19th century chastity law

Supreme Court abortion case brings 19th century chastity law to the forefront

By Tierney Sneed

References from conservative justices to a long-dormant chastity law during the Supreme Court’s arguments in a major abortion pill case this week are bringing new attention to the 19th century statute, which prohibits the mailing of drugs used for abortions among other “obscene, lewd, lascivious” or “indecent” materials.

The Comstock Act, as the law is known, is not central to the current Supreme Court case. However, comments from Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito showcase how the law is shaping up to be both a flashpoint in the legal battle over abortion and a potential election-year issue for voters.

There are now calls from within the anti-abortion movement for the Comstock Act to be enforced by the next Republican administration to ban the mailing of abortion medication – a move that would not require any action by Congress nor any blessing from the Supreme Court.

But there is uncertainty and disagreement among anti-abortion advocates about what that means. Some prominent figures in the anti-abortion movement dismiss the possibility that it would be used to effectively ban medication abortion, which depends on the shipment of abortion drugs to providers, even as other abortion foes have said the law – interpreted to its fullest extent – could potentially end not only medication abortion, but abortion altogether.

Abortion rights supporters argue that their opponents are over reading the law and are ringing alarm bells, as at least some justices on the Supreme Court appear to be entertaining a maximalist interpretation of the law’s reach.

Alito wrote the court’s opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, while Thomas is seen as a judicial pioneer in his success in bringing into the legal mainstream views previously seen as fringe. Their interest in the law’s relevance to Tuesday’s case speaks to how the Comstock Act has taken a more prominent role in the efforts to further limit abortion.

“Overturning a constitutional right to privacy that extends to abortion – as reflected in Roe v. Wade – is not their stopping point … they will do anything, even if that is seeking to resuscitate a 19th century statute that was passed before women had the right to vote,” said Skye Perryman, the president and CEO Democracy Forward Foundation.

Comstock and the current case against the FDA

The Comstock Act was first enacted by Congress in 1873 to ban the use of the mail to transport a wide range of “lewd” materials, including pornography, birth control, and drugs or other instruments used for abortion. There were some prosecutions under the law in the initial decades after it was passed, but courts in the early 19th century whittled down its scope, and enforcement of it stopped altogether while Roe v. Wade – the 1973 abortion rights precedent that the Supreme Court overturned in 2022 – was on the books.

The Comstock Act has so far played only a cameo role in the case heard by the Supreme Court on Tuesday, which concerned the federal government’s regulatory approach to mifepristone, one of the two drugs used in medication abortion. The justices are considering a challenge to the changes the US Food and Drug Administration made to mifepristone’s rules that made it easier to obtain – including the FDA’s 2021 move that allowed the drug to be sent to patients in the mail without an in-person doctor’s visit.

(The challengers also argued that mifepristone should be pulled from the market altogether; while a trial judge agreed with them, an appeals court reversed that aspect of the judge’s ruling.)

Among other arguments, the case’s plaintiffs, anti-abortion doctors and medical associations, have invoked the Comstock Act to argue the FDA acted unlawfully by not considering the 19th century criminal prohibition on mailing abortion drugs.

Alito pressed US Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, who was defending the FDA, on those arguments on Tuesday. Referencing the law by its US code number (18 U.S.C. 1461) rather than by its colloquial name, Alito said Comstock was a “prominent provision” and not an “obscure section of a complicated obscure law.”

The Biden administration contends the Comstock Act is not relevant to the current dispute over the drug’s medical regulations, because it is not the FDA’s job to interpret and enforce a criminal statute.

“It’s very clear that the only thing FDA can take into account for restrictions are safety and efficacy concerns in deciding whether to maintain a REMS program,” Prelogar said Tuesday, referring to the types of restrictions that are currently on mifepristone’s use.

Thomas also invoked the statute, asking a lawyer for the mifepristone manufacturer how she would respond to the argument that “mailing your product and advertising it would violate the Comstock Act.”

Other justices on the court did not show interest in digging into the Comstock Act’s significance or many of the other legal questions the case presents. Instead, there appeared to be a majority willing to toss the case because the challengers have failed to show standing, i.e. the type of harm that would warrant judicial action.

But much attention will be paid to any commentary about the statute, even if just in a dissent, when the Supreme Court issues its ruling in the case in the coming months.

“We could well see Comstock referenced in the court’s ultimate decision, either with respect to the outcome of this case, or a broader signaling of how some of the justices believe this Comstock Act could be used to strip away our right to abortion nationwide altogether,” said Julia Kaye, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU reproductive freedom project, on a press call after the arguments.

Comstock’s enforcement in the future

With the Supreme Court unlikely to reach any conclusions about the law’s reach in the case it heard Tuesday, the candidate who wins the presidency in 2024 could decide whether the Comstock Act will take on new life.

The Justice Department under President Joe Biden has issued internal legal guidance asserting that the Comstock Act’s prohibitions do not apply to drugs used for lawful abortions. The DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel opinion – which is binding across the federal government but is not controlling in court – points to court rulings from the early 20th century.

But some legal experts believe that if the DOJ position was reversed under a Republican administration – and the law was interpreted to apply to drugs used in both lawful and unlawful abortions – it could be enforced in a way that would hamstring and potentially end the provision of medication abortion nationwide, because drug manufacturers and distributors would not be permitted to ship abortion pills through the supply chain.

Access to clinical abortion could also be effectively ended, some believe, under an extreme reading of the law, if the Comstock Act was used to prohibit the shipment of tools and instruments used for abortions to abortion providers.

A policy agenda assembled by the Heritage Foundation, an influential conservative think tank, has called for the law to be enforced, but is sparse on the details as to what ends.

Roger Severino, the Heritage Foundation’s vice president of domestic policy, rejected the idea that a future administration would use the law in a way that would make abortion, or even medication abortion, unavailable in states where it is legal.

“The Comstock Act’s implications have been overblown by the pro-abortion side,” said Severino, who previously served in the Trump administration as a top official at the Department of Health and Human Services.

Severino described to CNN a scenario in which misoprostol – the other drug used for medication abortion – would still be accessible to women seeking abortion in states where abortion is legal, since misoprostol also has non-abortion uses.

Some in the anti-abortion movement, including advocates who asked for anonymity to speak candidly to CNN, are wary of a political backlash if the Comstock Act is enforced too aggressively – a backlash that would put pressure on Congress to repeal it altogether – and caution that former President Donald Trump, if he is reelected, should consider the political risks in deciding how his administration should wield the law.

The Trump campaign has avoided publicly weighing in on the Comstock Act or even the related question of how abortion pills would be regulated if he returned to the White House.

People close to Trump told CNN they acknowledge the complexity of the issue, as well as that many leading anti-abortion groups have different opinions on how to approach the legal fight.

The political ramifications of the Supreme Court’s ultimate decision in the current FDA case is also at the forefront of how they approach the subject. As of now, Trump has been “in listening mode,” one of the sources said, and is being advised by several of his top anti-abortion allies on the different angles of the case.

Where are you?

 

South China Sea naval patrols

US, Japan, Philippines plan joint South China Sea naval patrols

The collective show of maritime force against China will be a centerpiece of next month’s trilateral summit in Washington.

By PHELIM KINE, ALEXANDER WARD and LARA SELIGMAN

The U.S., Japan and the Philippines will launch joint naval patrols in the South China Sea later this year, according to a U.S. official and a foreign diplomat familiar with the planning. It’s a major move to counter China in the region — and one likely to elicit a strong response from Beijing.

The three-country naval maneuvers are part of a package of initiatives that President Joe Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. will unveil at their first-ever trilateral summit next month, the official and the diplomat said.

The White House is also expected to announce that it will “seriously consider” having Japan as a technological partner in elements of the “AUKUS” security partnership between the U.S., U.K. and Australia, according to a Defense Department official and another person familiar with the planning, both granted anonymity to speak ahead of an announcement.

The April 11 trilateral summit is seen as key to cementing efforts by the three countries to counter China’s regional influence. White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement last week that the three leaders will discuss ways to “further peace and security in the Indo-Pacific,” but did not provide further details.

