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June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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What to expect in the Post-Roe world

In their historic ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, six Supreme Court justices noted that the nation was grappling with this deeply divisive issue in 1973 but that “Roe abruptly ended that political process.” The court has now declared that the future of abortion will rest with 330 million Americans rather than nine justices. 

As this matter returns to the states, it is striking to consider what has changed legally and socially in the past 50 years. The comparison may hold some interesting surprises for politicians who are now declaring, as did President Biden, that “this fall, Roe is on the ballot.”

How little has changed

If one looks solely at the alignment of states, surprisingly little has changed. In 1973, 30 states banned abortion at any stage of a pregnancy, with some exceptions for the health of the mother. In the Dobbs litigation of 2022, 26 states asked the court to overturn Roe and its successor, Casey. 

Thus, we remain deeply divided. 

Roughly 16 states are poised or expected to make abortion illegal immediately under so-called trigger laws. South Dakota, Louisiana and Kentucky have immediate prohibitions that will come into effect. Missouri claimed to be the first to declare all abortion as unlawful except for medical emergencies.

Twenty-seven states have protections for abortion that are expected to continue. States like Colorado, New Jersey, Oregon and Delaware actually protected abortion without any limit on the stage of a pregnancy — guaranteeing the right up to just before time of birth.

Internationally, only seven countries allow abortion after the 20th week. While many countries have decriminalized abortion, most are closer to Mississippi than Michigan in limiting abortion to the first or second trimester.

How much has changed

While Dobbs is a major reversal of a long-standing precedent, much has changed legally since 1973. After Roe, the Supreme Court continued to expand protections over lifestyles and intimate relations. In the parade of horribles that followed Friday’s release of the Dobbs ruling, politicians and pundits warned that the decision could undo cases protecting contraception, same-sex marriage and other rights.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democrats continue to claim that the court was taking the country back to the last century. The image of criminalized homosexuality, marriage bans and contraception limits is unnerving — but also untrue.

In the Dobbs decision, the court’s majority expressly, repeatedly rejects the application of this holding to these other rights. Indeed, it is relatively rare to see the court go to this extent to proactively close off the use of a new case in future cases. The court said that “intimate sexual relations, contraception, and marriage” are not impacted by its holding because “abortion is fundamentally different, as both Roe and Casey acknowledged.” It noted that abortion is unique in dealing with “what those decisions called ‘fetal life’ and what the law now before us describes as an ‘unborn human being.’” 

The court repeatedly stressed that those claiming the country will be put into a legal Wayback Machine are simply using the opinion “to stoke unfounded fear that our decision will imperil those other rights.” It could not be more clear, as the court said, that “rights regarding contraception and same-sex relationships are inherently different from the right to abortion because the latter (as we have stressed) uniquely involves what Roe and Casey termed ‘potential life.'” 

The court and Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s concurrence repeat, almost mantra-like: “Nothing in this opinion should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion.” Only Justice Clarence Thomas suggested that these other cases should be examined, yet even he stressed this opinion expressly rejects that application.

Putting aside the legal changes, there are major technological changes since 1973 that will impact the post-Roe world. Roughly 60 percent of abortions today are carried out at home, not in clinics, using pills with mifepristone and misoprostol to abort a pregnancy — the so-called “morning-after” option typically used in the first ten weeks of a pregnancy. In 2021, the Food and Drug Administration permanently removed the in-person requirement for these prescriptions and allowed women to access the drugs via telehealth appointments and online pharmacies. It will be difficult for states to interfere with such prescriptions, particularly if the federal government protects such access.

How we have changed

The greatest change may be us. As this issue returns to the states for citizens to decide, we are a different country than we were in 1973. Great strides have been made in the advancement of women and a wider acceptance of people making decisions about their own lives and values. While we remain divided on abortion, the public seems far more moderate and unified than the leaders of either party.

While some Democrats are voicing absolute views of abortion, and some Republicans are calling for total bans, most Americans hold a more nuanced view.

In 1975, polling showed 54 percent supported abortion under some circumstances, with 21 percent saying it should be entirely legal; 22 percent said it should be illegal.

