Tag Archives: Office of Management and Budget

Biden 2025 Budget Would Offer ‘Welcome Relief,’ But Not Enough

One expert said that enacting his reforms “will begin to reverse the 40-year one-way ratchet of falling taxes for the wealthy and corporations and instead invest in workers and families.”

By Jessica Corbett. Published 3-11-2024 by Common Dreams

Photto: U.S. Secretary of Defense/flickr/CC

On the heels of delivering the latest State of the Union speech and signing a package of funding bills, U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday unveiled his budget blueprint for fiscal year 2025, a proposal praised by congressional Democrats and progressive advocates who want him to go even further.

The $7.3 trillion budget comes as the divided Congress is still sorting out funding for the current fiscal year. Given those divisions—and that the Republican House majority is already advancing its own budget resolution for the fiscal year that begins in October—the Democratic president’s plan is widely seen as a statement of priorities going into the November election.

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Green Groups Demand Answers About ‘Flimsy’ and Buried Biden Drilling Report

“Public records released as a result of this request will shine light on the dangerous chasm separating Biden’s climate promises from his refusal to phase out the use of our public lands and waters for oil and gas extraction.”

By Jessica Corbett.  Published 12-2-2021 by Common Dreams

U.S. President Joe Biden listens as Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland speaks at the White House. Photo: U.S. Department of the Interior/flickr/CC

A trio of climate and conservation organizations on Thursday filed a public records request regarding the development of a report about leasing federal lands and waters to fossil fuel companies that the Biden administration released the day after Thanksgiving.

The administration came under fire for not only the contents of the U.S. Department of the Interior report—required by President Joe Biden’s January executive order on “tackling the climate crisis at home and abroad”—but also dropping it on the Friday after a holiday. Continue reading

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‘Shameful Does Not Even Begin to Describe’ Trump EPA Decision on Chemical Known to Damage Children’s Brains

“Yet another abdication of duty by those that are entrusted with protecting Americans from needless and preventable harm.”

By Julia Conley, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 5-15-2020

The EPA signaled Thursday it will not regulate perchlorate, a chemical used in rocket fuel, in drinking water. (Photo: wonderisland/Shutterstock)

Environmental campaigners vowed to fight President Donald Trump’s EPA Thursday after the agency said it would propose that the rocket-fuel chemical perchlorate does not need to be regulated, despite its links to cognitive damage in fetal and child development.

According to the New York Times, the EPA plans to tell the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that it is “not in the public interest” to regulate the chemical at all, a year after the agency recommended the allowable amount in drinking water be limited to 56 parts per billion (ppb). Continue reading

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As Trump Sows Discord, Chief of Staff Mulvaney Reportedly Focused on ‘Building Empire for the Right Wing’

“Cabinet members are pressed weekly on what regulations they can strip from the books and have been told their performance will be judged on how many they remove.”

By Jessica Corbett, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 7-15-2019

Mick Mulvaney press conference about President Donald Trump’s budget plan. Screenshot: YouTube

While President Donald Trump dominates national media with racist tweets and lies, acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney is quietly “building an empire for the right wing” and pushing Cabinet members to impose a radical and rapid deregulation agenda across the federal government, according to a new Washington Post report.

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‘Big Attack on Working People’: Trump Moves to Redefine Poverty in Order to Slash Social Programs and Services for Millions

“A novel way to take healthcare, etc., away from people AND make it look like there are fewer poor people.”

By Julia Conley, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 5-7-2019

The Poor People’s Campaign has mobilized nationally to fight the Trump administration’s attacks on the poor. (Photo: Becker1999/flickr/cc)

The Trump administration on Monday moved to change the definition of “poverty” in the United States in a proposal which combines the president’s attempts to portray the U.S. economy as strong with his repeated attacks on the working poor and their access to government services.

In a regulatory filing, President Donald Trump’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) wrote that it may change how inflation is calculated in order to reduce the number of Americans who are living below the federally-recognized poverty line and are therefore eligible for certain government support services and social programs. Continue reading

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“Keep It, It’s Yours.” Postal Workers’ Message to Public Denounces Trump Privatization Plan

 “Don’t sell this national treasure to private interests that will charge more for less service,” union says ahead of Tax Day events

By Andrea Germanos, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 4-14-2019

The Tax Day message from the American Postal Workers Union. (Image: APWU with frame)

U.S. Postal Service workers will hold a day of action Monday to reject a Trump White House proposal to privatize the service.

“Our message to the public is quite simple. ‘The United States Postal Service—Keep it. It’s yours!'” said Mark Dimondstein, president of the American Postal Workers Union (APWU), in a statement. “Don’t sell this national treasure to private interests that will charge more for less service.” Continue reading

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Urgent Demands for Congress to Act as Net Neutrality’s “Slow and Insidious” Death Begins

“Momentum is on our side, but time isn’t. Members of Congress need to know that there will be a price to pay for being on the wrong side of internet history.”

By Jake Johnson, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 4-23-2018

Protest for net neutrality in New York City in December 2017. Photo: Mark Stanley/Twitter

Today is the day that net neutrality’s “slow and insidious” death at the hands of the Republican-controlled FCC officially begins, and Congress is facing urgent pressure to save the open internet before it’s too late.

With Monday marking 60 days after the FCC’s net neutrality repeal entered the Federal Register, parts of the GOP-crafted plan—spearheaded by agency chair and former Verizon lawyer Ajit Pai—will now slowly begin taking effect, while some still need to be approved by the Office of Management and Budget. Continue reading

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