The United States of Resistance is a weekly industry newsletter sharing the top news from across the resistance. Please share with others! Sign up | Archived Newsletters This Independence Day, let us remember: "Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of it. The history of liberty is a history of resistance." -Woodrow Wilson Resistance Spotlight: Action T...

Read More

SummarySteven Bradbury is the nominee for General Counsel at the Department of Transportation. During his tenure with the Bush Administration, he infamously wrote three memos justifying the use of torture as an interrogation technique, a position which has since been rejected by Congress and the Supreme Court. Whether you care about transportation, civil rights, the environment, or something else, Bradbury will likely poised to make a decision on that issue. Contact your Senators to oppose Bradbury, whose lack of judgment and moral character are antithetical to everything we stand for.Steven Gill Bradbury has been nominated for the position of General Counsel at the Department of Transportation. The position is the Department's primary legal advisor and has final authority on any questions of law arising at the Department. Bradbury served in several top positions at the Department of Justice from 2004-2009, heading the Office of Legal Counsel during George W. Bush's second term.Duri...

Read More

Introduction The Dodd-Frank Act is under threat. Republicans have long targeted the act, which was passed to strengthen and reform the US banking and financial system after the global financial crisis of 2008. Now they're acting to undermine it. In May, the House of Representatives took a step towards weakening Dodd-Frank Act by passing the Financial CHOICE Act, which repeals most of it. In addition, last week the Treasury released a summary of part of its proposal to weaken Dodd-Frank, which isn't as extreme as the Financial CHOICE Act, but still will have a large effect. We expect that any bill that's debated in the Senate will look more like the Treasury proposal than the Financial CHOICE Act, but we don't know that yet. What we do know, though, is that Republicans will try to push through changes to Dodd-Frank that Wall Street wants, even if they make another catastrophic financial crisis more likely. Financial regulation can be confusing; this explainer is intend...

Read More

Much of the attention last week was again on efforts to rush Trumpcare through the Senate, though after the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its analysis estimating that the bill would cause 22 million more Americans to become uninsured, Republicans have scrapped their plans to try to pass the bill before July 4th. Here's what has been happening in science and technology policy in the meantime. EPA axes 38 science advisers, cancels panel meetings It emerged last week that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will not renew the appointments of 38 members of the Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC) whose first term will expire in August. The BOSC advises the EPA's Office of Research and Development on scientific research. The office's leader, Acting Assistant Administrator Robert Kavlock, delivered the news in emails to BOSC members last week. These 38, combined with the nine advisors dismissed in May, mean that only 11 advisors remain, with no committee cha...

Read More

The room where it happens. Power industry executive met with U.S. Environmental Protection Administrator Scott Pruitt. Many of the executive said that if EPA is considering withdrawing the Clean Power Plan rule, they should instead replace it with a less stringent carbon regulation to provide regulatory certainty when making new investments. EPA has sent its proposed review of the Clean Power Plan to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). EPA is expected to rescind the Obama-era rule regulating carbon pollution from existing power plants.Goodbye scientific advisory board. Dozens of scientists on EPA's Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC) have been informed that they will not be renewed for their roles advising the agency. The move dismisses 38 out of the 49 remaining subcommittee members, and leaves the board for "complete reappointment." The BSOC advises EPA's Office of Research and Development — which has been targeted by this administration for extreme budget cuts — on wheth...

Read More

The United States of Resistance is a weekly industry newsletter sharing the top news from across the resistance. Please share with others! Sign up | Archived Newsletters Roll Up Your Sleeves and Get to Work with RISE Hello Risers! We are at an important stage in the growth of RISE Stronger. Our new website is up and running, and our tools like the People's Calendar and United States of Resistance ma...

Read More

1. Apprenticeships: In an effort to reduce the skills gap, in which job applicants lack the skills needed by employers, Trump signed an executive order to double funds (currently $200 million) spent on learn-and-earn programs under ApprenticeshipUSA. While there is bipartisan support for apprenticeships, Trump's budget proposal cuts funding from job training programs by 40%, or $1.1 billion, and the ApprenticeshipUSA program will be funded by further cuts to existing job training programs. Trump has ordered the streamlining of 43 workforce programs into 13 agencies. While efficiency is important, job training programs are essential for mobilizing individuals into new industries, particularly when layoffs are expected in manufacturing.2. The Financial CHOICE Act passed the House. The act rolls back consumer protections from the Dodd-Frank Act, weakens the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau considerably, and reduces the power of shareholders, among other things. Republican argue tha...

Read More

Hello RISE Stronger community! We are at an important stage in the growth of RISE Stronger. Our new website is up and running, and our tools like the People's Calendar and United States of Resistance map continue to improve. As our work evolves, we're discovering new ways to make our work more productive. Toward that end, we've decided to migrate the RISE Stronger Slack community to a messaging and project space called Basecamp. Basecamp offers significant advantages over Slack, including being much easier and more intuitive to use, as well as a better tool for project management, oversight and delivery. A number of RISE groups have already moved over or are in the process of changing, and we are finding it a very helpful and productive way to engage with each other on a range of projects.As an active Slack user, we'd like to invite you to join us as an active member of the RISE Stronger community! There are many ways to get involved in specific projects:1) First, make sure you h...

Read More

Robbing from Peter to Pay Paul: Air-Traffic-Control, Army Corps of Engineers, and Housing as InfrastructureDid you know? If placed end to end, the length of the nation's structurally deficient bridges would stretch 1,276 miles or half the distance from New York to Los Angeles. (ARTBA 2017 Bridge Report)On aviation, infrastructure, and "social infrastructure," the Trump Administration continues to say one thing and do another. While Rise agrees with making the public sector more efficient, effective, and user-centric, we believe those improvements cannot come at the expense of citizen safety and well-being. Privatizing the Air-Traffic-Control SystemWhy are we exposing travelers and air-traffic control data to harm and hacking?Two weeks ago, President Trump kicked off infrastructure week by announcing his commitment to privatizing the management of the U.S. air-traffic-control system. That system is currently managed by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), a government agency th...

Read More

While much attention this week is on Senate Republicans' secretive efforts to draft health care legislation that could take health insurance from millions of Americans (and which will apparently be revealed this Thursday), here is what has been happening this week in science and technology policy."Tech Week" begins at White HouseOn Monday, June 19, CEOs from several major technology companies were at the White House for a series of private brainstorming sessions, followed by a public event. This inaugural meeting of the American Technology Council kicks off what is being billed as "Tech Week" at the White House. The week features just two events, and it is unclear what policy outcomes, if any, will result from the meetings. On Monday, there was general agreement on the non-controversial need to update government IT infrastructure. However, despite major concerns in the technology community, the attendees failed to press Trump on his most controversial policies, including the US with...

Read More