Wednesday, March 23, 2016

CAMPAIGN 2016

► In today’s (Everett) Herald — In Everett, Hillary Clinton pledges pursuit of job creation — Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton campaigned at the Machinists hall in Everett on Tuesday, pledging to pursue policies that create jobs and boost exports while defending the rights of organized labor.

MORE local coverage of Clinton’s campaign swing through the state in today’s Columbian, News Tribune, and Seattle Times.

► In the Seattle Times — As Hillary Clinton bolstered Boeing, company returned the favor — New emails provide a fuller look into the former secretary of state’s advocacy for Boeing. A campaign spokeswoman says Clinton “proudly and loudly advocated on behalf of American businesses and workers and took every opportunity to promote U.S. economic interests abroad.”

► In today’s Seattle Times — Bernie Sanders plans rally at Seattle’s Safeco Field on Friday — Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders will return to Washington state this week — scheduling rallies Thursday in Yakima and Friday at Safeco Field in Seattle. The ballpark will open at 4 p.m. for the event, with speeches to start later in the evening, the Sanders campaign announced in a news release Tuesday night. While attendance at the event is free and open to the public, the campaign urged online RSVPs. Sanders first will look to Central Washington, with Thursday’s rally scheduled at the Yakima Valley SunDome at State Fair Park. Doors for the Yakima event will open at 4 p.m., and online RSVPs also are requested.

► In today’s News Tribune — Democrats in Washington to make their pick for president at Saturday caucuses

► From The Hill — Clinton notches win in Arizona; Sanders claims Utah, Idaho — The number of delegates awarded Clinton and Sanders were almost equal early Wednesday.

► From The Hill — Trump, Cruz split wins in the West — Donald Trump and Ted Cruz split big delegate prizes in Arizona and Utah on Tuesday night, further raising questions over whether the long-time front-runner can avoid a contested convention.

► In today’s Washington Post — Arizona county gambled and lost on Election Day — In an attempt to save money, Maricopa County, one of the state’s biggest, cut the number of polling places from 200 to 60, betting against high turnout in the primary. Instead, voters waited up to three hours, and some locations ran out of ballots, requiring that more be printed.

RAISE UP WASHINGTON

► From KEXP — Why Washington’s working families need Initiative 1433 (audio) — Listen to Teresa Mosqueda of the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO explain why I-1433 to raise the minimum wage and pass paid sick leave is so important in Washington state.

ALSO at The Stand — I-1433 volunteers needed for Dem caucuses

STATE GOVERNMENT

► From KPLU — Despite improvements, audit finds safety gaps in Washington prisons — Officer Jayme Biendl was murdered by an inmate in the chapel at the Monroe Correctional Complex in 2011. Her death spawned a major prison safety initiative in Washington. A state performance audit released Tuesday concluded that Washington prisons are safer five years after Biendl’s murder, but safety gaps still persist that put staff at risk.

► In today’s (Everett) Herald — State gets an ‘F’ for its effort on education spending (editorial) — For a state that is doing as well as it has following the recession and recognizing the vital part that education plays in fostering that economic growth, it’s clear, whether lawmakers start this year or next, Washington must significantly increase its investment in education. The preamble for Article IX of the state constitution makes it the “paramount duty of the state to make ample provision for the education of all children.” When we have the means to provide that, an “F” for effort falls far too short.

► From AP — Budget negotiations ongoing in Legislature — Republican Sen. Andy Hill, one of the negotiators, said Tuesday that “significant progress” was made in the last week and that there was still a possibility that lawmakers could finish their work by the end of the week.

► In the Spokesman-Review — GOP lawmakers were asked to stay away from Oregon refuge occupation — Just days before the start of the 2016 Washington Legislature, state Rep. Matt Shea and a handful of other Republican lawmakers from around the West arrived in Burns, Oregon, saying they wanted to help negotiate a peaceful resolution to the standoff at the nearby federal wildlife refuge. Local officials told them to go home; their help wasn’t wanted and there was nothing to negotiate.

ALSO at The Stand — It’s up to the GOP to hold Rep. Shea accountable

LOCAL

► From KUOW — ‘Thank God it’s over:’ Nestora Salgado’s family, supporters welcome her home — Smiling to the crowd, Salgado said she plans to go back to Mexico and to keep fighting. Even if it puts her life at risk. She vowed to keep pushing for the release of other members of the community police who are still in prison.

► From KPLU — Friends of 88-5 FM is now a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization — Friends of 88-5 FM is now a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization. All donations are now tax-deductible, and eligible for employer matching.

