Tim Canova
Chair, Progress For All
While the mainstream media continues to focus on war and scandal, House Speaker Paul Ryan pulled a fast-one on the American people by passing two dangerous deregulation bills through the House of Representatives. Unfortunately, too many corporate-funded Democrats have been either distracted or shamefully silent.
These two bills would allow huge corporations to boost their profits at the expense of the health and safety of American workers: by moving us backwards on climate change and pollution; undermining food safety and public health; threatening the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act; scrapping restrictions on predatory lending practices; curbing efforts to increase the number of employees eligible for overtime; and blocking fair pay and safer workplace protection rules.
The Regulations From the Executive in Need of Scrutiny (REINS) Act of 2017 (H.R. 26) strips the executive branch of the power to issue significant new rules and requires any regulation that has an economic impact of over $100 million to be approved by Congress within a 70-day period.
The Midnight Rules Relief Act of 2017 (H.R. 21) was designed as a means for mass demolition by allowing lawmakers to pool together multiple regulations finalized in the last six months of the Obama administration, and to revoke them with one vote — thereby jeopardizing protections of public health and safety and the environment that have often been in the making for years, if not decades.
These bills have been introduced in the Senate (REINS Act, S. 21) and (Midnight Rules Relief Act, S. 34) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is pushing hard for passage. We must do all we can to stop these horrendous bills in the Senate. Please call your senator and urge them to vote NO on these egregious bills being pushed by the Koch brothers and other right-wing organizations.
Simply call the number below and ask to be directed to your senator’s office.
U.S. switchboard: (202) 224-3121
According to Gene Karpinski, President of the League of Conservation Voters, these two bills are a tool for huge corporations to “scuttle new health and safety and environmental safeguards” by polluting our air and water, resulting in countless premature deaths and illnesses.
President Trump has said he will sign these bills if they come to his desk and he will work hard to get them passed. Not surprisingly, his adviser on regulatory “reform” is Carl Ichan, the billionaire financier who has invested billions in heavily regulated industries that will profit greatly from these two bills should they become law.
We must organize and mobilize to stop the wholesale repeal of forty years of progress in environmental, civil rights, labor standards, health and safety, and consumer protections. We’re ready to fight back and we won’t back down.