Please help InsideSources continue to grow. Ask your friends and colleagues to signup for InsideAlerts.
Energy
Obama Is Said to Be Planning New Rules on Oil and Gas Industry’s Methane Emissions
NEW YORK TIMES
Coral Davenport
In President Obama’s latest move using executive authority to tackle climate change, administration officials will announce plans this week to impose new regulations on the oil and gas industry’s emissions of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, according to a person familiar with Mr. Obama’s plans. The administration’s goal is to cut methane emissions from oil and gas production by up to 45 percent by 2025 from the levels recorded in 2012. The Environmental Protection Agency will issue the proposed regulations this summer, and final regulations by 2016, according to the person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the administration had asked the person not to speak about the plan. The White House declined to comment on the effort.
Grueling fight on Keystone pipeline to hit new Senate
THE HILL
Laura Barron-Lopez
Senators are bracing for a debate over legislation on the Keystone XL pipeline that could take weeks to conclude, setting up an early test of GOP leader Mitch McConnell’s pledge to allow “regular order” in the upper chamber. McConnell (R-Ky.) on Tuesday threatened a midnight vote before senators agreed to move forward on the pipeline bill, and could soon turn to late nights and weekend work to muscle through a stack of amendments.
Clash Looms Over Fuel Economy Standard
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Mike Spector and Christina Rogers
Auto makers are on a collision course with U.S. regulators over the timetable to achieve stringent fuel-economy standards as cheap gasoline sends consumers flocking to less-efficient pickup trucks and sport-utility vehicles. Car companies are laying the groundwork to seek some relief when the targets come up for review by regulators in 2017, executives said at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. They are in some cases already canvassing the White House, Capitol Hill and regulatory agencies to start lobbying for possible changes to fuel economy standards that take effect in 2022.
Tom Steyer: I’m Not Sure I’m Running for Senate, But Here’s What I’ll Say If I Do
NATIONAL JOURNAL
Ben Geman
“California Democrats are blessed to have a deep bench of talent, and I will decide soon based on what I think is the best way to continue the hard work we’ve already started together to prevent climate disaster and preserve American prosperity,” he writes.
Technology
Obama’s privacy and cyber bills are the GOP’s first big test at governing
WASHINGTON POST
Brian Fung
Passing the president’s initiatives should be relatively straightforward, analysts say. Obama wants Congress to develop a national standard for data breaches, telling companies how quickly they need to disclose a leak of customer data in the event of a hack. He’s also proposed a bill that would keep students’ electronic data — generated by educational apps and devices — out of the hands of some commercial entities. All of these are relatively popular ideas and have been the subject of discussion among lawmakers. Reps. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Peter Welch (D-Vt.) are already working on their own version of a data breach proposal, for example.
Obama Backs Government-Run Internet
NATIONAL JOURNAL
Brendan Sasso
“Laws in 19 states—some specifically written by special interests trying to stifle new competitors—have held back broadband access and, with it, economic opportunity,” the White House wrote in a fact sheet. “Today, President Obama is announcing a new effort to support local choice in broadband, formally opposing measures that limit the range of options available to communities to spur expanded local broadband infrastructure, including ownership of networks.” Telecom and cable companies have been lobbying for the state laws, arguing that it’s not fair for them to have to compete with government-owned Internet providers. The companies claim the city projects discourage private investment and are often expensive failures. House Republicans passed legislation last year to protect the state laws from FCC action.
Information sharing at top of Obama cyber agenda
POLITICO
David Perera
A new legislative proposal unveiled by President Barack Obama on Tuesday would reshape federal cybersecurity information-sharing with the private sector, broadening DHS’ outreach beyond the sectors of critical infrastructure like banks and power companies on which it has traditionally focused. A central portion of the White House’s plan would grant targeted liability protection to companies that share cyber threat information with the government — removing what critics say is a major stumbling block to private sector partnership with federal authorities on cyber issues.
GOP lawmaker offers bill to block treating Internet as utility
THE HILL
Mario Trujillo
Rep. Bob Latta (R-Ohio) has reintroduced legislation to prevent the Federal Communications Commission from reclassifying broadband Internet as a utility. Latta, vice chairman of the House Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology, called the FCC’s plans misguided. His legislation notes that the strict regulations were “designed for the monopoly telephone system in 1934 and has its origins in 19th century shipping regulations.” “These businesses thrive on dynamism and the ability to evolve quickly to shifting market and consumer forces,” he said in a statement. “Subjecting them to bureaucratic red tape won’t promote innovation, consumer welfare or the economy.”
Bipartisan Senate Bills Would Increase Visas and Green Cards for High-Tech Workers
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Laura Meckler
Two bipartisan bills in the Senate would increase the number of visas and green cards available to high-tech workers, as lawmakers in both houses of Congress begin to sort out what is politically doable on the contentious issue of immigration. The Senate bills are an effort to alleviate a pent-up demand for visas, particularly among technology companies that say they are losing good workers who are educated in the U.S. and then forced to leave.
Lawyers, Former Workers Reach New Hiring Settlement With Tech Companies
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Jeff Elder
Lawyers for 64,000 current and former workers have reached a new settlement with four Silicon Valley companies they accuse of conspiring not to hire each other’s employees, suppressing wages from 2005 to 2009, according to representatives of both sides and a document filed Tuesday. Details of the proposed settlement with Apple Inc., Google Inc., Intel Corp. and Adobe Systems Inc., couldn’t be learned. The proposal is expected to be filed in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif., on Thursday, one lawyer said.
