Latest news with #JoshHawley
Yahoo
8 hours ago
- General
- Yahoo
Buyouts likely for six Florissant homes due to radioactive contamination
FLORISSANT, Mo. – The owners of six homes in Florissant are likely to be offered buyouts due to radioactive contamination. City officials have been made aware of a potential planned buyout of six homes in Florissant's Cades Cove subdivision, according to a statement from Florissant Mayor Timothy Lowery. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers previously told city officials that six homes are currently the only area of concern, according to the mayor's office. According to FOX 2's news partners at the St. Louis Post Dispatch, federal officials have cited concerns about radioactive waste below the backyards of six properties. Removing the homes is likely necessary because of the contaminated soil lies close to and may impact the foundations. Watchdog group calls for St. Louis Sheriff's removal over alleged misconduct Homeowners are in the process of gathering necessary paperwork. The federal government hasn't made any offers just yet. Over the last few years, national reports have surfaced suggesting that the federal government downplayed and failed to fully investigate the risks of nuclear waste contamination that stemmed from the Manhattan Project, a World War II-era uranium production effort that occurred in the St. Louis region. When leftover nuclear waste was later disposed, it found way into Coldwater Creek, a 19-mile tributary of the Missouri River that runs through neighborhoods, schools, and parks. On Friday, Missouri U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley – a longtime advocate for cleanup of radioactive waste in the St. Louis area – sent a letter to Lieutenant General William H. Graham, Jr. of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, calling for accountability. The letter raises concerns about the scope of radioactive contamination along nearby Coldwater Creek and questions why only the Cades Code subdivision is being considered for buyouts. 'It should come as no surprise that the community is extremely concerned about proposals for residential buyouts after USACE previously downplayed the potential risks,' said Hawley in the letter. Close Thanks for signing up! Watch for us in your inbox. Subscribe Now Meanwhile, a statement sent to FOX 2 on the potential buyouts from the Florissant Mayor's Office, in part, includes the following: 'For decades, both the city and our residents have received inconsistent and at times conflicting information regarding contamination, flood mitigation plans, and potential buyouts. This prolonged lack of clarity has contributed to confusion, frustration, and a sense of mistrust among those impacted. Promises of transparency, timely updates, and genuine engagement have not always been upheld, and our community deserves better moving forward. 'We are actively seeking more information about the scope and timeline of the potential buyout and are committed to working closely with all involved agencies to ensure that impacted families have the resources, information, and support they need during this process.' 'Florissant will continue to advocate for a fair, transparent, and consistent approach moving forward. We will share updates with the community as they become available, and we will not hesitate to hold the responsible agencies accountable for delivering clear and honest communication.' Any residents with concerns or questions are encouraged to contact Florissant City Hall directly at 314-921-5700. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Fox News
a day ago
- Business
- Fox News
Hawley urges DOJ probe of Chinese trucking company
FIRST ON FOX – Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., asked the Justice Department Thursday to investigate a Chinese-owned self-driving trucking company, one of the largest in U.S., citing allegations that it had shared proprietary data and other sensitive technology with state-linked entities in Beijing. The letter, sent to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and previewed exclusively to Fox News Digital, asks the Justice Department to open a formal investigation into the autonomous truck company TuSimple Holdings, a Chinese-owned company and one of the largest self-driving truck companies in the U.S. In it, Hawley cites recent reporting from the Wall Street Journal that alleges that TuSimple "systematically shared proprietary data, source code, and autonomous driving technologies" with Chinese state-linked entities— what he described as "blatant disregard" of the 2022 national security agreement with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, or CFIUS. "These reports also revealed communications from TuSimple personnel inside China requesting the shipment of sensitive Nvidia AI chips and detailed records showing 'deep and longstanding ties' with Chinese military-affiliated manufacturers," Hawley said. He noted that to date, TuSimple "has not faced serious consequences" for sharing American intellectual property with China, despite having continued to share data with China after signing a national security agreement with the U.S. government in 2022, which was enforced by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. "If the reports about TuSimple are accurate, they represent not just a violation of export law, but a breach of national trust and a direct threat to American technological leadership," Hawley said. "The American people deserve to know how and why a supposedly U.S.