Congress
Powell signals higher interest rates. Here’s why Friday’s jobs report will affect Fed’s decision.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said this week that interest rate increases could be higher and come faster if Friday’s unemployment data shows the nation’s labor market isn’t cooling off. Stock indexes fell after his comments.
Lawmakers hear theories on COVID-19 origins in U.S. House hearing
WASHINGTON — Democrats and Republicans mostly agreed Wednesday that scientists and the intelligence community should fully investigate the origins of COVID-19 without political interference over whether the virus emerged from nature or through a lab leak.
Child poverty dropped to a record low last year. A new report shows how to keep it that way.
North Carolina is among the states that benefited the most from an expanded Child Tax Credit The expanded child tax credit that families received in 2021 helped reduce child poverty across the country, but particularly in the South where families lack a sufficient safety net, according to a paper released on Wednesday.
Attorneys general from 23 GOP-led states back suit seeking to block abortion pill
WASHINGTON — Attorneys general representing nearly two dozen Republican states are backing a lawsuit that would remove the abortion pill from throughout the United States after more than two decades, eliminating the option even in states where abortion access remains legal. The state of Missouri filed its own brief in the case Friday while Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch filed a brief on behalf of her state as well as Alabama...
Biden in State of the Union address draws boos and shouts from a combative GOP
President Joe Biden began his State of the Union address Tuesday — his first to a divided Congress — with an appeal to bipartisan priorities, but later criticized parts of the GOP agenda and got a sense of Republicans’ appetite for conflict during one combative stretch.
Proposed federal rule would lower credit card late fees
As Americans continue to struggle with high credit card rates, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has proposed a rule to help lessen some of their financial burden — in the form of lower late fees. The new rule would limit late fees to $8. Currently credit card companies can charge as high as $41 — penalties that the CFPB’s director, Rohit Chopra, said are charged for “no purpose beyond padding the credit card companies’ profits.”
States criticized for spending federal relief funds on tax cuts, prisons
As states plan how they’ll spend the $25 billion remaining in federal COVID relief funds, some also are facing criticism and renewed scrutiny over how they allocated money already received from the American Rescue Plan Act. Of the $198 billion authorized by Congress in 2021, $173 billion already has been appropriated by states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Much of the money went — as it was intended — to deal with the COVID-19 public health emergency...
GOP U.S. House passes bill opening more public land to development if reserve oil is tapped
U.S. House Republicans passed a bill Friday to force the White House to make more federal land and waters available for oil and gas development if the president orders the withdrawal of more oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. The bill, passed 221-205, mostly along party lines, would strip the president’s power to remove oil from the reserve unless the U.S. Energy Department has a plan to allow new leasing on federal lands and waters for oil exploration.
Here’s what you need to know about new workplace protections for pregnant, nursing workers
The $1.7 trillion federal spending bill President Joe Biden signed last week ushers in expanded protections for workers who are pregnant or nursing. Proponents of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act and the PUMP for Nursing Mothers Act — both included as amendments to the spending bill — say the measures clarify rights for these workers, who weren’t properly covered under existing laws.
FTX failure divides lawmakers on how tough to get with crypto regulation
NC's Patrick McHenry defends cryptocurrency industry at House Financial Services Committee hearing; Senator-elect Ted Budd is a no-show
How the fight for tribal rights in North Carolina could reshape Native Hawaiian housing
Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz is trying to cut a last minute deal that could bring tens of millions of dollars in new funding to the islands for Native Hawaiian housing. WASHINGTON — As Congress prepares to wrap up work for the year, Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz is looking to cut an ambitious deal that could pump tens of millions of dollars of new money into Native Hawaiian housing for at least the next decade.
Same-sex marriage protected under bill passed by U.S. Senate with GOP support
Tillis and Burr 'aye' votes help assure measure could not be filibustered WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate approved legislation Tuesday that would enshrine protections for same-sex and interracial marriages, codifying many of the rights that would disappear if the U.S. Supreme Court were to overturn those landmark decisions the way it overturned the nationwide right to an abortion this summer.