Category: Security

The U.S. House of Representatives voted on Friday to expel Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.), making him the sixth lawmaker to face expulsion from the lower chamber in its roughly 200 year history.  

Over 300 representatives voted to expel Santos, including 105 members of his own party. The vote required a two-thirds majority to pass.

Prior to the vote, Santos warned his expulsion would set “a very dangerous precedent.”

“In history, five members of Congress have been expelled. All five had suffered convictions in a court. All five had due process. This expulsion vote simply undermines and underscores the precedent that we’ve had in this chamber. It starts and puts us in a new direction – a dangerous one that sets a very dangerous precedent for the future,” Santos said.

“Are we to now assume that one is no longer innocent until proven guilty? And they are in fact guilty until proven innocent? Or are we now to simply assume that because somebody doesn’t like you, they get to throw you out of your job? Or better more, does the Constitution bare no consequence where a duly elected member of the House of Representatives is elected by the general public, but then a couple of politicians decide that they don’t like that person?” he added.

Santos is facing 23 federal charges over alleged fraud, money laundering, misused campaign funds, aggravated identity theft and lies about his personal finances on House disclosure reports. The GOP congressman has pleaded not guilty to all charges.

READ MORE: Jan 6 protester ‘QAnon shaman’ running for Congress

“Representative Santos’ congressional campaigns were built around his backstory as a successful man of means: a grandson of Holocaust survivors and graduate from Baruch College with a Master’s in Business Administration from New York University, who went on to work at Citi Group and Goldman Sachs, owned multiple properties, and was the beneficiary of a family trust worth millions of dollars left by his mother, who passed years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks as a result of long-term health effects related to being at one of the towers,” a report by the House Ethics Committee stated last month.

“No part of that backstory has been found to be true,” it added.

This article was originally published by Radio Free Asia and is reprinted with permission.

The homes of 10 Christian families were recently destroyed by local authorities and nearby residents, the latest instance of religious harassment in southern Laos.

The families were driven from three villages in Saravan Province’s Samoey District about two months ago, according to some fellow Christians and officials.

District authorities eventually arranged for new land for the families in one of the villages where they could rebuild their homes, but no compensation or financial assistance has been provided, the sources told Radio Free Asia.

“Now, the authorities have put them together in one place separated from the other villages,” a Christian who has been assisting the families with the resettlement said. 

“Our brothers and sisters have to build their own new homes,” he told RFA on Wednesday on condition of anonymity; “They can’t be on their feet yet. They don’t have much money.”

Even though Laos has a national law protecting the free exercise of faith, similar assaults on Christians have become common in the one-party communist state with a mostly Buddhist population.

In Saravane province, 15 Christians from seven families were evicted from villages between 2020 and 2021.  

Earlier this year, 15 families and a pastor were forced to leave Mai village in northwestern Luang Namtha because of their Christian beliefs. 

The village is home to many members of the Ahka minority, which has its own spiritual beliefs. But when 15 families in the village converted to Christianity, their neighbors banded together and chased them out of town.

‘Religion of foreigners’

A Christian in a different village in southern Laos said he was told to leave by security guards.

“They don’t want us to live with them,” he said. “We can’t organize any ceremony like a wedding. We’re not allowed to get together or set up loudspeakers.”

A Christian pastor in northern Laos told RFA that some villagers think Christianity is a threat to their community because it’s “the religion of foreigners.”  

In several recent cases, crimes against Christian victims have gone unsolved in Laos. 

In February 2022, attackers burned the house of a Christian ethnic family in Savannakhet province. In Khammouane province, a pastor was found dead in October 2022. His body showed signs that he had been tortured prior to his death. 

No suspects have been arrested in either case.

The Christian who has been helping the families recently evicted in Samoey District said that no one has been charged in their case as well. 

“Even though they are now living in a separate village, they still receive threats and harassment from residents of their old villages, another Christian said of the families. “They can’t live in peace.”

A Samoey District official said that setting aside land for the families was the most important way for authorities to help the families. Additionally, other villagers and village authorities have been ordered to stop their harassment, he said.

