown Robert White to be the most significant challenger, running to Bowser’s left. Reducing rising violent crime and increasing the number of affordable housing units have been some of the top issues of the race. 

Bowser’s notable endorsements include the abortion rights group EMILY’s List, the Metro Washington Labor Council AFL-CIO and The Washington Post’s editorial board. Robert White has been endorsed by D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine and organizations like the Sierra Club, the Washington Teachers’ Union and the D.C. Working Families Party. 

A poll commissioned by Robert White’s campaign earlier this month showed Bowser leading White by just four points, 41 percent to 37 percent. Trayon White received 6 percent, and 15 percent were undecided. The poll showed about half of respondents rated Bowser’s job performance as “excellent” or “good” and half marked her performance as “just fair” or “poor.” 

The winner will face Stacia Hall, the only Republican candidate, in the general election. 

Attorney General 

Incumbent Karl Racine (D), who has served as attorney general since 2015, announced in October that he would not seek reelection. 

Ward 5 Council member Kenyan McDuffie was considered a potential frontrunner for the Democratic nomination after declaring his run soon after Racine’s announcement, but he suspended his campaign last month after the D.C. Board of Elections ruled he was ineligible to run. Attorney Bruce Spiva, another candidate, successfully argued that McDuffie did not meet the minimum qualifications for the position because he had not actively worked as an attorney in the past decade while serving on the Council. 

Spiva is facing fellow attorneys Brian Schwalb and Ryan Jones. Racine has endorsed Schwalb, who also received endorsements from former D.C. Attorney General Irvin Nathan (D) and three major unions representing plumbers, carpenters and ironworkers, respectively. 

Spiva has been endorsed by former U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli (D), former D.C. shadow House representative John Capozzi (D) and the Sierra Club. Jones has been endorsed by former At-Large Council member Vincent Orange (D). 

At-Large Council member 

Anita Bonds is running for a third full term after having served as an at-large member of the Council since 2012. Bonds served as chair of the D.C. Democratic Party for more than a decade and has served in multiple mayoral administrations. 

She has received endorsements from Council chairman Phil Mendelson (D), Ward 7 Council member and former Mayor Vincent Gray (D) and former Mayor Anthony Williams (D). She has also been endorsed by a couple labor unions and the District of Columbia Association of Realtors. 

Bonds is facing three challengers. Nate Fleming, who was endorsed by The Post’s editorial board, ran against Bonds in 2014 when she was seeking her first full term after being appointed to finish Council chairman Phil Mendelson’s term. He was elected as D.C.’s shadow representative to the House in 2013 and most recently served as the Council’s legislative and committee director. 

Lisa Gore is an ANC commissioner for Chevy Chase, Md., and worked in federal law enforcement until her retirement in 2020. She has been endorsed by the D.C. chapter of the National Organization of Women. 

Dexter Williams, who used to work for Robert White, was endorsed by the D.C. Latino Caucus and the Washington Teachers’ Union. 

Ward 1 Council member 

Brianne Nadeau is running for a third term representing Ward 1. She has received endorsements from multiple organizations and several of her colleagues on the Council, including Robert White, Ward 4 Council member Janeese Lewis George (D) and Ward 6 Council member Charles Allen (D). 

Nadeau is facing off against two challengers, former MPD officer Salah Czapary and ANC Commissioner Sabel Harris. Czapary received an endorsement from the Post’s editorial board. 

Ward 5 Council member 

More than a half dozen candidates are running to fill the vacancy left by McDuffie when he ran for attorney general. 

A couple weeks after McDuffie suspended his attorney general campaign, he endorsed Faith Gibson Hubbard, a D.C. government worker, to succeed him representing Ward 5. She was also endorsed by At-Large Council member Christina Henderson (I) and former At-Large Council member David Grosso (I). 

Vincent Orange is seeking to return to the Council after holding an at-large seat from 2011 to 2016 and the Ward 5 seat from 1999 to 2007. He was endorsed by John Ray (D), a former at-large council member. 

Zachary Parker, the president of the D.C. State Board of Education, is also seeking the Democratic nomination, receiving endorsements from Racine, Ward 4 Council member Janeese Lewis George (D) and multiple labor unions. 

Other candidates include Ward 5 Democratic chairman and ANC Commissioner Gordon Fletcher, former ANC Kathy Henderson, retired deputy U.S. Marshal Art Lloyd and Gary Johnson, the founder of a non-profit organization focused on academic and socio-emotional youth development programs in the D.C. area.

