Archive by Author

Abrams raises $22 million in two months, far outpacing Kemp

Stacey Abrams, Georgia’s Democratic gubernatorial nominee, raised more than three times the amount that her opponent, Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, raised during the months of May and June. 

An Abrams spokesperson told The Hill that Abrams’ campaign raised about $9.6 million during those two months while her One Georgia Leadership Committee raised about $12.3 million in that timeframe, totaling about $22 million. 

Kemp raised about $3.8 million while the Georgians First Leadership Committee, a Kemp-aligned PAC, raised about $3 million throughout May and June. 

A release from the Abrams campaign states that more than 240,000 donors have given contributions of $100 or less to the campaign since it began in December. 

The Abrams spokesperson said the campaign and committee have raised about $49 million combined since December, with the campaign bringing in $30.5 million and the committee accumulating $18.5 million. 

Abrams has $18.5 million cash on hand from her campaign and the committee, the release states. 

“Our proven strategy in 2018, which was validated in 2020 and 2021, relies on an intense combination of traditional outreach, innovative communication tools, voter turnout operations and voter protection models that anticipate barriers to participation,” Abrams campaign manager Lauren Groh-Wargo said in a memo on the campaign’s fundraising strategy. “We are in an uphill battle, but our vision of One Georgia is within reach, and we are excited to make it so.” 

The governor’s race in Georgia this year will be a rematch of the 2018 election in which Kemp narrowly defeated Abrams by about 1.5 percentage points. Current polling shows a tight race with Kemp holding a small lead over Abrams. 

The RealClearPolitics polling average gives Kemp a 4.8-point lead, but a Quinnipiac poll released last month showed Abrams and Kemp tied.

Source: TEST FEED1

The debt ceiling strategy is no excuse to go nuclear on the filibuster

Pressure to “nuke” the Senate filibuster is rising among Democrats as they seek to legislate new policy on such divisive issues as voting, guns and abortion. Last week, even President Joe Biden joined the chorus calling for a “carve-out” in Senate rules to codify now-defunct Roe v. Wade protections. One argument put forth by party activists, writers and even Hillary Clinton points to their success in raising the debt limit in December 2021 as a precedent. 

But the debt limit isn’t an accurate analogy. In fact, through the multi-stage process that the Senate pursued to raise the debt limit, Democrats needed to muster a supermajority of 60 votes. Consequently, the debt limit deliberations of several months ago provide no justification for weakening the filibuster. 

In December, the federal government faced the prospect of defaulting on its debt if policymakers did not raise the nation’s debt limit. Without a debt limit increase, the government would have lacked the means to pay its bills. 

At the time, Republicans said that while they didn’t want to see a default, they also did not want to lend their votes to raise the debt limit. They wanted Democrats to be “held accountable” for the need to raise it in the first place. 

Despite popular belief to the contrary, the Senate does not require 60 votes to pass a bill in most circumstances. It requires a simple majority in the 100-member body. Before taking a vote, however, the Senate must secure either the unanimous consent of all 100 members or, short of that, the support of 60 members to end a filibuster. 

With their bare majority in the chamber, Senate Democrats could raise the debt without any Republican help.  They could not, however, muster the 60 votes to end a filibuster of such a measure. With neither party seeking a default, Senate leaders decided that rather than ask Republican senators to vote on raising the debt limit, they would add a provision to an unrelated measure that created an expedited process for passing the debt limit increase. This would limit debate and prohibit other delaying tactics, effectively making a filibuster impossible.  

The Senate still needed to overcome a filibuster on the unrelated measure, which it did with 64 votes.  A week later, with the expedited process in place, the Senate voted to raise the debt limit on a 50-49 vote. 

As a general matter, the Senate has created numerous exceptions (or “carve-outs”) to the filibuster over the last century, enabling certain policy measures to advance more easily. In fact, according to Brookings Institution scholar Molly Reynolds’s book, “Exceptions to the Rule: The Politics of Filibuster Limitations in the U.S. Senate,” senators have proposed more than 1,000 exceptions and the Senate has created more than 160 of them.  

One well-known exception involves the federal budget process. The Congressional Budget Act limits the time for debate on a budget resolution and it limits the ability of senators to filibuster related budget reconciliation bills. Both parties have used those limits on debate to enact significant policy changes as part of budget reconciliation measures, including President Obama’s health care reform and President Trump’s tax cuts. 

