Youth Voting Rights Act This bill expands voting access for youth. Specifically, the bill establishes a private right of action to enforce the Twenty-Sixth Amendment, which prohibits denying or abridging the right to vote based on age. Additionally, the bill directs each state to designate as voter registration agencies all offices within public institutions of higher education (IHEs) that provide assistance to students, implement a preregistration process to allow minors who are 16 years or older to register to vote in federal elections that take place when or after the preregistered individual turns age 18, and ensure the availability of polling places on campuses of IHEs (with the availability of waivers). The bill prohibits durational residency requirements for voting in all federal elections. Currently, this prohibition applies only to voting for the offices of President and Vice President. States and local jurisdictions with voter identification requirements must treat IHE-issued student identification cards as voter identification. The Election Assistance Commission (EAC) must make grants to states to increase the involvement of individuals under age 18 in public election activities. The Government Accountability Office must report to Congress on trends related to voter registration, absentee voting, and provisional voting. The EAC must also collect and make publicly available certain data from states.
Sponsored bills
Cattle Price Discovery and Transparency Act of 2022 This bill requires the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to take various actions to address transparency in contract terms and pricing in the cattle industry. Among these requirements, USDA must maintain a publicly available library or catalog of contracts entered into between meat packers and livestock producers for the purchase of cattle, including any schedules of premiums or discounts associated with the contracts and other specific details. USDA must make this information available to producers and other interested parties in a monthly report. The bill further requires USDA to establish five to seven regions encompassing the entire continental United States that reasonably reflect similar fed cattle purchase practices for processing plants and establish mandatory minimums for each region (i.e., the minimum percentage of cattle purchases that are required to be made through approved pricing mechanisms from producers that are not packers). Under the bill, approved pricing mechanisms are generally purchases of fed cattle made through a negotiated purchase, through a negotiated grid purchase, at a stockyard, or through trading systems or platforms where multiple buyers and sellers can regularly make and accept bids and offers. The bill also establishes a maximum penalty for mandatory minimum violations by covered packers. Under the bill, a covered packer is a packer that has slaughtered an average of 5% or more of the number of fed cattle slaughtered nationally during the immediately preceding five calendar years.
Meat and Poultry Special Investigator Act of 2022 This bill establishes within the Department of Agriculture (USDA) the Office of the Special Investigator for Competition Matters. Specifically, the office must use all available tools (e.g., subpoenas) to investigate and prosecute violations of the Packers and Stockyards Act of 1921 by packers and live poultry dealers. Further, the bill grants the office the authority to bring any civil or administrative action authorized by that act against a packer or live poultry dealer. Additionally, the office must serve as a liaison to the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission with respect to competition and trade practices in the food and agricultural sector, consult with the Department of Homeland Security on national security and critical infrastructure security in the food and agricultural sector, maintain a staff of attorneys and other professionals with appropriate expertise, and coordinate with the USDA Office of the General Counsel and the Packers and Stockyards Division of the Agricultural Marketing Service.
This resolution (1) recognizes the increase in educational opportunities, including in sports, for women and girls since the passage of title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972; and (2) encourages the Department of Education and the Department of Justice to ensure that students have a safe learning environment by working to ensure schools prevent and respond to discrimination and harassment on the basis of sex.
This resolution celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Federal Pell Grant program and expresses support for the designation of June 23 as National Pell Grant Day.
Fair Housing Improvement Act of 2022 This bill prohibits discrimination against individuals based on their source of income, veteran status, or military status in the sale or rental of housing and other related real estate transactions and services.
Protecting Americans' Data From Foreign Surveillance Act of 2022 This bill establishes certain export controls on personal data of U.S. nationals and individuals living in the United States. Among other requirements, the bill directs the Department of Commerce to identify categories of personal data that could be exploited by foreign governments and harm U.S. national security if exported, reexported, or in-country transferred in a quantity that exceeds the threshold established by Commerce.
Stop Anti-Abortion Disinformation Act or the SAD Act This bill prohibits advertisements that use deceptive or misleading statements related to the provision of abortion services. Abortion services include (1) surgical and non-surgical procedures to terminate a pregnancy, or (2) providing referrals for such procedures. The Federal Trade Commission must promulgate rules to implement the prohibition, and the bill provides for enforcement by the commission.
Fairness for Farm Workers Act This bill extends overtime pay protections to agricultural workers. The bill requires employers, beginning in 2023, to compensate agricultural workers for hours worked in excess of their regular hours (i.e., 55 hours in 2023, 50 hours in 2024, 45 hours in 2025, and 40 hours in 2026) at not less than one and one-half times the employee's regular rate. For employers with 25 or fewer employees, the overtime pay requirements begin in 2026. These overtime pay requirements do not apply, as under current law, to employees who are the parent, spouse, child, or other member of the employer's immediate family. The bill also repeals the exemption from overtime pay requirements for employers in various agriculture-related industries, including certain small farms, irrigation projects, sugar processing, and cotton ginning and compressing.
Transportation Fuel Market Transparency Act This bill expands prohibitions against manipulating fuel markets, establishes a body within the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to monitor fuel markets to ensure competitiveness, and addresses related issues. Prohibitions against the manipulation of wholesale fuel markets or reporting false (or misleading) information shall apply to actions related to crude oil and transportation fuel, defined in this bill to include gasoline, distillate fuels, jet fuel, aviation gasoline, and biofuel. Currently, such prohibitions only apply to crude oil, gasoline, and petroleum distillates. The bill further expands the prohibition on reporting false information to include such information that (1) concerns the supply of, operational actions related to, or output related to wholesale fuel markets; (2) is not required to be reported by law; or (3) affects the analyses or data compiled by a private sector price-reporting agency. The bill also increases the maximum civil penalty for violating these prohibitions from $1 million to $2 million for each day of the violation. Furthermore, the bill establishes within the FTC the Transportation Fuel Monitoring and Enforcement Unit. The unit must continuously and comprehensively collect and analyze fuel market data to support competitive market practices, identify market manipulation and other unfair methods of competition, and facilitate enforcement of competition-related statutes. The Energy Information Administration within the Department of Energy must collect data to facilitate transparent and competitive transportation fuel markets, determine adherence to sanctions, and protect consumers.