According to recent polling by the Pew Research Center, only 8 percent of adults say abortion should be illegal without exception, while just 19 percent say abortion should be legal in all cases, without exception. Yet, polls also show that 65 percent of Americans would make most abortions illegal in the second trimester, and 80 percent would make most abortions illegal in the third trimester.

These polls suggest that the majority of Americans will continue to live in states protecting abortion while citizens would support limits like the one in Mississippi. In Virginia, Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) announced an effort to limit abortions to Mississippi’s 15-week standard but expressed a willingness to compromise on that cutoff date. In other words, there may be room for compromise as states work out their own approaches to abortion.

Of course, none of the political or legal realities will likely penetrate the rage and rhetoric following the decision.

Indeed, there is a tendency toward Roe revisionism. Roe supporters ignore that Roe’s constitutional rationale was always controversial, including among some liberals. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, for example, called the ruling “heavy-handed judicial activism” and felt the decision went too far. The original Roe actually died years ago when it was gutted by Casey in 1992 in its logic and tests. It was later the subject of 5-4 decisions that created a confusing muddle of what constituted “undue burdens.”

Such revisionism is a natural part of grieving. In Shakespeare’s “Richard III,”the Queen Mother was asked how to deal with the hate of loss. She responds: “Think that thy babes were sweeter than they were; And he that slew them fouler than he is.” The same is true of Roe revisionism. Roe is now presented as inviolate and beyond question in its constitutional footing, while the opinion that slew it is presented as threatening every right secured since 1973.

Our post-Roe world will not be written by Congress with the proposed federalization of Roe or another 50 years of conflicting court decisions. Instead, it will rest with citizens in 50 different states in coming years. The process just might surprise us.

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. Follow him on Twitter @JonathanTurley.

Source: TEST FEED1

June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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We see it firsthand: red flag laws save lives

The Senate has reached an agreement on a bill to include support for the passage and implementation of red flag laws, properly known as extreme risk protection order (ERPO) laws, in states across the country. As a psychiatrist and an emergency physician in California, we are breathing sighs of relief. These orders fill a gap in our existing system – and when one of our patients falls through that gap, the consequences can be lethal. 

These civil orders are designed to prevent access to firearms by someone at imminent risk of harming themselves or others. They don’t require that a crime has been committed, or any mental health evaluation. If a judge determines a person to be at substantial risk of causing harm, their guns and ammunition can be temporarily removed, and new purchases can be blocked. 

Why isn’t this addressed by our current system? In most cases of mass shootings, the threats preceding them don’t constitute a crime, much less one that would result in a firearms prohibition. And though it seems incomprehensible that someone with excellent mental health would kill schoolchildren, most people who commit mass shootings don’t do so because of a psychiatric disorder. This gap between the criminal justice system and the mental health system often means that angry young men with violent revenge fantasies, white supremacist ideologies, or hatred for women can legally purchase semiautomatic weapons and all the ammunition they want. 

Most of these shooters do, however, exhibit warning signs, and nearly one-third of public mass violence is explicitly threatened before it happens. Persons considering suicide often exhibit warning signs, too. This is where extreme risk protection orders can fill the gap. 

In our practice, we see this often. Here’s a hypothetical case that reflects our real experience. A man comes into our ED with alcohol on his breath, saying that he wants to die and take other people with him. We put him on a psychiatric hold to evaluate his mental health. We hear about his recent divorce, the loss of his job where he hates his coworkers, his difficult relationship with his child, and the guns he has at home. We determine he is at risk of harming himself and potentially others in his life. But, when he wakes up in the ED the next morning, he claims his suicidal thoughts were just due to the alcohol, and that he is fine now. 

Alcohol abuse is not a mental illness for which we can hospitalize someone against their will, and he has not committed a crime. Without the option of an extreme risk protection order, we have to let this man go home to his guns, his alcohol, and his rage, fully aware of the harm he might soon cause.   

Situations like these are why we helped to get an ERPO bill passed in California. That law emerged, in part, due to a knowledge that psychiatry and emergency medicine share with law enforcement – there are dangerous people who make known their intentions to commit violence or attempt suicide, but for whom, absent ERPOs, nothing can be done to separate them from the means to convert intention into action.  

