Pennsylvania’s state Supreme Court on Monday weighed in on a flashpoint amid ongoing vote counting in the U.S. Senate election between Democratic Sen. Bob Casey and Republican David McCormick, ordering counties not to count mail-in ballots that lack a correct handwritten date on the return envelope.
The order is a win for McCormick and a loss for Casey as the campaigns prepare for a statewide recount and press counties for favorable ballot-counting decisions while election workers are sorting through thousands of provisional ballots.
McCormick’s campaign called it a “massive setback” for Casey.
The Democratic-majority high court’s order reiterates the position it took previously that the ballots shouldn’t be counted in the election, a decision that Republicans say several Democratic-controlled counties nevertheless challenged.
In a statement, Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, said a lack of legal clarity had surrounded the ballots, putting county officials in a position where they were “damned if they did and damned if they didn’t — likely facing legal action no matter which decision they made on counting.”
It comes amid a gust of fresh litigation in recent days filed by both campaigns, contesting the decisions of about a dozen counties over whether or not to count thousands of provisional ballots.
Casey’s campaign says the provisional ballots shouldn’t be rejected for garden-variety errors, like a polling place worker forgetting to sign it. Republicans say the law is clear that the ballots must be discarded.
The Associated Press called the race for McCormick last week, concluding that not enough ballots remained to be counted in areas Casey was winning for him to take the lead.
As of Monday, McCormick led by about 17,000 votes out of almost 7 million ballots counted — inside the 0.5% margin threshold to trigger an automatic statewide recount under Pennsylvania law.
Statewide, the number of mail-in ballots with wrong or missing dates on the return envelope could be in the thousands.
Republicans last week asked the court to bar counties from counting the ballots, saying those decisions violate both the court’s recent orders and its precedent in upholding the requirement in state law that a voter write the date on their mail-in ballot’s return envelope.
Democratic-majority election boards in Montgomery County, Philadelphia and Bucks County voted to count the ballots that lacked a correct date, echoing election officials around the state who say the date tells them nothing about a voter’s eligibility or a ballot’s legitimacy.
Republicans maintain that the date is a critical element of ballot security.
At first, Republicans also asked a court to block the count in Centre County. They later withdrew the protest of two ballots and its challenge to a third was filed too late, a court ruled. Centre County said one ballot had too many characters in the “date” boxes, another voter had changed a digit and another voter wrote the date as day-month-year, rather than month-day-year.
The vast majority of counties — including several heavily populated counties controlled by Democrats — didn’t count them.
Democrats cast more mail-in ballots than Republicans, and Democrats in the past have supported counting ballots that trip over what they view as meaningless clerical requirements in state law.
Various courts have ruled against the dating requirement in at least a half-dozen cases — including once by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — but higher courts have always reinstated it.
Meanwhile, the state Supreme Court has put off ruling on a pending case that calls into question whether the law violates the constitutional right to vote.
A Georgia appeals court on Monday canceled oral arguments that were scheduled for next month on the appeal of a lower court ruling allowing Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to continue to prosecute the election interference case she brought against President-elect Donald Trump.
Trump and other defendants had asked the Georgia Court of Appeals to hold oral arguments in the case, and the court had set those arguments for Dec. 5. But in a one-line order with no further explanation, the appeals court said that hearing “is hereby canceled until further order of this Court.”
A Fulton County grand jury in August 2023 indicted Trump and 18 others, accusing them of participating in a sprawling scheme to illegally try to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. Four defendants have pleaded guilty after reaching deals with prosecutors, but Trump and the others have pleaded not guilty.
But with Trump set to return to the White House in January, the future of the case against the once and future president was already in question even if the Court of Appeals ultimately says Willis shouldn’t be disqualified.
Trump and other defendants filed the appeal seeking to get Willis and her office removed from the case and to have the case dismissed. They argue that a romantic relationship Willis had with special prosecutor Nathan Wade created a conflict of interest. Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee in March found that no conflict of interest existed that should force Willis off the case, but he granted a request from Trump and the other defendants to seek an appeal of his ruling from the Court of Appeals.
McAfee wrote that “reasonable questions” over whether Willis and Wade had testified truthfully about the timing of their relationship “further underpin the finding of an appearance of impropriety and the need to make proportional efforts to cure it.” He allowed Willis to remain on the case only if Wade left, and the special prosecutor submitted his resignation hours later.
The allegations that Willis had improperly benefited from her romance with Wade resulted in a tumultuous couple of months in the case as intimate details of Willis and Wade’s personal lives were aired in court in mid-February.
