Netanyahu visits the US to meet with Biden, Harris, Congress
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has arrived in the U.S. for a visit with top political leaders. A meeting with President Joe Biden is reportedly to take place on Thursday, July 25, as the president recovers from COVID-19, with the White House saying he’s nearly symptom-free.
On Wednesday, July 24, Netanyahu is set to deliver a speech to Congress. He’s expected to thank the U.S. for its ongoing support for Israel in its war against Hamas.
“I wish that he would be a statesman and do what is right for Israel,” former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., told CNN. “We all love Israel. We need to help them and not have him stand in the way of that for such a long time. I think it’s going to invite more of what we have seen in terms of discontent among our own.”
I will not attend Netanyahu’s speech. Following Hamas’ horrific attack, Netanyahu’s war strategy killed 12,000+ women and children, inflicted widespread starvation, and prioritized his political survival over the release of hostages. He should not have a platform before Congress.
— Senator Jeff Merkley (@SenJeffMerkley) July 23, 2024
Netanyahu is focused on shoring up bipartisan support for Israel as the country continues to fight not only Hamas but is facing growing security threats from Iranian-backed groups in Lebanon and Yemen.
Netanyahu said Israel will still be a “key U.S. ally” to whoever replaces President Biden.
The prime minister is also expected to meet with presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris during his visit. Reports show he has also reached out to former President Trump to potentially meet with him before departing the U.S., but it’s unclear if that meeting will take place this week.
Senators are trying to ban members of Congress from buying stocks
Democrats and Republicans in the Senate joined forces in an effort to ban members of Congress from stock trading. The newly introduced Ethics Act would ban members of Congress, the president and vice president from buying or selling securities, commodities, futures, options, trusts and other investments immediately.
Members would have to divest from those same assets starting in 2027. The bill would also cover lawmakers’ spouses and dependent children starting in 2027.
Sens. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., Josh Hawley, R-Mo., Gary Peters, D-Mich., and Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., introduced the bill.
“Across the state of Georgia, Democrats, independents, Republicans overwhelmingly agree that members of Congress should not be playing the stock market while we legislate and while we have access to confidential and privileged information,” Ossoff said. “This is long overdue, this is necessary.”
According to a poll from the University of Maryland, 86% of registered voters favor prohibiting members of Congress from stock trading. That includes Republicans, Democrats and Independents. Voters also favor the same prohibition for the president, vice president and Supreme Court justices.
The lawmakers who wrote this proposal say the manner in which members trade stocks is “corrupt.” They also say members take their stock portfolios into account when they write legislation.
Violations of the Ethics Act would carry a stiff penalty. If a member fails to divest, they will be subject to a fine of their monthly salary or 10% of the value of covered assets, whichever is greater.
“Congress should not be here to make a buck,” Hawley said. “Congress should be here to serve the people. There is no reason why members of Congress ought to be profiting off of the information that only they get and the rest of the American people don’t get.”
According to the Motley Fool, these are the five members who conducted the most trades in 2023, although they did not necessarily make the most money.
Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif.: 4,200 trades, 94 million shares.
Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas: 1,800 trades, 287 million shares.
Rep. Daniel Goldman, D-N.Y.: 1,300 trades, 30 million shares.
Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J.: 620 trades, 93 million shares.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Al.: 404 trades, 11 million shares.
Plastic is in blood, breast milk and vital organs – Congress wants to get it out
A January study caught the public’s attention when researchers found that the average one liter bottle of water contains 240,000 tiny pieces of plastic. However, that information barely scratches the surface of the plastic problem that goes to the cellular level, and Congress wants to do something about it.
A recent hearing in the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee explored how plastic is literally everywhere.
Microplastics have been found in our livers, our lungs and the breast milk we feed our babies.
Sen. Jeff Merkley
“On top of mountains, at the bottom of the sea, in the food we eat, in the air we breathe, in drops of rain, and even drops of our own blood,” Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., said. “Microplastics have been found in our livers, our lungs and the breast milk we feed our babies.”
The plastics transfer through containers that hold water, food and clothes, as well as household appliances, like dishwashers, and the lining around detergent pods.
“Like people shed skin cells, plastics shed particles of plastics,” Merkley said.
The expert witnesses described the situation as a circle. People consume nanoplastics, the plastics go through their systems, and they go to the bathroom. That wastewater is treated and turned into biosolids that are sent to farms.
“This application allows plastic particles within the sludge to be re-released into nearby waterways as runoff or moved through the soil into the groundwater,” said Dr. Sherri Mason, the director of Sustainability at Penn State Behrend.
