Tootfinder

Republican state legislators in California filed suit on Tuesday
to block a mid-year redistricting plan meant to counter Texas’s effort to redraw congressional district lines.
The emergency petition argues that the process being used in the California assembly violates laws requiring a 30-day period between the introduction of legislation and voting on it.

"California advances climate action with new legislation"
#California #Climate #ClimateChange

David Barton isn’t just a primary pitchman for the Ten Commandments law in Texas
His fingerprints appear on 28 bills that have cropped up before the legislatures in 18 states this year.
A data analysis of the bills exposes how their language, structure and requirements are inherently identical.
In dozens of instances, they match model legislation pitched by Barton verbatim.
At the Texas hearing, Barton’s eyes fixated on the cover of the rare 1782 Aitken Bible.
…

28 Bills, Ten Commandments and 1 Source: A Christian Right ‘Bill Mill’
More than a dozen state bills — and three new laws mandating the Ten Commandments in public schools — are virtually identical to model legislation.

The ACT is the first jurisdiction in Australia to introduce legislation that guarantees students free access to period products.
Beyond schools, dispensers are installed at:
Canberra Hospital
University of Canberra Hospital
community and health centres
walk-in centres
ACT courts
ACT libraries.

This reporting doesn't make clear the resolution is nonbinding: the departments are free to blow off not just the "deadlines" but the requested actions as well.
It does signal priorities the supervisors may go on to weigh at budget time, when evaluating mayoral appointees that need confirmation, or negotiating with Lurie about legislation he wants passed. But it may be a weak signal because supes who signed onto this did so knowing it was nonbinding.

Supervisors approve new traffic safety plan with deadlines for city departments
After San Francisco’s policy on traffic safety expired at the end of 2024, city supervisors on Tuesday adopted a new plan to curb traffic fatalities and injuries on city streets. The Board of Supervisors passed the Street Safety Act, sponsored by District 7 Supervisor Myrna Melgar, that includes actions with deadlines for seven city departments, […]

If you are a US citizen holding a #HamRadio license, please add your name to #AmateurRadio antennas with bills in both the house and senate,…

The UK says it wants to change the law to ensure public service media content appears prominently on major video sharing platforms, implicitly targeting YouTube (Jake Kanter/Deadline)
https://deadline.com/2025/09/lisa-nandy-youtube-ofcom-1236544787/

UK Government Ready To Change Law So YouTube Carries Public Service Content Prominently
UK culture secretary Lisa Nandy has said that she is prepared to change legislation to ensure that YouTube carries public service content prominently.

A Price to Pay: U.S. Lawmaker Efforts to Regulate Algorithmic and Data-Driven Pricing
https://fpf.org/blog/a-price-to-pay-u-s-lawmaker-efforts-to-regulate-algorithmic-and-data-driven-pricing/
@…

"Water Cremation" - also known as hydrolysis,
involves water, heat and an alkaline solution being applied to a body in a chamber similar to that used in cremation.
And while the current method of reducing a person’s remains to ashes requires enormously high temperatures,
those in favour of water cremation say it is far less energy intensive and therefore more environmentally friendly.

Scotland to be first part of UK to introduce water cremation
Changes to legislation have paved the way for a more environmentally friendly and ‘gentler’ option for body disposal

One thing about Wikipedia potentially being forced to do user verification in the UK is that, back in 2012/2013, there was movement trying to make it such that wikipedia edits could be attributed to an identifiable individual. eg via the Defamation Act.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2013/

This story in The Onion from 1997 is now official policy of the Trump administration
https://theonion.com/u-s-offers-platinumplus-preferred-citizenship-1819564488/

U.S. Offers PlatinumPlus Preferred Citizenship
WASHINGTON, DC—In an 86-14 vote, the Senate approved legislation Monday establishing PlatinumPlus Preferred citizenship, an exciting new program offering special benefits and discounts to select members of the U.S.

Ukraine completes legislation screening with EU in key step toward accession: https://benborges.xyz/2025/09/30/ukraine-completes-legislation-screening-with.html

European policymakers are edging towards a decision that could force technology firms to scan encrypted messages in a bid to tackle child abuse material, reviving a debate that cuts to the heart of online privacy and security.
https://www.computing.co.uk/news/2…

EU moves closer to controversial ‘Chat Control’ law
European policymakers are edging towards a decision that could force technology firms to scan encrypted messages in a bid to tackle child abuse material, reviving ...

