November 5, 2021
UPDATE: 11/6/21 Federal judge has issued a TEMPORARY STAY on this OSHA order while the litigation proceeds. This is not the only case so there will be more orders coming soon as all these lawsuits play out. I will update when they come to a conclusion.
I know you all have a lot of questions about the video I posted yesterday that talks about the new official OSHA rules for vaccination or weekly testing and full time mask wearing for American workers at companies with more than 100 employees by January 4th.
Let me answer some of your most popular questions.
One — OSHA is not some random, private, independent organization. OSHA the Occupational Safety and Health Administration is part of the US Department of Labor. It’s a division created by Congress when they passed a law back in 1970 to “ensure safe and healthful working conditions for workers by setting and enforcing standards and by providing training, outreach, education and assistance.” So OSHA is the federal government. And in this case, was ordered by the president to come up with, distribute and enforce this rule.
Two — as I said yesterday – lawsuits are already piling up over this and we don’t know the outcome yet. States like Missouri, Florida, Louisiana, Indiana and Texas to name a few– have already filed suits in several different US Courts of Appeals. Some private companies have also sued over it. Their arguments are as expected they believe the federal government is overreaching with all of this.
Three – for some reason lots of you are concerned with USPS and whether or not postal workers have to comply with this. The fact is – OSHA specifically calls out the united states postal service and says yes – they must comply with this rule too. And a side note – the CDC, White House staff and all other federal employees under the jurisdiction of the executive branch and must comply with a stricter rule of full vaccination by January 4th with *no* testing option. Notice I said executive branch – that’s because the judicial branch and the legislative branch cannot be ordered to do anything by the executive branch because – we have three co-equal branches of government in the United States.
Four — lots of you have specific questions about what counts as 100 employees. And whether your specific working conditions and environment would exempt you from this rule. For all that information – please go to my website I have links to a really helpful document from osha called frequently asked questions.
Read OSHA ETS FAQ here.
After weeks of back and forth — the house has now passed the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill.
Final vote – 228 to 206. 13 republicans voting YES and 6 Democrats voting NO.
This bill already passed the Senate back in August with all Democrats and Independents voting YES and 19 Republicans also joining to say YES.
This is the bill that funds all kinds of traditional infrastructure programs I’ll explain those in a second. This is *not the Build Back Better bill sometimes called the “Human” infrastructure bill or the bill that would significantly expand the social safety net. That’s a totally separate bill. Not this one.
So what’s in this one?
Total price tag is $1.2 trillion including $550 billion in new federal spending over the next five years.
It funds all kinds of traditional infrastructure projects across the country like…
Rebuilding roads and bridges, the power grid, upgrading and installing high speed internet/broadband throughout the country, improvements to the railways, cleaning up our national water pipes, improving public transit, airport infrastructure, and building electric vehicle infrastructure like charging stations…just to name a few.
This bill will now go to the President’s desk for signature. He has indicated he’s ready to sign it the second it gets to the White House.
Democrats voting NO.
- Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York
- Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota
- Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri
- Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York
- Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts
- Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan
Republicans voting YES
- Rep. John Katko of New York
- Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska
- Rep. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey
- Rep. Don Young of Alaska
- Rep. Fred Upton of Michigan
- Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois
- Rep. Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio
- Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania
- Rep. Tom Reed of New York
- Rep. Andrew Garbarino of New York
- Rep. Nicole Malliotakis of New York
- Rep. David McKinley of West Virginia
- Rep. Chris Smith of New Jersey
You may have heard the House took some sort of vote on the President’s Build Back Better bill tonight.
But it’s probably not what you think it is. So let me explain it.
There are actually two separate bills. One was the $1.2 trillion bipartisan “traditional” infrastructure bill that has now fully passed both the House and the Senate and I explained in detail in this video. That’s the only bill that was passed tonight.
The other vote in the House tonight was just a procedural vote on the President’s Build Back Better bill – some call it the ‘human” infrastructure bill …it’s the one that would expand the social safety net. That bill – will cost somewhere around $1.75 and $1.9 trillion dollars as it stands right now.
This procedural vote in the House tonight –was a vote on the rule. It’s the first step to getting the bill passed through the House…it will still have another vote in the House and then move to the Senate where it will have several votes including a Vote-a-rama and a final Senate vote. We know the Democrats plan to pass this bill alone without one single Republican vote through a procedural maneuver called budget reconciliation.
The bottom line – this is a *long* way from over. And what goes in this bill, what programs are included and eliminated are all still subject negotiation and change.
