HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Gov. Tom Wolf signed legislation approved Friday by lawmakers that carries over $900 million in pandemic-driven aid for hard-hit hospitality businesses, private schools and people struggling to pay rent or utility bills in Pennsylvania. This time around, landlords and advocates for renters hope the money is free of federal and state rules that plagued the rollout of the first lump of pandemic aid for renters last year. READ MORE: COVID-19 In Pennsylvania: Lack Of Vaccine Supply Forces St. Clair Hospital To Cancel First Dose Appointments Both chambers passed the bill unanimously Friday, and Wolf signed it several hours later. In addition to distributing money, the bill carries a provision designed to clear up any uncertainty over whether federal pandemic aid, including Paycheck Protection Program loans and direct federal payments to taxpayers, are taxable as income in Pennsylvania. It is not, under the bill, although the Department of Revenue said it is concerned that the loans will be taken as deductions and amount to a $220 million hit to state tax collections. Most of the $912 million being allocated in the bill is federal aid approved by Congress in December. Some of it, $145 million, is cash from a state worker’s compensation fund that Wolf asked lawmakers to send to businesses hit hard by the pandemic. That money will be available through counties in grants of up to $50,000 for bars, restaurants and hotels, although industry representatives say the cash won’t reach many of the 30,000 such businesses that remain under pandemic restrictions in Pennsylvania. It also won’t replace much lost revenue in a state where restaurants did about $27 billion in annual sales before the pandemic. Eligible applicants cannot be publicly traded businesses — a provision that might limit some larger chains, although maybe not franchisees — but it still casts a wide net, allowing businesses with as many as 300 employees at one location and ...
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The Hill’s 12:30 Report – Presented by ExxonMobil – Third approved vaccine distributed to Americans
Presented by ExxonMobil To view past editions of The Hill's 12:30 Report, click here: http://bit.ly/1M1mIfw To receive The Hill's 12:30 Report in your inbox, please sign up here: http://bit.ly/1Tt4hqN --> A midday take on what's happening in politics and how to have a sense of humor about it.* *Ha. Haha. Hahah. Sniff. Haha. Sniff. Ha--breaks down crying hysterically. The Hill’s 12:30 Report: J&J vaccine rollout begins | 4M doses shipped | Initial supply limited | Trump’s first public appearance since leaving office | Renewed false election fraud claims | CPAC sights and sounds | Just 68 percent of CPAC attendees want Trump to run again | 55 percent would vote for him again | COVID relief package moves to Senate | Biden doesn’t release virtual visitor logs LATEST WITH THE CORONAVIRUS No. 3, LET’S GOOOOOOOOO!!: After Johnsons & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine was authorized over the weekend, the company is distributing 3.9 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine. https://bit.ly/2MAt83b This is key about the J&J vaccine : It only requires a single dose for patients to be fully immunized. When Americans could receive those doses — from J&J CEO Alex Gorsky : "We think, literally, within the next 24 to 48 hours, Americans should start receiving shots in arms," Gorsky said on NBC's "Today" on Monday. "They're literally rolling out with the trucks as we speak." 3.9 million isn’t a lot, right? : Yes, there have been production delays with this vaccine. Timeline for production : “The company expects to ramp up somewhat by the end of March, with 20 million total doses by that point, and 100 million by the end of June. WHAT TO EXPECT FROM THE J&J VACCINE SUPPLY — IT WILL BE LIMITED FOR A LITTLE WHILE: Via STAT News’s Rachel Cohrs : https://bit.ly/3kAJ95R FOR CONTEXT TO THE TOTAL U.S. VACCINE SUPPLY: “[J&J] says it's on track to produce 20 million doses by the end of March. Along ...
