May, 22 2019, 12:00am EDT
Telecom-Friendly House Democrats Are Pushing a Letter to Undermine Net Neutrality
Fight for the Future has learned that ahandful of House Democrats are shopping around a letter that echoes ISP lobbyist talking points, incorrectly claiming that the Save the Internet Act to restore net neutrality is dead and calling for the creation of a disingenuous "bipartisan working group," modeled after the one created in the Senate by Roger Wicker and Kyrsten Sinema, who are widely seen as enemies of the effort to restore net neutrality.
WASHINGTON
Fight for the Future has learned that ahandful of House Democrats are shopping around a letter that echoes ISP lobbyist talking points, incorrectly claiming that the Save the Internet Act to restore net neutrality is dead and calling for the creation of a disingenuous "bipartisan working group," modeled after the one created in the Senate by Roger Wicker and Kyrsten Sinema, who are widely seen as enemies of the effort to restore net neutrality.
The group is rumored to be led by Rep Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Rep Scott Peters (D-CA) who together have takenhundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from big telecom companies. Some of the reported signers include Democrats who have a track record of siding with big cable interests over their constituents, while others may have simply been misled into signing a letter they were told was in support of net neutrality. The fact remains that not a single House Democrat voted against the Save the Internet Act, and it continues to enjoy overwhelming public support.
The letter, a copy of which was obtained by Fight for the Future and is posted below, is unnecessary and misleading. The Save the Internet Act passed the House with massive support, and a similar measure passed the Senate with bipartisan support just last year. The bill reflects overwhelming bipartisan consensus from voters, who overwhelmingly support the restoration of real net neutrality protections, regardless of their political persuasion. The FCC's repeal of net neutrality also faces a court challenge, the outcome of which will dramatically change the calculus for the Save the Internet Act.
Zero net neutrality advocacy groups support the creation of such a working group -- the only purpose of this letter is to amplify the cable industry's narrative and build support for their end goal, which is to pass weak, loophole-filled legislation that claims to save net neutrality while permanently undermining it.
The letter has not yet been released, and many of the signers may not be aware of its true intent. Below is the list of reported signers. Please contact them and tell them to take their names off this misleading, anti-net neutrality letter, and instead to continue fighting on behalf of their constituents' internet freedom.
- Rep Ami Bera | (202) 225-5716 | @RepBera
- Rep Anthony Brindisi | (202) 225-3665 | @RepBrindisi
- Rep Anthony Brown | (202) 225-8699 | @RepAnthonyBrown
- Rep Salud Carbajal | (202) 225-3601 | @RepCarbajal
- Rep Tony Cardenas | (202) 225-6131 | @RepCardenas
- Rep Gil Cisneros | (202) 225-4111 | @RepGilCisneros
- Rep Lou Correa | (202) 225-2965 | @RepLouCorrea
- Rep Jim Costa | (202)-225-3341 | @RepJimCosta
- Rep TJ Cox | (202) 225-4695 | @RepTjCox
- Rep Henry Cuellar | (202) 225-1641 | @RepCuellar
- Rep Joe Cunningham | (202) 225-3176 | @JoeCunninghamSC
- Rep Abby Finkenauer | (202)-225-2911 | @RepFinkenauer
- Rep Lizzie Fletcher | (202)-225-2571 | @RepFletcher
- Rep Bill Foster | (202)-225-3515 | @RepBillFoster
- Rep Sylvia Garcia | (202)-225-1688 | @LaCongresista
- Rep Vincente Gonzalez | (202)-225-2531 | @RepGonzalez
- Rep Josh Gottheimer | (202) 225-4465 | @RepJoshG
- Rep Hank Johnson | (202) 226-0691 | @ReElectHank
- Rep Eddie Bernice Johnson | (202) 225-8885 | @RepEBJ
- Rep Josh Harder | (202) 225-4540 | @RepJoshHarder
- Rep Alcee Hastings | (202) 225-1171 | @RepHastingsFL
- Rep Katie Hill | (202) 225-1956 | @RepKatieHill
- Rep Kendra Horn | (202) 225-2132 | @RepKendraHorn
- Rep Steven Horsford | (202) 225-9783 | @RepHorsford
- Rep Chrissy Houlahan | (202) 225-4315 | @RepHoulahan
- Rep Derek Kilmer | (202) 225-5916 | @RepDerekKilmer
- Rep Ann Kirkpatrick | (202) 225-2542 | @RepKirpatrick
- Rep Daniel Lipinski | (202) 225-5701 | @RepLipinski
- Rep Ben McAdams | (202) 225-3011 | @RepBenMcAdams
- Rep Stephanie Murphy | (202) 225-4035 | @RepStephMurphy
- Rep Tom O'Halleran | (202) 225-3361 | @RepOHalleran
- Rep Scott Peters | (202) 225-0508 | @RepScottPeters
- Rep Kathleen Rice | (202) 225-5516 | @RepKathleenRice
- Rep Harley Rouda | (202) 225-2415 | @RepHarley
- Rep Dutch Ruppersberger | (202) 225-3061 | @Call_Me_Dutch
- Rep Kurt Schrader | (202) 225-5711 | @RepSchrader
