It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Friday, August 04, 2023
Texas abortion ban temporarily lifted for medical emergencies
Published
Image caption,
"I cried for joy when I heard the news," says lead plaintiff Amanda Zurawski
Women in Texas with serious pregnancy complications will be exempted from the southern US state's abortion ban, a judge has ruled.
Judge Jessica Mangrum said there was a lack of clarity in the legislation, siding with women and doctors who had sued Texas over the ban in March.
Doctors would not be prosecuted when exercising their "good faith judgement" for provision of abortions, she added.
The temporary injunction will be in force until the lawsuit is complete.
Friday's ruling is expected to be appealed by the state.
The Texas law that bans all abortions except in dire medical circumstances is seen as one of the strictest in the US.
Breaking the ban can carry a $100,000 (£78,000) fine and up to life in prison.
The legislation was introduced in 2022 - shortly after the Supreme Court overturned its 50-year-old Roe v Wade decision, meaning that millions of women across the country lost the constitutional right to abortion.
This case is the first brought on behalf of women who have been denied abortions since then.
In her ruling in the city of Austin, Judge Mangrum wrote that women were "delayed or denied access to abortion care because of the widespread uncertainty regarding physicians' level of discretion under the medical exception to Texas's abortion bans".
She also said that doctors must be allowed to determine what constituted medical emergencies that would risk a woman's health or even life.
The Center for Reproductive Rights, which is suing Texas, hailed the ruling.
"Today's ruling alleviates months of confusion around what conditions qualify as medical emergencies under Texas' abortion bans, giving doctors permission to use their own medical judgment in determining when abortion care is needed," the group said.
Lead plaintiff Amanda Zurawski said that "for the first time in a long time, I cried for joy when I heard the news".
Ms Zurawski says her life was put at risk last year when she was denied an abortion.
The lawsuit filed last March against Texas presses for a binding interpretation of the medical emergencies in the current law.
The Texas attorney general's office argues that the exceptions being pushed by the plaintiffs would effectively allow ways of bypassing the ban.
"It would, for example, permit abortions for pregnant females with medical conditions ranging from a headache to feelings of depression," office lawyers say.
The temporary injunction is intended to last until the lawsuit is decided. But under Texas law, a ruling is automatically stayed as soon as it is appealed.
Fall abortion battle propels huge early voter turnout for an Ohio special election next week A sign urging voters to vote “no” on Issue 1 in Ohio’s Aug. 8 special election stands planted in the grass on the outskirts of a parking lot in front of the Franklin County Board of Elections in Columbus, Ohio on Thursday, Aug. 3, 2023. Ohioans are voting on whether to make it harder to amend the state’s constitution – a decision that could impact another upcoming November vote on abortion rights in the state.
Ohio residents line up to vote early in-person on Issue 1 in front of the Franklin County Board of Elections in Columbus, Ohio on Thursday, Aug. 3, 2023. Ohioans are voting on whether to make it harder to amend the state’s constitution – a decision that could impact another upcoming November vote on abortion rights in the state.
(AP Photo/Samantha Hendrickson)
BY SAMANTHA HENDRICKSON August 4, 2023S
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A hastily called summer special election over a Republican-pushed measure that would make it harder for Ohio voters to pass future constitutional amendments, including one on the November ballot to guarantee abortion rights, has driven off-the-charts early turnout before Tuesday’s final day of voting.
Early turnout has been so heavy that some election offices are straining to manage the load and trying to recruit additional poll workers.
“This is gubernatorial-level turnout,” said Regine Johnson, deputy director of the board of elections in Stark County. As of Thursday, the board was about 100 volunteers short of the number it targeted as the minimum to be fully staffed
The early signs of a highly motivated electorate follows robust turnout in a handful of other states where voters have affirmed abortion rights after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade a little over a year ago.
Issue 1, the question before Ohio voters on Tuesday, was placed on the ballot this spring by the Republican-controlled Legislature. The measure does not specifically deal with abortion. Instead, it would erect several hurdles for voters to pass amendments to the state constitution, including raising the threshold to pass an amendment from a simple majority to 60%.
But if Issue 1 passes, it could be fatal to an amendment seeking to ensure the constitutional right to abortion that already is on the November ballot. In the 2022 midterm elections, AP VoteCast found that 59% of Ohio voters said abortion should be legal in most or all cases, just shy of that 60% mark.
Calling a special election in the middle of summer vacation season was seen by some as a cynical move because Republicans had just eliminated August elections with legislation signed into law only recently — specifically because those elections have historically generated such low turnout. Not this time.
As of Wednesday, more than 533,000 people had voted by mail or in-person since early voting began July 11, according to data collected by The Associated Press. That’s nearly double the final early voting figures for Ohio’s two previous midterm primary elections, which included races for governor and Congress. In the May 2022 primary, for example, 288,700 people voted early, according to AP data.
It’s also more than three times the roughly 142,000 early ballots cast by mail or in-person during last year’s August elections, although drawing a comparison is tricky. August special elections traditionally have been held in even-numbered years and are intended for local races and issues. The last statewide question on an August ballot in Ohio was in 1926.
