Breaking News: Democrats demand air time to counter Trump's border speech

View in your browser     Democrats demand air time to counter Trump's border speech Top congressional Democrats are demanding television networks give them the same amount of air time President Trump will get on Tuesday for his prime-time address on border security.  “Now that the television networks have decided to air the President’s address, which if his past statements are any indication will be full of malice and misinformation, Democrats must immediately be given equal airtime," Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said in a joint statement on Monday night.  Read the full story here         Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up for Breaking News     Forward Breaking News     You Might Like       Privacy Policy  |  Manage Subscriptions  |  Unsubscribe  |  Email to a friend  |  Sign Up for Other Newsletters   The Hill 1625 K Street, NW 9th Floor, Washington DC 20006 ©2016 Capitol Hill Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of News Communications, Inc.

News Alert: Trump to address nation on wall

View in your browser     Trump to address nation on wall President Trump will give a prime-time address Tuesday from the Oval Office to make his case for closing parts of the government over his demand for $5.7 billion in funding for a wall on the Mexican border. The president also plans to travel to the border on Thursday, a bellicose move reflecting the entrenched positions on both sides of the debate and one that almost certainly means the 18-day shutdown will continue into the weekend. Read the full story here           Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up for News Alerts     Forward News Alerts     You Might Like       Privacy Policy  |  Manage Subscriptions  |  Unsubscribe  |  Email to a friend  |  Sign Up for Other Newsletters   The Hill 1625 K Street, NW 9th Floor, Washington DC 20006 ©2016 Capitol Hill Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of News Communications, Inc.

On The Money: Trump plans prime-time address, border visit amid shutdown | White House says IRS will issue tax refunds despite shutdown | World Bank chief resigns

View in your browser     Happy Monday and welcome back to On The Money. I'm Sylvan Lane, and here's your nightly guide to everything affecting your bills, bank account and bottom line. See something I missed? Let me know at slane@thehill.com or tweet me @SylvanLane. And if you like your newsletter, you can subscribe to it here: http://bit.ly/1NxxW2N. Write us with tips, suggestions and news: slane@thehill.com, vneedham@thehill.com, njagoda@thehill.com and nelis@thehill.com. Follow us on Twitter: @SylvanLane, @VickofTheHill, @NJagoda and @NivElis.   THE BIG DEAL--Trump to give prime-time address and travel to border amid shutdown fight: President Trump will deliver a prime-time address to the nation from the Oval Office on Tuesday and, later this week, travel to the U.S.-Mexico border amid a partial government shutdown triggered by his demand for wall funding, the White House announced on Monday. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Trump will "meet with those on the frontlines" of what the administration is calling "the national security and humanitarian crisis" at the southwest border. She provided no further details about the trip, but said they would be announced soon. Trump later confirmed the speech, which was first reported by The New York Times, in a Twitter post. It'll be Trump's first speech from the Oval Office, which his predecessors typically used to project the strength and power of the presidency. The Hill's Jordan Fabian tells us more here.      Border trip: Trump is also planning to head to the border as Democrats refuse to meet his demands for $5 billion to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico. Bipartisan talks held over the weekend produced no meaningful progress as the shutdown heads toward its third week. Jordan tells us that Trump's trip would come on the 20th day of the shutdown if Congress does not pass a funding bill, nearing a record set in the mid-1990s for longest shutdown. Trump last week floated declaring a national emergency to build the wall without congressional sign-off, but that appears to be legally and politically questionable.   