-based company was allowed to serve as a conduit for the transfer of sensitive innovations to the Chinese Communist Party," he added. The letter asks Bondi and the Justice Department to take certain steps to investigate the company's actions, as alleged by the recent reports – including investigating whether TuSimple provided protected information to any Chinese-based entities, and what activities were covered by the company's national security agreement with CFIUS, struck more than two years ago. Hawley also asked Bondi what actions, if any, DOJ has taken to date to ensure that Bot Auto—a new Texas-based self-driving vehicle company staffed by many former TuSimple employees, "is not engaging in similar behavior." According to the Wall Street Journal report, TuSimple's actions helped shape new Commerce Department regulations, which blocked the sale of internet-linked cars and different components with links to China. According to the report, a CFIUS investigation determined TuSimple's tech sharing did not violate the official national security agreement— but the company was finned for other infractions, and ultimately paid out a $6 million settlement. The letter comes as Hawley, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, has emerged as one of the Senate's more vocal critics of the Chinese Communist Party, especially as it relates to the conduct of certain U.S. companies, and the sharing of certain intellectual property.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
There's no evidence work requirements for Medicaid recipients will boost employment, but they are a key piece of Republican spending bill
Republicans in the U.S. Senate are sparring over their version of the multitrillion-dollar budget and immigration bill the House of Representatives passed on May 22, 2025. Some GOP senators are insisting on shrinking the budget deficit, which the House version would increase by about US$3.8 trillion over a decade. Others are saying they oppose the House's cost-cutting provisions for Medicaid, the government's health insurance program for people who are low income or have disabilities. Despite the calls from U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri and a few other Republican senators to protect Medicaid, as a scholar of American social policy I'm expecting to see the Senate embrace the introduction of work requirements for many adults under 65 who get health insurance through the program. The House version calls for the states, which administer Medicaid within their borders and help pay for the program, to adopt work requirements by the end of 2026. The effect of this policy, animated by the conviction that coverage is too generous and too easy to obtain, will be to deny Medicaid eligibility to millions of those currently covered – leaving them without access to basic health services, including preventive care and the management of ongoing conditions such as asthma or diabetes. The notion that people who get government benefits should prove that they deserve them, ideally through paid labor, is now centuries old. This conviction underlay the Victorian workhouses in 19th-century England that Charles Dickens critiqued through his novels. U.S. Rep. Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., put it bluntly earlier this month: Medicaid is 'subsidizing capable adults who choose not to work,' he said. This idea also animated the development of the American welfare state, from its origins in the 1930s organized around the goals of maintaining civil order and compelling paid labor. Enforcing work obligations ensured the ready availability of low-wage labor and supported the growing assumption that only paid labor could redeem the lives and aspirations of the poor. 'We started offering hope and opportunity along with the welfare check,' Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson argued in the early 1990s, 'and expecting certain responsibilities in return.' This concept also was at the heart of the U.S. government's bid to end 'welfare as we know it.' In 1996, the Democratic Clinton administration replaced Aid to Families with Dependent Children, or AFDC, a long-standing entitlement to cash assistance for low-income families, with Temporary Aid for Needy Families, known commonly as TANF. The TANF program, as its name indicates, was limited to short-term support, with the expectation that most people getting these benefits would soon gain long-term employment. Since 1996, Republicans serving at the state and federal levels of government have pressed to extend this principle to other programs that help low-income people. They've insisted, as President Donald Trump put it halfway through his first term, that unconditional benefits have 'delayed economic independence, perpetuated poverty, and weakened family bonds.' Such claims are unsupported. There is no evidence to suggest that work requirements have ever galvanized independence