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| 📷 House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-California, talks to reporters just after the Republican majority in the House narrowly passed a sweeping debt ceiling package as they try to push President Joe Biden into negotiations on federal spending at the Capitol in Washington on Wednesday. (AP photo by J. Scott Applewhite) |
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📢 Maine's congressman urges the president and a top Republican to talk.
◉ U.S. Rep. Jared Golden, a Democrat from Maine's 2nd District, sent a letter to President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-California, alongside two other House centrists on Wednesday urging the two leaders to end a standoff over negotiations on the debt ceiling.
◉ The nation could default by early June if Congress does not make a deal. McCarthy and Republicans passed their own measure on Wednesday in the House, but it includes discretionary spending cuts that are a poison pill for Democrats including Golden, who voted against it. The measure has no chance of passing in the Senate.
◉ McCarthy's move this week is aimed at increasing his leverage with Biden. But practically speaking, Congress is going to have to end the impasse by making a bipartisan deal. Golden outlined his own framework blending tax hikes with spending cuts earlier this month.
◉ "It is time to end the partisan standoff and brinkmanship before it rattles markets, damages our economy, and hurts the American people," Golden and the two other Democrats said.
👛 Maine Democrats move to raise the minimum wage yet again.
◉ Democrats on the Legislature's labor committee moved Wednesday to endorse a measure that would raise Maine's minimum wage to $15 next year and continue indexing it to inflation. The hourly minimum is now $13.80 and it would likely rise above $14 by next year under the current regime set by a 2016 referendum driven by progressive groups now asking for more increases.
◉ This was pared back from an initial proposal from Rep. Ben Collings, D-Portland, who wanted to raise the wage by at least $1 per year through 2034. That drew opposition from business groups including the Maine State Chamber of Commerce as well as the Mills administration, whose labor department said the current law is working well and should be retained.
◉ Republicans opposed this measure and have backed others that would end indexing, overturn higher minimum wages in Portland and Rockland while preventing other cities from setting them and allow lower wages for workers under age 18. |
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What we're reading
☠️ Maine's handling of Aroostook poisonings 20 years ago laid the groundwork for the pandemic response.
🧑⚖️ Sen. Angus King's Supreme Court ethics bill has a hard road to passage.
🚂 In train news, passenger rail isn't coming to Bangor anytime soon and locomotives leaking fuel in rural Maine are being dismantled.
😷 Maine's largest health care provider dropped its mask requirement.
🗣️ Signs in Portland poking fun at Oregon's counterpart city get a key fact wrong. Here's your soundtrack. |
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