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Frustrated Democrats express alarm over Biden’s powerlessness

President Biden is finding himself largely powerless to address a spate of setbacks in recent weeks that have sparked alarm among Democrats about the state of the country.

Biden has been dealt blow after blow in recent weeks: The Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade and a woman’s right to an abortion; the country is plagued by gun violence, the latest example falling during an Independence Day parade in suburban Chicago; and rising costs for gasoline, food and other goods have frustrated the public for months.

In each case, Biden’s hands are largely tied, frustrating Democrats and contributing to Biden’s political malaise.

He has signed executive action and a bipartisan bill aiming to curb gun violence. He has taken some unilateral action to lower gas prices, such as releasing oil from the strategic petroleum reserve. And he has called on the Senate to alter the filibuster if needed to codify Roe v. Wade.

None of those steps were expected to do or will do much to show the gun violence plague, dramatically lower prices at the pump or bring back abortion rights in states where it is being outlawed.

And all of that is increasingly frustrating Democrats, who increasingly argue they voted Biden into office to enact change and are unhappy with the results.

The steps and statements Biden has taken and given, in this context, are seem as much too little.

“It’s infuriating,” said one top Democratic strategist, venting frustrations about Biden and his team. “Our house is on fire and it seems like they’re doing nothing to put the fire out. They’re just watching it with the rest of us.” 

Polls point to the gloom in American life.

A Gallup survey published Tuesday found just 23 percent of Americans have confidence in the institution of the presidency, down 15 percentage points from a year ago. 

A Monmouth University poll released Tuesday found 88 percent of Americans believe the country is headed in the wrong direction, with just 10 percent saying it’s on the right track, the lowest number tallied in a Monmouth poll since 2013.

Democratic strategist Joel Payne said Biden needs to change course. 

“There’s the administrative part of the job and the political part of the job and it seems like this president is leaning more in the administrative role at a time when his coalition is thirsty for political clarity and leadership,” Payne said. “The president and his team have to be vigilant about providing that and balance the need to do both.” 

Speaking about the Biden administration’s inaction on abortion, Bekari Sellers, the political commentator and former South Carolina representative put it this way Friday on CNN: “I’m not sure what he’s doing. I can tell you what he ain’t doing.”

“We have been sounding the alarm about this for a long time,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-N.Y.) tweeted in the wake of the Supreme Court’s abortion decision. “Some may want to go after the messenger, but we simply cannot make promises, hector people to vote, and then refuse to use our full power when they do. We still have time to fix this and act. But we need to be brave.”

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was asked multiple times at a Tuesday press briefing about complaints from Democratic lawmakers, activists and pundits that Biden has shown a lack of urgency and fire on certain issues.

“I can’t speak for them, I can only speak to what we’re trying to do,” Jean-Pierre said.

“This is a president that has been working tirelessly day in and day out since he’s walked into this administration fighting for the American public,” she continued. “That is what matters to him. That is what is important is delivering every way that he can to make sure that we get things done.

Jean-Pierre pointed to the bipartisan gun legislation passed after a school shooting in Texas, though Biden did not play a major role in those negotiations. And she noted Biden announced executive action to protect access to abortion pills and directed the Justice Department to protect women who cross state lines for the procedure in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling.

“Who knew bragging about how little you know about the Constitution and hurting the only route to putting Roe’s protections back in place would be such a tempting dopamine hit for people who backed defunding the police and helped ensure congressional majorities were so narrow,” one Biden ally said.

Doug Heye, a Republican strategist, said Biden is in a no-win situation. 

“I’m not sure there’s a whole lot substantively that he can do,” Heye said, adding that there are a few reasons Biden finds himself in this predicament. 

“The base just wants somebody who can fight. You don’t have to have a plan to land the punch, win the round, or knock down the opponent, you just need to be seen as fighting,” he said. 

But Heye also said expectations of Biden “have been way too high.”

“They have a small majority in the House and no real majority in the Senate. So what did they expect?” he explained. 

White House aides dispute the idea that Biden is not fighting to address issues like climate, abortion rights, gun violence and inflation. They pointed to his ambitious legislative proposals, executive actions he’s taken on guns, climate and voting rights, and his willingness to call for filibuster carve outs in the Senate, something he had not done on the campaign trail.

