The Road To Gilead Goes Through The Internet, Con't

The uncivil war between the states that allow abortion and those that criminalize it is expanding to the online front as South Carolina Republicans want to outlaw any medical information about abortions online.

Shortly after the Supreme Court ruling that overturned the right to abortion in June, South Carolina state senators introduced legislation that would make it illegal to “aid, abet or conspire with someone” to obtain an abortion.

The bill aims to block more than abortion: Provisions would outlaw providing information over the internet or phone about how to obtain an abortion. It would also make it illegal to host a website or “[provide] an internet service” with information that is “reasonably likely to be used for an abortion” and directed at pregnant people in the state.

Legal scholars say the proposal is likely a harbinger of other state measures, which may restrict communication and speech as they seek to curtail abortion. The June proposal, S. 1373, is modeled off a blueprint created by the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), an antiabortion group, and designed to be replicated by lawmakers across the country.

As the fall of Roe v. Wade triggers a flood of new legislation, an adjacent battleground is emerging over the future of internet freedoms and privacy in states across the country — one, experts say, that could have a chilling impact on First Amendment-protected speech.

“These are not going to be one-offs,” said Michele Goodwin, the director of the Center for Biotechnology and Global Health Policy at the University of California at Irvine Law School. “These are going to be laws that spread like wildfire through states that have shown hostility to abortion.”

Goodwin called the South Carolina bill “unconstitutional.” But she warned it’s unclear how courts might respond after “turning a blind eye” to antiabortion laws even before the Supreme Court overturned Roe.

Many conservative states’ legislative sessions ended before the Supreme Court’s decision, and won’t resume until next year, making South Carolina’s bill an anomaly. But some tech lobbyists say the industry needs to be proactive and prepared to fight bills with communications restrictions that may have complicated ramifications for companies.

“If tech sits out this debate, services are going to be held liable for providing basic reproductive health care for women,” said Adam Kovacevich, the founder and CEO of Chamber of Progress, which receives funding from companies including Google and Facebook.

 

The goal here is to make getting an abortion so catastrophically illegal that the de facto result is that nobody tries.

 

Legislation like this would allow states to go after doctors, internet providers, and big tech companies like Google and Facebook. The idea is to make sure that tech companies actively block all abortion information nationwide to avoid criminal lawsuits.

It was never about abortion. It was always about control.

 

Ukraine In The Membrane, Con't

Less than 24 hours after a UN-brokered agreement to allow Ukraine to resume shipment of grain to the rest of the world from the port city of Odessa, Russia all but scrapped the deal and blasted the port facilities with missile strikes.

Russian missiles hit the Black Sea port of Odessa on Saturday, Ukrainian officials said a day after Moscow and Kyiv reached a deal to release millions of tons of trapped grain and ease a global food crisis.

The military command in southern Ukraine said two Kalibr cruise missiles hit the infrastructure of the port but not its grain silos in the city of Odessa — one of the country’s largest and most important seaside trading hubs.

Air raid warnings rang at about 11 a.m. local time as the sounds of explosions rocked the city. The military’s southern command reported no casualties. It said air defense systems shot down two other missiles in the attack, which the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine described as “outrageous.”

The strike imperils an agreement that U.N. and Turkish officials, less than 24 hours earlier, had hailed as a breakthrough after months of negotiations. Friday’s deal, brokered by the United Nations and Turkey, would help lift a blockade that has exposed countries around the world to the threat of rising hunger, especially in Africa and the Middle East.

The deal depends in part on Russian promises not to attack Odessa and two other ports involved in the shipments. It included security assurances for both Ukraine and Russia, who agreed not to “undertake any attacks against merchant vessels and other civilian vessels and port facilities” tied to the initiative.

Kyiv accused the Kremlin of jeopardizing the deal, which guarantees the safe passage of merchant ships from the three ports, to restart the flow of grain cut off by a Russian naval blockade.

Ukraine’s ambassador to Turkey said the attack showed the deal with Russia wasn’t “even worth the signed paper,” while a Ukrainian foreign ministry official called it a “spit in the face” of the U.N. chief and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“It took less than 24 hours for Russia to launch a missile attack on Odessa’s port,” said Oleg Nikolenko, a Ukrainian foreign ministry spokesman.

Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine’s Interior Ministry, shared an image on Telegram that appeared to show smoking rising from the facility. “How will the safety of vessels in the port of Odessa be ensured, if Russia continues shelling?” he wrote.

 

The answer is that safety cannot be assured without risking a major naval confrontation on the Black Sea.  Russia either gets the Ukrainian concessions it wants, or it gets to starve out millions as grain rots in port. Russia cutting off natural gas to Europe is accomplishing much the same. 

 

Moscow isn't holding all the cards, but the hands they have put on the table have won again and again. 

As I've said previously, the current situation in Ukraine is untenable.  Russia's takeover of the Donbas region isn't complete yet, with Ukraine forces mounting counter-offensives thanks to US howitzers and HIMARS rocket artillery systems.

The Biden White House announced another $270 million in security assistance for Ukraine, including four more mobile rocket launchers — a weapon that officials say has caused severe damage to Russian forces.

John Kirby, a National Security Council spokesman, told reporters that the Biden administration will deliver four additional truck-mounted, multiple-rocket launchers — called High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, or HIMARS — bringing the number the United States has sent to 16.

Mr. Kirby said the United States would also send Ukraine more HIMARS ammunition, as well as 36,000 rounds of artillery ammunition for howitzers already delivered to Kyiv. Those items will be drawn down from existing Defense Department stocks, Mr. Kirby said.

In addition, Mr. Kirby said, the Defense Department will provide Ukraine with up to 580 Phoenix Ghost tactical drones. Similar to the better-known Switchblade drone, the drones are capable of surveillance but can also be flown into targets and detonated on impact.

Lloyd J. Austin III, the secretary of defense, and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Mark A. Milley, previewed the coming HIMARS delivery during remarks to reporters at the Pentagon earlier this week. General Milley said that Ukrainian forces were “effectively employing these HIMARS, with strikes against Russian command and control nodes, their logistical networks, their field artillery near defense sites and many other targets.”

“These strikes are steadily degrading the Russian ability to supply their troops, command and control of their forces, and carry out their illegal war of aggression,” General Milley said.

Mr. Kirby said the new deliveries would bring the Biden administration’s total military assistance to Ukraine to $8.2 billion, and that more aid packages would be announced in the coming weeks. “The president’s been clear that we’re going to continue to support the government of Ukraine and its people for as long as it takes,” Mr. Kirby said.

 

The US is showing how effective its weapons are. But Russia has its own weapons, and as we're seeing this weekend, those weapons are effective too, both tactically and strategically.