Further reading: The Washington Post: "U.S. towns with federal workers brace for impact as the shutdown continues" CNN: "How the government shutdown is affecting Americans" Bloomberg: "Trump Has Four Days Before Many Federal Workers Start Missing Paychecks   LEADING THE DAY White House says IRS will issue tax refunds despite shutdown: The Internal Revenue Service will issue tax refunds even if the government remains shut down when they are set to be issued, the Trump administration said on Monday.  "Tax refunds will go out," Russell Vought, the acting director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, told reporters during a briefing.  Vought said the move was a change from past shutdowns and that the appropriate agencies would issue further guidance.  House Democrats are planning to pass legislation this week to fund the Treasury Department and IRS, as part of their effort to push Republicans to end the shutdown. But the measure is unlikely to be enacted by President Trump.   World Bank chief Jim Yong Kim resigns: World Bank chief Jim Yong Kim on Monday announced that he is resigning from his post three years before his term was set to expire.  Kim said in an unexpected announcement that he will leave his post on Feb. 1, the Financial Times reported.  "It has been a great honor to serve as President of this remarkable institution, full of passionate individuals dedicated to the mission of ending extreme poverty in our lifetime," Kim said in a statement, according to the Financial Times. "The work of the World Bank Group is more important now than ever as the aspirations of the poor rise all over the world, and problems like climate change, pandemics, famine and refugees continue to grow in both their scale and complexity."  World Bank CEO Kristalina Georgieva is reportedly expected to act as interim president. Kim's resignation, citing personal reasons, raised questions about the reasons for his departure and the future of the international aid distributor.   GOOD TO KNOW Telecommunications giant AT&T eliminated more than 10,000 U.S. jobs last year and outsourced some of those positions to contractors overseas, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) said in a report released Monday. An international pilots association is urging President Trump to end the partial government shutdown, saying that it has detracted from the "safety, security and efficiency of our national airspace system." New acting Interior Secretary David Bernhardt is directing the National Park Service (NPS) to use all funds from entrance fees to keep parks open, according to an internal memo obtained by The Hill. A top House Democrat is raising concerns that the government shutdown could be negatively impacting security at major airports across the United States. The leader of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association on Monday predicted the partial government shutdown's "ripple effect" may last months "if not years," for aviation safety professionals. A supporter of President Trump is considering moving his company's production headquarters to Mexico in an effort to avoid Trump's tariffs on Chinese imports, according to The New York Times. Stocks rose slightly Monday as traders tried to make sense of a raft of new, slightly disparate economic data.  Cooling economic growth in both the U.S. and China is increasing pressure to reach a trade settlement, according to the Associated Press.  Banks, insurers and money managers are planning to move about $1 trillion of assets from the U.K. to the rest of Europe as Brexit uncertainty takes its toll, Bloomberg reports.   ODDS AND ENDS The Washington Nationals on Monday notified season-ticket holders furloughed during the ongoing partial government shutdown to delay their monthly payments until the government is re-opened, The Washington Post reported.           Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up for Finance Newsletters     Forward Finance Newsletters       Privacy Policy  |  Manage Subscriptions  |  Unsubscribe  |  Email to a friend  |  Sign Up for Other Newsletters   The Hill 1625 K Street, NW 9th Floor, Washington DC 20006 ©2019 Capitol Hill Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of News Communications, Inc.