We exist to end the abuse of animals raised for food by influencing the policies of the world’s biggest companies, demanding legislation, and empowering others to take action and leave animals off their plates. https://thehumaneleague.org

The Humane League
We exist to end the abuse of animals raised for food by influencing the policies of the world’s biggest companies, demanding legislation, and empowering others to take action and leave animals off their plates.

"[Lucy Powell] needs to spell out where she stands on key issues without delay — the Gaza genocide first of all, the priorities for the Budget, the arms bill, public ownership of water, continuing to extend employment rights beyond the present legislation and more.
"... about the likes of Ovenden and McSweeney, about the promiscuous withdrawal of the parliamentary whip from Labour MPs and Starmer’s general authoritarianism?"

Using Protected Identity to Suppress History https://jacobin.com/2025/08/israel-anti-zionism-antisemitism-education-palestine/

Using Protected Identity to Suppress History
Legislation on protected identities is supposed to foster good intercommunal relations. When it’s used to protect Zionism, it means shielding a 19th-century nationalist ideology from criticism as if it were an innate characteristic of all Jews.

Senate votes for fifth time against advancing legislation to end the shutdown (Jordain Carney/Politico)
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/06/senate-votes-for-fifth-time-against-advancing-legislation-to-end-the-shutdown-00595519
http://www.memeorandum.com/251007/p5#a251007p5

This legislation seems relevant
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/40/contents
The Identity Documents Act 2010 repealed the Identity Cards Act 2006.
When Blunkett and Blair touted the idea of ID cards quarter of a century ago, public opinion was…

SAG-AFTRA praises California Governor Gavin Newsom for signing new legislation to protect a performer's likeness, saying it takes action "against AI abuse" (Alyssa Ray/The Wrap)
https://www.thewrap.com/sag-aftra-statement-new-law-agai…

SAG-AFTRA Praises Governor Newsom for Taking Action 'Against AI Abuse' With New Law: 'California Stands With Performers'
SAG-AFTRA voiced their appreciation for California lawmakers on Monday, after new legislation was signed to protect a performer's likeness.

Automated Creation of the Legal Knowledge Graph Addressing Legislation on Violence Against Women: Resource, Methodology and Lessons Learned
Claudia dAmato, Giuseppe Rubini, Francesco Didio, Donato Francioso, Fatima Zahra Amara, Nicola Fanizzi
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.06368

Automated Creation of the Legal Knowledge Graph Addressing Legislation on Violence Against Women: Resource, Methodology and Lessons Learned
Legal decision-making process requires the availability of comprehensive and detailed legislative background knowledge and up-to-date information on legal cases and related sentences/decisions. Legal Knowledge Graphs (KGs) would be a valuable tool to facilitate access to legal information, to be queried and exploited for the purpose, and to enable advanced reasoning and machine learning applications. Indeed, legal KGs may act as knowledge intensive component to be used by pre-dictive machine le…

A look at the tensions between Meta, Apple, and Google on whether apps or app stores should check if a user is a minor, as states work on age verification bills (Emily Birnbaum/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20

Meta Clashes With Apple, Google Over Age Check Legislation
The biggest tech companies are warring over who’s responsible for children’s safety online, with billions of dollars in fines on the line as states rapidly pass conflicting laws requiring companies to verify users’ ages.

A bipartisan group in the Senate is planning to force a vote on legislation that would
bar the United States from engaging in hostilities inside Venezuela without explicit authorization by Congress.
The measure faces long odds given the unwillingness of most Republican lawmakers to challenge Donald Trump,
who would be all but certain to veto it.
But a vote on the legislation, which is required, would put Congress on the record on whether to rein in Trump’s escalating…

Senators Move to Force Vote to Bar Ground Strikes in Venezuela
The bid comes after the Senate rejected a similar measure to curb President Trump’s attacks against alleged drug runners in the Caribbean Sea.

