The Wall Street Journal - USA (2020-12-03)

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. ***** Thursday, December 3, 2020 |A

U.S. NEWS U.S. WATCH

CENSUS BUREAU

Delays Would Block

Immigrant Exclusion

Census Bureau schedules in-

dicate the agency needs until

Jan. 23 to complete the 2020

count and transmit apportion-

ment figures to the president, a

House committee said.

The delay would prevent

President Trump from excluding

unauthorized immigrants from

the decennial count of the popu-

lation that redistributes seats in

the House and votes in the Elec-

toral College.

The House Committee on

Oversight and Reform, controlled

by majority Democrats, obtained

three internal documents, re-

viewed by The Wall Street Jour-

nal, detailing the extent of the

bureau’s delays.

It concluded that census offi-

cials have identified at least 15

anomalies in the data that af-

fect more than one million cen-

sus records.

A spokesperson for the Com-

merce Department didn’t re-

spond to a request for comment.

—Janet Adamy

WASHINGTON

Civil Servants Face

Losing Job Protection

The Trump administration is

moving forward with a last-min-

ute push to ease hiring and fir-

ing standards for many senior

federal workers, setting off a

clash with Democrats in Con-

gress over whether civil servants

should maintain longstanding job

protections.

President Trump issued an

executive order in October creat-

ing a new category of federal

worker for career employees

with influence over government

policy. Employees in the new

category, called Schedule F,

would lose protections granted

to many federal employees, al-

lowing agencies to more easily

fire the workers and hire new

staffers outside the existing

competitive civil-service process.

Democrats have proposed leg-

islation canceling the order, re-

quested documents about its use

and pushed to include measures

in year-end spending legislation

blocking its implementation.

—Andrew Duehren

FEDERAL RESERVE

Kaplan Sees No Need

For Broad Policy Shift

A top Federal Reserve official

said the central bank will need to

decide on how to communicate

its intentions to continue buying

government assets but that

broader changes to its policy

stance, including by altering those

purchases right now, weren’t

needed.

Federal Reserve Bank of Dal-

las President Robert Kaplan said

that after getting through what

he expected would be a difficult

three-to-six-month period for the

economy due to the resurgence

of coronavirus cases, officials

need to “start thinking about

how we want to begin to taper

or communicate the composition

and the size of our asset pur-

chases.” He added: “We’re going

to have to give some clarification,

I think, in the not too distant fu-

ture. I could see where at some

point we might give guidance on

expressing the conditions under

which we begin to taper, for ex-

ample.”

—Nick Timiraos

ECONOMY

Recovery Picked Up

In Fall, Then Hit Bump

The U.S. economy’s recovery

picked up to a “modest or mod-

erate” pace this fall, while

growth began to slow in Novem-

ber in parts of the Midwest and

Northeast as coronavirus cases

proliferated, a Federal Reserve

report said Wednesday.

The Fed’s periodic compilation

of anecdotes from business con-

tacts, known as the Beige Book,

said the expansion continued in

most of the central bank’s 12

districts across the country. But

four regional Fed branches re-

ported “little or no growth,” and

four noted that activity began to

slow in early November.

“Firms’ outlooks remained pos-

itive; however, optimism has

waned,” the report said. “Many

contacts cited concerns over the

recent pandemic wave, mandated

restrictions (recent and prospec-

tive), and the looming expiration

dates for unemployment benefits

and for moratoriums on evictions

and foreclosures.”

—Paul Kiernan

86-14, and the House version

passed 295-125.

“We’ve always had veto-

proof majorities on the

NDAA,” said Sen. Mike Rounds

(R., S.D.), a member of the

Senate Armed Services Com-

mittee. “But then again, we’ve

never had real threats of veto-

ing the NDAA either.”

Democrats warned of the

consequences for the military

if the bill isn’t approved.

“There’s a lot of significant

policy issues there, too, which

the longer we delay the less

prepared we are for dealing

with our adversaries,” said

Sen. Jack Reed (D., R.I.), the

top Democrat on the Senate

Armed Services Committee.

Republicans are set to buck

Mr. Trump on his demands for

the annual defense bill in the fi-

nal weeks of his presidency. Re-

publican lawmakers have shown

a willingness to challenge Mr.

Trump’s positions on national

security throughout his term

while staying aligned with the

president on other issues.

“There will be a vote on a

defense authorization bill, I

expect it will be a big one

there, and I would hope we

can get that signed into law,

and not have a lot of drama

around it,” said Sen. John

Thune (R., S.D.), the No. 2 Re-

publican in the Senate.

Section 230 has given online

companies broad immunity

from legal liability for their us-

ers’ actions and wide latitude

to police content on their sites.

It has drawn bipartisan criti-

cism in recent years, with Re-

publicans accusing social-me-

dia companies of abusing the

provision to limit conservative

viewpoints on their sites. Dem-

ocrats argue that Section 230

has allowed companies to ig-

nore false and dangerous infor-

mation spreading online, and

President-elect Joe Biden has

called for revoking it.

But lawmakers haven’t

agreed on how to replace or al-

ter Section 230, and members

of both parties said repealing

it now would be premature.

WASHINGTON—Senate Re-
publicans signaled opposition
to stripping social-media com-
panies of liability protections as
part of an annual defense-pol-
icy bill, pushing forward with
the legislation despite Presi-
dent Trump’s threat to veto it
unless they take that step.
Mr. Trump on Tuesday said
he would veto the defense leg-
islation if it didn’t repeal Sec-
tion 230 of the 1996 Communi-
cations Decency Act, which
gives companies broad immu-
nity for the content they pub-
lish from users on their sites.
The defense bill includes a 3%
pay raise for U.S. troops and
authorizes $740 billion for mil-
itary and national security pro-
grams next year. It has passed
Congress every year for de-
cades with bipartisan support.
Sen. Jim Inhofe (R., Okla.),
chairman of the Senate Armed
Services Committee, said a re-
peal of the social-media immu-
nities wasn’t in the defense bill.
Mr. Inhofe said he told Mr.
Trump that he opposed includ-
ing a repeal of Section 230 in
the legislation because it “has
nothing to do with the military.”
“I agree with his senti-
ments,” Mr. Inhofe said. “We
ought to do away with 230.
But you can’t do it in this bill.
That’s not a part of the bill.”
Mr. Trump had previously
threatened to veto the defense
bill if it included language re-
naming military bases named
after Confederate command-
ers. Mr. Inhofe said Tuesday
that a measure from Sen. Eliz-
abeth Warren (D., Mass.) to re-
name those bases would also
be included in the legislation.
If Mr. Trump does veto the
defense bill, Congress needs a
two-thirds supermajority in
each chamber to override it.
The House and Senate have
reached a compromise on
their two competing versions
of the bill, clearing the way for
passage of the legislation
through Congress.
The Senate version passed

BYANDREWDUEHREN

GOP Bucks Trump

On Defense Bill

GRANITE GRIT: New Hampshire lawmakers convened for an outdoor session Wednesday at the University of New Hampshire in Durham.

ELISE AMENDOLA/ASSOCIATED PRESS