Pennsylvania House to Investigate Gov. Tom Wolf Sending Coronavirus Patients to Nursing Homes
The Pennsylvania House of Representatives announced an oversight investigation of Gov. Tom Wolf’s (D) handling of nursing homes and long-term care facilities during the coronavirus pandemic. Reps. Mike Kelly (R-PA), Fred Keller (R-PA), Dan Meuser (R-PA), Glenn “GT” Thompson (R-PA), Scott Perry (R-PA), Lloyd Smucker (R-PA), John Joyce (R-PA), and Guy Reschenthaler (R-PA) issued the following statement: The Pennsylvania Republican Congressional Delegation thanks the members of the General Assembly for taking the necessary steps to investigate the Wolf administration’s disastrous policies relating to our state’s nursing homes and long-term care facilities. Last March, the Pennsylvania Department of Health issued guidance requiring nursing homes to admit COVID-positive patients. Today, more than half of the state’s COVID fatalities have occurred in these facilities. Unfortunately, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro has repeatedly failed to investigate the policies that put Pennsylvania seniors living in long-term care facilities at risk. Pennsylvanians deserve a full and transparent investigation into what went wrong. Our offices remain committed to ensuring all information is brought to light so that the health and safety of our senior citizens are never again jeopardized by the careless actions of a state executive. In addition, the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued guidance on March 13, 2020, “For Infection Control and Prevention of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Nursing Homes.” The March 13 guidance said, “nursing homes should admit any individual that they would normally admit to their facility, including individuals from hospitals where a case of COVID-19 was/is present” only if the nursing home can follow the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) quarantining guidance. Former CMS administrator Seema Verma later said, “[u]nder no circumstances should a hospital discharge a patient to a nursing home ...
Democrat Sen. Joe Manchin Again Pledges He Will ‘Never’ Back Ending Filibuster
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) is standing firm against nuking the Senate’s filibuster, telling Capitol Hill pool reporters again on Monday that he will “never” support ending the rule. Asked if he is open to changing his position on the filibuster, Manchin responded by saying: “Never! Jesus Christ. What don’t you understand about never?” In January Manchin appeared on Fox News Channel’s “Special Report,” reassuring viewers he will not vote to end the filibuster after viewing a clip of his earlier vow, Manchin responded, “It’s all the same. Nothing’s changed.” In November Manchin also appeared on Fox News Channel’s Special Report , vowing that he will not vote for packing the courts or ending the filibuster if Democrats take the majority in the Senate. At the time saying: I commit to you tonight, and I commit to all of your viewers and everyone else that’s watching, I want to allay those fears, I want to rest those fears for you right now. Because when they talk about, whether it be packing the courts or ending the filibuster, I will not vote to do that. I will not vote to pack the courts. I think — and I will not vote to end the filibuster. … I will not be the 50th Democrat voting to end that filibuster or to basically stack the court, and in all the other things you’re hearing about, Bret, also, defund the police. I don’t know of any of the Democrats in the caucus that are for defunding the police. We’re not for that whatsoever. And when they talk about basically, Medicare for All, we can’t even pay for Medicare for some. It doesn’t make any sense at all. The Senate filibuster rule requires 60 votes to pass legislation out of the chamber, except in rare circumstances where a budget gimmick called reconciliation can be used to drop the total number of votes necessary to pass a bill down to just a simple majority of 51 votes. With a 50-50 Senate split evenly between Republicans and Democrats–where Vice President Kamala Harris breaks the tie giving ...
Fraud overwhelms pandemic-related unemployment programs
COLUMBUS, Ohio — With the floodgates set to open on another round of unemployment aid, states are being hammered with a new wave of fraud as they scramble to update security systems and block scammers who already have siphoned billions of dollars from pandemic-related jobless programs. The fraud is fleecing taxpayers, delaying legitimate payments and turning thousands of Americans into unwitting identity theft victims. Many states have failed to adequately safeguard their systems, and a review by The Associated Press finds that some will not even publicly acknowledge the extent of the problem. The massive sham springs from prior identity theft from banks, credit rating agencies, health care systems and retailers. Fraud perpetrators, sometimes in China, Nigeria or Russia, buy stolen personal identifying information on the dark web and use it to flood state unemployment systems with bogus claims. The U.S. Justice Department is investigating unemployment fraud by “transnational criminal organizations, sophisticated domestic actors, and individuals across the United States,” said Joshua Stueve, a spokesman for the department’s criminal division. The Labor Department inspector general’s office estimates that more than $63 billion has been paid out improperly through fraud or errors — roughly 10% of the total amount paid under coronavirus pandemic-related unemployment programs since March. “We’re all learning that there is an epidemic of fraud,” said U.S. Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas, the ranking Republican on the House’s powerful Ways and Means Committee. Brady said the $63 billion estimate “is larger than the entire budget of the Department of Homeland Security.” “These are frightening levels of fraud,” he said. California has been the biggest target, with an estimated $11 billion in fraudulent payments and an additional $19 billion in suspect accounts. Colorado has paid out nearly as much to scammers — an estimated $6.5 billion — as it has to people who ...
