Sen. Joe Manchin, III

Emergency Family Stabilization Act This bill establishes a competitive grant program within the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) for family stabilization agencies to provide emergency relief to children, youth, and families experiencing homelessness. These agencies include current ACF grantees or subgrantees, Indian tribes, tribal organizations, Native Hawaiian organizations, and other organizations with expertise providing direct services to those experiencing homelessness. Recipients may use grant funds for, among other purposes, personnel costs, personal protective equipment, and other supplies to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 (i.e., coronavirus disease 2019), as well as payments for security deposits and other housing-related needs. Additionally, the ACF must award the grants based on factors including the need for the services in the area served by the agency and specified allocation and prioritization requirements.

Paycheck Fairness Act This bill addresses wage discrimination on the basis of sex. Specifically, it (1) limits an employer's defense that a pay differential is based on a factor other than sex to only bona fide job-related factors in wage discrimination claims, (2) enhances nonretaliation prohibitions, (3) makes it unlawful to require an employee to sign a contract or waiver prohibiting the employee from disclosing information about the employee's wages, and (4) increases civil penalties for violations of equal pay provisions. Additionally, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs must train EEOC employees and other affected parties on wage discrimination. The bill directs the Department of Labor to (1) establish and carry out a grant program for negotiation skills training for girls and women, (2) conduct studies to eliminate pay disparities between men and women, and (3) make available information on wage discrimination to assist the public in understanding and addressing such discrimination. The bill also establishes the Secretary of Labor's National Award for Pay Equity in the Workplace for an employer who has made a substantial effort to eliminate pay disparities between men and women. Finally, the bill requires the EEOC to issue regulations for collecting from employers compensation and other employment data according to the sex, race, and national origin of employees for use in enforcing laws prohibiting pay discrimination.

TRICARE Retiree Protection Act This bill authorizes a covered beneficiary who is enrolled in TRICARE Select to reenroll in TRICARE Select at any time during 2021. Covered beneficiaries are those in the retired category who enrolled in TRICARE Select as of December 31, 2020, but did not establish a monthly enrollment fee payment during the 2020 TRICARE Open Season. A covered beneficiary who reenrolls in TRICARE Select must, at the time of enrollment, pay a portion of the annual enrollment fee and establish a monthly enrollment fee payment for the remaining months of 2021.

COVID-19 Mine Worker Protection Act This bill requires the Department of Labor to promulgate health and safety standards to protect coal miners from occupational exposure to COVID-19 (i.e., coronavirus disease 2019). Labor shall promulgate emergency standards within seven days of this bill's enactment, and such emergency standards shall be in force until permanent standards are established. Labor shall also collect data to track and investigate cases of exposure to COVID-19 among coal miners.

End Taxpayer Subsidies for Drug Ads Act This bill prohibits a tax deduction for expenses relating to direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs. Direct-to-consumer advertising is any dissemination, by or on behalf of a sponsor of a prescription drug product, of an advertisement that is in regard to the drug product and primarily targeted to the general public.

New Markets for State-Inspected Meat and Poultry Act of 2021 This bill allows meat and poultry products inspected by State Meat and Poultry Inspection programs to be sold in interstate commerce. Under the inspection programs, the Department of Agriculture Food Safety and Inspection Service allows states that meet certain requirements to inspect meat and poultry. The state-inspected products are currently limited to intrastate commerce, unless a state opts into a separate Cooperative Interstate Shipment Program.

Eliminating a Quantifiably Unjust Application of the Law Act or the EQUAL Act This bill eliminates the federal sentencing disparity between drug offenses involving crack cocaine and powder cocaine. Currently, different threshold quantities of crack cocaine and powder cocaine (e.g., 28 grams of crack cocaine and 500 grams of powder cocaine) trigger the same statutory criminal penalties. This bill eliminates the lower quantity thresholds for crack cocaine offenses. Under the bill, the same threshold quantities of crack cocaine and powder cocaine trigger the same statutory criminal penalties. The change applies to future cases and cases pending on the date of enactment. With respect to past cases, the bill authorizes resentencing of a defendant who was convicted or sentenced for a crack cocaine offense before the date of enactment.

This concurrent resolution authorizes the use of the rotunda of the Capitol for the lying in state, upon death, of the last surviving Medal of Honor recipient for acts performed during World War II, if the individual or their next of kin so elects.

See Something, Say Something Online Act of 2021 This bill requires an interactive computer service (e.g., a social media company) that detects a suspicious transmission to submit a suspicious transmission activity report (STAR) describing the suspicious transmission. A suspicious transmission is any post, message, comment, tag, or other user-generated content or transmission that commits, facilitates, incites, promotes, or otherwise assists the commission of a major crime. Each STAR must be submitted to the Department of Justice and contain (1) the name, location, and other identification information submitted by the user; (2) the date and nature of the user-generated content or transmission detected for suspicious activity; and (3) any relevant text, information, and metadata related to the suspicious transmission. Any provider of an interactive computer service that fails to report a known suspicious transmission shall not be immune from liability for such transmission and may be held liable as a publisher for the related suspicious transmission.

This resolution honors the memory of U.S. Capitol Police Officer Brian D. Sicknick for sacrificing his life in the line of duty on January 6, 2021, and it calls for justice to be brought to those responsible for the attack on the Capitol and the death of Officer Sicknick.