REALTORS ON THE BRINK: Our Katy O’Donnell reports that “a wave of legal challenges to the lucrative commissions that real estate agents are paid is threatening to upend an industry that employs 1.6 million people and funds one of the most powerful lobbying operations in Washington.” — “Lawyers for the Justice Department and the National Association of Realtors faced off on Friday in federal court over the Biden administration’s probe into the way home buyers' agents are compensated, a system that critics say inflates the cost of housing and amounts to a monopoly. The Realtors are also being hit with private lawsuits from home sellers around the country and have already lost one major case that could cost them up to $5.4 billion.” — “The Justice Department probe is part of a broader Biden administration effort to aggressively enforce antitrust law while lowering fees for consumers. But that investigation and the onslaught of lawsuits against a system that has prevailed for decades come at a time when the housing industry is already undergoing a severe test, battered by high interest rates that have sent home sales plunging and the cost of construction skyrocketing.” — “Yet despite the high stakes — and the political salience of a female-dominated industry at the heart of the middle class — NAR’s formidable lobbying operation has found its hands are tied on one of the biggest issues its members have confronted in the group’s 115-year history.” RESTAURANTS WHIP VOTES TO BLOCK JOINT EMPLOYER RULE: The National Restaurant Association and nearly every state restaurant association brought a fresh wave of pressure on lawmakers to overturn the Biden administration’s new joint employer rule via the Congressional Review Act. — In a letter to the Hill on Thursday, the restaurant associations complained that the new joint employer rule released last month, which could make it easier for companies to face liability for labor law violations involving franchisees or contractors, would have implications that “are profound and far-reaching for the restaurant industry.” — “This change is not merely administrative; it redefines what it means to be an employer in our industry. Under this rule, the expanded criteria for joint employer status could result in numerous restaurant operators being inadvertently caught in complex legal and regulatory networks, particularly those in franchisor-franchisee relationships or those utilizing third-party vendors,” the groups wrote, warning that it “could limit entrepreneurship and dampen the dynamism essential for restaurants' continued success and resilience in communities in every state.” — The National Restaurant Association is at the forefront of the business community’s aggressive opposition push to block the new rule from going into effect. Its legal arm was part of the industry coalition that filed the first legal challenge to the rule last month, and signed on to a letter with more than sixty other trade associations urging Congress to roll back the rule. HOUSE GOP WANTS TO TALK TO BLUE STAR: “House Republicans want to interview a pair of executives at Blue Star Strategies, a firm that once came under investigation for failing to disclose to the U.S. government that it lobbied on behalf of a Ukrainian energy company while Hunter Biden served on the company's board,” The Washington Examiner’s Ashley Oliver reports. — House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) cited their impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden in letters Wednesday to the firm’s co-founders Karen Tramontano and Sally Painter, asking them to schedule closed-door interviews with Jordan’s panel to discuss the work they did for Burisma — which Hunter Biden reportedly helped broker. — “Tramontano and Painter retroactively registered as foreign agents with the Department of Justice in May 2022, citing their work roughly six years earlier for Burisma on their forms, which are public information.” — Jordan and Comer “observed that the two lobbyists' registrations came only after the Department of Justice opened an investigation in 2021 into whether they violated the Foreign Agents Registration Act because of their Burisma work,” and pointed to an IRS whistleblower’s allegation that prosecutors investigating Hunter Biden shut down blocked the agency from subpoenaing Blue Star. — “‘We believe that you possess specialized information that will meaningfully advance the impeachment inquiry,’ they wrote. ‘Additionally, we believe that you possess relevant information that would assist the Committees in crafting potential legislation, including legislative reforms to FARA.’” MORE ADVOCACY WORLD LAYOFFS: “The liberal activist organization MoveOn laid off at least 18 employees this week, in the latest sign of a slowdown in donations from small donors to left-leaning causes and candidates,” per The New York Times’ Reid Epstein. — “‘We are retooling our team to meet the urgent needs of this moment and to have the resources necessary to do so,’ Rahna Epting, MoveOn’s executive director, said. ‘I extend my sincere gratitude to our departing colleagues and for the incredible contributions they’ve made to the MoveOn community.’” — “The job cuts are part of a broader restructuring before the 2024 election cycle that the group announced in June, according to a MoveOn employee who insisted on anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly. The staff members who lost their jobs were told this week that they would be leaving the organization, the employee said.” — “The MoveOn employee said that the group would be adding up to 18 new positions, but that it was cutting more positions than it would add. The staff members who were laid off have been invited to apply for the new roles, many of which will have lower pay than the posts eliminated this week, according to the employee, who said the group expected to have roughly 80 to 90 staff members overall in 2024.” SPOTTED at BGR Group’s holiday party last night at the International Spy Museum, per a tipster: Steve Benjamin of the White House, Reps. Andy Barr (R-Ky.), Mark Green (R-Tenn.), Tom Tiffany (R-Wis.), Scott Fitzgerald (R-Wis.), Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.), Jerry Carl (R-Ala.), Glen Grothman (R-Wis.), Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas), Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.), Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.), Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), Bryan Steil (R-Wis.), Daniel Meuser (R-Pa.), Laurel Lee (R-La.), Julia Letlow (R-La.), Ron Estes (R-Kan.), Rob Menendez (D-N.J.), Val Hoyle (D-Ore.), Lloyd Smucker (R-Pa.), Vern Buchanan (R-Fla.), Byron Donalds (R-Fla.), Randy Feenstra (R-Iowa), Rudy Yakym (R-Ind.), John James (R-Mich.), John Joyce (R-Pa.), Eric Burlison (R-Wis.), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), David Valadao (R-Calif.), Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), Beth Van Duyne (R-Texas), Daniel Meuser (R-Pa.), Lori Chaves DeRemer (R-Ore.), Randy Feenstra (R-Iowa), Andrew Garbarino (R-N.Y.), Trent Kelly (R-Mich.), Kevin Hern (R-Okla.), Drew Ferguson (R-Ga.), Steve Womack (R-Ark.) and Nikema Williams (D-Ga.). — And at the Blockchain Association's holiday party at Pearl Street Warehouse, per a tipster: Kristin Smith, Dave Grimaldi and Ron Hammond of the Blockchain Association; Marta Belcher of Filecoin Foundation; Kara Calvert of Coinbase; Lon Goldstein of Goldstein Policy Solutions; Bill Hughes of Consensys; Mark Murphy of Digital Currency Group; Georgia Quinn of Anchorage Digital; Marco Santori of Kraken; Jason Somensatto of Chainalysis; and Bart Stephens and Joshua Rivera of Blockchain Capital.
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