The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy announced a series of listening sessions between November 18th-29th covering AI, data-driven technologies, and equity. The sessions will focus specifically on Public and Private Sector Uses of AI-Enabled Biometric Technologies.
Details and registration information can be found here.
The Department of Energy will host a public hearing of the Presidents Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) at 12:15pm ET on November 29th. PCAST is consulted on and provides analyses and recommendations concerning a wide range of issues where understanding of science, technology, and innovation may bear on the policy choices before the President.
PCAST will hear from invited speakers on and discuss various aspects of biomanufacturing, the Federal science and technology workforce, and the National Nanotechnology Initiative. Additional information and the meeting agenda, including any changes that arise, will be posted on the PCAST website at: www.whitehouse.gov/PCAST/meetings.
View the Federal Register Notice here.
With more than 800 guests in attendance at the White House, President Biden officially signed into law yesterday the $1.2-trillion infrastructure legislation. The signing ceremony became possible after Democrats were able to come to an agreement on how to proceed on it and the reconciliation package and the House cleared the infrastructure bill before leaving town for Veterans Day last week.
Late Friday night, the House cleared H.R. 3684- Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and sent the legislation to President Biden to be signed into law. The bill, worth about $1 trillion, cleared the Senate back in August. The bipartisan bill includes provisions for roads, bridges, ports, public transit, electric vehicles, coastal infrastructure, and rural broadband access.
The final details of the Democrats’ Build Back Better Act are still being ironed out, however the House is ready to begin considering the bill with paid leave provisions re-inserted by Speaker Pelosi. A consensus is still needed from all 50 Democratic Senators if the bill has any hope of making it through the Senate’s narrow reconciliation rules.
After last minute negotiations among themselves last night, the House Democrats have finally scheduled votes on both the budget reconciliation and infrastructure bills for this morning.
There were a number of issues on which the House Democrats were trading proposals on the reconciliation measure, including those around immigration, deductibility of state taxes, and paid leave, just to name a few. The version that is being voted on today will be further modified by a “manager’s amendment,” crafted to address additional last minute changes.
Even if this version does pass the House by the narrowest of margins, how the Senate plans to deal with it remains unknown. The Senate may wind up taking up a different version of the bill, meaning that the ball would once again be in the House’s court.
The infrastructure bill, which has actually passed the Senate, is also scheduled (as of this morning) for a vote today. This was part of the compromise between the moderate and progressives, as the latter group wanted to make sure that the former would vote for a reconciliation bill as well as the less costly infrastructure package.
We will provide additional updates.