I think they should amend the entire body of UK legislation to remove "by fax" as an acceptable means of document transfer.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/all?text=%22 by fax"

Looks like the Europeans have cottoned onto the US bigtech's 'local cloud' gambit: #SovereignWashing Here in Aotearoa NZ, we should be giving …

Over-Threshold Multiparty Private Set Intersection for Collaborative Network Intrusion Detection
Onur Eren Arpaci (University of Waterloo), Raouf Boutaba (University of Waterloo), Florian Kerschbaum (University of Waterloo)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.12045

Over-Threshold Multiparty Private Set Intersection for Collaborative Network Intrusion Detection
An important function of collaborative network intrusion detection is to analyze the network logs of the collaborators for joint IP addresses. However, sharing IP addresses in plain is sensitive and may be even subject to privacy legislation as it is personally identifiable information. In this paper, we present the privacy-preserving collection of IP addresses. We propose a single collector, over-threshold private set intersection protocol. In this protocol $N$ participants identify the IP add…

🚂 How to repurpose abandoned railway tracks: Two projects explore driverless electric mini-trains
https://english.elpais.com/technology/2025-08-23/how-to-repurpose-abandoned-railway-tracks-tw…

How to repurpose abandoned railway tracks: Two projects explore driverless electric mini-trains
Autonomous rail vehicles with few seats could connect low-demand destinations at a very low cost, although Spanish legislation poses a stumbling block

UK delays introducing new cybersecurity legislation, again https://therecord.media/uk-cybersecurity-law-update-csrb-delayed-again

"
Reps. Luna, Valadao, and Garbarino declare the rebranded EATS Act a threat to family farmers and a legislative invitation to foreign-owned factory farms."
Republican Lawmakers Declare Opposition to Legislation to Overturn the States’ Most Important Farm Animal Welfare Laws - Legal Reader
https://www.legalreader.com/republican-lawmakers-declare-opposition-to-legislation-to-overturn-the-states-most-important-farm-animal-welfare-laws/

Rep. Kiley to Introduce Redistricting Legislation (kiley.house.gov)
https://kiley.house.gov/posts/rep-kiley-to-introduce-redistricting-legislation
http://www.memeorandum.com/250804/p120#a250804p120

The Italian federation of newspaper publishers submits a complaint to Italy's communication watchdog calling for an investigation into Google's AI Overviews (Angela Giuffrida/The Guardian)
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/202

Not even a city councillor standed up for our Sheppard Bike lanes
RIP
#biketo

LegiScout: A Visual Tool for Understanding Complex Legislation
Aadarsh Rajiv, Klaus Mueller
https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.01195 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2510.011…

LegiScout: A Visual Tool for Understanding Complex Legislation
Modern legislative frameworks, such as the Affordable Care Act (ACA), often involve complex webs of agencies, mandates, and interdependencies. Government issued charts attempt to depict these structures but are typically static, dense, and difficult to interpret - even for experts. We introduce LegiScout, an interactive visualization system that transforms static policy diagrams into dynamic, force-directed graphs, enhancing comprehension while preserving essential relationships. By integrating…

@… I think there’s more to it. They have outsized influence, not just presence.
Perhaps another term is more useful, then. The UK Competition Act, for example, talks about a “dominant position” in a given market.

Across the US, lawmakers and interest groups are stepping up efforts to shield Israel from accountability for war crimes, occupation, and apartheid.
They are doing so by restricting Palestine solidarity advocates’ First Amendment rights to free speech and political boycotts.
In June 2022, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled to uphold an Arkansas law punishing state contractors who boycott Israel.
Since 2014, dozens of states have adopted similar laws designed to puni…

Sources: Coinbase and Mastercard have each held talks to acquire stablecoin startup BVNK for $1.5B-$2.5B; a deal would be the largest stablecoin acquisition yet (Fortune)
https://fortune.com/crypto/2025/10/09/bvnk-acquisition-coinbase-mastercard-stable…

Exclusive: Coinbase and Mastercard have both held advanced talks to buy stablecoin startup BVNK for around $2 billion
Stablecoins have become a buzzy sector over the past year amid a red-hot IPO from the stablecoin giant Circle and recently passed legislation in Congress.