The law that came into being has filled that gap in California and provided a model for legislation in 16 additional states. Due process requirements are observed every step of the way. Now, when we encounter a patient like the one we describe above, we can work to have a petition submitted and, if a judge approves it, help ensure that he won’t harm himself or anyone else.   

Our research shows that ERPOs have been used to intervene in many cases where mass violence was threatened or planned, and none of those threatened incidents has occurred. Other studies (see here and here) have shown that, in cases of threatened suicide, a life is saved for every 10 to 20 orders issued. That is a highly effective treatment for a potentially fatal condition. 

As physicians, we have many tools available to save lives. Extreme risk protection orders are one we wish were widely available to protect our patients and people beyond the emergency department who are in danger. 

Amy Barnhorst, MD is an emergency psychiatrist and the director of the BulletPoints Project. Garen Wintemute, MD, MPH, is an emergency medicine physician and the director of the California Center for Firearm Violence Prevention at UC Davis.

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June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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‘Victimless rights’ at risk? How the court’s Roe ruling will affect your privacy

Following the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade and empowering states to abolish, regulate or allow the right of pregnant women to choose abortion, many abortion rights advocates have expressed fear that other relatively new rights — what might be termed “victimless rights” — will now be in danger. These endangered rights include birth control, gay marriage and even interracial marriage.

It is clear that opponents of these rights — perhaps including Justice Clarence Thomas, who indicated a possible interest in overturning other privacy precedents — may seek to have them overruled based on the “logic” of the court’s majority overturning Roe. Yet it is questionable whether they would succeed. They certainly shouldn’t. 

It is true that all of these rights are based, at least in part, on the same constitutionally unenumerated right of privacy on which Roe depended, but there is a considerable difference between them — a difference that should give the justices considerable pause before they slide down a slippery slope toward diminishing the fundamental right to be “let alone,” which Louis Brandeis characterized as our “most important” liberty some two decades before he became a Supreme Court justice in 1916.

The difference is that the right to use birth control or to marry whomever one loves does not clash with any other rights. No one is hurt when a couple seeks to prevent conception, when a man and woman of different races choose to marry, or when men and women have sex with someone of their own gender. These acts are simply nobody else’s business. Their right to be let alone does not conflict with any other legitimate right or interest, even for those who might be morally or religiously opposed to such alleged “sins” committed by those who don’t believe they are sinful.

Abortion is different, at least to those who regard the fetus as human life deserving of protection by the state. Even for many who do not hold such views (and I count myself among them), the act of aborting a fetus, particularly one that is several months old, is not like removing an appendix or tonsils. 

A fetus is a “something,” not a “nothing,” even to those of us who believe a woman has the right not to carry it to term and birth it. An infected appendix, in contrast, is a nothing, not worthy of a moment’s reflection; no one ever regretted or had moral qualms about removing an appendix. Yet some advocates of abortion have equated a fetus to an infected appendix. Florynce Kennedy, a pioneer in litigating abortion cases (and a friend of mine, until her death in 2000), declared during the runup to the court’s Roe decision in 1973: “There is no need for any legislation on abortion, just as there is no need for legislation on an appendectomy.”

This analogy, and others like it, are common among abortion advocates — but it does not reflect the view of most Americans. Nor does it reflect the views of most justices who have voted in favor of a woman’s right to choose to abort a fetus at some point in a pregnancy. It is a mistake, both tactically and morally, to ignore the difference between a fetus and an appendix. 

The case for abortion must take into account the widespread belief that ending the life of a fetus, especially after a few months, involves a clash of rights and interests — a clash that should be resolved in favor of the pregnant woman, in my view, but one that is not without countervailing rights and interests. Similarly, failure to recognize the difference between abortion and gay rights will increase the likelihood that those who want to overrule the latter will gain strength from the false comparison. 

The extremes on both sides — those who believe that a fetus is no different than a live human being, and those who believe that it is no different than an appendix — seem to agree that with Roe now overturned, it is only logical that other privacy rights, such as those involving contraception or marriage, will be overruled as well. 

