Independent News
Republicans plot national abortion ban as Democrats fail to even run on expanding the Supreme Court
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The forced birth movement is thinking big now, having secured the U.S. Supreme Court and set up at least a dozen states to completely ban abortion as soon as the court overturns 50 years of precedence in Roe v. Wade. That’s not nearly enough for them, because it would mean that dozens of other states would still allow the practice and pregnant people would be able to travel to them for the procedure.
No, what they are aiming to do now is ban abortion nationally. The Washington Post reports that the big “antiabortion groups and their allies in Congress have been meeting behind the scenes to plan a national strategy that would kick in if the Supreme Court rolls back abortion rights this summer, including a push for a strict nationwide ban on the procedure if Republicans retake power in Washington.” Because of course it isn’t about states’ rights when it comes to abortion. It’s not about anyone’s rights.
Republican senators are, apparently, ready to go. According to a Post source in the forced birth movement, Iowa Republican Sen. Joni Ernst is going to introduce a national ban on abortion at six weeks in the Senate, though she didn’t confirm that with the paper. Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) was at the meeting in which GOP senators supposedly discussed this, and said he will support it. That’s the beginning. If Republicans regain Congress, it’s what they’ll push and, with the Supreme Court having already done its part and the power behind this movement solidified, GOP Senate Leader Mitch McConnell would just as likely end the filibuster to make it pass.
Tuesday, May 3, 2022 · 2:13:50 AM +00:00
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Barbara Morrill
Now more important than ever:
Shocking SCOTUS leak shows abortion rights overturned under draft opinion from Justice Alito
What’s more, according to the Post: Forced birther Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, has been speaking with 10 potential Republican presidential candidates to get them on board. “Most of them, she said in an interview, assured her they would be supportive of a national ban and would be eager to make that policy a centerpiece of a presidential campaign.”
Kelley Robinson, executive director of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, is taking the “terrifying” threat of a national ban seriously. “By them saying out loud that their goal is to push a nationwide abortion ban, it makes it clear that we have to elect more pro-reproductive health champions on the national level and in the states,” she said.
Well, yes. But after the Democratic Party seemed to react to Texas’ six-week ban, the precursor to all of this, with a yawn, of course forced birthers are jacked and of course Republicans will fold to that small, extreme, horrifying base. All the way back in September 2021 the Supreme Court allowed the Texas ban to stand and all but end abortion in that state.
The response from Democrats has been underwhelming. There’s been little more than the usual platitudes from Democratic leadership about protecting the right to choose and absolutely no endorsement, or really even any talk, about the most important thing they could do right now to ensure that right: expand the courts.
Expand the district courts, the circuit courts and especially the Supreme Court to stop the radical right from imposing a right-wing evangelical dominionist hellscape across the land.
And while that’s not possible right now with an evenly divided Senate, run on it and work like hell to get a big enough majority in the Senate to make Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema irrelevant, get rid of the filibuster, and save the country.
At the very least, run on all of this so that the majority of Americans—including the all-important and all-too-often taken for granted base—that Democrats are going to fight like hell to protect us. Don’t tell us you’re going to fight like hell. Do it.
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‘Because we’re Trump supporters!’: Slur-spewing couple refuses to get off flight
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A middle-aged couple have gotten their 15 minutes of fame after being so obnoxious they were kicked off of a flight shortly after boarding in West Palm Beach, Florida. The flight, which was reportedly headed to Newark, New Jersey, was forced to deplane after an incident between the couple and other passengers boarding the plane. Whether or the couple was inebriated is not known.
The incident escalated as the couple unabashedly refused to get off the plane based on the misunderstanding that their First Amendment rights were being violated. Video of the incident begins around the time that the cabin crew asks the woman and man to get their things and leave the plane. The couple refuse and the police ended up being called. The fact that the couple, who are seemingly snowbirds leaving Florida to head back north after the winter, are avowed Trump supporters might add to one’s enjoyment of their comeuppance, but the real story here is their understanding of what exactly “free speech” is and is not.
A warning: There is general vulgarity and homophobic slurs spewed during the retelling of these freedom warriors’ adventures in ruining everyone’s day.
“You don’t like the words coming out of my mouth,” says the female half of the couple, using her hand as a to pantomime talking—like a hand puppet! She then throws up her hands and says, “Free speech is dead.” The clip jumps to her saying to whomever she thinks is her audience, “Do you guys see what’s happening in America? You didn’t like what he said, and now we’re getting kicked off of a plane.” But,she has a revenge planned at this point in her version of First Amendment protest: “And all of y’all are gonna have to wait.”
If you don’t realize why “this is fucking outrageous,” this snowbird connects the dots for you: “You guys, we’re gonna turn into China.” You get it? It’s going to be bad. Not white communism bad, Chinese communism bad. That’s like double-bad for a racist. From there she continues the slow realization that she isn’t winning jack shit in this nonexistent case for her special First Amendment right to make everybody, passengers and crew, feel frustrated and miserable about her current state. “Oh I love Elon Musk, he is the best. Elon!” which elicits some giggles from passengers as it is a truly new level of incoherence.