It's the last week of the California Legislative session, and there are a number of #climate & #environment bills awaiting action in the California Senate.
PLease help! #350BayArea has an eas…

Solutions that our communities need - Support these bills!
As Californians concerned about global warming and the climate crisis, it is up to us to make sure that our legislators listen to us and enact legislation that will do everything possible to fight climate change, and to mitigate its effects on all communities, especially those communities most directly affected. Please add your voice to this effort by signing this letter to your State Senator. Feel free to add your experiences and your thoughts about why your Senator needs to support this cl…

It's the last week of the California Legislative session, and there are a number of #climate & #environment bills awaiting action in the California Senate.
PLease help! #350BayArea has an eas…

Solutions that our communities need - Support these bills!
As Californians concerned about global warming and the climate crisis, it is up to us to make sure that our legislators listen to us and enact legislation that will do everything possible to fight climate change, and to mitigate its effects on all communities, especially those communities most directly affected. Please add your voice to this effort by signing this letter to your State Senator. Feel free to add your experiences and your thoughts about why your Senator needs to support this cl…

ChatControl wants to scan all your private messages
The European Union wants to force tech companies to scan your private messages & images, even in your favorite encrypted apps.
— by @…
🕵️

ChatControl wants to scan all your private messages
The EU is pushing legislation that would scan all our private messages, even in encrypted apps.

Imgur has started blocking access to its site from UK users after the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) threatened to fine the company over its advertising and data collection policies.
https://www.computing.co.uk/news/2025/legi

Imgur shuts down website to UK users over threat of fines from the ICO
Imgur has started blocking access to its site from UK users after the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) threatened to fine the company over its advertising ...

KFF Health Tracking Poll: Public Weighs Political Consequences of Health Policy Legislation (KFF)
https://www.kff.org/affordable-care-act/kff-health-tracking-poll-public-weighs-political-consequences-of-health-policy-legislation/
http://www.memeorandum.com/251003/p16#a251003p16

Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Rashida Tlaib on Monday introduced the
Tax Excessive CEO Pay Act
with the aim of raising taxes on companies that pay their executives more than 50 times their workers’ wages.
The legislation would impose penalties starting at 0.5 percentage points for companies with CEO-to-worker pay ratios between 50-to-1 and 100-to-1.
Firms where executives make more than 500 times their workers’ pay would be forced to pay the highest rate.

'Corporate Greed Is Out of Control': Tlaib-Sanders Bill Would Tax Companies for Excessive CEO Pay | Common Dreams
As Elon Musk nears trillionaire status, Bernie Sanders and Rashida Tlaib push for a bill to rein in excessive CEO pay. With CEOs making 600 times more than workers, it's time for corporations to pay their fair share.

<post link to news article on Facebook group>
:deadpixel_red: `In response to Canadian government legislation, news content can’t be shared.`
<saves page with SingleFile: https://www.getsinglefile.com>
<uploads to static web server

SingleFile – Effortlessly Save and Preserve Web Pages
Save an entire web page with all its resources in a single HTML file with SingleFile.

A Schema.org Mapping for Brazilian Legal Norms: Toward Interoperable Legal Graphs and Open Government Data
Hudson de Martim
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.00827 https://

A Schema.org Mapping for Brazilian Legal Norms: Toward Interoperable Legal Graphs and Open Government Data
Open Government Data (OGD) initiatives aim to enhance transparency and public participation by making government data openly accessible. However, structuring legal norms for machine readability remains a critical challenge for advancing Legal Tech applications such as Legal Knowledge Graphs (LKGs). Focusing on the Normas.leg.br portal initiative by the Brazilian National Congress, we propose a unified mapping of Brazilian legislation to the schema.org/Legislation vocabulary via JSON-LD and Link…

HEY EVERYBODY, GUESS WHAT
https://districtmagazine.ie/news/the-gardai-are-getting-powers-to-monitor-whatsapp-chats/

Who Pays for Fairness? Rethinking Recourse under Social Burden
Ainhize Barrainkua, Giovanni De Toni, Jose Antonio Lozano, Novi Quadrianto
https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.04128 https:…

Who Pays for Fairness? Rethinking Recourse under Social Burden
Machine learning based predictions are increasingly used in sensitive decision-making applications that directly affect our lives. This has led to extensive research into ensuring the fairness of classifiers. Beyond just fair classification, emerging legislation now mandates that when a classifier delivers a negative decision, it must also offer actionable steps an individual can take to reverse that outcome. This concept is known as algorithmic recourse. Nevertheless, many researchers have exp…

To my way of thinking it is better to starve a mad dog than to feed it.
If this shutdown slows down the destruction being caused by the maga-klan then the hurt we will feel from the shutdown will be more than repaid by the retardation of our rapid descent into fascism, inflation, and international irrelevance.

