NOT SO FAST — Beacon Hill leaders reluctant to suspend the state’s gas tax are finding little consensus on other ways to provide relief to residents facing record gas prices and rising inflation.
House Speaker Ron Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka continue to argue against shelving the 24-cents-per-gallon gas tax, with both Democrats saying Monday that the potential impact to the state’s bond rating outweighs possible savings for drivers.
“Twenty cents off $7 a gallon of gas is really not going to make anyone happy,” Mariano said at Monday’s post-leadership-meeting press conference. “We need to look at other ways to ease the inflation burden.”
But legislative leaders remained vague about the possible contents or timing of any relief package.
Mariano said he’s looking at “things that are more broad-based" and that would have "more of an impact on different segments of the population” than just drivers. Spilka said lawmakers could target “some tax breaks and credits” and cited past increases to the earned income tax credit as an example.
Gov. Charlie Baker also indicated he’d rather pursue broader tax relief — namely his proposed tax breaks for renters, seniors and low-income earners, and changes to the state’s estate tax — than pause the gas tax.
“The speaker’s kind of singing my song,” Baker said of Mariano. “We proposed about $700 million in tax cuts in our budget specifically to deal with the rising cost of everything.”
But GOP state Rep. Peter Durant, who led House Republicans’ unsuccessful push last week to suspend the gas tax, said “people need this relief now.” Durant suggested a sales tax holiday beyond the typical weekend in August; Baker unsuccessfully floated a two-month sales tax holiday last year.
“I’m very leery of the shiny object in the future. I don’t think it’s going to come,” Durant told Playbook. “I just think they’re kicking the can down the road and hope to see some turnaround in gas prices.”
GOOD TUESDAY MORNING, MASSACHUSETTS. Beacon Hill isn’t making much progress on punishing Russia for its bloody assault on Ukraine, either.
Mariano said the push to divest state pension funds from Russian companies has hit a roadblock.
“We’ve pretty much come to grips with the fact that getting at the investments that we might have through second or third parties — since we have no direct investments with the Soviet Union — would be a little bit too difficult,” Mariano said in reference to Russia.
TODAY — Baker makes a health care legislation announcement at Codman Square Health Center at 2 p.m. AG Maura Healey visits Baystate Medical Center at 11:30 a.m., Springfield Partners for Community Action at 1:40 p.m. and tours local small businesses at 2:30 p.m. Boston Mayor Michelle Wu is on GBH’s “Boston Public Radio” at 1 p.m. and WBZ’s “NightSide with Dan Rea” at 8 p.m.
Tips? Scoops? Need to debrief from the most dramatic episode of the most dramatic season of The Bachelor ever? Email me: lkashinsky@politico.com.
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— MAJORITY RULE: House Speaker Ron Mariano said he’s in “waiting mode” when it comes to naming a new majority leader to succeed now-U.S. Ambassador to Ireland Claire Cronin because “there are other changes that potentially may occur, so I would like to do them all at once if that’s possible.”
Mariano’s comment, made in response to a reporter’s question, comes as one of his division leaders, Lowell state Rep. Tom Golden, looks to become Lowell's next city manager. Mariano said he could know what he’s going to do in “two or three weeks.”
— “Package stores seek compromise in booze battle,”by Christian M. Wade, Eagle-Tribune: “Package store owners are urging lawmakers to avoid a costly ballot fight by passing legislation to expand beer and wine sales at convenience stores. A proposal heard by the Legislature’s Committee on Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure on Monday calls for gradually increasing the number of beer and wine licenses a single company can own — rising to 18 over the next decade. But the proposal offered by package store owners would set a new cap on how many total licenses can be issued to each business at seven, tighten limits on the sale of liquor and spirits, enhance ID requirements for sellers and increase penalties for businesses caught selling alcohol to minors.”
— “Fixing early ed system could cost $1.5 billion a year,”by Shira Schoenberg, CommonWealth Magazine: “Massachusetts’s early childhood education system is unaffordable and inaccessible to too many families, and it will cost an estimated $1.5 billion a year to improve it, according to a report released Monday by a special legislative commission looking at the economics of early education and care. The commission, led by Education Committee co-chairs Sen. Jason Lewis and Rep. Alice Peisch, calls for expanding the subsidies available to families while increasing financial support to childcare centers themselves and their workers. But it stops short of calling for universal public pre-kindergarten, as some activists have been calling for.”
