Airline rules: The White House announced today final rules that require airlines to provide automatic cash refunds to passengers and protect consumers from costly surprise airline fees. The first Department of Transportation rule requires airlines to promptly provide passengers with automatic cash refunds when owed because their flights are cancelled or significantly changed, their checked bags are significantly delayed, or the ancillary services, like Wi-Fi, they purchased are not provided. The second rule requires airlines and ticket agents to tell consumers upfront what fees they charge for checked bags, a carry-on bag, for changing a reservation, or cancelling a reservation. The rule is designed to protect consumers from surprise fees.
George Santos: After saying last November that he won’t be running for office again, and then this March saying he will be running for Congress, former Congressman George Santos now says he is dropping his effort to return to Congress. Santos posted a message on X, formerly Twitter, that he is withdrawing from his run as an independent candidate for Congress. Santos is under indictment on federal charges of financial fraud, credit card and identity theft and lying to federal officials. Santos has pleaded not guilty to the charges. He was expelled from the House of Representatives.
College protests: Speaker of the House Mike Johnson was planning to visit the Columbia University campus in New York today to meet with Jewish students and then denounce the antisemitism that is being displayed on various college campuses. The administration of Columbia says it is meeting with pro-Palestinian demonstrators to try to negotiate the removal of their tent encampment from the college campus. Protests continue to spread to additional campuses, including the University of Rochester, University of Michigan and California State Polytechnic University.
Union endorsement: North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU) today endorsed President Biden for re-election. It had endorsed the Biden-Harris ticket in the 2020 election, but in 2016 had endorsed Donald Trump. Union President Sean McGarvey today accused Trump of breaking every promise he made to help union workers before he originally was elected to the White House. He said that the time union leaders had spent with Trump to craft policies to benefit American workers was a giant waste of time. McGarvey accused Trump of not caring about anything but himself.
Overtime pay: A U.S. Department of Labor rule is in effect today that expands requirements to pay overtime to workers. The rule increases the salary thresholds required to exempt a salaried bona fide executive, administrative or professional employee from federal overtime pay requirements. Effective July 1, the salary threshold to be exempt from overtime will increase to the equivalent of an annual salary of $43,888 and increase to $58,656 on Jan. 1, 2025. Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su said, “This rule will restore the promise to workers that if you work more than 40 hours in a week, you should be paid more for that time.”
Foreign aid: President Biden has signed into law the legislation providing new aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan and requiring that the Chinese owner of TikTok either sell the company or risk a ban on TikTok in the U.S. Included is approximately $61 billion in aid for Ukraine, and a quick package of $1 billion in military assistance was expected to begin being processed immediately. Meanwhile, Russian forces have stepped up their attacks on Kharkiv, the second largest city in Ukraine.