In their recent calls for more exceptions to the filibuster, Senate Democrats are seeking something far different. Rather than secure a permanent change in Senate rules or a statutory carve-out (as with the recent debt limit increase) — both of which would require supermajority support to put in place — proponents want Democrats to “go nuclear” by ignoring Senate rules and precedent and insisting on ending a filibuster with a simple majority vote. Their “carve-out” is the nuclear option by another name. 

The nuclear option, as it’s known, has a contentious history. Both parties have threatened to use it and then, in fact, used it to eliminate the filibustering of presidential nominees. Each party screamed bloody murder at the other’s transgressions, but each party then committed the same transgression to get its way. 

Were the Senate to use the nuclear option for ordinary legislation, it would create a new playing field in the chamber that would likely come with unforeseen consequences.  After all, what can pass the Senate by a simple majority can be repealed by a simple majority down the road as power shifts and old minorities become new majorities. 

The debt ceiling carve-out of late last year is no analogy, nor does it provide a justification, for senators to deploy the nuclear option to make policy.  It is instead an example of how the Senate can adapt its procedures to secure a policy outcome with broad support even when the political incentives lean in the other direction. 

Michael Thorning is a director at the Bipartisan Policy Center where he analyzes U.S. political institutions. Thorning was previously an aide to U.S. Senators Jeff Bingaman and Tom Udall. 

Source: TEST FEED1

What President Biden’s executive order on abortion does not address

President Biden attempted to preserve abortion access on Friday through executive action but stopped short of restoring full access to the procedure or preventing states from enacting their own restrictions or bans. 

The executive order Biden signed empowers Health and Human Services (HHS) in a variety of ways, including the authority to protect and expand access to medication abortion — something the Department of Justice also warned states of, saying they cannot ban mifepristone, a drug used to aid in abortion, as it is approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). 

Biden’s executive order also ensures that people suffering medical emergencies while pregnant, like those experiencing a miscarriage or ectopic pregnancies, cannot be denied care — potentially allowing them to receive medically necessary abortions. 

HHS will also be allowed to expand access to reproductive health services — namely, access to emergency contraception and intrauterine devices (IUD). The executive order also taps into the Attorney General’s office and will organize private pro bono attorneys to help provide legal representation for patients, providers and third parties that lawfully seek reproductive health care services — like abortion. 

The executive order does not stop states from limiting abortion access. 

Though the executive action does target issues created in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s June decision that abortion is not considered a constitutional right — and which overturned Roe v. Wade — it doesn’t directly address access to surgical abortion for anyone that wants it.  

After Roe was overturned, over a dozen states enacted trigger laws that severely restricted abortion or outright banned it. Additional states began introducing and enacting abortion restrictions, but Biden’s executive order doesn’t address what states can or cannot do when it comes to abortion access. 

Abortion access was not declared a public health emergency 

The order also doesn’t declare abortion a public health emergency, which would allow the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services to take countless actions, including distributing more funding and personnel to health care centers and coordinating efforts between state and federal agencies. 

Abortions still cannot be done on federal land 

Another issue not addressed in Biden’s executive order is the Hyde Amendment, a law that prohibits using federal money on abortions, including the ability to conduct abortions on federal land. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) has reiterated since 2019 that the amendment overwhelmingly harms low-income Americans and women of color — because research has shown that low-income people disproportionately seek abortions. 

On Friday, Jen Klein, director of the White House Gender Policy Council, said that declaring abortion access a public health emergency wasn’t off the table, but that the White House doesn’t think it will free up many resources or release significant legal authority. 

Abortion advocates want more action 

Abortion rights group NARAL Pro-Choice America reacted to Biden’s executive order by saying it was an important first step and that it looked forward to working with the Biden administration to make good on its promise to champion reproductive freedom.  

Sarah Tabaie, chief political officer and communications director for #VoteProChoice, reacted to Biden’s executive order on Friday on Twitter and said in part, “what was announced today is not nearly enough of a response to the immeasurable suffering that has already started and will continue to grow as a result of the anti-choice attack on our reproductive freedom.” 

Tabaie continued by criticizing Biden’s effort, saying, “a true prochoice champion would use all of the power to fight back whether through creative uses for federal land and money, meeting with abortion providers or even doing the bare minimum of giving a prime-time address so that people can see their president fighting for them.” 

