Trump lies, no end in sight Presented by DoorDash

Editor's Note: This edition of Morning Shift is published weekdays at 10 a.m. POLITICO Pro Employment & Immigration subscribers hold exclusive early access to the newsletter each morning at 6 a.m. To learn more about POLITICO Pro's comprehensive policy intelligence coverage, policy tools and services, click here.



President Donald Trump made several misleading statements in his presidential address last night and signaled no change to his position that the Democrats must give him $5.7 billion for the border wall. The Democrats repeated that they won't. The partial government shutdown continues.


—Trump will meet with Senate Republicans today as he considers whether to secure funding for the border wall by declaring a national emergency.

— Federal workers won’t be getting their paychecks on Friday.

— More than 30,000 teachers, nurses and librarians in Los Angeles could strike as soon as tomorrow if negotiations with the school district sour.

GOOD MORNING! It’s Wednesday, Jan. 9, and this is Morning Shift, your daily tipsheet on labor and immigration news. Send tips, exclusives, and suggestions to [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] and [email protected]. Follow us on Twitter at @RebeccaARainey, @tedhesson, @IanKullgren and @TimothyNoah1.

TRUMP LIES — NO END IN SIGHT: Trump made several false or misleading statements about illegal immigration and border security in his televised prime-time presidential address last night, POLITICO’s Ted Hesson reports. Democrats in a televised rebuttal reiterated their refusal to give in to Trump's demand for a $5.7 billion wall as a condition of reopening the government. The impasse means the shutdown is likely to drag on and federal workers will have to keep waiting to get paid.

“The shutdown is creating real damage,” Paul Shearon, president of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, the union representing workers at NASA, DOJ, NOAA and the EPA, said in a statement. “Donald Trump should be deeply concerned about the morale of his employees."

Read a fact check of President Donald Trump’s speech from Ted Hesson here.

Related: “A quick history of Trump's evolving justifications for a border wall,” from POLITICO

TRUMP TO THE CAPITOL: Even as the president held off Tuesday night on declaring a national emergency to fund his border wall, Republican support for the move was growing, POLITICO’s Eliana Johnson, Burgess Everett, and Heather Caygle report. Trump and Pence will travel to Capitol Hill today to meet with Senate Republicans as GOP leaders weigh the emergency declaration as “a way out of a shutdown fight they’re losing.” More from POLITICO here.

SHUTDOWN STING: Government employees are all but guaranteed to miss their paycheck on Friday, POLITICO’s Caitlin Emma reports. “At least 4,806 federal employees and contractors living in D.C., Maryland and Virginia have applied for unemployment benefits since the shutdown began on Dec. 22,” Emma writes. Federal employees are still required to pay thousands of dollars for childcare services at on-site centers in federal buildings, even as they go without pay. HUD has also told lenders that landlords at properties insured by the Federal Housing Administration should dip into reserve cash so tenants aren’t evicted during the shutdown. More on the shutdown pain here.

Related read: “U.S. Chamber calls on lawmakers to reopen government,” from POLITICO

LA STRIKE TALKS TODAY: The United Teachers Los Angeles are set to meet with the Los Angeles Unified School District today to avert a strike that could begin tomorrow of more than 30,000 teachers, nurses and librarians in the second largest school district in the country, Kyle Stokes reports for NPR. “The union has been holding out, primarily, for the district to reduce class sizes and hire more nurses, librarians and counselors,” Stokes writes. Talks between the district and the union on Monday fell through after district officials brought more money to the table to address those concerns, but the union contends the offer actually increased the class size cap.

“Fundamentally something has to be done,” Daniel Barnhart, secondary vice president at UTLA told Morning Shift. “We want to get an agreement but when you're three days out and they’re moving backwards, that is not helpful.” More from NPR here.

DISCOURAGED WORKER COMEBACK: “Discouraged American workers are showing signs of returning to the labor market,” POLITICO’s Ben White reports. The rise in the labor force participation rate to 63.1 percent last month may help persuade the Federal Reserve to minimize interest rate hikes this year, White reports.

“Those who thought that the job market was at full capacity a year or more ago, and a lot of prominent people thought that, I think the evidence is they were wrong,” Jared Bernstein, former chief economist to Vice President Joe Biden, said on the latest edition of the POLITICO Money podcast. “There is more room to run in the American labor market than lots of economic people thought.” More here.

NJ STALLS ON MINIMUM WAGE: New Jersey’s Democratic Governor Phil Murphy was elected in 2017 on a promise to raise the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour, but after more than a year of intra-party disagreements on the details, the state minimum remains $8.85, POLITICO’s Katherine Landergan reports. More here.

KY LABOR CABINET REVIEWING SAFETY PROGRAM: Kentucky Labor Cabinet is reviewing “a number of unacceptable issues” in the state’s occupational safety and health program following a scathing report from federal OSHA that found, among other things, that KY OSH was conducting “inadequate” worker fatality investigations. In an op-ed published in the Lexington Herald Leader, David Dickerson, acting secretary of the state labor cabinet, argued that the report showed “year-over-year improvements in worker safety" and said the cabinet is working to address the problems.

Federal law encourages states to implement their own safety and health programs by offering federal funding up to 50 percent. But the 22 state programs, including KY OSH, must be at least as effective as federal OSHA’s rules. If not, the federal agency can take over. Still, it’s unlikely federal OSHA will intervene, given its strapped budget. Read the op-ed here.

OSHA NOMINEE “FRUSTRATED” OVER PROCESS: The Trump administration’s nominee to lead the Occupational Safety and Health administration, Scott Mugno, is “extremely frustrated by the Senate’s inability to get its act together to confirm his nomination,” a source close to the nominee tells Morning Shift. Following a December confirmation fight in which Democrats blocked expedited confirmation of the Trump administration‘s labor nominees unless the Senate also confirmed two Democrats, Mugno now must be renominated by the White House for a second time.

The sluggish process has worn down other nominees. Daniel Gade in December withdrew his name from consideration for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission citing a "political mess" in the Senate. However, the source notes that Mugno is in different circumstances than Gade, because he is retired and not passing up potential business opportunities.

— “Elizabeth Warren says the minimum wage no longer keeps a single mother out of poverty. Is that true?” from Boston.com

— “Trump’s Metaphysical Wall: An Investigation,” from POLITICO Magazine

—“Mich. Gov. Beefs Up Bias Protections For LGBT State Workers,” from Law360

—“What the Government Shutdown Looks Like Inside Federal Prisons,” from The Marshall Project

— “Asylum seekers find it’s catch and can’t release fast enough,” from The Washington Post

THAT’S ALL FOR MORNING SHIFT!

Follow us on Twitter Rebecca Rainey @rebeccaarainey