Two Democrats who serve on panels that oversee the Pentagon have stepped up their campaign to curb what they call widespread “price gouging” in contracts for military spare parts.

Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Rep. John Garamendi of California, both of them members of their chamber’s Armed Services Committee, pressed their case Wednesday in a pair of letters obtained by CQ Roll Call.

Warren and Garamendi expressed outrage that defense contractors are exploiting loopholes so the companies can regularly refuse to provide the Defense Department legally required data to document that their parts’ prices are fair and reasonable on contracts awarded without competition.

One of the missives went to Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III and the other to Kevin M. Stein, president and CEO of Cleveland-based TransDigm Group Inc., a company that has been at the center of the spare parts pricing controversy for more than a decade.

“Contractors who consistently refuse to turn over cost and pricing data continue to rake in DoD contracts,” Warren and Garamendi wrote to Austin.

In the lawmakers’ letter to Stein, they wrote that his company’s “ongoing refusal to provide DoD with pricing data is unacceptable given the company’s record of ripping off the government and taxpayer.”

‘Egregious’ records

The lawmakers cited not just TransDigm but also Boeing Co., one of the Pentagon’s top contractors, as having “particularly egregious” records on this score.

Those two companies have publicly denied wrongdoing in these matters.

TransDigm, for its part, refused to provide the Pentagon with cost data on 401 different items in a one-year period ending September 2022, according to a previously undisclosed Defense Department report to Congress on contractor cost disclosures.

Defense Department Undersecretary for Acquisition and Sustainment William LaPlante wrote in the report that the problem may be bigger than is known.

“The Department believes the problem in obtaining data from contractors to support fair and reasonable prices may be more prevalent than what has been collected to date, particularly with respect to sole source commercial products,” LaPlante wrote in the report, which was obtained by CQ Roll Call.

The Pentagon inspector general’s office disclosed in December 2021 that TransDigm owed the department nearly $21 million for overcharges on spare parts — the latest in a series of adverse audit findings about the company’s pricing practices.

The lawmakers noted in their Wednesday letter to Stein that there has been “no public update of the status” of the $21 million refund. They asked Stein to provide one.

In 2019, TransDigm repaid the government $16 million for a similar set of overcharges.

As for Boeing, the prior year’s Defense Department report on the issue found that Boeing had declined to provide cost data on nearly 11,000 parts on one contract.

‘Unacceptable exploitation’

Back in May of this year, Warren and Garamendi wrote to the Pentagon, TransDigm and Boeing seeking more information about military parts prices and how much information companies are withholding from the government.

Wednesday’s letters follow up on the May missives and indicate that the two lawmakers did not consider the responses to their earlier letter to be adequate.

“The latest report of contractors’ refusal to provide pricing data, along with the responses from Boeing, TransDigm, and DoD, highlight the need for DoD and congressional action,” the two lawmakers wrote in this week’s letter to Austin. “As stewards of taxpayers’ money, we look forward to your feedback and cooperation on how we can prevent unacceptable exploitation of the current contracting system.”

The new Warren-Garamendi letters posed a series of detailed questions to Austin and Stein with a view to gathering more information about the situation and to shape potential congressional responses.

9,400 percent profit

The Pentagon’s history of paying inflated prices for military spare parts is infamous. Stories about the issue surged during the 1980s defense buildup, including examples such as a $400 plastic knob for a fighter jet and a $37 screw for a ballistic missile, not to mention an ordinary hammer for $435.

Recent disclosures echo those bygone reports. In 2019, the Pentagon inspector general disclosed one instance where TransDigm charged $4,361 for a half-inch metal pin — representing nearly 9,400 percent in excess profit.

Other defense contractors besides TransDigm have been found to have overcharged for spare parts. These include top Pentagon contractors — Boeing, Raytheon Technologies Corp. (now RTX Corp.) and Lockheed Martin Corp.

Warren has ridden herd on the spare parts problem for many years.