Shutdown nears as congressional leaders meet with Trump
Democratic congressional leaders have left a White House meeting without a deal with President Donald Trump and Republicans to avoid a government shutdown. Trump is making it clear he has no intention to negotiate on Democrats’ current terms. Democrats are insisting on action to extend health care benefits, but Republicans are refusing to compromise. If government funding legislation is not passed by Congress and signed by Trump on Tuesday night, many government offices will be temporarily sh…

New Hampshire and Vermont working on plug-in solar bills to make solar systems more accessible for residents. Utah has already passed similar legislation, with other states considering the same. #climatechange #climatesolutions

Plug-in solar bills are in the works in New Hampshire and Vermont
DIY "balcony" solar kits, which can save residents money and give them more independence, are piquing interest from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

#California Gov #Newsom signs #ScottWeiner bill to bulldoze over opposition to expansion of #housing density and residential construction proj…

My recent article (online first already since 30.12.24, #OA ) has a number and a page range.
Yeah!
"Unequal refugeeness. Race, gender, and co-belligerence from Poles in colonial Africa to Ukrainians in Poland"
Journal of Refugee Studies, 2025, 38(3), 674–689

Going around in circles — Trump sets new deadline for peace in Ukraine, Graham again threatens with tough legislation: https://benborges.xyz/2025/08/21/going-around-in-circles-trump.html

Dems should buy ad slots in this video with gun legislation.
Sinclair Puts Charlie Kirk Special On YouTube Instead Of Kimmel's Slot https://share.google/iR0X3GML25AKVgnu2

The House passed legislation to
repeal the 1991 and 2002 Iraq Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMF)
in a bipartisan vote on Wednesday,
moving against two pieces of legislation that have vastly expanded the president’s ability to use military force in the U.S.’s “forever wars” in the Middle East.
The amendment to the House version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA)
passed easily in a 261 to 167 vote.
All Democrats and 49 Republicans v…

House Passes Repeal of 1991, 2002 Iraq War Authorizations in Bipartisan Vote
Anti-war advocates have long called for the AUMFs to be repealed.

Is there an expression for the contrary of "in advance of his time"?
Trump: "They should get rid of the windmills and bring back the oil"
How is it possible to promote such retrograde ideas and not be consumed by shame? It's not even good for jobs:
"With the acquiescence of Republicans in Congress, hundreds of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in investment in clean energy and electric car facilities is set to be lost, with one union calling the legislation “t…

I feel that way that news headlines talk about government proposals will often blur common understanding.
"Government grants new powers to police" is arguably only accurate for secondary legislation, I think it's misleading (both constitutionally and chronologically) to talk about the effect of future primary legislation (or amendments) using the past or present tense.

Digital welfare fraud detection and the Dutch SyRI judgment
Marvin van Bekkum, Frederik Zuiderveen Borgesius
https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.23843 https://arxiv…

Digital welfare fraud detection and the Dutch SyRI judgment
In 2020, a Dutch court passed judgment in a case about a digital welfare fraud detection system called Systeem Risico Indicatie (SyRI). The court ruled that the SyRI legislation is unlawful because it does not comply with the right to privacy under the European Convention of Human Rights. In this article we analyse the judgment and its implications. This ruling is one of first in which a court has invalidated a welfare fraud detection system for breaching the right to privacy. We show that the …

New plan would give Congress another 18 months to revisit Section 702 surveillance powers https://therecord.media/fisa-section-702-legislation-sen-tom-cotton-plan

DX Engineering invited John Robert Stratton N5AUS, ARRL West Gulf Director, to give more details about why this new attempt to give #HamRadio similar rights already given for broadcast antennas (the FCC's Over-the-Air Reception Devices, or "OTARD", rule) has a real chance to pass this time.
Go to

The Senate on Thursday night approved its $925 billion version of the
National Defense Authorization Act,
the annual must-pass Pentagon policy blueprint,
setting up what is expected to be a lengthy negotiation with the House to finalize the bill.

The legislation, deadlocked for weeks over various partisan disagreements,
advanced by a margin of 77 to 20 following amendment votes earlier in the evening.

