Sam Knight - page 27

President Obama will not have a chance to finalize the approval of his signature trade initiative, the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP). Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on Thursday that he will not bring up the controversial agreement for consideration this year. “But it will still be around. It can be massaged, changed, worked on during the next administration. So, I hope America will stay in the trade business,” McConnell said, according to Reuters. At a breakfast event in Kentucky, McConnell mentioned his staunch… Keep Reading

Federal appellate judges in Boston affirmed a lower court’s ruling striking down a tax in Puerto Rico that targeted the crisis-stricken island’s largest businesses—one that would have exclusively impacted Walmart. The First Circuit Court of Appeals said Wednesday that a Federal District Judge in Puerto Rico was correct earlier this year, when he declared the levy to be unconstitutionally discriminatory. The tax at the heart of dispute was passed by the Puerto Rican government in 2015, as part of efforts to raise money amid a… Keep Reading

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously upheld a law boosting the minimum wage for some hotel workers in the City of Los Angeles. A three-judge panel on the circuit said on Monday that a District Court had been correct last year, when dismissing the challenge to the initiative. The suit was brought by two industry groups: the American Hotel and Lodging Association, and the Asian American Hotel Owners Association. Passed in October 2014, the measure raised the minimum wage in L.A. this year to… Keep Reading

The Environmental Protection Agency has told Texas to improve its regulation of fracking, saying the energy extraction method has been linked to seismic activity in the state. An annual agency report to the Texas Railroad Commission, the state body that oversees fracking, concluded that “there is a significant possibility that North Texas earthquake activity is associated with disposal wells.” EPA said the study was based on “findings from several researchers, its own analysis of some cases and the fact that earthquakes diminished in some areas… Keep Reading

A federal judge in California allowed class action wage theft litigation to proceed against McDonald’s, on the grounds that a jury could find it guilty of negligence. Judge Richard Seeborg said Tuesday that the lawsuit against the corporation may continue under the “ostensible agency theory.” The doctrine holds an actor responsible for the fault of another, if victims reasonably believe that the perpetrator committed wrongdoing in the employ of said actor. The case involves McDonald’s franchise co-owners, Bobby and Carol Haynes, who operate eight restaurants… Keep Reading

New Mexico’s senate delegation came out on Tuesday in support of a Navajo Nation lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency. Sens. Tom Udall and Martin Heinrich, both Democrats, backed the tribe’s litigation, which was filed earlier in the week. The pair said the EPA has failed to adequately compensate the Navajo for last year’s Gold King Mine catastrophe—the heart of the legal dispute. “The spill was an accident, but the EPA made several serious mistakes, and the Navajo Nation has every right to pursue its… Keep Reading

The number of Americans who believe that “racism against whites is widespread” has jumped this year, according to the results of a Gallup survey released Wednesday. Forty-one percent of respondents to the poll told the research firm that they think White Americans suffer from “widespread” discrimination, up from 33 percent in 2015. The uptick comes after the same survey showed Americans increasingly uncomfortable with the idea that whites in the US are victims of systemic bigotry. Between 2009 and 2015, the percentage of Americans who… Keep Reading

About one in seventeen Americans who get their health insurance on state-level Obamacare exchanges will have to find a new provider next year. Aetna, one of the country’s largest health insurance company, said on Monday that in 2017 it will stop offering individual plans through eleven states’ Affordable Care Act exchanges. States impacted by the decision include Texas, Georgia, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida and Arizona. About 838,000 people are currently insured through Aetna’s individual plans sold on ACA state exchanges. Roughly 80 percent of them… Keep Reading