In a sensible world, Virginia House of Delegates v. Bethune-Hill would have nothing whatsoever to do with the Affordable Care Act. On its surface, Bethune-Hill is a racial gerrymandering case which, the Supreme Court announced on Tuesday, will be heard by the Court for the second time.
Yet Bethune-Hill also presents a difficult issue regarding when non-parties to a federal lawsuit may appeal lower court decisions to a higher authority. And this technical q...
politics
Ousted Republican faults McCain for losing House
A recently defeated Republican congressman says the late Sen. John McCain's vote against repealing the Affordable Care Act is to blame for the Democratic takeover of the House
Fox News anchor suggests Ocasio-Cortez should sell her clothes to pay for an apartment
A Fox News anchor claimed on Friday that newly-elected U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) cannot really be cash-strapped because she wore nice clothing in a magazine shoot.
There’s only one problem with that — the clothes weren’t hers.
Fox anchor Ed Henry lit into Ocasio-Cortez after the soon-to-be-lawmaker said on Thursday that she’s finding it hard to get an apartment in Washington, D.C. before her term starts in January.
The acting attorney general has a grotesque and incoherent view of the Constitution
In a 2014 interview, the man Donald Trump just picked to run the Department of Justice appeared to claim that Social Security is unconstitutional and that basic labor laws like the minimum wage must be struck down. Yet he also seemed to argue that the Supreme Court should not decide constitutional cases at all.
The interview reveals that Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker is easily taken in by conspiracy theories — he claims he was “quite possibly targeted for my p...
Trump administration finalizes rules allowing employers to stop paying for birth control
The Trump administration announced Wednesday that it has finalized the rollback of an Obama-era rule mandated by the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that required employers to provide contraception coverage for their employees, regardless of whether it conflicts with their moral or religious beliefs.
The new rules, set to take place in about 60 days, will allow employers that object to the use of birth control to stop paying for their workers’ contraception. The change will affect b...
Meet the other 29-year-old woman elected to Congress
Celebratory roundups of female “firsts” elected to the US Congress—including the first two Muslim women, the first two Native American women, and the first Korean-American woman—have been abounding since last night’s e...
Goodbye to all these Trump allies in the House
More than a few of the more moderate members of the Republican House caucus lost their seats in Tuesday’s elections. The narrative according to some is that these moderate losses make the House of Representatives more tied to Trump than ever. And President Trump seemed to further that himself during a press conference on Wednesday, when he blamed the losses in the House on Republicans who distanced themselves from him.
But that’s not the whole story. The 116th Congress w...
These Democrats just flipped key governor seats
Democrats flipped at least seven gubernatorial seats Tuesday, a significant achievement that could help undo years of harmful Republican policy — particularly when it comes to the gerrymandering efforts that help keep GOP politicians in control.
Michigan, Illinois, Kansas, New Mexico, Maine, Wisconsin, and Nevada will have Democratic governors come January 2019. When redistricting begins in 2021, Democratic governors can play an important role in reversing Republican gerrymand...
Scott Walker, longtime foe of public school teachers, loses Wisconsin governor race to former teacher
Tony Evers (D), Wisconsin’s state superintendent of public education and a former teacher, won the governor’s race against incumbent Scott Walker (R). Walker, who has undermined teachers unions and supported the underfunding of public education in the state throughout this career as governor, recently tried to recast himself as a champion for public schools. Voters didn’t buy it.
Walker became governor in 2010, survived a recall effort, and was re-elected in 2014 w...
West Virginia and Alabama voters approve dangerous anti-choice ballot initiatives
Voters in Alabama and West Virginia approved ballot initiatives on Tuesday that will update the state constitutions to declare that abortion rights are not guaranteed, a move that will severely curtail reproductive rights in the states. In Oregon, voters blocked a similar ballot initiative that would have prevented taxpayer dollars from covering abortions for Medicaid beneficiaries and public employees.
Pro-choice and anti-choice advocates in all three states campaigned for weeks pr...