— “Hackers hit Mass. background-check firm used by state agencies, universities,”by Dan Adams, Boston Globe: “Computer hackers made off with highly sensitive personal records on more than 164,000 job-seekers and license applicants in a virtual ‘smash and grab’ attack last November on Creative Services Inc., a Massachusetts company that conducts background checks on everyone from marijuana entrepreneurs to state employees, university faculty members, and workers at nuclear facilities. … The Mansfield firm said its security team was still investigating the motive and identity of the hackers behind the incident, which executives only disclosed in regulatory filings and letters to clients in February.”
— "Modernizing the bottle recycling program in Mass. would have big benefits, report finds,"by Miriam Wasser, WBUR: "Massachusetts could cut down on plastic litter, create less garbage, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and save cities and towns millions of dollars every year by modernizing the way it recycles beverage containers, according to a new report by the nonprofit Reloop North America."
NOT FEELING '22
— EYES EMOJI: Playbook asked Gov. Charlie Baker if he’s going to follow in Tom Brady’s footsteps and reverse his decision not to run for a third term. “That’s a very good take, by the way,” Baker replied on his way out of the post-leadership press conference. That’s not a no.
FROM THE HUB
— “Boston City Council to weigh protest restrictions,”by Emma Platoff and Danny McDonald, Boston Globe: “Members of the public and some elected officials Monday pushed back on Mayor Michelle Wu’s proposal to restrict the hours when protesters may demonstrate at private residences, with some warning of First Amendment violations and raising the specter of lawsuits even as Wu’s administration insisted the measure was on solid legal ground. … Among them were several people who routinely protest outside Wu’s home in the early morning hours, who defended their right to be there and characterized her neighborhood as a crucial venue for voicing their dissent.”
— “Lower Neponset River placed on Superfund priorities list,” by Gintautas Dumcius, Dorchester Reporter: “The Environmental Protection Agency on Monday said that 3.7 miles of the Neponset River as it runs through Hyde Park, Mattapan, Milton, and Dorchester to Boston Harbor, are now listed as a national priority for cleanup as a Superfund site.”
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PLANES, TRAINS AND AUTOMOBILES
— “Cheap fares, trains to more suburbs: This is what the MBTA was supposed to look like,”by Emily Sweeney, Boston Globe: “Imagine boarding the subway downtown and riding all the way to Lynn, Reading, Lexington, or Dedham — without ever switching trains. Or taking the Green Line from Boston all the way to Winchester and Woburn. That was the visionary plan for the region’s public transportation back in the 1940s.”
ON THE STUMP
— FIRST IN PLAYBOOK: Kristen Halbert, a community activist, political strategist and Democratic State Committee member, will serve as finance director for Tanisha Sullivan’s campaign for secretary of state.
— “With few specifics and lots of support, Maura Healey leads the race for Mass. governor. But it’s (very) early yet,”by Matt Stout, Boston Globe: “[State Attorney General Maura] Healey has ridden a long-forming wave of support to piles of cash, early endorsements, and significant political capital. The field has narrowed around her, creating a head-to-head race with Sonia Chang-DÃaz, a progressive state senator and first-time statewide candidate. Longtime admirers who have cheered Healey’s fast-moving rise within the party have quickly fallen into her column, giving her grassroots-level clout.”
RUSSIA-UKRAINE
— “Gillette supplies 70 percent of Russia’s shaving market, but it hasn’t cut ties with the country,”by Anissa Gardizy, Boston Globe: “Gillette has not cut ties with Russia, even as the country’s invasion of Ukraine has prompted other large firms to halt or scale back business operations there. The Boston-based shaving giant has a manufacturing facility in St. Petersburg where it makes more than 70 products, from disposable razors and double-edge blades to packaging. The plant accounts for nearly three quarters of the shaving product market in Russia.”
— “‘Things are growing worse by the hour’: Mass. Congress members weigh in on how US could help Ukraine,”by Gal Tziperman Lotan, Boston Globe: “Congress members expressed solidarity with [President Volodymyr Zelenskyy] and the Ukrainian people and denounced the bloodshed and destruction caused by troops of President Vladimir Putin of Russia, but some said it is unclear whether Putin’s ambitions can be contained by economic measures or if military action will be necessary.”
THE CLARK CAUCUS
— PRIORITIZING MATERNAL HEALTH: New legislation fromAssistant House Speaker Katherine Clark would expand a grant program to treat maternal mental health and substance-use disorders.