or lifted low-income people out of poverty. Instead, they have punished low-income people by denying them the benefits or assistance they require. Work requirements have consistently failed as a spur to employment. The transition from the AFDC to TANF required low-income families to meet work requirements, new administrative burdens and punitive sanctions. The new work expectations, rolled out in 1997, were not accompanied by supporting policies, especially the child care subsidies that many low-income parents with young children require to hold a job. They were also at odds with the very low-paying and unstable jobs available to those transitioning from welfare. Scholars found that TANF did less to lift families out of poverty than it did to shuffle its burden, helping the nearly poor at the expense of the very poor. The program took an especially large toll on low-income Black women, as work requirements exposed recipients to long-standing patterns of racial and gender discrimination in private labor markets. Work requirements tied to other government programs have similar track records. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which helps millions of Americans buy groceries, adopted work requirements for able-bodied adults in 1996. Researchers have found that SNAP's work requirements have pared back eligibility without any measurable increase in labor force participation. As happens with TANF, most people with SNAP benefits who have to comply with SNAP work requirements are already working to the degree their personal circumstances and local labor markets allow. The requirements don't encourage SNAP recipients to work more hours; they simply lead people to be overwhelmed by red tape and stop renewing their SNAP benefits. The logic of work requirements collapses entirely when extended to Medicaid. Red states have been pressing for years for waivers that would allow them to experiment with work requirements – especially for the abled-bodied, working-age adults who gained coverage under the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid expansion. The first Trump administration granted 13 such waivers for what it saw as 'meritorious innovations,' building 'on the human dignity that comes with training, employment and independence.' Arkansas got the furthest with adding work requirements to Medicaid at that time. The results were disappointing. 'We found no evidence that the policy succeeded in its stated goal of promoting work,' as one research team concluded, 'and instead found substantial evidence of harm to health care coverage and access.' The Biden administration slowed down the implementation of these waivers by directing the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to suspend or stem any state programs that eroded coverage. Meanwhile, state courts consistently ruled against the use of Medicaid work requirements. In Trump's second term, Iowa, Arizona and at least a dozen other states have proposed 'work requirement' waivers for federal approval. The waiver process is meant to allow state experiments to further the statutory objectives of the Medicaid program, which is to furnish 'medical assistance on behalf of families with dependent children and of aged, blind, or disabled individuals, whose income and resources are insufficient to meet the costs of necessary medical services.' On these grounds, the courts have consistently held that state waivers imposing work requirements not only fail to promote Medicaid's objectives but amount to an arbitrary and capricious effort to undermine those objectives. 'The text of the statute includes one primary purpose,' the D.C. Circuit ruled in 2020, 'which is providing health care coverage without any restriction geared to healthy outcomes, financial independence or transition to commercial coverage.' The House spending bill includes a work requirement that would require all able-bodied, childless adults under 65 to demonstrate that they had worked, volunteered or participated in job training for 80 hours in the month before enrollment. It would also allow states to extend such work requirements to six months and apply the new requirements not just to Medicaid recipients but to people who get subsidized health insurance through an Affordable Care Act exchange. If passed in some form by the Senate, the House spending bill would transform the landscape of Medicaid work requirements, pushing an estimated 4.8 million Americans into the ranks of the uninsured. This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit, independent news organization bringing you facts and trustworthy analysis to help you make sense of our complex world. It was written by: Colin Gordon, University of Iowa Read more: US safety net helps protect children from abuse and neglect, and some of those programs are threatened by proposed budget cuts Why do cuts to Medicaid matter for Americans over 65? 2 experts on aging explain why lives are at stake Social Security's trust fund could run out of money sooner than expected due to changes in taxes and benefits Colin Gordon does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
USA Today
3 days ago
- Business
- USA Today
Who are the GOP senators balking at Trump's tax bill?
