DHS Releases End of Year Fiscal Year 2016 Statistics

"Today the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released its end of Fiscal Year (FY) 2016 statistics.  These statistics reflect the Department’s immigration enforcement efforts prioritizing convicted criminals and threats to public safety, border security and national security.

Overall, in FY 2016, the Department apprehended 530,250 individuals nationwide and conducted a total of 450,954 removals and returns. The U.S. Border Patrol (USBP) reported 415,816 apprehensions nationwide, compared to 337,117 in FY 2015; and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested 114, 434 individuals, compared to 125,211 in FY 2015. Although apprehensions by the USBP in FY 2016 increased from FY 2015, they remain a fraction of the number of apprehensions routinely observed from the 1980s through 2008.  In addition, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Office of Field Operations (OFO) identified 274,821 inadmissible individuals at ports of entry, compared to 253,509 in FY 2015. ICE removed or returned 240,255 individuals in FY 2016, compared to 235,413 in FY 2015..."
Homeland Security statistics

U.S. and World Population Clock

Use the U.S. and World population clocks to find update to date data on populations in the United States and the world as a whole.
Population clocks

Guide to Law Online

"The Guide to Law Online, prepared by the Law Library of Congress Public Services Division, is an annotated guide to sources of information on government and law available online. It includes selected links to useful and reliable sites for legal information..."
Online law resource

Intel Committee Releases Declassified Snowden Report

"The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence today released a declassified version of its investigative report on Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who fled to China and then Russia after stealing an estimated 1.5 million classified documents. The report, including redactions for classified information, was the result of a two-year inquiry into Snowden’s background, likely motivations, and methods of theft, as well as the damage done to U.S. national security as a result of his actions. The report was completed in September 2016 and submitted to the Intelligence Community for a declassification review.

Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes said, “I’m gratified that, with the completion of the declassification review, the American people can now get a fuller account of Edward Snowden’s crimes and the reckless disregard he has shown for U.S. national security, including the safety of American servicemen and women. It will take a long time to mitigate the damage he caused, and I look forward to the day when he returns to the United States to face justice.”   

Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Adam Schiff said, “Snowden and his defenders claim that he is a whistleblower, but he isn't, as the Committee's review shows.  Most of the material he stole had nothing to do with Americans’ privacy, and its compromise has been of great value to America's adversaries and those who mean to do America harm. Whistleblowers are important to proper oversight and we will protect them from retaliation, and those who engage in civil disobedience are willing to stay and face the consequences.”..."
Snowden report

Restrictions on Lobbying the Government: Current Policy and Proposed Changes

"During the 2016 presidential campaign, President-elect Donald Trump proposed a series of ethics measures, including several lobbying-related provisions. They are:

 extending "cooling off" periods on lobbying the government for five years after government   service;
 "instituting a five-year ban on lobbying by former Members of Congress and their staffs";

 expanding the definition of a lobbyist to cover former government officials who engage in strategic consulting;

and issuing a "lifetime ban against senior executive branch officials lobbying on behalf of a foreign government."

President-elect Trump's ethics plan shares some features with past efforts to restrict Administration officials' future lobbying activities (the "revolving door") by adjusting "cooling off" periods—a period of time a former government official is restricted from contacting their former employer on particular matters they might have worked on in government. These previous efforts include a 1993 executive order issued by President Bill Clinton (E.O. 12834) and a 2009 executive order issued by President Barack Obama (E.O. 13490), and the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act (HLOGA) of 2007. The executive orders supplemented existing statutory revolving door and "cooling off" period requirements..."
Lobbying

Burden of TB in the United States

"Although tuberculosis (TB) is preventable and curable, many people in the United States still suffer from this disease. Persons with TB disease can be found in every state; in rural areas and cities; and in schools, workplaces, and many other places where people are in close contact. TB bacteria usually attack the lungs, but can also attack any part of the body such as the kidney, spine, and brain. Not everyone infected with TB bacteria becomes sick. As a result, two TB-related conditions exist: latent TB infection and TB disease. If not diagnosed and treated properly, TB disease can be fatal. One of CDC’s roles in addressing TB in the United States is to collect surveillance data and use that data to influence strategies to eliminate TB.."
Tuberculosis

National Marine Sanctuaries – Value Added for Communities and the Blue Economy

"If you were asked to draw a picture of the U.S. economy, what color would you use? Perhaps green, the color of money? How about the portion of the economy that is supported by our ocean and coasts? BLUE! 

Now think about what it feels like to be surrounded by blue seas – perhaps while casting out a line and peacefully waiting to feel the tug of a fish. Do you see that huge ocean liner on the horizon? Ever wonder which U.S. port it’s headed for? That ship, your boat, the fuel you used to get out there, the fishing rod in your hands – it’s all part of the “blue” or ocean economy. Including industries like maritime commerce, offshore mineral extraction, fishing, and coastal tourism, this ocean economy amounts to hundreds of billions of dollars in goods and services, and it supports millions of jobs each year..."
National marine sanctuaries

Precision Medicine: What Does it Mean for Your Health?