She proceeds to tell everyone that this is really bumming her out by saying that this isn’t bumming her out at all. “You know what, it’s a beautiful day, I am happy to stay one more night. I am suing you, what is your name, sir? I’m suing you, and I’m suing the airline.” At this point her husband, who has continued to wear his sunglasses the entire time, chimes in, “Hey buddy, I guarantee I have more money than you. You’re a fucking jerk-off” I guess the threat there is that he has the money to waste on frivolous litigation? Super free speech!
But to be clear, he proceeds, arms crossed, to repeatedly say mockingly, “Oh, I’m a fa@#$t, I’m a fa^%$t.” The part “free speech” MAGAvates like these don’t seem to get about stuff is that you just cannot sit 2 feet from someone else hurling invective at them and expect others to consider this a “safe” environment. I wonder if this America-loving patriot cursed at all of the TSA agents when they asked him to remove his shoes? They weren’t asking him to do that to look at his toenails, you know.
At a certain point, she films the passengers, trying to menace them. Then, the moment of truth! The husband, probably tired of sitting here knowing this isn’t going to end any other way than them getting off the plane, says, “Let’s go.” But, no. This First Amendment warrior reminds him: “You, me, free speech.” It’s like listening to the great oratory of Trump Jr.
The video then comes to a point where it seem that the man has gotten his seat belt off, is sort of just talking away about how he’s fine to get off, as there are “F@#$ts” and who knows what other half-concocted thoughts he has running around in his head. His wife seems to want to continue her sit-in for the rights of obnoxious homophobes everywhere, saying, “It’s our anniversary,” and then trying to get her husband’s seat belt back on.
“We’re going to get [kicked] off the plane because we’re Trump supporters!” she shouted. “Seriously, I really think that’s what it is!” It isn’t. If every Trump supporter was kicked off a plane, how would we continue to spread COVID-19?
There’s the rub” Everybody can sit there and take her and her husband’s shitty and obnoxious and bile-filled invective for three hours.
South Dakota teens say they received letter from beloved teacher filled with anti-trans rhetoric
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Being a young person today is far from easy—students are navigating life amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, considering higher education at a time when it’s devastatingly expensive, and watching rents and the housing market skyrocket. While LGBTQ+ youth are certainly not the only students experiencing hardships, research shows they do face disproportionate levels of bullying and harassment from their peers and are more likely to leave high school without a diploma. They are also more likely to become homeless.
In an ideal world, schools would be a safe haven for young people. Unfortunately, thanks to Republican hate, we’ve seen lawmakers push heinous policies that seek to separate trans youth from their peers, be it based on bathroom access or participating in sports teams. Research has shown teachers feel uniquely ill-equipped to step in on behalf of LGBTQ+ youth when it comes to bullying, for example, but a recent story out of South Dakota paints a very clear picture of a teacher as the one doing the bullying. At the time of writing, at least one student has already been pulled from the school.
RELATED: Thanks to Republican hate, Oklahoma is the first state in the nation to do a very bad thing
As reported by local outlet the Watertown Public Opinion, four high school students received a letter from their German teacher, Calvin Hillesland, in which he told the students that he felt it was “wrong” and a “lie” to call them by their chosen names but stressed he supports and respects them. The students, who are all openly trans, were told by their teacher via the letter that their biology is “female” and that “every cell in your body is female, feminine” as a “biological truth.” Hillesland allegedly offered to send the students in question candy (as a “symbol of the sweetness” he hopes they’ll discover) as well as a DVD that can explain the “spiritual” as well as the “scientific facts.”
In a word: Yikes.
Students received the letter on Monday and protested on Tuesday. Now, students and parents are asking the Watertown School District to take action against the teacher.
In a statement sent to parents in the school district, officials confirmed the letter was given to four students while at school on Monday. The statement, sent over text message, confirms that the teacher tried to discuss the students’ gender identity.
“The Watertown School District does not support this sort of action,” the statement reads in part. “And we respect the rights of our students to be who they are. We want to provide a safe learning environment for all students. We continue to work through the situation and ask for your support as we handle it.”
The outlet met with Superintendent Jeff Danielsen, who told the paper that Hillesland is still teaching while administrators are investigating the situation. The superintendent told the outlet they became aware of the situation after school ended on Monday, and the investigation is not yet complete. The outlet reports that Hillesland’s teaching certificate is currently active.
Several students told the outlet that they saw Hillesland pass out the letter to the four students in question during lunch, where Hillesland serves as a monitor.