She and Garamendi have been joined by other members from both parties in both chambers — including California Democratic Reps. Ro Khanna of the Armed Services Committee and Barbara Lee of the Appropriations Committee — in attempting to hold the Pentagon to account for oversight of spare parts prices.

The House-passed fiscal 2024 Defense appropriations bill contains an amendment by Lee that would require a Pentagon report to the Appropriations committees in both chambers on the department’s efforts to crack down on contractors that have charged excessive prices for parts.

In May, Warren joined with four other senators in writing Austin about that problem and the broader scourge of procurement fraud.

The other senators on that letter were Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Ron Wyden, D-Ore., Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa and Mike Braun, R-Ind.

Loopholes

At the same time, Warren has joined with Braun and Garamendi on legislation that would close some of the perceived loopholes.

These include one that enables contractors to withhold cost data from the Pentagon in cases where a part is like a commercial one — even if the part is only being sold to the U.S. military, experts have said.

Companies are also able to avoid disclosure of cost data for deals worth less than $2 million. That threshold was raised in the fiscal 2018 NDAA from $750,000 in an effort to streamline contracting and acquisitions.

In this week’s letter to Austin, Warren and Garamendi expressed concern that the department is not moving aggressively enough to tackle the problem.

“It remains unclear if any acquisitions have been canceled or if DoD is otherwise using its full authority to ensure the government isn’t being ripped off,” they wrote.

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© 2023 CQ-Roll Call, Inc

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Jamie Lynn Spears was tired of being in the jungle.

The “Zoey 101” actor has dropped out of the British reality competition show “I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!,” per ITV — the channel that airs the program.

“Jamie Lynn Spears has left ‘I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here!’ on medical grounds,” an ITV spokesperson wrote in a statement. “She’s been a fantastic camp mate who has triumphed at trials and bonded well with her fellow celebrities.”

In the show, celebrities of all eras are joined together to live in the harsh conditions of the Australian rain forest. Each contestant must work to secure food to avoid being voted off the program by viewers.

Spears’ castmates were made aware of her decision to not return to the show. Her last appearance on the show aired Wednesday.

In the program’s prior episode, Spears had expressed to others on the show that she was finding it increasingly challenging to be separated from her family for such an extended period.

“I do not want to be here. F— this,” she said. “I just want to see my kids, that’s it. I’ll stay out here with these fricking critters, just let me see them.”

She then backtracked, saying later in the episode, “I want to try and suck it up so I can be a better camp mate.”

While on the show, Spears also discussed her strained relationship with her older sister, Britney Spears.

“She’s a good big sister, she is. Yeah, I love her. … Me and her throw down. The world’s seen that,” she said. “I’ve learned to stop talking about it publicly, but you know what, families fight. Listen, we just do it better than most.”

Spears’ exit marked her third departure from a reality TV competition this year.

In October, Spears was eliminated from the ABC reality program “Dancing With the Stars” after she and her dance partner scored a 16 out of 30 on their cha-cha routine.

The 32-year-old actor self-eliminated from the Fox reality show “Special Forces: World’s Toughest Test” in January.

“I miss my children if I’m away from them for like a couple of hours, I miss them,” Spears told her fellow contestant Mel B in the third episode of the season, which was her last. “So this is a very big leap for me.”

She later explained in a show testimonial: “It probably goes back to a lot of things. Not only do I just love [my kids] and want to be with them, but also being away from them like this, even just for myself, it makes me feel like a crap mom, you know? They didn’t ask for their mom to be gone.”

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© 2023 Los Angeles Times

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Struggling online marketplace Groupon, whose massive River North headquarters were once the nexus of the Chicago tech ecosystem, is moving to the Loop and downsizing to a 25,000-square-foot space in the Leo Burnett building.

In January, Groupon will make the 25th floor of 35 West Wacker Drive its new Chicago home on a 22-month sublease from Publicis, the French parent company of ad agency Leo Burnett, which occupies much of the 50-story office tower.

“Groupon has always had a thriving office culture and this move to a space that is better aligned to our new hybrid working ethos is a great step to kick off 2024 for our Chicago team,” interim CEO Dusan Senkypl said in a statement Tuesday.