Who are the GOP senators balking at Trump's tax bill? All eyes will be on GOP Sens. Josh Hawley, Susan Collins, Rick Scott, Ron Johnson and others who are pushing for changes to the House-passed bill Show Caption Hide Caption Trump claims Putin has gone 'absolutely crazy' after attack on Ukraine President Donald Trump says Vladimir Putin has gone 'absolutely crazy' after his attack on Ukraine. WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump is hoping to celebrate a major legislative win later this summer by signing into law a massive bill with implications for every American, including extending his first term tax cuts and following through on a campaign pledge to eliminate taxes on tips and overtime. But to do that, Trump will need to convince a handful of vocal members of his own party in the Senate who want major changes to the version that passed the House on May 22. All eyes will be on Republican Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri, Susan Collins of Maine, Rick Scott of Florida and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin – among others – who are pushing for changes to the bill's approach to Medicaid, green energy subsidies, and overall spending. The upper chamber will soon begin working on the legislation that would extend income tax cuts, implement changes to Medicaid and food stamps, funnel more money toward immigration enforcement and more. They're not likely to take the House's version as-is – and some senators are already drawing red lines that GOP leadership will have to navigate as they seek to meet the goal of passing it by July 4. "The goal of the House effort has been to pass one big, beautiful bill. It's rhetoric, it's false advertising," Johnson said on May 22, hours after the House bill passed. "The goal should have been reduce average annual deficits. We have to focus on spending." Trump over the weekend encouraged senators to make changes – which, he said, "may be something I'd agree with" – despite House Speaker Mike Johnson urging senators "not to meddle with it too much" to make it possible to pass it again through the House. More: The 5 House Republicans who didn't vote for Trump's sweeping tax bill Senate Majority Leader John Thune, too, will have to deal with a narrow margin in order to get the bill across the finish line: He can lose only three Republican votes and still get the majority necessary to pass it presuming no Democrats cross party lines to support the legislative package. Senators have plenty they're looking to change, from Medicaid to overall spending cuts. Here are the main sticking points so far. Spending cuts The House-passed legislation would add an estimated $3.8 trillion to the national debt over the next 10 years, fueled by a permanent extension of the 2017 income tax cuts that Trump signed into law during his first term. The bill also includes temporary tax breaks for tips, overtime, seniors and buyers of American-made cars. There is also a boosted child tax credit, among other benefits. More: Treasury bond yields are surging as the Trump tax bill progresses. Here's why it matters. Some fiscal conservatives in the Senate say they can't sign off on legislation that would add to the country's national debt, which is already more than $36 trillion, and that there are enough of them to block the legislation. "I think we have enough to stop the process until the president gets serious about the spending reduction and reducing the deficit," Johnson said May 25 on CNN. "We have witnessed an unprecedented level of increased spending," the Wisconsin Republican added. "This is our only chance to reset that to a reasonable pre-pandemic level." Sens. Rick Scott, R-Florida, and Mike Lee, R-Utah, have similarly said they want to see deeper spending cuts in the final package. Scott is pushing for the GOP to "completely eliminate" the renewable energy provisions of former President Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act, while Lee says there are federal benefits for undocumented immigrants that need to be eliminated. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, has also raised concerns that the package raises the debt ceiling by $4 trillion – a provision that is necessary to prevent the U.S. from defaulting on its debt sometime in August. "Conservatives do need to stand up and have their voice heard," Paul said. Medicaid changes The House-passed legislation also would make major changes to Medicaid, saving $625 billion from the low-income healthcare program while pushing an estimated 7.6 million Americans off coverage. Among the changes would be a new requirement for able-bodied adults without children to prove that they're working, volunteering, or going to school for 80 hours per month, along with more frequent eligibility checks. Multiple senators have raised concerns about the House's cuts to the program. Maine's Collins has said the bill's language goes beyond "waste, fraud and abuse," as GOP leadership has suggested. More: 'Don't f--- around with Medicaid': Trump works to clear out GOP opposition to policy bill