Tag: Barack Obama

WASHINGTON (TIP): About 3.3 million people enrolled in private Obamacare health coverage through new US healthcare marketplaces from October 1 to February 1, the Obama administration said on February 12.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office had estimated in its latest forecast last week that 6 million people would sign up for private coverage through the marketplaces by March 31, down from an earlier forecast of 7 million. But the report predicted that the program, which was delayed by early technical problems with the HealthCare.gov website last autumn, would eventually overcome the deficit, signing up 24 million people by 2017.

Government data released on Wednesday also showed that the number of young adult enrollees aged 18 to 34 rose slightly to 25 percent of the total enrollment population. Participation among young adults could be crucial to the success of President Barack Obama’s signature healthcare law because they tend to compensate for higher risks from older or sicker policyholders who represent three-quarters of enrollees.

HOUSTON, TX (TIP): Twelve major American Sikh advocacy organizations, on January 28, 2014 sent letters to President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder calling on the Obama Administration to immediately reinstate Kawaljeet Tagore, a Sikh IRS Agent based out of Houston, TX fired in July, 2006 for wearing a kirpan, a Sikh religious article of faith.

Following her termination, Tagore sued the IRS and the Federal Protective Service (FPS),the federal agency responsible for the security of federal buildings, under Title VII and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act for failing to accommodate her Sikh religious practice of wearing the kirpan, a dagger-like article that symbolizes the Sikhs’ commitment to justice.

Even though FPS and IRS allow saws, box cutters, letter openers, and cake knives into federal buildings for work-related purposes, the IRS and FPS defended Tagore’s lawsuit by claiming that a federal criminal law, 18 U.S.C. section 930, prohibits them from according Tagore any accommodation for her kirpan.

In 2012, a Houston federal judge sided with the government and dismissed Tagore’s lawsuit. However, on November 13, 2013, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit-relying on a December, 2012 FPS Policy Directive that requires accommodation of kirpans -reversed the federal judge’s ruling in favor of FPS. The Fifth Circuit held that the new FPS Policy Directive “contradicts the arguments previously advanced by the government for denying Tagore an exception or exemption for the wearing of her kirpan.

Yet, to date, the government has refused to reinstate Tagore to her position as an IRS agent, compensate her, or accommodate her kirpan. “A hard working IRS agent is being kept from work due to her religious beliefs in a country founded on diversity and religious freedom. The FPS has already allowed 2.5 inch kirpans in almost 9,000 federal buildings but will not allow Ms. Tagore to wear her kirpan to work in an IRS building.

Now that this inconsistency has been addressed by the Fifth Circuit, it is time to give Ms. Tagore her job back,” said Anisha Singh, staff attorney and policy advocate for UNITED SIKHS. In their letter, UNITED SIKHS, along with other Sikh advocacy groups, claim that the IRS and FPS’ continuing violation of Ms. Tagore’s right to religious accommodation is contrary not only to RFRA and FPS Directive 15.9.3.1 but to the guiding principles and tenets of the Obama Administration,” including an Executive Order that requires federal agencies to promote diversity. The Sikh groups call on Obama to “direct the Civil Division of the Department of Justice, IRS, and FPS to appropriately resolve” Tagore’s lawsuit, by “reinstating her employment with the IRS and providing her her with an exemption to wear her kirpan to work.”

WASHINGTON (TIP): US President Barack Obama will meet Jordan’s King Abdullah II at an exclusive California estate next month, the White House said on January 29.

The talks, likely to focus on Syria’s refugee crisis and Middle East peace moves, will take place on February 14 at the same desert resort — the Annenberg estate at Sunnylands near Palm Springs — where Obama met China’s President Xi Jinping for an informal summit in June.

“The president looks forward to discussing with King Abdullah opportunities to strengthen the US-Jordan strategic partnership and how to advance our political, economic and security cooperation,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said in a statement.

“The two leaders will also continue consultations on regional developments, including Middle East peace and Syria.” The Jordanian embassy in Washington said in a statement that the summit would take place as the king returned from a trip to Mexico and that he would also travel to Washington to meet key officials and lawmakers.

WASHINGTON (TIP): For the second straight year, President Obama called for an increase in the national minimum wage during January 28 State of the Union address. Texas Democrats expressed strong support for the proposal.

“This has gained a lot of momentum,” said Rep. Al Green, DHouston. “Every poll that I see indicates that people are for raising the minimum wage. It can make a difference in the lives of people not only at the very bottom in the entry level jobs, but also in the lives of people up the ladder as well, because it tends to raise the other boats as it raises that boat that’s at the very lowest level.”

Conservatives, however, say that raising wages would add more expenses for business owners already struggling to stay afloat. Many Republicans point to studies suggesting that raising the minimum wage will slow job growth. The current federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. Obama called for a boost to $10.10, spotlighting a bill by Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa and Rep. George Miller, DCalif. currently attempting to raise the national minimum wage to that level. The president also announced an executive order to raise the minimum wage paid to federal contractors, to $10.10.