How are the affected students feeling? According to their parents, they’re feeling pretty betrayed by a teacher they were fond of. Parent Heather Hoffman, for example, told the outlet that her son Kai Price was one of the young people to receive a letter. Hoffman said Price is upset because Hillesland was one of his favorite teachers before this happened. For herself, Hoffman said she’s still in “disbelief” and said that this typed-up letter was a “premeditated attack.” She added that she doesn’t understand why he’s still teaching.
“I’m just a 14-year-old kid trying to get through life,” Price told local outlet KELO about the situation, who added lately they’ve been struggling to feel confident and that receiving a letter like this from a trusted person really affected them.
Ashley Bakke, another parent of an impacted student, said her child, Alex Bryant, texted a copy of the letter to her right after receiving it. Bryant says she reached out to the school’s counselor and went to the school the same day to speak to Brad Brandsrud, who serves as principal of the high school. But according to Bakke, she felt like was “talking with a politician” who was “dancing around the issue.” She left feeling like the principal was defending a friend instead of addressing the issue.
At this point, Bakke made the call to pull her son from the district immediately. Bakke added that for her child, too, Hillesland was formerly a favorite teacher.
LGBTQ+ outlet them reached out to Danielson for clarification on the DVD in reference and the superintendent said he had no knowledge of the DVD or the content it contained.
It cannot be overstated the sort of impact teachers, coaches, and other administrators can have on the life of young people. It is a baseline minimum expectation to have adults in the room be equipped to recognize and combat hatred and bullying, and it shouldn’t even be a question of whether or not such behavior or expression should be permitted from the mouths of those in charge themselves.
School staff need and deserve well-rounded education and training on these issues—plus more, in terms of things like ableism, disability rights, microaggressions, and so on—and they also need to be held accountable for the things they do and say. It’s always more than a matter of opinion or exercising poor judgment when dealing with impressionable young people, especially when those young people are also disproportionately at-risk for mental health issues like depression and suicidal ideation.
Shocking SCOTUS leak shows abortion rights overturned under draft opinion from Justice Alito
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A draft opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito shows that the Supreme Court could overturn abortion rights in the U.S., essentially nullifying the landmark Roe v. Wade, which Alito called “egregiously wrong from the start.” The document, obtained by Politico, spans 98 pages and was apparently drafted in February. It marks an unprecedented leak for the nation’s highest court. Per Politico, “no draft decision in the modern history of the court has been disclosed publicly while a case was still pending.”
A source told Politico that Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, all voted in agreement with Alito in a conference following oral arguments in December. The conservative justices have found zero support from their liberal counterparts. That conference and those oral arguments stem from a Mississippi case brought before the Supreme Court challenging the state’s law that would ban abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization has yet to be decided — and this window into some of the Justices’ thinking is absolutely alarming.
This is a developing news story.
Registered Republican in Arizona sentenced to probation after casting dead mom's ballot in 2020
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A Scottsdale, Arizona, woman who cast her dead mother’s ballot in the 2020 presidential election escaped jail time Friday and was sentenced to two years probation instead.
According to Associated Press, the prosecutor in the case against Tracey Kay McKee, 64, argued that McKee should serve at least a month behind bars after she reportedly lied to investigators while also urging them to hold those who vote illegally to account.
In an interview with investigators, McKee said: “The only way to prevent voter fraud is to physically go in and punch a ballot. … I mean, voter fraud is going to be prevalent as long as there’s mail-in voting, for sure. I mean, there’s no way to ensure a fair election,” McKee told investigators. “And I don’t believe that this was a fair election. I do believe there was a lot of voter fraud.”
RELATED STORY: Not one, not two, but three states Mark Meadows registered to vote in
McKee’s mother, Mary Arendt, died on Oct. 5—just two days before early voting began.
The indictment against McKee alleges she “knowingly signed the name” of her mother, “under penalty of perjury,” and illegally submitted it to election officials during the period between Oct. 7 and Nov. 3.
According to reporting from the AZ Mirror, voter registration records from the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office show that both McKee and her mother were registered as Republicans. AP reports that McKee was never asked whether or not she voted for former President Trump.
“Your Honor, I would like to apologize,” McKee told Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Margaret LaBianca just before she was sentenced. “I don’t want to make the excuse for my behavior. What I did was wrong and I’m prepared to accept the consequences handed down by the court.”
McKee’s attorney, Tom Henze, vehemently argued against jail time for his client.
“Simply stated, over a long period of time, in voluminous cases, 67 cases, nobody in this state for similar cases, in similar context … nobody got jail time,” Henze said. “The court didn’t impose jail time at all.”
According to Fortune after an exhaustive review of voter fraud in six states by the AP, less than 475 cases were uncovered. Not nearly enough to have changed the outcome of Trump’s loss to Biden.
There is one case however that stands outs—Mark ‘Big Lie’ Meadows, Trump’s former chief of staff, was removed from voter rolls in North Carolina after it was discovered he was registered in both Virginia and North Carolina. Then yet another state popped up: South Carolina.