 

 

Retribution Execution, Con't

After reducing women to second-class citizens with limited rights to their own bodies, facing felony-level criminal penalties for non-compliance, Republicans (as I have been warning you about for months) are now going after LGBTQ+ folks with the intent of criminalizing their existence.

Days after the Supreme Court overturned the right to abortion, Michigan’s Republican candidates for governor were asked if it was also time to roll back constitutional protections for gay rights.

None of the five candidates came to the defense of same-sex marriage.

“They need to revisit it all,” one candidate, Garrett Soldano, said at the debate, in Warren, Mich.

“Michigan’s constitution,” said another candidate, Ralph Rebandt, “says that for the betterment of society, marriage is between a man and a woman.”

Since the Supreme Court decision last month overturning Roe v. Wade, anti-gay rhetoric and calls to roll back established L.G.B.T.Q. protections have grown bolder. And while Republicans in Congress appear deeply divided about same-sex marriage — nearly 50 House Republicans on Tuesday joined Democrats in supporting a bill that would recognize same-sex marriages at the federal level — many Republican officials and candidates across the country have made attacking gay and transgender rights a party norm this midterm season.

In Utah, the Republican president of the State Senate, Stuart Adams, said he would support his state’s joining with others to press the Supreme Court to reverse the right of same-sex couples to wed. In Arizona, Kari Lake, a candidate for governor endorsed by Donald J. Trump, affirmed in a June 29 debate her support for a bill barring children from drag shows — the latest target of supercharged rhetoric on the right.

In Texas, Attorney General Ken Paxton said after the Roe reversal that he would be “willing and able” to defend at the Supreme Court any law criminalizing sodomy enacted by the Legislature. Before that, the Republican Party of Texas adopted a platform that calls homosexuality “an abnormal lifestyle choice.”

And in Michigan’s governor’s race, Mr. Soldano released an ad belittling the use of specific pronouns by those who do not conform to traditional gender roles (“My pronouns: Conservative/Patriot”) and accusing “the woke groomer mafia” of wanting to indoctrinate children.

Some Democrats and advocates for L.G.B.T.Q. communities say the Republican attacks have deepened their concerns that the overturning of Roe could undermine other cases built on the same legal foundation — the right to privacy provided in the Fourteenth Amendment — and lead to increases in hate crimes as well as suicides of L.G.B.T.Q. youth.

“The dominoes have started to fall, and they won’t just stop at one,” said Attorney General Dana Nessel of Michigan, a Democrat who was the first openly gay person elected to statewide office there. “People should see the connection between reproductive rights, L.G.B.T.Q. rights, women’s rights, interracial marriage — these things are all connected legally.”

 

In the House, Democrats have passed a number of bills shoring up nationwide rights to abortion, same-sex marriage, and contraception access, with the vast majority of Republicans voting against it. The same-sex marriage bill may actually have a change at passage, the rest, not so much.

 

Don't expect any protections from Republicans.  Their answer t everything is literally "Well Go Buy a Gun".

 

 

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BREAKING: Bannon Convicted Of Contempt Of Congress

Took all of a couple of hours for a jury to convict former Trump adviser Steve Bannon of contempt of Congress for his failure to appear before the January 6th Committee. 

Former White House strategist Steve Bannon was convicted of contempt of Congress Friday, following a swift trial featuring just two government witnesses who detailed the longtime Donald Trump aide’s defiance of a House committee’s demand for records and testimony in its investigation of the Capitol attack.

The federal court jury deliberated less than three hours before delivering the verdict, dealing victories to the special House committee which initiated the contempt proceedings and the Justice Department’s prosecution.

Sentencing is set for Oct. 21.

In closing arguments, prosecutors urged conviction, asserting that Bannon "chose allegiance to Donald Trump" over an obligation to comply with Congress.

"The defendant made a deliberate decision not to comply," Assistant U.S. Attorney Molly Gaston told jurors. "That, ladies and gentleman, is contempt. We are here because the defendant has contempt for the Congress.

"He has contempt for our system of government and does not believe he has to abide by the rules. Find him guilty."

So they did. 

The reality is that Bannon will appeal and probably not spend a day in prison until next year by the earliest, but then again if Republicans get control of the House, they'll drop the charges anyway.

Might want to keep that in mind when voting in November.

We Don't Need No Education, Con't

Miami-Dade County Schools will no longer teach sex education after right-wing idiots using GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis's "Don't Say Gay" law bullied the school board into reversing a decision to approve health textbooks for middle and high school students.

In a narrowly divided vote, the Miami-Dade School Board Wednesday reversed its decision to adopt a new sex education textbook for the 2022-23 school year — a move that leaves the district with no sexual education curriculum for at least four to eight months. 

The 5-4 vote followed an emotionally charged public comment period that included community members being escorted out of the building and a multi-hour board discussion that strongly paralleled the discussion it previously had in April, when members initially adopted the material in a 5-3 vote. 

At the time, Chairwoman Perla Tabares Hantman, Marta Perez and Mari Tere Rojas voted against the curriculum. Board member Lubby Navarro was absent from the initial vote.

On Wednesday, Tabares Hantman, Perez and Rojas were joined by Navarro and Christi Fraga in voting against the measure. Vice Chair Steve Gallon, along with Dorothy Bendross-Mindingall, Lucia Baez-Geller and Luisa Santos voted to adopt the book.

The book, “Comprehensive Health Skills,” which comes with a version for middle school and one for high school classes and offers research-based health education with topics such as nutrition, physical activity and sexually transmitted diseases, would have addressed the district’s units of study for Human Reproduction and Disease Education for grades six through 12. 

But the materials soon came under fire from some parents and community members who argued the lessons were not age appropriate and violated the state’s parental rights law, which Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law in March and which critics have dubbed the ‘Don’t say gay’ bill. They also argued the district’s process lacked transparency.

The pushback included the filing of 278 petitions objecting to the materials and resulted in Miami-Dade Superintendent José Dotres selecting a hearing officer to conduct a public hearing to review the concerns and the materials in question.

That hearing, which was conducted on June 8, resulted in the hearing officer recommending the board “deny the petitions and proceed with the adoption process,” according to the district.

This is not the first time school textbooks have been questioned. Earlier this year, the Florida Department of Education announced it was rejecting 54 math textbooks in the state’s public schools, claiming the books contained “prohibited topics,’’ including critical race theory. 

“I’m deeply disappointed by today’s decision. I hoped that Miami’s School Board would step up to protect youth in times of crisis,” said Kat Duesterhaus, a board member of Florida NOW and Miami Coalition to Advance Racial Equity. 