Overnight Energy: Justices reject Exxon appeal in climate case | Interior to use entrance fees to keep national parks open | Dems question legality of move | Hearing on water rule postponed due to shutdown

View in your browser     JUSTICES WON’T BLOCK EXXON PROBE BY MASSACHUSETTS: The Supreme Court on Monday refused to take up a case in which Exxon Mobil Corp. is trying to stop Massachusetts’s demand for company documents in a climate change investigation. The announcement in the case, Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Healey, came without explanation, as is the court’s usual practice. Four of the high court’s nine judges would have had to vote in favor of taking the case for it to be put in the docket. Exxon Mobil, the nation’s largest oil company by production volume, wanted the court to stop Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey (D) from compelling it to produce decades of records about how it has dealt with the threat of climate change to the world and to its businesses. What this means for Exxon: The Supreme Court’s rejection appears to be the last step Exxon Mobil could take to stop the investigation, and the company now must likely comply with the civil investigative demand, a document akin to a subpoena. Healey is probing whether the company lied to the public or investors about how much it knew about the threat of climate change, the role of its fossil fuel products and how climate policies would hurt its businesses. How we got here: The probe, launched in 2016, is part of a larger move by Democrats and environmentalists to hold Exxon Mobil accountable for allegedly sowing doubt about climate science while internally knowing the true extent of the problem. Exxon Mobil has denied the allegations. Massachusetts’s top court ruled for Healey in April, after which Exxon Mobil asked the Supreme Court to step in. “The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court compelled compliance with sweeping investigatory requests by the state’s attorney general for decades’ worth of documents concerning petitioner’s knowledge of, and the relationship of petitioner’s products to, climate change,” Exxon Mobil wrote in its September 2018 petition to the high court. Reaction: Healey’s office cheered the ruling as a major victory. “The law is clear. The Attorney General’s Office has the authority to investigate Exxon’s conduct toward consumers and investors, and we are proceeding,” Chloe Gotsis, a spokeswoman for Healey, said in a statement. “The public deserves answers from this company about what it knew about the impacts of burning fossil fuels, and when.” Read more on the legal fight here.   Happy Monday! Welcome to Overnight Energy, The Hill's roundup of the latest energy and environment news. Please send tips and comments to Timothy Cama, tcama@thehill.com, and Miranda Green, mgreen@thehill.com. Follow us on Twitter: @Timothy_Cama, @mirandacgreen, @thehill. CLICK HERE to subscribe to our newsletter.   INTERIOR TELLS PARKS TO DRAIN VISITOR FEE FUNDS: New acting Interior Secretary David Bernhardt is directing the National Park Service (NPS) to drain their funds collected from entrance fees "until they’ve reached a zero balance," in order to keep parks open, according to an internal memo obtained by The Hill. The secretarial memo sent from Bernhardt to NPS Deputy Director Dan Smith on Saturday directed the agency to “immediately utilize” the money they’d collected through fees to address “restrooms and sanitation, trash collection, road maintenance, campground operations, law enforcement and emergency operations, and staffing entrance gates.” “These operations shall be maintained until such funds have reached a zero balance,” the memo read. Bernhardt in the memo said the government shutdown “highlighted some significant challenges” the agency faces as it sought to both save park resources and provide public enjoyment. “We must provide opportunities for people to access and enjoy our wonderful parks, and we must do so in a way that ensures the same opportunity for future generations to enjoy,” he wrote. “The extended lapse in appropriations has highlighted some significant challenges the service faces as it strived to appropriately balance this dual mission.” Read more on the plan here. Democrats are questioning the legality of the move: The House Natural Resources Committee intends to investigate the Trump administration’s decision to dip into visitor fees to keep parks open, the panel's chairman warned Sunday. Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.) said that his committee — which oversees Interior — has plans to look into the legality of the decision, saying the shutdown has done “terrible damage” to the U.S. “President Trump and his advisors apparently just woke up to the fact that the shutdown they created several weeks ago has done terrible damage to our country,” Grijalva said in a statement Sunday. “This is not how a rational president behaves, and the Natural Resources Committee will demand answers about whether these moves are legally justified.” More on their concerns here.   WATER RULE HEARING POSTPONED: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Army Corps of Engineers have postponed a planned public hearing on the Trump administration’s proposal to reduce the waterways protected by the federal government. The agencies said in a statement that the ongoing partial government shutdown, which has furloughed most EPA employees, compels them to cancel the planned Jan. 23 hearing in Kansas City, Kan. The hearing is meant as an effort to gather more public input on the plan, which would cause some wetlands and streams to lose federal protections. The shutdown is also delaying publication of the proposal in the Federal Register. Although the administration released the proposal publicly in early December, it hasn’t been in the Federal Register yet, which will officially kick off the 60-day public comment period.   ON TAP TUESDAY: American Petroleum Institute President Mike Sommers will give the group’s annual State of American Energy speech, which is meant to set the policy agenda for the year.   OUTSIDE THE BELTWAY: Venezuelan state-owned oil firm PDVSA signed a deal with a company partly owned by a Florida Republican aimed at increasing the Venezuelan company’s oil output, Reuters reports. In his inaugural address, new California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) pledged to keep up the Golden State’s fights against the Trump administration over climate change, the Sacramento Bee reports. New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) tapped James Kenney, a former EPA official, to lead the state’s Environment Department, the Santa Fe New Mexican reports.   IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: Check out stories from Monday and the weekend ... - Interior chief directs staff to use all funds collected from visitor fees amid shutdown - Supreme Court rejects Exxon Mobil appeal in climate case - House panel to 'demand answers' on Interior's move to use visitor fees to keep parks open - National parks taking unprecedented move to support operations during shutdown with entrance fees         Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up for Energy Newsletters     Forward Energy Newsletters       Privacy Policy  |  Manage Subscriptions  |  Unsubscribe  |  Email to a friend  |  Sign Up for Other Newsletters   The Hill 1625 K Street, NW 9th Floor, Washington DC 20006 ©2019 Capitol Hill Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of News Communications, Inc.