"Precision medicine, sometimes called personalized medicine, is an approach for protecting health and treating disease that takes into account a person’s genes, behaviors, and environment. Interventions are tailored to individuals or groups, rather than using a one-size-fits-all approach in which everyone receives the same care. But what does this mean and how can precision medicine protect your health?

You might have heard the term "precision medicine" and wondered how it relates to you. Precision medicine is about finding your unique disease risks and treatments that will work best for you. Here are some ways that a precision medicine approach can protect your health:

• Using Family Health History: If you have a family health history of certain diseases, you are more likely to get that disease than someone without that family history. Knowing about your family health history can help you and your doctor take steps to prevent disease or find it early. In some cases, your doctor might recommend genetic counseling to help you decide whether to have genetic testing for a disease that runs in your family..."
  Precision medicine

NOAA's 2016 Arctic Report Card: Visual highlights

"Now in its 11^th year, the Arctic Report Card, released today at the annual American Geophysical Union fall meeting in San Francisco, is a peer-reviewed report that brings together the work of 61 scientists from 11 nations who report on air, ocean, land and ecosystem changes. It is a key tool used around the world to track changes in the Arctic and how those changes may affect communities, businesses and people. Below are a collection of maps and other images highlighting some of this year's key findings..."
Arctic Region

Jobseeker or Worker

Looking for a job? Take a look at these resources from the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Job search tools

Consumption of Combustible and Smokeless Tobacco — United States, 2000–2015

"Combustible and smokeless tobacco use causes adverse health outcomes, including cardiovascular disease and multiple types of cancer (1,2). Standard approaches for measuring tobacco use include self-reported surveys of use and consumption estimates based on tobacco excise tax data (3,4). To provide the most recently available tobacco consumption estimates in the United States, CDC used federal excise tax data to estimate total and per capita consumption during 2000–2015 for combustible tobacco (cigarettes, roll-your-own tobacco, pipe tobacco, small cigars, and large cigars) and smokeless tobacco (chewing tobacco and dry snuff). During this period, total combustible tobacco consumption decreased 33.5%, or 43.7% per capita. Although total cigarette consumption decreased 38.7%, cigarettes remained the most commonly used combustible tobacco product. Total noncigarette combustible tobacco (i.e., cigars, roll-your-own, and pipe tobacco) consumption increased 117.1%, or 83.8% per capita during 2000–2015. Total consumption of smokeless tobacco increased 23.1%, or 4.2% per capita. Notably, total cigarette consumption was 267.0 billion cigarettes in 2015 compared with 262.7 billion in 2014. These findings indicate that although cigarette smoking declined overall during 2000–2015, and each year from 2000 to 2014, the number of cigarettes consumed in 2015 was higher than in 2014, and the first time annual cigarette consumption was higher than the previous year since 1973. Moreover, the consumption of other combustible and smokeless tobacco products remains substantial. Implementation of proven tobacco prevention interventions (5) is warranted to further reduce tobacco use in the United States..."Tobacco consumption

Census Bureau Releases 2015 Income and Poverty Estimates for All Counties

"Today, the U.S. Census Bureau released the latest findings from its Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates program. The program provides the only up-to-date, single-year income and poverty statistics for all counties and school districts — roughly 3,140 counties and over 13,000 school districts nationally.

The tables provide statistics on the number of people in poverty, the number of children younger than age 5 in poverty (for states only), the number of children ages 5 to 17 in families in poverty, the number of children younger than age 18 in poverty, and median household income. At the school district level, estimates are available for the total population, the number of children ages 5 to 17 and the number of children ages 5 to 17 in families in poverty.

These findings are a combination of the latest data from the American Community Survey with aggregate data from federal tax records, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Bureau of Economic Analysis, Supplemental Security Income, decennial censuses and the Population Estimates Program..."Income and poverty

2017 Economic Report of the President

"As the 2017 Economic Report of the President goes to press, the United States is eight years removed from the onset of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Over the two terms of the Obama Administration, the U.S. economy has made a remarkable recovery from the Great Recession. After peaking at 10.0 percent in October 2009, the unemployment rate has been cut by more than half to 4.6 percent as of November 2016, below its pre-recession average. Real gross domestic product (GDP) per capita recovered fully to its pre-crisis peak in the fourth quarter of 2013, faster than what would have been expected after such a severe financial crisis based on historical precedents. As of the third quarter of 2016, the U.S. economy was 11.5 percent larger than at its peak before the crisis. As of November 2016, the economy has added 14.8 million jobs over 74 months, the longest streak of total job growth on record. Since private-sector job growth turned positive in March 2010, U.S. businesses have added 15.6 million jobs. Real wage growth has been faster in the current business cycle than in any since the early 1970s. Meanwhile, from 2014 to 2015, median real household income grew by 5.2 percent, the fastest annual growth on record, and the United States saw its largest one-year drop in the poverty rate since the 1960s..."

