A new bill in Congress would mute the Department of Labor’s proposed overtime rule changes

“Uh, dude. It’s ‘moot,’ not ‘mute.’ You did go to law school, right?”

Either way, on Tuesday, both the House and Senate put forth versions of the same bill called the Restoring Overtime Pay Act. Here is the House version, and here is the Senate version.

And here is a press release from Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH), from which I plan to quote liberally to tell you what the Restoring Overtime Pay Act is all about:

U.S. Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) and Patty Murray (D-WA), ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, and U.S. Representatives Bobby Scott (D-VA) and Mark Takano (D-CA) today reintroduced legislation to make millions of American workers newly eligible for overtime pay when they work more than 40 hours a week, providing economic security to millions of working families. Their Restoring Overtime Pay Act would increase the overtime salary level from $23,660 per year to roughly $51,000 per year, making roughly 4.6 million workers newly eligible for overtime pay. 

This bill codifies the Obama Administration’s 2016 overtime rule, which would have strengthened overtime protections for millions of workers. However, a November 2016 ruling out of a federal district court in Texas prevented the rule from being implemented. 

Brown, Murray, Scott and Takano first introduced this bill last Congress. 

In March, the U.S. Department of Labor indicated that it would raise the overtime salary level to $679 per week (equivalent to $35,308 per year). Senators Brown and Murray made it clear back then that they would not approve of the smaller salary-level hike. Since then, a bunch of state attorney generals has threatened to sue to block the DOL’s proposed rule change.

But, will this most recent piece of legislation move the needle?

No, this legislation will probably not become a statue with a Republican-controlled Senate and President Trump presumably backing the DOL rather than partisan legislation that comes out of the House.

“It not a statue, Eric. It’s not a sculpture. It’s a statute.”