The South China Sea has become increasingly tense in recent years as China has used its military might to lay claim to waters internationally recognized as belonging to the Philippines — establishing bases and harassing Philippine Coast Guard units. There are rising concerns in Washington that Beijing and Manila could tip into open conflict. Beijing could also use those military outposts to support a blockade or invasion of Taiwan in coming years.

The joint naval patrols will mark the most robust assertion of the Biden administration’s Indo-Pacific Strategy hinged to rallying allies and partners to offset China’s growing economic, diplomatic and military footprint in the region.

While the U.S. and the Philippines have conducted joint patrols previously, this will be the first time Japan’s navy has joined with them in doing so — a show of force designed to show Beijing its belligerence won’t be tolerated. Japan’s involvement also reflects the Kishida government’s moves to make Tokyo a bigger player in regional security alongside the U.S. that began with his announcement in 2022 of a doubling of the country’s defense budget within five years.

The National Security Council, DOD and the Japanese embassy in Washington declined to comment. The Philippine embassy didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The joint operations also raise the risk of possible confrontations with Chinese forces operating in the region. Beijing has already ignored repeated warnings from the Biden administration that the U.S.-Philippine Mutual Defense Treaty obligates the U.S. to intervene if Philippine forces come under armed attack.

In recent months, Chinese vessels have on multiple occasions deployed water cannons against Philippine Coast Guard vessels, injuring Filipino sailors.

Chinese forces “will continue to take resolute steps to safeguard its territorial interests,” China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said Monday. Marcos warned on Thursday that his government would respond with a “countermeasure package” aimed to deter “aggressive and dangerous attacks” by China in the South China Sea.

It is not clear how soon the Japan-U.S.-Philippines patrols will start. The three militaries have been laying the groundwork for joint patrols already — they began holding joint maritime training exercises in the region in June.

Court to deliver the unsettling news

Does “And” Really Mean “And”? Not Always, the Supreme Court Rules.

As a result, thousands of people will serve longer prison terms.

DANIEL KING

Just when you thought “and” meant “and,” and “or” meant “or,” along comes the Supreme Court to deliver the unsettling news: Your grammar is all wrong.

This historic toppling of words’ ordinary meaning comes from a recent ruling in which the court dashed the hopes of thousands of criminal defendants seeking reduced prison time. A majority of the justices found that the word “and”—at least as it’s written in a key section of a landmark law aimed at reducing mass incarceration—doesn’t mean what “and” usually means.

For anyone who isn’t a legal scholar, a copy editor, or an obsessive grammar nut, the debate here can be tough to follow. At issue was whether “and” in a provision of the Trump-era First Step Act was intentionally or mistakenly written to conjoin requirements for eligibility. For thousands of defendants, relief from mandatory minimum sentencing rested on whether “and” should be read as combining the set of conditions after the words “does not have.” In the puzzling provision, a defendant is eligible for relief if:

the defendant does not have—

(A) more than 4 criminal history points…;

(B) a prior 3-point offense…; and

(C) a prior 2-point violent offense…

(“Points” refers to the system of sentencing based on points assigned to various types of crimes.)

As I reported last year, lower courts were sharply divided on the vital question of whether “and” bundles the conditions—as in, you don’t have (A), don’t have (B), and don’t have (C)—which would mean a defendant who lacked any one of these conditions would be eligible for relief. The alternative reading, advocated by the Justice Department, holds that “and” really means “or”—that a defendant who met even one of the conditions would not be eligible for relief. In its 6–3 decision, the court sided with the DOJ’s interpretation, dramatically narrowing the scope of the law. The implications are profound: More than 10,000 people imprisoned since the law took effect will lose the chance to have their sentences reduced, and thousands more will face stiffer sentencing in the future.

So how did the justices reach this conclusion?

Taken at face value, the petitioner’s reading seemed obvious: He was eligible for relief because he didn’t meet all three conditions bundled by “and.” But the court’s majority disagreed, saying that any of the conditions satisfies the “does not” test because the law’s calculations would be incoherent otherwise. Someone with both the 3-point offense from (B) and the 2-point offense from (C) would have at least 5 points and automatically exceed the 4 points in (A), making (A) extraneous. To give (A) meaning, the court said “and” has to function as “or.” The ordinary meaning of “and” would so disjoint the law mathematically that the court ruled from context, not just text.

The court also found unpersuasive the ordinary-meaning argument that “and” is always conjunctive after a negative, like “Don’t drink and drive” means you could maybe do either but can’t do both. Writing for the majority, Justice Elena Kagan brushed that example aside. “For every negative statement [the petitioner] offers up, another cuts the opposite way,” she noted, citing a counterexample: “If someone says ‘I’m not free on Saturday and Sunday’…he most likely means ‘I’m not free on Saturday and I’m not free on Sunday’; he is not saying that although he cannot go away for a full weekend, he can make plans on one of those days.”

“Similarly,” Kagan added, “if a person says, ‘I didn’t like his mother and father,’ he probably means ‘I didn’t like his mother and I didn’t like his father’—not that he didn’t like the two in combination.”

Kagan’s and the petitioner’s counterexamples are each coherent, but they’re opposites, demonstrating that “and” serves either purpose. So much for shared meaning.

What’s a court to do when the tools of grammar don’t solve grammar? Argue over something else: the definition of “ambiguous.” Not only did the text divide the court, but even the question of whether the text is ambiguous divided the court. When a law is ambiguous, the rule of “lenity” often compels courts to favor defendants. That didn’t happen here because the court found the law un-ambiguous; it said the mere existence of a textual dispute—even among highly trained federal judges on multiple courts—is not proof of ambiguity: “Although there are two grammatically permissible readings…in context its text is susceptible of only one possible construction,” Kagan asserted. “That leaves no role for lenity to play.”

Ouch. The majority justices not only flunked the dissenting justices in grammar, but said they’re wrong to think there’s even a debate. Justice Neil Gorsuch did not take kindly to the scold. In his dissent, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, Gorsuch defended the ordinary meaning of “and” and ripped the “gymnastics” required to turn it into “or.” He criticized the majority for claiming to care about context but crushing the chances of nonviolent defendants seeking relief, people for whom the First Step Act was presumably intended but now, thanks to Kagan and her colleagues, “offers no hope.”

“Nor, it seems, is there any rule of statutory interpretation the government won’t set aside to reach that result,” Gorsuch lamented. “Ordinary meaning is its first victim.”

“I think Justice Gorsuch’s dissent really nails it,” professor Erica Zunkel of the University of Chicago Law School tells me, noting that the dissenters’ view aligns with how conservative theorists tend to argue the law should be interpreted. “The Federalist Society often complains of progressive activist judges who insert their policy preferences for what the law says—seems an apt criticism of what the majority did” in this case.

A striking aspect of the decision is that it did not split along ideological lines. Kagan, a liberal Obama appointee, joined five conservative justices and wrote the majority opinion. Gorsuch, who is generally viewed as the most conservative Trump appointee, joined two liberals and wrote the dissent. The rise of textualism—the theory of interpretation that aims to understand what Congress’ words mean, as opposed to what Congress probably intended to say—has “led some conservative justices to liberal outcomes in recent cases,” says professor Adam Davidson of the University of Chicago.

Even before this ruling, it was widely accepted for courts to correct drafting errors in laws, known as scrivner’s errors, when mistakes were obvious. But the bar was purposefully high to do so because the risk of courts rewriting laws rather than fixing mere technical mistakes is tremendous. That would constitute a staggering judicial overreach, especially in a criminal context.

That bar just got lower.

It is now conceivable that courts will wade more deeply into policy disputes by citing this case to argue that courts are compelled to find and fix perceived errors of logic in ways that run counter to laws’ ordinary meaning.

Beyond the grammar implications, this is the first time a Supreme Court opinion has cited a survey of Americans to inform its interpretation of a statute’s ordinary meaning. In his dissent, Gorsuch referred to a study showing how readers tend to understand “does not have A, B, and C” a certain way: does not have the full set of items. Georgetown law professor Kevin Tobia tells me that while surveys have played a role in other contexts, such as trademark law, “in statutory interpretation this is new.”

