Beltway Buzz, August 23, 2024

DNC Platform Previews Democratic Policy Priorities. The Democratic Party held its national convention this week in Chicago, Illinois, and workplace issues featured prominently in the party’s agenda. These workplace issues will undoubtedly be a focus of the Harris/Walz presidential campaign leading up to Election Day, and they will likely be policy priorities in the event that the Democratic ticket wins the White House in 2025. Here are a few tidbits that we picked up during the convention:

• Labor Unions.
  • Political appointments. Officials from labor unions such as the AFL-CIO, United Autoworkers, Communications Workers of America, Service Employees International Union, Laborers’ International Union of North America, and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers all had brief speaking opportunities at the Democratic National Convention. This wasn’t a surprise, given that the 2024 Democratic Party Platform proclaims that the Biden administration has been the most “pro-union Administration in history” and notes that “President Biden named staunch labor allies and former union leaders to positions across the government.” A Harris/Walz administration would likely continue this relationship with organized labor.
  • Legislation. The platform states, “Democrats will keep fighting to pass the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act … and to hold abusive bosses accountable for violating workers’ rights.” It goes on to state, “We oppose state right-to-work laws, which drive down wages and leave workers unsafe; and we support penalizing employers who engage in union busting.”
  • Top-down organizing. The platform alludes to aligning union priorities—such as so-called neutrality agreements—with federal assistance programs. (“Consistent with the law, we will ensure that federal grants and other assistance to employers are contingent on recipients committing to not interfering with workers’ efforts to form a union.”)

• Federal contractors. The platform touts the administration’s final rule on project labor agreements, and hints that a Harris/Walz administration would push for some form of federal contractor “blacklisting”: “Democrats will continue to create strong labor standards for jobs created with taxpayer dollars through legislation and with strong Buy American rules.”

• Workplace Safety / Wage and Hour. The platform maintains that Democrats will “strengthen enforcement and penalties for safety, wage, and other labor and employment violations.” Obviously, this means stricter enforcement on the ground, but it could also allude to pushing for passage of bills like the PRO Act or the “Labor Enforcement to Securely (LET’S) Protect Workers Act.”

• Immigration. According to the platform, Democrats will continue to push the U.S. Citizenship Act, which was introduced very early in the Biden administration but didn’t gain traction. The most recent U.S. House of Representatives version of the bill has 118 cosponsors and there is no companion bill in the U.S. Senate.

Suffice it to say, a Harris/Walz administration would, at a minimum, seek to continue the union-friendly policies of the current administration.

Court Blocks FTC Ban on Non-Competes. On August 20, 2024, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas enjoined the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) from enforcing its ban on non-compete agreements, which was scheduled to go into effect on September 4, 2024. The court determined that the rule not only exceeded the FTC’s statutory authority, but it was arbitrary and capricious because it was “based on inconsistent and flawed empirical evidence, fail[ed] to consider the positive benefits of non-compete agreements, and disregard[ed] the substantial body of evidence supporting these agreements.” This week’s action is unlikely to be the final word on the matter, as the FTC may appeal the decision and there are ongoing challenges in Pennsylvania and Florida. James M. Barrett and Sean C. Urich have the details.

USCIS Releases “Parole in Place” Proposal. On August 20, 2024, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued a notice implementing President Biden’s “parole in place” policy announced on June 18, 2024. The notice, which refers to the new process as “Keeping Families Together,” establishes a streamlined procedure by which certain noncitizen spouses and stepchildren of U.S. citizens can apply for adjustment of status to lawful permanent resident (LPR) while remaining in the United States. Currently, such individuals seeking LPR status must first depart the United States and apply for an immigrant visa at a U.S. embassy or consulate abroad.

To take advantage of this new process, a noncitizen spouse of a U.S. citizen must:

• “Be present in the United States without admission or parole”;

• “Have been continuously physically present in the United States since at least June 17, 2014 through the date of filing the parole in place request”;

• “Have a legally valid marriage to a U.S. citizen on or before June 17, 2024”;

• “Have no disqualifying criminal history”; and

• “Submit biometrics, undergo required background checks and national security, public safety, and border security vetting, and be found not to pose a threat to national security or public safety.”

A requestor who is the stepchild of a U.S. citizen must:

• “Be present in the United States without admission or parole”;

• “Have a parent who entered into a legally valid marriage with a U.S. citizen on or before June 17, 2024 and before the child’s 18th birthday”;

• “Have been continuously physically present in the United States since at least June 17, 2024 through the date of filing”;

• “Have no disqualifying criminal history”; and

• “Submit biometrics, undergo required background checks and national security and public safety vetting, and be found not to pose a threat to national security or public safety.”

This new process became effective on August 19, 2024.

NDEA and the Space Race. Sixty-six years ago this week, the U.S. Congress passed the National Defense Education Act of 1958 (NDEA). The push for the act began a year earlier, when the Soviet Union’s launch of Sputnik caused a slight panic within the defense and intelligence communities that the United States was losing the “space race.” Championed by Democratic Senator J. Lister Hill of Alabama, the NDEA sought to align educational and national security needs by providing funding to boost the study of science, mathematics, engineering, and foreign languages. It worked, too: between 1960 and 1970, the number of college students in the United States increased from 3.6 million to 7.5 million. The NDEA marks the federal government’s first foray into major funding of education.