Thursday, April 11, 2013
The 5th District congressman said it puts unfair burdens on poor seniors and veterans.
Rep. Keith Ellison took his fight against chained CPI to MSNBC on Wednesday, criticizing the president’s plan to use the new inflation formula as a way to compromise with Republicans and resolve a budget impasse. The so-called “chained consumer price index” would grow Social Security benefits at a slower rate than they grow under the current formula. The 5th District congressman argues that it amounts to a cut in benefits. “The fact is the president is someone who I support and campaigned hard for. But it is not about the president,” Ellison said on MSNBC's NewsNation with Tamron Hall. “It is really about … low-income seniors struggling to get by on $12,000 a year. It’s about a person, a veteran, it is about Americans who depend upon a …
Friday, March 22, 2013
The 5th District congressman didn’t agree with the cuts in the sequester.
Fifth District Rep. Keith Ellison protested the sequester cuts by voting against the continuing resolution that the House passed Thursday. The act funds the government for the next six months and keeps the government from shutting down later this month. The House passed the act on a 318-109 vote. The Senate passed it Wednesday. Following Thursday’s passage in the House, Ellison issued the following statement: “While I believe Congress has a basic responsibility to keep the government running, I voted against this bill to protest the deep cuts to everything from education funding to medical research known as the ‘sequester.’ The Sequester does nothing to improve the continuing jobs crisis in Minnesota and the country. Today’s legislation …
Monday, March 18, 2013
The 5th District representative said proposals to change the way inflation is calculated amount to a benefits cut.
Fifth District Rep. Keith Ellison is among congressional liberals pushing back against entitlement changes in President Barack Obama’s proposed “grand bargain” to end the sequester. Last month, Ellison and more than 100 House Democrats sent the president a letter stating their opposition to any proposal that would cut Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid as part of a deal to end sequestration. But Obama, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and other Democratic leaders have recently signaled their willingness to adopt a so-called “chained consumer price index” that would grow Social Security benefits at a slower rate than they grow under the current formula. Ellison and others say that amounts to a cut to Social Security benefits. When the …
Thursday, February 28, 2013
Federal New Starts funding is still a couple years away.
The Southwest Light Rail Transit project shouldn’t face any immediate setbacks if cuts from the looming sequestration take effect. The federal New Starts grants program, which helps fund transit expansion and will pay for some of the Southwest project, would be cut by 6 percent in the event of sequestration, according to Streetsblog. However, the Southwest LRT Project has not yet received federal funding, said Laura Baenen, the project’s communications manager. It continues advancing toward that goal in the next couple years.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Ellison to Hannity: 'I'm laughing at you—and it's not the first time.'
Sequestration was the issue as U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison (DFL-MN) made a feisty appearance on Fox News' Hannity program Tuesday, calling host Sean Hannity's introduction on the topic "yellow journalism." See the full 9-minute intro and their exchange in the YouTube above. As co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Ellison has spoken out against the sequester budget cuts coming Friday: For Ellison, the Hannity tussle was perhaps his most combative on-air appearance since a late-campaign radio debate with Republican challenger Chris Fields at KFAI-FM in Minneapolis:
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Minnesota has about 59,000 federal employees and retirees. See where they’re located and which agencies they work for in Patch’s interactive table.
Washington, D.C., may be the hub of the federal workforce, but Minnesota has tens of thousands of federal employees and retirees who could be hurt by the looming sequestration crisis. If the president and Congress can’t strike a deal by Friday, a series of mandated federal budget cuts would automatically kick in. That would force more than a million federal employees to take unpaid leave, according to the Washington Post. Minnesota, alone, has about 59,000 federal employees and retirees. Hennepin County accounts for 16,780 of that total, or about 28 percent. Most of those are federal retirees or Veterans Affairs and Postal Service employees. Use the table above to see how many federal employees and retirees Minnesota’s counties have. Just …
Rep. Keith Ellison, who represents SLP, has weighed in on the series of cuts that could hit the country March 1. The rollbacks would hit everything from education to senior care, the White House states.
If a deal isn’t struck by Friday between President Obama and Congress, a sequester will begin that will auto-start a series of mandated federal budget cuts that would quickly be felt across the Midwest. Here’s a sample of what’s at risk: U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, a DFLer representing Minnesota's Fifth District (including St. Louis Park), gave this statement to the Star Tribune earlier this month: “The Republicans have controlled the House of Representatives for 766 days and they’ve yet to make creating jobs a priority. Now House Republicans are letting across the broad spending cuts hit America’s working families hard. If these damaging spending cuts take effect on March 1st, the sequester will eliminate over 600,000 jobs this year—…
Monday, February 25, 2013
The Minnesota congressman was on a humanitarian trip to discuss the status of Somali refugees and U.S. remittances with the new Somali government.
U.S. Congressman Keith Ellison (DFL-MN) recently returned from a humanitarian trip to eastern Africa. The 5th District representative visited Mogadishu, Somalia and Nairobi, Kenya last week to discuss the status of Somali refugees in the region as well as U.S. remittances. Ellison was the first member of Congress to visit Somalia in nearly three years, on the heels of the U.S. government recognizing the Somali government earlier this year. Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, leaders of the new Somali government, the Mayor of Mogadishu, the Somali Chamber of Commerce, the director of the American Refugee Committee and several Somali-Americans from Minneapolis met with Ellison in Mogadishu. From there, Ellison traveled to Kenya to visit …
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
The Fifth District congressman also departed for a visit to Somalia and proposed a solution to the Asian Carp invasion.
As Democrats spar with Republicans in Washington D.C. over solutions to the nation's debt, and the nation frets over looming mandatory cuts to the federal budget, Congressman Keith Ellison (D-MN) and 107 other lawmakers pressured President Barack Obama to refuse cuts to national social safety-net programs. According to Salon.com , Ellison and members of the all-Democratic Congressional Progressive Caucus issued a letter opposing any reduction in entitlement benefits. The effort was lead by Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), although Ellison co-chairs the caucus. The liberal lawmakers are particularly concerned that Democratic leaders will agree to changes in how Social Security benefits are indexed to inflation through a procedure known as the "…
James Warden
4:16 pm on Friday, April 12, 2013
It's worth noting that chained CPI isn't only for Social Security benefits. The Atlantic Wire has a great article called "Chained CPI and You: A Primer": http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2013/04/what-is-chained-cpi/64083/ Here's the key part regarding it's other uses: "[Social Security is] not only thing the government uses CPI for. It's used to adjust income thresholds for government … more ›