The pandemic has tripled the number of pregnant or postpartum women struggling with these conditions, Clark’s office said. The bipartisan, bicameral bill would reauthorize her “Bringing Postpartum Depression Out of the Shadows Act” from 2016, scale up existing treatment and screening programs, more than quadruple the number of state programs receiving federal support and codify the Maternal Mental Health Hotline.
“Despite incredibly high rates of mental health issues during pregnancy, 75% of mothers never get treatment," Clark said in a statement. "That ends now.”
MARKEYCHUSETTS
— “Senator Ed Markey wants daylight saving time to stay for good,”by Rebecca Tauber, GBH News: “[Sen. Ed Markey’s] efforts to keep daylight saving time could be a rare bipartisan win. He says conservative Florida Sen. Marco Rubio has signed on, as well as nine other Republicans. Markey would only need 10 Republicans if he could get all the Democrats on board to pass his legislation in the Senate.”
— “OSHA cites ‘serious’ workplace health exposures at Pittsfield trash-burning plant,”by Larry Parnass, Berkshire Eagle: “Workers at a Pittsfield waste-to-energy facility risked breathing in smoke containing arsenic, cadmium and lead, the federal government says, a finding that confirms other accounts of hazards at the bankrupt plant.”
THE LOCAL ANGLE
— “Seeking support: Worcester advisory committee suspends work out of frustration with city leadership,” by Steven H. Foskett Jr. “The city’s Diversity and Inclusion Advisory Committee voted Monday to suspend its work until it can get more support from city leadership. Members of the committee expressed frustration at the departure Friday of Chief Diversity Officer Stephanie Williams, who had been the group’s liaison with City Hall.”
— "As Omicron raged in January, job growth slowed in Mass.,"by Larry Edelman, Boston Globe: "Employers added 10,600 jobs in the first month of the year, down from a revised increase of 14,500 in December, the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development said on Monday. The state’s unemployment rate rose to 4.8 percent in January from a revised 4.6 percent in the previous month."
— “Mass. companies blast Texas governors' transgender care penalties,”by Steph Solis, Boston Business Journal: “Multiple Boston-area companies signed onto a letter urging Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to reverse course on his effort to seek criminal penalties for parents who help their transgender children get gender-affirming care.”
— "Elon Musk gives Labor secretary a Giga-tour," by Mike Allen, Axios: "Elon Musk hosted Labor Secretary Marty Walsh [over the weekend] at Tesla's Gigafactory Texas outside Austin, during the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival."
MEANWHILE IN NEW HAMPSHIRE
— "State Sen. Tom Sherman launches campaign for New Hampshire governor,"by Adam Sexton, WMUR: "State Sen. Tom Sherman, D-Rye, is launching a campaign for governor, becoming the first high-profile Democrat to step forward and throw his hat in the ring to challenge three-term, Republican incumbent Gov. Chris Sununu."
— “An unexpected comment from New Hampshire’s governor changes the calculus on marijuana legalization in the Granite state,”by James Pindell, Boston Globe: “[Gov. Chris] Sununu’s steadfastness to veto any [marijuana] legalization bill has been the reason why there has not been serious money or efforts behind the bills filed each year that would add New Hampshire to the list. … Speaking to the New England Council last week, Sununu gave an off-the-cuff response to a question where, for the first time publicly, he significantly softened his stance, especially as it relates to a specific bill being debated in the legislature.”
MEANWHILE IN RHODE ISLAND
— “R.I. unveils 5 finalists for new license plate design,” by Brian Amaral, Boston Globe: “The plate would replace the iconic ‘Wave’ license plate, though some of the designs also feature waves. The reaction on social media was, frankly, brutal.”
TRANSITIONS — Meaghan Hohl, Christian Rodriguez, Macsonny Onyechefule and Jesse Rogers have joined Seven Letter’s Boston office. Hohl will be a central figure in the agency’s newly launched ESG practice — along with Scott Deitz , who is based in Washington, D.C.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY — to Miles Weber, Johanna Campbell Case and Lenny Alcivar.
Want to make an impact? POLITICO Massachusetts has a variety of solutions available for partners looking to reach and activate the most influential people in the Bay State. Have a petition you want signed? A cause you’re promoting? Seeking to increase brand awareness among this key audience? Share your message with our influential readers to foster engagement and drive action. Contact Jesse Shapiro to find out how: jshapiro@politico.com.