“If the Court is interested to learn how an ‘ordinary speaker’ understands language, carefully constructed surveys are useful, and after [this ruling] I expect to see more surveys in briefs,” Tobia says. 

He recalls Chief Justice John Roberts asking in oral arguments of another case: “The most probably useful way of settling all these questions would be to take a poll of 100 ordinary speakers of English and ask them what [the statute] means, right?” Justice Samuel Alito suggested similarly that “perhaps someday it will be possible to evaluate these [linguistic] canons by conducting…an analysis of how particular combinations of words are used in a vast database of English prose.” 

This month’s ruling dealt a blow to the First Step Act, but Congress can pass a new law shoring it up. Sens. Dick Durbin and Chuck Grassley have introduced a bipartisan bill to do so. But any new legislation will incur the same grammatical scrutiny. Stanford law professor Jeff Fisher says oral arguments these days “can seem like being in a sixth grade English class.”

Or first grade. Kagan’s opinion cites the children’s book The Very Hungry Caterpillar for a grammar lesson: “On Saturday, [the caterpillar] ate through one piece of chocolate cake, one ice cream cone, one pickle, one slice of Swiss cheese, one slice of salami, one lollipop, one piece of cherry pie, one sausage, one cupcake and one slice of watermelon.” Like “does not have” in her interpretation of the First Step Act, the words “ate through” apply “independently and equivalently to each of the ten foodstuffs that follow,” Kagan writes.

Gorsuch has a response to this, too. “As the story goes, the caterpillar is in the process of becoming a butterfly,” he reminds us. “So suppose the story said the caterpillar ‘will remain a caterpillar if he does not eat (A) one sausage, (B) one cupcake, and (C) one slice of watermelon.'”

“I suspect most ordinary readers (and children) would have little trouble concluding that the sentence means that the caterpillar will remain a caterpillar unless he eats all three things,” Gorsuch explains. “One alone will not do.”

ANAL 4 RFK

Pranksters fill Kennedy campaign calendar with hilarious erotic events

'Anal for RFK' and 'Dramatic reading of RFK Jr’s sex diary' were among the events listed on the presidential candidate's website

By Alec Regimbal

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s campaign website lists several “community events” created by supporters of the independent presidential candidate. A meet-and-greet dinner is scheduled for March 28 in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, as is another event for volunteers in Seattle. 

But for a short time Wednesday evening, the calendar listed several atypical events for a presidential candidate. And that’s putting it politely.

A “dramatic reading” of Kennedy’s “sex diary” was scheduled to be held in Intercourse, Pennsylvania (that’s a real place), on March 30. A “sex orgy” with Kennedy and his new running mate, Bay Area attorney Nicole Shanahan, who joined the ticket Tuesday, was scheduled for March 28 in Los Angeles.

Other events included “ANAL 4 RFK,” “RFK Jr’s family considers him an Embarrassment,” “Annual Skullf—k of my Uncle in memory of Jeff” and “RFK Jr. dies a gruesome death.” That last event was scheduled to be held on Halloween.

It’s a cautionary tale for politicians running for office in the digital age. It’s clear that before Thursday, when all the erotic events had disappeared from the calendar, the website allowed users to create their own events without any vetting, and online pranksters took advantage.

It’s reminiscent of the time Intercept reporter Ken Klippenstein tricked several prominent Republicans, including Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, into retweeting a military portrait of John F. Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald on Memorial Day in 2021 after telling them that the man in the picture was his grandfather.

Klippenstein also tricked former Bill Clinton adviser Naomi Wolf into retweeting a fake-anti vaccine quote attributed to a doctor named John Sims. The man pictured with the quote, dressed in medical garb, is a porn star who uses the stage name “Johnny Sins.”

But perhaps the most successful online political trolling came from TikTok users in 2020.

That year, hundreds of users RSVP’d for a Donald Trump rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, leading the former president to brag about how many people had asked for tickets. But many of those who requested tickets didn’t actually show up. The New York Times reported that the city’s fire marshal scanned 6,200 tickets for the rally, held in an arena that was capable of seating 19,000.

With a running mate now in tow, Kennedy has officially entered the dog days of the campaign season. He’s off to a rough start. 

Who do you blame....?

War looms for Europe, warns Poland’s Donald Tusk

“I don’t want to scare anyone, but war is no longer a concept from the past,” said Polish prime minister.

BY CLAUDIA CHIAPPA

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk warned that Europe is in a “pre-war era” but still has a “long way to go” before it's ready to face the threat ahead.

“I don't want to scare anyone, but war is no longer a concept from the past,” Tusk said in an interview with several European media outlets. "It is real, in fact it already started more than two years ago."

Tusk said what’s most worrying right now is that “literally any scenario is possible," adding that Europe has not faced a situation like this since 1945.

“I know it sounds devastating, especially to people of the younger generation, but we have to mentally get used to the arrival of a new era,” he said. “The pre-war era. I don’t exaggerate. This is becoming more and more apparent every day."

Amid Russia’s ongoing full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which started in February 2022, Western allies and top military officials have become increasingly worried about a potential spillover of violence — despite Russian President Vladimir Putin repeatedly denying any intentions to attack NATO.

Last week, a Russian missile entered Polish airspace, prompting Warsaw  to activate F-16 fighter jets, in what Tusk called a “troubling incident.”

But while tumult is on the horizon, Tusk warned that Europe is not ready to face the threat.

“We must be ready. Europe still has a long way to go,” he said. The first step is for countries to meet NATO’s target of spending 2 percent of their GDP on defense, he added.

"Today we have to spend as much as we can to buy equipment and ammunition for Ukraine, because we are living in the most critical moment since the end of the Second World War," he said. "The next two years will decide everything. If we cannot support Ukraine with enough equipment and ammunition, if Ukraine loses, no one in Europe will be able to feel safe."

At the same time, Tusk welcomed the attitude adjustment that has prompted some European leaders, including French President Emmanuel Macron, to ring the alarm bell more loudly.

“When I was prime minister for the first time [2007-2011], nobody except ... Baltic states paid any attention to my warnings that Russia could be a threat,” he said. “Now, without particular satisfaction, I observe the changes that are taking place in all capitals in Europe.”

With U.S. presidential elections coming up at the end of the year, European leaders have grown increasingly concerned over the likelihood of another Donald Trump presidency, fearful he would withdraw from NATO and obstruct further assistance to Kyiv. But to Tusk, Europe's role remains unchanged no matter who's next in the White House.

"Whether [U.S. President] Joe Biden or Donald Trump wins the next election, it is Europe that needs to do more when it comes to defense," Tusk said.

Vetoes marijuana market bill

Virginia governor vetoes marijuana market bill

“The proposed legalization of retail marijuana in the Commonwealth endangers Virginians’ health and safety,” Gov. Glenn Youngkin said in his veto statement.

By MONA ZHANG

A push to establish a legal marijuana market in Virginia is officially dead after Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed legislation on Thursday.

Virginia has allowed adults over 21 to possess and cultivate cannabis at home since the Legislature passed legalization legislation in 2021. But the law required another vote to implement commercial sales, which failed after Republicans won the House of Delegates later that year.

“The proposed legalization of retail marijuana in the Commonwealth endangers Virginians’ health and safety,” Youngkin said in his veto statement. “It also does not eliminate the illegal black-market sale of cannabis, nor guarantee product safety.”

The context: Pro-legalization advocates were hopeful that a marijuana regulation bill could make it to the finish line this year after Democrats won back the House of Delegates last November.

While Youngkin has historically opposed efforts to liberalize marijuana laws, the marijuana sales bill was poised to be used as a bargaining chip by Democrats in budget negotiations over one of Youngkin’s top priorities: A $2 billion stadium deal to bring the Washington Capitals and Wizards to Northern Virginia.

But earlier this month, the final budget enacted by Virginia’s Legislature did not contain funding for the “Glenn Dome,” as Democratic Senate Finance and Appropriations Chair Sen. Louise Lucas dubbed the project.

Pro-legalization advocates still believed they had a chance to negotiate with the governor ahead of the Legislature’s April 17 veto session. But on Wednesday, the city of Alexandria said a proposal to develop the arena there “ will not move forward.”