Voters have been waiting in long lines and sometimes for over an hour at many early polling places, even as heat waves have swept the Midwest and the rest of the country this summer. Tom Simmons of Clintonville, just north of the capital, Columbus, stood in line on a sunny Thursday morning and said he planned on voting in favor of Issue 1.
In his view, a 60% threshold would encourage more bipartisanship on hot-button topics.
The polarizing battle over abortion in the state, with the constitutional amendment seeking to protect reproductive rights before voters in the fall, has driven the narrative for the campaigns supporting and opposing Issue 1. Both sides have invested heavily in get-out-the-vote strategies.
Voters do not register by political party in Ohio, but data from L2, a political firm that tracks early in-person and mail voting, indicates that Democratic-leaning voters are turning out in higher numbers than Republican-leaning ones.
As of Tuesday, voters identified by L2 as Democrats had cast more than 52% of ballots, compared with 40% by voters identified as Republicans. Independents cast the remaining ballots, according to the firm, which models party affiliation using the partisan primary a voter most recently participated in.
So far, women are turning out in higher numbers than men, according to L2.
Sheila Harrell, from the Columbus suburb of Westerville, voted against Issue 1 on Thursday — a decision heavily influenced by the upcoming November vote on abortion rights.
“As a woman, you should have that right,” Harrell said, adding that parents also should be able to seek abortion care for their children in Ohio instead needing to travel for it. She recalled a case that generated nationwide attention last year, when a 10-year-old girl had to travel to Indiana for an abortion after being raped.
Sammi Cain of nearby Worthington also was voting early Thursday and said she planned to cast a “no” ballot. She does not see a need to change the state constitution and sees the measure as a way for Ohio’s political leaders to stifle voters’ voices.
Cain, a transgender woman and a veteran, believes her “no” vote is a way to make sure everyone, including people in the LGBTQ+ community, have equal rights.
“From my perspective, it looks like Republicans are just trying to take away the essential voting rights from literally the American people and they’re going to try to consolidate as much power as they can, so I’m basically just trying to stop that,” Cain said. “They’re not just going to stop at abortion rights.”
The voter motivation seen so far in Ohio is similar to what Kansas experienced a year ago, when it was the first state where voters weighed in on abortion rights since the Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe.
In that August election, voters in the Republican-leaning state affirmed abortion rights decisively. Voters rejected, by 59%, a proposed amendment to the state constitution to declare that it does not grant a right to abortion, which would have allowed lawmakers to greatly restrict or ban it.
More than 900,000 people voted in that primary election, nearly twice the number that turned out for a 2018 August primary. An aggressive grassroots campaign got Democratic and unaffiliated voters to the polls, quashing the usually Republican-heavy voting population but also gaining some support from GOP registered voters.
Elections officials across Ohio have been feeling the pressure of such a high-stakes election, especially after the Legislature abruptly reversed itself and called for the special election. In a tight 90-day time frame during what is usually a break period, county election boards have scrambled to train poll workers and find available polling locations.
Despite the heavy turnout and short window to prepare, several county officials said they feel ready for the election thanks to early planning.
In the first week of early voting, Franklin County’s early polling place processed more than 1,500 voters a day. Since then, the number has more than doubled, said Antone White, director of the county’s Board of Elections.
He said that number is likely to remain steady until Tuesday because the mail-in ballot deadline passed earlier this week. He thinks the final overall turnout may even surpass that of last November’s midterm election.
“The scale has far exceeded our expectations,” he said.
Associated Press writers Chad Day in Washington, Christine Fernando in Chicago and John Hanna in Topeka, Kansas, and researcher Ryan Dubicki in New York contributed to this report. ___ Samantha Hendrickson is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
Pope presides over solemn Way of the Cross prayer as Portugal government weighs in on LGBTQ+ protest Pope Francis arrives at Lisbon’s Parque Eduardo VII to preside over a ‘Via Crucis’ (Way of the Cross) with young people participating into Sunday’s 37th World Youth Day in the Portuguese capital, Friday, Aug. 4, 2023. Francis is in Portugal through the weekend to preside over the jamboree that St. John Paul II launched in the 1980s to encourage young Catholics in their faith. (AP Photo/Armando Franca)
BY NICOLE WINFIELD, BARRY HATTON AND PIETRO DE CRISTOFARO August 4, 2023
LISBON, Portugal (AP) — Pope Francis led an estimated 800,000 people in a meditation on the scourges of violence, poverty and intolerance Friday at World Youth Day, as the Portuguese government weighed in on an incident of intolerance directed at LGBTQ+ pilgrims attending the big Catholic youth festival.
Lisbon’s central Eduardo VII park was packed for Francis’ evening Way of the Cross prayer, one of the most solemn events in the days-long gathering. St. John Paul II launched these festivals of faith in the 1980s to try to inspire the next generation of Catholics, and young people from around the world have flocked to Lisbon in droves for Francis’ first edition since the coronavirus pandemic.
Francis had to quiet them down as the crowd erupted in the traditional World Youth Day chant of “This is the youth of the pope,” when he arrived on stage at sunset. He seemed to want to get right down to the seriousness of the dramatic re-creation of Christ’s crucifixion, urging them to “think of your own suffering, your own miseries, fears, desires.