Not only does providing comprehensive sexual education help prevent sexually transmitted diseases, sexually transmitted infections and unwanted teen pregnancy, it’s also important to “building bodily autonomy,” which is important for teens to prevent and identify instances of sexual assault, Duesterhaus said.

DeSantis's horrible law is working as intended, allowing a tiny minority of parents to bully school boards into canceling textbook after textbook, activity after activity, and educational experience after educational experience.

Republicans don't want kids to question, to learn, and to think. They want stupid kids to grow up ignorant in order to exploit them as stupid voters and stupid workers.

Most of all, they want scared, pliable fools who don't challenge the status quo of permanent Republican rule, and the outliers kept in line by fear and threats.

It starts with math textbooks having "critical race theory" and sex ed textbooks being removed. 

It ends in fascism.

Last Call For Hearing Aides For America, Con't

Day 8 of the January 6th terrorist insurrection hearings by the House laid out in prime time why Donald Trump should be prosecuted for crimes against the country: as Rep. Adam Kinzinger put it, Trump didn't fail to act to stop the attack, he chose not to do so.

The committee used Thursday's hearing to show how former President Donald Trump not only failed to act, but chose not to as he watched the violent assault on the US Capitol unfold.

Several witnesses with first-hand knowledge of what was happening inside the White House on January 6 told the committee that Trump did not place a single call to any of his law enforcement or national security officials as the Capitol attack was unfolding, according to previously unseen video testimony played during Thursday's hearing. 

The panel said it "confirmed in numerous interviews with senior law enforcement and military leaders, Vice President Mike Pence's staff, and DC government officials: None of them -- not one -- heard from President Trump that day," Luria said. 

The committee used that testimony to make the case that Trump's refusal to intervene amounted to a dereliction of duty. 

Former officials who were with Trump as he watched the riot unfold on television, including then-White House counsel Pat Cipollone and Trump's body man Nick Luna, told the committee they had no knowledge of the former President making a single call to the heads of various agencies who could have responded to the violence, including the secretary of defense or attorney general. 

Keith Kellogg, Pence's national security adviser who was also with Trump that day, testified that he never heard the former President ask for the National Guard or a law enforcement response. 

Kellogg also reaffirmed that he would have been aware if Trump had made such an ask. 

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley told the House select committee that he was astonished by the fact that he never heard from Trump as the Capitol attack was unfolding -- suggesting his failure to act amounted to an abdication of his duties as Commander in Chief, according to previously unseen video from his close-door deposition. 

"You know, you're the Commander in Chief. You've got an assault going on on the Capitol of the United States of America and there's nothing? No call? Nothing? Zero?" he said in the clip. 

On top of that, the missing US Secret Service texts from that day are now being treated as a criminal investigation.

The Department of Homeland Security’s Inspector General has launched a criminal investigation into the circumstances surrounding the destruction of Secret Service text messages that may have been relevant to inquiries about the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, two sources familiar with the matter told NBC News.

The results of the investigation could be referred to federal prosecutors, the sources said, depending on the results.


The DHS Inspector General informed the Secret Service on Wednesday evening that the investigation is now criminal and that it should halt all internal investigations on the missing text messages, according to a letter detailed to NBC News.

“To ensure the integrity of our investigation, the USSS must not engage in any further investigative activities regarding the collection and preservation of the evidence referenced above,” DHS Deputy Inspector General Gladys Ayala wrote in a letter to Secret Service Director James Murray on Wednesday evening. “This includes immediately refraining from interviewing potential witnesses, collecting devices or taking any other action that would interfere with an ongoing criminal investigation.”

 

The information the Committee does have, and that it revealed tonight, was shocking. Former VP Mike Pence's detail left calls for their family to say goodbye, because they didn't believe they would survive the day.

Former Vice President Mike Pence's security detail was so concerned for safety inside the Capitol as rioters broke into the building, that they "were starting to fear for their own lives," one committee witness said.

The moments were so tense, "there were calls to say goodbye to family members," an unidentified national security professional told the committee in a recorded interview played on Thursday.

He said it appeared that the agents were realizing they were running out of options and may have considered using lethal force.

"Is the VP compromised? Like, I don't know. We didn't have visibility, but if they're screaming and saying things, like, say goodbye to family....this is going to a whole other level soon," the national security official said. The committee shielded the identity of the official and obscured his voice.

Mike Pence was a target. If he couldn't fulfill his duty to count the electoral votes, Trump would have muddied the waters with Pence's blood and almost certainly triggered a Constitutional emergency.

We came that close to losing the country.

Trump has to be held accountable or we will lose it in the very near future.

The White House Goes Viral, Con't

President Biden has tested positive for COVID-19 and will isolate with "mild symptoms".

President Joe Biden tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday, underscoring the persistence of the highly contagious virus as new variants challenge the nation’s efforts to resume normalcy after two and a half years of pandemic disruptions.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said that Biden was experiencing “mild symptoms” and has begun taking Paxlovid, an antiviral drug designed to reduce the severity of the disease.

She said Biden “will isolate at the White House and will continue to carry out all of his duties fully during that time. He has been in contact with members of the White House staff by phone this morning, and will participate in his planned meetings at the White House this morning via phone and Zoom from the residence.”

Biden, 79, is fully vaccinated, after getting two doses of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine shortly before taking office, a first booster shot in September and an additional dose March 30.

Up to this point, Biden’s ability to avoid the virus seemed to defy the odds, even with the testing procedures in place for those expected to be in close contact with him. Prior waves of the virus swept through Washington’s political class, infecting Vice President Kamala Harris, Cabinet members, White House staffers and lawmakers. Biden has increasingly stepped up his travel schedule and resumed holding large indoor events where not everyone is tested.

Top White House officials in recent months have been matter-of-fact about the likelihood of the president getting COVID, a measure of how engrained the virus has become in society — and of its diminished threat for those who are up to date on their vaccinations and with access to treatments.

When administered within five days of symptoms appearing, Paxlovid, produced by drugmaker Pfizer, has been proven to bring about a 90% reduction in hospitalizations and deaths among patients most likely to get severe disease.

In an April 30 speech to more than 2,600 attendees at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, Biden acknowledged the risks of attending large events, but said it was worthwhile to attend.

“I know there are questions about whether we should gather here tonight because of COVID,” he said. “Well, we’re here to show the country that we’re getting through this pandemic.”

 

We're getting through the pandemic. 

You know, except for the 3,000 people dying per week still on top of the million who have died so far.