“Brass is already calling this Fort Hood 2.0,” a military official said of the investigation now underway at Fort Sill. “It was a dark day at work today.”
he Army is investigating a possible series of sexual assaults of a female soldier at the Army training base in Fort Sill, Oklahoma, a commander at the base told press yesterday. The investigation, according to a military official with direct knowledge, is scrutinizing allegations of multiple assaults against the soldier by 22 service members. Video of one incident under investigation involving several drill sergeants was circulating at the base and was obtained by Army investigators, the official said.
The soldier, who was a trainee at the time of the alleged assaults, formally reported them on March 27. The alleged incidents at times involved groups of assailants, the military official said, and the woman’s report identified seven of the 22 members she said assaulted her. He spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive personnel matters.
“I heard the term ‘sex ring’ thrown around, which is not one you love to hear,” the official said, reflecting concerns that the assaults may have been coordinated.
Colonel Cathy Wilkinson, a spokesperson for the U.S. Army, denied investigators have obtained a video, but declined to answer follow-up questions. “Investigators do not have any such video,” Wilkinson said in a statement to The Intercept.
The unit implicated in the assault is the 1-78 Field Artillery Battalion. The Defense Department is removing multiple unit drill sergeants as a result of the investigation, which is being conducted by the Army Criminal Investigation Command. Stars and Stripes reported that “multiple” personnel at Fort Sill were suspended this week following a sexual assault report filed by a soldier in training, but did not specify the exact number. According to Maj. Gen. Ken Kamper, at Fort Sill, the service members under scrutiny were part of a cadre that trains incoming troops.
Reports of sexual assault in the military have gone up dramatically in recent years, rising 38 percent from 2016 to 2018 and by 10 percent between 2018 and 2019. More than 20,000 service members reported being sexually assaulted in 2018, according to Defense Department figures.
“It’s been bad historically but brass is already calling this Fort Hood 2.0,” the official said on Thursday evening. “It was a dark day at work today.”
etails from more than 500 million Facebook users have been found available on a website for hackers.
The information appears to be several years old but it is another example of the vast amount of information collected by Facebook and other social media sites and the limits to how secure that information is.
The availability of the data set was first reported by Business Insider. According to that publication, it contains information from 106 countries including phone numbers, Facebook IDs, full names, locations, birthdates and email addresses.
Facebook has been grappling with data security issues for years. In 2018, the social media giant disabled a feature that allowed users to search for one another via phone numbers, following revelations that the political firm Cambridge Analytica had accessed information on up to 87 million users without their knowledge or consent.
In December 2019, a Ukrainian security researcher reported finding a database with the names, phone numbers and unique user IDs of more than 267 million Facebook users – nearly all US-based – on the open internet. It is unclear if the current data dump is related to this database.
The Menlo Park, California-based company did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In a statement provided to other publications, Facebook said the leak was old and stemmed from a problem that had been fixed in 2019.
In addition to concerns about COVID safety, workers at Amazon have expressed frustration about impossibly high productivity expectations and are therefore starting to unionize. (photo: Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)
Amazon Apology to Democrat Includes Admission Drivers Urinate in Bottles Guardian UK Excerpt: "Amazon has apologized to the congressman Mark Pocan, admitting to scoring an 'own goal' in its initial denial of his suggestion its drivers were sometimes forced to urinate in bottles during delivery rounds."
Firm hit back at Congressman Mark Pocan for saying workers had to urinate in bottles, before admitting Pocan was telling truth
mazon has apologized to the congressman Mark Pocan, admitting to scoring an “own goal” in its initial denial of his suggestion its drivers were sometimes forced to urinate in bottles during delivery rounds.
“We know that drivers can and do have trouble finding restrooms because of traffic or sometimes rural routes, and this has been especially the case during Covid when many public restrooms have been closed,” the company said in a blogpost.
Its admission came a week after the Wisconsin Democrat criticised working conditions for Amazon staff, saying in a tweet: “Paying workers $15 [an hour] doesn’t make you a ‘progressive workplace’ when you union-bust and make workers urinate in water bottles.”
Amazon responded: “You don’t really believe the peeing in bottles thing, do you? If that were true, nobody would work for us.”
It subsequently walked back that comment.