Trading in 300,000 square feet at the former Montgomery Ward catalog warehouse for one floor in the Leo Burnett building is a reflection of both the challenging office market and the decline at Groupon, which has been losing money for years and issued a going concern warning in May, signaling the company could be headed for insolvency.

The onetime Chicago tech unicorn, which built its business on daily online deals featuring deep discounts on everything from laser hair removal to kickboxing classes, has been downsizing and retooling amid ongoing revenue declines. In the third quarter, Groupon reported a net loss of nearly $41 million and had about $86 million in cash left as of Sept. 30, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Revenues for the quarter were $126.5 million, down 12% year-over-year, according to the earnings report.

Senkypl, a Czech investor and Groupon’s largest shareholder, took over as interim CEO in March and has been attempting to execute a turnaround strategy. Step one has been cutting costs, such as terminating the company’s lease at 600 W. Chicago Ave. — two years early — as of January. Groupon paid a $9.6 million penalty to exercise the early termination option, according to SEC filings.

Launched in 2008, Groupon was once the center of the Chicago tech scene. Google tried to buy Groupon for $6 billion in 2010, but investors and co-founder Andrew Mason said no deal. By 2011, Groupon was valued at $25 billion, and the company went public that fall, raising $700 million in the largest tech initial public offering since Google.

The current market cap is about $350 million.

Groupon moved into its headquarters at 600 W. Chicago Ave. in 2010, becoming one the largest tenants at the former Montgomery Ward warehouse and leasing more than 300,000 square feet through January 2026. The entire space was listed for sublease this year.

The company had more than 11,000 employees worldwide at its peak in 2012. It is unclear how many Groupon employees remain in the Chicago area.

Groupon had 2,904 employees worldwide, including 799 in the U.S., at the end of 2022, according to SEC filings. Another 700 employees were laid off during the first quarter, with more cuts reported on LinkedIn as recently as this month.

A Groupon spokesperson declined to comment beyond the emailed statement.

Meanwhile, the broader Chicago office market remains in a deep slump, with companies continuing to shed space in the post-pandemic hybrid work environment. Vacancy in the city’s central business district, including direct and sublease availability, hit a record 28.2% during the third quarter, according to data from real estate services firm Avison Young.

Chicago office buildings have been hovering at about 50% of pre-pandemic occupancy levels, according to the latest weekly reports by Kastle Systems.

Built for Leo Burnett in 1989, the 35 West Wacker office tower encompasses 1.1 million square feet along the Chicago River. The storied Chicago-based ad agency occupies 32 of the distinctive green granite building’s 50 floors, but more than half of that space was put up for sublease earlier this year, according to real estate listings.

A Publicis spokesperson declined to comment Wednesday.

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© 2023 Chicago Tribune

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

A new study shows that almost 3,000 private wells near 63 U.S. military bases have dangerous levels of contamination by “forever chemicals.”

According to the Environmental Working Group, which is a non-profit organization based in Washington, D.C., the Department of Defense has contaminated thousands of private water wells with dangerous levels of PFAS, known as “forever chemicals.” The non-profit organization claimed that the Department of Defense has so far refused to provide the individuals who have been impacted by the contaminated wells with clean drinking water if the contamination did not rise to the level of its current standards.

Based on a study of the Defense Department’s records, the Environmental Working Group documented 2,805 drinking water wells near 63 former and current U.S. bases across 29 states with PFOA and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFOS) contamination. The Environmental Working Group reported that the PFAS levels are over four parts per trillion (ppt) but lower than the Department of Defense’s standard of 70 ppt. If the contamination in the water is above 70 ppt, the Defense Department provides individuals with alternative options for clean drinking water.

According to Military.com, the Environmental Protection Agency proposed a new forever chemical contamination limit of 4 parts per trillion earlier this year; however, the new limit is not expected to take effect until the end of the year.

READ MORE: Chemical company to pay $10.3 billion for allegedly poisoning public drinking water

Environmental Working Group researchers noted that while the organization was not aware of how many people rely on the contaminated wells for drinking, bathing, or cooking, the 76 locations that were tested as part of the study makes up only a small portion of the private wells located near 714 current and former military sites in the United States.

