7. Former Vice President Joe Biden continues to crush his Democrat opponents in the 2020 presidential race
— According to a new Fox News poll, Biden is polling at 35%, while Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is only polling at 17%. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is polling at 9%, Pete Buttigieg is at 6% and Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) is polling at 5%. Since Biden has been the frontrunner in this race since before he entered, it is hard to see him losing — barring a major screw-up.
6. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) plans to take “enforcement action” against the Justice Department
— This action is due to the Justice Department not complying with Schiff’s subpoena for information from the Mueller report. Schiff has not clarified what the enforcement action would be, but it’s possible that he could attempt to hold Attorney General William Barr in contempt. Schiff sent the Justice Department a list requesting a dozen sets of counterintelligence and foreign intelligence documents, which he has said were in reference to the Mueller report.
5. Alabama legislators are pushing for a special session to deal with prison reform
— Legislators from both parties have committed to repairing the dangerous, understaffed and overcrowded prisons in Alabama. Senate Pro Tem Del Marsh (R-Anniston) has said that he hopes Governor Kay Ivey will call a special session on prisons within the current regular legislative session, which will end no later than June 17. While the governor did not comment on holding a special session, she did say, “This problem has been kicked down the road for the last time.”
4. It’s not just Alabama — Missouri wants some of that media attention
— The Missouri Senate has passed a bill that would ban abortions after eight weeks of pregnancy. The bill will need another approval by the House in Missouri before it can go to Governor Mike Parson. If they do pass the ban, they would join Georgia, Ohio and Alabama which have all passed strict abortion bans recently.
3. U.S. Senator Doug Jones (D-AL) has been loudly voicing his displeasure with the abortion ban recently passed in Alabama
— During a conference call with reporters on Thursday, Jones said, “It is the most extreme abortion ban in the country. And it is, in my view a product of what happens when you gerrymander political districts, so people don’t have to be accountable but to the extreme sides of an issue. This bill uses rape victims and victims of incest of all ages, even minors as political pawns.” He went on to say that the legal challenge of Roe v. Wade will cost taxpayers millions of dollars. Jones also used the conference call to make a case for the expansion of Medicaid, focusing on expectant mothers and children.
2. The Alabama Senate has passed the constitutional amendment that would be a historic change to the Alabama Board of Education
— The amendment is sponsored by Del Marsh and would replace the Alabama Board of Education with the Alabama Commission on Elementary and Secondary Education. It would also alter it to where the members are appointed rather than elected. The position of state superintendent would also be done away with and replaced with a Secretary of Elementary and Secondary Education. The bill also mandates that Common Core be replaced.
1. The abortion ban has been passed and now advocacy groups are seeking to assist women in leaving the state for abortions
— A Tuscaloosa-based group that provides financial assistance to women that need reproductive health care in Alabama has raised, they say, enough money to be able to provide for triple the number of clients it did in 2018. The money raised could go to medical costs, gas money or transporting women out of the state. The abortion ban in Alabama won’t go into effect until November, but there are no exceptions for rape or incest — only for if the health of the mother is at risk.
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