Both are wrong. 

Courts understandably are more reluctant to overrule rights that in no way impinge on other rights than they are to act if they believe that by overruling one alleged right (abortion) they may be vindicating another (the so-called right to life). Accordingly, the case for overruling conception and marriage rights is even weaker than the court majority’s weak (at least in my view) case for overruling the half-century-old precedent of Roe.

Indeed, despite the false or exaggerated claims by both sides of the abortion-rights divide, the court’s ruling in this case will not by itself make abortion illegal nationwide. It simply states, in effect, that there is no constitutional or federal right to have an abortion — at least until Congress acts to legislate such a right, a prospect which seems unlikely at present. Thus, the ruling’s effect will be to return that decision to each of the 50 states; some undoubtedly will (or already do) restrict or ban it, and some undoubtedly will seek to protect or expand that right. 

My prediction, therefore, is that the court’s overturning of Roe will not necessarily result in the overruling of privacy rights that pose no conflict with other rights or legitimate interests. Only the false “logic” of the extremes on both sides — those who believe that a fetus is a person, and those who believe it is no more significant than an appendix —would compel the same result in these very different cases.

Alan Dershowitz, professor emeritus for Harvard Law School, is the author of numerous books, including “The Case Against the New Censorship,” and “The Case for Color-Blind Equality in an Age of Identity Politics.” He is also the host of The Dershow on Rumble. Follow him on Twitter @AlanDersh.

Source: TEST FEED1

June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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Maher on SCOTUS rulings: ‘If you're keeping score at home, it's Guns: 1, Women: Nothing'

HBO host Bill Maher quipped on Friday after the Supreme Court issued several major decisions this week that “if you’re keeping score at home, it’s guns: 1, women: nothing.” 

The high court issued several key rulings this week, including the biggest one of its term on Friday when it eliminated the constitutional right to an abortion, overturning a 50-year precedent. 

The Supreme Court also invalidated legislation passed in New York that had restricted the ability to be issued a permit to conceal carry in public, arguing that the law’s requirement that people needed to show beyond solely self-defense why they needed a permit stopped “law-abiding citizens with ordinary self-defense needs from exercising their right to keep and bear arms.” 

“Well, if you’re keeping score at home, it’s guns: 1, women: nothing because they also – it’s funny – on the very week, very day I think where the Congress finally passed I think the first gun control law in 30 years, well the Supreme Court said ‘Hold my beer,’” Maher quipped on “Real Time with Bill Maher.”

“‘Cause they struck down a New York law about carrying guns, you know, on your body when you leave the house, so everyone now can be strapped at all times in public. Wow, well welcome to right-wing America, where if you want to end a young life, you have to shoot them,” he added. 

Maher quipped that even though the House select committee investigating the Capitol rioting had held its latest hearings – including one that demonstrated former President Trump’s role in pressuring the Justice Department to investigate baseless allegations of voter fraud and back his claims – the HBO host claimed “that’s not even the worst news we had.”

Maher’s comments come as Congress this week passed a bipartisan gun safety bill in the wake of the several high-profile shootings, a major feat given increasingly partisan gridlock between lawmakers, especially ahead of a midterm cycle.

President Biden is expected to sign that legislation into law on Saturday morning. 

Source: TEST FEED1

June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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The best winery in every state, according to Yelp

(NEXSTAR) – Much like a fine wine, the average American’s taste in drinking establishments only deepens, intensifies, and becomes more refined over time.

In your earlier years, for example, you might have been content to swig drinks at a local dive bar, or chug beers that were brewed in a stranger’s bathtub. But these days, you prefer to do any swigging or chugging at a fancy winery, like a respectable human being.

With that in mind, the analysts at Yelp have sorted through the platform’s databases to identify the top-rated wineries in each state. The results, based on Yelp’s own user-generated reviews and ratings, are listed below.

It should be noted that Yelp’s findings are also based on the “total volume” of reviews for each establishment, which means that newer wineries with fewer reviews could be underrepresented on the list. But on a positive note, Yelp worked to exclude any establishment with a failing health grade, so it’s very likely that none of the wines from the country’s top-rated vineyards were fermented in a stranger’s bathtub.