Democratic Del. Paul Krizek, the lead sponsor of the weed marketplace bill, blasted the governor’s veto.

“Governor Youngkin’s failure to act allows an already thriving illegal cannabis market to persist, fueling criminal activity and endangering our communities,” he said in a statement. “This veto squandered a vital opportunity to safeguard Virginians and will only exacerbate the proliferation of illicit products, posing greater risks to our schools and public safety.”

What’s next: Pro-legalization advocates, including the state’s medical marijuana providers, will no doubt continue their efforts to establish adult-use sales in the Commonwealth in the next legislative session.

Meanwhile, Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser and Caps and Wizards owner Ted Leonsis inked a deal that would keep the teams in the District until 2050, the Washington Post reported.

Changes

Federal government changes how it collects data on race

Americans will be able to check a box to identify as “Middle Eastern or North African” for the first time.

By OLIVIA ALAFRIZ

The federal government will change the way it collects demographic data related to race and ethnicity, laying the groundwork for a more accurate 2030 census, officials say.

The new standards combine race and ethnicity into one question. Previously, many government surveys — including the 2020 census — would ask if someone is of “Hispanic, Latino or Spanish origin” and then ask respondents’ race, which often resulted in people who answered yes to the first question identifying as either “white” or “some other race.” In addition to combining those questions, the new standards allow people to self-identify as Middle Eastern or North African for the first time.

The changes are intended to create more consistent and accurate data, federal officials say.“These revisions will enhance our ability to compare information and data across federal agencies, and also to understand how well federal programs serve a diverse America,” Karin Orvis, the chief statistician of the United States, said in a release from Office of Management and Budget on Thursday.

OMB, which sets the standards for federal data collection, published the revisions to its standards for collecting data related to race and ethnicity after a yearslong process.

The federal government uses the demographic data it collects to implement and assess policy, including enforcing civil rights laws or ensuring equal employment opportunities. Most Americans fill out government surveys once a decade: the constitutionally-required census, which sets how House seats are apportioned and billions of federal dollars are distributed across the country.

Since Middle Eastern or North African people typically do not identify as white, previous federal demographic data, such as census data, has not accurately reflected the presence of these communities.

Thomas Wolf, a census expert at the liberal-leaning think tank Brennan Center for Justice, said that this is a key step toward a more “accurate, equitable, and legitimate count.”

“Groups that have long been undercounted — or completely invisible — in the census numbers will see their representation in the census numbers grow. And that will grant them the increased political power and fairer share of government spending that they deserve,” Wolf told POLITICO in a written statement.

Similar changes were proposed ahead of the 2020 census, but were dismissed under former President Donald Trump’s administration.

Called Chris

Why Hasn’t Biden Called Chris Christie?

The man who never misses a funeral seems to have lost his personal touch when it comes to Republicans he needs — badly — in the fall.

By JONATHAN MARTIN

Chris Christie’s extended flirtation with No Labels should be a wake-up call — for President Joe Biden.

Christie seriously considered whether to run for president as an independent, according to people who spoke to him, and was being actively courted by No Labels. The group shared extensive polling and modeling data with the former New Jersey governor to make their pitch and even presented Christie with a list of potential Democratic running mates to fill out a unity ticket.

For his part, the former New Jersey governor commissioned polling of his own and drafted a potential budget, as first reported by The Washington Post.

That Christie decided not to run is a result of No Labels’ well-documented shortcomings, the structural challenges for any independent presidential candidate and the legacy-defining consequences of being the person who enabled Donald Trump to reclaim the White House.

That Christie considered a third-party bid at all is in part an indictment of Biden.

It has been well over two months since Christie dropped out of the Republican presidential primary. How has Biden not called Christie, whom he’s known since the former governor was in student government as a University of Delaware undergraduate, to ask for his support? Or, if he thought that too soon or too direct, he could at least have asked Christie to get together. But that ask has not been made.

Christie has made it abundantly clear he will not support Trump. And last month, in a conversation on Pod Save America, he even held open the possibility of voting for Biden, while noting: “I’m not there yet.” Why wouldn’t Biden want to enlist one of the most talented public speakers in either party, somebody who ran for the GOP nomination in no small part to be a rhetorical battering ram against Trump? A Caribbean, or even Mediterranean, ambassadorship would be a small price to pay for campaign services rendered.

It’s political malpractice. And Christie isn’t the only anti-Trump Republican or independent waiting for their phone to ring.

Prominent former GOP officeholders, from George W. Bush to Mike Pence to Paul Ryan, also haven’t been contacted.

The same goes for former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, who, like Christie, flirted with a No Labels run. Asked in January if Biden ever contacted him, perhaps about an ambassadorship, Hogan said no. As if to drive home the point, Hogan, whose wife is Korean American, happened to mention that he has a nickname in South Korea that translates to “son-in-law.” About two months later, Hogan announced his candidacy, as a Republican, for the Senate.

I reached out to every current Republican lawmaker who has refused to commit to Trump in the general election. Sens. Susan Collins (Maine) Mitt Romney (Utah), Todd Young (Indiana), Bill Cassidy (Louisiana) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) all said the same: they’ve not heard from Biden.

“It is surprising,” Collins told me. “It’s especially surprising because President Biden does understand the Senate, he has personal relationships with some of us.”

And that’s what makes the lack of any overtures so remarkable.

You, dear reader, may be screaming at your phone or computer by now (or before now). I can hear it: these politicians should grasp the stakes in this election and not require any personal touch from the otherwise busy leader of the free world.

But you know who understands the value of a politician receiving a personal touch, perhaps more than anybody else on the planet? Hint: It’s the man who rarely misses a funeral, happily calls the parents of lawmakers on their cell phones and quelled any hint of an uprising against his renomination in part because he’s so kind to, and well-liked by, his fellow officeholders.

This same person — you guessed it, Joe Biden — was also the one who as vice president did so much of the outreach to members of Congress, governors and mayors. And, if we’re being honest, Biden was the person who was frustrated that the detached president he served wasn’t more willing to use the power of the office to woo their fellow office-holders.

If you don’t think the personal matters in politics, well, you ought to talk to more politicians. Or pick up the published memoirs, letters or diaries of them. They tend to record slights. And solids. Both shape their actions.

So how could the Joe Biden whose long-serving advisers’ wince when he tells the story about learning from Jesse Helms — no prize in today’s Democratic primary! — to never question a senator’s motives be so maladroit when it comes to courting anti-Trump Republicans?

Well, yes, he has been busy, what with a war in Ukraine and another in Gaza. To say nothing of bridges collapsing at home.

It’s also that Biden has been focused on protecting his left flank. He’s wisely maintained a close relationship with Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) as a candidate and president.

The president’s staff, who some Republicans grumble are not letting Biden (truly) be Biden, have been particularly consumed with trying to mollify progressives. Biden, too, has come to recognize the grave political risk posed by, speaking of, that war in Gaza.

Yet just as revealing as those “uncommitted” votes that keep popping up in Democratic primaries are the remarkable number of votes Nikki Haley is still garnering in her political afterlife. These Trump-skeptical Republican primary voters are like the dog that simply will not swallow the pill, no matter how deep you bury it in the Alpo.

Surely Biden, who was in Arizona last week, knows that Haley won 20 percent of the vote (and Ron DeSantis another two percent) in Phoenix’s Maricopa County.

That’s 22 percent for somebody besides Trump in a race that’s long over. These are voters up for grabs in the fall. And voters whose ultimate decision could be shaped by leaders with credibility on the pre-Trump right.

To Biden’s credit, he did call Haley the day she dropped out. Which is more than Trump has done to appeal to his former rival.

Haley, of course, is highly unlikely to support Biden. Wanting a future in the GOP, she’ll likely come around to Trump.

Yet as Haley’s ongoing silence demonstrates, Trump has made that more difficult by doing nothing to win her over.

The same principle applies to Biden. By not reaching out to Republicans uneasy with their own nominee, the president is making it easier for them to criticize him.

Look, as the president would say, many of these Republicans will never publicly support Biden. They have real concerns about his administration (and some want to win future primaries).

As Romney told me by way of trying to explain why Biden has not called, the president’s policies give him pause.

