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Tag: Senate

  • Bank failures revive bitter Senate Democratic infighting

    Bank failures revive bitter Senate Democratic infighting

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    The current Senate Democratic discord is especially acute because the caucus had the numbers to block the 2018 effort — but under heavy pressure to cut a deal to help community banks in an election year, 17 of them supported it. The collapse of two banks with roughly $300 billion in total assets over the past week has animated those internal divisions among Democratic senators, who usually pride themselves on policy unity. And it starkly contrasts with Senate Republicans, who uniformly supported the last big banking bill.

    Asked whether he regretted his vote, Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) told reporters: “No. I voted for a bill that was a bipartisan compromise.”

    “Sometimes members choose policy positions and wait to see if history serves them,” said Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who opposed the legislation. “Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t.”

    In case it was unclear, he added: “I was on the right side of it.”

    Republicans instantly ruled out passing new bank regulations on Tuesday, arguing federal regulators are already empowered to increase scrutiny of those banks. So Democrats will have to decide whether it’s worth taking their internal fight to the Senate floor again.

    Several Democrats said they want to see either repeal of the 2018 legislation or other tougher laws. But at the moment there is no apparent solution that would get 51 Democratic votes, much less the 60 senators needed to vault a filibuster.

    “We’re going to try,” Senate Banking Committee Chair Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) told reporters. But he added that “I don’t know how we do a legislative fix.”

    Exacerbating the internal fight: Democrats don’t agree whether the rollback was actually to blame for the present bank failures. Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), who cut that 2018 deal with Republican Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho.), said in an interview Tuesday that he stands by his vote and disagrees with those blaming his legislation: “I don’t see it the same way. If you read the bill, you’ll know that it doesn’t let them off.”

    “Would I vote the same way [today]? Yes,” said Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), who caucuses with Democrats and voted in favor of the 2018 legislation. “Because of the important help to smaller banks and community banks; that was my mission.”

    The 2018 law peeled back parts of Dodd-Frank to exempt smaller banks from federally administered “stress tests” that weighed their ability to weather economic downturns. Its enactment meant Dodd-Frank’s stricter federal oversights only applied to a handful of bigger banks.

    And the issue is already becoming a cudgel in Senate races. Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), who is running for the Arizona Senate seat, went after Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) for her vote in support of the 2018 law, calling the votes the “most salient example of how we’re different.” Of the most vulnerable Democratic senators up for reelection next fall, Brown, Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania opposed the 2018 law, while Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Tester and Sinema supported it.

    “It was obviously a mistake,” said Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), another incumbent senator, who missed the 2018 vote but criticized the bill then. “It was ill-advised, these are big banks … and they need to have some backstops.”

    Asked whether he sensed a divide among Senate Democrats, Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) replied: “That question answers itself. Because there were some in 2018 who thought it was a good idea … and I put myself in that category; I was listening to my community banks.”

    Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, both of which qualified for the 2018 exemption, had lobbied hard for the measure by assuring lawmakers they were not big enough to pose systemic risk. Yet federal authorities cited that exact problem on Sunday when they announced they would backstop all of Silicon Valley Bank’s deposits after it collapsed thanks to a large-scale run.

    “Working together, a good job — a miraculous job — has been done to stem the possibility of systemic risk,” Rep. Maxine Waters said in an interview. The Californian is the top Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee and opposed the 2018 law.

    She also warned against jumping to conclusions on whether congressional action had prompted the bank failures: “I don’t know what could be said about what has happened here with this; the collapse of Silicon Valley as it relates to Dodd-Frank.”

    As it stands, the toughest regulations apply only to banks with more than $250 billion in assets. Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank held around $209 billion and $110 billion, respectively, when regulators took over. Summing up the back and forth, Warren said midsize banks were acting like “little community banks, and should be only lightly regulated. That was laughable on its face.”

    It’s made a painful issue for Democrats for years now, ever since a group of party centrists went around Brown, then the top Democrat on the Banking Committee, to cut a deal with Republicans. Brown said on Bloomberg Radio on Tuesday that some Democrats “don’t fight hard enough,” but then he went into peacemaking mode.

