Trump Orders Review Of Welfare Programs
Trump orders top-to-bottom review of welfare programs. Politico: "President Donald Trump has directed his agencies to raise the bar for recipients of food stamps, Medicaid, rent subsidies and other welfare programs, and find ways to put more of them back to work. In an executive order signed Tuesday afternoon, Trump directed the Departments of Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Agriculture and other agencies to make a top-to-bottom review of their safety-net programs, with the goal of finding ways to push more people into the workforce and off of welfare... With Republicans in control of the White House and Congress, conservatives have pushed the administration to take advantage of a rare opportunity to unwind or overhaul assistance programs, which they believe promote dependency and are easy to exploit. But the effort, in the works for months, had stalled amid internal debate at the White House, ultimately took a back seat to infrastructure as a top legislative priority in Congress, leaving conservatives with an executive order."
Poor People's Campaign Unveils New Agenda
Poor People's Campaign unveils agenda to combat poverty, racism, and militarism. Common Dreams: "In the spirit of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s original campaign against poverty that kicked off 50 years ago next month, leaders of the Poor People's Campaign (PPC) on Tuesday announced plans to revive Dr. King's radical moral vision with mass action nationwide and unveiled a series of ambitious demands aimed at combating the economic, racial, and environmental injustices that afflict tens of millions of people in the world's wealthiest nation. 'We are coming together to break the silence and tell the truth about the interlocking evils of systemic racism, poverty, ecological devastation, the war economy, and our distorted moral narrative.Titled the 'Declaration of Fundamental Rights and Poor People's Moral Agenda,' the document argues—as Dr. King did—that the crises of poverty, militarism, racism, and environmental degradation are interconnected and that all must be confronted if justice for the disenfranchised is to be achieved.'"
BofA Ends Lending To Makers Of Assault Weapons
Bank of America Says It Will Stop Lending to Military-Style Gunmakers. Time: "Bank of America Corp. plans to stop lending to companies that make assault-style guns used for non-military purposes. 'It’s our intention not to finance these military-style firearms for civilian use,' Anne Finucane, a vice chairman at Bank of America, said Tuesday in a Bloomberg Television interview. The firm has had 'intense conversations over the last few months' with those kinds of gun manufacturers to tell them it won’t finance their operations in the future, she said. Her comments mark the first time an executive at the nation’s second-largest bank has publicly laid out how it will deal with gun-industry clients following Feb. 14 shootings at a high school in Parkland, Florida, that left 17 people dead. The massacre set off a wave of pressure on banks, payments processors and other firms to cut services to the firearms industry and on money managers to stop investing in gunmakers."
Parkland School District Refuses To Arm Teachers
Parkland school district votes against arming teachers. CBS: "Leaders of the school district that includes Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Broward County Public Schools, are officially saying no to arming teachers, CBS Miami reports. That decision comes despite the new law that would allow gun carrying inside schools for certain teachers and other school employees. In the wake of the Feb. 14 shooting that killed 17, the Florida state legislature has earmarked $67 million to train school personnel, or at least those who were willing, to carry guns. The law is named after Aaron Feis, the football coach and security guard at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, who was one of the 17 killed."
Court Rules In Equal Pay Case
Women can't have prior salaries used against them, court says in equal pay case. NPR: "Employers can't pay women less than men just because they made less at a previous job, a federal appeals court has ruled. The continuing gender pay gap is "an embarrassing reality of our economy," the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said in its opinion. The court said a woman's prior salary, whether considered on its own or along with other factors, can't be used to justify paying a female employee less than her male counterpart. To do so perpetuates discrimination, the court's majority opinion said. Citing studies that show American women lose some $840 billion annually because of the wage gap, the court wrote, 'If money talks, the message to women costs more than 'just' billions: Women are told they are not worth as much as men.'"
More from OurFuture.org:
Restoring the Promise of the Fair Housing Act. Tara Raghuveer: "The Fair Housing Act, passed fifty years ago today, was a critical victory of the Civil Rights era and an effort to address generations of systemic racism in housing policy. The law intended to prohibit discrimination concerning the sale, rental, and financing of housing based on race, religion, national origin, or sex. The Act was indeed a victory – but it wasn’t perfect, and didn’t come close to rectifying the injustices that, by 1968, were already ingrained in American communities. Only a HUD that’s fully funded and empowered to fulfill the promises of the Fair Housing Act – and goes even further – can meet the real needs of the American people."