Saying there was no greater love than dying for others, as Jesus did, he urged them to not be afraid of loving. “Loving is a risk, but a risk worth taking.”
After he spoke, the crowd was led in prayer though a series of meditations that touched on problems facing young people today: violence, addiction, social media pressures, broken families, economic crises, intolerance and alienation.
The prayer took place against the backdrop of an incident of intolerance against LGBTQ+ Catholics attending World Youth Day that took on greater weight Friday when the Socialist government issued a statement demanding that pilgrims respect one another.
According to participants, a group of about 10 people, reciting the Lord’s Prayer in Latin and holding up crucifixes, tried to disrupt a Mass being celebrated in a Lisbon church for members of the LGBTQ+ Catholic community. According to the presiding priest, the Rev. Jose Nunes, the LGBTQ+ group was wary of possible trouble and had tipped off the police, who were keeping watch and led the protesters away after the Mass incident, Nunes told Portuguese radio station TSF.
Police did not immediately respond to an AP request for details of the incident.
In a statement Friday, Portugal’s secretary of state for equality and migrations, Isabel Almeida Rodrigues, called for respect of the human rights of LGBTQ+ people, noting that such principles are enshrined in the Portuguese Constitution.
“Bearing in mind that unfortunately this was not a unique episode in this World Youth Day — which summons all people to a common goal in the fight against hate speech and violence against all people — it is important to remember that people LGBTI+ are among the most stigmatized groups of people and the target of episodes of violence, based on sexual orientation, gender identity and expression and sexual characteristics,” the statement said.
Minority rights and liberal issues have been a political banner of Portugal’s center-left Socialist Party. In power for the past eight years, the government has pushed through laws allowing abortion, gay marriage and euthanasia in this mostly Catholic country.
The incident at the Mass came as Francis has emphasized the inclusive message of the church that he has championed throughout his 10-year papacy. During the World Youth Day opening ceremony on Thursday, he told the crowd that “in the church, there is room for everyone.” He led the crowd of a half-million people in a chant of “todos, todos, todos” or “everyone, everyone, everyone” to make his point.
That message of inclusivity has resonated in particular with LGBTQ+ Catholics, who have long felt ostracized by a church that considers homosexual activity “intrinsically disordered.” Francis, though, has offered a message of welcome to LGBTQ+ Catholics, starting from his very first World Youth Day in 2013, when he famously said “Who am I to judge,” when asked about a purportedly gay priest.
Dignity USA, a group of LGBTQ+ Catholics, has a delegation in Lisbon and said overall the reception had been positive, with a few moments of tension, including the Mass incident.
“We’ve been able to trade our rainbow pens, our rainbow prayer cards,” member Sam Barnes said Friday. But a transgender participant in the Mass, who identified herself as Victoria, said the liturgical protest was an unfortunate reminder of the problems LGBTQ+ Catholics face.
“It’s important that everyone, independent of their sexuality, can have their faith and their relation with God,” Victoria said, adding that despite such incidents she has felt very accepted in Lisbon.
In another incident captured on social media and broadcast on Portuguese television, two World Youth Day participants told a transgender participant to put away her flag.
The Mass had been organized by the Centro Arcoiris, an offshoot of a much larger Portuguese LGBTQ+ Catholic group called Sopro. They set up a “Rainbow Center” to welcome LGBTQ+ pilgrims to World Youth Day, outside the official organization
In an interview published Friday by the Spanish Catholic magazine Vida Nueva, Francis referred to his frequent meetings with members of the transgender community and his message of welcome.
“The first time a group of transsexuals came to the Vatican and saw me, they left weeping, saying I had given them my hand, a kiss, as if I had done something exceptional,” Francis was quoted as saying. “But they’re children of God!”
The Rev. James Martin, an American Jesuit who runs an outreach program for LGBTQ+ Catholics, said he had dined in Lisbon with the Arcoiris group the night before the Mass was disrupted. He said they had been looking forward to the liturgy, which he did not attend.
Recalling that the incident occurred on the same day as Francis’ “todos, todos, todos” comment, Martin tweeted: “LGBTQ people are part of todos.” ___
Once nearing extinction, Brazil’s golden monkeys have rebounded from yellow fever, scientists say
A golden lion tamarin sits in a tree in the Atlantic Forest region of Silva Jardim, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil, Friday, July 8, 2022. There are now more golden lion tamarins bounding among branches of the Brazilian rainforest than any other time since modern conservation efforts to save the species started in the 1970s, a new survey released Tuesday, Aug. 1, 2023, reveals.
(AP Photo/Bruna Prado, File) A group of golden lion tamarins are seen in a tree during an observation tour at a private partner property of the golden lion tamarin ecological park, in the Atlantic Forest region of Silva Jardim, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil, Thursday, June 16, 2022. There are now more golden lion tamarins bounding among branches of the Brazilian rainforest than any other time since modern conservation efforts to save the species started in the 1970s, a new survey released Tuesday, Aug. 1, 2023, reveals.
(AP Photo/Bruna Prado, File)
BY CHRISTINA LARSON August 1, 2023
There are now more golden lion tamarins bounding between branches in the Brazilian rainforest than at any time since efforts to save the species started in the 1970s, a new survey reveals.