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Former Tesla employees suing company for 'mass layoffs' without giving notice

Two former Tesla employees filed a class-action lawsuit this week against Tesla, accusing the electric automaker company of violating federal law after they say executives recently approved “mass layoffs” without giving proper notice.

The 10-page complaint, filed by John Lynch and Daxton Hartsfield in the U.S. District Court in the Western District of Texas on Sunday, alleges Tesla violated the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act of 1988, which requires 60 days written notice before a mass layoff.

“Instead, Tesla has simply notified the employees that their terminations would be effective immediately,” the complaint reads. “Tesla has also failed to provide a statement of the basis for reducing the notification period to zero days advance notice.”

The Hill has reached out to Tesla for comment.

In a June 2 email reviewed by Reuters, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said he had a “super bad feeling” about the economy and needed to cut 10 percent of the company’s workforce and pause hiring. Tesla has about 100,000 employees worldwide.

Musk then appeared to contradict that number in a tweet following the Reuters report.

“Total headcount will increase, but salaried should be fairly flat,” he wrote in a tweet on June 4, responding to a post about Tesla’s workforce.

On Tuesday, CNBC obtained another email in which Musk clarified he was cutting 3.5 percent of the entire workforce, with 10 percent of the company’s salaried employees being laid off and the number of hourly employees increasing. He said that overall percentage was “not super material,” and added that in a year, “our head count will be higher in both salaried and obviously in hourly.”

Musk also dismissed the lawsuit as “of minor consequence.”

“Anything that relates to Tesla gets big headlines, whether it is a bicycle accident or something much more serious,” he wrote, according to CNBC.

Both Lynch and Hartsfield had worked at a gigafactory plant in Sparks, Nev., and were terminated on June 10 and June 15, respectively. The lawsuit says more than 500 employees were fired at the gigafactory this month and thousands have been laid off across the U.S.

The former employees said in the complaint that they were suing for wrongful termination on behalf of all employees included in the layoff, who suffered a “devastating economic impact.”

The former Tesla workers are seeking compensation equal to the WARN Act, which stipulates that employers compensate former employees with back pay and benefits if they are found to be in violation.

Tesla could also face up to a $500 civil fine for each day of violation.

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Biden calls Chevon CEO 'mildly sensitive' in tangle with oil executive

President Biden called the chief executive of oil giant Chevron “mildly sensitive” after he wrote a letter to the president accusing the Biden administration of vilifying the oil and gas industry over high prices.  

Biden made the comments in an exchange with reporters Tuesday afternoon when asked about the letter penned by Chevron CEO Michael Wirth, who, along with other oil executives, is scheduled to meet with Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm later this week.  

“He’s mildly sensitive,” Biden said. “I didn’t know they’d get their feelings hurt that quickly. Look, we need more refining capacity. This idea that they don’t have oil to drill and to bring up is simply not true.”  

“We ought to be able to work something out whereby they’re able to increase refining capacity and still not give up on transitioning to renewable energy,” Biden continued. “They’re both within realm of possibility.”  

Wirth sent a letter to Biden earlier Tuesday arguing that Chevron was doing its part to increase oil and gas production amid a period of high demand. He also argued that the industry needs more support from the administration in order to boost energy security long term.  

“Chevron and its 37,000 employees work every day to help provide the world with the energy it demands and to lift up the lives of billions of people who rely on these supplies,” Wirth wrote to Biden. “Notwithstanding these efforts, your Administration has largely sought to criticize, and at times vilify, our industry. These actions are not beneficial to meeting the challenges we face and are not what the American people deserve.” 

The letter was a direct response to one that Biden penned to Chevron and six other oil refining companies last week urging them to produce more in order to lower the price at the pump, calling their record profits unacceptable. Some Democrats have praised Biden for the tougher rhetoric on the oil industry.

The latest exchange of words comes days before Wirth and other oil executives are slated to sit down with officials from the Energy Department on Thursday. Biden is not expected to take part in that meeting.  

Biden has limited options to ease the steep gas prices, which average about $5 per gallon across the country. The price of gas has been elevated for some time amid high inflation and has been exacerbated by Russia’s war in Ukraine and the related disruptions to global energy markets.  

Biden is considering calling on Congress to suspend the federal gas tax as a way to provide some relief to consumers in the interim. 

While some in touch with the White House have expressed support for such a move, others have argued it would potentially contribute to inflation and hamper infrastructure projects. The tax revenue helps fund road infrastructure projects, though Biden dismissed the notion that it would have a major impact on Tuesday. 

“It will have some impact, but it’s not going to have an impact on major road construction and major repairs,” he said in an exchange with reporters, adding that he would make a decision on the gas tax holiday by week’s end.  

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