Trump signs repeal of regulation on energy company payments to foreign governments News
Trump signs repeal of regulation on energy company payments to foreign governments

US President Donald Trump signed legislation [HJR 41, PDF] on Tuesday that repeals a regulation requiring energy companies to disclose their payments to foreign governments. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) rule [text, PDF], enacted under the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law, mandated that US energy companies disclose royalties or other payments made to governments to combat corruption involved in resource-rich countries. Trump stated [press release] that this repeal will be instrumental in economic and job recovery. Supporters of the legislation claim the SEC rule imposed unnecessary costs to US energy companies, leaving them at a huge disadvantage with competing foreign companies. According to Sen. Sherrod Brown [official profile], an opponent of the legislation, the regulation created transparency [press release] that protected US citizens and investors. Press Secretary Sean Spicer [official profile] said [press briefing] HJR 41 is a step towards fixing the broken regulatory system, thus improving American productivity.

Since Trump’s inauguration, his administration has been working to repeal numerous Obama administration rules. Earlier this month a resolution was passed to repeal [JURIST report] a rule that required coal miners to clean up the waste from mountaintop removal mining and prevent waste from passing into local waterways. Also this month Trump issued [JURIST report] an executive order and a presidential memorandum [texts] with orders aimed at an incremental dismantling of the Obama administration’s financial regulations. In late January Trump signed presidential memoranda [JURIST report] to progress construction of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipeline [memoranda]. Also in January Trump reinstated a policy [JURIST report] that prevents foreign non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from receiving US funding if they provide abortions or promote policies that may lead to abortions.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, murdered by Henry II's knights

On December 29, 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral by knights acting in the name of Henry II.

Becket and Henry had been entangled in a power struggle over, among other things, criminal jurisdiction over clergy. Read a contemporary account of the murder of Thomas Becket.

Texas attains US statehood

On December 29, 1845, Texas became the twenty-eighth state to join the United States of America when US President James K. Polk signed the Ordinance of Annexation. Texas had a complicated path to statehood because it had formerly been part of Mexico and then an independent republic. The US Congress passed the Annexation of the Republic of Texas Joint Resolution on March 1, 1845. Voters in Texas then approved the Ordinance of Annexation in October, before it was approved by the US Congress and signed into law by President Polk on this day in 1845. The US Supreme Court later ruled in Texas v. White that, despite its unique path to statehood, Texas did not have the right to secede from the union.