What you missed while watching the impeachment, Week 4

Everybody hates robocalls, so the House voted to crack down on them. Food stamps are getting slashed — 700,000 People might lose them. The Justice Division hunted down a bunch of Russian cyber gangsters often known as “Evil Corp.”

These are headlines which may have risen above the fold if Washington weren’t gripped by an all-consuming impeachment saga. However these actions — and dozens of others by the federal authorities this week, present that the gears of the federal authorities are still firing away, with life-changing and controversial coverage selections being made whereas the nation is distracted.

The Senate confirmed yet another lifetime federal judicial nominee — Sarah Pitlyk — whose nomination flew under the radar but is exceptional as a result of her anti-abortion views are so expansive that she opposes some fertility remedies for ladies.

What these main coverage selections all have in widespread is that they'll affect tens of millions of People and a number of sectors of the financial system — but acquired little air time on the cable networks and nearly no entrance page protection in major newspapers. That’s why POLITICO’s policy editors are coming via with week three of “What you missed whereas Washington was impeaching the president.”

Drug prices are too excessive, and Pelosi is doing something about it

It took virtually a yr, however Democratic leaders are at last ready to bring a sweeping plan to lower drug prices up for a floor vote. The choice to schedule the vote next week provides the chamber’s weak first-term Democrats an opportunity to go on the document about a problem positive to loom giant within the 2020 election that helped the social gathering retake control of the chamber in the midterms. But the bill has no probability of being taken up in the Republican-controlled Senate. — Adriel Bettelheim

Robocalls get nearer to extinction

Afraid bipartisanship is extinct in Washington? You then may have been shocked or heartened by Wednesday’s 417-Three vote within the House for a bill aimed toward stifling the billions of noxious, often fraudulent robocalls that People endure each month. The surge of congressional unity got here on the identical day the two events have been sparring on the Judiciary Committee’s first impeachment hearing — and now the bill heads to the Senate, which expects to ship it to President Donald Trump’s desk earlier than Christmas. The lesson for anybody interested in additional cultivating that "Kumbaya" spirit within the Capitol: Target a scourge that everybody detests equally. “There are not any purple robocalls or blue robocalls, just hated robocalls,” stated Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), a sponsor of the trouble in the higher chamber. “And that's what brought Democrats and Republicans collectively.” — Bob King

Trump's Ag Division slashes meals stamps

The final rule set by USDA on Wednesday to make work requirements stricter for tens of millions of food stamp beneficiaries largely follows what the administration initially proposed earlier this yr. About 688,000 adults can be ineligible for this system underneath the modifications, USDA estimated, saving almost $5.5 billion over five years.

As expected, the rule tightens the standards that states must meet to get a waiver from present work requirements for able-bodied adults. However the division additionally made one other vital, little-noticed change: It eliminated one of many key ways states get waivers from work requirements when unemployment is quickly rising — a change that has anti-hunger advocates even more concerned. — Helena Bottemiller Evich

Justice Department expenses 'Evil Corp' gang leaders

Russian hackers, unique automobiles and a $350,000 wedding ceremony: That was the stuff of a sweeping legal case towards the alleged leaders of a cybercrime gang often known as “Evil Corp” that British and American officers say orchestrated hacking assaults "so audacious and complicated they might be troublesome to imagine if they have been not actual," in line with an assistant U.S. lawyer basic.

The Division of Justice, State Department and the U.Okay. National Crime Company unveiled the fees on Thursday towards Russian nationals Maksim Yakubets and Igor Turashev for deploying malicious software that bilked “tens of hundreds of thousands of dollars of loses to victims worldwide.” And based on officers, the hackers fueled a lavish way of life with the spoils from the wave of cybercrime.

The Treasury Department also sanctioned Evil Corp and claimed Yakubets aided Moscow’s “malicious cyber efforts, highlighting the Russian authorities’s enlistment of cybercriminals for its personal malicious functions.” The U.S. is providing a $5 million reward for info leading to Yakubets’ arrest. — Michael B. Farrell

5G revolution coming to rural America

The FCC will create a $9 billion fund in an effort to boost wireless providers and connections in rural America for the subsequent era of providers referred to as 5G, or fifth era.

The 5G fund will substitute an earlier pot of FCC subsidies deliberate to assist within the build-out of 4G LTE, referred to as the Mobility Fund. Fee officers decided to scrap plans to move forward with these subsidies after determining that the wi-fi protection knowledge submitted by carriers was not correct. — Madi Bolaños

Teen vaping charges are still rising

Federal knowledge made public Thursday reveal e-cigarette use continues to rise amongst highschool students, with greater than a quarter saying they vape despite a lung illness epidemic and widespread public health outcry that has pitted Trump towards congressional Democrats. The president first noticed early knowledge in September and announced that he would soon problem a widespread flavor ban — however the policy has stalled amid polling figures and a tense White House meeting convening business executives and anti-tobacco advocates.

A White House official informed POLITICO this week that the president will "soon" be introduced with "some options" on learn how to proceed. In the meantime, general teen tobacco use is at its highest since 2000. — Sarah Owermohle

There’s a new Power secretary

Dan Brouillette, former Power secretary Rick Perry’s second-in-command, sailed by means of a affirmation vote within the Senate.

He inherits from Perry an agenda that included selling U.S. fossil gasoline exports and looking for a authorized method to compel power corporations to keep operating their economically ailing coal and nuclear crops. — Anthony Adragna

Article initially revealed on POLITICO Magazine

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