    “I think that it’s been illuminating to a lot of people,” Brown told reporters later. “I think all the Democrats [now] realize we need stronger rules.”

    Even with their entrenched positions, Democratic senators are trying to avoid a replay of the backbiting five years ago when Warren called out her colleagues that supported deregulation in a fundraising email. That move prompted a contentious meeting among Democratic chiefs of staff in which Dan Geldon, then Warren’s top aide, cited nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office warnings that more bank failures could result from rolling back Dodd-Frank, according to three people familiar with the meeting.

    Geldon argued at the time that Warren was fighting on principle and not just to target other senators, while aides to senators that supported the bank bill blanched at her tactics and said they were merely reacting to banks back in their states, according to those three people.

    Now Democrats can at least face that dispute from the majority, when they’re able to choose what comes to the floor. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has been careful about how he characterizes a potential congressional response, saying Capitol Hill will “look closely” at next steps. He opposed the bank bill five years ago.

    New Hampshire Democratic Sens. Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen both said they’d be willing to reexamine the 2018 law, which both supported, if investigations find that was the cause of the failures. But they evinced no regrets about their position.

    “The reality is, it was very bad management at SVB. And you can’t fix that with any regulation,” Shaheen said.

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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • California’s Dem Senate hopefuls vie for higher ground over Silicon Valley Bank debacle

    California’s Dem Senate hopefuls vie for higher ground over Silicon Valley Bank debacle

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    “What happened in the last financial crisis? Dodd-Frank was put in place to reflect those lessons,” Porter said in an interview, using the colloquial name for the 2010 law shaped to rein in the industry after the Great Recession of the Obama years. “Not even 10 years later, look what happens: The so-called pro-business Democrats and the Trump administration and Republicans voted to weaken the capital holding requirements.”

    But Porter’s two main Senate rivals, Reps. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), are also pointing to the 2018 vote as an example of Wall Street’s hold over Congress and a leading cause of the regional bank’s failure. Schiff previewed his own proposal Monday on MSNBC to hold bank management accountable. Schiff and Lee both voted against the 2018 bill; Porter, who at the time was a House candidate, said she’d oppose it and is now working on legislation to reverse it.

    The California trio’s close and loud positioning on the bank failure may not yield much competitive advantage for any single candidate, despite voters’ laser-focus on an uncertain economy. But it does focus new attention on lingering divisions between Democrats lining up to blame the 2018 legislation and the handful of centrists still in office who voted for it, some of whom face tough reelection battles this fall.

    The 2018 measure sparking the current Democratic backlash had rolled back capital requirements put in place for smaller banks in the aftermath of the Great Recession, which some experts and Democrats say would have allowed those institutions to better weather economic volatility.

    “The capital requirements are really the bottom line for banks,” said Alexandra Thornton, a senior director for tax policy at the liberal-leaning Center for American Progress. “When they don’t have enough equity there, it’s other people who are harmed. And then, if the government has to step in, that just creates the expectation that this will happen again and again.”

    The Bank Policy Institute, a group that represents mega- and regional banks, has pushed back on claims that the rule change played a role in the ongoing turmoil — noting that the change “does not appear to have been a major factor in SVB’s or Signature Bank’s failure.”

    Schiff, who built a national profile on the House Intelligence Committee where oversaw a lengthy investigation into former President Donald Trump, announced his own plan on Monday as lawmakers picked through the wreckage of SVB’s collapse. The Los Angeles Democrat, whose district includes tony swaths of Hollywood and Burbank, said that Congress needs to craft rules that would force SVB’s executives to disgorge bonuses and stock sale proceeds.

    “I plan to introduce legislation to claw back those earnings from these delayed bonuses from stock trades that were beneficial in the run up to this run on the bank,” Schiff said during an appearance on MSNBC, adding that the “failure of oversight” and a “failure of the banks’ management” merited different solutions.