Without further ado, the top-rated wineries in the country — as determined the Yelp community — are listed below.

More of a beer drinker? Have a look at the country’s most popular breweries, as determined by Yelp’s community of reviewers.

Source: TEST FEED1

June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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Biden signs bipartisan gun safety bill into law

President Biden on Saturday signed into law the most wide-ranging gun violence prevention bill that Congress has passed in nearly 30 years.

Biden signed the bipartisan gun safety bill, which was drafted in the wake of the deadly mass shootings in Uvalde, Texas, and Buffalo, N.Y., the day after it cleared the House in a 234-193 vote. Fourteen Republicans voted with Democrats in supporting the measure.

The House took up the bill hours after the Senate approved it in a 65-33 vote on Thursday night. Fifteen Republicans, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.), joined all Democrats in supporting the measure in the upper chamber.

The bill, known as the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, enhances background checks for gun purchasers between the age of 18 and 21, makes obtaining firearms through straw purchases or trafficking a federal offense and clarifies the definition of a federally licensed firearm dealer.

It allocates $750 million to help states administer red flag laws, which seek to keep guns away from people deemed a threat to themselves or others, and other intervention programs, and it includes funding for mental health treatment.

Additionally, it closes the so-called boyfriend loophole by barring individuals from possessing a firearm for at least five years if they are convicted of a misdemeanor crime of violence involving a current or former romantic partner. It extends the law that previously only applied to abuse against spouses, a person they share a child with or a cohabitating partner.

The president’s bill signing comes just an hour before he is set to leave the White House for the Group of Seven summit in Germany.

Biden largely waited on the sidelines for a bipartisan group of senators to finalize the bill and had left it up to Capitol Hill to come to an agreement. He has called on Congress to pass some form of gun control legislation since he took office, specifically to reinstate an assault weapon ban that expired in 2004, which he helped pass as a senator. 

Biden ran for president in 2020 as an ally to the gun violence prevention movement. Earlier this week, he said Congress for too long has failed to make progress on gun violence.

He was vice president when a gunman killed 26 people at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., in 2012. At the time, Congress failed to pass stronger gun laws, which would have expanded background checks and instituted an assault weapons ban.

On Thursday, the president condemned the Supreme Court ruling that struck down a New York state law that made it difficult to obtain a permit to carry a handgun outside the home, saying that more must be done to protect Americans in the wake of the Uvalde and Buffalo mass shootings.

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June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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Warren, Smith following SCOTUS abortion ruling: ‘We need action, and we need it now’

Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Tina Smith (D-Minn.) on Saturday urged for President Biden to take action after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade the day prior, writing in an op-ed: “We need action, and we need it now.”

“On Friday, with the release of the Dobbs decision, we entered a perilous time that threatens millions of women across this nation,” the senators wrote in an op-ed published Saturday in The New York Times.

“We urge the president to declare a public health emergency to protect abortion access for all Americans, unlocking critical resources and authority that states and the federal government can use to meet the surge in demand for reproductive health services,” they continued. “The danger is real, and Democrats must meet it with the urgency it deserves.”

The two Democrats also pointed to a letter they had issued earlier this month as a part of group of more than 20 senators who urged the White House to take executive action to protect abortion rights, listing several ways Biden could do so as the nation waited for a decision from the high court that would ultimately decide the fate of the 1973 landmark ruling. 

“The Supreme Court has spoken: Roe is gone. But the Supreme Court doesn’t get the final say on abortion. The American people will have the last word through their representatives in Congress and the White House,” they wrote.

The senators also urged voters to press candidates on their stances over reproductive rights and for their commitment to changing the 60-vote legislative rule in the Senate ultimately needed to pass most legislation. 

Two moderate Democrats – Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) and Joe Manchin (W.Va.) – have already expressed their opposition over changing the filibuster, however. 

The op-ed comes as the high court ruled on Friday that it would be eliminating the constitutional right to an abortion, overturning a 50-year precedent. 