Source: TEST FEED1

House Democrats tee up votes on abortion rights bills

House Democrats are planning to vote next week on a pair of bills aimed at protecting access to abortion as lawmakers try to chart a path forward in the post-Roe world.

As lawmakers return to the Capitol for the first time since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the House plans to vote on legislation that will protect women who need to travel to seek an abortion if they live in a state that now bans it. 

Some Republican governors and anti-abortion groups are already eyeing laws that would criminalize women who try to seek abortions out of state. 

A second bill is an updated version of the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would codify abortion rights into law and expand on Roe’s protections. That bill passed the House last fall after every Democrat except one voted in favor. 

Both bills face long, if not impossible odds in the Senate since they don’t have enough support to overcome the filibuster’s 60-vote threshold. The Senate twice failed to pass the Women’s Health Protection Act after bringing it to a vote in both February and May of this year. 

Still, Democratic leaders said voting on the bills shows the urgency of the issue and the need for Congress to act.

“We have a sacred, fundamental duty to expand freedom in America, not to roll back fundamental rights. While Republicans seek to criminalize reproductive health care nationwide, House Democrats will never relent in our fight to defend freedom for women and for every American,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said in a statement.

As pressure builds on the White House to take bold action to protect abortion rights, President Biden has been insistent Congress holds the ultimate authority. 

Biden on Friday signed an executive order instructing the Department of Health and Human Services to protect access to emergency medical care, enforce ObamaCare’s birth control mandate and expand access to abortion medication. 

But the president acknowledged executive power alone won’t be enough to restore abortion rights in states that are rapidly moving to ban access and exhorted Democrats to vote in November.

“We need two additional pro-choice senators and a pro-choice House to codify Roe as federal law. Your vote can make that a reality,” Biden said.

In announcing the votes, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) also indicated it was up to Congress to protect abortion rights.”

“[I]n truth, there is very little that the President can do on his own to address the dangers posed by the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson.  It is up to Congress to take meaningful action by enacting laws that guarantee reproductive freedom in all states and territories of our union,” Hoyer said in a statement.

Source: TEST FEED1

Groups of 150 fin whales spotted in Antarctic, suggesting recovery after whaling

The once endangered fin whale is making a comeback.  

The whales, which were almost hunted to extinction in the 19^th century, were seen in large numbers in their ancestral hunting grounds close to Elephant Island in the Antarctic, according to research published Thursday in the journal Scientific Reports.  

A team of scientists led by the University of Hamburg’s Helena Herr spotted over 100 groups of southern fin whales during two expeditions in 2018 and 2019, the research states.   

America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news.

“I’d never seen so many whales in one place before and was absolutely fascinated watching these massive groups feed,” said one of the study’s lead authors, Bettina Meyer, a biologist at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research and at the University of Oldenburg, as well as the Helmholtz Institute for Functional Marine Biodiversity.

Those groups were usually made up of one to four fin whales, but some were unusually large and at least eight groups were made up of 150 individual fin whales, some of the largest groupings of baleen whales ever recorded, taking part in feeding frenzies, scooping water into their massive mouths and filtering out krill with their long bristly teeth.  

Prior to this, scientists have only ever seen groups of up to 13 fin whales feeding together.  

Herr and her colleagues documented the whale sightings via aerial photos from helicopters and — in another first for science — caught some of the communal feeding on video with the help of a camera crew from the BBC.

Fin whales, along with humpback and blue whales, were almost hunted to extinction with researchers estimating that by the time whaling was banned in the 1970s over 700,000 fin whales had been killed.  

Researchers believe that the data suggests the Antarctic fin whale population is recovering and has the potential to improve their area’s marine ecosystem through eating and excreting krill along with other types of plankton.  

Whale waste is high in nutrients, particularly nitrogen, which when it reaches the surface it feeds phytoplankton which in turn feeds many fish and other marine life, according to one study.  

