Global reproductive health experts: The U.S. has joined a truly dreadful list of repressive nations

By
June 27, 2022
In Commentary

Dr. Anu Kumar. President and CEO of Ipas

In case you missed it, Dr. Anu Kumar, the President and CEO of the Chapel Hill-based global reproductive heath organization Ipas — a nonprofit  that has worked long and courageously to bring reproductive health care to people across the globe living under repressive regimes, issued a powerful statement last Friday that forecasts the future in a post-Roe v. Wade United States.

It’s a “must read and share” for all who care about human rights.

Overturning Roe v. Wade: A rights-denying move that will devastate access to abortion

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade officially denies millions of U.S. residents fundamental rights—to health care, to bodily autonomy, and to freedom. In the coming weeks, 26 U.S. states will severely restrict or outright criminalize abortion.

As a global reproductive justice organization dedicated to expanding access to abortion and contraception for all who need it, Ipas strongly condemns this decision.

We know from our work around the world that criminalizing abortion does not stop abortions. But they do become harder to get, especially for Black, indigenous, and people of color, as well as those struggling to make ends meet. Women face greater economic struggles, and their children have fewer resources. Women, pregnant people and providers will go to jail. Many people will be forced to carry unwanted pregnancies to term. Everyone will have less freedom.

In Brazil, we’ve seen police raids of abortion clinics, and in Nicaragua we’ve seen doctors stop providing lifesaving treatment because they’re scared of arrest. In places like El Salvador, and in the past in Nepal and Rwanda, women have been put in jail when abortion is criminalized.

The protections Roe v. Wade offered did not guarantee access for all; but this inhumane decision now forces people to endure even greater hardships for what is essential health care. Marginalized communities, particularly people of color, who already face discrimination and undue surveillance of their bodies, will be criminalized for their pregnancy outcomes.

With this decision, the U.S. joins a handful of autocratic, anti-democratic countries bent on denying human rights and restricting access to abortion when the rest of the world is progressing toward reproductive justice for all. Middle-to-low-income countries like Benin and the Democratic Republic of the Congo have recently liberalized their abortion laws. And in Central and Latin America, the Green Wave feminist movement has swelled, with countries like Argentina and Colombia liberalizing their laws.

Ipas will continue to advocate for access to safe, legal abortion everywhere because we believe everyone, no matter who they are or where they live, should be able to determine their own future.

Roe overturned, Medicaid expansion talks revived, sports wagering folds (for now): The week’s top stories on Policy Watch

By
June 26, 2022
In Commentary, News

In this issue:

1. U.S. Supreme Court overturns right to abortion in landmark decision

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that established abortion as a constitutional right.

The decision by six of the Court’s nine justices will allow each state to set its own abortion laws, leading to a patchwork of access throughout the country. The result is expected to be an uptick in the number of women traveling out of state for abortions, as well as unsafe abortions in states where the medical procedure will now be banned or heavily restricted.

“We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in his opinion, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. Chief Justice John Roberts filed a separate opinion concurring in the judgment.[Read more…]

*Bonus read: ‘Disastrous’ and ‘unthinkable’ North Carolinians react to the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade

2. The NC GOP’s copycat crusade against voting rights continues (commentary)

It’s a familiar childhood scene – perhaps even from your own. A group of cool, older kids engages in some kind of rebellious action or expresses a shared opinion on an issue of perceived import and soon thereafter, a younger sibling or friend, trying hard to keep up, attempts to mimic their behavior or statements.

The younger kid never gets it quite right, or often, even fully grasps the substance of the subject matter, and their behavior will likely be barely acknowledged by the older ones, but the exercise nonetheless makes them feel as if they are at least nominally a part of the gang and helps reenforce household/neighborhood attitudes and pecking orders.

For a modern, adult world example of this phenomenon in action, check out the ongoing efforts of North Carolina Republicans in the field of voting rights and “election security.” [Read more…]

3. NC House Republicans want the state to negotiate for a Medicaid expansion work requirement

A NC House Republican proposal for Medicaid expansion would require the state’s health department to negotiate for a work requirement for enrollees before the question of offering health insurance to low-income adults comes to a vote of the legislature.

A new committee of House members and senators, called the Joint Legislative Committee on Medicaid Rate Modernization and Savings, would decide on Dec. 15 whether the state Department of Health and Human Services’ expansion plan meets criteria set out in Senate bill 408. If the joint committee decides the plan checks all boxes, the legislature would vote on it. House Speaker Tim Moore said the House would vote before the end of the year on an expansion plan that made it through the new joint committee. [Read more…]

*Bonus read: NC House members decline to gamble on ‘predatory’ sports wagering bill (w/ video)

4. Gov. Cooper orders NCORR to expedite Hurricane Matthew recovery, but homeowners’ woes continue

Thad Artis, Jr. is living alone in limbo.

Artis is entering his second summer in a Goldsboro motel, waiting to move into his new modular home in Pikeville. But his contractor, Rescue Construction, has made no progress on the home.  “A motel is not a home,” Artis said. “It’s just a place to go when you’re on vacation.”

Artis is among thousands of homeowners enrolled in the NC Office of Recovery and Resiliency’s Hurricane Matthew disaster recovery program. He is also among hundreds and hundreds still displaced after the historic 2016 storm.

Worse yet, his wife suffered a stroke and is paralyzed on one side of her body. “She can’t walk. She can’t see,”Artis said.

He asked motel management to allow a hospital bed and a lift to be placed in their room so the couple could stay together and she could receive therapy with him by her side.

The management denied his request.[Read more…]

5. Transgender North Carolinians see legal victories on birth certificates, health coverage

Transgender people born in North Carolina can now change the gender marker on their birth certificates without undergoing medical transition, according to a consent judgment in a federal law suit issued Wednesday.

The lawsuit, filed last year by Lambda Legal, Baker Botts LLP and Brooks Pierce McLendon Humphrey & Leonard, challenged state restrictions on how transgender North Carolinians can change their gender markers.

Many transgender people do not choose to have any surgery or to medically transition. They say requirements that they do so don’t reflect the reality of transgender peoples’ lives.

This week’s judgment means the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services and other state officials and agencies will have to provide birth certificates reflecting an applicant’s sex, consistent with their gender identity, without their having to undergo any surgery. [Read more…]

6. House bill would hand control of the State Board of Education to state superintendent

A House bill filed last week would give the state Superintendent of Public Instruction control of the State Board of Education.

House Bill 1173 was filed by Rep. Hugh Blackwell, a Burke County Republican. It would need lawmakers’ approval to be placed on the November ballot for voter approval or rejection.

Blackwell could not be reached for comment Tuesday afternoon.

He has filed similar legislation in the past to expand the powers of the superintendent, but it did not win lawmakers’ support.[Read more…]

7. ‘Just say the election was corrupt’: Trump pressure on Justice Department detailed

President Donald Trump sought to use the U.S. Justice Department to create the illusion of a legitimate investigation into the validity of the 2020 election results, the Jan. 6 committee and former Justice Department leaders said Thursday in the panel’s fifth hearing this month.

In the weeks between Election Day 2020 and Jan. 6, 2021, the date of the attack on the U.S. Capitol, the former president implored Justice Department officials to “just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and Republican congressmen,” according to former acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue.

Several Republican House members appeared willing to play the role Trump proposed for them, publicly endorsing the president’s unfounded claims of a stolen election and privately strategizing about how to overturn the result. [Read more...]

8. How the Trump fake elector scheme fizzled in four states

Part of Donald Trump’s plan to reverse his loss in the 2020 presidential election hinged on replacing legitimate electors in a handful of swing states with “fake electors.”

In theory, these bogus Republican slates in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Nevada and Wisconsin would cast their electoral votes for the incumbent — canceling out the popular vote for Joe Biden in their states.

Groups of fake electors met on Dec. 14, 2020, in those seven states, an investigative counsel working for the panel, Casey Lucier, said in a video presentation shown in a Tuesday hearing of the U.S. House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. [Read more…]

9. NC lawmakers briefed on ‘zombie deer,’ efforts to preserve hunting heritage

North Carolina legislators weary from two years of COVID learned last week of a new virus-like organism they would need to keep on their radar.

In late March, Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) was first detected in a single deer in Yadkin County.

“It’s not a bacteria. It’s not a virus. It’s a prion,” Rep. Jay Adams (R-Catawba) told members of the House Wildlife Resources Committee on Tuesday.

“It creates spongiform brain lesions, and the animal ultimately dies from it,” Adams explained.

Because infected deer often stumble, drool and lose body mass, CWD has been colloquially called “zombie deer” disease.

Brad Howard, chief of the state Wildlife Management Division, told lawmakers North Carolina is now the 30th state where CWD has been detected.[Read more…]

10. Weekly Radio Interviews and Daily Radio Commentaries: 

Click here to listen to the latest interviews and audio commentaries with NC Policy Watch director Rob Schofield.

11. Weekly Editorial Cartoon:

Read more about the series that inspired this cartoon

Weekend humor from Celia Rivenbark: Prince Louis needs to meet Meemaw

By
June 25, 2022
In Commentary

After watching the antics of bonny Prince Louis of Cambridge last week at Queen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee Celebration and Wet Waistcoat Contest, I found myself thinking somebody needs to ship the wee master across the pond so a Southern Mee-maw could, er, correct a few bad behaviors.

Louis, age 4, is a walking, talking meme. He slams his little palm over mom, Kate Middleton’s, mouth to make her stop talking. He rolls his eyes when bored with the exaggeration of a Catskills comic in the ‘50s. Take my monarchy, please.

At the Jubilee, he literally thumbed his nose at his parents during the pageantry. Blimey! The only time Prince Louis seemed composed  was while sitting with his grandfather, Prince Charles Who Will Never, Ever Be King and Nobody Even Cares Anymore Least of All His Own Mother. Perhaps Charles’ sadness, as omnipresent as Camilla’s unfortunate off-white stockings, moves even the tiny tyrant to a rare and respectful silence.

The British press is besotted with Prince Louis, calling him “delightfully precocious” and a “charmer whose crowd-pleasing antics never disappoint.”

Oh, sure they do.

You can’t blame Prince Louis, though. He leads a pretty cushy life from what I can tell. He probably has a child from the village fetched every day to taste his pudding to make sure it’s not too hot.

You can imagine him sitting with his quieter siblings wondering aloud, “I wonder what the poor people are doing tonight.”

All of which means a Southern Mee-maw intervention is needed here. And soon.

Of course, no one spanks anymore so we will need Mee-maw 2.0 for the task. There can be no invitation to “go get a switch” in this modern age. When we know better, we do better. I believe Howard Stern said that.

Once he arrives in mythical Catgut, N.C., Prince Louis will be taught to “straighten up and fly right” not by a proper English governess in starched pinafore and thick-soled shoes but by a genuine Southern great grandma, wearing aqua crocs and a sweatshirt decorated with “U.S. Songbirds.” This is the uniform of a warrior going into battle and it is, statistically speaking, undefeated.

Prince Louis will frown at the bowlful of grits presented him for his first stateside breakfast. His trademark scowl, which is “delightfully iconic” according to royal-watchers and “incredibly annoying” to everyone else, will be greeted with Southern Mee-maw wisdom.

“You keep scrunching up yer face and it’ll freeze like that.”

Done.

If he raises his tiny fists to her, she will laugh loudly and remind him “You can get glad in the same clothes you got sad in.”

He is 4, so this may take a moment for all that wisdom to sink in, but he will ultimately understand she’s telling him “Let go of what’s making you mad.”

As he stomps and sasses, she will instruct him “don’t act ugly.” Which is Southern for “stop being a jerk.” She will be moved to tell him she’s ill with him and he will come to decipher that this “ill” has nothing to do with a physical ailment.

By the time he is returned to his loving family, and Megan Markle, Prince Louis will be whipped (not really!) into shape and become the model of decorum. And if he backslides? Help is just an overnight flight away. And it’s got a new pair of crocs.

Celia Rivenbark is a NYT-bestselling author and columnist. Write to her at [email protected].

Let’s hope sports betting bill stays dead

By
June 23, 2022
In Commentary

(Photo illustration by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

The state of North Carolina needs a lot of things — access to healthcare for hundreds of thousands of people trapped in the coverage gap, new laws to prevent the proliferation of military-grade killing machines, adequate funding so that its public schools comply with the state constitution —  but legalized sports gambling is not on the list.

That’s why last night’s preliminary defeat of such a proposal in the state House was more than welcome. As Wake County State Rep. Abe Jones put it succinctly and accurately in regard to such a proposal in the House floor debate as reported by WRAL.com:

“This is bad. Pure, simple, straight-up wrong. You can’t fix what’s wrong because you can’t amend it away.”

A powerful fact sheet prepared a few years back by the national advocacy group Stop Predatory Gambling lists numerous reasons why commercialized sports betting is a huge and deeply problematic scam. But topping the list are these:

  • It fundamentally changes the way people watch and consume sports (and not for the better).
  • It will relieve Americans of billions upon billions of dollars of wealth on an almost always illusory notion that they can win big.
  • It is designed to target kids and turn them into lifetime gamblers.

As the fact sheet notes:

Public officials and opinion leaders of all political stripes who profess a desire to improve opportunity and alleviate poverty often lament how few levers they have to pull.

Saving is the road to wealth creation yet around 50% of the U.S. population has zero or negative net wealth. More than 60% of citizens don’t have enough savings to cover a $1000 emergency expense. This is a critical issue because asset-building is the direct opposite of commercialized gambling.

Americans were expected to lose $118 billion of their personal wealth to government-sanctioned gambling in 2018. Over the next eight years, the American people are on a collision course to lose more than $1 trillion of their personal wealth to government-sanctioned gambling. If approved, commercialized sports betting will make these financial losses even worse.

To improve opportunity and increase mobility out of poverty, state officials must stop turning millions of people who are small earners, who could be small savers, into habitual bettors.

Last night’s vote was razor-thin, and perhaps not the last word on the issue. If state leaders, however, retain any interest in protecting the people of the state from predatory corporations that differ little from loan sharks and payday lending scammers, they’ll see that the legislation stays dead.

Modest national progress on gun safety likely to have little impact in NC

By
June 22, 2022
In Commentary

Senators Thom Tillis and Richard Burr

For decades, American politicians have had a disturbing tendency to make big promises about tackling gun violence in the aftermath of horrific mass shootings and then, as the weeks go by, the headlines wane, and gun lobby bullying increases, lose interest.

You know the mantra: “We’ll keep studying the matter,” they say.

And tragically, the pattern appears to be repeating itself yet again. North Carolina Senators Thom Tillis and Richard Burr, for instance, have won plaudits of late for their work with Democrats on some modest federal gun safety reforms, but as veteran journalist Darrell Ehrlick of the Daily Montanan argues persuasively in an essay published today by Policy Watch, the legislation is pathetically unambitious.

As he explains:

[The legislation] neither obligates the gun industry or the gun lobby to do anything meaningful. And it certain does nothing to curb the explosive expansion and development of different sophisticated weapons of war, nor will it impact what you can buy or gun sales, which have soared in the past decade.

Instead, the new laws will just place more work on the federal government, which will be set up for blame when something doesn’t work perfectly. The NRA and the gun manufacturers should be thrilled: They’re getting legislation that is disguised as action, but I can’t see any reason to believe it will make much difference in situations like Uvalde, Sandy Hook or Buffalo.

Rep. Marcia Morey

Ehrlick allows that the legislation would provide incentives for states to enact “red flag” laws — laws that allow courts to issue directives akin to domestic violence orders that would require individuals found to be dangerous to temporarily surrender their firearms — but as he also notes, there would be no uniformity to the laws or any requirement that they be enacted.

Indeed, here in Tillis and Burr’s home state, their fellow Republicans in the state House have already made it crystal clear they have no intention of allowing consideration of a red flag proposal anytime soon. In an interview with Policy Watch earlier this week, the longtime champion of such a law for North Carolina — Durham County State Representative and former state judge Marcia Morey — reported that she’s already received the message from House Speaker Tim Moore that her bill (which has never even received a hearing over a period of years) will be buried again in 2022.

The bottom line: While any advances — even tiny ones on the margins — are welcome, the supposed progress on tackling gun violence we keep hearing about is beginning to feel like a shell game. North Carolina voters, who overwhelmingly support stronger gun safety laws, must not allow the politicians behind the scam to get away with it.

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