- Rep David Scott | (202) 225-2939 | @RepDavidScott
- Rep Mikie Sherrill | (202) 225-5034 | @RepSherrill
- Rep Susie Lee | (202) 225-3252 | @RepSusieLee
- Rep Dina Titus | (202) 225-5965 | @RepDinaTitus
- Rep Norma Torres | (202) 225-6161 | @NormaJTorres
- Rep Xochitl Torres Small | (202) 225-2365 | @RepTorresSmall
- Rep Jefferson Van Drew | (202) 225-6572 | @VanDrewTeam
- Rep Filemon Vela | (202) 225-9901 | @RepFilemonVela
- Rep Debbie Wasserman Schultz | (202) 225-7931 | @RepDWStweets
Below is a copy of the reported letter obtained by Fight for the Future:
Dear Speaker Pelosi, Leader Hoyer and Whip Clyburn:
The Internet is one of the greatest engines of economic growth in our nation's history. It has fundamentally changed virtually every aspect of our lives -- how we connect with friends and family, as well as how we get our news, information, and entertainment. For that reason, we, like you, strongly support net neutrality and the preservation of an Open Internet. We commend you, Chairman Pallone, and Subcommittee Chairman Doyle for your leadership in championing this issue and for successfully advancing the "Save the Internet Act" through the House.
We, the undersigned, voted for this legislation because it represented an opportunity to resolve questions that courts have struggled with for decades. At the same time, we recognize that this legislation is unlikely to become law, or pass through the Senate, in its current form. If that proves true, consumers will be left without enforceable net neutrality protections while partisan conflict continues. We believe this result is unacceptable and unnecessary.
In the spirit of passing bipartisan, bicameral legislation that can be signed into law, we are calling for the establishment of a bipartisan working group, like the Wicker-Sinema effort in the Senate. As the Senate begins its bipartisan negotiations on net neutrality legislation, the House must also begin a process of forging bipartisan consensus. Various models for legislation could achieve our goals of providing strong, enforceable net neutrality protections for consumers.
We believe a bipartisan working group will allow us to work together to enact strong, enforceable protections that will ensure a truly free and open Internet for all. We hope that we can count on your support.
Sincerely,
Fight for the Future is a group of artists, engineers, activists, and technologists who have been behind the largest online protests in human history, channeling Internet outrage into political power to win public interest victories previously thought to be impossible. We fight for a future where technology liberates -- not oppresses -- us.
(508) 368-3026LATEST NEWS
'Seismic Win for Workers': FTC Bans Noncompete Clauses
Advocates praised the FTC "for taking a strong stance against this egregious use of corporate power, thereby empowering workers to switch jobs and launch new ventures, and unlocking billions of dollars in worker earnings."
Apr 23, 2024
U.S. workers' rights advocates and groups celebrated on Tuesday after the Federal Trade Commission voted 3-2 along party lines to approve a ban on most noncompete clauses, which Democratic FTC Chair Lina Khansaid "keep wages low, suppress new ideas, and rob the American economy of dynamism."
"The FTC's final rule to ban noncompetes will ensure Americans have the freedom to pursue a new job, start a new business, or bring a new idea to market," Khan added, pointing to the commission's estimates that the policy could mean another $524 for the average worker, over 8,500 new startups, and 17,000 to 29,000 more patents each year.
As Economic Policy Institute (EPI) president Heidi Shierholz explained, "Noncompete agreements are employment provisions that ban workers at one company from working for, or starting, a competing business within a certain period of time after leaving a job."
"These agreements are ubiquitous," she noted, applauding the ban. "EPI research finds that more than 1 out of every 4 private-sector workers—including low-wage workers—are required to enter noncompete agreements as a condition of employment."
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has suggested it plans to file a lawsuit that, as The American Prospectdetailed, "could more broadly threaten the rulemaking authority the FTC cited when proposing to ban noncompetes."
Already, the tax services and software provider Ryan has filed a legal challenge in federal court in Texas, arguing that the FTC is unconstitutionally structured.
Still, the Democratic commissioners' vote was still heralded as a "seismic win for workers." Echoing Khan's critiques of such noncompetes, Public Citizen executive vice president Lisa Gilbert declared that such clauses "inflict devastating harms on tens of millions of workers across the economy."