Once on the brink of extinction, with only about 200 animals in the wild, the population has rebounded to around 4,800, according to a study released Tuesday by the Brazilian science and conservation nonprofit Golden Lion Tamarin Association.
“We are celebrating, but always keeping one eye on other threats, because life’s not easy,” said the nonprofit’s president, LuÃs Paulo Ferraz.
Golden lion tamarins are small monkeys with long tails and copper-colored fur that live in family groups led by a mated pair. Usually, they give birth annually to twins, which all family members help to raise by bringing them food and carrying them on their backs.
The population survey was conducted over roughly a year. Researchers went to specific locations and checked whether monkeys responded to recordings of the tamarins’ long call, which basically means “I’m here. Are you there?” said James Dietz, a biologist and vice president of the U.S.-based nonprofit Save the Golden Lion Tamarin.
The new population figures are notable because the species had experienced a sharp decline from a yellow fever outbreak. In 2019, there were 2,500 monkeys, down from 3,700 in a 2014 survey.
Scientists intervened by vaccinating more than 370 monkeys against yellow fever, using shots adapted from a formula for humans — a fairly novel approach for conservation.
Scientists “cannot pinpoint a single exact cause for the recovery,” but believe several factors may be at play, said Carlos R. Ruiz-Miranda, a State University of Northern Rio de Janeiro biologist who advised on the population study.
Firstly, the yellow fever outbreak has subsided, perhaps due to a combination of the virus’ natural cycle and the vaccination campaign.
The animals may also be benefiting from an increase in forest habitat, said Dietz, who is also a research associate at the Smithsonian Institution’s Conservation Biology Institute. Between 2014 and 2022, the amount of connected forest habitat increased 16%, mostly through forests regrown on converted cattle pasture, he said.
Currently about three dozen farmers and ranchers in the Atlantic Forest region participate in such reforestation programs.
“It makes me so happy to see the tamarins playing free on my farm. They don’t only live in protected areas,” said Ayrton Violento, a farmer and entrepreneur in the small city of Silva Jardim. His family’s Fazenda dos Cordeiros has planted native fruit trees and also manages a tree nursery for native Atlantic Forest seedlings to plant on other farms.
“Recently, every year I see more tamarin families, more frequently,” he said.
Ferraz, of the nonprofit Golden Lion Tamarin Association, said that despite the good news, he was still concerned about a renewed risk of trafficking for the illegal pet trade. The problem was rampant in the 1960s, but had almost disappeared in recent decades due to enforcement.
In July, the anti-poaching nonprofit Freeland Brazil reported that Suriname’s forest service had seized seven golden lion tamarins and 29 endangered Lear’s macaws believed to have been trafficked from Brazil for sale in Europe.
“We have seen the resilience of the species, but also know they are still vulnerable,” said Ferraz. ___
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content. ___
This story has been corrected to show that Deitz is vice president, not president, of Save the Golden Lion Tamarin.
Many stars at Women’s World Cup juggle parenthood while playing on the world stage Australia’s Katrina Gorry, center, plays the ball next to Nigeria’s Ifeoma Onumonu, right, and Christy Ucheibe, left, during the Women’s World Cup Group B soccer match between Australia and Nigeria In Brisbane, Australia, Thursday, July 27, 2023. Nigeria won 3-2. (AP Photo/Tertius Pickard) Jamaica’s Cheyna Matthews shields her eyes as rain intensifies during the Women’s World Cup Group F soccer match between France and Jamaica at Sydney Football Stadium in Sydney, Australia, Sunday, July 23, 2023. (AP Photo/Sophie Ralph)
BY ANNE M. PETERSON August 3, 2023
Alex Morgan was speaking to reporters at the Women’s World Cup when she had to excuse herself to Facetime her young daughter before the toddler’s bedtime back home in the United States.
Just another day for a working mom.
Forget about orange slices, players such as Morgan, Katrina Gorry of Australia and Cheyna Matthews of Jamaica are redefining what it means to be a “soccer mom.”
There have been plenty of elite athletes who have also juggled parenthood, but the level of support the mothers are receiving while on the job at the Women’s World Cup is improving.
Morgan’s daughter, Charlie, has now joined her mother at the World Cup as the United States prepares for a Round of 16 match against Sweden on Sunday in Melbourne, Australia. Morgan has been reflective about being both a parent and a player at soccer’s biggest international tournament. In 2019, when the United States won its second straight World Cup trophy and fourth overall, now 3-year-old Charlie hadn’t even been born.
Now that the American star has a daughter, she’s had to balance her job with trying to lead the United States to an unprecedented third consecutive World Cup title.
“I have become a little bit more patient with my daughter and in life in general. But I think the biggest thing about it is that I get to bring my daughter with me. On all of these trips, I get to show her what mom does and surround her by just so many strong and confident women,” Morgan said.
There are three moms on the U.S. team: Morgan, Crystal Dunn and Julie Ertz. Other moms at this World Cup include Konya Plummer of Jamaica, Amel Majri of France, Vanina Correa of Argentina and Melanie Leuopolz of Germany.
Morgan, Ertz and Dunn have all become mothers since winning the World Cup in 2019, and all three are benefitting from the battles that prior players fought to make sure that moms — and their kids — were supported while representing the United States abroad.