“This was an own goal, we’re unhappy about it, and we owe an apology to Representative Pocan,” Amazon said in its blogpost, adding that its previous response only referred to staff at warehouses and fulfilment centers.
In response, Pocan tweeted: “Sigh. This is not about me, this is about your workers who you don’t treat with enough respect or dignity.”
Amazon said urinating in bottles was an industry-wide problem and shared links to news articles about drivers for other delivery companies who have had to do so.
“Regardless of the fact that this is industry-wide, we would like to solve it,” the company said. “We don’t yet know how, but will look for solutions.”
The apology comes as workers at an Alabama warehouse are waiting for a vote count that could result in the online retailer’s first unionized facility in the US, which would be a watershed moment for organized labor.
Amazon has long discouraged attempts among its more than 800,000 US employees to organize. Allegations by many workers of a grueling or unsafe workplace have turned unionizing the company into a key goal for the US labor movement.
Pocan tweeted that the company should acknowledge “the inadequate working conditions you’ve created for all your workers, then fix that for everyone and finally, let them unionize without interference.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., speaks during a news conference after the Senate passed a COVID-19 relief bill in Washington, Saturday, March 6, 2021. (photo: J. Scott Applewhite/AP)
The majority leader shared his plans for cannabis legislation with POLITICO in an exclusive interview.
Schumer has been making waves on cannabis policy since he first introduced a bill to legalize marijuana in April 2018. It was part of his pitch for voting Democrat in the 2020 election, and now — with the majority in hand — he is putting together new federal marijuana reform legislation with Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
This week, Schumer’s home state of New York legalized marijuana use for adults, after years of failed efforts. More than 40 percent of Americans now live in states that have embraced full legalization.
President Joe Biden has been a conspicuous outlier among Democrats when it comes to supporting marijuana legalization. But Schumer said Biden’s reticence won’t deter the Senate from taking aggressive action to loosen federal restrictions.
“I want to make my arguments to him, as many other advocates will,” Schumer said in an interview with POLITICO this week. “But at some point we're going to move forward, period.“
Schumer pointed to the decade-long experiment with state legalization as evidence that the worst fears of what would happen were overblown. “The legalization of states worked out remarkably well,“ he said. “They were a great success. The parade of horribles never came about, and people got more freedom.“
Schumer was so enthusiastic to get to the cannabis policy discussion that he started sharing his thoughts before a question was posed. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Schumer: In 2018, I was the first member of the Democratic leadership to come out in support of ending the federal prohibition. I'm sure you ask, “Well what changed?” Well, my thinking evolved. When a few of the early states — Oregon and Colorado — wanted to legalize, all the opponents talked about the parade of horribles: Crime would go up. Drug use would go up. Everything bad would happen.
The legalization of states worked out remarkably well. They were a great success. The parade of horribles never came about, and people got more freedom. And people in those states seem very happy.
I think the American people started speaking with a clear message — more than two to one — that they want the law changed. When a state like South Dakota votes by referendum to legalize, you know something is out there.
Was there a specific moment or a specific experience that you can point to and say, “This is when I started to see this issue differently?”
A while back — I can't remember the exact year — I was in Denver. I just started talking to people, not just elected officials, but just average folks.
[They said] it benefited the state, and [didn’t] hurt the state. There were tax revenues, but people had freedom to do what they wanted to do, as long as they weren't hurting other people. That's part of what America is about. And they were exultant in it.
What difference does the fact that the Senate is now controlled by Democrats make for legalization, and is 51 votes enough to pass the bill that you're about to propose?
Probably the most important power of the majority leader is the ability to put bills on the floor. And the fact that I am introducing a bill, and the fact that people will know that there will be a vote on this sooner or later — that's the big difference.
Even when states were for this, if [then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch] McConnell wouldn't bring the bill up, their senators were never challenged: “How are you going to vote?” And they could say, “Well ... I don't know.” They don't have to say anything. And so the fact that every member will know once we introduce this legislation — not only that it has my support, but that it will come to the floor for a vote — is going to help move things forward in a very strong way.
What role does President Biden play in this? He does not support the full legalization of cannabis. Are you worried that he could veto this bill if it passes?
Well, he said he'd like to see more information on the issue. I respect that. I certainly will have an ongoing conversation with him, and tell him how my views evolved. And hope that his will to.
Will the Senate move forward even if the president's views do not evolve on this?