That came with pledges for other executive orders, drawing the ire of conservatives, who called such actions “imperialist.” “Shame on us,” said Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, of Congress’ inability to raise the minimum wage. “The actions that the president is taking are not overbearing or far-reaching. They respond to the outcry of the American people for a decent wage and a decent quality of life.” Texas’ minimum wage is the same as the federal minimum. In 2013, Texas had more minimum wage workers than any other state – 452,000 of the 3.6 million nationwide.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a quarter of all Texas workers- more than 2.5 million- make less than $10 an hour. More than 700,000 workers in the Dallas metro area make around that level, or less. “I believe in a decent living wage,” said Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Dallas. She said businesses she’s spoken to in her district are on board with the boost. “They don’t have a problem with $10 an hour. I’ve talked with fast food owners [and] Costco…. They all feel it’s worthy to get the wages up, to get money in circulation so employees can live a decent life.

WASHINGTON (TIP): He talked a good game of acting on his own if necessary, calling for 2014 to be a “year of action, but President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address showed he knows that true progress depends on cooperation with a divided and recalcitrant Congress.

“Sometimes we stumble; we make mistakes; we get frustrated or discouraged,” he said near the end of the more than hour-long speech, seeming to describe his bad 2013 that lowered his approval ratings. “But for more than 200 years, we have put those things aside and placed our collective shoulder to the wheel of progress.”It was vintage Obama, blending hopeful calls for a unified approach with declarations of presidential independence through executive orders.

There were the now familiar calls to recalibrate the tax code, spend more to rebuild roads and bridges, bolster education and avoid war if at all possible. He brought many to tears with a tribute to Sgt. First Class Cory Remsburg, a disabled war veteran who sat next to first lady Michelle Obama and waved with wounded limbs to a prolonged standing ovation. Even Republicans relentlessly critical of the President conceded his oratorical skill. “A speech by Barack Obama is a lot like sex,” said GOP strategist and CNN contributor Alex Castellanos. “The worst there ever was is still excellent.”

According to a snap CNN/ORC International poll, 44% of respondents had a “very positive” response to Obama’s speech, while 32% described a “somewhat positive” response and 22% didn’t like it at all. Last year, 53% of respondents in a similar poll rated their response to the 2013 address as very positive. The underlying theme of Obama’s fifth State of the Union address was his call on Tuesday for the government to work on behalf of all Americans in 2014, and his pledge to do so even if Congress refused to join him in an election year. “Let’s make this a year of action,” Obama said. “That’s what most Americans want — for all of us in this chamber to focus on their lives, their hopes, their aspirations.”

It’s an optimistic goal for a President with a 43% approval rating entering his sixth year in office and facing a determined opposition in the Republican-led House of Representatives with congressional elections looming in November. “What I offer tonight is a set of concrete, practical proposals to speed up growth, strengthen the middle class, and build new ladders of opportunity into the middle class,” Obama said. “Some require congressional action, and I’m eager to work with all of you. But America does not stand still, and neither will I.”

On issue after issue, he invited Congress to work with him but said he also would go it alone. Obama called for more government support to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure, but also said that “I will act on my own to slash bureaucracy and streamline the permitting process for key projects, so we can get more construction workers on the job as fast as possible.”The President also promised an executive order to raise the minimum wage for some government contract workers.While the action is relatively narrow and affects less than half a million people, Obama urged Congress to follow suit for all low-wage workers in America.

Earlier Tuesday, House Speaker John Boehner chafed at such unilateral action, telling reporters that Republicans are “just not going to sit here and let the President trample all over us.”In the official Republican response, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington complained that Obama’s policies “are making people’s lives harder.” “We hope the President will join us in a year of real action — by empowering people — not by making their lives harder with unprecedented spending, higher taxes, and fewer jobs,” she said. One area of possible progress is immigration reform. Obama got a long ovation when he urged Republicans in the House to join Democrats in passing a Senate plan that got bipartisan support.

McMorris Rodgers also brought up the issue backed by some Republicans as a way to bolster their weak support among Hispanic Americans, the nation’s largest minority demographic. “We’re working on a step-by-step solution to immigration reform by first securing our borders and making sure America will always attract the best, brightest, and hardest working from around the world,” she said in describing the more limited GOP approach to the comprehensive Senate measure that includes a path to legal status for immigrants living illegally in the country.

On another major reform issue, Obama chided Republicans for trying to undermine his signature health care law that passed in 2010 without GOP support. He cited the millions of people helped by the reforms that ended denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions among its benefits. “The American people aren’t interested in refighting old battles,” Obama said. “Let’s not have another 40-something votes to repeal a law that’s already helping millions of Americans. …The first 40 were plenty. …We all owe it to the American people to say what we’re for, not just what we’re against.”