David Cameron Can’t Control the Internet
NATIONAL JOURNAL
Brian Resnick
Cameron has pledged that if his party is reelected in May, Parliament would essentially outlaw any application that doesn’t allow for government spying, like the encrypted messaging services Snapchat and WhatsApp. These platforms are appealing for just the reason Cameron wants them banned. In an era of mass surveillance, it’s nice to know a private communication is just that: private. The idea of world leaders wanting to change the rules of the Internet within their own countries is fraught with complications. The architecture of the Internet is not in a single place, governed by a single set of laws.
Finance
Warren Doesn’t Get Her Man
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Editorial
Ms. Warren gets to claim victory, while Mr. Weiss can still have lunch at the Treasury dining room and do most of what Mr. Lew wants him to do. Don’t be surprised if Mr. Obama never nominates anyone else for the domestic Treasury job.
MetLife Takes On the Feds
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Editorial
Regulators don’t react well to being challenged, so MetLife is taking some political risk with its suit. It might have been easier to roll over, as everyone else has, and play the inside game of trying to maneuver special regulatory favors and exemptions under the non-bank rules. The company deserves credit for challenging a regulatory process that is expanding the federal safety net without transparency or any evident need.
In New Congress, Wall St. Pushes to Undermine Dodd-Frank Reform
NEW YORK TIMES
Jonathan Weisman and Eric Lipton
The continuing assault on the 2010 Dodd-Frank law has achieved remarkable success, especially compared with the repeated failures of opponents of another 2010 law, the Affordable Care Act. The financial industry has been methodical, drafting technically complicated legislation that can pass the heavily Republican House with a few Democratic votes. And then, once approved, Wall Street has pushed to tack such measures on to larger bills considered too important for the White House to block.
ECB’s bond plan is legal ‘in principle’
FINANCIAL TIMES (Subscribe)
Claire Jones
A top adviser to the European Court of Justice has said the European Central Bank’s crisis-fighting plan falls within the mandate of policy makers, removing a major legal hurdle to purchases of government bonds.
Politics
Early 2016 moves by Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney spur other GOP contenders into action
WASHINGTON POST
Robert Costa, Matea Gold and Philip Rucker
A broad field of GOP candidates are ramping up preparations for presidential runs in the wake of early maneuvering by establishment favorites Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney, kicking off the race for the 2016 Republican nomination at a breakneck speed.
For G.O.P., Precedent to Cooperate and Shed Its ‘Party of No’ Label
NEW YORK TIMES
John Harwood
The question is how much that responsibility changes the instincts, habits and calculations of a party that, when it comes to governing, has grown so deeply accustomed to saying no. The answer will determine whether the next two years bring any relief from the partisan inertia of the past four.
Obama, congressional leaders huddle at the White House, with few signs of accord
WASHINGTON POST
Ed O’Keefe and Sean Sullivan
Huge differences over energy and immigration policy continue to dominate the debate on Capitol Hill in the run-up to Obama’s State of the Union address next Tuesday, and the White House has promised to veto any legislation that tries to roll back the president’s recent changes in immigration policy. The GOP-controlled House is expected to pass a new spending bill doing just that on Wednesday.
Conservatives split off from Republican Study Committee
POLITICO
Lauren French
More than a dozen of the House’s most conservative lawmakers will splinter from the decades-old Republican Study Committee to form a new organization designed to push the GOP caucus to the right. The currently unnamed group will be led by Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Raúl Labrador of Idaho, sources involved with the planning said, and will probably include 30 or more Republicans — many of them among the most vocal critics of GOP leadership.
Reviewing Federal Education Law, Senator Seeks More Local Control
NEW YORK TIMES
Motoko Rich
Ahead of hearings to discuss an overhaul of No Child Left Behind, the signature education law from the George W. Bush administration, Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee and chairman of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, said Tuesday that he wanted to reverse the “trend towards a national school board” in federal education policy. Speaking on the floor of the Senate, Mr. Alexander said he wanted to “put the responsibility back with states and local school districts” to oversee public schools with as few mandates as possible from Washington.
Supreme Court Seeks Compromise on Equality Cases
NEW YORK TIMES
Adam Liptak
The Supreme Court on Tuesday seemed to be looking for a middle ground in a case about what efforts the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission must make to settle cases informally before it files lawsuits. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy captured the court’s frustrated mood near the end of the argument. “I think there’s substantial merit to your position that the courts have gone too far,” he told a lawyer for the commission. “But you have given us no midway, no alternative.”
Special interests deliver obstacles to fixing the Postal Service
WASHINGTON POST
Editorial
So far, what Mr. Donahoe called the “myopia” of postal-related interest groups has prevailed in Congress, preventing the passage of bipartisan reform legislation aimed at restoring the postal service’s sustainability. Without a more farsighted approach, the agency can, at best, expect to stagger along its current path of missed innovations and underinvestment. The new Congress has the power to revive the reform bill this year and thereby decide whether the U.S. Postal Service thrives and modernizes — or whether this foundational institution of the U.S. economy continues to crumble under the weight of special-interest politics.