“What we’re hearing is voter fraud is out there,” Todd Lawson, the Assistant Attorney General in McKee’s case told LaBianca. “And essentially what we’re seeing here is someone who says ‘Well, I’m going to commit voter fraud because it’s a big problem and I’m just going to slide in under the radar. And I’m going to do it because everybody else is doing it and I can get away with it.’
He added, “I don’t subscribe to that at all.”
‘My son loves school because of her’: There are no words for how wonderful teachers are, but we try
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I come from a long line of teachers. My mother, father, grandmother, and a few aunts are all educators. So when I say teachers raised me, I’m not being figurative. They actually changed my diapers, showed me how to cross the street, and taught me how to think for myself. I owe everything to educators, and I’m not alone.
The staff members here at Daily Kos wanted to take this Teacher Appreciation Week to acknowledge the many educators who have directly impacted us. We hope you’ll join us in showing the teachers you know and love some appreciation in the comments.
RELATED STORY: Video of 11-year-old Prince supporting striking teachers unearthed by Minneapolis news station
As a student, my high school history teacher, Mr. Gunn, was a game-changer for me. After taking U.S. history, I took a semester course he taught on “the Constitution and students’ rights.” He created a series of cases based on, but not identical to, past Supreme Court cases involving students and schools, and had us research the precedents and argue for a side. It was an amazing education in reading carefully and crafting rigorous arguments, and he pushed us to have opinions and defend them, but debate respectfully with each other.
As a parent, I am so grateful for my kid’s kindergarten teachers. It’s a mixed JK/K class, so the kids are at a range of developmental stages, and then the pandemic is a complicating factor since some of the kids have had seriously limited time in group settings and outside the home until this year. In addition to everything he’s learning, I am blown away by the level of warm, concerned, individual attention my kid is getting, and the way his teachers have shown they really understand who he is. And not just his classroom teacher and paraprofessional, but the librarians, who on day one got his buy-in on the excitement of checking out a book every week. The gardening teacher. His afterschool teachers who come up with fun activities—active body, medium body, and quiet body—week after week. This has been such a challenging couple years for teachers and kids alike, and from everything I have seen, teachers have risen to the occasion in heroic ways.
Adrienne Crezo:
I never took a class with her, but my great-grandma, Dorothy Sunrise Lorentino, was my favorite teacher. As a child, she won a landmark education case that made public schools in the U.S. accessible to Native students, setting a precedent cited in Brown v. Board of Education. She then spent the rest of her life learning and teaching others. She was a special education teacher at a number of schools in New Mexico, Arizona, and Oregon, working primarily with ESL and disabled students. In 1997, she became the first Native American and first Oklahoman National Teacher of the Year when she was inducted into the National Teachers Hall of Fame. She’s an important figure in our Comanche history, in the history of education in the U.S., and in my life as I try to learn from her example and make the world a little more equitable.
I’ve had a lot of impactful and important teachers growing up, but one of the most important ones was John Gunn, my ninth and tenth grade advisory, and humanities teacher. I went to an alternative public school in New York and so advisory was sort of like a more robust “homeroom.” Your advisor teacher kept tabs on your progress across the board. John was great in many ways, but I will always remember how well he was able to zero in and ask me very simple questions that struck the perfect chord of not making me defensive, while also pointing out how naive many of my assertions were at that point in my very young intellectual life.
My very very impactful teacher was Carolyn Oubre, who taught me at Xavier University Preparatory School in NOLA. She was my English IV and English AP teacher. She taught me so much curiosity and critical reading skills, how language evolved, how to study media for themes, symbolism, and subtext. I grew such an appreciation for language and its nimbleness. I was already something of a writer before she got to me, but she thoroughly upped my game and the stakes. AND she brought texts alive. We would be reading Shakespeare like it was “The Young and the Restless.”
The two most important teachers in my life are people who so many want to contend are not teachers. In my own state, after repeated attempts to fund them, we still look down on funding special education paraprofessionals. Without two paraprofessionals as part of my life, I do not know where I would be, or where my children would be right now.
In my son’s early education, special education was difficult. He couldn’t tolerate loud noises, he didn’t like hearing or seeing other people eat, and he needed to wash his hands repeatedly. It’s funny because today, that might be a good thing, but at the time, a child washing their hands for three or four minutes in a row was not condoned. Teachers offered the lessons; the paraprofessionals put them into action. When my son struggled to write due to fine motor skill issues, they talked to him and made him feel okay about typing and succeeding at something he could handle. Holding a pencil? That was tough. Typing on a keyboard? He could do it. They offered to take him out after school to see local events to broaden his horizon. When a paraprofessional learned that we were struggling at home with his lack of sleep, a paraprofessional offered to sit with our son at night to provide my family respite.
These paraprofessionals provided the services that made for a young man who wanted to achieve.