    For her part, Lee said in a statement that the next step following the Biden administration’s actions was ensuring “that we have the strong regulation in place to prevent future problems, and that we seek accountability for any impropriety or market manipulation.”

    Other House progressives, in some ways, see themselves vindicated for their 2018 opposition to the deregulation bill by the fallout from the bank failure and the likely family conversation looming in the party.

    “Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse is the predictable and direct outcome of a furious 2018 effort by bank lobbyists to evade basic oversight, transparency, and financial stability in favor of profit,” said Congressional Progressive Caucus chair Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), in a statement highlighting the group’s raising of the alarm against the legislation, though the liberals singled out Republicans for creating a “future of more chaos for our economy and more impunity for bank misbehavior.”

    Nearly half of the 33 House Democrats who voted for the 2018 bill have since left the House, including now-Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.). She’s since faced harsh campaign-trail criticism from Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), who’s vying for the Senate seat in next fall’s elections, over her past positions on banking regulation.

    Some House Democrats still in office who voted for the 2018 bill, like Reps. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) and Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.), could still face competitive reelection challenges in the future. But Thornton, the Center for American Progress expert, said the banking reform should transcend partisan politics.

    “Here’s the thing, members go through elections, and those are difficult. But there should be people on both sides of the aisle — there should be Republicans strongly supporting an increase in capital requirements,” she said.

    And it’s not just candidates who are openly criticizing fellow Democratic or Democratic-aligned lawmakers for their past votes. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who represents Silicon Valley, knocked his party colleagues for the vote in a tweet that remarked “[t]oo many Dems voted yes” in 2018.

    Feinstein and then-Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) joined the majority of their party in opposing the 2018 banking bill.



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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Senate Republicans are breaking with Ron DeSantis over his opposition to more Ukraine aid, saying further assistance would help the U.S. be more hawkish on China.

    Senate Republicans are breaking with Ron DeSantis over his opposition to more Ukraine aid, saying further assistance would help the U.S. be more hawkish on China.

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    “Well, I don’t know what he’s trying to do or what the goal is,” Marco Rubio said.

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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Manchin keeps ’em guessing, from Senate Dems to the House GOP

    Manchin keeps ’em guessing, from Senate Dems to the House GOP

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    Manchin says he’s not deciding on anything until the end of the year and is also pointedly refusing to rule out a presidential run on a third-party ticket. That gives him roughly nine more months to keep Washington guessing. In the meantime, he’ll keep exerting his political leverage, at least until he runs and Republicans start to limit his opportunities or a retirement announcement saps his Senate sway.

    And the West Virginian is well aware of that limited window to maximize his current role as the GOP’s best bipartisan dealmaking partner and the Senate Energy Committee chair. This week alone, he announced opposition to Biden’s proposed IRS commissioner, tanked the nomination of an FCC commissioner and has “serious concerns’’ about Interior nominee Laura Daniel-Davis.

    “If you can’t do the job the last two years because you’re in cycle, that tells you what’s wrong with this place. That’s why I haven’t made any commitment or a decision,” Manchin said in an interview this week.

    It seems not a day goes by without Manchin tweaking the Biden administration over something. He thrashed the president’s team Wednesday for “putting their radical climate agenda ahead of our nation’s energy security” then on Thursday said White House advisor John Podesta was “irresponsible” in comments about Chinese energy production.

    In his typical style, Manchin says none of those moves have anything to do with his reelection decision.

    “I’m just trying to do the right thing. I’m just trying to get things implemented. The country desperately needs energy security,” Manchin said. “And if you can’t implement a bill that basically is all about national security … it’s bullshit.”

    There’s also a critical new ingredient to his legislative success in the newly empowered House GOP. Manchin spent the first two years of Biden’s presidency cutting deals with more liberal Democrats, only to get kneecapped by Senate Republicans on his final push for an energy permitting deal.

    Yet for the moment, the House Republican majority is staying open to collaboration with Manchin on the topic, regardless of his political future — as long as any cross-Capitol compromise delivers a win for them, too.