Aides said Biden shares the public’s sense of frustration that the country has faced a series of setbacks, something the president indicated in remarks during an Independence Day celebration at the White House.

“In recent days, there’s been reason to think that this country is moving backward, that freedom is being reduced, that rights we assumed were protected are no longer,” Biden said in remarks to military families on Monday. “A reminder that we remain in an ongoing battle for the soul of America, as we have for over 200 years. 

“I know it can be exhausting and unsettling,” Biden continued. “But tonight, I want you to know we’re going to get through all of this — for all that we have faced, that we are going to get through this, and look how far we’ve come.”

Source: TEST FEED1

Trump White House bid threatens GOP midterm strategy

Former President Trump’s plans to announce his 2024 presidential campaign as early as this summer, well before what he previously indicated, throws a wrench into Republicans’ strategy for winning back the Senate and House majorities in November.  

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) made clear they want the 2022 midterms to be a referendum on President Biden and his handling of inflation and the economy.  

But that strategy will run into trouble if Trump announces his plans to run for president again in 2022. An early Trump campaign kickoff would give plenty of opportunity for Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and other Democrats to make November a referendum on Trump instead of Biden. 

Republican and Democratic strategists say Trump will also provide a shot of energy and motivation to a dispirited Democratic base that right now feels less enthusiastic than Republicans about voting in the midterms.

“Midterm elections tend to be referenda on the governing party and given President Biden’s rock-bottom job approval rating, anything that detracts from a focus on the Biden administration and its many failures weakens the Republicans’ ability to take control of Congress,” said Whit Ayres, a leading Republican pollster.  

Biden’s job approval rating now stands at 38 percent, according to an average of recent polls compiled by RealClearPolitics.com. 

Ayres say Republican voters are significantly more motivated than Democrats to vote given liberal disappointment over the Biden agenda.

“No question about it. The administration has managed to increase Republican enthusiasm and depress Democratic enthusiasm by the way it has governed,” he said.  

Former Rep. Jim Walsh (R), who represented a swing district in upstate New York, said a Trump 2024 anouncement could hurt Republican candidates in competitive races.  

“I think it causes problems for Republicans. If Trump were to announce this summer, I think it definitely causes problems for Republicans,” he said.  

Walsh said if Trump launches his campaign, “it’s not going to bring Republicans out this election but what it may do is motivate Democrats.” 

The non-partisan Cook Political Report races four New York House races as toss ups.   

Democrats acknowledge they face an enthusiasm gap but say that would likely change if Trump announces plans to run again for president. They say their voters are already more energized in the wake of the 6-3 Supreme Court decision striking down Roe v. Wade, the landmark abortion rights case.  

Trump considered announcing his White House bid last year in the aftermath of the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan when Biden’s approval ratings began their downward spiral but was talked out of it by his advisers.  

Trump advisers cautioned the former president at the time that he didn’t want to “own” the midterm results if Republicans fell short of winning back the Senate and House, according to a Washington Post report in October of 2021.  

The former president is now motivated to announce a bid as polls show he is losing popular support amid the damaging revelations from the House select Jan. 6 committee’s hearings. This has opened the door for potential rivals, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who led Trump 39 percent to 37 percent among likely Republican voters in New Hampshire, an early primary state, according to a recent University of New Hampshire poll.  

Republican leaders in Congress fear a new Trump bid would ensure the midterms will be a fight over Trump’s false claims that he won the 2020 election. Leaders in Congress repeatedly advise Republican candidates to focus on Biden’s agenda and the economic problems facing the nation today instead of re-litigating the 2020 election.  

“Objectively speaking it would be best if this midterm were run as a referendum on Biden, his overall performance and inflation, the economy and quality of life. That’s an unassailable fact,” said Scott Jennings, a Republican strategist who has advised McConnell’s past campaigns.  

But Jennings said analysts can’t assume “Donald Trump cares about whether Republicans win the midterms or not.” 

“His tactical objectives here are different than the party’s and he’s never shown much of an interest in what’s best of the party in this regard,” he added.  

Many Senate Republicans blamed Trump for contributing to their loss of two Senate seats in last year’s election runoff in Georgia because he claimed fraud in the 2020 November election, depressing GOP turnout in the following January runoff.  

“Case in point the Georgia special we had in January of last year. Trump gave no thought whatsoever to what it meant to tell Republicans their vote no longer counted,” Jennings pointed out.  

