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Friday, April 28, 2023

Joe Biden’s Approval Rating Hits Rock Bottom at 37 Percent

Spencer Brown: Americans’ view of President Biden’s job performance has been in the doldrums for months, with even Democrats and a concerning number of independents increasingly souring on the job he’s doing. After months spent with underwater approval, Gallup delivered more bad news for Biden in the same week he announced via prerecorded video that he was running for reelection in 2024 (Townhall). Gallup News: Joe Biden’s job approval rating as president is now 37%, the lowest in his presidency to date (Twitter).

US to Investigate Collapse of SVB

Bloomberg: The US House’s top government watchdog committee has launched an investigation into the role the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco and other state and federal regulators played in the March failure of Silicon Valley Bank. SVB was directly supervised by the Fed, and Vice Chair of Supervision Michael Barr will be publishing the central bank’s own probe Friday (Bloomberg). Townhall: According to the Republican lawmakers, “the signs of significant and alarming risk were clear,” yet “no regulator used more severe tools, such as fines or consent orders, to require action from SVB” (Townhall).

First Republic Bank Value Down 95 Percent with No Potential Buyers

Investor’s Business Daily: First Republic Bank is fighting for survival again after reporting a nearly 41% deposit flight in its first-quarter earnings beat Monday. FRC stock halved during in Tuesday trading and continued pushing new lows Wednesday. Trading was briefly halted multiple times for volatility reasons throughout the trading day. Now, the San Francisco-based outfit is pleading for additional aid from other banks while it tries to shore up its balance sheet (Investor’s Business Daily). Wall Street Journal: For many years, First Republic had a sterling reputation as a fast-growth lender focused on a very desirable clientele—the affluent. One might think that such a franchise would fit well with any number of banks looking to grow businesses like wealth management. Its assets are also seemingly mostly solid ones, like government securities and mortgages extended to those well-off clients. Yet with the bank’s market value now hovering at around $1 billion, down about 95% from the start of the year, no buyer has emerged (Wall Street Journal).

Teachers Sue District, State Education Board for Forcing Them to Lie to Parents of Gender Confused Kids

National Review: Teachers from a California middle school sued their school district and the state education board on Thursday over policies that they say require them to hide students’ intentions to change genders from their parents. The federal lawsuit filed by attorneys from the Thomas More Society alleges that administrators at the Escondido Union School District and California State Board of Education violated the First Amendment with a policy that would compel teachers to aid in a student’s transgender “social transition.” The litigation was prompted by Escondido’s implementation of a series of new policies on the treatment of “transgender” or “gender diverse” students (National Review). Fox News: When encountering “a suspicious parent,” teachers were instructed to reply that they were allowed only to discuss “information regarding the student’s behavior as it relates to school, class rules, assignments, etc.,” according to the suit (Fox News).

Catholic Organizations Strike Back, Sue DOJ for Targeting Parishioners

National Review: CatholicVote and Judicial Watch filed a lawsuit against the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday, alleging that the agencies have failed to respond to a request for records related to the FBI’s investigation of Catholics. The conservative nonprofits are seeking information regarding a memo from the bureau’s Richmond, Va., field office that warned against “radical traditionalist Catholic ideology,” among other records. CatholicVote says it filed requests under the Freedom of Information Act on March 8, for any communications from high-level FBI officials and DOJ officials in the Office of the Attorney General dating back to March 1, 2022 that mention several key words (National Review). CatholicVote: CatholicVote President Brian Burch on foxandfriends to discuss why we’re suing the FBI (Twitter).

Kansas Republicans Overturn Governor’s Vetoes in Trans Bathroom, Pro-Life Legislation

National Review: Republicans in the Kansas Legislature obtained the necessary two-thirds supermajority needed to overturn Democratic Governor Laura Kelly’s veto of a bill that requires Kansans to use public restrooms that correspond to their sex. The law will reinforce that “distinctions between the sexes” in such spaces advances “the important governmental objectives of protecting the health, safety and privacy,” the bill reads (National Review). The Legislature in Kansas also overturned a pro-life veto. Fox News: Kansas health care providers could face criminal charges over accusations about their care of newborns delivered during certain abortion procedures after the Republican-controlled Legislature on Wednesday overrode Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto of their legislation. The new law takes effect July 1 and will require that heath care providers “exercise the same degree of professional skill, care and diligence” to preserve the health of newborns delivered during an abortion procedure that a “reasonably diligent and conscientious” provider would with other live births. The newborns will have to be transported to a hospital, and violating the law will be a felony, punishable up to a year’s probation for a first-time offender (Fox News).