“They are going to have to test more bases,” Jared Hayes, an Environmental Working Group senior policy analyst said. “Those 2,805 are going to be a small number when they start testing drinking water wells near every single base.”

According to the Department of Defense’s website, the agency is investigating hundreds of U.S. military bases and the surrounding communities to see if drinking water, soil, or groundwater is contaminated with forever chemicals. Military.com noted that the Defense Department is responsible for a large portion of PFAS pollution in the United States due to the use of industrial solvents, firefighting foam, and chemical spills.

A report published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine explains that exposure to PFAS is linked to health issues such as cancer, high blood pressure during pregnancy, low birth weight, and a decreased response to vaccines.

The Environmental Working Group’s study also found that the Department of Defense had discovered 1,800 wells with over 70 ppt and had provided services to the owners of the wells to help mitigate the contamination.

According to Hayes, it is not clear how long some of the individuals located near the military bases with contaminated wells have been drinking water contaminated by forever chemicals. “Chances are it’s been years, decades,” he warned.

A group of Republican senators led by U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) sent a letter Friday to President Joe Biden, asking his administration to implement a ban on travel between the United States and China in light of an “unknown respiratory illness” that has recently been spreading throughout China.

Led by Rubio, Senators J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), Rick Scott (R-Fla.), Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), and Mike Braun (R-Ind.) wrote a letter expressing concerns about the Chinese “respiratory illness” and urging the president to take swift action to prevent another health crisis.

“In light of an unknown respiratory illness spreading throughout the People’s Republic of China (PRC), we call on you to immediately restrict travel between the United States and the PRC,” the senators wrote. “As you know, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has a long history of lying about public health crises. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the CCP’s obfuscation of the truth, and lack of transparency, robbed the United States of vital knowledge about the disease and its origin.”

A new mysterious respiratory illness is emerging in China and the mistakes from COVID-19 cannot be repeated.

Sent a letter to Pres Biden with Republican colleagues urging him to impose a travel ban on China until we gain further knowledge on this virus. pic.twitter.com/vzvxQu1rmQ

— Senator Marco Rubio (@SenMarcoRubio) December 1, 2023

Providing historical context for their request, the Republican senators pointed to former President Donald Trump’s order that restricted travel from China into the United States in January 2020, which the senators claimed was able to protect U.S. citizens and reduce the spread of the COVID-19 virus.

“Many officials and commentators—including you—criticized his decision as being influenced by ‘xenophobia,’” the senators wrote. “But history and common sense show his decision was the right one.” 

READ MORE: China may get Americans’ genetic data from tech firm: Report

The senators warned Biden that the world currently faces “another unknown pathogen” coming from China that has the potential to spread to other countries, including the United States.

“The PRC has reported an increase in this mystery illness—which it claims to be pneumonia caused by known pathogens—since mid-October,” the senators stated. “This illness reportedly is a special hazard for children and has overrun hospitals in the north of the country.”

Rubio and his Republican colleagues explained that the World Health Organization has noted that it is not clear whether the mysterious disease has been caused to an increase in respiratory infections or “separate events.” “If history is any indication, we have cause to be concerned,” the senators warned.

The increase in respiratory cases in China caused the World Health Organization to ask China last week for more information on the issue. The World Health Organization released a statement, saying, “WHO has made an official request to China for detailed information on an increase in respiratory illnesses and reported clusters of pneumonia in children.”

While the Republican senators acknowledged that the World Health Organization requested additional information from China regarding the “mystery illness,” Rubio and his fellow senators claimed that the Chinese Communist Party has an “incentive to lie.” Citing China’s record with the COVID-19 pandemic, the senators explained that a new pathogen could result in the derailment of China’s efforts to “stimulate” its economy.

“Besides, we should not wait for the WHO to take action given its track record of slavish deference to the CCP. We must take the necessary steps to protect the health of Americans, and our economy,” the senators wrote. “That means we should immediately restrict travel between the United States and the PRC until we know more about the dangers posed by this new illness. A ban on travel now could save our country from death, lockdowns, mandates, and further outbreaks later.”