Sen. Jim Justice, R-West Virginia, who has also been wary of the lower chamber's changes to Medicaid, doesn't like a portion of the bill that limits states from raising money to pay for their part of Medicaid spending through health-care-related taxes known as "provider taxes." Drawing the ire of Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, is a requirement in the House bill for people who earn between 100 percent and 138 percent of the federal poverty level to pay up to $35 per service, which is currently a salary of $35,365 to $44,367 annually for a family of four. Sens. Jerry Moran, R-Kansas, and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, have also said they're worried about the impact of Medicaid cuts on their constituents. SALT taxes House Republicans from primarily Democratic states like California, New York and New Jersey pushed for an increased cap on state and local tax deductions, also known as SALT, which allows people to write off a portion of their local taxes from what they owe the federal government. The 2017 tax law capped that deduction at $10,000. The new bill would raise that cap to $40,000 for people who make less than $500,000 per year. More: The White House's tax bill will consider SALT (again). What could that mean for you? But in the Senate, there are no blue-state Republicans pushing for similar changes. Some may seek to strip it out to decrease the bill's price tag. "There's not one Republican in the United States Senate" who cares about the SALT tax issue, Sen. Kevin Cramer, R-North Dakota, told reporters, adding that getting a majority in the House "does matter... and we want to be cognizant about that." Green energy The House bill would cut off many renewable energy tax credits for projects beginning 60 days after the bill passes. It would also rescind several other climate change-related provisions of the IRA, including a $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles. It would pull back unspent money for several grant and loan programs at the Energy Department and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, delay methane fees for oil and gas companies, repeal additional rules encouraging the adoption of electric vehicles, and accelerate permitting for fossil fuel projects. While senators like Scott of Florida want to further strip down the IRA's green energy boosters, another group of senators thinks the changes go too far. Murkowski, Moran, and Sens. John Curtis, R-Utah and Thom Tillis, R-North Carolina, sent a letter to Thune in early April warning that rolling back the IRA's renewable energy tax credits could create major disruption to American businesses. Contributing: Savannah Kuchar
Yahoo
7 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Can Josh Hawley out-Trump Trump with the working person?
If you offered me half of Elon Musk's holdings to tell you what Josh Hawley truly believes, I would not be able to cash the check. But after watching our senior U.S. senator for eight years now, I can say with confidence that he likes to stand out in a crowd. By being first to object to the 2020 Electoral College results, then claiming he never tried to overturn the election that Joe Biden won, he did more harm than we'll ever be able to calculate. But there he was, leading the way, even if it was to perdition. With that infamous raised fist on Jan. 6, he tried to rally the rioters he then bolted away from. But hey, by that afternoon, many more Americans knew his name. Our man Hawley played a big role in the Big Lie: The risk that Donald Trump would not leave office after his defeat in 2020 really only became real, according to the 2021 book 'Peril,' by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, when Hawley said he would object to the Electoral College certification. In the traumatic hours after the attack on the Capitol, Hawley stood off to himself on the Senate floor, as The Star reported at the time. According to the book, 'No one spoke to Hawley, who many of them blamed for instigating the riot by announcing his opposition to the certification a week earlier.' Eventually, Sens. Ted Cruz and Roy Blunt asked him what he was going to do, and 'even with the carnage and push from some colleagues to stand down, Hawley decided he would keep his objection to both Arizona and Pennsylvania. He would remain in lockstep with Trump. When told of his decision, many of his Republican colleagues groaned. … Other Republicans would surely stick with Hawley, fearful of being seen as out of step with Trump's voters.' So what to make, then, of Hawley's recent declarations that he would never, no not ever, vote to cut Medicaid, as the Big Beautiful Bill currently does in a big, ugly way? This is quite a turnaround for someone who tried so hard to repeal Obamacare, and to fight Medicaid expansion. Lately, Hawley has started saying that cutting this precious program for the most vulnerable is one line he'd never cross, and that what's more, it's one that Trump wouldn't cross, either. This is clever, because how can Trump call him out for quoting Trump's own