DAILY NEWS
Defend the Dream | School funding | No longer a democracy
Wednesday, January 3, 2018
DEFEND THE DREAM
ALSO at The Stand — WSLC: ‘We stand tall with the DREAMers’ (Sept. 6, 2017)
DREAM nurse speaks out to save DACA (Sept. 17, 2017)
► From The Hill — DACA tensions roil GOP — A recent CNN poll indicated 83 percent of adults want the program’s benefits to remain in place. So Democrats believe their party has significant leverage to tie DACA protections into a spending bill to avert a government shutdown. The deadline for such a deal is Jan. 19. That leaves Republicans having to decide if there is a way to extend the program’s protections while not incurring the wrath of their anti-immigrant base.
► From The Hill — Dem, Republican leaders meet in search of budget deal, DACA fix — House and Senate leaders from both parties are meeting with White House officials on Capitol Hill today, in search of an elusive budget deal before a Jan. 19 deadline.
► In today’s Washington Post — Trump takes hard line on ‘dreamers’ but remains willing to deal — Inside the White House and the Republican Party, President Trump is caught in a thicket of political pressures as he maps out possible requisites for a deal over the fate of young immigrants brought to the United States illegally as children.
LOCAL
EDITOR’S NOTE — We look forward to some news reports that bother to ask minimum wage workers and those who’ve never before received paid sick leave what they think of these new standards.
ALSO at The Stand — Washington state gets raise, paid sick leave
► In today’s News Tribune — DuPont curve where Amtrak derailed long known as problem for high-speed train alignment — The curve where Amtrak Cascades 501 derailed Dec. 18, killing three people, was identified years ago as an obstacle to Washington state’s dream of creating high-speed rail.
► In today’s Seattle Times — Seattle Police guild files 2nd unfair-labor complaint related to reforms — The latest complaint claims the city’s new “accountability legislation” can’t be implemented without collective bargaining.
THIS WASHINGTON
ALSO TODAY at The Stand — “Important progress can be made” in 2018 — WSLC announces its Shared Prosperity Agenda for legislative session that begins Monday.
► In today’s Olympian — Western State Hospital’s woes need firmer hand (editorial) — The ongoing public safety and treatment troubles at Western State Hospital have tagged along with the new year. Our state Legislature, which opens a 60-day session next Monday, has no choice but to wade back into these ongoing problems.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Last year, Baumgartner was the sole sponsor of a Senate bill to make Washington a “right to work” for less state. He has also sponsored bills to promote lawsuits against unions, block cities from enacting higher minimum wages, weaken prevailing wage standards, require laid-off workers to do community service (you know, like criminals) before collecting unemployment benefits, privatize public services, and privatize the state workers’ compensation system (an idea voters soundly rejected just a few years ago). Just thought you should know.
► In today’s News Tribune — Leader of Washington State Republican Party to step down next month — Washington State Republican Party Chairman Susan Hutchison will step down next month. (At right, she is pictured at the 2016 Republican National Convention allocating the state’s GOP delegates to Donald Trump as the party’s nominee for President of the United States of America.)
► A related story from NBC News — Trump to North Korean leader Kim: My nuclear button ‘is bigger & more powerful’
THAT WASHINGTON
► From The Hill — Labor Department eyes drug test rule for unemployment pay — The Trump administration is looking to bring back and broaden a rule requiring drug testing for unemployment benefits.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Washington’s GOP Reps. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, Jaime Herrera Beutler, Dan Newhouse and Dave Reichert all voted to repeal the rule requiring federal contractors to disclose sexual harassment.
► In today’s Washington Post — Hundreds of highly skilled personnel have left NSA since 2015, officials say — Hackers, engineers and data scientists — including some disillusioned with the intelligence agency’s leadership and an unpopular reorganization — have taken higher-paying, more flexible jobs in the private sector.
► In today’s NY Times — Critics say questions about citizenship could wreck chances for an accurate census — The Justice Department’s request to ask people about citizenship status in the 2020 census would keep Latinos and other ethnic minorities from being counted, critics say.
► In today’s NY Times — Orrin Hatch plans to retire, creating an opening for Romney — Orrin G. Hatch, the longest-serving Senate Republican, announced that he would retire at the end of the year, clearing a path for Mitt Romney to run.
► In today’s Washington Post — Say it again, Mitt Romney: Trump is unfit to serve (by Greg Sargent)
NATIONAL
► In today’s LA Times — More workers say their bosses are threatening to have them deported — Complaints over immigration-related retaliation threats surged last year in California. The cases include instances in which employers allegedly threatened to report workers to ICE after they raised issues over working conditions, including wage theft.
► From NPR — Los Angeles Times newsroom employees to vote on unionizing — The paper has not fared well since it was first sold to the Tribune company in 2000, with rounds of layoffs and buyouts that continued under new ownership called Tronc. Now, fresh concerns are surfacing over the paper’s new editor-in-chief.
TODAY’S MUST-READ
The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 10 a.m.