But this is where we are now, a preventable disease that only a fraction of us are still trying to prevent, killing 500 per day, probably another 100K plus will die through the rest of the year as this latest rise in cases will mean more deaths as we head into flu season and orders of magnitude more still suffering mental and physical disabilities from long COVID...

But we're getting through!

Welcome to the new normal, I guess.

That's The Sound Of The Police, Con't

To make it extremely and unequivocally clear that "defund the police" has zero place in the Biden administration, and that Biden actually does care about community police alternatives and mental health programs to prevent violence, the White House says  "Why not throw the kitchen sink at it?" with a $37 billion crime bill proposal unveiled today.

President Joe Biden is proposing to spend roughly $37 billion for fighting and preventing crime, including $13 billion to help communities hire and train 100,000 police officers over five years.

Biden will outline his anti-crime program on Thursday during a visit to Wilkes University in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. The Democratic president will request the money from Congress as part of his latest budget proposal, according to senior administration officials who previewed the plan on the condition of anonymity ahead of the formal announcement.

Republicans are trying to gain leverage in November’s midterm elections by portraying Democrats as unwilling to confront crime problems.

As part of Biden’s plans, $3 billion would be geared toward clearing court backlogs and resolving cases involving murders and guns. The president also wants to use $15 billion to create a grant program that would fund ideas for preventing violent crime or creating a public health response to nonviolence incidents, aimed at reducing the burden on law enforcement.

The remaining $5 billion would support programs intended to stop violence before it occurs.

 

So, a holistic response to helping communities that need policing and helping communities that need mental health programs too, gosh that sounds like a reasonable, measured response that addresses both issues.

Not thrilled about 100,000 more cops in the country but we're always going to need police, they just need drastic reform from the ground up including intense federal oversight is all.

Now, if we purged all the Punisher sticker, Thin Blue Line, violent racist asshole cops and then retrained the rest and then added properly trained non-asshole cops, great.

My expectations are that we only get the cops and none of the other programs however.

Last Call For The Big Lie, Con't

Enough Senate Republicans are getting behind Susan Collins and Joe Manchin (yes, that Joe Manchin) to very possibly pass the Electoral Count Act.

After months of negotiating, a group of senators announced two proposals Wednesday designed to close gaps in federal law and prevent future candidates from stealing elections.

The measures — called the Electoral Count Reform and Presidential Transition Improvement Act and the Enhanced Election Security and Protection Act — are led by Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va.

The bills seek to close loopholes in election law that then-President Donald Trump and his allies tried to exploit to keep him in power despite his defeat in the 2020 election. The first bill would clarify the vice president's role in counting Electoral College votes, raise the bar for members of Congress to object, and try to prevent fake slates of electors from interfering in the process. The second is aimed at protecting election workers.

The bills come as the House’s Jan. 6 committee prepares to holds its last public hearing — at least for the time being — on Thursday outlining evidence it has received in connection to what it calls a plot to overturn the result of the 2020 election.

“Through numerous meetings and debates among our colleagues as well as conversations with a wide variety of election experts and legal scholars, we have developed legislation that establishes clear guidelines for our system of certifying and counting electoral votes for President and Vice President," Collins, Manchin and the rest of the Senate group said in a joint statement. "We urge our colleagues in both parties to support these simple, commonsense reforms.”
Preventing fake electors

The Electoral Count Reform and Presidential Transition Improvement Act would overhaul the 1887 Electoral Count Act by making clear that the vice president's role in confirming an election result is "solely ministerial" — that she or he doesn't have unilateral power to reject electors. It would also raise the threshold for forcing a vote on objecting to electors — from one House and Senate member to one-fifth of each chamber, the authors said.

In all, 147 Republicans, including eight senators, objected to certifying electors on Jan. 6, 2021.

The bill would also amend the Presidential Transition Act of 1963 to ensure that candidates of both parties receive resources to aid the transition, in limited circumstances "when the outcome of an election is reasonably in doubt," according to a summary.

 

Here's the problem with the bill:

One of the thorniest issues for the group was how to make sure the correct electors for the winning candidate are counted. The legislation would identify the state's governor unless otherwise specified by the state, as the person responsible for submitting the election result — an attempt to avoid dealing with competing slates of electors. The Jan. 6 committee has outlined how Trump's team organized groups of fake electors in multiple states to try to overturn the 2020 election result in his favor; nearly a dozen false electors in Georgia have been hit with subpoenas in a criminal investigation into election interference in the state.

The bill would also provide a process for expedited judicial review, featuring a three-judge panel and the possibility to directly appeal to the Supreme Court if a candidate wants to challenge the submitted electors. "This accelerated process is available only for aggrieved presidential candidates and allows for challenges made under existing federal law and the U.S. Constitution to be resolved more quickly," says the summary of the legislation.

That's the bad news. Red states could still pull off electoral nonsense and/or a three-judge panel could too if they were loyal to Trump in 2024.

And then there's SCOTUS.

This is the good news:

 

And the legislation would eliminate "a provision of an archaic 1845 law that could be used by state legislatures to override the popular vote," the summary continued.

The second bill, the Enhanced Election Security and Protection Act, would double penalties under federal law for people "who threaten or intimidate election officials, poll watchers, voters, or candidates," the summary of the proposals said.

It would also add Postal Service guidance to improve the processes for mail-in ballots, reauthorize the Election Assistance Commission for five years and make clear that electronic election records must be preserved.

 

All of that is necessary, but what's missing is the ability to stop states where the GOP has both the state legislature and governor's office but a Democrat wins the election there (Florida comes to mind in a 2024 scenario) and they simply annul a Democratic win.

The bill is a good start, but much more is needed.

Trump Cards, Con't

Why yes, the Trump plan to put a citizenship question on the 2020 Census was absolutely part of a larger effort to rob big blue states like California, New York, and Illinois of House districts and federal funding by not counting undocumented workers.

Former President Donald Trump's administration spent years trying to add a census citizenship question as part of a secret strategy for altering the population numbers used to divide up seats in Congress and the Electoral College, internal documents released Wednesday by the House Oversight and Reform Committee confirm.

Long kept from the public, the Trump administration memos and emails were disclosed by lawmakers following a more than two-year legal fight that began after Trump officials refused to turn them over for a congressional investigation. Citing the "exceptional circumstances" of the case, the Biden administration, which inherited the lawsuit last year, agreed to allow House oversight committee members and their staff to review the documents.

The hotly contested question — "Is this a person a citizen of the United States?" — ultimately did not end up on the 2020 census forms. In 2019, the Supreme Court blocked the Trump administration's unprecedented efforts after finding its use of the Voting Rights Act as the stated reasoning for the question "seems to have been contrived," as Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the majority opinion.