 READ MORE STORIES FROM CHANGING AMERICA

WOLVERINE CAPTURED, COLLARED IN ‘ONCE-IN-A-LIFETIME EXPERIENCE’ FOR UTAH RESEARCHERS 

WILDLY RARE VIDEO SHOWS YELLOWSTONE BEAR JOIN IN WOLF HUNT — AND STEAL FOOD IN ‘KLEPTOPARASITIC’ DRAMA

RESEARCHERS CAPTURE FOOTAGE OF RARE DEEP SEA FISH WITH TRANSLUCENT HEAD

‘I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO DIE’: MAN SUDDENLY ATTACKED BY PACK OF OTTERS

Source: TEST FEED1

Energy Department announces $40M to boost electricity, weatherization in low-income communities

The Biden administration on Friday announced over $40 million in funds toward weatherization and electrification of low-income areas. 

“This investment addresses a critical gap in federal assistance and it’s just the latest action this administration is taking the lower energy costs for working families,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said on a call with reporters Friday.  

The bipartisan infrastructure law, which President Biden signed in November 2021, included $3.5 billion toward the department’s Weatherization Assistance Program, which Granholm described as an increase of over 10 times what the program typically spends over the course of a year.

The additional funds, she added, will allow some 450,000 households to afford upgrades to their homes that result in hundreds of thousands of dollars per year in collective savings. 

The funding includes $36.5 million to go towards community organizations through the department’s Enhancement and Innovation Program and another $5.1 million toward state weatherization agencies. 

Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) said on the call that the grants will “turbocharge” recipients’ ability to “meet the future.” Kaptur’s district includes Toledo, whose Neighborhood Housing Services organization will receive $1.9 million of the $36.5 million award.   

“We know that 40 percent of America’s energy goals must be met by conservation in the built environment and housing is a major focus of meeting this goal,” Kaptur said.  

The Biden administration has pledged to ensure 40 percent of environmental benefits go to underprivileged communities. Last year, the White House announced a pilot program for the so-called Justice40 initiative that included weatherization and resilience programs.

The impact of extreme weather on low-income and disadvantaged communities has increasingly come to the forefront as the western U.S. faces an unprecedented water crisis, as well as continued concerns that vulnerabilities in Texas’s self-contained power grid were not properly addressed after extreme winter weather battered the state in early 2021.

Source: TEST FEED1

Tennessee governor presses Pentagon on National Guard vaccine exemptions

Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee (R) is pressing the Department of Defense to approve requests for exemptions from the COVID-19 vaccine mandate made by his state’s National Guard.

In a letter to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin obtained by The Hill, Lee says his state’s Guard has recommended approval for Guard members and are awaiting final decisions from Army and Air Force officials.

“Our force is medically ready, regardless of COVID-19 vaccination status, and has proven this even as the science on COVID-19 changed drastically,” Lee wrote.

“Rejecting these exemptions would be a choice to reduce the force at the risk of both our state preparedness and our national security,” he added.

The deadline for Army National Guard members to be vaccinated was June 30, while Air National Guard members had until December to be in compliance.

The Army said last Friday that unvaccinated Guard and reserve personnel will not be allowed to participate in federally funded training and won’t receive pay or retirement credit.

Multiple Republican governors have pressed the Pentagon to end the mandate altogether, arguing that Austin had no authority to implement the mandate when the Guard is under individual state control as opposed to operating under federal orders.

Most recently, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) wrote a letter asking the defense chief to “indefinitely postpone” implementation of the mandate.

Lee’s letter comes a week after a group of Tennessee National Guard members who feared being discharged held a demonstration urging him to take action over the mandate. At the time, the governor’s office told Fox 17 Nashville that no one would be terminated based on vaccination status.

A spokeswoman for Lee told The Hill that the governor still has no plans to terminate unvaccinated Guard members.

“As you know, the COVID-19 vaccine mandate is a DoD requirement, but we have approved every exemption request at the state level and are advocating for the same exemptions federally,” the spokeswoman said.

According to data from the Army released Friday, 89 percent of National Guard members have received at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine and 87 percent are fully inoculated.

Over 12,000 Guard members have refused the vaccine, but none have been separated.

Meanwhile, over 7,000 temporary exemptions have been approved for Guard members, while only six medical exemptions have been granted, and no religious exemptions have been given.

Lee says his state’s National Guard is 93 percent vaccinated, but that those seeking exemptions are “expressing their genuinely held beliefs, not a dishonorable defiance of orders.”

The governor noted that he deployed over 1,700 personnel to Washington, D.C., to secure the 2021 Presidential Inauguration following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. He also said that 300 Tennessee Guardsmen recently concluded a mission at the Southern Border.