“Biden has not asked for my support,” said Romney. “I’m pretty critical of his mess at the border—that should have cooled his jets!”

The point, though, isn’t for Biden to turn all these figures into his campaign surrogates. Perhaps some will do that, former Rep. Liz Cheney being the most likely prospect to embrace that sort of Stop Trump mission. But the more realistic goal, certainly with GOP senators, is to soften their criticism of him and make them feel more comfortable denouncing Trump.

Would figures such as Romney or Collins still be uneasy with Biden’s immigration policy if the president had them and their spouses to Camp David or a private White House dinner? Of course. Yet would the senators be somewhat more restrained in their public judgment of Biden? Well, it’s a people business.

At the heart of Biden’s challenge this year is that, unlike in 2020 when he was largely a vehicle to end Covid-19 and defeat Trump, he’s a fully defined candidate in his own right, having made decisions that appealed to some voters and alienated others.

“He’s the incumbent so he has weaknesses he didn’t have in 2020,” as Bill Kristol, the anti-Trump commentator and one-time vice-presidential chief of staff, said. “He needs to be more active and aggressive in getting as broad an anti-Trump coalition as possible.”

It is, Kristol said, “mystifying” that Biden has not done more to win over major Republican figures who are opposed to Trump: “He ought to have Chris Christie to lunch.”

Immediately after dropping out of the GOP presidential primary in January, Christie told people he was highly unlikely to run as a third-party candidate under the No Labels banner. There was only a 10 percent chance he would do so, he said at the time.

Yet earlier this month, he was sounding a lot more like a candidate. Republicans who saw him at the annual American Enterprise Institute conference in Sea Island, Georgia, told me Christie sure didn’t seem like somebody who was ready to return to punditry.

And last week, when Christie spoke on David Axelrod’s podcast, the former governor was all but signaling his campaign message. “I will do whatever I can to try to make sure that the country doesn’t go through what I think will be the misery of a second Trump term,” Christie said.

He resisted the temptation in part because he found No Labels’ infrastructure and finances wanting. Their handing him a list of potential running mates that included (in some cases lapsed) Democrats such as congresswoman-turned-Fox News personality Tulsi Gabbard, disgraced former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and even Maryland’s Doug Gansler also didn’t help.

However, that Christie nearly mounted an independent campaign that would’ve given the center-right voters Biden needs another place to go should not only alarm the president. It should rouse him to the challenge. This is not 2020.

“I talk to a lot of Republicans, Democrats and Independents,” said Collins. “I gotta tell you, it’s really rare that I find anyone who’s happy with their choices.”

Fake electors in Arizona

Pro-Trump fake electors in Arizona have pleaded the Fifth before grand jury

Requiring the targets of the probe to invoke their rights in front of grand jurors is an unusual tactic that raises a risk of bias, legal experts say.

By BETSY WOODRUFF SWAN

Arizona Republicans who falsely posed as electors for Donald Trump in 2020 have appeared before a grand jury in recent days and invoked their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, as state prosecutors near a decision on potential criminal charges against those who helped Trump try to overturn his loss in the state.

The prosecutors’ decision to require these people to appear in person is the latest escalation of the long-running probe by the state’s attorney general, Kris Mayes, into election interference by Trump allies. The tactic is also highly unusual and risks biasing the grand jury against key targets of the probe, according to independent legal experts who have worked as both prosecutors and defense lawyers.

If the grand jury charges them, it could even provide a longshot basis for the targets to challenge the indictment.

“My view is that the better practice is not to call people before the grand jury who you know are going to invoke the Fifth Amendment,” said Paul Charlton, a former Arizona assistant attorney general. “Why? Because all that does is unnecessarily prejudice the grand jury.”

The Fifth Amendment of the Constitution allows people to avoid answering questions from investigators if they fear those answers could incriminate them. Pleading the Fifth is not an admission of wrongdoing, but grand jurors who watch someone invoke the amendment might unfairly assume the person is guilty. That’s why targets of an investigation are seldom asked to testify in front of a grand jury, especially if prosecutors know in advance that the targets will invoke their rights to not answer questions, experts say.

But prosecutors working for Mayes have required some of the false electors they’re investigating to physically appear before the grand jury and formally assert their Fifth Amendment rights — despite the fact that their defense lawyers told prosecutors they would take that step, according to two people familiar with the probe who were granted anonymity to share the details on the sensitive investigation.

“Is it weird? Yeah,” said Omer Gurion, a Phoenix criminal defense lawyer who is not involved in the case but has defended clients facing other attorney general probes. “I would say this is highly unusual. Is it permissible? Yes. Is it a good idea? Definitely not.”

A spokesperson for Mayes declined to comment.

The Justice Department’s manual for federal prosecutors says that when subpoenaed targets and their lawyers say they plan to plead the Fifth, those targets should ordinarily be excused from grand jury testimony.

Renato Mariotti, a former federal prosecutor, said the attorney general may have departed from the typical practice in hopes of pressuring potential defendants to become cooperating witnesses.

Mayes, a Democrat who was elected in 2022, replacing a Republican, launched the investigation last year into the efforts of Trump allies to upend Joe Biden’s victory in Arizona. At the center of those efforts was a slate of 11 Republicans who signed papers claiming to be the state’s electors in the Electoral College. The so-called alternate electors included several high-profile state Republicans, including former state GOP chair Kelli Ward and two current state senators, Jake Hoffman and Anthony Kern.

Prosecutors in three other states — Georgia, Michigan and Nevada — have brought criminal charges against pro-Trump false electors in their states.

POLITICO revealed earlier this month that Mayes had issued grand jury subpoenas and was nearing a decision on criminal charges in Arizona. Her decision to haul the false electors before the grand jury — and their decision to plead the Fifth — is the latest escalation of the probe.

Gurion, the Phoenix defense attorney, said Arizona prosecutors have never forced any of his clients to plead the Fifth in front of a grand jury. Instead, he said, when his clients decide to plead the Fifth in response to subpoenas, he informs prosecutors in advance, and the prosecutors don’t make his clients assert their rights in person.

Lawyers for people subpoenaed in the fake electors probe took the same approach, according to the two people familiar with the investigation. Those lawyers told prosecutors that their clients would plead the Fifth in front of the grand jury. Prosecutors, however, still required them to appear in person to assert those rights.

Charlton said the decision points to an unusually fraught relationship between prosecutors and defense lawyers.

“There’s a measure of cooperation that you see — at this stage in particular — that isn’t reflected in a defense attorney saying, ‘My client’s going to take Five’ and the prosecutor saying, ‘If they take Five, it’s going to be in front of a grand jury,’” said Charlton, now a partner at the law firm Dentons. “That’s an unusual discussion to have.”

Gurion said the practice could even be a basis for anyone indicted under these circumstances to try to have the indictment thrown out.

“I would say that forcing them to invoke the Fifth Amendment created a bias in the grand jury against them and allowed the grand jury to consider their exercise of their constitutional rights against them, which is something that is not permitted,” he said.

But Mariotti, the former federal prosecutor, said such a motion would face an “uphill battle,” even if Mayes’ office had crossed a line.

“It’s the sort of thing that a defense attorney of course is going to raise because, if nothing else, it’s going to show the judge that the prosecutors are acting aggressively, and raise the specter with the judge that perhaps the client is being unfairly targeted.”

“Prosecutors have extraordinary discretion,” he added, “and they should use that discretion very carefully and treat potential defendants fairly — not just lawfully, but fairly. And this is unfair.”

Regardless of the move’s strategic value, it’s far outside the norm, according to David Lish, a former prosecutor in Arizona who now practices criminal defense. Usually, he said, grand juries just hear from one or two witnesses: the detective or case agent working on the investigation.

“I’ve never had a client who’s been ordered to appear in front of a state grand jury who was the target of that investigation,” he said. “That’s not normal practice.”

Border security

Egypt seeks border security support from US amid Gaza negotiations

Cairo wants help through funding and equipment if an Israeli operation into Rafah sends Gazans fleeing to its border.

By ERIN BANCO

Egyptian officials have put forward a slew of requests from the U.S. in negotiations with Israel over Gaza, including security funding and equipment, according to five officials from Egypt, the U.S. and Israel.

