Promoting Access to Diabetic Shoes Act This bill allows a nurse practitioner or physician assistant to fulfill documentation requirements for coverage, under Medicare, of special shoes for diabetic individuals. Under current law, such requirements may be satisfied only by a physician.
Storing CO2 And Lowering Emissions Act or the SCALE Act This bill establishes programs within the Department of Energy that provide financial support and incentives to develop infrastructure for carbon dioxide capture, transport, utilization, and storage.
Major Richard Star Act This bill allows a veteran with a combat-related disability and fewer than 20 years of creditable service to receive retirement pay, without reduction, concurrent with disability compensation.
Ensuring Lasting Smiles Act This bill requires private health insurance plans to cover diagnosis and treatment of congenital anomalies and birth defects, such as reconstructive services and items. Coverage must include services and items that functionally improve, repair, or restore any body part that is medically necessary for normal bodily functions or appearance, as determined by the treating physician. Coverage limits and cost-sharing requirements for such services and items may not be more restrictive than those applicable to all medical and surgical benefits under the plan.
This bill waives certain eligibility requirements for hospitals participating in the 340B drug discount program (i.e., a program that allows entities to receive covered outpatient drugs at reduced prices from manufacturers) during the COVID-19 (i.e., coronavirus disease 2019) public health emergency. Specifically, the bill waives the required minimum proportion of low-income patients served for hospitals that began participating in the program during or prior to the COVID-19 emergency.
Protecting Americans with Pre-Existing Conditions Act of 2021 This bill nullifies specified guidance and final rule provisions pertaining to Section 1332 waivers (also known as State Innovation Waivers or State Relief and Empowerment Waivers) issued by the Department of the Treasury and the Department of Health and Human Services. The provisions allow states to forego certain requirements of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in order to implement experimental plans for health care coverage, as long as the resulting coverage meets certain statutory criteria. The provisions, which supersede earlier guidance from 2015, alter agency interpretation of how states may satisfy the statutory criteria for waiver approval. For example, the provisions (1) redefine acceptable coverage under such waivers to include short-term, limited-duration insurance and association health plans; (2) allow the comprehensiveness and affordability of coverage under such waivers to be assessed based on projected availability, rather than enrollment; and (3) allow the level of coverage to be assessed based on the effects over the entire course of the waiver, rather than per year.
This joint resolution proposes a constitutional amendment declaring that (1) the rights enumerated in the Constitution and other rights retained by the people are the rights of natural persons; (2) the terms "people," "person," and "citizen" as used in the Constitution do not include corporate entities; and (3) corporate entities are subject to such regulation as the people, through representatives in Congress and state representatives, may determine reasonable, consistent with the powers of Congress and the states.
Cleaning Up Washington's Act This bill revises post-employment lobbying restrictions on senior executive branch officials and Members of Congress. Specifically, the bill increases from two years to five years the post-employment lobbying restrictions on a political appointee compensated on the Executive Schedule. Additionally, it increases to five years the post-employment lobbying ban on a former Member of the Senate (currently, two years) or a former Member of the House of Representatives (currently, one year).
Sunlight for Unaccountable Non-profits (SUN) Act This bill expands the disclosure requirements for certain tax-exempt organizations. This bill requires the annual tax return information for tax-exempt organizations and deferred compensation plans to be made available to the public at no charge and in an open structured data format that is processable by computers, with the information easy to find, access, reuse, and download in bulk. The bill also requires the disclosure of the names and addresses of contributors of $5,000 or more to tax-exempt organizations that participate or intervene in political campaigns on behalf of, or in opposition to, any candidate for public office.
This bill provides statutory authority for the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) to establish and maintain a portal and corresponding database through which it shall receive information on blocked railroad-highway grade crossings as a three-year pilot program. The FRA must use information from the database (1) to assist in identifying the locations and potential impacts of frequent and long-duration blocked railroad-highway grade crossings; (2) as a basis for outreach to communities, emergency responders, and railroads; and (3) to support collaboration in the prevention of incidents at railroad-highway grade crossings. Additionally, the Department of Transportation must evaluate the requirements of its railway-highway crossing program to determine whether the program provides states sufficient flexibility to adequately address current and emerging grade-crossing safety issues, the structure of the program provides sufficient incentive and resources to states and local agencies to make changes at grade crossings that are most effective at reducing deaths and injuries, there are appropriate tools and resources to support states in using data-driven programs to determine the most cost-effective use of program funds, and any statutory changes are necessary to improve the effectiveness of the program.
