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President Joe Biden could have simply had some of the productive weeks of his presidency, though it’s not clear what number of Individuals seen ― or what number of grasp what it says concerning the stakes of the November election.
Within the span of lower than 5 days, the Biden administration issued greater than a half-dozen main laws with the potential to have an effect on many tens of millions of Individuals — and, arguably, the way forward for the planet as effectively.
None of those bulletins got here as a shock. The entire new laws are ultimate variations of guidelines which have been within the works for years. The impetus for rolling them out this week is the calendar and a legislation referred to as the Congressional Assessment Act, which provides Congress a number of months’ time to rescind new guidelines the White Home implements.
By issuing these new guidelines now, the Biden administration is defending them from the Congress that takes workplace in January 2025 ― i.e., after the following election, when Republicans hostile to those laws may achieve management of each chambers.
However finalizing the foundations now remains to be no assure they are going to keep on the books. If Donald Trump turns into president, he might problem new laws that reverse Biden’s. The method would take a while, however it will be effectively inside his powers. Biden did the identical to a lot of Trump’s laws upon taking workplace, simply as Trump as soon as did to Barack Obama’s.
Trump might additionally resume his venture of packing the courts with conservatives on a mission to shrink the regulatory state. As it’s, a number of of Biden’s new guidelines won’t survive scrutiny from the Supreme Courtroom, the place a (now) 6-to-3 conservative majority has been hacking away on the govt department’s leeway to make guidelines on the whole lot from air pollution to client security. In a federal judiciary with much more Trump appointees, the foundations would face even steeper odds.
All of which suggests the way forward for these new laws is dependent upon who wins the presidential election. However that’s not the one purpose they need to be a part of voters’ calculus come November.
The brand new guidelines additionally say lots about Biden’s priorities ― concerning the issues dealing with the American public, and the way he thinks the federal authorities will help remedy them. A second Biden time period would presumably imply nonetheless extra guidelines like those the administration introduced this week.
Is {that a} good factor? A nasty factor? Someplace in between?
The reply is dependent upon what you consider regulation normally, as effectively these new guidelines particularly. And it’s fairly an inventory:
On Monday, the administration required nursing houses to fulfill new staffing requirements. It additionally expanded well being report privateness guidelines in order that they shield details about abortion.
On Tuesday, the administration made tens of millions of latest employees eligible for additional time pay and, individually, gave retirees new protections from predatory funding recommendation.
On Wednesday, the administration pressured airways to start out issuing refunds for flight cancellations and lengthy delays.
On Thursday, the administration introduced new limits on energy plant emissions and raised the vitality effectivity requirements for brand new houses. It additionally issued stronger diet necessities for the meals youngsters get at public colleges.
Power’s impression on the planet — and your payments at residence
The facility plant emission guidelines are among the many most far-reaching, as a result of they might play such an important function in efforts to gradual world warming. As HuffPost’s Alexander Kaufman explains in his evaluation, the brand new guidelines are designed to work in tandem with inexperienced vitality subsidies from the Inflation Discount Act, the sweeping local weather legislation that Democrats handed and Biden signed in 2022:
Paired with the billions of {dollars} in carrots for manufacturing, constructing and shopping for trendy vitality gear that got here with President Joe Biden’s landmark climate-spending legal guidelines, the foundations chart a path for the U.S. to keep away from almost 1.4 billion metric tons of carbon air pollution by means of 2047. That’s equal to taking 328 million gasoline-fueled automobiles off the street or a full 12 months of emissions from the U.S. electrical energy sector as we speak.
The emission limits are a part of a broader bundle that embrace guidelines streamlining the allowing course of for transmission strains, decreasing a number of the purple tape that’s made it tough to construct the grid infrastructure to extend using renewable vitality.
The ultimate model contains some concessions to utilities and different conventional opponents of emission laws. Amongst different issues, the emission guidelines apply to new pure gasoline crops however to not present ones, following objections from utilities. However that doesn’t imply the critics are completely happy. Republicans and their allies have denounced the foundations as job-killers, with officers from West Virginia, one of many nation’s prime coal-producing states, main the cost ― and promising lawsuits too.
“We shall be difficult this rule,” vowed West Virginia Legal professional Basic Patrick Morrisey.
As Alex notes in his article, administration officers assume they’ve written the brand new guidelines in methods that may survive even the brand new, stricter assessments for laws the Supreme Courtroom has laid out.
The identical goes for one more large new local weather rule: a plan to boost the development requirements for brand new houses that qualify for federal housing loans. It sounds wonky, however as Alex particulars in a separate article, there’s large quantities of cash at stake. Each time excessive warmth waves hit, demand for air con spikes — and with vitality costs have roller-coastered ever since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Individuals’ excellent debt to utility surged to a report of over $20 billion final 12 months.
