Senate slowly presses forward on bipartisan infrastructure bill
CBSN
Washington — The Senate is slowly inching closer to a final vote on the roughly $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, as debate on amendments to the proposal continues and Republicans urge their Democratic colleagues not to move too quickly.
The Senate has so far considered eight amendments to the plan, which provides $550 billion in new spending to revitalize the nation's physical infrastructure. The upper chamber is poised to consider another "substantial tranche" of amendments Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said, though an agreement on the total number of amendments to weigh has not yet been reached. "The Senate is moving full steam ahead on the bipartisan infrastructure bill," the New York Democrat said in remarks on the Senate floor, adding they're "making great progress on amendments, and we're going to make further progress very soon."President Joe Biden said France was America's "first friend" at its founding and is one of its closest allies more than two centuries later as he was honored with a state visit Saturday by French President Emmanuel Macron aimed at showing off their partnership on global security issues and easing past trade tensions.
The Consumer Federal Protection Bureau last week launched an inquiry into what the agency is calling "junk fees in mortgage closing costs." These additional fees, involving home appraisal, title insurance and other services, have spiked in recent years and can add thousands of dollars to the final cost of buying a home.
Retired Maj. Gen. William Anders, the former Apollo 8 astronaut who took the iconic "Earthrise" photo showing the planet as a shadowed blue marble from space in 1968, was killed Friday when the plane he was piloting alone plummeted into the waters off the San Juan Islands in Washington state. He was 90.