The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department arrested over 70 individuals and identified over 200 victims in a sex trafficking operation during the recent Formula 1 Las Vegas Grand Prix.

According to 8 News Now, Las Vegas police used the month of November to educate hundreds of employees at hotels, nightclubs, casinos, hospitals, and airlines, as well as various community groups, on how to identify potential victims of human trafficking before the week-long operation was conducted during the Las Vegas Grand Prix.

During a Tuesday press briefing, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Deputy Chief Nicholas Farese said, “What we’re seeing in the human trafficking world is that these panderers, these pimps, they travel around the country and sometimes internationally, going where the money is, so we weren’t surprised to see people flying in.”

During the press briefing, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department emphasized the widespread nature of human trafficking in the area. Capt. Hector Cintron, who works in the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department’s Gangs, Vice, and Special Investigations Bureau, told the community that sex trafficking is not limited to the city’s “tourist corridors” but that it is happening in the neighborhoods “beyond the strip.”

“During this operation, we arrested 36 individuals for pandering, or more commonly known as sex trafficking, 31 people who were trying to purchase sex for money, 7 individuals for luring a child or soliciting a minor,” Cintron said. “This was part of a covert operation where the sex buyer believed they were meeting an underage victim for sex.”

READ MORE: 26 arrested in human trafficking ring bust

In addition to the 74 individuals who were arrested as part of the operation in Las Vegas, police officers were also able to identify 215 people that they believed were victims of sex trafficking, as well as five individuals below the age of 18.

Farese told reporters, “These are 5 juveniles that were reported as runaways that we came into contact with, in various operations both on the strip and then in other areas of town, that are running away from a bad situation and then they’re being preyed upon by human traffickers.”

According to Fox 5 Vegas, Las Vegas police worked in conjunction with Signs of Hope’s R.I.S.E. program, which is a non-profit organization that provides support and resources to human trafficking victims. While only 10% of the human trafficking victims accepted the non-profit’s services, a spokesperson for the R.I.S.E program highlighted the positive impact the organization is able to have on those who accept the services.

“Housing, employment, education, we’re able to assist the victims to get out of the life and provide them with a different way of life,” the representative said. “When we see victims that want to follow up and for our resources, we see that as a win. Each and every time, we see it as a win, no matter how many.”

During Tuesday’s press briefing, the police department also announced that it is planning to introduce a new sex trafficking initiative that will involve a partnership with the National Football League, as well as other groups in the community.

The last operating blast furnace at U.S. Steel’s plant in Granite City will remain idled indefinitely, the company said Tuesday, extending a closure first billed as temporary.

The company on Tuesday also notified 600 additional employees that they might lose their jobs.

U.S. Steel spokeswoman Amanda Malkowski, however, said the company only expected to lay off a portion of those.

And a local union official said he thought the plant would keep operating with the same number of workers, at least for now.

The fate of the Granite City plant has been in question since last summer, when U.S. Steel revealed plans to sell a portion of the facility to Chicago-based SunCoke Energy in a deal that would eliminate nearly 1,000 of 1,450 jobs at the plant.

The companies are still in discussion.

Then, lending further uncertainty, U.S. Steel said this summer that it was considering a sale of the company.

The Pittsburgh-based steel company has not made any public announcements about finalizing either potential transaction.

The Granite City facility has two blast furnaces, used to make steel. One was previous shut down.

This fall, U.S. Steel shut down the second temporarily, predicting the closure would last less than six months.

But in a layoff notice filed with area officials, dated Tuesday, the company told 1,000 employees it now expects the closure will continue longer.

Of those, 400 workers were already on temporary layoff from the site. The notification this week warned 600 more that permanent layoffs could be on the horizon.

Dan Simmons, president of United Steelworkers Local 1899, said Tuesday afternoon that he expected the plant to keep operating with the same number of workers for now.

The company estimated that, of the 1,000 total workers who received the notices, 60% might ultimately be affected, Malkowski said.