My high school English teacher, Ms. Jorgenson at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, D.C., instilled in me a love of reading. She was kind, and inspiring, and inclusive and made everyone in our class feel like what we had to say was important. I’ll never forget her.
I could list teachers for days who have helped me along the way, but the one who has had the most direct affect on my life recently is my son’s preschool teacher, Ms. Bracy. It was clear from his first day in her class that this was not a person just collecting a check. This was an educator who truly loves children. She had my son sit directly next to her on his first day and was patient with him during the months it took him to warm up. She cooks with her students, carves pumpkins with them, and makes Mother’s Day and Father’s Day cards with them. My son loves school because of her, and she makes all of our lives that much easier. Really, all the teachers at his school do. My daughter’s teachers just love her to death, too, and they work so hard to make sure she is well taken care of, from changing her multiple times a day to teaching her new dance moves, which she very much so appreciates. (If you’ve never heard this song before, thank my daughter’s teachers later for the introduction.)
So many of my educators were instrumental in shaping my life, from the high school teachers who helped me leave an abusive parent for foster care, to the college professor who talked me out of getting an MBA, to the grad school professors who shepherded my early career. But the first truly transformative teacher, the only teacher I’ve abused Google to track down, was the one who led me through second grade. My elementary school lumped the so-called “gifted” kids into two-grade classrooms, and Miss Seaman cultivated our curiosities, noticed our struggles, catered to our unique needs and interests, and always managed to do it with a sense of humor I remember to this day.
We were even in a short film together when I was 7! In Being Gifted: The Gift, I essentially played a version of myself—an annoyingly precocious kid—and she did the same, portraying a loving, thoughtful teacher. We may not have been great actors, but I remember her presence easing my discomfort amid the lights and cameras. Thirty years later, I spoke to the director. She told me it was Miss Seaman who promised the director that she had the “perfect kid” for the role, and it was she who convinced my mother to let me audition!
When I reached out to Miss Seaman (who’s long since become a Mrs.) eight years ago, it meant so much to me to hear that, despite teaching dozens of students per year, for 26 years, she vividly remembered me; she described me as “a wonderful spark to [her] school days.” We’ve fallen out of touch, but thanks to this challenge, I put a card of appreciation in the mail for her today!
Alisha Taylor:
My sixth grade math teacher, Gretchen Cullen, was amazing. She found ways to motivate us to learn more in a subject that many hate: algebra. She gave us “paw points” when we did extras. One that I remember was memorizing the first 30 numbers of pi. We’d trade in our points for prizes, one of which was lunch with her. I saved up all year to have a special pizza lunch with her and spent the entire time hammering her with questions, which she graciously answered. I’ve never forgotten her and believe that she was my inspiration for obtaining a Masters in Accounting. I wanted to be just like her: graceful, kind, generous, and inspirational.
Please keep this list going and shout out your favorite teachers in the comments!
ICE sued over over illegal deletion of surveillance footage at Florida detention facility
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The Biden administration announced last month that it would be pausing immigration detention at Glades County Detention Center (GCDC) in Florida. This is undoubtedly a major step forward for immigrant rights. In just one example, the jail has been accused of violating the law by regularly erasing surveillance footage.
But while civil rights and watchdog groups filed a complaint against that earlier this year, they say Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has “failed to take any action to correct these abuses, recover video footage, or ensure that Glades County is in compliance with federal law.” The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Florida and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) are now suing ICE, along with the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).
“The public needs a full accounting of any violations that occurred at the Glades County Detention Center, and that starts with ICE and NARA enforcing recordkeeping laws against the facility,” said CREW Senior Counsel Nikhel Sus. “It’s time to hold ICE accountable for contractors who violate federal law and fail to meet the standards of immigration detention.”
RELATED STORY: Biden administration to stop use of one of the worst immigration detention sites in the nation
Glades, which has contracted with the federal government to detain immigrants, is legally required to preserve footage for three years. The ACLU of Florida and CREW filed a complaint this past January after discovering the jail was violating the law by erasing footage. They said ICE had also known about the deletions but failed to report them, as is also required by law. The organizations then sued after ICE failed to take any corrective action.
What can Biden do? Listen to immigration activist Juan Escalante on Daily Kos’ The Brief podcast
“ICE has been aware of Glades County’s unlawful practice of deleting footage for over a year and has yet to take any action against Glades to repair the issue, especially during such a pivotal moment when allegations of abuse can be confirmed with that video,” said ACLU of Florida Deputy Legal Director Katie Blankenship.
Just this past year, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was urged to probe the illegal misuse of a toxic chemical at GCDC. More than two dozen groups in a complaint expressed worry the facility was miusing chemicals at up to 50 times the permitted concentration, leaving detained people in danger of “shortness of breath, coughing, bloody noses, headaches, severe nausea, and an increased risk of reproductive health damage, among other chronic illnesses.”
