Friday, December 11, 2015

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley today released the following statement on the proposed merger of DuPont and Dow Chemical.  The Judiciary Committee has jurisdiction over antitrust policy.

"DuPont and Dow are two titans of American industry and the proposed merger demands serious scrutiny.  Federal regulators are responsible for examining and approving the transaction to make sure that it's not anticompetitive.  Vigorous enforcement of the antitrust laws is imperative to maintaining an open, fair and competitive marketplace.   I'll be listening to Iowa farmers and consumers about any concerns they may have with this proposal, and the Judiciary Committee will be exercising its appropriate oversight function."

Quad Cities, USA: The Salvation Army is desperately seeking enough toys to save Christmas for thousands of less fortunate children in the Quad Cities.  The 2015 Angel Tree Toy Drive was planned to conclude on Dec. 14th. Due to the lack of toys, Angel Tree donations will be extended through Tuesday, December 15th!  

The Salvation Army encourages people to add just one more child to their Christmas list...a child living in poverty.

ANGEL TREE Toy Collection sites are located at all four Quad City Wal-Marts, NorthPark Mall (JCPenney Court) and SouthPark Mall (near JCPenney Court) and ends December 15th. Mall times are 11am - 8pm daily, and 11am -- 5pm on Sunday.

Major Gary Felton, Quad Cities Coordinator for The Salvation Army, states that "Close to 1,500 families are depending on us.  Every child in our community should wake up Christmas morning to a new toy. This final week's hard work will hopefully be enough so we can let children know they are special on Christmas morning!"  

Last year, thousands of toys were displayed at The Salvation Army's Toy Shop on the Christmas Assistance distribution days.  Parents are able to "shop" for their child's gift, and also receive a food box with the ingredients for a Christmas dinner

Q: What is the Every Student Succeeds Act?

 

A: In the first rewrite of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) since 2001, the Republican-led Congress restored a much greater degree of local control and decision-making authority to parents, teachers and local school board members in December with bipartisan passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act. It replaces the troubled No Child Left Behind Act. President Bush's proposal for that law called for greater local control over teaching in return for more accountability in terms of student achievement outcomes, but the degree of local freedom many had hoped for didn't materialize. What we did get was a detailed one-size-fits-all assessment and accountability system that prescribed interventions for schools not making progress toward all students being proficient in reading and math by 2014. That date has now passed so schools across Iowa face increasingly onerous top-down interventions. Since the No Child Left Behind Act was supposed to last only until 2007, there should have been plenty of time to adjust the goal, but until now, Congress has not been able to come up with a replacement.

The Every Student Succeeds Act was a bipartisan compromise, which was necessary to pass the Senate. It does not go as far as I would like in reducing federal involvement in local schools, but it is a big improvement over the status quo. Schools serve as the lifeblood of neighborhoods across the country. It makes sense that parents, taxpayers, elected school board members and educators living and working in these neighborhoods are best able to identify problems, solve challenges and remove learning barriers in the classrooms where students are attending the schools in their communities.  I believe that our local schools can do more when the Washington bureaucracy does less and this new law will allow key decisions to be made closer to the parents and students they affect.

Q: What provisions did you secure in the new education law?

 

A:  As founder and co-chair of the Senate Caucus on Foster Youth, I work to give a voice to foster kids at the policymaking tables in Washington. Too many foster youth face a lifetime of uncertainty and interminable transition. Many times, schools are their only lifeline to stability and haven for a sense of belonging. That's why I worked to strengthen connections between child welfare agencies and state and local education institutions so that foster youth aren't allowed to fall behind or face an endless cycle of being shuffled from one school to the next.  Also included were key parts of a bill I introduced to fix federal incentives that were preventing gifted and talented students from disadvantaged backgrounds reaching their fullest potential. Beyond that, I worked on provisions to ensure states are free from federal coercion in setting content standards and I ensured that a civic education grant program the bill's authors included kept a focus on teaching the history and principles of the Constitution. These founding principles have guided America's prosperity for more than 200 years. It makes sense that younger generations develop a keen understanding and appreciation for the bedrock values of liberty, freedom and justice.

WASHINGTON - The Senate Judiciary Committee has passed bipartisan legislation that would strengthen the United States' national security laws by ensuring that the government can successfully investigate and prosecute nuclear terrorists.  The bill was introduced by Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley and Senator Sheldon Whitehouse and cleared the Judiciary Committee by a sweeping 17-3 margin.

The bill implements three changes to federal criminal law that had been requested by both the Bush and Obama administrations on multiple occasions, most recently in 2011, but were not acted on by the committee until now. They were also omitted in House-authored legislation passed earlier this summer that created new offenses involving nuclear and maritime terrorism.

The first provision of the bill would allow the Department of Justice to go to court and obtain a wiretap if there is probable cause that a defendant is committing one of the new offenses.

The second provision would allow the newly-created offenses to be predicates for the separate crime of material support for terrorism.  The provision helps to ensure that all who help plan, finance and aid terrorist attacks can be brought to justice.

The third, and final provision, would permit the Department of Justice to seek the death penalty, in appropriate cases, for terrorists who commit acts of nuclear and maritime terrorism that kill Americans.

"The recent terrorist attacks in the United States and abroad show just how vulnerable our country is.  These are complex attacks that are planned for months or even years," Grassley said.  "Nuclear terrorism isn't just theoretical; it's a very real threat.  The government needs the ability to seek the death penalty for nuclear terrorists under the appropriate circumstances.  It's also common sense that we provide the government the ability to prosecute those who provide material support to these terrorists, including by financing them.  And, it's important that authorities have the capacity to seek lawful wiretaps, authorized by a federal judge, to investigate these terrorists.  These are tools that were requested by both Presidents Bush and Obama that will help keep Americans safe."

Two amendments expressing a "Sense of the Senate" were also added to the bill.  The first recognized that excluding people from coming to America solely on the basis of their religion is contrary to the country's founding principles.   The second amendment recognized that the United States was not founded on religious liberty alone, and depriving Americans of other core constitutional rights, like the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms, is also contrary to the country's founding principles.

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