Like the ability plant rule, the housing necessities have already drawn blowback from Republicans in Congress and will simply draw Trump’s consideration in a second time period, given his frequent assaults on something related to inexperienced vitality.
When extra work doesn’t imply extra pay
Comparable threats loom for the brand new additional time guidelines — which, as HuffPost’s Dave Jamieson defined this week, are designed to assist low-income employees who haven’t been capable of accumulate additional time pay as a result of they’re salaried.
Most hourly employees are entitled to time-and-a-half pay after they log over 40 hours, which discourages employers from working them an excessive amount of. However whether or not salaried employees can get additional time pay is dependent upon how a lot they earn and what their job duties are. Employers have an incentive to pile work onto these with out additional time protections, for the reason that additional work is finished basically at no cost.
The present additional time wage threshold is simply $35,568 … Salaried employees, similar to retail retailer managers, should earn lower than that quantity to routinely be entitled to any extra pay after they work greater than 40 hours.
“This rule will restore the promise to employees that if you happen to work greater than 40 hours in every week, you ought to be paid extra for that point,” Julie Su, performing Labor Secretary, mentioned in an announcement.
The brand new guidelines symbolize the second latest try by a Democratic administration to make extra salaried employees eligible for additional time pay. Obama tried to do the identical factor in 2016. Then a federal choose blocked the rule, and Trump later put in place the present, weaker customary.
Republicans haven’t jumped to oppose the additional time guidelines like they’ve the emission limits, maybe as a result of higher pay for extra employees sounds interesting even to many Republican voters.
However enterprise teams to whom Republicans steadily pay attention have made clear they oppose these necessities, warning that they are going to drive firms to boost costs, fireplace employees or shutter altogether — and that small companies particularly shall be susceptible, as a result of they’re least capable of soak up new prices.
Sean Kennedy, a spokesman for the Nationwide Restaurant Affiliation, advised CNN the brand new guidelines would “exponentially improve” prices for small institutions.
A Begin On Nursing Dwelling Reform
Critics of the Biden administration are additionally elevating the specter of upper costs, layoffs and closures in response to the brand new nursing residence laws.
The foundations set a minimal for the variety of direct care staffers relative to the variety of residents. Though the federal authorities has lengthy required nursing houses to take care of ample employees, that is the primary time it has established a numerical customary.
The rule follows by means of on a promise Biden made within the 2022 State of the Union in response to media stories about poor situations in nursing houses, particularly throughout the pandemic, together with analysis linking staffing ranges to affected person well-being.
Greater than 80% of nursing houses don’t meet the brand new customary, in keeping with an analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan well being care analysis group. Nursing residence business officers say the price of including employees will push some amenities previous the brink of failure.
However advocates for senior residents and different longtime proponents of nursing residence care reform are skeptical of the business’s arguments, citing widespread stories of how for-profit firms that personal long-term care amenities use artistic accounting to disguise income.
These advocates additionally level to proof from states which have acted on their very own.
“When states have adopted minimal staffing requirements — and plenty of states have them, Massachusetts has one, California too ― it hasn’t put nursing houses out of enterprise,” David Grabowski, a Harvard well being coverage professional and longtime champion for nursing residence care reform, mentioned in a telephone interview. “I do assume there’s cash within the system right here.”
However advocates had pushed for even larger requirements than the administration finally endorsed. And a few, like Richard Mollot, govt director of the Lengthy Time period Care Group Coalition, mentioned he worries nursing houses will interpret the brand new minimal as a most, making a “race to the underside” as better-staffed establishments lay off employees.
Others have questioned a number of the regulation’s specifics, together with the way in which it allocates hours amongst several types of direct care employees.
A Distinction In Priorities ― And On The Poll
However among the many longtime advocates for stronger nursing residence regulation, even these involved concerning the Biden guidelines bear in mind what occurred again when Trump was in cost. The agenda was very completely different.
“They reduce on enforcement [[of existing nursing home standards]], something that Obama did, they pulled again,” Toby Edelman, senior coverage legal professional on the Heart for Medicare Advocacy, advised me .
And whereas there’s no technique to know the way aggressively the federal authorities would implement these new guidelines if Biden will get a second time period, Edelman mentioned his concentrate on nursing residence high quality suggests these reforms are a giant deal to him. “They’re attempting, the administration is attempting,” she mentioned.
You may say the identical factor about Biden’s consideration to employees ineligible for additional time, or to the local weather risks of soiled vitality, and even to one thing as quotidian because the disruptions from canceled airline flights. Regardless of the final deserves of those strikes, as coverage or legislation, they present Biden believes these are issues are value addressing. It’s yet another factor voters may wish to think about in November.