We will move forward. He said he's studying the issue, so [I] obviously want to give him a little time to study it. I want to make my arguments to him, as many other advocates will. But at some point we're going to move forward, period.
New York State will soon have a legal cannabis industry, and banking is going to be a big issue. The SAFE Banking Act has already been reintroduced in the Senate. Are you working with Banking Committee Chairman [Sherrod] Brown to move the SAFE Banking Act this Congress?
We've talked to the Banking Committee, and we certainly want to make sure that the communities that [have] most been affected by this — over the scheduling of marijuana — get some of the benefits here. But we have to figure out the right way to do that.
Chairman Brown has said that standalone cannabis legislation shouldn't move ahead of the comprehensive reform. Do you agree with that statement?
I would like to see it all move together, yes.
You said during the 2020 election that McConnell's opposition to cannabis policy was the primary thing holding it up. But do you know of or believe there are other Republicans who do support removing cannabis from the Controlled Substances Act?
Yes. What we want to do is first introduce our comprehensive bill, and then start sitting down with people who are not for this in both parties, and A) try to educate them, B) see what their objections are, and if they have some modifications that don't interfere with the main thrust of the bill — we'd certainly listen to some suggestions if that'll bring more people on board. That is not to say we're going to throw overboard things like expungement of records — [things that are] very important to us — just because some people don't like it.
Speaking of expungement of records, most criminal records are at the state level, not at the federal level. Do you think that the federal government should be pushing states to expunge those records?
Yes.
How?
While we can't require it, we can get all kinds of different incentives — incentives and disincentives.
Along those lines, decriminalization versus legalization is something that a lot of people don't fully understand. You actually said yesterday to reporters that you call it “decriminalization” because that lets the states legalize. And just to clarify, when you say decriminalization…
I am personally for legalization. And the bill that we'll be introducing is headed in that direction.
Does it remove marijuana completely from the Controlled Substances Act?
Oh, you'll have to wait. I don't want to get into the details of our bill. You'll have to wait and see.
The vice president sponsored the [comprehensive legalization legislation] MORE Act in the previous Congress. Has she been involved at all in these legalization talks?
We would like to get her involved, but we have not yet.
You said that the timeline on this bill is soon. Does that mean that we're going to see it in the next two weeks?
Texas, Florida and Arizona are among the Republican-led states considering similar legislation, setting the stage for potential clashes with companies headquartered there.
Industry experts are closely watching how things unfold in Georgia to see whether there is a boycott and loss of business similar to what North Carolina experienced with regard to its “bathroom bill” from 2016. That picture became clearer on Friday when Major League Baseball announced it won’t hold this year’s All-Star Game in Georgia as initially planned.
Companies in Texas are already weighing in on a bill making its way through the state legislature that would limit early voting hours and broaden the authority of partisan poll watchers.
American Airlines came out against the legislation, passed by the state Senate on Thursday, while Dallas-based Southwest Airlines said in a statement that “the right to vote is foundational to our democracy” but did not oppose the measure outright.
“This is not good enough, @SouthwestAir. Do you oppose these extreme voter suppression bills SB7/HB6?” tweeted Julián Castro, the former Democratic mayor of San Antonio and secretary of Housing and Urban Development under former President Obama.
That kind of public criticism is putting more pressure on consumer-facing businesses to pick a side, experts say.
"Whether they want to or not, I think [companies are] going to increasingly get pulled into policy issues, and sometimes policy issues that are very political. In the old days, maybe it was a little easier to say, 'We don’t comment on it. We don’t talk about it.' I think increasingly that’s just not really realistic," said John Forrer, director of the Institute for Corporate Responsibility at George Washington University.
Voting rights advocates are focusing their attention on Arizona and Florida as well.
In Arizona, a bill that would impose restrictions on early and mail-in voting is likely to land on Gov. Doug Ducey’s (R) desk. The state legislature in Florida, where potential 2024 GOP presidential contender Ron DeSantis is governor, is considering a similar bill targeting absentee ballots.
Both states have major sporting events on the horizon, just like Georgia did. The Super Bowl is slated for Glendale, Ariz., in 2023, and Miami is in the running to host part of the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
The intensifying debate isn’t just ensnaring companies with headquarters in states considering new voting laws.
Brad Smith, president of Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft, said his company is concerned about Georgia’s election law after deciding "to invest substantially in Atlanta" by purchasing land for new office space.