Biden earlier this month said he was mulling executive action over abortion protections, saying during a taped appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!,” “There’s some executive orders I could employ, we believe. We’re looking at that right now.”

The Hill has reached out to the White House for comment. 

Source: TEST FEED1

June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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Women will thrive in a post-Roe world

The post-Roe era has officially begun now that the U.S. Supreme Court has handed down its much-anticipated opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and upheld Mississippi’s law protecting unborn life. Now that legal and policy decisions on abortion have been returned to the American people, what will it mean for American women?

From working with Mississippi to draft its pro-life law to serving on the Mississippi legal team defending that law at the Supreme Court, my colleagues and I at Alliance Defending Freedom have been privileged to ensure that women and their unborn children are protected and cherished in Mississippi. We stand ready to help other states achieve this aspiration.

And we are confident that American women will thrive in a world without Roe. Nearly 50 years of abortion-on-demand has incalculably harmed women and their families. And now we have the opportunity to right the wrongs that Roe wrought.

A full and frank national discussion of the myths and facts surrounding abortion is long overdue. Truth was one of the first casualties of Roe. To secure and advance their radical agenda, abortion rights proponents repeatedly and brazenly misled Americans. We must advance a comprehensive, life-affirming agenda, while correcting the falsehoods still being peddled by abortion supporters.

Many claim that abortion does not kill a baby, but simply terminates a “clump of cells” or a “potential life.” As the legislative findings supporting Mississippi’s law protecting life after 15 weeks’ gestation recognized, an unborn child’s heart begins beating by six weeks, the child begins to move about in the womb at eight weeks and all of his or her basic physiological functions are present by nine weeks. Anyone who has ever viewed a pregnancy-related ultrasound recognizes its striking images as a living, developing human being.

Abortion rights advocates imply that women are not strong enough or capable enough to manage motherhood and a job, school or other interests. But Americans never fully believed this. In a 2018 Marist poll, 52 percent of respondents acknowledged that in the long run abortion “does more harm than good,” while only 29 percent believed that it improves a woman’s life.

They also argued that American women wanted unrestricted and unregulated access to abortion paid for at taxpayer expense. This bold assertion purposely ignores that many vulnerable women only reluctantly “choose” abortion after the financially incentivized abortion lobby convinces them that abortion is their only choice.

Proponents of abortion tout it as beneficial to women’s health, often hiding evidence that the procedure carries significant physical and psychological risks, and that these medical risks increase as the pregnancy progresses. This lie continues today as these proponents aggressively market dangerous chemical abortions to American women. A 2009 Finnish study revealed that complications were nearly four times more frequent after chemical abortions than surgical abortions.

Rather than abortion, American women need laws that protect them and their families. They need more social and financial support, better access to life-affirming care and the perceived ability to say “yes” to life.

A 2005 study from the pro-abortion rights Guttmacher Institute found that more than 93 percent of abortions were motivated by social and economic concerns. Other studies have placed this number at nearly 97 percent.

The Supreme Court has given state legislatures permission to protect the unborn and promote a culture of life. But this historic decision won’t end the circumstances that drive women to seek abortion. Some women will still fear that abortion is their only option. These women need financial, material and other resources, as well as the unequivocal life-affirming support of American churches and social agencies.

The pro-life community must seize this opportunity to demonstrate that abortion is a false answer to a real difficulty, that choosing life is the answer and that pro-life policies going forward will set the conditions for women and their babies to truly flourish.

Denise Burke is senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom (@ADFLegal), where she is a member of the Center for Legislative Advocacy.

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June 25, 2022 0 Comment admin
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Suspected terror-linked shooting in Oslo kills 2, wounds 10

OSLO, Norway (AP) — A gunman opened fire in Oslo’s night-life district early Saturday, killing two people and leaving 10 seriously wounded in what police are investigating as a possible terrorist attack during the Norwegian capital’s annual Pride festival.

Investigators said the suspect, identified as a 42-year-old Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, was arrested after opening fire at three locations in downtown Oslo.

