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WASHINGTON—U.S. Rep Mark Pocan (WI-02), an owner of a union small business and proponent of labor rights, today strongly criticized legislation that would effectively shut down the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and deny legal recourses for workers across the country. The ironically titled “Preventing Greater Uncertainty in Labor-Management Relations Act” would in fact promote more uncertainty for both employees and employers by preventing the NLRB from issuing any new decisions or enforcing existing decisions.
WASHINGTON—U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (WI-02) today commented on the decision by the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) to withdraw its proposal to end Saturday delivery service. Pocan is a co-sponsor of The Postal Service Protection Act of 2013, which maintains the six-day delivery schedule and gives USPS the ability to make commonsense reforms so it can meet 21st century customer needs.
WASHINGTON—U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (WI-02), a member of the House Budget Committee, today expressed concern with the budget proposal released by President Obama. Pocan is disappointed with the decision to include a change in how benefits are calculated for Social Security recipients, also known as a chained CPI. According to the Social Security Administration, moving to a chained CPI formula would reduce an 85-year-old’s benefits by more than $1,100 a year.
WASHINGTON—U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (WI-02) today released the following statement in honor of Equal Pay Day, which marks the day in 2013 when women’s wages finally catch up to what men were paid in 2012.
In the second district, women make only 81 cents for every dollar earned by men. Across all of Wisconsin, women make 78 cents for every dollar earned by their male counterparts.
When people first enter politics, it can take a while before they settle down and reach across the aisle. That was certainly the case with Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.).
Elected to the Wisconsin State Assembly in 1998 to replace then-state Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Pocan quickly gained a reputation for being an outspoken progressive. It was a label he worked to earn.
Republicans plan to balance the budget “on the backs of the middle class,” said U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Madison, during a rally held at Blackhawk Technical College’s central campus.
The rally was sponsored by The National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare (NCPSSM) and Every Child Matters. Both are Washington, D.C.-based lobbying groups.
Washington’s Congressional Budget Office said three quarters of the federal deficit over the next year is caused by economic weakness, Pocan said.
MADISON, WI—U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (WI-02), a member of the House Budget Committee, today commented on the monthly jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. According to the report, the economy added 88,000 jobs in March and the unemployment rate fell to 7.6 percent.
University of Wisconsin-Madison faculty members expressed concern Wednesday to U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., that the sequester, a series of automatic federal spending cuts that recently took effect, could have a devastating impact on research programs.
UW-Madison President Kevin Reilly announced last month that the sequester could eliminate $35 million in funding from university research projects, but Pocan said he wanted to learn about the specific effects the spending cuts might have so he could share them with other members of Congress.
Rep. Mark Pocan’s office is just two blocks from the U.S. Supreme Court, where justices this week heard two separate cases involving same-sex marriage. But for the first-term Wisconsin lawmaker, the issue of marriage equality hits even closer than that.
Pocan is the only gay member of Congress who is married. (He wed Phillip Frank in Toronto in 2006, just weeks after Wisconsinites voted to ban same-sex marriage in the state constitution.) And he is one of just seven openly gay lawmakers on Capitol Hill, including his predecessor, now-Sen. Tammy Baldwin.
A freshman Congressman from Wisconsin reflects on his first few months in Washington. Prior to Mark Pocan being elected to Congress in November and his appointment to the House Budget committee, he served on the state Legislature’s budget panel including a stint as co-chairman.
Speaking to the Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce, he recalls his time in the Wisconsin Capitol: “We spent eight hours a day, three days a week for four months putting a budget together because every single line meant something; it’s a statement of your values. We just don’t do that in Washington.”