Pelosi backtracks on her minimum wage hypocrisy, while Rep. Frank freaks out

On Friday, I blogged about a Washington Times story that talked about how Rep. Pelosi was showing favoritism to a company in her San Francisco district by not including that company – along with all other American Samoa companies – from the new federal requirement she wants to put in place to raise the minimum wage. The WashTimes reports in a followup story that Pelosi is reversing course:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi yesterday said Democrats will close a loophole in the House-passed minimum wage increase that exempts American Samoa — an action taken after it was revealed that one of the U.S. territory’s main employers is based in her congressional district.

“I have asked the Education and Labor Committee as they go forward with the legislation to make sure that all of the territories have to comply with U.S. law on the minimum wage,” Mrs. Pelosi said.

Related to this, Ian at Hot Air has video of Rep. Barney Frank erupting over the controversy over this issue. Ian sets the stage:

The Republican arguing with power-hungry Barney Frank is Patrick McHenry. McHenry rose to offer an amendment that would exempt American Samoa from the stem-cell bill β€” a clear dig at the fact that Samoa, which is home to StarKist factories that employ nearly 75% of the island’s work force, was conspicuously exempt from the minimum-wage bill that had passed the day before.

Here’s the video:

The Boston Globe writes a glowing review of Frank’s actions here.

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