McConnell on Tuesday hammered Biden’s successful push for the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, which Congress passed in March of last year without a single Republican vote, which Republicans say fueled inflation.  

“On a party-line basis, not a single Republican in the House or Senate voting for it, they dumped almost two trillion [dollars] on the economy,” he said during remarks to the Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce, echoing what has become his midterm election message.  

McConnell regularly deflects questions about Trump and his actions in the runup to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol when asked by reporters, usually replying that he’s paying more attention to the issues immediately before the Senate.  

Jennings predicted that McConnell and other Republicans will find a way to adapt if Trump launches his White House campaign early, even if it’s not an ideal scenario.  

He also said that Democrats were always planning on making Trump central to their midterm campaign message for the Senate and House, even though Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe’s effort to do just that in the Virginia 2021 gubernatorial race failed to earn him a victory.  

Ford O’Connell, a GOP strategist who was close to the Trump White House, acknowledged the GOP establishment doesn’t want Trump to jump into the presidential race early but he argued Republican leaders in Washington don’t fully understand Trump’s effectiveness on the campaign trail.  

“If he’s driving the conversation, you could make an argument that he could help the Republicans even more because it’s not like the Democrats aren’t trying to focus on Trump anyway as part of their plan to scrape back some seats in the House or the Senate,” he said. “Democrats are underestimating the fact that Trump is a one-man political force of nature.”  

“Mitch McConnell’s a very establishment person and he’s going to go along with the conventional wisdom” that Republicans are better off in November with Trump on the sidelines, Ford said.  

“That’s what Mitch is probably thinking but I don’t if Mitch is right on that front,” he added. “It’s not like the Democrats aren’t trying to run on Trump already.”  

Source: TEST FEED1

Why some aren't buying Democrats’ 'go vote' message on abortion

Voters are becoming disillusioned by Democrats’ calls to storm the polls following Roe v. Wade’s demise, arguing the party’s failure to prepare for the moment means it could face an unpleasant fate in November.

Almost from the moment the Supreme Court announced it was ending the constitutional right to an abortion, Democrats began working to make it a midterm issue, presenting a vote for their side as a way to help codify Roe at the state and perhaps federal level — or at least prevent Republicans from doing the opposite.

But that message is already falling flat. Frustration with the lack of progress on many women’s issues and what some see as a lack of a clear vision on abortion have left voters skeptical that the solution lies at the ballot box.

“Here we are with leadership basically [reduced] to begging for people to vote,” said Aaron Chappell, political director of the grassroots group Our Revolution. “No clear plan, no promises of what those votes will translate to.” 

“The people chanting ‘just vote blue’ make me lowkey want to die,” said another disgruntled operative involved with strategy for progressive candidates. “It’s nuts.”

Democrats across the country have sought to make abortion access front and center in their election bids. Last week, incumbent Sen. Maggie Hassan’s (D-N.H.) campaign became the first to launch a television advertisement on the issue since the Supreme Court decision last month. In Florida, Rep. Val Demings (D), who is challenging incumbent Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), rolled out a digital hitting him over his abortion stance. 

Democratic and abortion rights groups are also pouring money into ad buys. On Thursday, Planned Parenthood Votes launched a $3 million television campaign in Pennsylvania hitting GOP Senate nominee Mehmet Oz over his pro-life support. The national group’s action fund followed up with $1.5 million in spending in Wisconsin attacking Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.). And in Nevada, EMILY’s List rolled out a $2.1 million buy slamming Republican Senate candidate Adam Laxalt on the same topic.  

Top Republican lawmakers, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), have signaled that a nationwide abortion ban is unlikely. McConnell personally hasn’t been too eager to press the issue while his party is not in power. 

But Democrats don’t believe things will stay that way. They are so skeptical, in fact, that liberal candidates are warning on the campaign trail that their GOP counterparts would do just that if they win back control of the upper chamber, hoping to create enough urgency to tilt the turn-out numbers in their favor.  

“One of the primary examples of just how politically bad this can be for Republicans is the talking points Senate Republicans put out within 24 hours of the leak happening,” said Jessica Floyd, who leads the Democratic PAC American Bridge.

“Don’t talk about the fact that this could take away your contraception. Don’t talk about the fact that this will actually limit general health care options,” she said about the apparent right wing strategy. 