Senate and House staff will next reconcile their bills…

Senate passes $925 billion defense bill, setting up House talks
Staff from both chambers must now negotiate final, compromise legislation ahead of a vote expected later this fall.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signs a bill that gives ride-hailing drivers in California the right to unionize while remaining classified as independent contractors (Associated Press)
https://apnews.com/article/lyft-uber-rideshare-driver-union-cali…

California Uber and Lyft drivers get union rights
California Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed a bill allowing 800,000 Uber and Lyft drivers in the state to join a union and bargain collectively for better wages and benefits. The legislation is a significant compromise in the yearslong battle between labor unions and tech companies over drivers’ rights. California is the second state to give rideshare drivers the right to unionize. In exchange, Newsom also agreed to sign a bill supported by Uber and Lyft to lower the companies’ insurance requir…

Desperately wanted: legislation to require some sort of "unsubscribe" link equivalent for paper mail.

AFL-CIO opposes major crypto legislation (Brady Dale/Axios)
https://www.axios.com/2025/10/07/crypto-market-structure-afl-cio
http://www.memeorandum.com/251007/p134#a251007p134

I will stand on business and say that narcissistic doomers are as bad for discussion surrounding progressive legislation as actual opposition, we saw what PirateSoftware saying "no this isn't feasible" for long enough with no substantive proof did to SKG and how we only saved it by the skin of its teeth.

Free speech advocates are sounding the alarm about a bill in the US House of Representatives that they fear could allow Secretary of State Marco Rubio to
strip US citizens of their passports
based purely on political speech.
The bill, introduced by Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.), will come up for a hearing on Wednesday

New Bill Would Allow Rubio to Strip US Citizens’ Passports Over Political Speech
The legislation would allow the Secretary of State to strip anyone’s US passport with no legal due process.

"Brazil passes ‘devastation bill’ that drastically weakens environmental law"
#Brazil #Environment #Deforestation

Trump Is Taking Credit for Infrastructure Projects Funded by Biden Legislation He Opposed (Peter Wade/Rolling Stone)
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/trump-taking-credit-biden-infrastructure-projects-1235422782/
http://www.memeorandum.com/250907/p68#a250907p68

Doug Ford obcession with municipal traffic laws continue
https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/doug-ford-will-outlaw-municipal-speed-cameras-this-fall-sources/articl…

If the US designates domestic anti-fascist groups to be part of an international terrorist group (as the President stated yesterday), that may need to be incorporated into UK legislation for its ongoing intelligence co-operation?

EU privately warns Ukraine anti-graft agencies law is a setback for membership talks, media reports: https://benborges.xyz/2025/07/23/eu-privately-warns-ukraine-antigraft.html

Democracy-in-Silico: Institutional Design as Alignment in AI-Governed Polities
Trisanth Srinivasan, Santosh Patapati
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.19562 https://

Democracy-in-Silico: Institutional Design as Alignment in AI-Governed Polities
This paper introduces Democracy-in-Silico, an agent-based simulation where societies of advanced AI agents, imbued with complex psychological personas, govern themselves under different institutional frameworks. We explore what it means to be human in an age of AI by tasking Large Language Models (LLMs) to embody agents with traumatic memories, hidden agendas, and psychological triggers. These agents engage in deliberation, legislation, and elections under various stressors, such as budget cris…

Rain, a stablecoin-backed Visa card issuer, raised a $58M Series B led by Sapphire Ventures, after raising a $24.5M Series A led by Norwest in March (Yueqi Yang/The Information)
https://www.theinformation.com/briefings/stablecoin-…

Stablecoin Card Startup Rain Raises $58 Million Led By Sapphire Ventures
Rain, a stablecoin-backed card issuer that works with Visa, said it raised $58 million in Series B round led by Sapphire Ventures, just months after its last fundraising round, demonstrating once again investor enthusiasm for crypto startups flowing from congressional passage of stablecoin legislation in July. With the deal, Rain’s valuation increased nearly six times from its $24.5 million

The Online Safety Act, which went into effect in the U.K. on July 25, requires any website that might have adult content to conduct age-verification checks.
According to the U.K.’s Office of Communications, or Ofcom,
users must provide proof of age
in the form of photo IDs, credit cards, photos for facial recognition software, and other so-called age gates,
or else be denied access.
Though often heralded by parents as a way to keep kids from accessing sexually…

‘Anonymity Online Is Going to Die’: What Age-Verification Laws Could Look Like in the U.S.
As controversy around the U.K.’s Online Safety Act continues, experts warn about similar legislation thriving in the U.S.