“Two things are clear to us. First, the right to vote is the most cherished aspect of democracy. And second, this new law has important provisions that unfairly restrict the rights of people to vote legally, securely, and safely,” Smith wrote in a blog post, noting that the company raised concerns with the legislation before it became law.
The national-level corporate criticism comes five years after North Carolina faced significant backlash for enacting its so-called bathroom law that targeted transgender people. The state lost more than $3.76 billion in business, according to an Associated Press analysis from 2017, as major companies refused to build or expand in the state and concerts and major sporting events were canceled.
Few companies have taken similar action in Georgia, though Major League Baseball's announcement on Friday could prompt others to follow suit.
"The most proactive action as a company ... is to come out now and say, 'Look. We stand against a policy in any state that doesn’t meet these basic criteria, or we expect any voting policy to look like X,'" said Daniella Ballou-Aares, CEO of the Leadership Now Project, a consortium of more than 300 business leaders and academics working to enact democratic reforms.
Ballou-Aares, who worked in the State Department during the Obama administration, said employers face even more pressure to do something when the legislation is in their home state.
“Companies have always been concerned about their employees, and we have seen companies engage for a long time on issues relevant to their local employees,” said Ballou-Aares.
In Georgia, both Coca-Cola CEO James Quincey and Delta CEO Ed Bastian called the voting bill “unacceptable” but only after boycott threats.
Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams called the responses from corporate America “mealy-mouthed” and said she was “deeply disappointed” that many didn't speak up until after the bill was signed into law, not while it was making its way through the state legislature.
Forrer said such missteps can be prevented.
“It’s natural for activists to try to target those corporations that are most closely aligned with it to try to turn the heat on. So companies need to start anticipating taking stances on issues because they are increasingly being pressured to,” he said.
Some state leaders seemed to welcome the fight with their corporate critics.
Georgia Republicans this week took a swipe at Delta by passing a bill in the state House to repeal a tax break on jet fuel.
When asked this week about the corporate backlash, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) told CNBC he’s “glad to deal with it.”
I'm gonna tell you fascists You may be surprised The people in this world Are getting organized You're bound to lose You fascists bound to lose
Race hatred cannot stop us This one thing we know Your poll tax and Jim Crow And greed has got to go You're bound to lose You fascists bound to lose.
All of you fascists bound to lose: I said, all of you fascists bound to lose: Yes sir, all of you fascists bound to lose: You're bound to lose! You fascists: Bound to lose!
People of every color Marching side to side Marching âcross these fields Where a million fascists dies You're bound to lose You fascists bound to lose!
I'm going into this battle And take my union gun We'll end this world of slavery Before this battle's won You're bound to lose You fascists bound to lose!
Honeybees on the outside of a bee hive. U.S. agriculture has become almost 50 times more toxic to honeybees and other insects over the past 25 years, a new study finds. (photo: Redux)
Insect 'Apocalypse' in US Driven by 50x Increase in Toxic Pesticides Stephen Leahy, National Geographic Leahy writes: "America's agricultural landscape is now 48 times more toxic to honeybees, and likely other insects, than it was 25 years ago, almost entirely due to widespread use of so-called neonicotinoid pesticides, according to a new study published today in the journal PLOS One."
Bees, butterflies, and other insects are under attack by the very plants they feed on as U.S. agriculture continues to use chemicals known to kill.
merica’s agricultural landscape is now 48 times more toxic to honeybees, and likely other insects, than it was 25 years ago, almost entirely due to widespread use of so-called neonicotinoid pesticides, according to a new study published today in the journal PLOS One.
This enormous rise in toxicity matches the sharp declines in bees, butterflies, and other pollinators as well as birds, says co-author Kendra Klein, senior staff scientist at Friends of the Earth US.
“This is the second Silent Spring. Neonics are like a new DDT, except they are a thousand times more toxic to bees than DDT was,” Klein says in an interview.
Using a new tool that measures toxicity to honey bees, the length of time a pesticide remains toxic, and the amount used in a year, Klein and researchers from three other institutions determined that the new generation of pesticides has made agriculture far more toxic to insects. Honey bees are used as a proxy for all insects. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency does the same thing when requiring toxicity data for pesticide registration purposes, she explained.
The study found that neonics accounted for 92 percent of this increased toxicity. Neonics are not only incredibly toxic to honeybees, they can remain toxic for more than 1,000 days in the environment, said Klein.