Cairo in recent months has asked for the U.S. to consider helping supply additional tranches of funding and new military gear — such as security and radar systems — to secure the border with Gaza in preparation for an Israeli ground invasion of Rafah, the five officials said, all of whom were granted anonymity to speak about sensitive discussions.

The Egyptian requests come as American officials deliberate with their counterparts in Qatar, Egypt and Israel to iron out a roadmap that will eventually lead to a pause in fighting to allow for the release of all remaining hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. As part of those talks, Israel has said it will attempt to clear Hamas militants out of the southern portion of the enclave by conducting a ground operation in Rafah. Egyptian and American officials increasingly believe that the Rafah invasion will eventually happen.

Egyptian officials have pushed back hard against that idea, saying the invasion will inevitably force hundreds of thousands of Gazans to flee south to the border where they will likely attempt to pass through. Officials are particularly worried about Hamas militants passing into Sinai — a region that has for years harbored extremists who have carried out multiple deadly terrorist attacks.

The additional funding and equipment Egypt requested will help its military deal with a potential influx of Gazans on its border, officials said. But the Egyptian petitions — while typical, especially in the midst of an intense international negotiation — have added an additional layer of complexity to the talks and have slowed them down, the two American officials said.

“In order for Israel to move ahead with the Rafah invasion, we really need the approval of Egypt,” the Israeli official said. “It’s their border they’re worried about. They don’t want to house all of the Gazans in Rafah.”

The Egyptian Foreign Ministry declined to comment. The U.S. State Department also declined to comment.

A third U.S. official said the administration has accelerated conversations with the Egyptians in recent weeks amid growing concerns about its border, adding that Washington also wants to shut off all potential routes of smuggling for Hamas.

Some 1.5 million people have fled to Rafah from other parts of Gaza to escape the war. They have no place else to go besides the border region, the Egyptians argue, as Israel has largely prevented them from moving north.

It is possible that Cairo will end up getting the help from elsewhere — potentially from Arab states. Earlier this month, American officials were preparing to pitch Israel a plan to help secure the border in lieu of a Rafah invasion.

In recent years, the U.S. has withheld hundreds of millions of dollars over Egypt’s human rights record. In September it approved $235 million in aid for Egypt but withheld an additional $85 million for the same reason. Egypt has asked the U.S. to rethink its stance and consider providing additional funds it says it needs to manage the fallout from the Rafah invasion.

Where you hear insanity, you see the insane....

RFK Jr.'s vice presidential pick calls IVF ‘one of the biggest lies being told about women’s health’

She has weighed in on in vitro fertilization many times through her nonprofit work.

By BRITTANY GIBSON

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s running mate has been a harsh critic of in vitro fertilization, while funding alternative research on extending women’s reproductive years.

Nicole Shanahan has for years denounced IVF — calling it “one of the biggest lies that’s being told about women’s health today.”

At the same time, she has also been a vocal proponent of and financial backer for unconventional research into the possibility of helping women having children into their 50s and exploring no-cost interventions to help women conceive, such as exposure to sunlight.

“I’m not sure that there has been a really thorough mitochondrial respiration study on the effects of two hours of morning sunlight on reproductive health. I would love to fund something like that,” Shanahan said to a 2023 panel with the National Academy of Medicine, a group to which she said she had previously donated $100 million. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine said Bia-Echo’s donation amounted to $150,000.

The statement was met with chuckles, “Yeah, let’s do it,” she added. “I just have an intuition that could be interesting and maybe work.”

As a candidate, her criticisms of IVF have taken on heightened importance following an Alabama Supreme Court’s ruling that embryos are children, which briefly forced clinics in the states to pause operations. Republicans and Democrats — including both President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump — rushed to defend the procedure, which is broadly popular.

The 38-year-old’s opposition to IVF and skepticism of the fertility industry makes her an outlier in the presidential field — though she has not called for banning the procedure.

Kennedy has not weighed in on IVF access, and has made conflicting comments about abortion access. At the Iowa State Fair, Kennedy, 70, said he supported a ban on abortion after 15 or 21 weeks of pregnancy, but then his campaign said he misunderstood the question and does not support such a ban.

In multiple interviews, Shanahan has been public about how she feels about the IVF industry, including one as recently as this February.

“It became abundantly clear that we just don’t have enough science for the things that we are telling and selling women,” Shanahan told the Australian Financial Review. “It’s one of the biggest lies that’s being told about women’s health today,” she said.

After publication of this article, the Kennedy campaign sent a statement responding to POLITICO’s request for comment reaffirming her comments in the Financial Review.

“I’ve spent the past five years funding science to understand the environmental factors that impact women’s reproductive health because these have gone largely ignored,” Shanahan said. “IVF is a very expensive for-profit business, and many of these clinics are owned by private equity firms that are not invested in the underlying health of women. What I care about is informed consent, and not letting corporations take advantage of us.”

And in a personal essay for People Magazine in 2022, in which she detailed her split from her ex-husband and Google co-founder Sergey Brin, she said, “I believe IVF is sold irresponsibly, and in my own experience with natural childbirth has led me to understand that the fertility industry is deeply flawed.”

IVF has been used to help parents conceive for decades, and today accounts for about 2 percent of all births in the U.S. These criticisms come from “junk science,” said Mini Timmaraju, president of Reproductive Freedom for All, which has endorsed Biden.

“Reasonable people could have concerns with bioethics, or a lot of us have concerns with how a lot of science is marketed and mass produced, right?” Timmaraju said. “I’m sure there’s a tiny little kernel and rationale behind all of this. But at the end of the day, IVF has been a long-established reproductive health technology, and Nicole Shanahan, bless her, is not a medical expert.”

Shanahan had a personal experience with IVF. While trying to conceive her first child, she was told she would not be a good candidate for IVF because she had polycystic ovary syndrome, according to an interview she gave to The New Yorker in 2023. Two years later, she naturally conceived her daughter. Shanahan said she was unhappy with her experience and began funding research into “reproductive longevity,” which she said is “the natural progression of the women’s rights movement.”

She questioned the financial incentives involved in fertility treatments, telling the New Yorker, “Many IVF clinics are financially incentivized to offer you egg freezing and IVF and not incentivized to offer you other fertility services.”

Shanahan, as founder and president of the Bia-Echo Foundation, is often described as the first funder and creator of women’s reproductive longevity research. In articles detailing her six-figure donations to the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, she talked about the inequalities between women and men in the reproductive space.

“Personally, I find it crazy that my reproductive organs are considered geriatric long before any other organ even begins to show the slightest decline,” Shanahan said in an interview with the Marin Independent News. “I find it even crazier that we have conceded to this narrative for half of the human species.”

Through her nonprofit, Shanahan contributed $5 million to the Buck Institute in 2020 for “reproductive longevity and equality,” followed by an additional $2 million in 2021 for a “healthy and livable planet,” according to financial disclosure forms filed by the foundation.

“I try to imagine where we would be as a field if all of the money that has been invested in IVF, and all of the money that’s been invested into marketing IVF, and all of the government money that has been invested in subsidizing IVF, if just 10 percent of that went into reproductive longevity research and fundamental research, where we would be today,” Shanahan said in a webinar hosted by the Buck Institute in 2021.

Not Funny

 

Is it really that hard to believe he would do it?

The Christian reaction to Trump’s Bible endorsement goes deeper than you think

By AJ Willingham

Former President Donald Trump is officially selling a patriotic copy of the Christian Bible themed to Lee Greenwood’s famous song, “God Bless the USA.”

“Happy Holy Week!” Trump announced on social media Tuesday, during the most solemn period of the Christian calendar, the last week of the Lenten season marking the suffering and death of Jesus. “As we lead into Good Friday and Easter, I encourage you to get a copy of the God Bless The USA Bible.”

The concept of a Bible covered in the American flag, as well as a former president’s endorsement of a text Christians consider to be sacred, has raised concern among religious circles. It’s also raised questions about Trump’s motivations, as the former president finds himself in the middle of several expensive legal battles.