“It was important to us and to the women that everything was equal, and we were very transparent about that,” said goalkeeper Matt Turner, who brought his wife and son to the men’s World Cup in Qatar late last year. “We’re going to take advantage of the different benefits that the other team might have had.”
Majri is the mother of a 1-year old daughter, Maryam, who accompanied her to a training camp in April. Her daughter’s presence was supported by French coach Herve Renard.
“There needs to be organized facilities, with a nanny. It won’t affect the team, and psychologically speaking, it’s very important. In order for her to have peace of mind and to perform well, the two need to be associated,” Renard said. “There is progress to be made in terms of assistance. We’re going to manage what they do in the USA. Maybe one day we’ll end up with four or five kids among us, and if things run smoothly, it won’t be an issue.”
In 2020, FIFA adopted rules to protect women who choose to become parents, including mandatory maternity leave of at least 14 weeks, and continued pay at a minimum of two-thirds of their salary. The rules also require clubs to make sure women are reintegrated after childbirth and that they have necessary medical support.
“No female player should ever suffer a disadvantage as a result of becoming pregnant, thus securing greater employment protection for women in football,” FIFA said in announcing the new rules.
While all of the Americans have their kids with them at the World Cup, others choose to leave them at home.
“Being a mom and leaving them at home is hard, but it is obviously a personal decision to be here. They are enjoying it from home, they didn’t ask to come,” said Correa, Argentina’s goalkeeper, and the mother of twins. “They have told me they are proud that I’m here. I know they are with me and it gives me the energy and drive to be here.”
Moms at the World Cup are helping show that parenting and soccer can mix, but some are slow to catch on. A television commentator came under fire for his comments about Gorry, who had IVF treatments and gave birth to her daughter, Harper, in 2021.
“Certainly motherhood has not blunted her competitive instincts, that’s for sure,” the Australian broadcaster said during the Matlidas’ tournament-opener against Ireland.
Ertz gave birth to son, Madden, last year and worked hard to get back in time for the World Cup. It was tough for Ertz because she had not played for the team since the 2021 Olympics because of injuries and her pregnancy.
“I think the truth is, I had no idea what my timeline was going to be where typically, like, obviously, pregnancy changes for your body changes it for so long versus like an injury, which usually has a timeline,” she said.
Madden has a village caring for him at the World Cup, including his dad, Arizona Cardinals tight end Zach Ertz — and of course all his `aunts’ on the U.S. team.
“Like anything else in life, you figure it out, and we’re doing it together as a family,” Julie Ertz said. “It’s just a really cool opportunity to be able to share with them.” ___
French judoka Clarisse Agbegnenou gestures during an interview with The Associated-Press in Paris, Wednesday, June 14, 2023. Breast-feeding and high-performance sports were long an almost impossible combination for women athletes, faced for decades with the cornelian choice of career or motherhood, because it was so tough to have both. But that’s becoming less true ahead of the first Summer Games where men and women will compete in equal numbers and with pioneering super-mums showing that it’s possible (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
Breastfeeding and high-performance sports were long an almost impossible combination for top female athletes, torn for decades between careers or motherhood, because having both was so tough.
They don’t pretend that late-night feeds, broken sleep, pumping milk and having to eat for two people are easy. But some female athletes are also discovering that juggling their careers with the rigors of motherhood can pay off with powerful emotional well-being.
French judoka Clarisse Agbegnenou breast-feeds her baby Athena at an unknown location in France, Oct. 17, 2022. Breast-feeding and high-performance sports were long an almost impossible combination for women athletes, faced for decades with the cornelian choice of career or motherhood, because it was so tough to have both. But that’s becoming less true ahead of the first Summer Games where men and women will compete in equal numbers and with pioneering super-mums showing that it’s possible (Nadia Benabdelouamed via AP)
The Paris Olympics’ chief organizer, Tony Estanguet, says they’re also exploring the possibility of providing facilities for nursing athletes at the Games.
“They should have access to their children — for the well-being of the mothers and the children,” he said in an AP interview. “The status of athletes who are young mothers needs to evolve a bit. We need to find solutions to perhaps make it easier for these athletes to bring babies” into the Olympic village where athletes are housed.
For some breastfeeding athletes, being a pioneer is part of the kick.
French judoka Clarisse Agbegnenou gestures during an interview with The Associated-Press in Paris, Wednesday, June 14, 2023. Breast-feeding and high-performance sports were long an almost impossible combination for women athletes, faced for decades with the cornelian choice of career or motherhood, because it was so tough to have both. But that’s becoming less true ahead of the first Summer Games where men and women will compete in equal numbers and with pioneering super-mums showing that it’s possible (AP Photo/Michel Euler
Two-time Olympic rowing champion Helen Glover, now aiming for her fourth Summer Games, gave birth to twins at the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, breastfed them and then came out of what she’d intended to be retirement to compete at the pandemic-delayed Tokyo Games in 2021. Glover was the first rower to compete for Britain at the Olympics as a mother.
Glover’s eldest, Logan, lost interest in her milk about the time of his first birthday, but twins Kit and Willow kept feeding to 14 months old. She says that mixing her punishing rowing training with long feeds for two babies was “very draining. It was taking every calorie I had.”