Federal lawmakers representing the state had in February urged the Biden administration to terminate its contract with the facility. The next month, officials said they would pause immigration detention at the site. But The Washington Post reported that “officials said they are open to using the jail again someday if the county addresses the issues they raised.” But immigration detention is inhumane by design. It should stay paused indefinitely. Better yet, don’t renew the contract.
“The new lawsuit seeks to keep ICE accountable amidst an ambiguous moment at Glades as the current contract between ICE and Glades County ends on April 30, 2022,” the organization continued. But as of May 1, it’s unclear what the current status of the contract is. “The agency will decide between terminating its contract with Glades County, which would likely cause the center to close, or renewing a contract to keep the detention center open.”
Bel’Or Mbema Mapudi Ngoma, who was at one time detained at Glades, in March called it “one of the worst experiences” in detention. “I experienced constant abuses at Glades, in addition to unprofessional and racist treatment. The xenophobia I experienced at Glades reflects the limited vision of the world at places like Glades. Thus, Glades must close rather than continue to subject people to inhumane conditions, which would be a step in the direction of a vision of a world where all people are treated with humanity.”
Nor should detained immigrants be shuffled from one abusive site to another, as ICE has typically done when a facility has been shut down. ICE has every ability to release people in its custody. Let them fight their cases from their own homes and communities, and out of harmful immigration detention.
RELATED STORIES: Groups urge termination of ICE contract for site accused of unlawfully deleting surveillance videos
Lawmakers urge Biden admin to close Florida ICE facility accused of racist abuse, COVID endangerment
‘Glades is a dangerous place for immigrants’: EPA is urged to probe chemical misuse at ICE facility
Southern California faces major water restrictions as Western U.S. drought continues
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California is once again facing major drought conditions, albeit with no areas experiencing exceptional droughts at least. Still, a large stretch in the middle of the state is considered to be in an extreme drought, which has officials with Southern California’s Metropolitan Water District (MWD) imposing stringent restrictions on water usage across six agencies, spanning dozens of communities. The water restrictions, which will take effect on June 1, primarily target outdoor watering, according to the Los Angeles Times, which reports that the activity accounts for as much as 70% of residential usage. Hand-watering trees is still on the table, though officials caution that residents “can’t afford green lawns” and should only be watering outdoors once a week.
The outdoor watering restrictions could be enough to meet the 35% reduction of usage needed to get through the drought and keep an all-out outdoor watering ban from being imposed in September. Approximately six million Southern Californians are expected to be affected, with officials hoping they stick to using 80 gallons of water per day—a decrease from the MWD average of 125 gallons of water per person per day. “We knew climate change would stress our water supplies and we’ve been preparing for it but we did not know it would happen this fast,” MWD Board of Directors Chairperson Gloria Gray told CBS News. A colleague of Gray’s called the drought “unprecedented,” though California has been experiencing some semblance of drought conditions since at least 2001, just one year after the U.S. Drought Monitor began.
Water districts in various parts of the state have been responding to the worsening drought, which has so far spanned three years, with January-March of this year bringing the driest conditions on record in California. In addition to residential restrictions for communities served by the Vallecitos Water District that encompasses inland San Diego County, commercial businesses face permanent restrictions like only serving water at restaurants if a customer specifically requests it or hotels giving guests the option of having their towels and linens laundered less frequently. More than 109,000 people rely on services from the Vallecitos Water District.
In Northern California, customers who rely on the East Bay Municipal Utility District will also face water restrictions—albeit less drastic than those in Southern California. The agency is asking its 1.4 million customers to reduce individual water usage by 10% from 2020 levels. The drought has crippled a majority of the West. According to the U.S. Drought Monitor’s map of the West, just over 6% of residents across New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, California, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Montana are not experiencing any drought conditions. There is major concern for the more than 55 million people experiencing drought conditions as well as what that could bring for wildfire season. Already, New Mexico has reported seven large fires since the start of the year, with Arizona reporting two. According to a World Economic Forum report in March, the present drought’s severity is undeniably linked to climate change. A study in Nature Climate Change even found that human activity contributed to 19% of the drought last year. Water restrictions may be tough, but if humans can make a difference in worsening the drought, they can hopefully move to lessen its intensity as well.
Spouting ‘groomer’ rhetoric, ‘Patriot’ bikers plan to confront Pride rally next month in Idaho
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Taking their cue from the incoming tide of far-right fearmongering about “grooming” and an “LGBTQ agenda” in schools and libraries, a group of Idaho biker militiamen are planning to show up to confront people celebrating a Pride event in a downtown Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, park next month.
Two men from the leadership of Panhandle Patriots, a militia-oriented bikers club based in northern Idaho—Justin Allen, the group’s vice president, and Jeff White, its “sergeant at arms”—told a recent gathering at a church hosted by Republican state House member Heather Scott that they planned to have a gun-driven event next month in Coeur d’Alene the same day as the city’s Pride Celebration at a park less than a mile away, and that they planned a confrontation: “We actually intend to go head to head with these people. A line has to be drawn in the sand. Good people need to stand up,” White told the audience.
