The AFL-CIO has filed a complaint with the Bush Administration that says violence against trade unionists in Guatemala may have worsened since the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) became law, reports The Hill's Kevin Bogardus:
Expect the labor union to use the complaint as an argument against the free trade agreement with Colombia. Colombian supporters believe the trade deal would help that country's economy and thus lessen violence against labor activists. But the AFL-CIO complaint on Guatemala runs counter to this argument.
"This petition will demonstrate that labor conditions in [Guatemala] have remained unchanged or have worsened since the trade agreement was ratified," charges the complaint. "The level of physical violence against trade unionists increased markedly since the agreement entered into force in July, 2006. Violations of freedom of association and collective bargaining continue apace, and access to fair and efficient administrative or judicial tribunals remains elusive."
Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee want Attorney General Michael Mukasey to clarify his claim that the the government failed to act on a phone call about the September 11th terrorist attacks.
Mukasey said last month in San Francisco that the government failed to wiretap a phone call from an Afghanistan "safe house" to somebody in the United States prior to the September 11th strike. Mukasey made the claim while arguing that that Congress should renew a 2007 expansion of government surveillance capabilities.
On Monday, House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.), Rep. Robert "Bobby" Scott (D-Va.) and Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) sent a letter to Mukasey asking what he was referring to. Mukasey's statement, they wrote, was "very disturbing" because it was the first time someone had referred "to a call from a known terrorist safe house in Afghanistan to the United States which, if it had been intercepted, could have helped prevented the terrorist attacks.
They added: "If such calls were known about and not intercepted, serious additional concerns would be raised about the government's failure to take appropriate action before 9/11."
Here's Mukasey's quote under scrutiny, as reported by the New York Sun:
Officials "shouldn't need a warrant when somebody picks up the phone in Iraq and calls somebody in the United States because that's the call that we may really want to know about. And before 9/11, that's the call that we didn't know about. We knew that there has been a call from someplace that was known to be a safe house in Afghanistan and we knew that it came to the United States. We didn't know precisely where it went."
Mukasey made the claim while calling on Congress swiftly renew an amendment to the Foreign Surveillance Intelligence Act (FISA) that had allowed for expanded surveillance activities.
House Democrats have bucked the Bush administration's request, passing their own FISA update last month that does not include retroactive legal immunity for telecom companies that participated in the government's domestic warrantless wiretapping program. President Bush has said he would veto any FISA bill that lacks immunity for the companies.
Read the Democrats' letter to Mukasey here (.pdf).
A Democratic nominee for the Federal Election Commission has pulled his name from consideration, a move that may further prolong the Senate impasse over filling four FEC vacancies.
Democrats had hoped to return Robert Lenhard, a former chairman of the commission, to the FEC. But Lenhard no longer wants to be considered due to the delay over the nomination process, according to a letter from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten.
"[Lenhard] is exceptionally well-qualified and his nomination is not controversial," Reid wrote. "However, given the complete unwilligness among Republicans to constitute a functional FEC, I could not assure him of timely confirmation."
Senate Democrats have held up votes to confirm the four pending nominees due to their objection to Republicans' choice of Hans von Spakovsky. While Republicans have called for one vote to confirm all four nominees as a bloc, Democrats have sought a separate vote for each nominee, believing that von Spakovsky does not have enough support for confirmation. Democrats, led by Barack Obama, have concerns over von Spakovsky's voting rights record in Georgia and as a lawyer in the Department of Justice.
Reid wrote that the search for a new Democratic nominee and the process to get one confirmed typically takes seven months.
The FEC has only two current members, which isn't enough for a quorum.
Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) posted this video to his congressional site today, attacking a proposed loophole that would exempt contractors from waste, fraud, and abuse oversight on jobs done overseas. Welch has introduced legislation to prevent the loophole.
House Oversight Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) has subpoenaed Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) documents involving the White House as part of his committee's investigation of EPA's 2007 decision stating that California could not impose its own stricter regulations on auto emissions.
Waxman said his committee has found evidence that the EPA communicated with the White House about the decision. "Unfortunately, EPA has refused to disclose the substance and extent of its communications with the White House," Waxman said today. "The Committee must have these documents in order to understand how the agency
House Oversight Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) today requested information on the Federal Reserve's deal with BlackRock Financial Management, Inc., the firm hired to manage the portfolio backing the Bear Stearns buyout.
Waxman expressed concern that the Fed awarded a no-bid contract to BlackRock to manage $30 billion in tax revenue. The Fed's regional bank in New York made an immediate, no-bid deal with BlackRock to manage the portfolio backing its loan to JP Morgan Chase.
See Waxman's letter to Timothy Giethner, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, after the jump.
Read more...
The House Oversight Committee announced today it will hold a hearing April 22 to "examine the broad trends, incentives, and challenges present in the Defense Department
A federal judge has ruled that Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) can collect more than $1 million in legal fees in a lawsuit against Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) over a taped phone call, the Associated Press reports.
Boehner had sued McDermott for leaking a tape of a 1996 call featuring Republican congressmen discussing an ethics case against then-Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.).
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