“This is not just a few disposable positions: this is a matter of force readiness that is keeping with our role as the nation’s ‘Volunteer State.’”

Source: TEST FEED1

Texas rep 'working on' bill to expand state's abortion law nationwide

A congressman from Texas said he plans to introduce legislation in the House that would ban abortion at the federal level.

Rep. Jodey Arrington (R-Texas) said he is working on modeling the legislation after a Texas law that bans abortion at six weeks of pregnancy, significantly reducing abortion access in the state.

“I’m working on it actually, right now,” Arrington said Thursday at a press conference. “I’d like to have that [Texas’s law] the law of the land and I think that is the ideal for me.”

The Supreme Court struck down the constitutional right to an abortion last month, upholding a Mississippi state law that bans abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy. People in more than a dozen states with “trigger laws” — abortion bans designed to take effect after the court overturned Roe v. Wade — are now facing limited or no access to abortions.

As Republicans attempt to take back the House and Senate in November, some are suggesting that banning abortion in all 50 states will be on their priority list since the court’s ruling allows each state to decide its own abortion laws.

“I understand and respect and also support the decision that the Supreme Court made, which is until such time there is legislation that passes the legislative body at the federal level then we delegate it to the states,” Arrington said. 

“It’s a steeper hill to climb in Washington, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have to start climbing it now,” Arrington continued.

Even if Republicans controlled Congress in November, they would be unlikely to achieve 60 votes in the Senate on any abortion ban, and it is almost guaranteed President Biden would not sign it into law.

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) said in May that Republicans would pursue the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act — requiring any infant who survives an abortion to receive care — if they hold a majority after midterms. 

Abortions after 21 weeks of pregnancy, when a fetus could potentially survive outside the womb, only represent 1 percent of all abortions in the United States, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Other bills that Republicans would be likely to pursue are the Life at Conception Act, which would recognize rights “from the moment of fertilization,” and the Heartbeat Protection Act, which would ban abortion after cardiac activity can be detected in the fetus.

House Republicans previously passed the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which would ban abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy, in 2015 and 2017.

Leaders in the party have differed on to what extent abortion should be banned. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) told CNN he would support a 15-week ban at the federal level, while Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) doubted to reporters that a ban would make it through the Senate in the face of the filibuster.

It will likely be a hot topic among candidates in the 2024 Republican presidential primary. Former Vice President Mike Pence, who is reportedly flirting with a bid, said “we must not rest” until abortion is banned in every state. Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, another potential candidate, tapped state lawmakers to draft a 15-week abortion ban bill.

Source: TEST FEED1

Oath Keepers leader pushes to testify publicly before Jan. 6 panel

Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes is pushing for a chance to publicly testify before the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack as it prepares to review the role extremist groups played in the riot.

Rhodes, the leader of the far-right militia group, is incarcerated and awaiting trial on seditious conspiracy charges that carry up to 20 years in prison.

“He’s willing to speak directly with the January 6 Select Committee. He has a few what I consider to be extremely reasonable conditions to be met,” his attorney James Lee Bright told The Hill.

Bright said Rhodes would be willing to waive his Fifth Amendment rights, but he said any testimony would need to be live and in person. He dismissed the idea of a taped interview, fearing the committee would showcase only those moments that “benefit the direction they’re seeking as a committee.”

Rhodes already sat with investigators from the Jan. 6 committee for more than six hours in February.

But Bright said during that interview he pleaded the Fifth to questions about the time period in between the election and Jan. 6 at the advice of his attorneys.

The committee subpoenaed Rhodes last November, noting that he committed to providing security for “multiple scheduled events, speakers, VIPs, and event attendees” in connection with Jan. 6. The subpoena also refers to a video showing members of the Oath Keepers with former President Trump confidant Roger Stone outside the Willard Hotel, where the Trump team had set up headquarters for its post-election efforts. 

The committee did not immediately respond to request for comment.

The panel has a hearing slated for Tuesday, in which it plans to review the role of groups like the Oath Keepers as well as the Proud Boys, outlining any connections to Trump.

“We will be connecting the dots, as people know,” Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), a member of the select committee, told MSNBC on Thursday. “This wasn’t just an event that unfolded. It was planned. Who did the planning and who were they connected with? How did it unfold?” 

Source: TEST FEED1