campaign promise to the public? Trump pushed hard for the House to pass the 'Big Beautiful Bill,' cuts and all, which it did. And when Hawley says Trump would never sign his own BBB if it included Medicaid cuts, well, sure he wouldn't. Hawley is right that cutting Medicaid would be a disaster for low-income families and the disabled and those with autism and in nursing homes. It's also incontrovertibly true that such cuts would hit Missourians particularly hard: An analysis by KFF Health News earlier this month found that Missouri was one of six states, along with Kentucky, Mississippi, New Mexico, South Carolina and West Virginia that would suffer the most. A recent front-page piece in The New York Times suggested that Hawley the culture warrior has also been 'less noisily' on the side of the little guy all along. So much less noisily that I can't say we ever noticed the effects of all those years of effort in Missouri. The graduate of Rockhurst High, Stanford and Yale Law, who clerked for Chief Justice John Roberts and spent a gap year teaching at St. Paul's in London, does, like Trump, who was a millionaire in grade school, talk an awful lot about how much the elites hate us regular folks. At Hawley's Senate campaign launch in 2018, I was still capable of disappointment at hearing him start right in with this us-versus-them golden oldie: 'The liberal elites who call themselves our leaders refer to us as flyover country,' he said. 'They deride not just our location but our whole way of living.' But, that's a song that always gets them out on the dance floor, and maybe the aggrievement was genuine. The Times piece about him said that as a longtime populist, Hawley had from his earliest days in office done things like go after opioid manufacturers as attorney general of our state. He did file lawsuits against them, it's true, and maybe he would have done so anyway. But he did that, as The Star reported, after discussion with the Washington political consultants who were involved in running his office and then his U.S. Senate campaign to get him some national buzz. And this was after his soon-to-be Senate opponent, Claire McCaskill, had already launched a Senate investigation into the opioid industry. My point is really that we have heard many words but seen few results from Josh Hawley, man of the people. If our senior senator really wants to, as a former aide to Bernie Sanders told The New York Times, break up the cozy relationship between his party and corporate America that's gone on since Reagan was president, does that mean he'll challenge Trump for selling access and demanding fealty from CEOs who then cash in? Rhetorical question. In some ways, what Hawley is doing reminds me of the recent moves from California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is breaking with his party and running to the center on trans athletes, limits on Medi-Cal for undocumented immigrants and declarations that he's going to stop 'funding failure' when it comes to curbing homelessness. Only, where Newsom is concerned, everyone and his puppy sees what he's doing as a bald political calculation in preparation for a potential '28 presidential run. He's getting nothing but noogies, both from his own party and from Republicans, for tacking to the center, while Hawley has been praised and reappraised by Democrats for simply saying he wouldn't cut Medicaid. The Wall Street Journal did disapprovingly note 'Josh Hawley's Medicaid Switcheroo.' And on X, he's being pressured to change his mind. Of course, if Missourians lost their health care, and Grandma couldn't stay in the nursing home, those giving him grief now would feel differently. And if that's what he's betting on, then he's right. Hawley's ambition is one of the only other things I know for sure about him. In his own recent essay in The Times, he made it seem that on the issue of Medicaid cuts, this is him and Trump against the bad guys. 'Mr. Trump has promised working-class tax cuts and protection for working-class social insurance, such as Medicaid,' he wrote. 'But now a noisy contingent of corporatist Republicans — call it the party's Wall Street wing — is urging Congress to ignore all that and get back to the old-time religion: corporate giveaways, preferences for capital and deep cuts to social insurance.' I can practically hear the score to 'Les Mis' in the background, calling us to the barricades, can't you? Now that the Republican House has passed the bill with those very same deep cuts — deeper, actually — it will be up to the Senate to stop the worst of it. Far less surprisingly, Sens. Jerry Moran of Kansas and Susan Collins of Maine have concerns about the bill, and Sen. Ron Johnson thinks it doesn't cut spending enough. They have until July to figure it out. Maybe Hawley won't backtrack at this point. And trying to out-Trump Trump with the working person, if that's the goal, would not actually be that hard. But if he really wants to become Trump's heir, and make that dreamed-of presidential run in the way that he hopes, he'll have to start doing more than talk.
