‘Waging’ a campaign against AB 168
We are deeply concerned with the passage of AB 168 and are urging Gov. Jerry Brown to veto this bill as it exposes all employers to unnecessary litigation, creates hurdles in the hiring process and seeks to tackle an issue already addressed by existing law.
California has taken great strides in attempting to level wage disparities, particularly when it comes to gender-pay inequalities. However, AB 168 does nothing to resolve concerns, while it only puts new restrictions on small-business owners who may have legitimate reasons for inquiring about an applicant’s pay history.
Research shows us that those who work at a small business tend to stay there longer than employees of a large corporation, for a variety of reasons. Therefore, when a small-business owner must fill a job vacancy, they likely are unaware of current market wages. Asking an applicant about their salary history allows the small business to remain competitive and empowers the applicant to leverage current market wages.
Small-business owners have a much more direct relationship with their employees than larger corporations and want to offer competitive wages to retain a skilled, vibrant workforce, but adding new mandates and legal liabilities does nothing to accomplish this.
For these reasons, NFIB is strongly urging Gov. Brown to veto AB 168.
Tom Scott
California State Executive Director
National Federation of Independent Business
More election deflection?
[Tuesday’s] [President’s Advisory Commission on Election Integrity] meeting is just the latest effort by Mr. Trump and Kris Kobach to suppress the voting rights of eligible American citizens. The Trump and Kobach commission should be shut down before it can cause lasting harm to our democracy. Congress should take action to defund the commission without delay.
Today’s commission meeting was absent any testimony from women or people of color. Yet, the commission did include testimony suggesting that American citizens should be required to pass a background check before being allowed to vote. Kobach failed to call out this offensive proposal, which shouldn’t be a surprise as Kobach has also been moonlighting as a columnist for Breitbart [News Network].
I will continue to refuse to comply with this commission’s requests for voter data because it would compromise the privacy of California voters and because the commission has no authority. It is clear that this commission has but one goal— to suppress the vote and undermine voting rights.
Strangely, the issue of Russian tampering in our elections has not been a focus of the commission. Why is that? For a commission formed to investigate election integrity to ignore Russian tampering and instead demand personal information from American citizens is unbelievable.
Alex Padilla
Secretary of State
California
No news is bad news
The Hun Sen regime is making it perfectly clear that it has no intention of allowing a free press to exist in Cambodia, and the government appears ready to use any contrivance it can— intimidation, threats, coercion and even outright violence— to prevent the people of Cambodia from having independent, reliable and trustworthy news that is not filtered through the [Cambodian Prime Minister] Hun Sen lens.
RFA (Radio Free Asia) in Cambodia has faced a growing escalation of rhetoric from the Hun Sen regime, and now, for the safety of its staff, RFA has been forced to cease operations within Cambodia. It joins the Cambodia Daily newspaper, numerous non-governmental agencies, as well as FM broadcast stations that have been forced to close by the government.
The democratic principles that the Cambodia people are guaranteed under their constitution are being destroyed— one at a time— by the Hun Sen government, and I am appalled.
The right of political expression, the right of a free media and the right to dissent, are all being quashed by Hun Sen in an effort to subvert free and fair national elections in Cambodia scheduled for next year.
This is a crisis situation, and I will call on the United States ambassador to Cambodia as well as the Secretary of State to express my concern and urge them to take any and all action to stop this out-of-control situation and assist the Cambodian people.
Alan Lowenthal
U.S. Congressmember
Long Beach
