Welcome to This Week in Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. State legislatures across the country continued their attacks on the LGBTQ community, President Biden reauthorized a major piece of legislation, and the Supreme Court prepared itself to hear arguments on a case which could affect voting rights in North Carolina. Just across the street from the Supreme Court, the Senate did its own preparation for the historic Supreme Court confirmation hearings of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson.<\/p>\n
The Texas Supreme Court closed off the final challenge to the state\u2019s controversial anti-abortion law.\u00a0<\/strong>The Texas legislature passed SB 8 last September, effectively banning abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy and instituting a peculiar enforcement mechanism which allows any private citizen in Texas to sue anyone who performs an abortion in Texas, or who \u201caids or abets\u201d anyone getting an abortion in Texas. This past December, the United States Supreme Court, on a\u00a06-3 vote<\/a>, dismissed abortion providers\u2019 lawsuit against state officials, but\u00a0allowed the lawsuit against Texas health licensing officials<\/a>, who are responsible for disciplining abortion providers who violate SB 8, to move forward. However, the Texas Supreme Court determined that SB 8 does not grant enforcement power to health licensing officials, but rather only to \u201cprivate citizens\u201d, and\u00a0dismissed the final challenge to SB 8.<\/a><\/p>\n Across the nation, state legislatures have advanced significant anti-trans legislation.\u00a0<\/strong>Following Texas governor Greg Abbott\u2019s\u00a0order<\/a>\u00a0to investigate parents who assist their children in undergoing gender-affirming procedures, and Alabama\u2019s progress toward becoming\u00a0the second state<\/a>\u00a0to criminalize gender-affirming care, Kentucky recently passed\u00a0a bill<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0\u201cban transgender youth from playing sports consistent with their gender identity.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0Those are just a few examples of the more than\u00a0130 anti-trans bills<\/a>\u00a0introduced across the country this year.<\/p>\n President Biden<\/strong>\u00a0signed the 2022 Reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), one of his landmark pieces of legislation during his time in the Senate.\u00a0<\/strong>Apart from reauthorizing all current VAWA grant programs until 2027, the\u00a0White House claims<\/a>\u00a0the reauthorization \u201cincreases services and support for survivors from underserved and marginalized communities\u201d and establishes \u201ca federal civil cause of action for individuals whose intimate visual images are disclosed without their consent.\u201d Additionally, the reauthorization prevents local and state governments from\u00a0threatening evictions<\/a>\u00a0against those who exercise their right to seek assistance under VAWA.<\/p>\n In Colorado, lawmakers are considering raising the minimum age of juvenile prosecution from 10 to 13 years old.\u00a0<\/strong>The bill, which has exceptions for cases involving sexual assault or homicide,\u00a0would address<\/a>\u00a0the higher risk of subsequent incarceration after an initial encounter with the criminal justice system, the lower likelihood of high school graduation for system-impacted children, and the disproportionate effect of juvenile prosecution on Black children.<\/p>\n Today, the Supreme Court will consider an effort by two Republican leaders of the North Carolina State Legislature to join a lawsuit to defend the constitutionality of a state voter-ID law.\u00a0<\/strong>The law, which is much like North Carolina\u2019s 2014 law that was\u00a0struck down by the 4th Circuit<\/a>, \u201crequires voters to provide photo identification to cast a ballot\u2026and instructs county election boards to provide ID cards at no cost to voters.\u201d\u00a0The legislators seek<\/a>\u00a0de novo<\/em>\u00a0review of the district court\u2019s determination that there is no right to intervene because the state\u2019s interest is adequately represented, and the\u00a0NAACP argues<\/a>\u00a0for an abuse of discretion review of the district court\u2019s determination that North Carolina\u2019s attorney general is adequately representing the state\u2019s interest.<\/p>\n Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson\u2019s Supreme Court confirmation hearings begin today.\u00a0<\/strong>If confirmed,\u00a0<\/strong>Judge Jackson, a Harvard Law School alum, would be the\u00a0first former federal public defender<\/a>\u00a0on the Supreme Court. Judge Jackson\u00a0also served<\/a>\u00a0as a member of President Obama\u2019s U.S. Sentencing Commission, as a U.S District Court Judge for the District of Columbia, and was just last year confirmed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Despite her impressive credentials, recent history suggests<\/a>\u00a0that Judge Jackson will likely face difficult, partisan-powered hearings before becoming the first Black woman to sit on the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Welcome to This Week in Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. State legislatures across the country continued their attacks on the 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