FedSmith | Legislation has been introduced in the House to guarantee back pay to federal employees who would be furloughed in the event of a partial government shutdown. Funding for the federal government expires at the end of the day on Friday, December 21, 2018 unless Congress can agree on a funding bill. The bill is being introduced by Congressmen Don Beyer (D-VA) and Rob Wittman (R-VA). Collectively the two Congressmen represent nearly 120,000 federal employees. During a partial government s...
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Government Executive | Dozens of lawmakers from both parties do not want to take any chances in ensuring federal employees are taken care of during a shutdown, pushing legislation that would guarantee back pay for anyone furloughed during an appropriations lapse. Sixty-six members of Congress have already signed on to the Federal Employee Retroactive Pay Fairness Act, which was introduced by Virginia Reps. Don Beyer, D, and Rob Wittman, R. About 350,000 federal workers would be sent home without...
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Huff Post | Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke has often said that he’s not afraid of a fight. In an interview with Breitbart News last month, the former Montana congressman and Navy SEAL dismissed reports that his days in the Trump administration were numbered as nothing more than rumors. “I’ve been in a lot of firefights. I don’t mind getting shot at,” he said. “It is better to charge up a hill under fire than cower in a foxhole.” ... Stepping down now “may spare Zinke some embarrassment, but it wi...
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The Hill | Democratic lawmakers joined conservation groups Saturday in cheering President Trump’s announcement that Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke is leaving his job by the end of the year. Zinke’s departure comes as Democrats prepare to take over as the majority in the House, which included gearing up to challenge policies created under Zinke and questioning a number of the secretary’s own ethical decisions. Under Zinke’s watch, the Interior Department carried out an aggressively pro-industry ag...
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Newsweek | Donald Trump’s Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke will be leaving his post at the end of the year and top Democrat Chuck Schumer says “the swamp cabinet will be a little less foul without him.” “Ryan Zinke was one of the most toxic members of the cabinet in the way he treated our environment, our precious public lands, and the way he treated the [government] like it was his personal honey pot,” the Senate Minority Leader tweeted. Trump announced Zinke’s departure in a tweet on Saturday mor...
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Mother Jones | On Saturday, President Donald Trump announced via Twitter that his Interior secretary, Ryan Zinke, will be leaving his position in the coming weeks. Zinke’s tenure overseeing the nation’s public lands has been controversial and has resulted in a number of federal investigations. (He reportedly used taxpayer money to purchase a $139,000 door, for example.) A new secretary will be announced next week. It would be an understatement to say that environmentalists and Democratic politic...
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The Hill | Nearly 100 Democratic lawmakers called on President Trump to back federal climate change initiatives. In a letter, 96 House members urged Trump to heed warnings included in his administration’s national climate assessment released last month which spoke of the harsh economic repercussions climate change would reap on the U.S. “We write to convey our grave concern that time is running out for the United States to work to reverse and mitigate the worst effects of a warming climate,” the...
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The Hill | A major Republican donor gave former Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chief Scott Pruitt $50,000 for his legal defense fund before he stepped down in July. In an ethics filing the EPA released Thursday, Justina Fugh, the agency’s top ethics official, said the donation was “believed to be in cash” and that Pruitt did not seek ethics advice on receiving it. The EPA did not know about it until he filed the disclosure in November, a requirement upon leaving the government. The gift c...
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The Hill | The Trump administration took a major step Friday toward allowing testing for offshore oil and natural gas under the Atlantic Ocean. The National Marine Fisheries Service, part of the Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), is letting five companies commit “incidental” harassment of marine mammals like whales and dolphins as part of their seismic testing to determine oil and gas deposits under the ocean floor, the agency said. It’s the first time ...
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McClatchy | The Trump administration on Friday approved permits for seismic testingon the Atlantic Coast, a prelude to offshore oil drilling and move that is sure to antagonize Republican governors and lawmakers in the Southeast, whose support the president will need in a 2020 re-election bid. The National Marine Fisheries Service, an arm of the U.S. Commerce Department, approved permits for five companies to conduct seismic testing between northern Delaware and central Florida. That testing is ...
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