ALSO at The Stand — Help save KPLU, the state’s only unionized NPR station

BOEING

► From Bloomberg — Boeing likely to miss delivery date for tankers, Pentagon says — Boeing is likely to miss the first major requirement of its $51 billion tanker program for the U.S. Air Force: delivering the initial 18 aerial refueling planes by August 2017, according to the Pentagon agency that oversees contracts.

TRANS-PACIFIC PARTNERSHIP

► MUST-READ in today’s Washington Post — The new trade paradigm: Pro-globalization, anti-‘free’ trade agreement (by Jared Bernstein) — The time has come to create a new category of person in this town: Someone who supports expanded trade and is all for globalization with a voice for working people here and abroad, but who has completely soured on so-called free-trade agreements (FTAs), as they too often squelch that voice… The era of FTAs is likely behind us for now. I know for a fact that there are many who feel as I do — supportive of trade but deeply dissatisfied with FTAs. Join us in injecting a new, progressive option into an old, stale D.C. debate.

► From AFL-CIO Now — TPP puts Big Pharma profits ahead of people like Zaraha — Ever wonder how the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal would affect you or the people you love? Zahara Heckscher explains how TPP will make it harder for cancer patients to afford life-saving treatment.

► In the Seattle Times — Trade, manufacturing jobs and voter anger (by Jon Talton) — Loss of factory jobs has poisoned many American workers against trade deals. Is Washington really so different, or is the sentiment headed here, too?

SUPREME COURT

► From Huffington Post — Supreme Court hands down first 4-to-4 decision since Scalia’s death –The split decision in a minor banking case was “per curiam,” which means it was handed down in the name of the entire court, and nobody really knows what justice was on which side. The opinion was just one line long: “The judgment is affirmed by an equally divided Court.” That means the ruling sets no nationwide precedent and leaves the lower-court ruling as the final decision in the case. Leaving the law unsettled for now could potentially be good or bad news for major cases where future splits are a possibility — including pending disputes on abortion, affirmative action, public union fees, immigration and contraception coverage under the Affordable Care Act.

► From The Hill — Poll: Nearly 8 in 10 think GOP is ‘playing politics’ on Supreme Court — Overall, 77 percent of Americans say they think Republicans are “playing politics” by not allowing nominee Merrick Garland to get a hearing. That total includes 62 percent of surveyed Republicans.

► From AP — Supreme Court upholds $5.8 million award in pay dispute against Tyson Foods — In a setback to business, the Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld a $5.8 million judgment against Tyson Foods Inc. in a pay dispute with more than 3,000 workers at an Iowa plant. The court’s 6-2 ruling rejected new limits Tyson asked the high court to impose on the ability of workers to band together to challenge pay and workplace issues.

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

► From Huffington Post — It’s about to get harder for companies to hide union-busting — A lot of U.S. companies pay top dollar just to keep labor unions out of their workplaces. It’s hard to know exactly how much — or who — they pay, because the reporting standards aren’t all that strict. But that’s about to change. On Wednesday, the Labor Department announced a final version of its contentious “persuader” rule. Persuaders are lawyers and consultants hired by companies to discourage workers from unionizing. The art — sometimes subtle, sometimes not — is known as “union avoidance.” Unions, though, have a more derisive term for it: union-busting.

► From Politico — Congress setting new bar for doing nothing — The biggest achievement in the House last week was a party-line vote to file a brief in a court case. In other action, GOP leaders all but conceded they won’t be able to pass a budget, the party’s first order of business, this year.

► From Huffington Post — GOP tax plans would be the largest redistributions to the rich in American history (by Robert Reich) — Trump and Cruz pretend to be opposed to the Republican establishment, but when it comes to taxes they’re seeking exactly what that Republican establishment wants.

TODAY’S MUST-READ

► Long but worth it, in New York magazine — There was no Republican establishment after all (by Frank Rich) — While it’s become a commonplace to characterize Trump’s blitzkrieg of the GOP as either a takeover or a hijacking, it is in reality the Establishment that is trying to hijack the party from those who actually do hold power: its own voters… The fiction that Trump’s exploitation of racial resentments is a shocking breach of Republican values has been fiercely asserted by Romney, Ryan, and the rest of the GOP Establishment for the obvious reason: A nearly all-white party, staring down the barrel of a looming minority-white America, can’t compete in national elections unless it can claim to have retained its founding identity as the party of Lincoln… Some modern Republican leaders — and not just notorious southern racists of the Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms ilk but the Establishment’s very own centurions — have courted, and still court, bigots much as Trump does… For all the Republican talk about “personal responsibility,” the party’s leaders have worked overtime to escape any responsibility for fanning the swamp fevers that produced Trump: They instead blame him on the same bogeymen they blame everything on — Obama and the news media.

The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 10 a.m.