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Top Senate Democrats have reached an initial agreement on a monumentally chonky infrastructure package that they intend to pass with a party-line vote. Now they just need to get every other Democrat on board, and possibly put the Senate parliamentarian under some sort of spell?
- President Biden met with Senate Democrats on Wednesday to sell them on both infrastructure bills, after Democrats on the Senate Budget Committee announced their plan to adopt a $3.5 trillion budget resolution on Tuesday night. Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) said he’s waiting to see the full details, but that he’s “open” to the price tag, and Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI) said Tuesday that he’s feeling freshly optimistic about the legislation’s prospects: “We’re going to do this.”
- Pretty huge if true! The package includes major investments for the fight against climate change, with the aim of allowing the U.S. to achieve 80 percent clean energy by 2030. Key measures include a clean-energy standard (that’s where a little light sorcery becomes necessary, we’ll come back to this), renewable-energy tax incentives, a transformed power grid, and some amount of funding for the Civilian Climate Corps—a progressive priority that would combat climate change and unemployment at the same time.
- In addition to Biden’s spending proposals for education, caregiving, and paid leave, the budget plan includes a Medicare expansion championed by Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders, that includes vision, hearing, and dental benefits, reduced prescription drug costs, and a lower eligibility age. The plan would also expand Medicaid coverage to GOP-controlled states that have refused to do so, closing a gap that’s left two million low-income Americans uninsured. To pay for it all, Democrats plan to increase funding for IRS enforcement, raise taxes on corporations and wealthy individuals, and retool the international tax code.
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The proposal goes well beyond the initiatives outlined in the American Families Plan, which is where things get murky.
- Democrats hope to use this reconciliation package to pass as many items on Biden’s agenda as possible with just 50 votes, in their one remaining opportunity to dodge the filibuster without, you know, just dodging the filibuster. The plan thus includes budget-related aspects of the PRO Act, which aims to protect labor organizing efforts, and immigration reforms that would provide a pathway to citizenship for millions of undocumented immigratns, including DREAMers.
- The great news: King Manchin hath smiled upon the inclusion of immigration reform! The bad news: Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough also gets to weigh in. Under the Byrd Rule, Democrats can’t use the budget-reconciliation process to pass any provisions that aren’t strictly budgetary. MacDonough’s ruling that a minimum-wage increase didn’t meet that standard was what prompted Democrats to strip it from the American Rescue Plan earlier this year, and we could see another frustrating repeat with crucial-but-not-very-budgety provisions like immigration reform and the clean energy standard.
Senate Democrats somehow convincing the parliamentarian that Everything Is Budget and going on to pass one of the most significant pieces of legislation since the New Deal would be a great outcome. An even better one would be for them to take this opportunity to abolish the filibuster and free themselves up to pass the rest of Biden’s agenda—even the parts that can’t fit through an arbitrary loophole.
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The European Union has rolled out an ambitious plan to pivot away from fossil fuels, regrettably called “Fit For 55.” (Is it landmark climate-change policy? Is it a yogurt slogan? The uncertainty draws you in!) The proposal aims to slash the region’s greenhouse gas emissions at least 55 percent from 1990 levels by 2030. The plan to accomplish that includes a tariff on imports from non-E.U. countries with weaker climate laws—which would pressure other nations to match their policies—and a ban on new gasoline and diesel cars by 2035. The package of proposals could change significantly as the 27 member states negotiate them over at least the next year, and while the package is one of the world’s boldest yet, some climate activists say the 55 percent target isn’t ambitious enough to stave off a 1.5 degree rise in global temperatures.
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- U.S. overdose deaths hit a record 93,000 last year, as the pandemic exacerbated the crisis.
- The Department of Housing and Urban Development seems to have abandoned some proposed safety rules for public housing that would have required fire extinguishers, a minimum number of outlets, circuit breakers to prevent electrocution, and other key features. Just one followup: ?????????
- The Trump Justice Department sought a court order for Washington Post reporters’ communication records just before Bill Barr resigned as attorney general, going beyond standard email providers to seize data from Proofpoint, a firm that (ironically) provides data-security services.
- The death toll in the Surfside, FL, condo collapse has risen to 96, and officials expect the final toll to be between 96 and 99.
- Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has been hospitalized with a 10 day case of the hiccups, and may need emergency surgery for an intestinal obstruction.
- Taylor Keeney, a former aide to Virginia’s last GOP governor, has announced her campaign to challenge Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA) in 2022.
- Britney Spears told a Los Angeles judge that she wants to charge her father with conservatorship abuse, after the judge ruled that Spears could hire prominent Hollywood lawyer Mathew Rosengart to represent her.
- A Utah company has stopped selling kits that make actual handguns look like toys,
after hearing a child’s laugh and remembering how to be human after Lego sent it a cease-and-desist letter.
- A family of five from Texas has been arrested for storming the Capitol. The Party of Family Values continues to deliver.
- Tucker Carlson smeared his first-grade private-school teacher (who was also his private reading tutor) in his book, to explain how he became an everyman hater of elite libs.
- Guitar Center sold 250,000 ukuleles in the first six months of the year, a distressing 15 percent increase from the year before. Stay safe out there.
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Today in Facebook Executives Are Up to No Good: A few years after Facebook acquired CrowdTangle, a data analytics tool that’s useful for analyzing trends on the platform, a dispute broke out among executives over whether researchers and journalists should have access to the tool itself. The problem was that journalists were using it to expose unflattering information, like the fact that right-wing blowhards Ben Shapiro and Dan Bongino get more engagement than legitimate news outlets. Rather than grapple with the fact that that was happening, Facebook decided to protect its reputation by limiting transparency and disclosing its own data selectively. That instinct wasn’t limited to CrowdTangle: In 2017, Facebook executives told staff to cut all mentions of Russia from a white paper on the platform’s security concerns, sanitizing an earlier draft that demonstrated how Russia had used Facebook in its 2016 election interference.
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In 2021 mental health is finally a thing, especially as people are not feeling like their normal selves. Let’s support one another and talk openly. Whether or not therapy is your thing, knowing it’s available and affordable is important, for you or perhaps a loved one.
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BetterHelp is customized online therapy that offers video, phone and even live chat sessions with your therapist, so you don’t have to see anyone on camera if you don’t want to. It’s much more affordable than in-person therapy and you can start communicating with your therapist in under 48 hours.
It’s always a good time to invest in yourself, because you are your greatest asset. See if online therapy is for you by heading to BetterHelp.com/crooked for 10% off your first month.
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Senate Democrats have introduced draft legislation that would decriminalize marijuana at the federal level, expunge nonviolent marijuana-related arrests and convictions from federal records, and earmark funding for restorative justice programs.
New implant technology allowed a paralyzed man to communicate via decoded brain waves alone.
Maine has become the first state to shift the costs of recycling from taxpayers to packaging producers.
New York City looks poised to enfranchise noncitizens in local elections.
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