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The Federal Tap: States sue Trump administration over new abortion rules
From Ballotpedia
March 9, 2019Issue No. 151
THE WEEK IN REVIEW
Saturday, March 2
Republicans select nominee for PA-12 special election
- Republicans from counties represented by Pennsylvania's 12th Congressional District met and selected State Rep. Fred Keller as their nominee for the special election on May 21. He was selected from a field of 14 candidates after four rounds of voting. Keller will face college professor Marc Friedenberg (D), who was unopposed for the Democratic nomination.
- The previous incumbent, Tom Marino (R), resigned on January 23 to take a job in the private sector. He beat Friedenberg 66-34 in the November 2018 general election.
- In 2018, Democrats picked up two U.S. House districts in special elections: Conor Lamb (D) won in Pennsylvania's 18th Congressional District in March 2018, while Mary Gay Scanlon (D) won Pennsylvania's 7th Congressional District in November 2018. Heading into the special election, Pennsylvania's U.S. House delegation has nine Democrats and eight Republicans.
Monday, March 4
Former Colorado Gov. Hickenlooper (D) announces presidential run
- John Hickenlooper (D), the former governor of Colorado, announced that he is running for president in 2020. He joined Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D), who entered the race last Friday, calling himself “the only candidate who will make defeating climate change our nation's number one priority.”
- While they are still on the sidelines, former Vice President Joe Biden (D), possible independent candidate Howard Schultz, and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas) have been rumored to be looking to expand their teams.
- There were also prominent names that ruled out a presidential run this week. They include former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (D), former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (D), and Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.).
- Compared to the 2016 presidential cycle, Democrats in 2020 are on track to match, if not exceed, the number of Republican candidates who ran four years ago.
North Carolina State Board of Elections sets schedule for NC-09 special election
- The North Carolina State Board of Elections unanimously voted to set the dates for the new election in North Carolina’s 9th Congressional District. Primary elections are scheduled for May 14, 2019, and the general election will be held on September 10, 2019. If a primary runoff election is necessary for either party, it will be held on September 10, 2019, and the general election will be moved to November 5, 2019.
- While this election is on a different schedule than the other special election occurring in the state, in North Carolina’s 3rd Congressional District, it lines up with the schedule of municipal elections occurring this year in Charlotte.
Justice Gorsuch pens anti-Chevron dissent in workers’ compensation case
- The Chevron doctrine may be dying according to Justice Neil Gorsuch’s dissent in BNSF Railway Co. v. Loos. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s 7-2 majority upheld an IRS interpretation of the law but ignored Chevron.
- The Chevron doctrine requires judicial deference to reasonable agency interpretations of unclear laws. That means judges uphold agency decisions even when they may disagree about the meaning of a law. The U.S. Supreme Court decided Chevron v. NRDC in 1984 and bipartisan litigants cited the decision 81,000 times as of 2018. Even so, every justice has argued for limiting Chevron at least once, according to a 2018 study.
- Gorsuch said the railroad company would have made a stronger case for deference if the Chevron doctrine was still powerful. Instead, he said the company was reluctant to cite Chevron in its briefs and during oral argument. Gorsuch disagreed with the court’s interpretation of the relevant laws, but not its method. He said it was good that the court gave an independent judicial interpretation of the law “[i]nstead of throwing up [its] hands and letting an interested party—the federal government’s executive branch, no less—dictate an inferior interpretation of the law that may be more the product of politics than a scrupulous reading of the statute.”
SCOTUS issues two unanimous opinions in copyright cases
- The U.S. Supreme Court issued two unanimous opinions in copyright cases.
- In the first, Rimini Street Inc. v. Oracle USA Inc., Justice Brett Kavanaugh delivered the opinion of the court. It was his second opinion of the term.
- In the second, Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corp. v. Wall-Street.com, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the court. It was her fourth opinion of the term.
- The Supreme Court has issued 12 unanimous opinions this term.
States sue Trump administration over new abortion rules
- State attorneys general from 21 states joined together to sue the Trump administration over a new rule that increased restrictions on Title X family planning program funds. The final rule, issued by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), prohibits using Title X funds to perform, promote, or refer for abortion as a family planning method. The rule also requires clear financial and physical separation for clinics conducting Title X and non-Title X activities. California filed a separate lawsuit on March 4th asking for an injunction to block the rule from going into effect.
- According to HHS, Title X is the only federal program solely dedicated to providing family planning and related preventative services giving priority to low-income families. Supporters say the new rule updates Title X regulations to bring them in line with congressional intent not to support abortion with those funds. Opponents of the new Title X rule call it a “gag rule” because it prohibits fund recipients from referring patients for abortion services. Both sides claim that the rule would cut millions of dollars in funding for Planned Parenthood.
- The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a similar rule in 1991, but the rule never went into effect once Bill Clinton became president.
- A final rule, in the context of administrative rulemaking, is a federal administrative regulation that went through the proposed rule and public comment stages of the rulemaking process and is published in the Federal Register with a scheduled effective date. The published final rule marks the last stage in the rulemaking process and includes information about the rationale for the regulation as well as any necessary responses to public comments.
Thursday, March 7
Manafort sentenced to almost 4 years in bank fraud case
- Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was sentenced to 47 months in prison in the first of two rounds of sentencing. He was convicted last year of five counts of tax fraud, two counts of bank fraud, and one count of failure to disclose a foreign bank account. Manafort's convictions did not relate to his involvement in the 2016 presidential campaign.
- After his conviction in September 2018, Manafort pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy against the United States and one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice by witness tampering, and he agreed to cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. Manafort also agreed to forfeit several of his properties and money in several of his bank accounts. The crimes Manafort pleaded guilty to did not relate to his involvement in the 2016 presidential campaign.
Congress is in session
The House will be in session Monday through Thursday. The Senate will be in session Monday through Friday. Click here to see the full calendar for the first session of the 116th Congress.
SCOTUS is out of session
The Supreme Court will not hear arguments this week. The justices will return for oral argument on March 18. To learn more about this term, read our review.
WHAT'S ON TAP NEXT WEEK
Where was the president last week?
- On Monday, President Donald Trump had lunch with Vice President Mike Pence. He also spoke at the National Association of Attorneys General.
- On Tuesday, Trump participated in a signing ceremony for an executive order on a “National Roadmap to Empower Veterans and End Veteran Suicide."
- On Wednesday, Trump greeted Danny Burch, who was a former hostage in Yemen. He also attended the first meeting of the American Workforce Policy Advisory Board.
- On Thursday, Trump and first lady Melania Trump meet with Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis and his wife, Monika Babisova, at the White House. Trump also had lunch with Secretary of State Pompeo.
- On Friday, Trump met with national security officials at the Pentagon. He and Melania then flew to Alabama to survey damage after a tornado that caused multiple deaths. The couple then flew to Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida for the weekend.
Federal Judiciary
- 154 federal judicial vacancies
- 59 pending nominations
- 17 future federal judicial vacancies
About
The Tap covered election news, public policy, and other noteworthy events from February 2016 to February 2022.