Plastic in the body’s system can have negative health effects, which are still being researched. However, the chemicals on plastic are already known to be carcinogens, endocrine disruptors and lead to insulin resistance.
“Formulations of plastics are estimated to use upwards of 13,000 chemicals and microplastics are widely documented to harm aquatic and terrestrial wildlife,” said Dr. Susanne Brander, an associate professor at Oregon State University. “They can slow growth, alter behavior and cause reproductive disruption. They also cause adverse effects in mammals and particle presence is now confirmed in the human heart, placenta and lung tissues, as well as in circulation in the bloodstream.”
The purpose of this hearing was not just to learn about the problem, but to figure out how to stop plastics from entering the environment in the first place and filter out what’s already there. The witnesses said it starts at the macro level with a recycling and waste plan.
“You don’t tackle this problem when you’re dealing with something that’s nano sized,” Dr. Mason said. “You deal with it when you’re talking about something that’s big.”
“We really don’t have very good understanding about the occurrence of nano plastics in the environment and our water supplies,” said Brent Alspach, the vice president and director of Applied Research at Arcadis. “And until we understand that occurrence, we really can’t conduct meaningful treatability or toxicity studies to really understand, in turn, how we should take action about microplastics,”
Plastics are not only difficult to remove from the environment because of their microscopic size, but also because they’re synthetic and therefore don’t degrade. As they sit in the environment, they get smaller and smaller over time, becoming ever more difficult to remove.
Senators push bill to make banking easier for cannabis businesses
A bipartisan group of senators have introduced a banking reform bill that would allow banks to work with cannabis companies in states where it’s legal. Sens. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., and Steve Daines, R-Mont., introduced the Secure and Fair Enforcement (SAFE) Banking Act on Wednesday, April 26.
The Senate bill was introduced despite the fact that marijuana is still illegal at the federal level. The bill primarily focuses on bank regulators, preventing them from dinging banks just for working with weed-related businesses.
“Most state legal medicinal or recreational cannabis businesses are denied access to the banking system because banks fear they may be prosecuted under federal law given the ongoing federal restrictions on cannabis,” the press office for Sen. Daines said in a release. “The lack of access to bank accounts, credit cards, and checks have forced state legal cannabis businesses to operate in cash, opening the door to tax evasion and to a dangerous pattern of robberies.
The bill in its form as introduces is a “skinny” version, with other potential reforms left out. Those reforms include helping states expunge the records of non-violent marijuana offenders and removing restrictions on gun ownership for cannabis users. In a joint statement, Sen. Merkley and Saines said there will be a chance to add these reforms to create the “SAFE Banking Plus” package.
“This expanded ‘SAFE Banking Plus’ package will represent the largest-ever cannabis reform legislation with bipartisan support in Congress,” the senators said in the join statement. “We are committed to making 2023 the year a bill is signed into law that ensures all legal cannabis businesses have access to the financial services they need.”
The House has passed some a cannabis banking reform bill seven times since 2019. Each time, the legislation has failed in the Senate.
Jerome Powell insists Fed will not become a ‘climate policymaker’
Don’t expect the Federal Reserve to wade into the climate change fray. Fed Chair Jerome Powell made clear Tuesday that the banking system does not have a significant role in the space.
“We are not, and will not be, a ‘climate policymaker,’” Powell said. “We should ‘stick to our knitting’ and not wander off to pursue perceived social benefits that are not tightly linked to our statutory goals and authorities.”
The Federal Reserve has a dual mandate from Congress: Maximum employment and stable prices. Managing climate change risk isn’t on that list. But in the increasingly politicized climate of banking, where global institutions consider how climate change could threaten the financial system, the Fed finds itself between a rock and a hard place.
Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee have previously expressed concern that the Fed may, “use financial regulation and supervision to further environmental policy objectives. That would be beyond the scope of the Federal Reserve’s mission.”
From Powell’s statements, his point of view is that the Fed’s climate role is very narrow, limited to making sure banks understand and manage all material risk, including financial risks of climate change.
“But without explicit congressional legislation, it would be inappropriate for us to use our monetary policy or supervisory tools, for example, to promote a greener economy or to achieve other climate-based goals,” he said, adding that any attempt to do so would harm the Fed’s independence.
At least one Fed governor disagrees with Powell in the Fed having even a narrow scope to climate change.
“Climate change is real, but I disagree with the premise that it poses a serious risk to the safety and soundness of large bans and the financial stability of the United States,” Fed Governor Christopher Waller said in December. “The Federal Reserve conducts regular stress tests on large banks that impose extremely severe macroeconomic shocks and they show that the banks are resilient.”