“But I could do it because it was my own time and my own choice,” she says.
“Everyone should have the choice,” Glover adds. “Our bodies ... are sometimes very changed through childbirth and pregnancy and breastfeeding. So the answers are never going to be one-size-fits-all. But I think it’s really exciting that these conversations are even being had.”
For some athletes, Milk Stork has also been a help. The U.S.-based transporter ships working moms’ milk when they’re separated from their babies. It says it shipped milk pumped by athletes who competed at the 2021 Paralympic Games in Tokyo and also transported 21 gallons (80 liters) of milk from coaches, trainers and other support staff at the Olympics that year.
The daughter of British archery athlete Naomi Folkard was just 5 1/2-months old and breastfeeding exclusively when her mother traveled to Tokyo for her fifth and final Olympic Games.
Nursing mothers successfully pushed to be able to take babies to those Olympics, held with social distancing and without full crowds because of the coronavirus pandemic. Rather than put her daughter, Emily, through the ordeal of having to live apart from her, in a Tokyo hotel outside of the athletes’ village, Folkard reluctantly left her behind with a large stock of frozen milk. She built that up over months, pumping into the night so Emily wouldn’t go hungry while she was in Japan.
But that created another problem: Because Folkard’s breasts had become so good at making milk, she had to pump regularly at the Games to stop them from becoming painfully swollen. She threw that milk away.
“I was having to get up in the night and pump just because my supply was so much,” she says. “It wasn’t great for performance preparation really. But I did what I had to do to be there.”
And with each drop, progress.
“There’s still a long way to go, but people are talking about it now. Women aren’t retiring to have children. They’re still competing,” Folkard says.
After helping prevent extinctions for 50 years, the Endangered Species Act itself may be in peril
A bald eagle flies over a partially frozen Des Moines River, Dec. 21, 2022, in Des Moines, Iowa. Fifty years after the Endangered Species Act took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say the law is as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk.
(AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall, File)
BY JOHN FLESHER August 3, 2023
SHARON TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — Biologist Ashley Wilson carefully disentangled a bat from netting above a tree-lined river and examined the wriggling, furry mammal in her headlamp’s glow. “Another big brown,” she said with a sigh.
It was a common type, one of many Wilson and colleagues had snagged on summer nights in the southern Michigan countryside. They were looking for increasingly scarce Indiana and northern long-eared bats, which historically migrated there for birthing season, sheltering behind peeling bark of dead trees.
The scientists had yet to spot either species this year as they embarked on a netting mission.
“It’s a bad suggestion if we do not catch one. It doesn’t look good,” said Allen Kurta, an Eastern Michigan University professor who has studied bats for more than 40 years.
The two bat varieties are designated as imperiled under the Endangered Species Act, the bedrock U.S. law intended to keep animal and plant types from dying out. Enacted in 1973 amid fear for iconic creatures such as the bald eagle, grizzly bear and gray wolf, it extends legal protection to 1,683 domestic species.
More than 99% of those listed as “endangered” — on the verge of extinction — or the less severe “threatened” have survived.
“The Endangered Species Act has been very successful,” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland said in an Associated Press interview. “And I believe very strongly that we’re in a better place for it.”
Biologist Ashley Wilson holds a big brown bat in Sharon Township, Mich., June 21, 2023. Fifty years after the Endangered Species Act took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say the law is as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk.
(AP Photo/Paul Sancya)Read More
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Biologist Ashley Wilson weighs a captured big brown bat in Sharon Township, Mich., June 21, 2023. Fifty years after the Endangered Species Act took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say the law is as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
A gray wolf is pictured on July 16, 2004, at the Wildlife Science Center in Forest Lake, Minn. Fifty years after the Endangered Species Act took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say the law is as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk.
(AP Photo/Dawn Villella, File) A grizzly bear roams near Beaver Lake on July 6, 2011, in Yellowstone National Park, Wyo. Fifty years after the Endangered Species Act took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say the law is as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk.
(AP Photo/Jim Urquhart, File)
Fifty years after the law took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say it’s as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk.
Yet the law has become so controversial that Congress hasn’t updated it since 1992 — and some worry it won’t last another half-century.
The act is “well-intentioned but entirely outdated ... twisted and morphed by radical litigants into a political firefight rather than an important piece of conservation law,” said Bruce Westerman, an Arkansas Republican and chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources, who in July announced a group of GOP lawmakers would propose changes.
Environmentalists accuse regulators of slow-walking new listings to appease critics and say Congress provides too little funding to fulfill the act’s mission.
“Its biggest challenge is it’s starving,” said Jamie Rappaport Clark, president of the advocacy group Defenders of Wildlife.
After helping prevent extinctions for 50 years, the Endangered Species Act itself could be in peril
Fifty years after the U.S. Endangered Species Act took effect, officials say 99% of the animals and plants it protects have survived. But some scientists and activists fear the act itself is in trouble (Aug. 4)(AP video: Mike Householder)
Some experts say the law’s survival depends on rebuilding bipartisan support, no easy task in polarized times.