‘Sacrilege,’ theology, and the shadow of Christian nationalism

The $59.99 Bible, which was first published in 2021, features an American flag and the words “God Bless the USA” printed on the cover. Inside, it has the words to “God Bless the USA” and the text of The Declaration of Independence, the Pledge of Allegiance and other historic American documents. Promotional material for the Bible shows the former president alongside country singer Lee Greenwood.

Responses to Trump’s social media announcement called the endorsement “sacrilege,” “heresy” and “borderline offensive” and cite lessons directly from the Bible that suggest taking advantage of people’s faith for money should be condemned.

“It is a bankrupt Christianity that sees a demagogue co-opting our faith and even our holy scriptures for the sake of his own pursuit of power and praise him for it rather than insist that we refuse to allow our sacred faith and scriptures to become a mouthpiece for an empire,” said Rev. Benjamin Cremer on X.

Jason Cornwall, a pastor from South Carolina, said on X that Trump’s Bible endorsement was a violation of one of the Ten Commandments of the Hebrew Testament that forbids taking God’s name in vain.

However, the criticism doesn’t end with whether or not Trump’s endorsement is un-Christian or not. In fact, it’s just the beginning.

Historian and author Jemar Tisby says the whole project echoes the values of Christian nationalism — the idea that America was founded as a Christian nation and the government should work to sanction Christianity on a national scale. The tenets of Christian nationalism are historically tied to prejudice, nativism and white supremacy.

“There’s a very long tradition of what is included and what is not included in the Bible,” Tisby told CNN.

“What has caused outrage with this Bible is that it includes the Declaration of Independence, US Constitution, and even the lyrics to a Lee Greenwood song. So it’s adding to the Bible, and it’s adding specific political documents to the Bible that completely erase the separation of church and state.”

Tisby, who holds a Master of Divinity Degree from Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi, has written about the dangers of Christian nationalism — both for the country and the Christian faith.

“What’s so pernicious about this is it plays on people’s devotion to God and their love of country, either of which by themselves could be innocuous or even good,” he said.

“But in this effort, it is blending the two. And with Trump as the spokesperson, is conveying a very clear message about what kind of Christianity and what kind of love of nation (he is) promoting.”

When Guthrie Graves-Fitzsimmons, communications director for the BJC Center for Faith, Justice and Reconciliation, saw Trump’s Bible endorsement, he said he saw a politician using fears rooted in racism and prejudice to promote a specific Christian ideology.

“When I hear ‘Make America Pray Again,’ I hear Christian nationalist promises that we are going to somehow ‘restore’ Christianity in this country. And if authoritarianism does come to the United States, it’s all but guaranteed it will be done in the name of Christianity, which is a very scary thought.”

Graves-Fitzsimmons holds a Master of Divinity degree from Union Theological Seminary in New York City and also works with the group Christians Against Christian Nationalism. He says things like the “God Bless America” Bible overlook the many, many Christians who do not agree with Trump’s politics or the blending of patriotism with faith.

“There is a diversity within American Christianity that gets overlooked whenever politics and religion intersect,” he told CNN. “There’s this false notion that most American Christians are pushing for anti-abortion restrictions, and are anti-LGBTQ, and the opposite is actually true. Christians, I would argue, are the ones who are most concerned about the effects of Christian nationalism in this country.”

This version of the Bible has drawn controversy before

The “God Bless the USA” Bible drew controversy from community members and publishers when it was published in 2021. It was originally supposed to be published by HarperCollins Christian Publishing, but the company passed on the deal.

HarperCollins said in 2021 that pushback to the concept was not a factor in their decision. (Eagle-eyed Bible buffs will note this is why the Trump-backed tome uses the King James Version of the text, which is in the public domain. (HarperCollins holds US publishing rights to the bestselling New International Version translation of the Bible.)

Tisby has published three books under Zondervan, the HarperCollins imprint specializing in religious publications. He was among the imprint’s writers who tried to discourage them from publishing the “God Bless the USA” Bible when the idea was first introduced.

“We did not want to be associated with a publisher who’s going to publish a Bible like this,” he said. “And I think it took on an elevated sense of urgency because we’re not just talking about someone’s book. We’re talking about the sacred text of the Bible.”

While there are innumerable versions of the Bible — ranging widely in price, theme, and additions like indices, references, maps and graphs — this particular combination of the Bible and a beloved patriotic song is especially potent.

Such a notion doesn’t come as a surprise to David W. Peters, an Anglican vicar in Pflugerville, Texas. Peters served as an enlisted Marine Corps and Army Chaplain and was deployed to Iraq in 2005.

“I am reminded of how we closed every Marine Corps boot camp chapel service with Lee Greenwood’s ‘God Bless the USA’,” he told CNN. “We’d all sing and cry. The only emotional release in the week.”

He says the range of reactions to something like a patriotic Bible shows just how different American Christianity can be, depending on the denomination or community.

“I think the essence of liberal progressive faith is compassion, so it is mind boggling (to such people) how someone could say they were a Christian and follow a guy who is very much not compassionate.”

For people who view Christianity differently, or who are already unshakeable supporters of Trump, Peters says he doubts this latest incident will do anything to shake their faith.

“I think it will confirm (to them) that their critics are out of touch,” he said. “Why would anyone object to a Bible?”

It’s not clear where proceeds from the Bible’s sales will go

In addition to the multitude of theological questions it raises, Trump’s endorsement of the “God Bless the USA” Bible coincides with several legal battles that could put the presumptive Republican nominee for president on the line for hundreds of millions of dollars.

The FAQ section of the “God Bless America” Bible website clarifies that no proceeds from the sales of the Bible will go towards Trump’s presidential campaign. However, there is no mention of whether any proceeds could be put toward his personal legal troubles.

“No, GodBlessTheUSABible.com is not political and has nothing to do with any political campaign. GodBlessTheUSABible.com is not owned, managed or controlled by Donald J. Trump, The Trump Organization, CIC Ventures LLC or any of their respective principals or affiliates,” the site reads.

However, it goes on to say Trump’s name, likeness and image are under “paid license from CIC Ventures LLC.” CIC Ventures is directly linked to Trump in his 2023 public financial disclosures.

CNN has reached out to EliteSource Pro, the marketing company behind the “God Bless the USA” Bible, for more information.

Trump has been criticized before for his use of the Bible in public settings. In 2020, religious leaders from several Christian denominations condemned his display of the Bible in a “photo-op” in front of an Episcopal church near the White House as racial justice protests raged around the country.

“You just don’t do that, Mr. President,” televangelist and vocal Trump supporter Pat Robertson said of the incident. “It isn’t cool!”

In 2015, Trump also called the Bible his favorite book, but famously declined to share a favorite verse.

$11.2 billion. 25 years in prison

Bankman-Fried is sentenced to 25 years in prison

From CNN's Lauren del Valle

Sam Bankman-Fried has been sentenced to 25 years in federal prison for defrauding customers and investors in crypto exchange FTX.

In addition to the prison sentence, Kaplan also ordered a forfeiture of $11.2 billion.

However, he said there would be no restitution because it would "impractical" in this case with so many victims.

Judge Lewis Kaplan said he would recommend to the Bureau of Prisons that Bankman-Fried be placed in a medium-security facility or any lower-security facility the bureau finds appropriate.

Medium-security federal prisons have strengthened perimeters — often double fences with electronic detection systems — and mostly cell housing, according to the Bureau of Prisons. They also have a "wide variety of work and treatment programs."

Sam Bankman-Fried's sentence of 25 years puts him at the high end for sentence length in prominent white-collar fraud cases. He faced over 100 years in prison under federal sentencing guidelines.

Ahead of him is Bernard Madoff, who was sentenced to 150 years behind bars for the $20 billion Ponzi scheme he led — the largest financial fraud in history. He died around 12 years into his sentence.

Theranos founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes, meanwhile, is serving a much shorter sentence than Bankman-Fried. Holmes was convicted on four charges of defrauding investors while running the failed blood-testing startup Theranos. She faced a maximum of 20 years in prison but was sentenced to a little over 11 years. She began serving her sentence in May of last year.