Spirit Airlines said Monday that it has filed for bankruptcy protection and will attempt to reboot as it struggles to recover from the pandemic-caused swoon in travel and a failed attempt to sell the airline to JetBlue.
Spirit, the biggest U.S. budget airline, has lost more than $2.5 billion since the start of 2020 and faces looming debt payments totaling more than $1 billion over the next year.
Spirit said it expects to operate as normal as it works its way through a prearranged Chapter 11 bankruptcy process and that customers can continue to book and fly without interruption. All tickets, credits and loyalty points remain valid, the airline said, as are affiliated credit cards and other membership perks.
Shares of Spirit Airlines Inc., based in Miramar, Florida, dropped 25% on Friday, after The Wall Street Journal reported that the airline was discussing terms of a possible bankruptcy filing with its bondholders. It was just the latest in a series of blows that have sent the stock crashing down by 97% since late 2018 — when Spirit was still making money. Shares rose nearly 4% before the opening bell Monday.
CEO Ted Christie confirmed in August that Spirit was talking to advisers of its bondholders about the upcoming debt maturities. He called the discussions a priority, and said the airline was trying to get the best deal it could as quickly as possible.
“The chatter in the market about Spirit is notable, but we are not distracted,” he told investors during an earnings call. “We are focused on refinancing our debt, improving our overall liquidity position, deploying our new reimagined product into the market, and growing our loyalty programs.”
People are still flying on Spirit Airlines. They’re just not paying as much.
In the first six months of this year, Spirit passengers flew 2% more than they did in the same period last year. However, they are paying 10% less per mile, and revenue per mile from fares is down nearly 20%, contributing to Spirit’s red ink.
It’s not a new trend. Spirit failed to return to profitability when the coronavirus pandemic eased and travel rebounded. There are several reasons behind the slump.
Spirit’s costs, especially for labor, have risen. The biggest U.S. airlines have snagged some of Spirit’s budget-conscious customers by offering their own brand of bare-bones tickets. And fares for U.S. leisure travel — Spirit’s core business — have sagged because of a glut of new flights.
The Association of Flight Attendants told union members early Monday that it does not expect any furloughs, or changes to pay or working conditions. The union also said that it has retained bankruptcy counsel.
The premium end of the air-travel market has surged while Spirit’s traditional no-frills end has stagnated. So this summer, Spirit decided to sell bundled fares that include a bigger seat, priority boarding, free bags, internet service and snacks and drinks. That is a huge change from Spirit’s longtime strategy of luring customers with rock-bottom fares and forcing them to pay extra for things such as bringing a carry-on bag or ordering a soda.
In a highly unusual move, Spirit plans to cut its October-through-December schedule by nearly 20%, compared with the same period last year, which analysts say should help prop up fares. But that will help rivals more than it will boost Spirit. Analysts from Deutsche Bank and Raymond James say that Frontier, JetBlue and Southwest would benefit the most because of their overlap with Spirit on many routes.
Spirit has also been plagued by required repairs to Pratt & Whitney engines, which is forcing the airline to ground dozens of its Airbus jets. Spirit has cited the recall as it furloughed pilots.
The aircraft fleet is relatively young, which has made Spirit an attractive takeover target.
Frontier Airlines tried to merge with Spirit in 2022 but was outbid by JetBlue. However, the Justice Department sued to block the $3.8 billion deal, saying it would drive up prices for Spirit customers who depend on low fares, and a federal judge agreed in January. JetBlue and Spirit dropped their merger two months later.
U.S. airline bankruptcies were common in the 1990s and 2000s, as airlines struggled with fierce competition, high labor costs and sudden spikes in the price of jet fuel. PanAm, TWA, Northwest, Continental, United and Delta were swept up. Some liquidated, while others used favorable laws to renegotiate debts such as aircraft leases and keep flying.
The last bankruptcy by a major U.S. carrier ended when American Airlines emerged from Chapter 11 protection and simultaneously merged with US Airways in December 2013.
An Indiana law banning gender-affirming care for minors can remain in effect, a federal appeals court has ruled months after allowing the ban to take effect.
A panel of judges on the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 Wednesday that the law’s restrictions are within the purview of the Indiana General Assembly and do not infringe on the constitutional rights of transgender children, their parents or medical providers, The Times of Northwest Indiana reported.
