The Paper Trail: October 1, 2024

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The Paper Trail

Announcements

The Office of the Whistleblower Ombuds is excited to announce a new, on-demand training available to House staff through the Congressional Staff Academy: The Legal Landscape of Protected Whistleblowing. This 45-minute, self-paced course provides an in-depth look at the laws and legal processes whistleblowers rely on when they share vital information with Congress and other key audiences.

The Paper Trail

Top stories for October 1, 2024

Hurricane Helene spotlights rising prices for home and flood insurance: The devastation of Hurricane Helene arrives after years of skyrocketing prices for home and flood insurance that have left some households without coverage and others choosing low-cost plans with weaker policies. Homeowners at properties damaged by Helene are likely to see their insurance costs rise even more, imposing financial strain for years to come. (Max Zahn, ABC News)

How ignored warnings at Boar’s Head plant led to a deadly listeria outbreak: The sleuthing that determined the cause of the outbreak happened quickly, but there is evidence that the conditions that caused the outbreak had been building over time. Food safety experts say the pattern of violations at the plant raises questions about why it wasn’t closed sooner and suggests a failed food safety system. (Rachel Roubein and Joe Heim, Washington Post)

Justice Department to pay $22 million to settle gender bias claims against FBI: Even as it has prioritized recruiting more women, the FBI has struggled to add more female agents: Women comprise 46% of the bureau’s employees but only about one-quarter of its agents. (Adam Goldman, New York Times)

36% of new IRS hires faced delays due to technical and security clearance jams: Despite hiring nearly two-thirds of its new employees in fiscal 2022 and 2023 within its 80-day goal, it took the IRS an average of 124 days to employ the remaining one-third due to workload constraints and miscommunication, delayed security checks, and limitations in IRS’s hiring management system. (Sean Michael Newhouse, Government Executive)

After bungling financial aid process, Education Department begins testing new FAFSA: Problems with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) continue to haunt the department. (Danielle Douglas-Gabriel, Washington Post)

Republicans lay legal groundwork for election challenges: Republicans have launched an aggressive legal campaign laying the groundwork to challenge potential losses at the polls in November. The RNC says it’s involved in more than 120 lawsuits across 26 states; legal experts and voting rights groups say the effort is meant to undercut faith in the system. (Jack Queen, Reuters)

🔎 See Also: Democrats sue to block new Georgia rule requiring hand-count of Election Day ballots (Devan Cole and Marshall Cohen, CNN)

Israel-Hamas War

How many U.S. troops are in the Middle East? The number of American troops in the region is now approximately 43,000, including more than a dozen warships and four fighter squadrons. (Lolita C. Baldor and Tara Copp, RealClear Defense)

Dobbs Aftermath

Finding help to get sober is hard. In Kentucky, it’s even harder as a mom: Among pregnant women and new mothers, mental health conditions including suicide and overdose are a top cause of death. The toll has been especially devastating in Kentucky, which has a near-total ban on abortion. (Danielle Paquette, Washington Post)

California sues hospital for denying patient an emergency abortion: The case shows that denial of emergency abortion care can happen in even strongly pro-choice states. (Pam Belluck, New York Times)

Defense and Veterans Affairs

VA staff got into Vance, Walz medical files, sparking investigation: At least a dozen Veterans Health Administration employees improperly accessed the medical records of the vice-presidential nominees, a violation of federal health privacy laws that is under criminal investigation. (Lisa Rein and Devlin Barrett, Washington Post)

VA leaders in New York accused of delaying critical medical visits: Community care — where veterans receive medical appointments and treatments at private-sector clinics but have the expenses covered by the VA — has been a controversial topic in recent years, with some claiming that the VA unnecessarily limits outside options. (Leo Shane III, Military Times)

Opinion: Sen. Wicker, the Pentagon and its contractors need accountability, not more money: Congress has approved massive increases to the Pentagon budget year after year, arguing that it will make us safer. But policymakers haven’t reckoned with defense contractors’ troubling track record of fleecing the government. (Omar Tabuni, Mississippi Clarion Ledger)

Business and Finance

Leonard Leo-linked group attacking efforts to educate judges on climate: A right-wing, pro-fossil fuel think tank connected to conservative legal activist Leonard Leo is attacking efforts to educate lawyers and judges about climate science. (Dharna Noor and Alice Herman, The Guardian)

Deadly harvest: The hidden costs of your Filet-O-Fish: While Alaskan pollock is often held up as a prime example of sustainably sourced seafood, advocates warn the trawlers catching it are destroying the Bering Sea’s food web, and that federal regulators are ignoring the growing catastrophe because many of them have close ties to the industry. (Lois Parshley, The Lever)

Shrimp farmers in Asia exploited by U.S. supermarkets for big profits, research finds: A new investigation found that big Western supermarkets’ aggressive pursuit of ever-lower wholesale prices is causing misery for shrimp farmers in Vietnam, Indonesia, and India. (CBS News)

Second oil company CEO conspired with OPEC to keep prices high, FTC charges: The charges make Hess Corporation CEO John B. Hess the second major oil company head to be accused of engaging in an illicit conspiracy with OPEC. (Saul Elbein, The Hill)

Tech

Epic Games says Google found a new way to violate antitrust law: Last year, a jury found that Google broke the law by suppressing options to download Android apps outside the company’s Google Play store. The company that won the antitrust lawsuit claims Google found a new way to entrench its illegal monopoly. (Shira Ovide, Washington Post)

Infrastructure

The dirty business of clean energy: The U.K. power company polluting small towns across the U.S.: Drax, which runs the U.K.’s biggest power plant, is rapidly expanding its wood pellet production operations in America despite a troubling environmental record. (Camille Corcoran and Bertie Harrison-Broninski, The Intercept)

Health Care

Despite persistent warnings, Texas rushed to remove millions from Medicaid. That move cost eligible residents care: When the federal government’s pandemic-era health care coverage protections ended last year, Texas moved swiftly, kicking people off of Medicaid faster than any other state. Officials acknowledged some errors during this time, but an analysis found many errors were preventable and foreshadowed in persistent warnings. (by Eleanor Klibanoff and Lomi Kriel, ProPublica)

The Medicare Advantage influence machine: New court filings and lobbying reports reveal an industry juggernaut that has signed up more than 33 million seniors and is aggressively fighting to stave off cuts and legal accountability. (Fred Schulte and Holly K. Hacker, KFF Health News)

Internet drug ring tricked buyers with fake and deadly pills, U.S. says: Federal prosecutors say a network in the U.S., India, and the Dominican Republic used seemingly innocuous websites to distribute deadly narcotics to tens of thousands of customers. (Colin Moynihan,New York Times)

ICYMI

Project 2025:

→ Project 2025 could become a political reality that would upend medical practice

→ Project 2025 calls for the break-up of NOAA, commercialized weather service forecasts

Immigration and Border Security:

→ Biden expands asylum restrictions that sharply curbed border crossings

→ Harris touts plan to bring on more border agents, but hiring is already lagging

→ Surveillance cameras placed on palm trees by drug cartel “falcons” in city on border with Arizona, Mexico authorities say

Other News:

→ Americans are more reliant than ever on government aid

→ Trump gave them a second chance. They could not stay out of trouble

→ Major conservative poll cited by media secretly worked with Trump team

→ U.S. taxpayers funded a covert campaign to downplay the risks of pesticides and discredit environmentalists in Africa, Europe, and North America

→ U.S. raises new concerns over Chinese lending practices

Upcoming Events

📌 Zoom Webinar: Project 2025 and our System of Regulatory Safeguards. Coalition for Sensible Safeguards / Center for Progressive Reform. Wednesday, October 9, 3:00 p.m. ET.

Hot Docs

🔥📃 DHS OIG: CISA Faces Challenges Sharing Cyber Threat Information as Required by the Cybersecurity Act of 2015. OIG-24-60 (PDF)

🔥📃 DHS OIG: ICE Did Not Always Manage and Secure Mobile Devices to Prevent Unauthorized Access to Sensitive Information. OIG-24-61 (PDF)

Nominations & Appointments

Appointments

• Richelle Allen - Member, Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board
• Lake Barrett - Member, Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board
• Miles Greiner - Member, Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board
• Silvia Jurisson - Member, Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board
• Peter Swift - Member and Designated Chair, Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board
• Seth Tuler - Member, Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board