Before Trump eventually released a presidential memo in 2020 calling for the unprecedented exclusion of unauthorized immigrants from a key set of census numbers, earlier releases of internal documents and public statements by Trump officials signaled their interest in using citizenship data to try to break with more than two centuries of precedent in how congressional seats and Electoral College votes are redistributed among the states.

Still, the newly disclosed documents provide a detailed look into some of the early behind-the-scenes discussions at a time when Trump officials were focused on keeping their plans under wraps.

The documents' release, along with a new report by the House oversight committee, comes as Congress considers a House bill that could help shield upcoming national head counts from the kind of interference that saddled the 2020 census during the Trump administration.

"Today's Committee memo pulls back the curtain on this shameful conduct and shows clearly how the Trump Administration secretly tried to manipulate the census for political gain while lying to the public and Congress about their goals," says Democratic Rep. Carolyn Maloney of New York, who chairs the House oversight committee and introduced the bill, in a statement. "It is clear that legislative reforms are needed to prevent any future illegal or unconstitutional efforts to interfere with the census and chip away at our democracy."

 

Every action by Trump and his regime was designed to give him more power at the direct expense of the people who voted against him.

He cannot be allowed in public office again.

Hell, he cannot be allowed to walk the streets as a free man.

Crab Cakes, Cooked

Departing two-term Maryland GOP Gov. Larry Hogan, still widely popular with voters in both parties on his way out and having endorsed state commerce secretary Kelly Schulz as his successor, could only watch in disbelief as the state's Republicans went RINO hunting last night in the state's primary and chose MAGA minion election-denier and January 6th insurrectionist Dan Cox instead.

Another Republican who has sowed false doubt about the 2020 election is a step closer to a governor's mansion and the power to certify results of the 2024 presidential race.

Dan Cox, a state delegate in Maryland, won his state’s GOP primary Tuesday, NBC News projects, beating Kelly Schulz, a former state secretary of commerce backed by the state party's establishment.

Cox — who was at the rally that preceded the deadly insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 and scored former President Donald Trump's endorsement — likely owes his win at least in part to national Democrats who aired TV ads reinforcing his right-wing views. While the strategy could pay longer-term dividends in a state where voters lean more toward the center and left, efforts to elevate a presumably weaker opponent risk backfiring in the general election.

The Democratic Governors Association spent more than $1 million on largely Cox-centric messaging. Cox himself spent a fraction of that: $21,000 through Monday, according to the media-tracking firm AdImpact.

Cox will face the winner of Tuesday’s Democratic primary, a contest that centered on three leading candidates: former U.S. Labor Secretary Tom Perez, state Comptroller Peter Franchot, and author Wes Moore. That contest was too early to call, according to NBC News.

Maryland isn’t ordinarily a battleground in election years, but outgoing Gov. Larry Hogan’s two terms — a rarity for Republicans in the state — set the stage for a competitive year. The outgoing governor’s staunch opposition to Trump and endorsement of Schulz, who served in his Cabinet, emboldened the former president to support Cox. In addition to attending and busing Trump supporters to the rally on Jan. 6, Cox also tweeted at the time that then-Vice President Mike Pence was a traitor for certifying Joe Biden’s victory.

"Cox worked with Trump trying to prove the last election was a fraud," a narrator says in a DGA ad that also played up Trump's endorsement and Cox's hardline positions on guns and abortion.

The Democratic strategy of meddling has become a staple of other races this year, with the party engineering outcomes it preferred in governor's races in Illinois and Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania effort was particularly notable for efforts by Josh Shapiro, the state's attorney general and unopposed Democratic candidate for governor, to emphasize the conservative credentials of state Sen. Doug Mastriano, who eventually won a crowded GOP primary. Mastriano, like Cox, has been vocal about the 2020 election and was in Washington, D.C., on the day of the Jan. 6 riot. He also pushed for an alternate slate of Trump electors, operating under the idea that Biden's Electoral College win could be reversed in Trump's favor.

 

Dems have bet heavily, in both campaign cash and in election clout, that Trumpian MAGA dipsticks like Cox, PA's Doug Mastriano and Mehmet Oz, and Ohio's JD Vance can't win general elections in November, even in this political atmosphere.

Whether it pays off or not, the risk is huge. If the GOP wins here, we're going to have disastrous consequences, just like six years ago.

Better vote.

Last Call For The Huckleberry Speaks

In something of a shocker, GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham will accept Fulton County Georgia's subpoena to a grand jury in the case of Trump's efforts to defraud the state with alternate voters and plotting to cheat the 2020 presidential election.

Sen. Lindsey Graham agreed Tuesday to accept service of a subpoena for his testimony before a Georgia grand jury investigating possible criminal meddling in the 2020 election by then-President Donald Trump.

But Graham, R-S.C., still retained his right to challenge the legality of the subpoena, a court filing showed.

The Atlanta-based grand jury is seeking evidence related to efforts by Trump and others to get Georgia officials to overturn the election won there by President Joe Biden.

Graham’s agreement to accept the subpoena likely will streamline his dispute with Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis over the demand for his testimony. Asked Tuesday afternoon about the development, Graham told NBC News that Fulton County hasn’t “even tried to subpoena me. I just want to get it done.”

The Republican lawmaker, one of Trump’s closest confidants in the Senate, had asked a federal judge in South Carolina last week to quash the subpoena.

But Willis in a court filing Monday told the judge that Graham’s challenge was both too early, and not filed in the right court. She said the fact that Graham had not yet been served with the subpoena made any motion to quash it premature, and that he might not be served in South Carolina.

On Tuesday, attorneys for both parties told the judge that Willis and Graham “have reached an agreement to withdraw all process and proceedings pending” before the South Carolina district court.

“Senator Graham has agreed to accept service of a subpoena for testimony from the Fulton County Special Purpose Grand Jury in Atlanta, Georgia, without waiving any challenges or any applicable privilege and/or immunity,” the lawyers wrote in the court filing.

Any future challenges to the subpoena will be pursued in Georgia, either in Fulton County Superior Court or U.S. District Court in Atlanta.

 

Now, Graham still doesn't think the subpoena is valid, but he'll take it for now.  Maybe he just wants to get the deposition over with. Maybe he doesn't want to fight this all the way to the US Supreme Court. Maybe he wants to give a deposition in order to help Trump.

The point is, DA Fani Willis made him blink first. Graham may very well get the last laugh, but for now, Willis drew first blood.

We'll see how far this gets before Graham decides to burn the whole place down.

In which case, I'm sure DA Willis has options...

Just sayin'.