Wednesday’s ruling follows a February decision by the Chicago-based appeals court that allowed the law to take effect by removing a temporary injunction that had blocked the law. The new ruling vacates that injunction entirely and definitively authorizes state officials to enforce the law.
Indiana’s law was enacted in spring 2023 amid a national push by GOP-led legislatures to curb LGBTQ+ rights. It was slated to go into effect on July 1, 2023, but the month before, U.S. District Court Judge James Patrick Hanlon issued an injunction preventing most of the law from taking effect. Hanlon blocked the state from prohibiting minors’ access to hormone therapies and puberty blockers but allowed the law’s prohibition on gender-affirming surgeries to take effect.
Hanlon’s order had also blocked provisions of the law that would prohibit Indiana doctors from communicating with out-of-state doctors about gender-affirming care for their patients younger than 18.
Since 2021, more than 20 states have enacted laws restricting or banning such treatments, even though they have been available in the United States for over a decade and are endorsed by major medical associations. Most of those state bans on gender-affirming care for minors have been challenged with lawsuits.
The Texas Supreme Court on Friday ruled that a legislative subpoena cannot stop an execution after Republican and Democratic lawmakers who say Robert Roberson is innocent used the novel maneuver to pause his execution at the last minute.
The ruling clears the way for Roberson’s execution to move forward, weeks after a bipartisan group of state House lawmakers bought him more time by subpoenaing Roberson as he waited to be taken to the nation’s busiest death chamber.
Roberson was sentenced to death in 2003 for killing his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki Curtis. He would be the first person in the United States to be executed over a conviction tied to “shaken baby syndrome,” a diagnosis that has been questioned by some medical experts.
A new execution date for Roberson has not been set, but it is certain to proceed unless Republican Gov. Greg Abbott grants a 30-day reprieve. Abbott did not move to do so before Roberson’s original execution date and his office challenged the subpoena tactic used by lawmakers, accusing them of overstepping their power.
The state’s all-Republican high court agreed, ruling that “under these circumstances the committee’s authority to compel testimony does not include the power to override the scheduled legal process leading to an execution,” wrote Republican Justice Evan Young, issuing the opinion of the court.
The ruling addressed a subpoena issued for Roberson by the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee. Roberson was scheduled to die by lethal injection on Oct. 17 when lawmakers, in a last-ditch effort, issued a subpoena to have him testify at the Texas Capitol days after his planned execution.
This spurred a legal conundrum between the state’s criminal and civil courts, which ultimately led to the Texas Supreme Court temporarily ruling in Roberson’s favor while it considered the matter. Roberson has gained bipartisan support from lawmakers and medical experts who say he was convicted on faulty evidence of “shaken baby syndrome,” which refers to a serious brain injury caused when a child’s head is hurt through shaking or some other violent impact, like being slammed against a wall or thrown on the floor.
Rep. Joe Moody, who has led the effort to stop Roberson’s execution, said delaying the execution with the subpoena was “never our specific intention” and added that the court “rightly agreed” that the subpoena and lawsuit were valid.
South Korean opposition leader Lee Jae-myung was convicted of violating election law and sentenced to a suspended prison term Friday by a court that ruled he made false statements while denying corruption allegations during a presidential campaign.
If it stands, the ruling could significantly shake up the country’s politics by potentially unseating Lee as a lawmaker and denying him a shot at running for president in the next election. But Lee, who faces three other trials over corruption and other criminal charges, is expected to challenge any guilty verdict and it remains unclear whether the Supreme Court will decide on any of the cases before the presidential vote in March 2027.
Lee told reporters that he plans to appeal Friday’s verdict by the Seoul Central District Court, which gave him a sentence of one year in prison, suspended for two years. Under South Korean law, Lee would lose his legislative seat and be barred from running in elections for five years if he receives either a penalty exceeding a 1 million won ($715) fine for election law violations or any prison sentence for other crimes.
“There are still two more courts left in the real world, and the courts of public opinion and history are eternal,” he said, apparently referring to plans to take the case to the Supreme Court. “This is a conclusion that’s impossible to accept.”
Lee, a firebrand liberal who narrowly lost the 2022 election to conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol, has steadfastly denied wrongdoing. Choo Kyung-ho, the floor leader of Yoon’s People Power Party, said the verdict showed that “justice was alive” and called for the judiciary to conclude the case swiftly.