In her response, though, McMorris Rodgers continued the GOP attack line on the health care reforms as big government run amok and causing harm to people by raising costs and limiting their personal choices of doctors and medical treatment.The CNN/ORC poll indicated 59% of respondents thought Obama’s policies as presented in the speech would help the economy, a lower figure than in recent years. Obama said he will order the U.S. Treasury to create a new federal retirement savings account called MyRA, a savings bond that would guarantee “a decent return with no risk of losing what you put in.”

It will be available to those whose jobs don’t offer traditional retirement savings programs, he said. Additionally, Obama called for: — Eliminating $4 billion in tax subsidies for the fossil fuel industries “that don’t need it” and instead “invest more in fuels of the future.” — Equal pay for women, noting they make 77 cents for each dollar a man earns, which he called “wrong” and “an embarrassment” to prompt loud and long applause. — Setting new fuel standards for American trucks to help reduce U.S. oil imports “and what we pay at the pump.”– Reworking the corporate tax code.

He urged Congress to work with him to close “wasteful, complicated loopholes that punish businesses investing here” and instead “lower tax rates for businesses that create jobs right here at home.”– Congress to lift restrictions on transferring detainees from Guantanamo Bay so the prison cna be closed in 2014.Obama also reiterated that he will veto any new sanctions bill from Congress that would derail talks on preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon, adding that “for the sake of our national security, we must give diplomacy a chance to succeed.”

NEW YORK (TIP): More than 6.3 million Americans were deemed eligible for government healthcare plans for the poor since the October 1 launch of President Barack Obama’s healthcare law through December, federal officials reported on Wednesday.

The swelling rolls for Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) reflect both an expansion of Medicaid under Obama’s Affordable Care Act (ACA) and what healthcare policy analysts call an “out-of-the-woodwork effect,” in which people who heard about Obamacare sought to obtain health insurance and discovered that they had qualified for Medicaid even before the law expanded eligibility.

“We have people who for the first time will have some health security that they never had before,” Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, said of the Medicaid numbers at the winter meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington, D.C. It was not clear how much credit goes to the healthcare law, however.

“What many people don’t read far enough to learn is that this number also can include people in some states who are eligible under pre-expansion — the woodwork effect — and whose Medicaid enrollment was simply renewed,” said Matt Salo, executive director of the National Association of Medicaid Directors. The 6.3 million people determined eligible for Medicaid or CHIP last fall swamps the 2.2 million people who had purchased private health insurance on the state-based Obamacare marketplaces that launched on Oct. 1.

The ACA also raised the income threshold for Medicaid eligibility to 138 percent of the federal poverty level, or $15,856 for a single person. A Supreme Court decision in 2012 allowed each U.S. state to decide whether to accept the expansion. So far, 25 states have reached an agreement with the administration to do so. Prior to the ACA, just over 60 million Americans were covered by Medicaid. In December alone, 2.3 million individuals were determined eligible to enroll in Medicaid or CHIP, an increase of over 20 percent from November, according to the report from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the lead Obamacare agency.

About 1.2 million of these were in the 25 states (and the District of Columbia) already expanding Medicaid, and just over 1 million were in the 25 states that have not. The CMS figures refer to the number of people that meet Medicaid eligibility rather than actual enrollment in the program due to the troubled HealthCare.gov website, which is run by the federal government to serve Obamacare sign-ups in 36 states.

For months, the website did not correctly transmit information that applicants are eligible for Medicaid to their state Medicaid program. The state offices do the actual enrollment, and have been scrambling to send out tens of thousands of letters to residents to actually enroll them, the Washington Post reported this month. At the same time, the national figures mirror what many of the Medicaid-expansion states have reported. In California, for instance, 625,000 individuals have gained coverage through private policies purchased on the state’s Obamacare exchange, Covered California, while 1.2 million enrolled in Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid program.

The websites through which people can shop for insurance under Obamacare are required to have what the Obama administration calls a “no wrong door” policy, meaning that even if people went to their state’s exchange expecting to buy private insurance, the site would determine if they were instead eligible for Medicaid or CHIP, which generally charge zero premiums. Several states have gone beyond that, seeking out Medicaid-eligible people by contacting those who receive food stamps or other benefits that indicate they have very low incomes

WASHINGTON (TIP): President Barack Obama is expected to endorse changes to the way the government collects millions of Americans’ phone records for possible future surveillance, but he’ll leave many of the specific adjustments for Congress to sort out, according to three US officials familiar with the White House intelligence review. That move would thrust much of the decision-making on Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act toward a branch of government that is deeply divided over the future of surveillance.

And members of Congress are in no hurry to settle their differences and quickly enact broad changes. Obama will speak about the bulk collections and other surveillance programmes in a highly anticipated speech on Friday at the justice department. White House officialscautioned that the review Obama has been conducting is not complete and that he could make additional decisions. They said that a panel recommendation that has proven particularly challenging for Obama is to strip NSA of its authority to hold phone records.