“The Endangered Species Act is our best tool to address biodiversity loss in the United States,” Senate Environment and Public Works chairman Tom Carper said during a May floor debate over whether the northern long-eared bat should keep its protection status granted in 2022.
“And we know that biodiversity is worth preserving for many reasons, whether it be to protect human health or because of a moral imperative to be good stewards of our one and only planet.”
That’s an ominous sign, said Kurta the Michigan scientist, donning waders to slosh across the mucky river bottom for the bat netting project in mid-June.
“Its population has dropped 90% in a very short period of time,” he said. “If that doesn’t make you go on the endangered species list, what’s going to?”
TURBULENT HISTORY
It’s “nothing short of astounding” how attitudes toward the law have changed, largely because few realized at first how far it would reach, said Holly Doremus, a University of California, Berkeley law professor.
Attention 50 years ago was riveted on iconic animals like the American alligator, Florida panther and California condor. Some had been pushed to the brink by habitat destruction or pollutants such as the pesticide DDT. People over-harvested other species or targeted them as nuisances. California Condor named Hope takes to flight at the Los Angeles Zoo on Tuesday, May 2, 2023. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel)
FILE - A Florida panther, rescued as a kitten, was released back into the wild in the Florida Everglades, April 3, 2013. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter, File)
The 1973 measure made it illegal to “harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture or collect” listed animals and plants or ruin their habitats.
It ordered federal agencies not to authorize or fund actions likely to jeopardize their existence, although amendments later allowed permits for limited “take” — incidental killing — resulting from otherwise legal projects.
The act cleared Congress with what in hindsight appears stunning ease: unanimous Senate approval and a 390-12 House vote. President Richard Nixon, a Republican, signed it into law.
“It was not created by a bunch of hippies,” said Rebecca Hardin, a University of Michigan environmental anthropologist. “We had a sense as a country that we had done damage and we needed to heal.”
But backlash emerged as the statute spurred regulation of oil and gas development, logging, ranching and other industries. The endangered list grew to include little-known creatures — from the frosted flatwoods salamander to the tooth cave spider — and nearly 1,000 plants.
“It’s easy to get everybody to sign on with protecting whales and grizzly bears,” Doremus said. “But people didn’t anticipate that things they wouldn’t notice, or wouldn’t think beautiful, would need protection in ways that would block some economic activity.”
An early battle involved the snail darter, a tiny Southeastern fish that delayed construction of a Tennessee dam on a river then considered its only remaining home.
The northern spotted owl’s listing as threatened in 1990 sparked years of feuding between conservationists and the timber industry over management of Pacific Northwest forestland. A northern spotted owl sits on a branch in Point Reyes, Calif., in June 1995. Fifty years after the Endangered Species Act took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say the law is as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk. (AP Photo/Tom Gallagher, File)
Rappaport Clark, who headed the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service under President Bill Clinton, said there were still enough GOP moderates to help Democrats fend off sweeping changes sought by hardline congressional Republicans.
“Fast-forward to today, and support has declined pretty dramatically,” she said. “The atmosphere is incredibly partisan. A slim Democratic majority in the Senate is the difference between keeping the law on life support and blowing it up.”
But with a couple of Democratic defections, the Senate voted narrowly this spring to undo protections for a rare grouse known as the lesser prairie chicken as well as the northern long-eared bat. The House did likewise in July.
President Joe Biden threatened vetoes. But to wildlife advocates, the votes illustrate the act’s vulnerability — if not to repeal, then to sapping its strength through legislative, agency or court actions.
One pending bill would prohibit additional listings expected to cause “significant” economic harm. Another would remove most gray wolves and grizzly bears — subjects of decades-old legal and political struggles — from the protected list and bar courts from returning them.
“Science is supposed to be the fundamental principle of managing endangered species,” said Mike Leahy, a senior director of the National Wildlife Federation. “It’s getting increasingly overruled by politics. This is every wildlife conservationist’s worst nightmare.” ELUSIVE MIDDLE GROUND
Federal regulators are caught in a crossfire over how many species the act should protect and for how long — and how to balance that with interests of property owners and industry.
Since the law took effect, 64 of roughly 1,780 listed U.S. species have rebounded enough to be removed, while 64 have improved from endangered to threatened. Eleven have been declared extinct, a label proposed for 23 others, including the ivory-billed woodpecker.
That’s a poor showing, said Jonathan Wood, vice president of law and policy with the Property and Environment Research Center, which represents landowners.
The act was supposed to function like a hospital emergency room, providing lifesaving but short-term treatment, Wood said. Instead, it resembles perpetual hospice care for too many species.
But species typically need at least a half-century to recover and most haven’t been listed that long, said Noah Greenwald, endangered species director with the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental group.
And they often languish a decade or more awaiting listing decisions, worsening their condition and prolonging their recovery, he said. The Fish and Wildlife Service has more than 300 under consideration.
The service “is not getting the job done,” Greenwald said. “Part is lack of funding but it’s mixed with timidity, fear of the backlash.”
Agency officials acknowledge struggling to keep up with listing proposals and strategies for restoring species. The work is complex; budgets are tight. Petitions and lawsuits abound. Congress provides millions to rescue popular animals such as Pacific salmon and steelhead trout while many species get a few thousand dollars annually.