The ruling drew intense media coverage and seemingly thousands of protesters. Surrounded by police lines, Lee’s supporters and critics occupied separate streets near the court, shouting opposing slogans and holding signs that said “Lee Jae-myung is innocent” and “Arrest Lee Jae-myung.” There were no immediate reports of major clashes.
Prosecutors indicted Lee in 2022 over charges that he made false claims related to two controversial development projects in the city of Seongnam, where he was mayor from 2010 to 2018, while campaigning as the presidential candidate for the Democratic Party.
One of the comments cited by prosecutors is related to suspicions that Seongnam city in 2015 changed the land-use designation to allow a housing project on a site previously preserved as green space due to lobbying by private developers.
Lee said during a parliamentary hearing in October 2021 that the city was instead “coerced” by the national government to make the change to the site in the district of Baekhyeon-dong. Prosecutors say there’s no evidence to back Lee’s claim, which has been denied by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport.
Prosecutors also cited a TV interview Lee gave in December 2021, when he said he didn’t know a senior official at Seongnam city’s urban development arm during his time as mayor. Lee spoke a day after the official was found dead during an investigation into a property development project in the district of Daejang-dong, which reaped huge profits for a small asset management firm and its affiliates and raised suspicions about possible corrupt links between them, city officials and politicians.
Prosecutors argued that Lee was lying to the public to distance himself from the controversies and improve his chances of winning the election. They had sought a two-year prison sentence for him.
The court found Lee guilty over the comments related to the Baekhyeon-dong project, saying it was clear that the city’s decision to change the site’s land-use designation wasn’t based on demands by the land ministry. It acquitted Lee on most of the charges related to his Daejang-dong comments, citing a lack of evidence.
Republicans and Democrats awaited the outcome of vote-counting for crucial U.S. House districts in California on Wednesday, as the GOP clinched majority control of the chamber next year with a race call in neighboring Arizona.
In a rematch from 2022, Rep. Ken Calvert — the longest-serving Republican in the state’s congressional delegation — defeated rival Democrat Will Rollins in the 41st District, which lies east of Los Angeles and was a top target for national Democrats.
In Southern California’s Orange County, Democrat Dave Min defeated Republican Scott Baugh in a closely divided swing district, ending Baugh’s bid to seize the seat being vacated by Democratic Rep. Katie Porter in what was once a conservative stronghold.
The 47th District, southeast of Los Angeles, was a top target for national Republicans looking to protect and possibly expand the their narrow majority.
Calvert, who was backed by President-elect Donald Trump, claimed his 17th term in a district narrowly carried by Trump in 2020.
“This is a hard-fought victory that shows voters want someone who will put results above partisan politics,” Calvert said in a post on the social platform X.
Min, also posting on X, said that in Congress he will “fight to protect our democracy, safeguard our freedoms and expand economic opportunity.”
Baugh said on the same platform that “despite running a strong campaign … that effort is going to come up a little short.”
On Tuesday, Republican Rep. David Valadao’s victory in California’s 22nd District moved Republicans within two wins of retaining the House gavel, with the tally 216-207 in favor of the GOP, as counting continued in a sliver of races across the country.
With Calvert’s win, the Republican tally reached 217. That became 218 on Wednesday night, securing a majority margin, as Rep. Juan Ciscomani won reelection to a seat representing southeastern Arizona. Some squeaker races remained in play in California.
In the 45th District, anchored in Orange County, Republican Rep. Michelle Steel’s lead over Democrat Derek Tran was whittled down to a few hundred votes as counting continued.
California is known as a liberal protectorate — Democrats hold every statewide office, dominate the Legislature and congressional delegation and outnumber registered Republicans by a staggering 2-1 ratio. Still, Republicans retain pockets of political clout in the Southern California suburbs and vast rural stretches, including the Central Valley farm belt.
Orange County was once considered conservative holy ground, where white, suburban homeowners delivered winning margins for Republicans year after year. It was a foundational block in the Reagan revolution. But the county has become more demographically diverse and Democratic over time, like much of the state.
The 47th District, which includes Huntington Beach and other famous surf breaks, has been occupied by Porter, a progressive favorite who in 2022 narrowly defeated Baugh, a former Republican legislator. Porter, known for grilling CEOs during Capitol Hill hearings, stepped aside to run for U.S. Senate, but lost in the primary.
Given the stakes in the closely divided district, the contest was especially rancorous. Min ads called Baugh a “MAGA extremist” who would endanger abortion rights. Baugh said Min’s “extreme liberal views” were out of step with the district.
Supreme Court - POSTED: 2024/11/20 13:43