The changes will begin as early as Jan. 28, according to the notice.

When the decision to idle the blast furnace was first announced in September, the company blamed softening demand from the automotive industry, due to the sprawling United Auto Workers strike. Officials pushed back on the company’s assertion that the strike was to blame: U.S. Rep. Nikki Budzinski, D-Illinois, cast it as an attempt to “pit working people against one another.”

The UAW walkout at the Big Three automakers — Ford, General Motors and Stellantis — ended in late October.

On Tuesday, U.S. Steel said the move to idle the blast furnace indefinitely was made to balance its production with customer demand.

The company’s steel rolling and finishing operations at the site will continue, using metal slabs from other facilities.

Granite City Mayor Mike Parkinson said he is already thinking about the buildings and land that will be left vacant as parts of the plant close. He said he is concerned with how those areas will be maintained, and is raising the issue with U.S. Steel.

“I’m going to force them to start thinking about that,” Parkinson said. “My citizens deserve better.”

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© 2023 STLtoday.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC

President Joe Biden’s administration announced a new series of highway emissions regulations last week while Americans were traveling for the Thanksgiving holiday.

The new rule, established by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), requires state and local transportation agencies to create greenhouse gas reduction targets to be used for federal-funded road projects.

Announcing the finalized rule, FHWA explained that the agency is taking two major steps to address the “impacts of climate change” through the president’s “whole-of-government approach” to reduce carbon pollution by 50% before 2030.

First, the FHWA said the rule adds a new measure of greenhouse gas performance management to the agency’s national performance measures to create a “national framework” in order to help individual states “track performance” while making “informed investment decisions.” The FHWA also said the new rule would establish a “flexible system” for state Department of Transportation and Metropolitan Planning Organization agencies to set individual targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

“Every state has its own unique climate challenges, and every state ought to have the data, funding, and flexibility it needs to meet those challenges head on,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said. “This new performance measure will provide states with a clear and consistent framework to track carbon pollution and the flexibility to set their own climate targets—which we will also help them meet with more than $27 billion in federal funding through President Biden’s Investing in America agenda.”

While Federal Highway Administrator Shailen Bhatt claimed that the new performance measure will not “impose penalties” on states and local agencies that fail to achieve their greenhouse gas emission targets, critics of the Biden administration’s new rule have argued that the policy is an attempt by the federal government to use its funding to force state and local governments to adopt certain climate policies.

READ MORE: Biden admin tracking all Americans who traveled to DC on Jan. 6, 2021: Report

“Federal overreach to advance a misguided climate agenda has become a staple of the Biden administration,” Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.VA.) told the Daily Caller. “The final rule, which imposes the performance measure and the requirement to set greenhouse gas targets on state departments of transportation and metropolitan planning organizations (MPO), is just one more example of these harmful regulations.”

The West Virginia senator explained that emission reduction requirements similar to the new rule established by the FHWA were intentionally left out of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law that was passed in 2021.

“Without the authority to impose this mandate, the FHWA is ignoring the letter of the law to finalize a rule that hampers the ability of state DOTs and MPOs to address the transportation needs of their constituents,” Capito said.

American Road and Transportation Builders Association CEO Dave Bauer argued in a statement that the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law “would not have been bipartisan” if it had included requirements that forced states to address global climate change. Bauer suggested that states should prioritize transportation safety and mobility improvements with the funding provided by the bill, not addressing climate issues.

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) described the new rule as “fundamentally unworkable” in rural states throughout the country. He added, “I look forward to leading a Congressional Review Act resolution of disapproval overturning it.”

Dan Kish, a senior research fellow at the Institute for Energy Research, told the Daily Caller that the timing of the Biden administration’s announcement of the new rule was “not surprising.”

“It’s not surprising the Biden administration had Mayor Pete drop this regulation just as many Americans were fighting traffic to be with family on Thanksgiving on roads he won’t fix because he’s squandering gas tax money on bike lanes and climate nonsense. They don’t let the law get in the way of them imposing new edicts on Americans.”