Minnesota Sen. Al Franken, along with co-sponsors Sen. Amy Klobuchar (also of Minnesota), and Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa, have introduced the Federal Response to Eliminate Eating Disorders (FREED) Act, the Minnesota Independent reports.
The bill is seen as the first of its kind, and would require the federal government to:
WASHINGTON – Kayla VanDyke has had to leave a lot behind over the past 14 years as a foster child.
The 18-year-old living in Eagan has cycled through a multitude of homes, schools and counselors throughout her life, after being sent into foster care because of her mother’s drug use.
“I have been homeless. I have experienced living in a shelter. And I have been separated from my siblings along the way,” she told a U.S. Senate panel examining education reform Thursday. “But I am pleased to tell you that … I will be graduating [from high school] in four weeks with a 3.7 GPA.”
Washington DC – Minnesota first responders will receive over $2 million in federal grants to acquire new equipment and training. Minnesota Senators Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken, and House Representatives Jim Oberstar, Colin Peterson and Tim Walz. today announced the grants from the Department of Homeland Security’s Assistance to Firefighters Grants program (AFG).
“This has been a particularly dry spring in Northeast Minnesota and firefighters are on high alert for grass and forest fires,” said Oberstar. “At times like this we see how it pays off to invest in our first responders.”
Washington, D.C. — U.S. Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) invited Eagan High School senior Kayla VanDyke to testify before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee hearing today (Thursday, April 29) regarding special populations and education reform.
Sen. Franken invited VanDyke to testify to illustrate the obstacles facing foster youth in the education system, an issue he has been working to improve in the upcoming education reauthorization bill.
VanDyke is an 18-year-old foster youth who has lived through seven different foster care placements as well as a period of homelessness. She testified today that she was regularly forced to change schools, often missing important lessons and repeating others. She also testified that, had she had access to liaisons and counselors and known about transportation arrangements such as those included in Sen. Franken’s Fostering Success In Education Act, it would have helped her stay in the school of her choice.
WASHINGTON — Sen. Al Franken teamed with several colleagues Thursday to promote new legislation that would restrict the influence of corporations and big-money special interests in elections.
The measure proposed by Franken, Sens. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., Russ Feingold, D-Wis., Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Ron Wyden, D-Ore., is intended to blunt the impact of the January Supreme Court decision opening the gates to spending on political advertising by corporations and unions.
The lawmakers hope to get a vote on the bill by July 4 so the law can take effect before the November midterm elections.
DFL Sen. Al Franken and several other U.S. Senators are backing legislation that would require any corporate CEOs to appear in any political ads that they purchase. The measure would also prohibit foreign companies and government contractors from participating. Here’s part of the news release:
Under the Senators’ proposal, the heads of any organization sponsoring an ad–including corporate CEOs–would be required to appear during the ad, as is currently required of candidates for federal office. In cases where special interests funnel their money into shell groups, the top five organizations that have donated to the group would have to be identified on screen during any ad sponsored by that group.
Minnesota Sens. Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar joined a Democratic assault on the U.S. Supreme Court’s controversial Citizens United ruling on Thursday, signing on to a bill that would slap new regulations on political expenditures by unions and corporations.
Readying for the fall elections, the two Minnesota Democrats are joining Sens. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., Russ Feingold, D-Wis., and others in an effort to blunt the impact of the landmark decision that removed restrictions on independent spending in elections by corporations and other special interests.
The bill appears to lay down a marker in an election year in which Democrats will try to tie their Republican opponents to Wall Street and other corporate interests. The lawmakers said their goal is for the Senate to pass the new measure by July 4 in order to curb the flow of corporate money in the 2010 midterm elections.
Both of Minnesota’s senators, Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken, as well as Iowa’s Sen. Tom Harkin, introduced the Federal Response to Eliminate Eating Disorders (FREED) Act on Tuesday, which would direct the federal government to track, screen, diagnose and treat eating disorders. The bill is the first of its kind in the Senate and will improve access to treatment for people suffering from eating disorders, especially teens on government assistance.
It’s a popular site but today, Senator Al Franken is not ‘friending’ Facebook’s information-sharing policy.
The Democrat says the site has taken its endeavors too far when it comes to distributing personal material.
The backlash has started: more than 2.2 million angry Facebook users are standing up against the new Facebook application that now takes user information and shares it with outside websites. Something Senator Al Franken also says has gone way too far.
SEN. AL FRANKEN/(D) MINNESOTA: “To say suddenly everything you’ve ever written on Facebook is suddenly going to be ours to send, sell, is not, to me isn’t kosher.”
He and three other U.S. Senators sent a letter to Facebook administrators, saying they need to switch their privacy policy around: saying users should have to “opt-in” instead of “opt-out” of the new service.