The meeting, titled “Gameplan to Remove Inappropriate Materials in Our Schools and Libraries,” was held at Regeneration Calvary Chapel in Kootenai, a small town north of Sandpoint. Scott—who has a long history of associations and identification with the far-right Patriot movement—cohosted the gathering along with Amy Henry, who spoke remotely via Zoom. About an hour into the discussion—which mostly involved efforts to censor LGBT-friendly material from local public schools and libraries—Scott invited Allen and White up to the podium to speak.
White was the only person who actually spoke; Allen said not a single word during White’s soliloquy:
In Coeur d’Alene, on the 10th of June, there is Family Day. And at Family Day they are promoting family values, activities, and everything. The very following day, they are having Gay Pride Day. In the very same park the very next day, where they will be allowed to parade through all of Coeur d’Alene—drag queen dancers, education hour, making all this material available for all the kids in a park that is designed for kids.
We are having an event the very same day. That very same day we actually intend to go head to head with these people. A line has to be drawn in the sand. Good people need to stand up. And she was talking about the repercussions. We say, Damn the repercussions. Stand up, take it to the head. Go to the fight.
If you can, possibly, we know a lot of you are in Bonner County—we live in Bonner County. We are fighting in multiple counties. We are asking for all of you to come stand with us.
Ironically, the event being planned that day by Panhandle Patriots, dubbed “Gun d’Alene,” is being billed as an anniversary of the day in 2020 that armed “Patriots” flooded the streets of Coeur d’Alene in response to hoax rumors of the impending arrival of buses full of evil black-clad “antifa” vandals who mysteriously never showed up anywhere they were rumored to be going.
Dozens of people showed up on armed patrol, toting AR-15s and wearing body armor, at a downtown shopping strip mall. In a cellphone video shared on Facebook, one videographer said: “If you guys are thinking of coming to Coeur d’Alene, to riot or loot, you’d better think again. Because we ain’t having it in our town. … I guess there’s a big rumor that people from Spokane are gonna come out here and act up. But that shit ain’t gonna happen.”
Of course it didn’t happen, because it was never going to happen in the first place. The event next month is essentially celebrating the Patriots’ lethal gullibility. But that’s not how White described it, of course:
Our event is advertised as “Gun d’Alene,” because it’s an anniversary of when we stood to protect our community. We’re standing again to protect our community. We shifted our date to be able to go head-to-head with these people. They are trying to take your children.
Considering that the flagrant brandishing of weapons is part of the event’s entire raison d’être, his words also took on ominous overtones as he urged the audience members to come support them:
This fight is not just paper, it’s not just words, it’s not just politicians. They have to see people standing in their face saying ‘No more.’ If we don’t do this—they’re winning, as she said. The amount of steps they take are 10 to 1. They’ve got people nonstop. Nonstop on this. We gain two steps, they gain twelve. We’re not gonna win, we’re not gonna fight back at a leisurely pace. We’re busy six days a week doing this, and we know a lot of you are too. But we’re asking a lot of you—leave your homes, leave your comfort, come stand.
If you want to see it, if you want to see what they’re promoting, come down there on June 11. Come see what they’re doing. Come with us—come stand.
Another flier posted by the Panhandle Patriots advertising their planned confrontation with the Pride event shows a drag queen reading at a public library, and urges people to join them “in standing up against the indoctrination and grooming of our children.” Among its slogans: “If you don’t protect children, you are part of the problem.”
The park where the Patriots plan to hold their gun event, McEuen Park, is on the Coeur d’Alene waterfront less than three-quarters of a mile from Coeur d’Alene City Park, where the “Pride in the Park” events are scheduled to be held.
The Panhandle Patriots have been harassing members of the LGBT community in northern Idaho for awhile now. Last November, in conjunction with a local evangelical Christian church, they organized a protest in Post Falls outside the city library on the night it was hosting a program called the “Rainbow Squad,” an LGBTQ-friendly reading-discussion program.
Among the signs they carried, police body-camera footage shows, were slogans like “Flee From Sexual Immorality,” “Obey God Not Men,” “Sexual Immorality is an Abomination to God,” and “The Solution is Jesus Christ.”
On Facebook, Panhandle Patriots shared a post with its members calling out the library network’s upcoming meeting and urging others to attend:
The perversion that is becoming so pervasive in these libraries needs to be called out and CAST OUT.
We need people to show up and speak out, demand the removal of pro-LGBT books like the following:
[Links to such books as Auntie Uncle: Drag Queen Hero and Be Amazing: A History of Pride.]
A Post Falls native named Michelle White told the Coeur d’Alene Press that she and her two children had been participating for several months in Rainbow Squad events, saying she had always thought of the library as a “safe space” without judgment.
