While the political maneuvering continues in the House, industry and business groups reacted favorably to a massive, comprehensive, bipartisan highway, transit, water, broadband construction bill. Here’s some reaction: American Farm Bureau Federation President Zippy Duvall on the Senate passage of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
Category: Legislative Updates
Climate change was one of a number of legislative priority issues discussed at the recent National LICA Legislative Committee meeting. Infrastructure and budget reconciliation bills include numerous provisions to reduce carbon emissions. A new report from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warns time is growing short to address global climate change, whose impacts are being seen in more extreme weather events such as drought and heavier precipitation, and changes to agricultural practices could take decades to have an impact on carbon emissions.
The report "is a code red for humanity," the United Nations panel said. "The alarm bells are deafening and the evidence is irrefutable: greenhouse gas emissions are choking our planet & placing billions of people in danger."
The Census Bureau will release district level census data this week, the first step in the decennial redistricting process. But Republicans and Democrats have this lingering elation or dread -- depending on which side of the aisle you are on -- the GOP is already close to winning back the House even before one vote is cast in the 2022 midterms. Republicans need five seats to win back the majority. There already have been key Democratic retirements in Wisconsin, where Rep. Ron Kind called it quits, and in Illinois, where Rep. Cheri Bustos -- who chaired the DCCC last cycle -- retired. Democratic Rep. Conor Lamb in Pennsylvania is running for Senate, putting another swing seat in play.
The White House and Congressional leaders have turned up the pressure this week to package together a comprehensive - and expensive - plan to approve their legislative priorities.
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Ransomware is akin to blackmail: Pay and the hackers will give you a key to get your data back. The FBI defines it as “a type of malicious software, or malware, that prevents you from accessing your computer files, systems, or networks and demands you pay a ransom for their return.”
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Newly introduced legislation backed by Farm Bureau and several dozen organizations representing a broad range of interests would help ensure farmers, ranchers and the many others who rely on GPS would not have to pay to correct any interference created by Ligado Networks’ operation on the broadband spectrum.
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The House Agriculture Committee unanimously advanced a bipartisan bill Wednesday authorizing $43 billion to expand rural broadband service nationwide by dramatically increasing USDA's expiring loan and grant program.
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The House Appropriations Committee approved a fiscal 2022 funding bill this week for the Agriculture Department, Food and Drug Administration and Commodity Futures Trading Commission that would boost spending by more than 10%, including hefty amounts for ag research and climate-change-related programs.
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While there is a reported agreement by a bipartisan group of senators to the framework of increased spending on core infrastructure programs, the political jockeying continues. Republicans question how the increased spending will be paid for – definitively not with any kind of gas tax increase – in addition to what commitments are being made to then consider a massive government funded bill that would not require bipartisan support. Progressive Democrats have concerns also about how the bill would be paid for – definitely not by increasing the corporate tax rate -- and argue that it doesn’t do enough for climate change and other social issues they want addressed.
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On June 9, 2021, EPA and the Department of the Army (the agencies) concluded their review of the Navigable Waters Protection Rule defining the term “waters of the United States” and announced their intention to initiate a new rulemaking process that restores the protections in place prior to the 2015 WOTUS implementation and develops a new rule to establish a durable definition of “waters of the United States.”
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