    “There’s a lot of motivation all around for us to do something on permitting reform,” said Rep. John Curtis (R-Utah), who is so devoted to an energy deal that he turned down a spot on a more sought-after House committee to work on it.

    Senate Democrats are similarly playing it cool when it comes to the parlor game of what Manchin might be thinking about 2024. Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), who chairs the party’s campaign arm, said he’d had conversations with Manchin about running again but is taking a light touch.

    “He has time. It’s not like we have a lot of Democrats wanting to run in West Virginia. And if he decides to run, I am confident he will win,” Peters said.

    Rep. Alex Mooney (R-W.Va.) is already running for the seat, but Republicans are also looking to land West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice in their primary. They see the Democrat-turned-Republican as the strongest possible recruit to force Manchin into retirement.

    “It would certainly make me think twice, if I was in his shoes,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas).

    Amid the political intrigue, House Republicans are downright buoyant about their chances of reaching a Manchin-blessed deal on energy permitting that would help speed the way for construction of major fossil-fuel and other projects. It helps that the genial West Virginian has personally spoken with nearly every major House player on the issue, from Speaker Kevin McCarthy to GOP panel chairs to the Democrats who are quietly supportive of his push.

    Several House Republicans who’ve spoken with Manchin said they’ve given little thought to what he — the pivotal vote on some of Biden’s biggest wins — will choose to do next year. The same goes for whether a bipartisan permitting agreement could help him achieve it.

    Natural Resources Committee Chair Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.) spoke to Manchin this week, and Westerman said each is committed to getting a result. Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) brushed aside potential GOP concerns that a deal could help lift Manchin to reelection: “My goal is to get a substantial permitting bill on the president’s desk.”

    Rep. Carol Miller (R-W.Va.), whose GOP colleague Mooney is running for that Senate seat next year, said of Manchin: “I would work with anyone on permitting.”

    Senate Republicans are more committed to defeating Manchin because West Virginia could easily determine who holds the Senate majority next year. They blocked attempts at attaching permitting legislation to year-end spending deals last year, in part out of retribution for Manchin’s dealmaking with Biden on Democrats’ massive party-line tax, health care and climate bill.

    Now they’re questioning whether the rest of Manchin’s party would really follow him on a sweeping energy permitting deal with the House GOP.

    “I do believe I can make a deal with Manchin. I’m not sure how many other Democrats would come on board,” said Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, his Republican counterpart on the Energy Committee.

    Manchin said Democrats would “be hypocritical” to shun work on an energy bill just because it’s led by the GOP House. He called his work last year a “roadmap” for Republicans to follow; 40 Senate Democratic caucus members supported his bill last year.

    And he’s putting out feelers of his own. As Republicans steer their party-line energy package to the floor this month, Manchin has asked some of his House Democratic colleagues about the GOP’s plans.

    “He said, ‘Let me know what the Republicans are looking at, because I want to do something,’” said Texas Rep. Henry Cuellar, another conservative Democrat who’s been talking to the GOP on energy.

    Asked how he’s reading the tea leaves on Manchin’s fate in 2024, Cuellar replied: “He wants to legislate.”

    Still, Manchin isn’t totally tuned out of politics. He inquired about where his fellow red-state Democratic Sen. Jon Tester of Montana stood in the lead-up to announcing a reelection bid.

    But now, as Manchin wreaks havoc on the Biden administration, Tester has no plans to push Manchin on 2024.

    “Joe being Joe, it’s just what Joe does,” Tester said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he runs. I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t.”

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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Biden’s nominee for IRS chief confirmed by Senate

    Biden’s nominee for IRS chief confirmed by Senate

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    Republicans, meanwhile, have promised to grill Werfel on everything from what they view as the agency’s excessive funding to the leak of confidential taxpayer information.

    Senate Finance Committee Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said in a floor speech Wednesday that Werfel can handle the crosswinds, given his stint as acting commissioner of the IRS in 2013 after the resignation of his predecessor over allegations that the agency unfairly targeted conservative organizations who were seeking tax-exempt status.