“These people are making it not a safe place for kids to gather by picketing and yelling at them as they go inside,” she told the Press. “Creating an environment that is not safe is not OK.”
Jessica Mahuron, the North Idaho Pride Alliance outreach coordinator, attended the November Rainbow Squad event and observed how the protesters’ intentions were to eliminate that safe space—and they succeeded.
“There were some people who felt intimidated from entering the building, others left because they were feeling so terrible, and for some, this is nothing new to them, so they stood strong,” Mahuron said. “The program is supposed to provide a safe, inclusive space for fun and friendship. What they experienced coming into that meeting was the exact opposite.”
As Tess Owen noted last year at Vice, Panhandle Patriots is closely associated with the so-called “American Redoubt” movement that is trying to organize a secessionist 51st state in the interior Northwest as a homeland for “Patriots.” And they’ve been increasingly busy the past few years: teaming up with anti-immigration vigilantes at the border (which involved confiscating drinking water left for migrants), leading anti-vaccination rallies, and swarming libraries to demand the removal books they say promote “an LGBTQ agenda.”
Their leader—a man named Mike Birdsong, who uses the nickname “Viper”—was present at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., during the Jan. 6 insurrection, and was photographed engaging the police in battle at barricades outside the building, though he has not been charged with any crimes from that day. Birdsong also has been photographed alongside well-known Proud Boys who have been charged with conspiracy at the insurrection.
Republican who wants to make state book the Bible calls for burning banned books
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Republicans love nothing more than stirring hysteria in their voter base. As Daily Kos continues to cover, for example, conservatives have made trans rights—and particularly the rights of trans youth—a rallying cry as we approach the 2022 midterm elections. Republicans have insisted they’re protecting women’s rights by banning trans girls from competing in sports teams, for example, and used the same justification to try and keep trans women out of women’s bathrooms. They’ve also made it clear they want to make it impossible for trans youth to access gender-affirming health care, which we know to be lifesaving.
Republicans are also going after library books. Yes, book bans are apparently alive and well in 2022. As Daily Kos continues to cover, most of the efforts to pull, ban, or even burn books are coming from conservatives at all levels of government. We’re also seeing concentrated efforts from conservative groups to mobilize folks (not all of whom are even parents or even live in the local area) to call for book bans at school board meetings. Book bans, perhaps unsurprisingly at this point, also target books by and about people of color, LGBTQ+ people, and books that tackle nuanced topics like sexual abuse, child abuse, and gender-based violence.
With all of this in mind, Tennessee lawmakers have passed SB 2247/HB 2666, which, if signed into law by Republican Gov. Bill Lee, will allow members of the state’s textbook commission to decide if a challenged book will stay or be removed from public school libraries. The textbook commission, by the way, is filled with political appointees, as reported by The Washington Post.
RELATED: South Dakota teens say they received letter from beloved teacher filled with anti-trans rhetoric
In practice, here’s how the process would work. Challenged books are reviewed by the school board, all of whom are (obviously) elected to serve on the board. Makes sense. Once they decide on whether or not to keep a book, however, this legislation essentially vetos their decision. As long as one person—a parent, a student, or an employee of the school district—doesn’t want the book available in the library system, they can appeal to the textbook commission. Those folks, again, are political appointees. And their decision on that appeal would apply to all school libraries in the state.
Ultimately, the bill is just another way for conservatives to get books they don’t like out of the hands of young people. Even if a school district, for example, reviews a challenge or complaint about a book and decides to keep it, this appeal process is essentially a way for adults to try again and have the book pulled not just in their area, but statewide.
And if you’re thinking, Well, is that really so bad… It really is so bad. One of the sponsors of the bill, Republican Rep. Jerry Saxton, actually said he’d like to see inappropriate books burned.
As a review of that, per the Associated Press, Democratic. Rep. John Ray Clemmons, who represents Nashville, asked Sexton what he suggests be done with books ultimately deemed as inappropriate.
“You going to put them in the street?” Clemmons asked. “Light them on fire? Where are they going?”
“I don’t have a clue,” Sexton said. “But I would burn them.” Later on, Sexton did note he isn’t on the commission and that he doesn’t think anyone is going to burn books, but still. (Also: Sexton has continuously suggested that the state book of Tennessee should be the Bible. Really!)
You can watch that clip below, courtesy of local outlet FOX Nashville.
In speaking to Chalkbeat, Lindsey Kimery, who serves as a school librarian in Nashville, described the bill as a chance for just one person to “dictate” what is available in all school libraries. It’s unfair to students and it’s dangerous.
Relatedly, details of the bill also don’t specify how long a book would be unavailable from the library for this additional review process, which could mean that books are essentially banned before actually being banned.
Gov. Lee hasn’t commented directly on this legislation but based on his history of signing hate into law, it’s not looking good.