The budget reconciliation bill being considered in the Senate is overflowing with harmful government policies. Reckless spending that quickens inflation is only the tip of the spear. Other components that tinker with the free market will have lasting consequences that are more challenging to undo.
WASHINGTON – Two new government reports on rising inflation and the cost of the Biden administration’s legislative agenda has political observers looking squarely at U.S. Senator Joe Manchin.
WASHINGTON – Sen. Joe Manchin always said inflation would be his guide in deciding on the massive Build Back Better bill. Now, a new report on inflation says it will stay with us for much longer than anticipated, further calling into question by some the addition of trillions more in federal spending.
CHARLESTON – A federal 4th Circuit appeals court judge and West Virginia native has rescinded his plan to become a senior status judge and will remain on the bench.
CHARLESTON – Now that the compromise voting rights legislation championed by Sen. Joe Manchin has been defeated, one election law expert says Manchin’s stance on the filibuster becomes even more important.
CHARLESTON –Republicans were successful in blocking U.S. Senator Joe Manchin’s Freedom to Vote Act earlier this week thanks, at least in part, to Manchin’s staunch support of maintaining current filibuster rules.
WASHINGTON – The version of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act passed last week by House Democrats varies greatly from the compromise Sen. Joe Manchin offered earlier this summer. And the ranking member of the Committee on House Administration says Manchin, who likely will be the key vote when the matter goes to the Senate, wouldn’t support this latest version of the bill if he “were to follow his own framework.”
CHARLESTON — West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey has sent a letter to the leadership of the U.S. Senate’s Environment and Public Works Committee opposing the nomination of Janet Gaven McCabe as deputy administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.
Compelling non-union government workers to pay so-called “fair share fees” to unions they do not wish to join violates the First Amendment speech rights of non-union workers and is unconstitutional, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled, finding in favor of an Illinois state worker who had sued to end the fees, also known as agency fees, in Illinois and across the country.
WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) - Days after a federal judge overseeing some of the most important current litigation demanded to be told if outside interests were funding it, Republican senators have introduced a bill that would do even more in all class action lawsuits.
A group of nine Republicans currently serving in the Illinois General Assembly, including two rookie state lawmakers, have signed their names to a brief filed with the U.S. Supreme Court, asking the court to uphold the state’s ability to allow unions to extract fees from government employees who don’t wish to join a union, arguing the country’s founding federalist principles should allow the 50 states to decide such policy questions for themselves.
LOS ANGELES (Legal Newsline) – Bipartisan legislation that passed the U.S. House of Representatives in December with an eye toward undoing the unintended consequences of the Obama-era Operation Choke Point program may not quickly come up in the Senate, says a financial services attorney who still believes it stands a "decent" chance to become law.
A resolution of disapproval, striking down the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s new anti-arbitration rule, passed 51-50 Tuesday, with Vice President Mike Pence casting the tie-breaking “yes” vote. Only one Republican voted against the resolution.
Joe Rubin, who recently was named senior vice president of government relations and public affairs at Washington, D.C.-based public relations firm MWWPR and who previously served as senior counsel at Arnall Golden Gregory LLP, said the plaintiff groups’ arguments are “very strong.”
Last week, more than 150 groups and organizations sent a letter to members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, urging them to oppose any “ill-considered efforts” that would split the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. So far, three such bills have been introduced in Congress this year.