Jan 10, 2019

Second federal workers union sues Trump admin over shutdown

Khorri Atkinson

Photo: Drew Angerer via Getty Images

The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents hundreds of thousands of federal workers at 33 agencies, sued the Trump administration Wednesday for forcing tens of thousands of employees to work without pay during the government shutdown.

Details: The lawsuit, which names two Customs and Border Protection officers as the plaintiffs, comes a week after the American Federation of Government Employees filed a similar suit, calling the shutdown a "blatant violation" of the Fair Labor Standards Act. NTEU President Tony Reardon said in a statement: “If employees are working, they must be paid — and if there is not money to pay them, then they should not be working."

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Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian

Scoop: Census Bureau is paying Chinese state media to reach Americans

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

The 2020 Census Paid Media Campaign, which sends U.S. taxpayer dollars to community media outlets to run ads about the upcoming census, is including a Chinese state-run broadcaster as one of its media vendors.

Why it matters: After China's yearslong campaign to co-opt independent Chinese-language media in the U.S., Washington is now paying Beijing-linked media outlets in order to reach Chinese Americans.

Go deeperArrow36 mins ago - World
Axios

Live updates: Coronavirus spreads to Latin America

Data: The Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins, the CDC, and China's Health Ministry. Note: China numbers are for the mainland only and U.S. numbers include repatriated citizens.

Brazil confirmed the first novel coronavirus case in Latin America Wednesday — a 61-year-old that tested positive after returning from a visit to northern Italy, the epicenter of Europe's outbreak.

The big picture: COVID-19 has killed more than 2,700 people and infected over 81,000 others. By Wednesday morning, South Korea had the most cases outside China, with 1,261 infections. Europe's biggest outbreak is in Italy, where 374 cases have been confirmed.

Go deeperArrowUpdated 2 hours ago - Health
Dan Primack

GOP congressman accuses California pension official of working for China

Illustration: Rebecca Zisser/Axios

The latest season of Red Scare has come to Sacramento.

Driving the news: Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) has repeatedly accused Ben Meng, chief investment officer of the California Public Employees' Retirement System (CalPERS), of tacitly working on behalf of the Chinese government. Banks also says that, were it up to him, Meng would be fired — and has questioned the patriotism of California Gov. Gavin Newsom for not at least investigating Meng.

Go deeperArrow2 hours ago - World