Biden Sanctions Russia, Iran for Wrongful Detention of American Citizens Overseas

CNBC: The Biden administration on Thursday announced a first round of sanctions targeting Russia and Iran for engaging in hostage-taking and the wrongful detention of U.S. citizens abroad. The U.S. sanctions take aim at Russia’s Federal Security Service, often known as the FSB, and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Intelligence Organization, or IRGC-IO, for “being responsible for or complicit in, directly or indirectly engaged in or responsible for ordering, controlling or otherwise directing the wrongful detention of a U.S. national abroad.” Two senior administration officials said Thursday’s sanctions were underway before Russian authorities detained American citizen Evan Gershkovich last month (CNBC). Axios: Russia’s Foreign Ministry denied a request for a U.S. consular visit to Gershkovich in retaliation for the U.S. denying visas to Russian journalists seeking to travel to New York with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov (Axios).

Penn Wharton Reassesses Impact of Inflation Reduction Act

Let’s revisit the blunder that costs more than three times the estimates. Wall Street Journal: The Inflation Reduction Act may go down as one of the greatest confidence tricks on taxpayers in history. Democrats used accounting gimmicks to claim the partisan law would reduce the budget deficit. But now a Goldman Sachs report projects its myriad green subsidies will cost $1.2 trillion—more than three times what the law’s supporters claimed. The Congressional Budget Office forecast that the IRA’s energy and climate provisions would cost $391 billion between 2022 and 2031, but this appears to be a huge under-estimate. One reason is companies are rushing to cash in on tax credits that aren’t capped. The Biden Administration is also loosely interpreting conditions for the credits (Wall Street Journal). RNC Research: Karine Jean-Pierre says it’s “a good thing” that Penn Wharton revised its estimated cost of the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” from $385 billion over ten years to more than $1 TRILLION (Twitter). Senator Mike Crapo: A new analysis from Penn Wharton shows that not only does the ‘Inflation Reduction Act’ do nothing to address inflation, but the Green New Deal provisions cost almost three times more than original estimates—over $1 trillion (Twitter). Fox News: The law will allocate $369 billion toward climate and energy policies, extend the Affordable Care Act to reduce the cost of health insurance and incorporate a 15% minimum corporate tax for companies that earn more than $1 billion per year (Fox News).

Lyft to Lay Off 26 Percent of Corporate Workforce Just After Round of Layoffs in November

CNBC: Ride-hailing app Lyft will lay off 1,072 employees, roughly 26% of its corporate workforce, and won’t hire for an additional 250 positions, the company said in an SEC filing Thursday. The news comes a week after a memo from new Lyft CEO David Risher confirmed that the company would trim its head count. Lyft shares closed up around 1.5% Thursday. The company has around 4,000 employees and had already implemented a 13% head count reduction in November 2022 (CNBC).

10.

US Economy Q1 Slows Down Due to Inflation

Wall Street Journal: The U.S. economy cooled in the first quarter amid still-high inflation and rising interest rates, with solid consumer spending propping up growth. U.S. gross domestic product, a measure of the value of all the goods and services produced in the country, rose at an inflation- and seasonally-adjusted 1.1% annual rate from January to March, a slowdown from 2.6% growth in the fourth quarter, the Commerce Department said Thursday (Wall Street Journal). Dagen McDowell: US economic growth slowed to 1.1% annual rate in the 1st quarter. The vice grip of high inflation and higher interest rates. Consumers have started to cut spending. Manufacturing contracting. In the decade before the pandemic, our economy grew at 2.2% a year (Twitter).