Advocacy

​The Big “I" today announced that Bill Hemmer, co-anchor of FOX News Channel's “America's Newsroom," will be a featured speaker at the annual Big “I" Virtual Legislative Conference.Hemmer will chat with Big “I" President & CEO Bob Rusbuldt on Friday, April 16, in the closing segment starting at 2 p.m. ET about small business news, the latest headlines and his perspectives from his anchor chair. Hemmer joined Fox News in 2005, and previously worked at CNN. As one of the network's top breaking news anchors, Hemmer has provided extensive live coverage of every election cycle since joining the network, including FOX's 2020 election night coverage. Hemmer…

On Wednesday, Howard Kronberg of Keidel, Weldon, and Cunningham presented oral arguments on appeal of our ongoing challenge to the best interest regulation for life insurance and annuities (Regulation 187). Our key argument for overturning the regulation is that it is unconstitutionally vague. Specifically, the regulation compels speech by the agent or broker (i.e. making a specific product recommendation), yet fails to provide concrete guidance on how specifically to comply with the law. The regulation holds that the producer must act in the “best interest of the customer” but is silent on what is sufficient to demonstrate they acted in the customer’s best interest, nor…

​Today, members of the New York legislature reintroduced the New York Health Act and called for its passage as early as this spring. The Realities of Single Payer Coalition, of which Big I NY is a member, pushed back strongly on the proposal to create a single payer health care system in NY. "The New York Health Act would destroy the existing insurance market and hurt consumers by removing their ability to choose the best healthcare for their needs. Independent insurance agents and brokers are committed to helping New Yorkers protect what matters most. We believe consumers are best served by a competitive market rather than…