While the motive was unclear, organizers of Oslo Pride canceled a parade that was set for Saturday as the highlight of a weeklong festival. One of the shootings happened outside the London Pub, a bar popular with the city’s LGBTQ community, just hours before the parade was set to begin.

Police attorney Christian Hatlo said the suspect was being held on suspicion of murder, attempted murder and terrorism, based on the number of people targeted at multiple locations.

“Our overall assessment is that there are grounds to believe that he wanted to cause grave fear in the population,” Hatlo said.

Hatlo said the suspect’s mental health was also being investigated.

“We need to go through his medical history, if he has any. It’s not something that we’re aware of now,” he said.

The shootings happened around 1 a.m. local time, sending panicked revelers fleeing into the streets or trying to hide from the gunman.

Olav Roenneberg, a journalist from Norwegian public broadcaster NRK, said he witnessed the shooting.

“I saw a man arrive at the site with a bag. He picked up a weapon and started shooting,” Roenneberg told NRK. “First I thought it was an air gun. Then the glass of the bar next door was shattered and I understood I had to run for cover.”

Another witness, Marcus Nybakken, 46, said he was alerted to the incident by a commotion in the area.

“When I walked into Cesar’s bar there were a lot of people starting to run and there was a lot of screaming. I thought it was a fight out there, so I pulled out. But then I heard that it was a shooting and that there was someone shooting with a submachine gun,” Nybakken told Norwegian broadcaster TV2.

Police inspector Tore Soldal said two of the shooting victims died and 10 people were being treated for serious injuries, but none of them was believed to be life-threatening.

Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere said in a Facebook post that “the shooting outside London Pub in Oslo tonight was a cruel and deeply shocking attack on innocent people.”

He said that while the motive was unclear, the shooting had caused fear and grief in the LGBTQ community.

“We all stand by you,” Gahr Stoere wrote.

King Harald V also offered condolences and said he and Norway’s royal family were “horrified by the night’s shooting tragedy.”

“We sympathize with all relatives and affected and send warm thoughts to all who are now scared, restless and in grief,” the Norwegian monarch said in a statement. “We must stand together to defend our values: freedom, diversity and respect for each other. We must continue to stand up for all people to feel safe.”

Christian Bredeli, who was at the bar, told Norwegian newspaper VG that he hid on the fourth floor with a group of about 10 people until he was told it was safe to come out.

“Many were fearing for their lives,” he said. “On our way out we saw several injured people, so we understood that something serious had happened.”

Norwegian broadcaster TV2 showed footage of people running down Oslo streets in panic as shots rang out in the background.

Investigators said the suspect was known to police, as well as to Norway’s security police, but not for any major violent crimes. His criminal record included a narcotics offense and a weapons offense for carrying a knife, Hatlo said.

Hatlo said police seized two weapons after the attack: a handgun and an automatic weapon, both of which he described as “not modern” without giving details.

He said the suspect had not made any statement to the police and was in contact with a defense lawyer.

Hatlo said it was too early to say whether the gunman specifically targeted members of the LGBTQ community.

“We have to look closer at that, we don’t know yet,” he said.

Still, police advised organizers of the Pride festival to cancel the parade Saturday.

“Oslo Pride therefore urges everyone who planned to participate or watch the parade to not show up. All events in connection with Oslo Prides are canceled,” organizers said on the official Facebook page of the event.

Inge Alexander Gjestvang, leader of FRI, the Norwegian organisation for sexual and gender diversity, said the shooting has shaken the Nordic country’s gay community.

“It’s tough for the queer movement to experience this,” he was quoted by TV2 as saying. “We encourage everyone to stand together, take care of each other. We’ll be back later, proud, visible but right now it’s not the time for that.”

Norway has a relatively low crime rate but has experienced violent attacks by right-wing extremists, including one of the worst mass shootings in Europe in 2011, when a gunman killed 69 people on the island of Utoya after setting off a bomb in Oslo that left eight dead.

In 2019, another right-wing extremist killed his stepsister and then opened fire in a mosque but was overpowered before anyone there was injured.

___

Karl Ritter in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, and Jari Tanner in Helsinki contributed to this report.

Source: TEST FEED1