To address the problem and mollify federal government critics, supporters of the act propose steering more conservation money to state and tribal programs. A bill to provide $1.4 billion annually cleared the House with bipartisan backing in 2022 but fell short in the Senate. Sponsors are trying again.
The Fish and Wildlife Service is using funds from Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act to improve strategies for getting species off the list sooner, Director Martha Williams told a House subcommittee in July.
It’s also seeking accommodation on another thorny issue: providing enough space where imperiled species can feed, shelter and reproduce.
The act empowers the government to identify “critical habitat” where economic development can be limited. Many early supporters believed public lands and waters — state and national parks and wildlife refuges — would meet the need, said Doremus, the California-Berkeley professor.
But now about two-thirds of listed species occupy private property. And many require permanent care. For example, removing the Kirtland’s warbler from the endangered list in 2019 was contingent on continued harvesting and replanting of Michigan jack pines where the tiny songbird nests.
Meeting the rising demand will require more deals with property owners instead of critical habitat designations, which lower property values and breed resentment, said Wood of the landowners group. Incentives could include paying owners or easing restrictions on timber cutting and other development as troubled species improve.
“You can’t police your way” to cooperation, he said.
“Did the makers of DDT voluntarily stop making it? No,” said Greenwald, arguing few landowners or businesses will sacrifice profits to help the environment. “We have to have strong laws and regulations if we want to address the climate and extinction crises and leave a livable planet for future generations. GRIM PROSPECTS
Stars and fireflies provided the only natural light on the June night after Michigan biologists Kurta and Wilson extended fine nylon mesh over smoothly flowing River Raisin, 90 minutes west of Detroit. Frogs croaked; crickets chirped. Mayflies — tasty morsels for bats — swarmed in the humid air.
Long feared by people, bats increasingly are valued for gobbling crop-destroying insects and pollinating fruit, giving U.S. agriculture a yearly $3 billion boost.
“The next time you have some tequila, thank the bat that pollinated the agave plant from which that tequila was made,” Kurta said, tinkering with an electronic device that detects bats as they swoop overhead.
Allen Kurta, an Eastern Michigan University professor, prepares netting to capture bats in Sharon Township, Mich., June 21, 2023. Fifty years after the Endangered Species Act took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say the law is as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya) Biologist Ashley Wilson prepares a net to capture bats in Sharon Township, Mich., June 21, 2023. Fifty years after the Endangered Species Act took effect, environmental advocates and scientists say the law is as essential as ever. Habitat loss, pollution, climate change and disease are putting an estimated 1 million species worldwide at risk. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
Hour after hour crept by. Eight bats fluttered into the nets. The scientists took measurements, then freed them. None were the endangered species they sought.
A month later, Kurta reported that 16 nights of netting at eight sites had yielded 177 bats — but just one Indiana and no northern long-eared specimens.
“Disappointing,” he said, “but expected.” ___
Associated Press climate and environmental coverage receives support from several private foundations. See more about AP’s climate initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content. ___
Follow John Flesher on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com@johnflesher
WHITE SUPREMACY IS INJUSTICE
Court throws out conviction after judge says Black man ‘looks like a criminal to me’
The Theodore Levin United States Courthouse is seen in Detroit, Monday, July 11, 2011. An appeals court on Thursday, Aug. 3, 2023, overturned the drug conviction of a Black man, saying his rights were violated by U.S> District Judge Stephen Murphy III who was upset over delays in the case and declared: “This guy looks like a criminal to me.” Murphy is based in the Detroit courthouse.
(AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)
BY ED WHITE August 4, 2023
DETROIT (AP) — An appeals court on Thursday overturned the drug conviction of a Black man, saying his rights were violated by a Detroit federal judge who was upset over delays in the case and declared: “This guy looks like a criminal to me.”
“Such remarks are wholly incompatible with the fair administration of justice,” the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said.
U.S. District Judge Stephen Murphy III, who is white, apologized nearly two years later when the case against Leron Liggins finally was ready for trial. He explained that he was mad at the time “and I regret it.”
Nonetheless, the appeals court said Murphy should have removed himself as Liggins’ attorney had requested. The court threw out a heroin distribution conviction and 10-year prison sentence and ordered a new trial with a different judge.
Allowing the conviction to stand “would substantially undermine the public’s confidence in the judicial process,” 6th Circuit Judge Eric Clay said in a 3-0 opinion.
Prosecutors said the remark was a reference to Liggins’ alleged conduct, not his appearance. But the appeals court said a “reasonable observer” could interpret it differently.
Murphy said he lost his composure in 2020 after Liggins repeatedly had switched between wanting to plead guilty and choosing a trial and also failed to get along with his second lawyer. He ended up with four.
“I’m tired of this case. I’m tired of this defendant. I’m tired of getting the runaround. This has been going on since February 6, 2018,” Murphy said in court.
“This guy looks like a criminal to me. This is what criminals do,” Murphy said. “This isn’t what innocent people who want a fair trial do. He’s indicted in Kentucky. He’s indicted here. He’s alleged to be dealing heroin, which addicts, hurts and kills people, and he’s playing games with the court.”
At trial in 2021, Murphy, a judge for 15 years, apologized and said he could be fair to Liggins.