Democrats seeking higher office or looking to remain in their current positions see merit in pushing talking points that shift the focus to what Republicans could do if they reclaim one or both chambers of Congress. 

“I believe the best way to protect a woman’s fundamental freedom is to reject candidates who would support the nationwide abortion ban McConnell has been pushing for,” Hassan told reporters last week. 

Hassan, who previously served as the state’s governor with a staunch pro-choice record, said it’s “essential” to support Democrats who have said on the record that they would “vote to enshrine Roe.” 

But some strategists question whether that’s the right approach.

“I think that there is just this wishful thinking on the part of the party establishment that suddenly Roe being overturned is good news, that this changes the tide of the midterms,” Chappell said. 

Some candidates, aware of voter anger about what many see as a weak response from the Biden administration, are putting forward their own proposals.

Progressives and some moderates favor making the Supreme Court bigger by adding more justices to the bench, bolstering the long-held belief on the left that if there are more seats, it would even the representation of viewpoints and theoretically create more equitable rulings. Currently, the high court has a 6-3 conservative majority after former President Trump appointed three justices during his first White House term. 

On Tuesday, left-wing lawmakers solidified that position, with Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), the caucus chair, issuing a statement calling for more seats.  

“We must hold these rogue justices to account,” Jayapal wrote on behalf of her caucus. 

Democratic candidates are also pledging their commitment by supporting an end to the Senate’s filibuster. If it wasn’t for that one parliamentary procedure, they say, there would be more progress on everything from women’s rights to democracy reforms. Last week, Democratic lawmakers and activists praised Biden for saying he believes the rule should be amended in order to codify Roe. 

While his call was met with relief for some, others said that it was “half-assed” and lamented that he could have moved on the filibuster much sooner. 

“It’s just astounding that it took them this long and then when he finally gets to it, when he finally comes around on it, it’s a weak announcement at the end of a news week,” said another Democratic strategist, speaking without attribution to talk freely about the sensitive subject. “People are pretty pissed.” 

As with earlier blockades, however, Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), the two most moderate Democratic voices in the Senate, have been opposed to changing the rules and don’t appear likely to alter their stances now. This means that Democrats would likely have to keep the seats they currently hold and win two more in order for possible action. 

“Abortion Rights Week is feeling a lot like Infrastructure Week in that it never actually begins,” the progressive operative said.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre declined to offer further guidance on Tuesday, while Biden previously indicated that there could be an announcement in the coming days. 

For all the personal angst around the issue of abortion, other Democrats argue it’s not happening in isolation. Topics like access to reproductive health care, environmental regulationns, and certain education reforms are broadly popular with voters, yet liberals aren’t able to make traction. 

That dynamic has created more tension between candidates running on aspirational platforms and elected officials facing the realities of a log jammed Washington, D.C.    

“There’s this degree of self-fulfilling defeatism when leaders who control nearly every level of political power just sort of callously point to the next election,” said Sawyer Hackett, a senior communications strategist at the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. 

“If we have all of that and we still can’t win on issues in that environment, then there are clearly these major structural issues we have to tackle too.” 

Source: TEST FEED1

Corporations’ thirst for profits isn’t to blame for inflation, economists say

There’s growing agreement among economists that companies have become more powerful and more profitable over the past several decades — a fact they say pokes a hole in some lawmakers’ arguments that greed for profits is what’s behind spiking inflation.  

The logic among lawmakers about the causes of inflation falls largely along party lines.  

Most Republicans blame inflation fiscal stimulus sent out during the early days of the pandemic.

“Democrats’ $2 trillion in so-called COVID ‘stimulus’ spending fueled inflation long before Russia invaded Ukraine,” House Ways and Means Republican leader Rep. Kevin Brady (R-Texas) said in a June 30 statement.

Most Democrats – and a few Republicans – say inflation is due to a lack of competition and an out-of-control drive for profits among corporations.

“The CEOs of some of the biggest companies have been bragging to their investors that inflation has created a terrific opportunity for them to raise prices and boost profits,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said in a statement earlier this year.

Her sentiments were echoed in April by Republican Rep. Randy Feenstra (R-Iowa) who told CEOs from the heavily concentrated meatpacking industry that “the market share lets you control the price of contracts.”

But economists say that since 1980, the market power of companies over consumers has ticked up an average of about 1 percent a year, allowing them to keep marking up their prices higher and higher above input costs. 