Republicans unveil 'Department of War' legislation (Elizabeth Crisp/The Hill)
https://thehill.com/policy/defense/5488531-congress-rebranding-defense-war/
http://www.memeorandum.com/250905/p87#a250905p87

AUTOPSY: A Framework for Tackling Privacy Challenges in the Automotive Industry
Sebastian Pape, Anis Bkakria, Maurice Heymann, Badreddine Chah, Abdeljalil Abbas-Turki, Sarah Syed-Winkler, Matthias Hiller, Reda Yaich
https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.16788

AUTOPSY: A Framework for Tackling Privacy Challenges in the Automotive Industry
With the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in place, all domains have to ensure compliance with privacy legislation. However, compliance does not necessarily result in a privacy-friendly system as for example getting users' consent to process their data does not improve the privacy-friendliness of the system. Therefore, the goal of the AUTOPSY project was to support the privacy engineering process in the automotive domain by providing several building blocks which technically improve th…

Last month, Republicans passed a reconciliation bill that is expected to kick millions of Americans off of Medicaid and other forms of health insurance.
The legislation includes over $800 million in cuts to Medicaid spending over the next 10 years,
the largest in the program’s history.
Now, as Republicans gear up for next year’s midterm elections,
vulnerable lawmakers who supported the so-called “Big Beautiful Bill”
are attempting to recast themselves as prote…

Vulnerable Republicans Are Claiming They Love Medicaid After Voting to Gut It
Reps. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Tom Kean Jr., and Gabe Evans introduced a resolution supporting Medicaid after voting for cuts to the program. 

UK legislation to allow foreign states to own up to 15% in British newspapers passes, clearing the way for the Telegraph's sale to a RedBird Capital-led group (Mark Sweney/The Guardian)
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/jul

'Veto the law!' — Protests held across Ukraine after parliament passes bill weakening anti-corruption institutions: https://benborges.xyz/2025/07/22/veto-the-law-protests-held.html

The House passed its $892.6 billion defense policy bill Wednesday,
despite vocal criticism from Democrats
after the Republican majority denied votes to limit the Trump administration’s use of the military domestically.

The bill advanced by a vote of 231 to 196, largely along party lines.

The House now will wait on the Senate to pass its version of the annual legislation before beginning the “conference” process,
in which negotiators from both chambers reconcile …

House passes $892.6 billion defense bill over Democrats’ protests
The vote, mostly along party lines, lost Democratic support as the GOP rebuffed efforts to rein in President Donald Trump’s domestic military agenda.

Cyber information-sharing law and state grants set to go dark as Congress stalls over funding https://therecord.media/cisa-2015-state-cyber-grants-lapse-congress-government-shutdown

Ofcom says public service TV is becoming an "endangered species" after finding that streamers offered by PSBs only account for 9% of all viewing in the UK (Mark Sweney/The Guardian)
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/jul/21/uk-public-servi…

The administration is putting up signs that say,
"President Donald J. Trump"
and
"Rebuilding America's Infrastructure"
at worksites funded by Biden's 2021 infrastructure bill
-- and for projects Trump opposed
https://www.

Trump Is Taking Credit for Infrastructure Projects Funded by Biden Legislation He Opposed
Donald Trump is taking credit for infrastructure projects funded by a bill former president Joe Biden signed into law, which Trump opposed.

Texas Democrats had been out of state for less than 48 hours when Gov. Greg Abbott moved to have their seats declared vacant.
The emergency legal filing represents an unprecedented escalation of Abbott’s effort to pass a new congressional map that adds additional GOP seats -- as demanded by Donald Trump.
It flies in the face of Texas’ own founding documents,
centuries of legal precedent
and a recent Supreme Court of Texas ruling, legal experts say.
Even Attorney G…

Abbott’s bid to expel the House Democratic leader goes to a court filled with his appointees
The Texas Supreme Court said in 2021 the Constitution allows members to thwart legislation by leaving the state. Abbott wants them to reconsider.