"The pervasive use of noncompete clauses limits worker mobility, drives down wages, keeps Americans from pursuing entrepreneurial dreams and creating new businesses, causes more concentrated markets, and keeps workers stuck in unsafe or hostile workplaces," she said. "Noncompete clauses are both an unfair method of competition and aggressively harmful to regular people. The FTC was right to tackle this issue and to finalize this strong rule."
Morgan Harper, director of policy and advocacy at the American Economic Liberties Project, praised the FTC for "listening to the comments of thousands of entrepreneurs and workers of all income levels across industries" and finalizing a rule that "is a clear-cut win."
Demand Progress' Emily Peterson-Cassin similarly commended the commission "for taking a strong stance against this egregious use of corporate power, thereby empowering workers to switch jobs and launch new ventures, and unlocking billions of dollars in worker earnings."
While such agreements are common across various industries, Teófilo Reyes, chief of staff at the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, said that "many restaurant workers have been stuck at their job, earning as low as $2.13 per hour, because of the noncompete clause that they agreed to have in their contract."
"They didn't know that it would affect their wages and livelihood," Reyes stressed. "Most workers cannot negotiate their way out of a noncompete clause because noncompetes are buried in the fine print of employment contracts. A full third of noncompete clauses are presented after a worker has accepted a job."
Student Borrower Protection Center (SBPC) executive director Mike Pierce pointed out that the FTC on Tuesday "recognized the harmful role debt plays in the workplace, including the growing use of training repayment agreement provisions, or TRAPs, and took action to outlaw TRAPs and all other employer-driven debt that serve the same functions as noncompete agreements."
Sandeep Vaheesan, legal director at Open Markets Institute, highlighted that the addition came after his group, SBPC, and others submitted comments on the "significant gap" in the commission's initial January 2023 proposal, and also welcomed that "the final rule prohibits both conventional noncompete clauses and newfangled versions like TRAPs."
Jonathan Harris, a Loyola Marymount University law professor and SBPC senior fellow, said that "by also banning functional noncompetes, the rule stays one step ahead of employers who use 'stay-or-pay' contracts as workarounds to existing restrictions on traditional noncompetes. The FTC has decided to try to avoid a game of whack-a-mole with employers and their creative attorneys, which worker advocates will applaud."
Among those applauding was Jean Ross, president of National Nurses United, who said that "the new FTC rule will limit the ability of employers to use debt to lock nurses into unsafe jobs and will protect their role as patient advocates."
Angela Huffman, president of Farm Action, also cheered the effort to stop corporations from holding employees "hostage," saying that "this rule is a critical step for protecting our nation's workers and making labor markets fairer and more competitive."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Discriminatory' North Carolina Law Criminalizing Felon Voting Struck Down
One plaintiffs' attorney said the ruling "makes our democracy better and ensures that North Carolina is not able to unjustly criminalize innocent individuals with felony convictions who are valued members of our society."
Apr 23, 2024
Democracy defenders on Tuesday hailed a ruling from a U.S. federal judge striking down a 19th-century North Carolina law criminalizing people who vote while on parole, probation, or post-release supervision due to a felony conviction.
In Monday's decision, U.S. District Judge Loretta C. Biggs—an appointee of former Democratic President Barack Obama—sided with the North Carolina A. Philip Randolph Institute and Action NC, who argued that the 1877 law discriminated against Black people.
"The challenged statute was enacted with discriminatory intent, has not been cleansed of its discriminatory taint, and continues to disproportionately impact Black voters," Biggs wrote in her 25-page ruling.
Therefore, according to the judge, the 1877 law violates the U.S. Constitution's equal protection clause.
"We are ecstatic that the court found in our favor and struck down this racially discriminatory law that has been arbitrarily enforced over time," Action NC executive director Pat McCoy said in a statement. "We will now be able to help more people become civically engaged without fear of prosecution for innocent mistakes. Democracy truly won today!"
Voting rights tracker Democracy Docket noted that Monday's ruling "does not have any bearing on North Carolina's strict felony disenfranchisement law, which denies the right to vote for those with felony convictions who remain on probation, parole, or a suspended sentence—often leaving individuals without voting rights for many years after release from incarceration."
However, Mitchell Brown, an attorney for one of the plaintiffs, said that "Judge Biggs' decision will help ensure that voters who mistakenly think they are eligible to cast a ballot will not be criminalized for simply trying to reengage in the political process and perform their civic duty."
"It also makes our democracy better and ensures that North Carolina is not able to unjustly criminalize innocent individuals with felony convictions who are valued members of our society, specifically Black voters who were the target of this law," Brown added.
North Carolina officials have not said whether they will appeal Biggs' ruling. The state Department of Justice said it was reviewing the decision.
According to Forward Justice—a nonpartisan law, policy, and strategy center dedicated to advancing racial, social, and economic justice in the U.S. South, "Although Black people constitute 21% of the voting-age population in North Carolina, they represent 42% of the people disenfranchised while on probation, parole, or post-release supervision."