    “For Mr. Werfel to get bipartisan support to lead the IRS at a time when a lot of Republicans would happily mothball the entire agency is a testament to his fairness, his ability to work with both sides and his undeniable qualification for this role,” said Wyden.

    Werfel, whom Biden plucked from a top job at Boston Consulting Group, had stints at the White House Office of Management and Budget and the Justice Department under Republican and Democratic administrations.

    His overriding order of business at the IRS will be managing how the unprecedented $80 billion influx is spent. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen had promised to deliver a blueprint for the spending by February, but missed the deadline.

    In addition to playing defense with Republicans, lawmakers also want to see improved customer service — an abysmal 250 million of 282 million calls to the taxpayer help line went unanswered in 2021 — and upgrades to the computer systems that lawmakers from both sides consider woefully outdated.

    IRS employees have also traditionally had to manually enter information from paper returns number by number, a labor-intensive process that severely bogged down the agency during the pandemic and that Treasury hopes to now fix with new digital scanning technologies.

    Republicans, however, say the administration’s true intent is to unleash an army of auditors on middle-class taxpayers and small businesses, with Finance Committee ranking member Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) saying Wednesday that achieving the agency’s collection targets will be impossible without violating Yellen’s pledge to not increase audits on those making less than $400,000.

    Werfel managed to alleviate at least some of those concerns for the Republicans who voted for him: Sens. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Thom Tillis of North Carolina and Todd Young of Indiana.

    “Danny Werfel showed an openness to different ways to update IRS processes. This is long overdue,” said Cassidy on why he voted for Biden’s pick.

    Young added that former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, who led the OMB under George W. Bush while Werfel was climbing the ranks there, attested to the Biden nominee’s competency and non-partisan nature.

    Still, Werfel’s bona fides didn’t prove enough to sway most of the GOP conference, with several indicating their no votes were cast out of general frustration with the tax policy charted by Biden and Yellen.

    Those skeptical Republicans got an unexpected boost from Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), who voted against Werfel amid a fierce battle over the administration’s handling of some provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act enacted last year, including those that require components of batteries for electric vehicles to be made in the United States and the opening of new oil leases in the Gulf of Mexico.

    “I hope they come to their senses and do what the bill says that should be done,” said Manchin, who nonetheless called Werfel “supremely qualified.”

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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • French Senate adopts pension reform as street protests continue

    French Senate adopts pension reform as street protests continue

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    The French Senate voted in favor of the controversial pension reform overnight, paving the way for a potential final adoption of the law on Thursday, as thousands of people continue to demonstrate across the country.

    The widespread opposition to the retirement overhaul is a political test to French President Emmanuel Macron, whose liberal party has been struggling to pass the reform ever since it lost its majority in parliament last summer.

    “A decisive step to bring about a reform that will ensure the future of our pensions. Totally committed to allow a final adoption in the next few days,” French Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne tweeted after the vote.

    The French government wants to change the retirement age from 62 to 64, with a full pension requiring 43 years of work as of 2027. The right-leaning Senate adopted the reform with 195 in favor and 112 against the measure.

    Hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated across France on Saturday, and protests were expected to continue on Sunday. So far, strikes have disrupted sectors including public transport, oil refineries, schools and airports.

    On Sunday, Laurent Berger — who heads the largest French labor union — said: “I call on parliamentarians to see what’s happening in their districts. … You can’t vote for a reform that’s rejected by so many in the workforce.”

    During the presidential campaign, Macron vowed to reform the French pension system to bring it in line with other European countries like Spain and Germany, where the retirement age is 65 to 67 years old.

    Official forecasts show that the French pensions system is financially in balance for now, but it’s expected to build up a deficit in the longer term.

    French labor unions are calling for a “powerful day of strikes and demonstrations” on Wednesday, when lawmakers from the Senate and National Assembly are set to hold a small-group meeting to find a compromise on the pensions revamp. If they do reach an agreement, the law could be adopted on Thursday.

    The government could also ultimately decide to adopt the revamp using an exceptional procedure that requires no parliamentary vote.



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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.eu )

  • Norfolk Southern CEO to apologize to Senate for East Palestine wreck

    Norfolk Southern CEO to apologize to Senate for East Palestine wreck

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    The top Democrat and Republican on the committee — Chair Tom Carper (D-Del.) and ranking member Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) — said Wednesday that they want to hear more about what’s being done to help East Palestine. Carper said that he expects “straight answers” and “accountability.” And Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he expects Shaw to “own up to his company’s spotty safety culture, particularly the increasingly apparent pattern of negligence”

    Shaw also plans to urge an “industry-wide comprehensive approach, including railcar owners, car manufacturers, leasing companies, equipment makers, and the railroad companies” — suggesting regulators should cast a net much wider than his own company, or even his own industry. He’ll specifically call for changes to certain types of railcars, which the railroads do not directly own.

    Shaw will also highlight Norfolk’s new focus on moving away from “efficiency” and profits, and toward something he will call “a more balanced approach to service, productivity, and growth”— which he called a “significant departure from the railroad industry’s recent past.” (These moves were first announced on a December earnings call, where he also assured investors that “other important financial measures, such as earnings per share, Return on Invested Capital, and revenue” would still be paramount.)

    Capito made it clear that she’ll also focus on the adequacy of the Environmental Protection Agency’s response to the environmental disaster that the derailment caused. “Personally, I think the EPA failed on risk communication,” she said Wednesday. “There was confusion, there was delayed data and a sense that nobody really cared.”

    The committee will also take testimony from Ohio Sens. Sherrod Brown (D) and J.D. Vance (R) as well as Pennsylvania Democrat Bob Casey, who are part of the group of lawmakers pressing forward with a bipartisan rail safety bill.

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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Senate, White House push new bipartisan bill that could ban TikTok

    Senate, White House push new bipartisan bill that could ban TikTok

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    It’s not the first bill that seeks to tackle the perceived national security threat posed by TikTok, which is owned by Chinese-based company ByteDance.

    But it almost certainly has the most momentum of any legislation introduced on the issue so far. It’s the Senate’s first bipartisan effort on TikTok this legislative cycle. It’s being pushed by two of the most powerful lawmakers on Capitol Hill — Warner is chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee and Thune is the Senate minority whip.

    And according to a statement issued during Tuesday’s presser by national security adviser Jake Sullivan, the White House is also on board.

    “This bill presents a systematic framework for addressing technology-based threats to the security and safety of Americans,” Sullivan wrote. He said the RESTRICT Act would strengthen the administration’s ability to address both “discrete risks posed by individual transactions” as well as “systemic risks” posed by multiple transactions “involving countries of concern in sensitive technology sectors.” Sullivan urged lawmakers “to act quickly to send it to the President’s desk.”

    The RESTRICT ACT is somewhat similar to legislation that advanced last week out of the House Foreign Affairs Committee without Democratic support. Like the House bill, it would alter a portion of U.S. law known as the Berman amendments, which allow for the free flow of “informational material” from hostile countries. In 2020, TikTok invoked those amendments as part of its successful court effort to block an attempted Trump administration ban. Warner said his bill would create a “rules-based process” that would short-circuit the Berman amendments and allow the president to restrict — or even ban — foreign apps like TikTok, as well as other technologies.

    Unlike last week’s House bill, however, the RESTRICT Act does not require the Commerce Department or White House to impose bans or sanctions. It would instead task federal agencies with reviewing potential threats posed by tech emanating from China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba or Venezuela. Any further restrictions, said Warner, are up to the Commerce Department.

    Warner said the RESTRICT Act is meant to improve Washington’s “whack-a-mole approach” to risky foreign technologies over the last several years — including efforts to ban telecommunications equipment from Chinese firms Huawei and ZTE, as well as actions taken against Russian cybersecurity company Kaspersky Labs. “We lack, at this moment in time, a holistic, interagency, whole-of-government approach,” Warner said.

    The senator explained that the RESTRICT Act would apply to existing hardware, software and mobile apps, as well as future AI tools, fintech, quantum communications and e-commerce products.

    The bill’s introduction comes after more than a year of discussion within the Biden administration on whether to ban TikTok, and how to limit the ability of foreign applications like it to access Americans’ data. That includes an ongoing national security review of TikTok at the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., which was begun under the Trump administration but has stalled in the Biden administration amid conflict between national security and economic officials. The impasse has delayed a separate executive order on foreign data collection planned for over a year, and the administration still has not finished a separate Commerce Department rule on information and communications technology.

    ByteDance has long denied any association with Beijing’s surveillance or propaganda operations. Its critics, however, point to provisions in Chinese law that require companies based in-country to comply with any and all requests from state intelligence services.

    In a statement, TikTok spokesperson Brooke Oberwetter said the Biden administration “does not need additional authority from Congress to address national security concerns about TikTok: it can approve the deal negotiated with CFIUS over two years that it has spent the last six months reviewing.” She called a ban on TikTok “a ban on the export of American culture and values to the billion-plus people who use our service worldwide.”

    Oberwetter’s argument is similar to the one made last week by Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), the ranking member on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. At the time, Meeks urged his colleagues to wait for CFIUS and warned against banning TikTok “without consideration of the very real soft power, free speech and economic consequences.”

    But on Tuesday, Warner suggested many of his Democratic colleagues in the House will back the RESTRICT Act. “I can assure you that I’ve actually had very positive conversations with House Democratic colleagues who have become very interested in supporting this bill,” he said.

    Despite surging bipartisan support for the RESTRICT Act, getting the bill to the president’s desk won’t be easy. TikTok regularly garners over 100 million monthly users in the United States. If the legislation is framed as a “TikTok ban bill,” that could make it tougher for vulnerable lawmakers to risk constituent ire by nuking their favorite online platform.

    “This is a popular application,” Warner said, who noted that a ban would also likely trigger First Amendment concerns. “I think it’s going to be incumbent upon the government to show its cards, in terms of how this is a threat.”

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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Bernie Sanders got his wish: Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz will testify before the Vermonter’s panel in the Senate. 

    Bernie Sanders got his wish: Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz will testify before the Vermonter’s panel in the Senate. 

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    Sanders was preparing a subpoena vote this week.

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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Mastriano, unchastened, says he is weighing a Senate run

    Mastriano, unchastened, says he is weighing a Senate run

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    In a sit-down interview, Mastriano, who rarely speaks with the mainstream media, made it clear that he is not finished with his quest to win higher office and transform the Republican Party along the way. He said he is “praying” about whether to go forward with a potential Senate run in 2024. After God, his wife, Rebbie, will have the final word he said.

    “We’ve seen people in the past, other Republican gubernatorial candidates, they rise and they disappear when they lose. Why?” he asked. “You have people that love you and support you.”

    If he pulls the trigger, Mastriano would run in a primary for the right to take on Democratic Sen. Bob Casey, an institutional figure in the state. Virtually no one in the Pennsylvania GOP establishment is eager for that matchup. But Mastriano said Casey is a letdown to the anti-abortion cause. Casey’s father, former Gov. Robert Casey Sr., signed abortion regulations into law that went all the way to a landmark Supreme Court case, where they were largely kept intact.

    “I think he’s a huge disappointment. He’s nothing like his dad,” he said. “His dad was more pro-life than most Republicans.”

    Until now, Mastriano’s future plans have been a mystery within political circles. He has few relationships with party leaders and eschews traditional consultants, leaving it all but impossible for GOP officials to know what he’s thinking. In that vacuum of information, rumors have been swirling that he might be eyeing a challenge against Republican Rep. John Joyce, whose seat is safely red. But he ruled that out: “Congressman Joyce and myself are friends.”