Inflation since 1980 has remained mostly at low levels, and experts say that the notion higher profits would have suddenly contributed to spiking inflation following the pandemic is a tough pill to swallow.  

“I am pretty skeptical about the ‘greedflation’ narrative,” Gabriel Unger, a PhD student in economics at Harvard and the co-author of an influential paper on private sector market power, said in an email to The Hill.  

“It’s true that markups (and market concentration) have been rising sharply since around 1980. But over almost this whole period, up until the pandemic, inflation has been historically very low. So for most of the past 40 years, we’ve had an economy with high and rising markups, and very low inflation.”  

“It’s possible that in the absence of the former, inflation might have been slightly lower, but I still think this suggests it’s unlikely that high markups on their own cause an explosion of inflation,” he added. 

Unger’s paper, which he co-authored with European economists Jan De Loecker and Jan Eeckhout in the U.S. Quarterly Journal of Economics in 2020, found that “in 1980, aggregate markups [started] to rise from 21 percent above marginal cost to 61 percent now.” 

Markups can be implemented to account for rising input costs, but excluding these costs, the authors found “an increase in the average profit rate from 1 percent to 8 percent” over the same period. 

The authors also found the most powerful companies have increased their price markups the most. 

“The increase is driven mainly by the upper tail of the markup distribution: the upper percentiles have increased sharply. Quite strikingly, the median is unchanged. In addition to the fattening upper tail of the markup distribution, there is reallocation of market share from low- to high-markup firms,” they wrote. 

Economists say that this viewpoint is gaining wider traction within the field. 

“I don’t know how many people want to sign up for consensus on this, but there’s been a lot of research that people have found reasonably convincing that says that measures of market power seem to have been ticking up. It’s not unanimous, but more people think that’s true now than five years ago,” Chad Syverson, an economist at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, said in an interview. 

Still, more liberal economists argue that increased concentration — a small number of companies that play a large part in the economy — helps to obscure how companies can work together implicitly to increase consumer prices under the appearance of behaving competitively.  

A recent study from the Boston Federal Reserve found that “the US economy is at least 50 percent more concentrated today than it was in 2005” and that this concentration has the effect of “passing through” cost increases into even higher prices. 

“Our estimates imply that the pass-through becomes about 25 percentage points greater when there is an increase in concentration similar to the one observed since the beginning of this century.” 

“Our findings suggest that the increase in industry concentration over the past two decades could be amplifying the inflationary pressure from current supply-chain disruptions and a tight labor market,” the authors of the paper found. 

Another study from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute (EPI) came to a similar conclusion, finding that the increased market power of corporations over consumers has, indeed, resulted in sustained higher prices. 

“It is unlikely that either the extent of corporate greed or even the power of corporations generally has increased during the past two years. Instead, the already-excessive power of corporations has been channeled into raising prices rather than the more traditional form it has taken in recent decades: suppressing wages,” EPI economist Josh Bivens wrote. 

This jump in the market power of companies rhymes with other economic trends that disproportionately favor the wealthy in various segments of the economy.  

For example, there has been a decrease in IRS audit rates for the wealthiest taxpayers and a change in retirement plan rules that favor those who can contribute the most to their IRAs. 

Source: TEST FEED1

FDA temporarily suspends order banning sales of Juul

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Tuesday announced it had temporarily suspended its ban on sales of the popular e-cigarette maker Juul. 

“On July 5, 2022, FDA administratively stayed the marketing denial order,” the agency Tabacco division wrote in a tweet. “The agency has determined that there are scientific issues unique to the JUUL application that warrant additional review.” 

“This administrative stay temporarily suspends the marketing denial order during the additional review but does not rescind it,” the agency said in its Twitter thread. 

“All electronic nicotine delivery systems, or ENDS products, including those made by JUUL, are required by law to have FDA authorization to be legally marketed,” the agency concluded. “The stay and the agency’s review does not constitute authorization to market, sell, or ship JUUL products.”

The health agency also said that the company is allowed to market its products in the U.S. for the time being.

Two weeks earlier, the health agency banned the sale of the e-cigarette maker, saying that the company did not prove to them that keeping their product on the market is the best for the “protection of public health”. 

In a statement, FDA commissioner Robert Califf said that Juul has played a major role in the rise of vaping among U.S. youth. 