The group notes that in 44 North Carolina counties, "the disenfranchisement rate for Black people is more than three times the rate of the white population."
"Judge Biggs' decision will help ensure that voters who mistakenly think they are eligible to cast a ballot will not be criminalized for simply trying to re-engage in the political process and perform their civic duty."
In what one civil rights leader called "the largest expansion of voting rights in this state since the 1965 Voting Rights Act," a three-judge state court panel voted 2-1 in 2021 to restore voting rights to approximately 55,000 formerly incarcerated felons. The decision made North Carolina the only Southern state to automatically restore former felons' voting rights.
Republican state legislators appealed that ruling to the North Carolina Court of Appeals, which in 2022 granted their request for a stay—but only temporarily, as the court allowed a previous injunction against any felony disenfranchisement based on fees or fines to stand.
However, last April the North Carolina Supreme Court reversed the three-judge panel decision, stripping voting rights from thousands of North Carolinians previously convicted of felonies. Dissenting Justice Anita Earls opined that "the majority's decision in this case will one day be repudiated on two grounds."
"First, because it seeks to justify the denial of a basic human right to citizens and thereby perpetuates a vestige of slavery, and second, because the majority violates a basic tenant of appellate review by ignoring the facts as found by the trial court and substituting its own," she wrote.
As similar battles play out in other states, Democratic U.S. lawmakers led by Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Sen. Peter Welch of Vermont in December introduced legislation to end former felon disenfranchisement in federal elections and guarantee incarcerated people the right to vote.
Currently, only Maine, Vermont, and the District of Columbia allow all incarcerated people to vote behind bars.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Biden Labor Department Finalizes Pro-Worker Rules on Overtime, Retirement Savings
"Democrats are delivering for working people!" declared Rep. Pramila Jayapal as the AFL-CIO noted that GOP ex-President Donald Trump "gutted the rules that required overtime pay for millions of workers."
Apr 23, 2024
Roughly 4.3 million U.S. workers will now be eligible for overtime pay under a new rule finalized Tuesday by President Joe Biden's Labor Department—in stark contrast to his Republican predecessor's rules that severely limited the number of workers who were eligible for required compensation when they worked more than 40 hours per week.
Under the new rule, employers will be required to pay overtime premiums to salaried workers who work more than standard full-time hours if they earn less than $1,128 per week, or about $58,600 per year.
Former President Donald Trump, now the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, may now have to defend his 2020 rule that set the overtime pay threshold at just $35,500 per year, leaving out millions of workers.
U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) noted that the updated rule was "a major piece" of the Executive Action Agenda released by the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which she chairs.
"This is a HUGE pro-worker initiative by President Biden," said Jayapal. "Democrats are delivering for working people!"
Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su, who Biden has nominated to fill the role permanently, said it is "unacceptable" that lower-paid workers "are spending more time away from their families for no additional pay," while hourly workers are eligible for overtime pay.
"This rule will restore the promise to workers that if you work more than 40 hours in a week, you should be paid more for that time," said Su. "The Biden-Harris administration is following through on our promise to raise the bar for workers who help lay the foundation for our economic prosperity."
The Labor Department posted a chart on social media showing how under Trump's policy, only workers who earn less than $688 per week are eligible for required overtime pay. The full rule is set to go into effect in January 2025.
The chart offers a "good split screen with the GOP," saidSlate reporter Mark Joseph Stern.
"It isn't just that Trump's Department of Labor fought overtime pay—it's also that Trump appointed anti-labor judges who are about to block Biden's new rule," he said.
The former Republican president's appointed judges could also block a new Federal Trade Commission rule introduced on Tuesday, which blocks companies from including noncompete clauses in workers' contracts.
"Both reforms happened because of Biden and in spite of Republicans," said HuffPost labor reporter Dave Jamieson.
Along with the overtime rule, the Labor Department announced a new policy aimed at safeguarding people's retirement savings from their financial advisers' conflicts of interest.
The finalized retirement security rule requires "trusted investment advice providers to give prudent, loyal, honest advice free from overcharges," said the department. "These fiduciaries must adhere to high standards of care and loyalty when they recommend investments and avoid recommendations that favor the investment advice providers' interests—financial or otherwise—at the retirement savers' expense."
"Under the final rule and amended exemptions, financial institutions overseeing investment advice providers must have policies and procedures to manage conflicts of interest and ensure providers follow these guidelines," the agency said.
Liz Shuler, president of the AFL-CIO, said the nation's largest labor federation has "been pushing for the fiduciary and overtime rules since the Obama administration."
"It's really this simple," said Shuler. "Every worker deserves their fair share of the wealth they help create and every worker deserves to make sure their hard-earned money is secure."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular