Daniel Nichanian. bsky.app/profile/taniel.bsky… Editor & founder of @BoltsMag. Local politics, criminal justice, voting rights.
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The final paragraph of the three liberals' Dobbs dissent:
"With sorrow—for this Court, but more, for the many millions of American women who have today lost a fundamental constitutional protection—we dissent. "
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When you use images from your own presidency to warn of what would happen if your opponent won
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it took me a moment to realize the NYPD commissioner who was just raided by the feds is the NYPD commissioner who succeeded the NYPD commissioner who was raided by the feds a few weeks ago and then resigned
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BREAKING: Rhode Island Senator Harold Metts, a *30-year* Dem lawmaker who is a fervent opponent of abortion rights, has **lost** Tuesday's primary against a 26-year old progressive who's a reproductive rights advocate.
The mail-in ballots just came in: Tiara Mack won 60% to 40%.
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NEW: Democrats GAIN a congressional seat in Alaska.
Mary Peltola has defeated Sarah Palin, 51.5% to 48.5%.
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going into a city and holding a rally for white people to have them to boo at the mention of a large & ethnically different part of the local population is unapologetic & open white supremacy
Trump vows to crack down on Somali refugees in a city with one of the largest Somali populations in the country
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Vermont has a new Senator!
Peter Welch wins to replace Pat Leahy, and he'll be the second Democratic senator in the state's history. (@AP calls).
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The Uvalde mother who was handcuffed by the police and then ran to the school says that law enforcement threatened her with probation violation (and so criminal punishment) if she talked about her story to the media…: news.yahoo.com/mother-ran-te…
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I can't possibly understate the political & policy consequences of this: Democrats just gained full control of four state governments today.
Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, and Minnesota.
(I have no idea what to make of the aliteration.)
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France is quickly responding to yesterday's U.S. news by moving to adopt a constitutional amendment codifying abortion rights in the French Constitution.
Macron's party and the left opposition agree on it, and @lemondefr says it has the votes: lemonde.fr/politique/article…
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Biden won the popular vote by 5+ million & got 306 electoral votes.
Trump lost the popular vote by 2+ million & got 306 electoral votes.
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RESULT: Pittsburgh has overwhelmingly voted to ban no-knock warrants for police in a local ballot initiative.
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Susan Collins voted against the Dream Act in 2010.
Maine's @SenatorCollins: praises DACA ruling:
“I have long supported a path to citizenship for Dreamers...Now that the Court has ruled, Congress should take up legislation like the Dream Act so that these young people can stop living in fear.”
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And there's moer: Democrats have flipped two seats in the Mississippi senate, and in so doing they've broken the GOP's supermajority in the chamber.
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What is transpiring here is that the Democratic candidate who won a safe blue seat in North Carolina on a pro-choice platform, and then switched to the GOP to give them a supermajority for their anti-abortion law, was a Republican plant all along. nyti.ms/3QmuUDx
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Democrats have gained a trifecta in Maine. They picked-up the governorship, AND flipped the state Senate; they already had the House.
Immediate impact: Maine will finally move forward on the Medicaid expansion that voters approved in 2017, and that GOP Gov. LePage was blocking.
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That's two more years of judges appointed by Biden.
Keep in mind, one thing that Biden has been very different on than his predecessors (including Obama) is the professional background of his appointees, notably many more public defenders.
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Woa, an 18-year old high school student, Shiva Rajbhandari, won a school board election in Boise, Idaho, on Tuesday.
He ousted an incumbent school member who had received an endorsement from a far-right group, which Rajbhandari went after.
Some context: idahoednews.org/news/pac-wit…
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Big news in Michigan: A county clerk who was an election denier faced a recall election. (She was accused of mishandling equipment.) She massively lost tonight & will be out of office.
(This is a very red area.)
wlns.com/news/hillsdale-coun…
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Huge news in France, that just two weeks ago seemed unthinkable: the four major left and center-left parties have struck a left-wide coalition deal, the first of its kind in decades, that gives them a shot to wrestle power from Macron in the June parliamentary elections.
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It looks like Harris County is on track to have more than 100,000 in-person voters for the 4th day in a row (out of 4).
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JUST NOW: Tishaura Jones WINS mayoral election in St. Louis.
She ran as the most progressive candidate in the primary & the runoff: includes support for ending cash bail, decriminalizing sex work, closing Workhouse jail, & more.
She's the 1st black woman elected as mayor here.
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RESULT: Marvin Robinson, a Dem state Rep. in Kansas, was just *ousted* by voters in his Dem primary.
Who is Robinson? He provided Kansas Republicans the decisive vote to override the Dem governor's veto, and pass an anti-trans bill into law.
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Of the 4 most populous states, the two Dem-run ones (CA + NY) are using independent or court maps. The two GOP-run ones (FL + TX) are using maps strongly gerrymandered by the GOP.
The House majority right there.
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Here's the Alabama congressional map that was struck down today.
It packs African American residents from Birmingham to Montgomery to Tuscaloosa to Selma into one single district (=everything that's blue on this map).
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Jill Karofsky, the liberal challenger, has won Wisconsin's Supreme Court election.
She ousts incumbent Dan Kelly, a Scott Walker-appointed, Trump-endorsed incumbent conservative known for things like comparing slavery to affirmative action.
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RESULT: The GOP has lost control of the Arizona state government for the first time since 2009.
Democrats Katie Hobbs will be the next governor, defeating Republican Kari Lake, NBC just called.
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I just want to make sure everyone knows Georgia's Secretary of State race went to a Dec. 4th runoff between John Barrow (D) and Brad Raffensperger (R).
This is the election to elect Brian Kemp's successor. So it should be obvious how important position is for voting rights.
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Confirmed: The 3 school board candidates who ran on anti-LGBT platforms in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, lost tonight.
The election took place in a context of violent threats against the board's LGBT-inclusive policies: wpr.org/eau-claire-school-bo…
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JUST IN: Polls closed in France. Exit polls show surprise:
—Left coalition (New Popular Front) projected first. (!)
—Far-right (RN) has lost its bid to take power. Anti-RN front appears to have worked very well.
—No bloc close to majority.
Follow this 🧵 for results and more:
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exactly 2 weeks ago , at around this hour, Ted Cruz voted to disenfranchise every single voter of Pittsburgh (a city that went for Biden) by throwing out their state's electoral votes.
By rejoining the Paris Climate Agreement, President Biden indicates he’s more interested in the views of the citizens of Paris than in the jobs of the citizens of Pittsburgh. This agreement will do little to affect the climate and will harm the livelihoods of Americans.
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RESULT: Kentuckians have rejected Amendment 2, the ballot measure that would have allowed public funding to go to private schools.
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Wow. Voters have been locked out of a polling station in Louisville, & are now banging on the doors demanding to get to vote.
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Political situation in France is fairly jaw-dropping.
1. Elections were 7 weeks ago, & in France transition is quick. But still no new government, & it's not just bc there's no solution: Macron stalled, then announced a bizarre "Olympic truce," & is now stalling again.
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Terrible night for the GOP in cities:
In one swell swoop, it has lost the mayor's offices in the most populous city anywhere in the nation that it presently governed (Jacksonville), as well as in the 7th most populous (Colorado Spring).
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Big news in Oregon: the outgoing Governor commuted the death sentences of everyone currently on death row in the state. oregonlive.com/politics/2022…
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JUST IN: The Republican Mayor of Fairbanks, Alaska, lost re-election last night to a Democrat.
Mayor David Pruhs is a conservative who fought protections for LGBTQ+ residents; he made comments this year drew condemnation this year from Alaska Natives. He lost to Mindy O'Neall.
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RESULT: Do you remember Jared Smith, the Florida judge in Hillsbourgh County (Tampa) who tried to block a teenager from accessing abortion because her grades were too low? (jezebel.com/florida-judge-tr…)
He was ousted tonight. He trails 52% to 48% with mail + all precincts reporting.
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Mark Kelly & Raphael Warnock were two of Dems' best results in 2020—but both needed to run again within 2 years since their first wins were specials.
Now they'll both be around till 2028.
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Joe Biden is now ahead in Georgia!
Latest batch of ballots from Clayton County has given him the statewide lead. More remains from Clayton, part of which John Lewis represented in Congress until July.
No Democrat has won GA in a presidential race since 1992.
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JUST IN: Pennsylvania Democrats appear to have kept control of the state House.
Cambria County just added ballots & nearly finished counting, keeping Dem lawmaker Frank Burns on top by 3% in very Trumpian area.
So Democrats retain a 102-101 majority: no change in seats at all.
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🚨news in Florida: a House committee has moved forward a bill to strip Floridians of right to vote if they haven't been able to fully pay court fines & fees. Hundreds of thousands could be disenfranchised.
Coups easier to pull off when universal suffrage devalued to start with.
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NEW: The Michigan Supreme Court just directed the State Board of Canvassers to place two constitutional amendments back on November's ballot: one to protect abortion rights, one to strengthen voting rights.
It rebukes Republicans on the Board who blocked the measures last week.
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Kanye West is already too late to make ballot in Texas, New York, and Illinois; has 10 days to collect 130,000 signatures to make it in Florida, & an extra day to collect 12,000 in Michigan. The takes on what it means he’d run for president should probably reflect some of this.
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a remarkable referendum today: Berlin voters by a comfortable margin voted that the city should expropriate housing from large landlords (that have at least 3,000 units) & socialize those units.
Roughly 200,000 units fit that description.
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BREAKING: Delaware state Rep. Earl Jaques has **lost** to progressive challenger Eric Morrison in tonight's Dem primary.
Jaques had opposed gay marriage. Morrison is gay, & long performed as a drag queen, & was attacked by Jaques for hosting a drag show during the campaign.
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All ballots are now counted in Arizona. And Democrats have won the attorney general race, pending a recount.
Mayes leads Hamadeh by 510
votes.
Out of 2.5 millions! A margin of 0.02%.
If recounts confirms, this means Arizona’s statewide far-right slate has all lost.
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ICE agents terrorized this New Jersey teenager throughout Sunday night. She knew not to open the door because of the “know your rights” posts on social media. nytimes.com/2019/07/14/us/ic…
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🚨 The portal to request a mail-in ballot for Georgia’s January 5th runoffs is now online.
If you are in Georgia & if you wish to vote by mail: ballotrequest.sos.ga.gov
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RESULT: Dems just flipped the mayor's office in Jacksonville, Florida.
This was the most populous city with a GOP mayor anywhere in the country. No more.
Donna Deegan will be the next mayor.
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Iowa had abortion protected by its state courts. Then, just *days* before Dobbs, the Iowa's state supreme court struck that right down.
The GOP passed a 6-week abortion ban. It was upheld by the state supreme court this summer.
This is the first election since that ruling.
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What DeSantis is doing here may be the most cynical, antidemocratic, & nakedly destructive of people’s lives maneuvers I can think in recent US politics. Beyond any politics, it’s just so horrible & tragic to these people. miamiherald.com/news/politic…
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A video from Paris, of supporters of the Left coalition, waiting for the exit poll to drop at 8pm—and reacting:
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Oh, Illinois passed a referendum to codify the right to collective bargaining in its state constitution.
The first state to do so!
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A landlord threatened to call ICE on their tenant. And was just fined $17,000 for that.
Likely "the first case in the country where an individual was fined for threatening to call immigration authorities." wsj.com/articles/new-york-ju…
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Gwinnett County, the big northern Atlanta suburb, took another jump to the left today.
Romney +9 in 2012
Clinton +6 in 2016
Abrams +14 in 2018
Biden +18 in 2020
Warnock +24 in 2022 (!).
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RESULT: Tucson voters have approved raising the minimum wage to $15 by a very large margin.
Tucson is a key base for Democrats in Arizona, whose senior Dem senator made quite a show of opposing a minimum wage hike earlier this year.
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‼️ Dems have seized a 17-vote (!) lead in Alaska's HD17 with the count of mail-in ballots, which (if it holds post-canvass & recount) may end up denying the GOP legislative control & an overall trifecta in this state!
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The 3 dissenters warn that more is coming. They write that the conservatives' approach in the Dobbs ruling "places in jeopardy other rights, from contraception to same-sex intimacy and marriage."
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It's frustrating to think of the controversy over @AOC using "concentration camp," when Joe Arpaio used those words to describe a detention center HE HIMSELF ran, & Trump embraced him & pardoned him, and now Arpaio is running for sheriff again on a promise to reopen that camp.
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Washington's Senate is on fire. In past month, it has passed automatic & same-day voting registration, a ban on conversion therapy, stronger protections for trans students, stronger financial disclosure rules—and today death penalty abolition. nitter.app/davidminpdx/status/963…
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This is the part of the night where things looking promising enough for Democrats that they subconsciously feel it's all a cosmic plot to crush their spirits more vigorously.
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Okay, this may be the single most definitive aspect of the Wisconsin results so far: Kenosha County has been as swing as it gets, Trump +1%, Evers +3%, and Hagedorn (con) +3%.
Now Karofsky, the liberal challenger, is up by 17% (94% in).
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JUST IN: a progressive win in Wisconsin.
Jill Underly, a progressive who was supported by teacher's unions, has won WI's statewide election for school superintendent against Deb Kerr. (who was backed by Scott Walker & the charter school network associated with Betsy DeVos).
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❗️Karen Bass has taken the LEAD in the mayoral race in Los Angeles.
She now leads Caruso 50.4% to 49.6%.
(Expect her lead to continue to grow quite a bit.)
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Stacey Abrams has already come closer to a statewide victory in Georgia than any other Democratic candidate for president, senate, or governor since 2000. (And they are still counting ballots.)
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when a 6-year old is dragged to court for picking a tulip
read the North Carolina story: journalnow.com/north-carolin…
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So Dems succeeded in replacing Sinema with Gallego for six years through an open race in a state Trump carried at the same time.
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Brad Lander speaks: "Andrew Cuomo is in the past. He is not the present or future of New York City. Good fucking riddance"
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So, 17 of 20 members of Alaska's incoming senate have just formed a coalition to govern the chamber.
It'll include all 9 Dems, plus 8 Republicans — isolating 3 conservative Republicans into a minority.
Outgoing majority leader is one of those isolated 3. adn.com/politics/alaska-legi…
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BREAKING: One of Trump's fake presidential elector who tried to overturn the 2020 election was running for re-election in Wisconsin today, and lost. boltsmag.org/wisconsin-elect…
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One day after the newspaper was raided by an entire police force, the 98-year old owner of the Marion County Record died today.
marionrecord.com/direct/upda…
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A Wyoming judge just struck down WY's abortion bans.
Get this: Judge invoked a constitutional amendment codifying a right to make health care decisions... that was passed in 2012 by conservatives who thought it'd screw Obamacare! Just backfired.
Context: boltsmag.org/abortion-access…
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D.C. has 0 senator but more residents than WY, whose 2 senators were decisive today to advancing a bill that triples D.C.'s uninsured rate. nitter.app/MrDanZak/status/889862…
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Jon Ossoff's lead is now larger, in both votes (+12.8K) and in percentage points (+0.30%), than Biden's multi-recounted win over Trump in Georgia.
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It’s over: A majority of the pledged DNC delegates have now endorsed Kamala Harris, virtually ensuring she clinches the Democratic nomination on the first ballot.
The endorsement of California’s delegation just now put her hundreds of delegates over the threshold needed.
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In 2002, Nevadans approved a ballot measure to ban same-sex marriages in the state 67% to 33%.
This year, they repealed that ban & enshrined same-sex marriage in their constitution. Right now the ballot measure is ahead 61% to 39%.
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Trump quoting from Pat Buchanan's screed against a multiracial/multilingual America just a few days after Steve King explicitly defended white supremacy tells you all you need to know about who's feeling empowered, and what's driving the shutdown.
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Between 1836 and 1844, the US House had a literal “gag rule” banning reference to slavery & abolition of slavery.
In 1842, an Ohio congressmember was censured by the chamber for breaking the gag rule because he introduced an abolish resolution.
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O'Rourke, Hickenlooper, Bullock, and Castro, who could run for Senate against GOP incumbents (in TX/CO/MT/TX) but are running for president instead, are polling at 2%, 1%, 0%, and 0%.
Bullock 0%
Delaney 0%
Gabbard 0%
Gillibrand 0%
Williamson 0%
Bennet 0%
Castro 0%
de Blasio 0%
Gravel 0%
Inslee 0%
Messam 0%
Moulton 0%
Swalwell 0%
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In CNN's new poll, Trump's approval is just 22% among all respondents under 35, and 27% among all respondents under 45, and 29% among women. cdn.cnn.com/cnn/2018/images/…
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to be very explicit:
what these results mean is the end of ICE's 287(g) program in two of the biggest counties it exists in.
i can't overstate how big this is. and the activism it took to push the candidates to address this.
Two HUGE resuts in Georgia: Dems have flipped the sheriff's offices in Cobb & Gwinnett counties (pop: 1.6 million)
This is big for many reasons.
1/ The GOP sheriffs here have intense ties with ICE, which the Dems had promised to curtail or end. See:
theappeal.org/politicalrepor…
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The GOP forced Justice Scalia's seat to stay vacant for 419 days. Justice Kennedy's has been vacant for 47 days.
I await the GOP's explanation for why any more delay right now would be prejudicial to the Supreme Court's functioning.
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Where we're at:
—Dems win #NJGov, full control of NJ government.
—Dems win VA Gov, huge gains in VA Assembly (shock shot at majority)
—Dems win St. Petersburg & Manchester.
—Dems pick-up leg seat in NH.
—Dems up in Charlotte.
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if it is 218-217 GOP: the over 700,000 residents of Dem Washington, D.C. being denied all congressional representation will be what clinches the GOP majority.
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There hasn't been a *single* day during ALL of the 117th Congress (current one) without a vacancy in the House.
There were 4 vacancies by Feb. 2021; there were 4-6 vacancies (up to 7) for multiple monthslong periods.
A 218-217 House would never actually exist. Total chaos.
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Two HUGE resuts in Georgia: Dems have flipped the sheriff's offices in Cobb & Gwinnett counties (pop: 1.6 million)
This is big for many reasons.
1/ The GOP sheriffs here have intense ties with ICE, which the Dems had promised to curtail or end. See:
theappeal.org/politicalrepor…
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The Trump staffers who resign after more than 99% of his presidency is over will spend the next decades telling us they're democracy heroes & selling books on it.
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NEW: Marine Le Pen's far-right party has failed to win any of France's regions in today's regional elections.
(It fell well short of its pre-election aim of winning several regions & its pre-runoff goal of winning Provence; overall, far further from a win than in 2015.)
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I think this gigantic result has been drowned out: South Dakotans voting (56% to 44%!) to expand Medicaid will make tens of thousands of people newly eligible for the public insurance.
And SD joins many other red states that expanded Medicaid via referendum: NE, UT, ID, MO, OK.
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Elon Musk endorsed the challenger to Austin's progressive DA. He emailed Tesla staff to go out to vote in the race today.
The DA, José Garza, just won by a 2 to 1 margin. boltsmag.org/houston-austin-…
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The dissent: The majority is "acting at practically the first moment possible", "eliminates a 50-year-old contitutional right that safeuards women's freedom," "breaches a core rule-of-law principle," "places in jeopardy other rights," and "undermines the Court's legitimacy."
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‼️ The House passed the bill for $2,000 checks by meeting the 2/3rds threshold for an expedited "suspendion of the rules" process.
Now 👀 on McConnell (and Perdue, and Loeffler).
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Virginia has repealed the ultrasound requirement before an abortion, as well as the 24-hour waiting period. Northam signed this bill yesterday.
Virginia also just banned housing & employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation & gender identity.
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