“Today’s action is further progress on the FDA’s commitment to ensuring that all e-cigarette and electronic nicotine delivery system products currently being marketed to consumers meet our public health standards,” Califf said in his statement. 

A federal appeals court a day later temporarily blocked the FDA ban on Juul, granting the e-cigarette maker’s request for a stay order, noting that its order will not reflect its ruling on the case.

Source: TEST FEED1

Judge won’t block law banning most Mississippi abortions

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — As attorneys argued about abortion laws across the South on Tuesday, a Mississippi judge rejected a request by the state’s only abortion clinic to temporarily block a law that would ban most abortions.

Without other developments in the Mississippi lawsuit, the clinic will close at the end of business Wednesday and the state law will take effect Thursday.

One of the clinic’s attorneys, Hillary Schneller of the Center for Reproductive Rights, said the judge should have blocked the law.

“People in Mississippi who need abortions right now are in a state of panic, trying to get into the clinic before it’s too late,” Schneller said. “No one should be forced to live in fear like that.”

Mississippi legislators passed the “trigger” law before the U.S. Supreme Court recently overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion nationwide. The clinic, Jackson Women’s Health Organization, sought a temporary restraining order that would have allowed it to remain open while the lawsuit played out in court.

“This law has the potential to save the lives of thousands of unborn Mississippi children,” Republican Gov. Tate Reeves said after the judge’s ruling. “It is a great victory for life. I also believe it is critical that we showcase to every mother and child that they are loved and that their communities will support them.”

The closely watched lawsuit was part of a flurry of activity nationwide since the Supreme Court ruled. Conservative states have moved to halt or limit abortions while others have sought to ensure abortion rights, all as some women try to obtain the medical procedure against the changing legal landscape.

Elsewhere in the South, Florida’s new 15-week abortion ban was blocked but then quickly reinstated Tuesday after an appeal from the state attorney general in a lawsuit challenging the restriction. Judge John C. Cooper issued the order temporarily halting the law after reproductive health providers argued that the state constitution guarantees a right to the procedure. The state quickly appealed his order, automatically putting the law back into effect.

The Florida law makes exceptions if the procedure is necessary to save the pregnant woman’s life, prevent serious injury or if the fetus has a fatal abnormality. It does not allow for exemptions for pregnancies caused by rape, incest or human trafficking.

The law, which went into effect Friday, was passed by the GOP-controlled legislature and signed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis this spring.

In Louisiana, the state attorney general has asked the state Supreme Court to allow enforcement of a ban on most abortions. Louisiana’s anti-abortion statutes include so-called triggers that were designed to instantly take effect if the U.S. Supreme Court were to reverse abortion rights. But a state judge in New Orleans last week blocked enforcement of the law pending a court hearing on a lawsuit filed by a north Louisiana abortion clinic and others.

The Louisiana suit says the law is unclear on when the ban takes effect and on medical exceptions. The attorney general’s application to the Supreme Court, filed over the holiday weekend and announced Tuesday, says the order blocking enforcement should be dissolved.

The north Louisiana clinic’s attorneys argued in a Tuesday afternoon brief that it’s premature for the high court to get the case before the district judge and an appellate court have had a chance to more fully consider the issues.

Mississippi was one of several states with a trigger law contingent on the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade. The law passed in 2007 and has never been challenged in court. It says abortion will be legal only if the pregnant woman’s life is in danger or if a pregnancy is caused by a rape reported to law enforcement. It does not have an exception for pregnancies caused by incest.

The clinic’s lawsuit cited a 1998 Mississippi Supreme Court ruling that said the state constitution invokes a right to privacy that “includes an implied right to choose whether or not to have an abortion.”

The state attorney general’s office argued that the 1998 ruling was rooted in U.S. Supreme Court decisions in 1973 and 1992 that established or protected abortion rights but were overturned on June 24. But Rob McDuff, a Mississippi Center for Justice attorney representing the clinic, argued that state justices never said their ruling was made because of the federal Constitution.

“They never said it would evaporate if Roe was ever overruled,” McDuff said in court Tuesday.

The state attorney general’s office said the Mississippi Constitution does not recognize a right to abortion and the state has a long history of restricting the procedure.

“In the past two weeks, the state of the law has changed dramatically,” the state solicitor general, Scott Stewart, argued Tuesday in court.

The lawsuit was filed three days after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in a case that originated in Mississippi. The clinic had continued to see patients, but owner Diane Derzis said it will close if the near-ban on abortions takes effect.

In rejecting the clinic’s request hours after the hearing, Halford wrote, “The plain wording of the Mississippi Constitution does not mention abortion.” She added that it is “more than doubtful” that the Mississippi Supreme Court would continue to uphold its 1998 ruling now that the U.S. Supreme Court has overturned its own previous abortion rulings.

McDuff told The Associated Press that clinic attorneys will review Halford’s decision and consider whether to appeal it to the state Supreme Court.

Outside the courthouse in Mississippi’s capital city, several women held signs supporting abortion rights while two men took turns using a microphone to tell abortion rights supporters that God would punish them for eternity.

“You’re bloodthirsty. Bloodthirsty, abominable filth in the eyes of God,” said one of the anti-abortion protesters, Allen Siders. “Consider your ways today, sinners. Consider your ways today. Shame on you.”

An abortion-rights supporter performed an improvised dance in front of Siders to mock him, and several women laughed.

Source: TEST FEED1

Harris visiting Highland Park after July 4th shooting

Vice President Harris is visiting Highland Park, Ill., following a mass shooting there on the Fourth of July that resulted in the death of seven people. 

In a statement on Tuesday, the White House said that Harris will be joined by the city’s mayor, Nancy Rotering (D); Rep. Brad Schneider (D-Ill.); and Illinois state Sen. Julie Morrison (D). 

Harris’s visit follows in the wake of Monday’s shooting, in which seven people were killed and more than 30 others wounded as a gunman opened fire at a crowd of local residents attending the annual Fourth of July parade in the city. 

Authorities on Tuesday charged suspect Robert Crimo III with seven counts of first-degree murder, adding that more charges will likely come. 

Lake County state’s attorney Eric Rinehart said at the news conference that the mass shooting at Highland Park was a “premeditated and calculated attack,” renewing calls for an assault weapons ban and urging the state to bring more awareness to its red flag laws as well. 

“The loss of life and these devastating injuries and the overwhelming psychological trauma demand we seek justice and that we take broader action to protect life,” Rinehart said at the news conference. 

Authorities also said that the 21-year-old Crimo, son of a former mayoral candidate in the city, planned this attack for several weeks, disguising himself as a woman to blend into a crowd of locals as he accessed a roof of a local business to commit the crime.

Rinehart added that Crimo will face a mandatory life sentence if convicted of the crimes against him.

The shooting comes a month after President Biden signed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act into law in response to the mass shootings that happened in Uvalde, Texas, and Buffalo, N.Y.

Source: TEST FEED1

Dez Bryant on Demaryius Thomas: 'A lot of us living with CTE and the NFL know it’

NFL wide receiver Dez Bryant on Tuesday said many professional football players are living with encephalopathy (CTE) but are afraid to speak out about their symptoms.

Bryant’s tweet came the same day as a New York Times report that said former Denver Broncos wide receiver Demaryius Thomas, who played a key role in the team’s 2015 Super Bowl championship run, had been posthumously diagnosed with Stage 2 CTE.

“DT88 my heart weak bro… it’s a lot of us living with CTE and the NFL know it…most importantly the Athletes who have those symptoms are scared to speak…,” Bryant, who spent eight seasons with the Dallas Cowboys wrote in a tweet on Tuesday. “1 thing about me ain’t living no false life…my love and support for athletes are on a much deeper level than most…”

Thomas, a four-time Pro Bowl selection at wide receiver, died last December at his home in Roswell, Ga. Authorities believe his death was caused my medical complications stemming from a 2019 vehicle crash.

A Concussion Legacy Foundation (CLF) medical professional said that Thomas struggled with both CTE and seizures caused by the crash. 

Thomas’ family members also told the Times that they saw the signs of CTE, which can only be formally diagnosed after death, during the star wide receiver’s last year of life, during which he suffered from memory loss, paranoia, and isolation. 

Thomas is among a growing list of former NFL players to have been diagnosed with the degenerative brain disease, including former San Diego Chargers and Tampa Bay Buccaneers wide receiver Vincent Jackson, whose family said last November that the 38-year-old star player, who was found dead in a hotel room earlier that year, suffered from Stage 2 chronic CTE. 

Source: TEST FEED1