California
California will require that masks be worn at schools when classrooms open this fall, despite new guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that says vaccinated teachers and students don’t need to wear face coverings inside school buildings…
There are now over 80 candidates running for governor of California in the 2021 recall election, all aiming to oust Democrat Gavin Newsom…
Coronavirus
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is preparing to announce a new warning for the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) COVID-19 vaccine saying the shot has been linked to Guillain-Barré syndrome, a serious but rare side effect in which the immune system attacks the nerves…
The CDC has updated its COVID-19 guidance for kindergarten through high school, providing flexibility for local decision makers to determine what’s needed to safely keep kids in the classroom…
Pfizer plans to request U.S. emergency authorization in August for a third booster dose of its COVID-19 vaccine, based on data from an early human study showing that a third dose of its existing COVID-19 vaccine is safe and can raise neutralizing antibody levels by five to 10 fold compared with the original vaccine…
Faced with a steep decline in vaccination rates, President Joe Biden announced last week that his administration would send people door to door, set up clinics at workplaces and urge employers to offer paid time off as part of a renewed push to reach tens of millions of unvaccinated Americans…
Americans are almost evenly divided over whether schools or most private employers should require COVID-19 vaccinations as part of reopening, according to a Politico-Harvard survey…
President and Administration
The U.S. Supreme Court will clarify next term whether victims of disability discrimination under federal law can win emotional distress damages, after it granted review of a Fifth Circuit decision…
Facing a nationwide increase in violent crime - particularly involving firearms - President Biden will meet with law enforcement, local elected officials and advocates to discuss his efforts to address gun crimes…
President Biden’s executive order to bolster competition includes 72 initiatives by more than a dozen federal agencies…
Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday, 7/8, announced a $25 million expansion of the Democratic National Committee’s “I Will Vote” campaign, a move intended to increase voter registration, turnout and protections…
Yields in the $4 trillion municipal-bond market, already historically low, could drop even more, according to the biggest underwriter of state and local debt…
Congress
House appropriators are set to finish markups this week after releasing their final four spending bills yesterday, 7/11, though they haven’t made progress toward a bipartisan top-line spending deal…
Child Tax Credit checks are going to start going out this week…
Education
Last week, the administration formally withdrew a rule proposed by the Trump administration that would have required international students to reapply for student visas after fixed terms of up to four years…
As momentum grows around providing students with supports that foster retention and completion, a bill seeking to address one of the biggest hindrances in bringing these types of programs to community colleges has been reintroduced in the Senate, with a path forward appearing to be clearer than in years past…
Secretary Cardona visited Puerto Rico in the last week of June…
Education Department officials are recommending that the White House once again extend the pause on federal student loan payments, according to people familiar with the internal discussions, putting pressure on the administration ahead of a fall deadline…
Almost all schools with fourth and eighth grades were offering some in-person learning at the end of the school year, but more than half of students at those levels remained in hybrid or fully remote programs, according to the final round of school reopening data from the Institute of Education Sciences…
Last week, the Education Department announced more political appointees including…
As required by law, the Education Department issued annual determinations regarding states’ implementation of IDEA…