Her counterpart, Ramesh "Sunny" Balwani, the former COO of Theranos and ex-boyfriend of Holmes, was sentenced to nearly 13 years in prison. He also faced up to 20 years.

Bankman-Fried told the court he'd been pained to see FTX's customers suffer.

"It's been excruciating to watch," he said. "Customers don't deserve any of that pain."

As CEO, he was responsible for that pain, he said. But "I'm not the one that matters at the end of the day — it's the customers and employees affected that matter."

Seeming to acknowledge his looming prison sentence, he said: "My useful life is probably over. It's been over for a while now."

The Omega

 Globular star cluster Omega Centauri, also known as NGC 5139, is 15,000 light-years away. The cluster is packed with about 10 million stars much older than the Sun within a volume about 150 light-years in diameter. It's the largest and brightest of 200 or so known globular clusters that roam the halo of our Milky Way galaxy. Though most star clusters consist of stars with the same age and composition, the enigmatic Omega Cen exhibits the presence of different stellar populations with a spread of ages and chemical abundances. In fact, Omega Cen may be the remnant core of a small galaxy merging with the Milky Way. With a yellowish hue, Omega Centauri's red giant stars are easy to pick out in this sharp, color telescopic view.

The good...

In Alabama, Abortion and IVF Helped Flip a Red Seat in a Special Election

Democrats say Marilyn Lands’ win offers a road map for using abortion rights to win elections.

JULIANNE MCSHANE

On Tuesday, Alabama provided even more evidence of what we already know to be true: Abortion rights win elections. 

Democrat Marilyn Lands won a special election for an Alabama state House seat, flipping a Republican-held seat by campaigning on abortion rights in the deep-red state that bans abortion with no exceptions for rape or incest. Lands won 62 percent of the nearly 6,000 votes cast, while her challenger, Republican Teddy Powell, won 37.5 percent, according to the unofficial election night results from the Alabama Secretary of State. The candidates were running to replace Republican David Cole, who resigned last year after he was arrested on a voting fraud charge. (Lands ran against Cole in 2022 and lost by just under 1,000 votes, or about 7 percentage points—making her win last night all the more significant.)

Lands—a licensed professional counselor whose website says her “Christian values deeply influence her life and work”—campaigned on repealing the state’s abortion ban, as well as expanding Medicaid, investing in community mental health resources, and improving the local economy and education. Days after the state Supreme Court‘s decision threatening IVF last month, Lands released a campaign ad in which she and another Alabama woman, Alyssa Gonzales, each shared their personal stories of getting emergency abortions following nonviable pregnancies. For Lands, it happened 20 years ago; for Gonzales, it happened after the Dobbs decision was handed down in 2022. 

“We will not stand by and watch our most basic human rights be stripped from us,” Lands says in the ad.  

Tuesday’s election results once again demonstrated the far-reaching effects that abortion bans can have in galvanizing voters in decisive elections around the country. The trend can be directly traced to the Supreme Court’s Dobbs ruling, which was repeatedly cited throughout the Alabama Supreme Court decision that effectively banned IVF procedures. (The Alabama Legislature subsequently passed a bill, which the governor signed, to protect IVF access, but it didn’t address the legal status of frozen embryos.) 

While Alabama is reliably red—and the state legislature remains majority Republican—Lands’ district, the state’s 10th District, has been a battleground: Trump won it by only one percentage point in 2020, the Washington Post reported, while he won the state by more than 35 percentage points. Voters told the 19th earlier this month that they were going to vote for Lands because of her stance on abortion and reproductive rights. 

Lands told local CBS affiliate WHNT that she saw her victory as “a victory…for women, for families,” adding that she wanted to “repeal the bad ban on no-exceptions abortion” and “protect IVF and contraception.” 

“It feels like the start of a change here, and I think we’ll see more change in 2026. I think Alabama is changing,” she said.

Former Alabama Sen. Doug Jones (D) agreed, telling CNN that the results were “a huge win for Alabama, not just for Democrats.”

Lands’ win seems to send a clear message—one that advocates have been trying to send President Biden and other Democrats for some time: it’s reproductive justice that wins elections in the post-Roe era. And as long as Republicans’ anti-abortion policies continue to harm pregnant people—including those who aren’t seeking abortions—they’ll likely continue losing to Democrats like Lands.

Grifter: A person who engages in petty or small-scale swindling:

What to Know About Donald Trump’s New $60 Bible

“All Americans need a Bible in their home, and I have many. It’s my favorite book.”

INAE OH

One month after releasing a line of gilded high-tops for $399, Donald Trump revealed on Tuesday a new item: the Bible. “All Americans need a Bible in their home, and I have many,” the former president explained in a video promoting the country singer Lee Greenwood’s version of a King James translation, the “God Bless the USA Bible.”

“It’s my favorite book,” Trump added.

Throughout the rest of the clip, as if daring us into a collective disgust, Trump swerved through random opportunities to rail against bureaucrats and a country under threat—all while hawking a holy text.

But his latest sales pitch also prompted some legitimate questions. Such as: What the hell is going on? And: Excuse me? Here, we try to answer some of the queries.

So, that first question—what the hell—but more formally: What exactly is Trump promoting and how much will it cost me to shell out for this? 

Trump is encouraging his supporters to buy a Bible endorsed by himself and Lee Greenwood. It costs $59.99, without taxes or shipping included. That seems to sit on the more expensive end of Bibles on sale at Barnes & Noble. But those books presumably don’t include copies of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the handwritten lyrics to the chorus of Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA.”

The “God Bless the USA Bible” does include these items.

Trump is in a serious cash crunch. So is he going to make money with this Bible?

According to the book’s official site, the God Bless the USA Bible has nothing to do with Trump’s campaign. It is “not owned, managed, or controlled by Donald J. Trump, The Trump Organization, CIC Ventures LLC, or any of their respective principals or affiliates.” Instead, Trump’s “name, likeness, and image” are being used “under paid license from CIC Ventures LLC.”

Wait, what is CIC Ventures LLC, though?

Okay, so CIC Ventures LLC is, according to the Washington Post, basically a pipeline to Trump:

In [Trump’s] financial disclosure released last year, he’s identified as the [CIC Ventures LLC’s] “manager, president, secretary and treasurer” and the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust is identified as a 100 percent owner of the business. The same entity also receives royalties from his book “A MAGA Journey” and speaking engagements.

In case it’s not already obvious: if you look at the company’s documents, you’ll find the principal address for CIC Ventures LLC is 3505 Summit Boulevard, West Palm Beach, Florida. That is a Trump golf course. Moreover, in a 2022 disclosure, Nick Luna is listed as a manager. Luna was Trump’s personal assistant and body man.

So, I’m sorry, but let me ask again: Is Trump making money off this?

The New York Times reports that “according to a person familiar” (classic) Trump will receive royalties from sales.

You could have just said that.

I wanted to tell you about the other stuff I found. Any other questions?

Yes. Who is Lee Greenwood?

The country singer who wrote “God Bless the USA.” Greenwood is a fierce MAGA guy who otherwise made news after pulling out of an NRA concert in response to the Uvalde, Texas, mass shooting.

Does Greenwood have a Christmas album with an oddly sexual cover?

Yes. Look at this.

Perfect sweater. Anyway, I feel like I’m experiencing deja vu. Hasn’t Trump made headlines before with a Bible?

You’re probably recalling that despicable photo-op when Trump held up a Bible in front of St. John’s Church, which had been a location of racial justice protests in the days prior. There was a complicated saga, afterward, about whether or not Trump deployed the police to clear protesters to get to the church. An Inspector General’s report ultimately concluded that he did not. 

Man, it’s pretty rough remembering all the awful shit we went through with him as president.

Yep. If you ever want to wallow in political depression, check out this quick compilation.

But wait. Wasn’t there another time Trump and the Bible made waves for something far more stupid?

Christian nationalists adore Trump, so there have probably been many times that Trump has referenced the Bible. But you might also be thinking of this incredible clip of Trump attempting to name his favorite verse.

Has a presidential candidate ever partnered on a holy text sale with a country musician?

Not to my knowledge. But this is from a dude who just last week seemed to compare his current legal jeopardy with the persecution of Jesus Christ. Happy Easter!