Economic Report of the President

How Carbon Dioxide is Affecting Marine Life and Our Oceans

"Carbon dioxide isn’t just causing shifts in our earth’s climate. About one fourth of the carbon dioxide (CO2) released into the air from the burning of fossil fuels to power our homes and cars ultimately ends up in the ocean, causing a change called ocean acidification. U.S. West Coast shellfish growers have already felt the impacts, and those in other regions recognize that change is in motion and want to understand potential impacts and how best to adapt.

Seawater rich in CO2 is deplete of a key building block shellfish like oysters, clams and mussels need to grow and maintain shells. These shellfish are particularly vulnerable when they are very young and just forming their shells. This higher-CO2, more-acidic water can lead to increased mortality among these young shellfish. NOAA and partners are working with shellfish growers around our nation to provide the tools that are needed to rise to this challenge..."Carbon dioxide and marine life

Drinking Water Contamination in Flint, Michigan, Demonstrates a Need to Clarify EPA Authority to Issue Emergency Orders to Protect the Public

"This report is an EPA OIG Management Alert. To avoid future public health harm through drinking water contamination, the EPA needs to clarify for its employees how its emergency authority can and should be used to intervene in a public health threat.

Report Materials

Report at a Glance (PDF)(1 pg, 180 K)

• Full Report (PDF)(16 pp, 938 k)..."
• Flint Michigan drinking  and EPA

Hydraulic Fracturing for Oil and Gas: Impacts from the Hydraulic Fracturing Water Cycle on Drinking Water Resources in the United States

"This final report provides a review and synthesis of available scientific information concerning the relationship between hydraulic fracturing activities and drinking water resources in the United States.

The report is organized around activities in the hydraulic fracturing water cycle and their potential to impact drinking water resources.  The stages include: (1) acquiring water to be used for hydraulic fracturing (Water Acquisition), (2) mixing the water with chemical additives to prepare hydraulic fracturing fluids (Chemical Mixing), (3) injecting the hydraulic fracturing fluids into the production well to create fractures in the targeted production zone (Well Injection), (4) collecting the wastewater that returns through the well after injection (Produced Water Handling), and (5) managing the wastewater via disposal or reuse methods (Wastewater Disposal and Reuse)..."

Hydraulic fracking

Gun Control: FY2017 Appropriations for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and Other Initiatives

"The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) is the lead federal agency charged with administering and enforcing federal laws related to firearms and explosives commerce. ATF is also responsible for investigating arson cases with a federal nexus, and criminal cases involving the diversion of alcohol and tobacco from legal channels of commerce. As an agency within the Department of Justice (DOJ), ATF is funded through an annual appropriation in the Departments of Commerce and Justice, Science, and Related Agencies (CJS) Appropriations Act.

The Administration’s FY2017 budget request included $1.306 billion for ATF. This amount was $66.1 million above the FY2016 appropriation. This proposed increase included $11.8 million in technical and base adjustments to anticipate inflation and other variable costs and $54.3 million in budget enhancements..."
Gun control appropiations

EEOC Issues Publication on the Rights of Job Applicants and Employees With Mental Health Conditions

"The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) today issued a resource document that explains workplace rights for individuals with mental health conditions under the Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA).

Depression, PTSD, & Other Mental Health Conditions in the Workplace: Your Legal Rights explains that job applicants and employees with mental health conditions are protected from employment discrimination and harassment based on their conditions. They may also have a right to reasonable accommodations at work. Reasonable accommodations are work adjustments that can help individuals to perform their jobs and remain employed. The resource document also answers questions about how to get an accommodation, some types of accommodations, restrictions on employer access to medical information, confidentiality, and the role of the EEOC in enforcing the rights of people with disabilities.

EEOC charge data shows that charges of discrimination based on mental health conditions are on the rise. During fiscal year 2016, preliminary data shows EEOC resolved almost 5,000 charges of discrimination based on mental health conditions, obtaining approximately $20 million for individuals with mental health conditions who were unlawfully denied employment and reasonable accommodations..."

Job rights and mental health

Options for Reducing the Deficit: 2017 to 2026

"The Congress faces an array of policy choices as it confronts the challenges posed by the amount of federal debt held by the public—which has more than doubled relative to the size of the economy since 2007—and the prospect of continued growth in that debt over the coming decades if the large annual budget deficits projected under current law come to pass (see Figure 1-1). To help inform lawmakers, the Congressional Budget Office periodically issues a compendium of policy options that would help to reduce the deficit.1 This edition reports the estimated budgetary effects of various options and highlights some of the advantages and disadvantages of those options.