“The good news is that we don’t need neonics,” she says. “We have four decades of research and evidence that agroecological farming methods can grow our food without decimating pollinators.”
“It’s stunning. This study reveals the buildup of toxic neonics in the environment, which can explain why insect populations have declined,” says Steve Holmer of American Bird Conservancy.
As insects have declined, the numbers of insect-eating birds have plummeted in recent decades. There’s also been a widespread decline in nearly all bird species, Holmer said. “Every bird needs to eat insects at some point in their life cycle.”
What are neonics?
Neonic insecticides, also known as neonicotinoids, are used on over 140 different agricultural crops in more than 120 countries. They attack the central nervous system of insects, causing overstimulation of their nerve cells, paralysis and death.
They are systemic insecticides, which means plants absorb them and incorporate the toxin into all of their tissues: stems, leaves, pollen, nectar, sap. It also means neonics are in the plant 24/7, from seed to harvest, including dead leaves. Nearly all of neonic use in the U.S. is for coating seeds, including almost all corn and oilseed rape seed, the majority of soy and cotton seeds, and many yard plants from garden centers.
However only 5 percent of the toxin ends up the corn or soy plant; the rest ends up the soil and the environment. Neonics readily dissolve in water, meaning what’s used on the farm won’t stay on the farm. They’ve contaminated streams, ponds, and wetlands, studies have found.
This is the first study to quantify how toxic agricultural lands have become for insects and it shows toxicity levels rapidly increased when treating seeds with neonics really took off, said Klein. “This is also when beekeepers began to see declines in bee numbers,” she says.
These are correlations, since the study did not quantify or estimate what bees or other insects are actually exposed to. It may or may not overestimate actual insecticide doses received by bees, the study says.
However, the study did not look at the many documented nonlethal impacts of neonics on bees, including impaired reproduction, altered immune function, and inability to navigate effectively.
“For that reason we think our study is a very conservative estimate,” Klein says.
Insect apocalypse?
Some scientists have been warning that there is an “insect apocalypse” underway. A global analysis of 452 species in 2014 estimated that insect abundance had declined 45 percent over 40 years. In the U.S. the numbers of iconic Monarch butterflies has fallen 80 to 90 percent in the last 20 years. A study published last month reported that 81 species of butterflies in Ohio declined by an average of 33 percent in the last 20 years. Systematic measurements of butterfly populations are the best indicator of how the world’s 5.5 million insect species are doing, the authors of the Ohio study noted.
Not only do bees, butterflies, and other insects pollinate one-third of all food crops, declining insect numbers can also have catastrophic ecological repercussions. Renowned Harvard entomologist E.O. Wilson has said that without insects the rest of life, including humanity, “would mostly disappear from the land. And within a few months.”
In April 2019 a major study warned that 40 percent of all insect species face extinction due to pesticides—particularly neonics, since they’re the most widely used insecticide on the planet—but also because of with climate change and habitat destruction.
The study authors acknowledge that “their analysis is simplistic and not a suitable basis upon which to draw conclusions about risk,” says David Fischer, Chief Scientist and Director, Pollinator Safety, at Bayer Crop Science.
Regulatory agencies such as the EPA have concluded that seed treatment with neonics poses a low risk, Fischer wrote in an email.
Bayer-Monsanto makes imidacloprid and clothianidin, two of the three neonicotinoids that contributed most to overall toxicity, according to the PLOS One study. Syngenta-ChemChina makes the third one, thiamethoxam.
“Neonics are less toxic to non-target organisms than older insecticides, and, when used according to the label, are low risk to bees,” says Syngenta in a statement.
In 2018, the European Union banned neonicotinoids for field use based on their harm to pollinators. In 2019, Canada also passed restrictions on the use of the most widely used neonicotinoids.
Farms using neonics had 10 times the insect pressure and half the profits compared to those who use regenerative farming methods instead of insecticides according a 2018 study. Like agroecological farming, regenerative agricultural uses cover crops, no-till and other methods to increase on-farm biodiversity and soil health. The regenerative corn-soy operations in the study didn’t have to worry about insect problems, said co-author Jonathan Lundgren, an agroecologist and Director of the ECDYSIS Foundation.
Farmers who are dependent on chemicals are going out of business, said Lundgren, who is also a grain farmer in South Dakota. “It’s painful to see when we have tested, scientifically sound solutions. Working with nature is a good business decision,” he says.
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