The State Of The Buckeye State

Ohio's state Supreme Court has, for the fourth time now, knocked down the GOP's gerrymandered redistricting maps as unconstitutional. The 2022 maps have already been decreed by Trump federal judges and the state's 2022 elections for the US House at least will take place using unconstitutional maps. However, the fight will go on to 2024.

The Ohio Supreme Court struck down the state's Republican-drawn congressional map Tuesday, ruling that districts used in the May primary violate anti-gerrymandering rules in the state Constitution.

In a 4-3 decision, the Supreme Court rejected Ohio's 15-district congressional map and ordered Ohio lawmakers to redraw a new one for the 2024 elections within 30 days. If they can't, the Ohio Redistricting Commission will have 30 days to adopt a congressional map.

The map struck down by the Ohio Supreme Court will be used in the November elections, however, because candidates were selected in the May primary using these districts.

That map guarantees Democrats two victories – Columbus' 3rd Congressional District represented by Rep. Joyce Beatty and Cleveland's 11th Congressional District represented by Rep. Shontel Brown. But Republicans are either assured wins or have a shot in the remaining 13.

"Clearly, we agree with the Ohio Supreme Court that this second congressional map is gerrymandered beyond a reasonable doubt," said Jen Miller, executive director of the League of Women Voters of Ohio. "It’s our hope that the Ohio mapmakers will heed court orders and deliver congressional districts that truly serve voters."

The Ohio Supreme Court's majority ruled that the map was slightly more favorable to Democrats than one rejected earlier this year. Three Republican justices dissented, writing that both maps met Ohio's constitutional standards.

"The majority clearly has a number of Democrat congressional seats in mind, and any plan that does not result in that number will be deemed unconstitutional and therefore invalid," wrote Justices Sharon Kennedy and Pat DeWine, both Republicans. The former is running for chief justice against Democratic Justice Jennifer Brunner this November.
No end run around anti-gerrymandering language

Before approving this map, Senate President Matt Huffman, R-Lima, argued that the Ohio Redistricting Commission didn't need to abide by voter-approved rules that prevent maps from unduly favoring one party. The court, ultimately, disagreed.

"No constitutional language suggests that the voters who approved Article XIX intended to allow the prohibitions against partisan favoritism and unduly splitting governmental units to be avoided so easily," according to the majority's opinion, which did not list a specific author.

However, Kennedy and DeWine pointed out in their dissent that "there is nothing in the Constitution that precludes map makers from seeking to maximize competitive districts, and such a goal does not cause undue favoritism."

Ohio's unconstitutional congressional map creates a toss-up district for Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur, Congress' longest-serving female lawmaker. In November, Kaptur faces Republican newcomer J.R. Majewski, who won former President Donald Trump's endorsement after painting his lawn with a giant Trump banner.

 

So there's a very good chance that Republicans will take 12 of 15 House seats, if not 13, with barely 50% of the popular vote.  The state legislature will continue to be a supermajority with about the same 50% vote, garnering 65% of state House and 75% of state Senate seats.

And at least this year, they get away with it, as I've been telling you that they would ever since this whole redistricting scheme came up.

Climate Of Emergency, Con't

With Sen. Joe Manchin killing any new climate legislation in order to serve his West Virginia coal masters and to fill his own pockets, the last shot we have at any meaningful action on global warming would be an emergency executive order. According to the Washington Post, President Biden could announce a nationwide climate emergency as soon as this week, something that will almost certainly be blocked within days by Republicans in court.

President Biden is considering declaring a national climate emergency as soon as this week as he seeks to salvage his environmental agenda in the wake of stalled talks on Capitol Hill, according to three people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private deliberations.

The potential move comes days after Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) told Democratic leaders that he does not support his party’s efforts to advance a sprawling economic package this month that includes billions of dollars to address global warming. If an emergency is invoked, it could empower the Biden administration in its efforts to reduce carbon emissions and foster cleaner energy.

Two of the individuals with knowledge of the discussions said also they expect the president to announce a slew of additional actions aimed at curbing planet-warming emissions. The exact scope and timing of any announcements remain in flux.

“The president made clear that if the Senate doesn’t act to tackle the climate crisis and strengthen our domestic clean energy industry, he will,” a White House official, who requested anonymity to describe the deliberations, said in a statement late Monday. “We are considering all options and no decision has been made.”

Jared Bernstein, a top White House economic adviser, emphasized to reporters at a news briefing earlier in the day that Biden would work “aggressively fight to attack climate change.”

“I think realistically there is a lot he can do and there is a lot he will do,” Bernstein said.

Top aides to Biden are debating the best course of action as another punishing heat wave has descended this week on the central United States, and as a similar weather pattern is breaking temperature records across Europe. Many Democrats have called on the White House in recent days to use its powers to address global warming as hopes for congressional action have faded.

“This is an important moment. There is probably nothing more important for our nation and our world than for the United States to drive a bold, energetic transition in its energy economy from fossil fuels to renewable energy,” Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) told reporters Monday.

Citing the impasse, Merkley added: “This also unchains the president from waiting for Congress to act.”

It is unclear how, exactly, Biden plans to proceed if he opts to declare a climate emergency, which Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) urged him to do just days after the president took office last year.

Some climate activists have urged the White House in recent months to deploy an emergency declaration to maximum effect, arguing that it would allow the president to halt crude oil exports, limit oil and gas drilling in federal waters, and direct agencies including the Federal Emergency Management Agency to boost renewable-energy sources.

But the president faces a tough balancing act as he seeks to calibrate his response to a warming planet with the recent economic reality of high gas prices. The policies could aid in Biden’s quest to halve U.S. emissions by the end of the decade compared to 2005 levels, though they still fall short of what Biden aimed to enact through his earlier economic plan, known as Build Back Better.

Any new executive action on climate also could face a formidable court challenge, which could affect the future of environmental regulations. Last month, the Supreme Court cut back the federal government’s powers to regulate power plants’ carbon emissions.

 

Several observations:

 

1) Joe Manchin remains a colossal asshole, and the sooner we can relegate him to powerlessness by picking up 2 or more Senate seats in November, the better.

2) Biden at this point needs to go for broke. Republicans are going to be screeching about "Biden's Green New Tyranny" no matter what measures he actually includes. He won't get any credit for trying from DO SOMETHING Democrats, either.

3) Having said that, not a single word of Biden's emergency order will ever take effect, because it'll be blocked by Trump judges up until the Roberts Court can fast track it and dispose of it next June, and that will be the end of any meaningful climate change measures by the US.

4) The rest of the world is not going to tolerate US inaction on fighting climate for much longer.

We'll see where this goes, but I have little reason to believe that any Biden executive action on climate will survive the courts in 2022.