    What Mastriano ultimately decides to do will illuminate just how chastened the most diehard supporters of former President Donald Trump are after the 2022 midterms. Usually, losses of that magnitude drive people out of electoral politics. But the last three federal elections have been discouraging for Republicans, and each time, they’ve shown little desire to course correct. Trump himself is campaigning again in 2024 and remains the frontrunner for the nomination. Whether the GOP finally does move on will be determined, in large part, by how Republican primary voters treat potential and declared candidates like him and Mastriano.

    Inside Mastriano’s small legislative quarters, an anti-abortion protest sign sat in the corner. Wearing his trademark spurs and a 3rd Infantry Division ball cap, he said that his fans have been encouraging him to run for the Senate. But he was open about the fact that those encouraging him aren’t Republican dignitaries.

    “It’s mostly supporters across the state,” he said. “Nobody with big names have come out and said, ‘Doug, you need to think about this.’ Just people like you and me.”

    In fact, Mastriano’s flirtation with another statewide campaign is sure to give heart palpitations to GOP leaders. When a blue wave swept across Pennsylvania in 2022 — Democrats won the gubernatorial race, Senate race and a majority of state House contests — most Republican officials pointed the finger at Mastriano. His staunchly anti-abortion stance that allowed for no exceptions, his efforts to overturn the 2020 election in Pennsylvania, and his appearance at the capitol the day of the Jan. 6 attack alarmed many swing voters.

    After staying out of primaries last year, the Senate GOP’s campaign arm intends to get involved this time around. Party leaders at the national and state level have aggressively courted Dave McCormick, the former hedge fund CEO who narrowly lost the Senate primary in 2022, to run again against Casey. Though McCormick sought Trump’s endorsement and employed former Trump aides during his campaign, Republicans believe he has a mainstream appeal that would attract suburban voters.

    Mastriano declined to weigh in on the possibility of a McCormick bid: “Unbelievably, I’ve never met him, so I’d hate to make a judgment on him without meeting him since he’s probably going to run.” He also speculated that there could be a number of Republican candidates who vie for the Senate next year, though he declined to name names: “I think I’ll have a few people also running that I know and like.”

    As he considers what’s next, Mastriano is analyzing what went wrong in 2022, even showing a willingness to bend on certain political tactics that, last cycle, his party shunned.

    Republicans, he said, “have to embrace no-excuse mail-in voting.” That they did not is the reason he thinks he lost. He said he knew during the campaign that it was going to cost him. “It’s just so — repugnant’s the wrong word — it’s just so antithetical to how I view elections,” he said.

    Mastriano said he was sure he was going to beat now-Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro right up until Election Day. He didn’t buy the polls showing him down badly.

    “Because I’d go to these rallies and people would say, ‘We’ve never seen this.’ In Josh Shapiro’s home county the night before the election, I had over 1,000 people — we stopped counting at 1,000. I saw no Shapiro signs in his own county,” he said. “Here I am in Montgomery County the night before the election, I’m like, we got this. The rally was just electric.”

    Mastriano did not formally concede until five days after the election.

    He acknowledged that taking on Casey could be a challenge.

    “How do I beat the Casey name? ‘Mastriano’?” he said with a grin. “At least they know who I am now.”

    In the meantime, Mastriano is taking steps to position himself for a possible run. He is holding a rally this Saturday in central Pennsylvania, which will feature Trump lawyer Christina Bobb and conservative media personality Wendy Bell as speakers. He led a hearing on the East Palestine train derailment over the border from the incident in western Pennsylvania, and he successfully pushed a committee he chairs to subpoena Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw to testify. He also hired Dan Cox, the unsuccessful Maryland gubernatorial nominee, as his chief-of-staff.

    Toward the end of the interview, Mastriano said Cox was part of his “A team.” As it happens, Cox’s hiring is also a reason political insiders think he might want to run for higher office again.

    “Hmm,” he said, laughing. “Gute erkennung. As the Germans say, ‘Good deduction.’”

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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )