Weekly Legislative Update
 Week of May 22, 2017
  
Congressional Outlook

Week of May 22

The House and Senate are both in session this week. The House will vote on 20 bills under suspension of the rules, including the Adam Walsh Reauthorization Act of 2017 (H.R. 1188), which reauthorizes, through FY 2022, grants to the states and other jurisdictions to implement sex offender registry requirements; the Juvenile Justice Reform Act of 2017 (H.R. 1809), which reauthorizes, though FY 2022, about $1.6 billion for juvenile justice and at-risk youth programs at DOJ and HHS; and the Put Trafficking Victims First Act of 2017 (H.R. 2473), which requires DOJ to provide training and technical assistance to federal, state, local and tribal governments on prosecuting human traffickers and providing support services to trafficking victims. For the remainder of the week, the House will vote on the Reducing Regulatory Burdens Act of 2017 (H.R. 953), which exempts pesticides approved for use under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) from Clean Water Act permitting requirements; the Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Abuse Act of 2017 (H.R. 1973), which requires national amateur sports organizations to report suspected cases of child abuse to law enforcement and implement policies to prevent such abuse; and the Protecting Against Child Exploitation Act of 2017 (H.R. 1761), which closes a loophole in existing federal criminal law by making the production or transmission of pornographic photos or videos of a child a crime regardless of the perpetrator's intent.      
 
The Senate will vote on Monday to confirm Iowa Governor Terry Branstad to serve as U.S. Ambassador to China. Later in the week, the Senate will vote on the nomination of John Sullivan to serve as Deputy Secretary of State, the second-highest position in the State Department, below Rex Tillerson. The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee this week will hold a nomination hearing for Robert Powelson and Neil Chatterjee to join the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and Dan Brouillette to become Deputy Secretary of Energy.  
 
Lawmakers will be analyzing President Donald Trump's spending blueprint for FY 2018 that is set to be delivered to Capitol Hill on Tuesday morning. The President plans to propose $1.7 trillion in cuts to major social and entitlement programs for lower-income Americans, as part of an effort to balance the budget within a decade. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) predicted in an interview last week that Congress would pursue its own spending priorities, ruling out severe cuts that Trump has proposed. The President's budget will assume that the real growth in the gross domestic product will rise to 3 percent by 2021, however, that scenario may prove unrealistic, with the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projecting average growth of 1.9 percent from 2021 through 2027. Numerous Cabinet secretaries and agency heads will be testifying before House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees this week to begin explaining, elaborating and defending their priorities for FY 2018.  
 
On Wednesday afternoon, the non-partisan CBO is scheduled to release its budget score of the American Health Care Act of 2017 (H.R. 1628), which the House passed on May 4 by a vote of 217-213. This analysis will tell House Republican leadership whether the bill cuts the deficit enough to permit Senate consideration under reconciliation procedures that would allow for a simple majority vote in that chamber. Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) said last week that he has been holding on to the bill "out of an abundance of caution," and that he doesn't expect the CBO score to force another vote in the House.
 
On Thursday, voters in Montana will go to the polls to pick a new House member for the at-large seat vacated by Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on March 1. The contest pits Republican businessman Greg Gianforte against Democratic musician Rob Quist. 
 
President Trump continues traveling the globe this week on his first international trip as President. He arrived in Saudi Arabia last Friday, landed in Israel on Monday, and will travel to the Vatican City, Belgium, and Italy for the remainder of the week.
Week in Review

Former FBI Director Mueller Named Special Counsel to Oversee Investigation Into Russian Interference in 2016 Election and President Trump's Campaign
 
On May 17, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed former FBI Director Robert Mueller as special counsel to oversee the FBI's investigation into Russian interference with the 2016 election. Officially, Mueller is investigating "any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump," as well as   crimes   that may take place during the course of the investigation, such as perjury, obstruction of justice, and witness intimidation. Several other related events took place last week leading up to Mueller being named special counsel, including: (1) on May 15, the Washington Post reported that Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian Foreign Affairs Minister and Russia Ambassador in a closed-door meeting in the Oval office on May 10; (2) on May 16, reports indicated that a memo former FBI Director James Comey wrote in February shows that Trump asked him to shut down the FBI investigation into former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn ; later that day House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) requested, by May 24, from the FBI all records related to Trump's conversations with Comey; and (3) on May 19, it was announced that former FBI Director Comey will testify publicly before the Senate Intelligence Committee in early June. Read more...
Trumps Signs CRA Disapproval Resolution Into Law Nullifying State Retirement Savings Rule
 
On May 17, President Trump signed H.J. Res. 66 into law, a Congressional Review Act (CRA) disapproval resolution nullifying an August 2016 Department of Labor  rule to support state efforts to establish retirement savings plans for workers who do not otherwise have access to a tax free long term savings plan. The rule would have given states legal clarity under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) to establish retirement savings plans for private and nonprofit sector employees who are not offered a workplace savings plan, thereby encouraging states to create these important retirement savings accounts for private sector workers living in their jurisdictions. The Senate passed the resolution on May 3 by a vote of 50-49 and the House passed it on February 15 by a vote of 231-193 . President Trump has now signed a total of 14 CRA disapproval resolutions into law. Under the terms of the CRA process, the resolution not only nullifies the rule, but prevents the Labor Department from considering a "substantially similar" rule in the future. Read more...
Senate Votes to Confirm Deputy Secretary of Transportation and Associate Attorney General
 
On May 16, the Senate voted 56-42 to confirm Jeffrey A. Rosen to serve as Deputy Secretary of Transportation (second-ranking official at DOT below Elaine Chao); the six Democratic Senators to vote with all 50 Senate Republicans for Rosen were Sens. Joe Donnelly (D-IN), Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Joe Manchin (D-WV), Gary Peters (D-MI), and Mark Warner (D-VA). On May 18, the Senate voted 52-46, on a straight party-line vote, to confirm Rachel L. Brand to serve as Associate Attorney General (third-ranking official at DOJ below Jeff Sessions and Rod Rosenstein). Read more here and here.
Senate Passes Four Law Enforcement-related Bills
 
On May 16, the Senate passed four bills by Unanimous Consent related to law enforcement for Police Week:  
  • Rapid DNA Act of 2017 (S. 139): establishes a system to enable law enforcement officials to use Rapid DNA instruments to help reduce DNA backlogs. The Rapid DNA Act will give law enforcement officials a new system that meets FBI quality assurance standards to compare DNA samples collected at the time of an arrest to profiles in the FBI's Combined DNA Index System (CODIS);
  • Public Safety Officers' Benefits Improvement Act of 2017 (S. 419): reduces the backlog of families awaiting approval of survivor benefits of public safety officers killed in the line of duty; 
  • American Law Enforcement Heroes Act of 2017 (S. 583): prioritizes the U.S. Department of Justice's Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) funding of law enforcement agencies that use the funding to hire military veterans; and
  • Law Enforcement Mental Health and Wellness Act of 2017 (S. 867): makes grants available to initiate peer mentoring pilot programs, directs DOJ and HHS to develop resources for mental health providers based on the specific mental health challenges faced by law enforcement, and supports law enforcement officers by studying the effectiveness of crisis hotlines and annual mental health checks.It would also direct DoD, DOJ, and the VA to confer about existing DoD and VA mental health practices and services that could be adopted by law enforcement agencies.
House Passes Law Enforcement-related Bills
 
Last week, the House passed various bills related to law enforcement for Police Week, including:
  • Rapid DNA Act of 2017 (H.R. 510), passed by voice vote on May 16, establishes a system to enable law enforcement officials to use Rapid DNA instruments to help reduce DNA backlogs;
  • American Law Enforcement Heroes Act of 2017 (H.R. 1428), passed by voice vote on May 16, prioritizes COPS funding of law enforcement agencies that use the funding to hire military veterans;
  • Strengthening State and Local Cyber Crime Fighting Act of 2017 (H.R. 1616), passed by a vote of 408-3 on May 16, which would formally authorize the Secret Service's National Computer Forensics Institute, which assists state, local, and tribal law enforcement in combating cybercrime;
  • Thin Blue Line Act (H.R. 115), which passed by a vote of 271-143 on May 18, would require federal courts to consider the murder, attempted murder, or targeting of a state or local law enforcement official, firefighter, or first responder as an aggravating circumstance when determining if a death sentence is warranted for a convicted felon, provided the crime occurred under federal jurisdiction; and
  • Probation Officer Protection Act of 2017 (H.R. 1039), which passed by a vote of 229-177 on May 19, would expand the arrest authority of federal probation officers to allow the probation officer to arrest a third party individual if there is "probable cause to believe that the person has forcibly assaulted, resisted, opposed, impeded, intimidated, or interfered with a probation officer or a fellow probation officer," before obtaining a warrant. 
Trump Announces Nominations to Administrative Posts
 
Last week, the White House announced that the following 12 nominations had been sent to the Senate for consideration:
  • Susan Bodine to be an Assistant Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Enforcement and Compliance Assurance;
  • Dan R. Brouillette to be Deputy Secretary of Energy;
  • James Donovan to be Deputy Secretary of the Treasury;
  • Kevin Allen Hassett to be Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers;
  • Derek Kan to be Under Secretary of Transportation for Policy;
  • Doug Manchester to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Commonwealth of The Bahamas;
  • Brian D. Quintenz to be a Commissioner of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission for a term expiring April 13, 2020;
  • James J. Sullivan, Jr. to be a Member of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission for a term expiring April 27, 2021;
  • Brooks D. Tucker to be an Assistant Secretary of Veterans Affairs (Congressional and Legislative Affairs);
  • Claire M. Grady to be Under Secretary for Management, Department of Homeland Security;
  • Neomi Rao to be Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget; and
  • David J. Redl to be Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information 
Trump also announced his intent to nominate the following six individuals to various positions last week:  
  • G. Keith Bryant to be Administrator of the United States Fire Administration at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Department of Homeland Security;
  • Elizabeth Erin Walsh to be Assistant Secretary and Director General of the United States and Foreign Commercial Service, Department of Commerce;
  • Richard Ashooh to be an Assistant Secretary of Commerce, Export Administration;
  • Callista L. Gingrich to be U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See;
  • Dr. Poonam Alaigh to be designated Acting Under Secretary of Veterans Affairs for Health; and
  • Kathleen Troia ("K.T.") McFarland to be the U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Singapore