President Obama on Wednesday said he will nominate Tom Wheeler, a former lobbyist and investor, to serve as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission.

Obama said that for more than 30 years, Wheeler has been at the forefront of changes in the technology industry, making him a great fit for "one of the toughest jobs in Washington."

"Tom knows this stuff inside and out," Obama said.

Southwest Airlines is being fined $150,000 for its delayed and poor responses to consumer complaints.

The Department of Transportation (DOT) levied the penalty against the airline for its failure to respond to complaints made between June 2011 and January 2012, including multiple grievances about service to passengers with disabilities. The department claims that the company's responses were late and inadequate to the consumers' problems.

Messages released Wednesday show Lisa Jackson using the secondary account to talk with people outside the government.

The raft of new rules designed to clamp down on risky and abusive lending practices in the aftermath of the economic crisis should be modified for struggling community banks, the New York Stock Exchange’s chief executive told regulators Wednesday.

In remarks to the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Advisory Committee on Small and Emerging Companies, Duncan Niederauer said the “one size fits all” approach of new regulations should be rethought.

The action follows the administration’s move to simplify application forms for ObamaCare's tax credits and health exchanges.

The State Department wants to fix a foreign teacher exchange program so that it is used to advance cultural understanding rather than fill staffing gaps in American classrooms. 

The department's proposed changes to a portion of the Exchange Visitor Program would seek to ensure that exchange teachers are used to share cultures, not make up for holes in the American workforce or as a stepping stone to teaching permanently in the United States.

The Obama administration is writing rules to ban “shark finning” more than two years after Congress passed the Shark Conservation Act.

Shark finning is when boats catch sharks, only to cut off their fins before throwing them back into the water. The proposals, which will be published by the National Marine Fisheries Service on Thursday, would ban the practice and eliminate loopholes from other shark-protection laws.

Only a few agency committees will announce their upcoming meetings in Thursday's Federal Register. Here they are:

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's advisory panel on reactor safeguards is meeting May 9 and 10 in Rockville, Md., to discuss licensing issues and possible hazards at power plants. 

Agencies will use the Federal Register on Thursday to announce new and proposed measures on fishing, agriculture and commercial furnaces, among other issues. Here's what to expect:

Agriculture:
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is changing the authorization measures to import plants that are otherwise prohibited but could have some experimental, therapeutic or developmental purpose.