Last Call For London Is Burning

Europe's heatwave is roasting across the continent this week, and in the UK, Londoners are facing the equivalent of triple-digit temperatures here in the US.

The UK has had one of its hottest days on record, with a high of 38.1C recorded - and forecasters are warning it will be hotter still on Tuesday.

A high of 38.1C was recorded in Santon Downham, Suffolk, on Monday, and 37C was exceeded in several places.

The Met Office has issued a red extreme heat warning for Monday and Tuesday in much of England, with temperatures of up to 41C forecast.

The current highest temperature in the UK is 38.7C, in Cambridge in July 2019.

A high of 38.5C was reached in Faversham, Kent, in August 2003, making Monday the third hottest day on record - and the hottest day of the year so far.

Hawarden in Flintshire hit 37.1C, meaning the hottest day on record for Wales according to provisional figures from the Met Office.

Scotland and Northern Ireland also experienced their warmest days of the year so far with 31.3C recorded in Aboyne, Aberdeenshire, and 31.1C in Derrylin, County Fermanagh.

Temperatures above 37C were also recorded in London, Cambridge, Surrey and elsewhere in Suffolk.

Amber warnings are in place across England and Wales, and parts of Scotland.

Peak temperatures are expected on Tuesday afternoon, with Worksop, Nottinghamshire, forecast to see 41C by the Met Office.

 

Hey folks, 38C is 100F, and the UK really doesn't have air conditioning because it's not supposed to be, you know, 105 in goddamn London ever.

People are going to die, thousands of people, from heat exposure.  There are no cooling centers like there are here in the States. This doesn't happen in the UK and Europe.

Except now it does.

Global warming is killing people and it's going to kill a lot more in the years ahead, so.

The time to do something about this was back in the Clinton days with the Kyoto Protocols but hey, that ship sailed right into an iceberg.

 

The GOP excuse of course will be that it's too late now to do anything, so why bother, including why bother voting against Republicans scorching the earth and everyone on it?

Orange Meltdown, Con't

Trump is at this point telling his people that he needs to announce his candidacy for President now so that he can avoid charges and then hold out on the legal front until winning a second term and appointing an Attorney General who will dismiss the investigation.

When Donald Trump formally declares his 2024 candidacy, he won’t just be running for another term in the White House. He’ll be running away from legal troubles, possible criminal charges, and even the specter of prison time.

In recent months, Trump has made clear to associates that the legal protections of occupying the Oval Office are front-of-mind for him, four people with knowledge of the situation tell Rolling Stone.

Trump has “spoken about how when you are the president of the United States, it is tough for politically motivated prosecutors to ‘get to you,” says one of the sources, who has discussed the issue with Trump this summer. “He says when [not if] he is president again, a new Republican administration will put a stop to the [Justice Department] investigation that he views as the Biden administration working to hit him with criminal charges — or even put him and his people in prison.”

Presidential immunity and picking his own attorney general aren’t Trump’s only reasons for running again. And as he works on another run, Trump is in a tug-of-war with leaders and operatives of his own party about when to announce, according to multiple people with knowledge of the matter.

The former president is motivated to announce early — even before Election Day 2022 — in the hopes of clearing the field of primary rivals. But GOP leaders, including some of Trump’s closest advisors, don’t want him to declare his intentions until after the midterm elections. The GOP wants to keep voters focused on President Joe Biden, rather than transforming the contest into a referendum on Trump. In recent months, Trump has reluctantly agreed to hold off, only to return shortly thereafter with threats to make an early announcement, either out of self-interest, spite, or some combination of the two.

But as Trump talks about running, the four sources say, he’s leaving confidants with the impression that, as his criminal exposure has increased, so has his focus on the legal protections of the executive branch.

It’s not just liberal wish-casters or Trump critics who are acknowledging the former president’s legal jeopardy. Trump’s teams of lawyers and former senior administration officials speak about it commonly. “I do think criminal prosecutions are possible…for Trump and [former White House chief of staff Mark] Meadows certainly,” Ty Cobb, a former top lawyer in Trump’s White House, bluntly told Rolling Stone late last month.

Trump himself seems to acknowledge potential problems. He “said something like, ‘[prosecutors] couldn’t get away with this while I was president,’” another one of the four sources recalls. “It was during a larger discussion about the investigations, other possible 2024 [primary] candidates, and what people were saying about the Jan. 6 hearings … He went on for a couple minutes about how ‘some very corrupt’ people want to ‘put me in jail.’”

The powers of the presidency would offer a welcome pause to the various civil suits and criminal investigations now hanging over Trump. It’s unclear whether the Justice Department will charge Trump in connection with fomenting the January 6 insurrection, but winning the White House would be extremely helpful to him. Department policy forbids the prosecution of a sitting president, effectively insulating Trump from any federal charges for another four years.

 

Trump is absolutely planning to do this as soon as he can line up the donors and the rest of the GOP to fall in line behind him.  It's a race now to see who acts first, Trump, or the people prosecuting him.

Hearing Aides For America, Con't

This week's primetime hearing has been moved to Thursday for the January 6th Committee, and WIN THE MORNING 2.0 has actually found that the hearings have changed some Trump voters' minds in swing states like Wisconsin.

The House select committee's Jan. 6 hearings are cementing the views of some voters who once backed former Predident Trump and now believe he should face criminal prosecution, according to our latest Axios Engagious/Schlesinger focus groups.

Driving the news: 10 of 14 Wisconsin swing voters last week said Trump should be prosecuted for trying to overturn the 2020 election and his role in the attack on the Capitol; 10 of 13 Arizona swing voters in panels last month said the same.

Why it matters: The findings follow bombshell testimony by former White House aides and lawyers. Committee members have previewed forthcoming revelations about potential witness tampering.The focus groups track with national polling showing more than half of Americans believe Trump should face criminal charges.

How it works: Engagious/Schlesinger conducted two online focus groups on Tuesday with 14 Wisconsinites who voted for Trump in 2016 then Joe Biden in 2020. They included 12 independents, one Democrat and one Republican.While a focus group is not a statistically significant sample like a poll, the responses show how some voters are thinking and talking about current events.

Details: Eight participants said they've watched at least part of the Jan. 6 hearings so far. Several said the hearings were helpful for "accountability" but that the committee already has "their proof" of what happened that day.Those who thought Trump should face criminal prosecution didn't relent even when the moderator pushed back and said doing so would be unprecedented, potentially putting future presidents at risk of being prosecuted for political reasons.

Voters were adamant that such a move would help deter similar attempts by anyone else in the future to "overthrow the government."