This volume presents 115 options that would decrease federal spending or increase federal revenues over the next decade (see Table 1-1 on page 6)..."
Federal deficit

Studying Birds as Indicators of Ecosystem Health

"How can you tell where a tiny forage fish like the sand lance spends its days? Look at what’s eating it.

Popular recreational and commercial fishing species such as Atlantic cod, halibut, flounder and monkfish rely on sand lance as a staple of their diets. These forage fish are also on the menus for predators like humpback whales and many kinds of seabirds, including the great shearwater. However, sand lance are moderately vulnerable to changes in ocean and climate patterns, especially warming seas and ocean acidification. "The numbers of these forage fish (sand lance) fluctuate and have been relatively low in the past few years," explains David Wiley, research coordinator for Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary. Over the past several years, sanctuary scientists have been studying great shearwater populations to better understand the availability of food like the sand lance throughout the sanctuary..."
Birds and ecosystem health

FDR's December 8, 1841 Annotated Draft of "Day of Infamy" Speech

Here you may read an annotated copy of President Theodore Roosevelt's  "Day of Infamy" speech. The speech was delivered to a joint session of Congres on December 8, 1941  leading to a declaration of war against Japan.
Day of Infamy

The Electoral College Has Been Divisive Since Day One

"The Electoral College polarized Americans from its inception. Created by the framers of the Constitution during the 1787 Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, the College was put forth as a way to give citizens the opportunity to vote in presidential elections, with the added safeguard of a group of knowledgeable electors with final say on who would ultimately lead the country, another limit on the burgeoning nation’s democratic ideals.

The story of the Electoral College is also one of slavery—an institution central to the founding of American democracy. The bulk of the new nation’s citizenry resided in cities like Philadelphia and Boston in the North, leaving the South sparsely populated by farmers, plantation owners, other landholders, and, of course, enslaved laborers. This disparity in the population distribution became a core element of the legislative branch, and in turn, the Electoral College..."
Electoral College

Travel to Hot Climates

"Planning your next trip to a tropical climate like in the Caribbean? Pack your swimsuit and sunscreen, and follow these tips to prevent heat illness and injury when traveling in a hot climate.

It's winter time across the United States, and many travelers are looking to vacation in tropical areas to escape the cold temperatures at home. But traveling in hot climates can make you sick, especially if you are not accustomed to the heat. For most travelers who choose to relax on the beach or by the pool, heat illness and injury pose only a slight risk. However, people at highest risk are the elderly, young children, and people with chronic illnesses such as heart disease and diabetes. But even young and healthy people can get sick from heat if they participate in strenuous physical activities during hot weather. Dehydration, for example, makes people most susceptible to heat illness..."
Hot climates

Homes on the Range: Homeownership Rates Are Higher in Rural America

"For decades, homeownership rates have been an important indicator of the health of housing markets all across the United States. Communities use these data to recognize the changing landscape of their housing markets by analyzing patterns in the percentage of owner-occupied housing units compared  to all occupied units. Homebuilders, financial institutions and realtors all depend on homeownership data to determine what type of housing to build, finance and sell to prospective homebuyers. While last decade’s housing crash and Great Recession altered the economy and conditions of housing markets throughout the nation, studies have shown that most Americans continue to believe homeownership is both desirable and attainable..."
Rural homeownership

The Terrorist Screening Database and Preventing Terrorist Travel

"After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the federal government developed a unified regimen to identify and list known or suspected terrorists. The regimen has received repeated congressional attention, and this report briefly discusses for congressional policymakers how the U.S. government fashions and uses the Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB) to achieve such an end. It also discusses how the federal government engages in two travel-related screening processes—visa screening and air passenger screening. Both processes involve subsets of the Terrorist Screening Database..."
Terrorist database

Preventing sexual violence

"Prevent sexual violence on college campuses.

Preventing sexual violence (SV) of all types requires a shift in culture and climate. Primary prevention—preventing violence before it occurs—is difficult work and change takes time. Culture change doesn't happen overnight, but it does happen. To address this problem, the White House established the Task Force to Protect Students From Sexual Assault in 2014. The task force had a mandate to strengthen federal enforcement efforts and to provide schools with additional tools to help prevent SV on their campuses..."
Preventing sexual violence

Wash your hands

"Handwashing is one of the best ways to protect yourself and your family from getting sick.

Handwashing is easy to do and it's one of the most effective ways to prevent the spread of many types of infection and illness in all settings—from your home and workplace to child care facilities and hospitals. Clean hands can stop germs from spreading from one person to another and throughout an entire community..."
Handwashing