The overtures to "accountability" in national security legislation are never expected to actually do anything, since there's often no (legal) mechanism to establish standing.
https://mastodon.xyz/@privacyint/114926117300945444

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin),
👉one of the richest people in the Senate,
said on Wednesday that Congress shouldn’t be banned from trading stocks
-- because the basic anti-corruption rule would make it
“unattractive” to run for office.
During debate on a congressional stock ban introduced by Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Missouri) on Wednesday,
Johnson said that he was concerned about “unintended consequences” stemming from the legislation.
He called the bill…

Ron Johnson, Worth $40M, Says Stock Trading Ban Would Make It “Unattractive” to Be in Congress
Sen. Ron Johnson is one of the richest members of Congress, with a net worth of tens of millions of dollars.

Like all the rest of the lawless authoritarianism,
this Article III constitutional crisis is really an Article I crisis.
Congress could end it all at literally any time,
through normal legislation.
Doing that must be item #1
https://skywriter.blue/pages/did:plc:q…

This week, a group of senators
— three Democrats and one independent
— introduced legislation that aims to reform the redistricting process
and eliminate gerrymandering in every state in the country.
The proposed bill would forbid redrawing maps between census cycles,
which is currently being performed by several Republican-led states seeking to subvert the will of voters in order to ensure a GOP-majority Congress in the second half of President Donald Trump’s t…

Democrats Submit Bill Aimed at Limiting GOP’s Mid-Census Gerrymandering Scheme
Several GOP-led states are hoping to mitigate midterm losses by redistricting their maps before the next census.

Decentralized social network Mastodon says it can’t comply with Mississippi’s age verification law
— the same law that saw rival Bluesky pull out of the state
— because it doesn’t have the means to do so.
The social nonprofit explains that Mastodon doesn’t track its users,
which makes it difficult to enforce such legislation.
Nor does it want to use IP address-based blocks, as those would unfairly impact people who were traveling, it says.
The statement …

Mastodon says it doesn't 'have the means' to comply with age verification laws | TechCrunch
Decentralized social network Mastodon says it cannot comply with age verification laws, like in Mississippi and elsewhere, and says it's up to individual server owners to decide.

"In Ohio, oil and gas industry is steering new carbon capture bill"
#US #USA #America #FossilFuels

In Ohio, oil and gas industry is steering new carbon capture bill
Newly obtained public records show that the industry has worked hard to ensure the legislation prioritizes their interests over climate change concerns.

The irony of Trump’s signature tax legislation:
Many of its biggest beneficiaries fiercely oppose the president
— and oppose policies he is pushing that will make them richer.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/07/25/trump-tax-law-rich-li…

They’re rich. They’re anti-Trump. And they don’t want their big tax cut.
Many of the biggest beneficiaries of the GOP tax law say they are getting millions of dollars they don’t want or need.

Constituents in Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District showered Representative Ashley Hinson with
boos and jeers for supporting Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful” bill.
The Republican lawmaker was excoriated during a town hall Wednesday in Worth County,
where Iowans urged Hinson to
“stop lying” after she baselessly claimed that the president’s key legislation had ushered in “higher wages” and an improved cost of living.
“Higher wages?” shouted one woman incredulously. “F…

“Stop Lying”: Voters Erupt at GOP Lawmaker’s Shocking Claim on Economy
Iowa State Representative Ashley Hinson’s comments were met with boos and jeers.

For the first time in the history of the United States,
asylum seekers will have to pay to file an asylum application.
The so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” or OBBA, mandates new minimum fees for immigration and visa applications.
The legislation authorizes the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Attorney General to raise fees above the minimum,
and all fees are subject to an annual inflation adjustment starting in fiscal year 2026.

Asylum Seekers Now Have to Pay to File Immigration Claims
The so-called “Big Beautiful Bill” imposes unprecedented fees on asylum seekers.

Shteyngart’s novel, we come to realise, plays out a decade from now, in a “post-democracy” USA
where red state officials monitor menstrual cycles,
self-driving cars shop their owners to the feds
and the news platforms are abuzz with Russian disinformation.
Desperate to redeem herself at school, Vera prepares to debate in support of the proposed “Five-Three Amendment”,
a piece of racist legislation that would grant added voting weight to those “exceptional Amer…

"Crackdown on 'forever chemicals' expands ahead of EU rules overhaul"
#EU #EuropeanUnion #PFAS #ForeverChemicals

Crackdown on 'forever chemicals' expands ahead of EU rules overhaul
As the EU prepares a broader reform of its chemical legislation, the European Chemicals Agency has updated its proposal to restrict “forever chemicals,” adding new sectors to the scope of its planned ban.