What they're saying: "He's our president and a president should have never done anything to provoke what happened. Many people were injured. Look at how many lives you put at stake because you were allowing this to happen. And he was happy about it," said Samantha O., 39.Andrew R., 59, said: "We have to show other people that this just can't be done in the future. [Prosecution] is going to be the price to pay if you try to do a coup again — and that's exactly what it was, a coup."
 

Others likened what happened that day to the politics of "third-world countries."
 

36-year-old Jaime M. said what happened on Jan. 6 "was too extreme, and something needs to be done about it to prevent it from ever happening again," otherwise "it just opens a floodgate for what anybody else is allowed to do."
 

Another voter said criminally prosecuting Trump would ensure that “the credibility of the justice system is upheld."
 

“Ironically, most of these Wisconsin swing voters think the president who led chants of ‘lock her up’ should himself be locked up for his actions on Jan. 6,” said Rich Thau, president of Engagious, who moderated the focus groups.

 

Again, if the point of the January 6th Hearings are to make the case for Trump's prosecution, a majority of Americans now agree, and that wasn't true before the hearings started. Minds have been changed.

 

It would be a shame to not do so, Merrick Garland.

Last Call For Another Day In Gumerica, Con't

The Texas state House committee looking into the Uvalde shooting two months ago is expected to release a blistering report on Monday finding that everything that could go wrong with the system that should have prevented the massacre did go wrong, from parental failures to school safety laxity to not just the ridiculous response from local Uvalde cops, but the failures of state and federal law enforcement as well.

The 77-page report, reviewed by The Texas Tribune, provides a damning portrayal of a family unable to recognize warning signs, a school district that had strayed from strict adherence to its safety plan and a police response that disregarded its own active-shooter training.

It explains how the gunman, who investigators believe had never fired a gun before May 24, was able to stockpile military-style rifles, accessories and ammunition without arousing suspicion from authorities, enter a supposedly secure school unimpeded and indiscriminately kill children and adults.

In total, 376 law enforcement officers — a force larger than the garrison that defended the Alamo — descended upon the school in a chaotic, uncoordinated scene that lasted for more than an hour. The group was devoid of clear leadership, basic communications and sufficient urgency to take down the gunman, the report says.

Notably, the investigation is the first so far to criticize the inaction of state and federal law enforcement, while other reports and public accounts by officials have placed the blame squarely on Uvalde school police Chief Pete Arredondo, for his role as incident commander, and other local police who were among the first to arrive.

The report also reveals for the first time that the overwhelming majority of responders were federal and state law enforcement: 149 were U.S. Border Patrol, and 91 were state police — whose responsibilities include responding to “mass attacks in public places.” There were 25 Uvalde police officers and 16 sheriff’s deputies. Arredondo’s school police force accounted for five of the officers on the scene. The rest of the force was made up of neighboring county law enforcement, U.S. Marshals, and federal Drug Enforcement Agency officers.

The investigators said that in the absence of a strong incident commander, another officer could have — and should have — stepped up to the task.

“These local officials were not the only ones expected to supply the leadership needed during this tragedy,” the report said. “Hundreds of responders from numerous law enforcement agencies — many of whom were better trained and better equipped than the school district police — quickly arrived on the scene.”

The other responders “could have helped to address the unfolding chaos.”

 

No blame for Republican state lawmakers who made it criminally east to get an AR-15 to kill 20 with, however. You won't find a word of that here. 

Just another day of finger-pointing in Gunmerica.

Being All Judge Mental, Con't

 A federal judge in Tennessee has blocked the Biden administration's Title IX transgender directives on bathrooms, sports teams, and more, saying that the federal government cannot punish states for enforcing state laws "protecting women".

A federal judge in Tennessee has temporarily blocked Biden administration directives allowing transgender workers and students to use bathrooms and locker rooms and join sports teams that correspond with their gender identity.

Judge Charles Atchley Jr. of the Eastern District of Tennessee ruled on Friday that the administration's directives would make it impossible for some states to enforce their own laws on transgender athletes' participation in girls' sports and access to bathrooms.

A coalition of 20 Republican attorneys general brought a lawsuit last year against the federal government, noting that they stood to lose significant federal funding as the Biden directives were in conflict with their own state laws.

Atchley agreed with that, writing in his order that the states "cannot continue regulating pursuant to their state laws while simultaneously complying with Defendants' guidance."

Oklahoma Attorney General John O'Connor, one of the plaintiffs, said in a written statement on Saturday that Atchley's order "is a major victory for women's sports and for the privacy and safety of girls and women in their school bathrooms and locker rooms."

The Justice Department, the Department of Education and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission are named as defendants in the lawsuit. None immediately replied to requests for comment on Saturday. The three had earlier requested that Atchley dismiss the states' lawsuit, a motion the judge denied in his Friday ruling.

The coalition of Republican states argued the Biden administration directives improperly expanded on a 2020 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that extended anti-discrimination protections to transgender workers.

The top court in Bostock v. Clayton County said employers cannot terminate workers because of their gender identity or sexuality. The justices expressly declined to decide if the ruling applied to sex-segregated bathrooms and locker rooms.

The Supreme Court in Bostock held that the bar on workplace sex discrimination in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 extended to bias based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

The Department of Education in its guidance issued last year concluded that because Title IX, which bars sex bias in federally funded educational programs, borrowed language from Title VII, Bostock also applied to schools.

The department said, for example, that preventing a transgender high school girl from using the girls' restroom or trying out for the girls' cheerleading team would violate Title IX.

Atchley on Friday agreed with the states, writing in his ruling that the Supreme Court in Bostock "explicitly refused to decide whether 'sex-segregated bathrooms, locker rooms, and dress codes' violate Title VII."

 

This fight is of course going back to the US Supreme Court, where I expect that not only will there be five vote for Judge Atchley's bigoted views, but that Bostock was wrongly decided and should be eliminated...along with the rest of the Civil Rights Act. 

 

Let me repeat that. In just a few weeks, doctors in dozens of states are now facing felony imprisonment for treating women with pregnancy issues. Look at how fast that fell apart after Roe's demise. They didn't stop with women, either. 

 

If you think they're going to magically stop at criminalizing the existence of trans folk, I guarantee you that it won't be too long before the entire concept of a "protected class" is struck down by the Roberts Court, and the Civil Rights Act along with it.

We're heading back to Jim Crow, folks, an era where your rights to work, go to school, buy a house, or even exist will depend solely on which state you live in. It won't take long to get there, either, a bifurcated America that cannot survive without falling into brutal, bloody violence.

Hell, on women's bodies, we're already there. Buckle up, because we're going straight into the crucible of history, and not all of us are going to see the other side.