DL Open Thread: Saturday, August 5, 2023
Remember when the El Supremos eviscerated the Voting Rights Act b/c they didn’t see any deliberate non-compliance on the part of the southern states? Guess they overlooked Mississippi:
JACKSON, Miss. — Mississippi is violating the U.S. Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment by permanently stripping voting rights from people convicted of some felonies, a federal appeals court panel ruled in a split decision Friday.Two judges on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel ordered the Mississippi secretary of state to stop enforcing a provision in the state constitution that disenfranchises people convicted of specific crimes, including murder, forgery and bigamy.
If the ruling stands, thousands of people could regain voting rights, possibly in time for the Nov. 7 general election for governor and other statewide offices.
Mississippi Republican Attorney General Lynn Fitch expects to ask the full appeals court to reconsider the panel’s 2-1 ruling, her spokesperson, Debbee Hancock, said Friday.
The lawsuit that the appeals court panel ruled on Friday is based on arguments that Mississippi is imposing cruel and unusual punishment with a lifetime ban on voting after some felony convictions.
“Mississippi stands as an outlier among its sister states, bucking a clear and consistent trend in our Nation against permanent disenfranchisement,” wrote Judges Carolyn Dineen King and James L. Dennis.
Under the Mississippi Constitution, people convicted of 10 specific felonies — including murder, forgery and bigamy — lose the right to vote. The state’s attorney general expanded the list to 22 crimes, including timber larceny and carjacking.
Lots of hurdles to leap before this blatant disenfranchisement ends. Mississippi Goddam.
Insurance Companies Abandon Florida Policyholders. As long as there are no hurricanes, fly-by-nighters make out like, well, bandits. When a Big One comes, they flee the state like bandits:
UPC, the ninth property insurer in Florida to go insolvent since 2021, and the largest to do so in 15 years, left many of its Florida customers in a similar nightmare, facing what is predicted to be a powerful hurricane season with still unfixed, hazardous homes, drained life savings and, in some cases, no insurance to protect them.
UPC hemorrhaged money over the past six years, in large part because of costly claims from a series of major hurricanes. During this time, the company began to cut insurance adjusters’ damage estimates, and underpay and ignore increasingly desperate policyholders, according to a Washington Post investigation based on interviews with nearly two dozen people, including those who worked for UPC, policyholders, insurance experts and a review of hundreds of documents from regulators, adjusters, court cases financial filings and other sources.
The company also underestimated how much it would have to spend to cover claims, but still paid shareholders, including top executives who owned a significant percentage of the company, millions of dollars in dividends, data showed.
Now, the state-run Florida Insurance Guaranty Association is responsible for trying to close 22,000 UPC claims, which will take more than a year and probably cost around $600 million, officials say. For the first time since Hurricane Andrew in 1992, the state has to levy an emergency assessment on nearly all Florida residents to help cover the cost of such a massive insolvency, further spiking homeowners’ rates.
“Insurance companies have been given tremendous amount of leeway in Florida,” Birny Birnbaum, the director of the Center for Economic Justice and a former insurance regulator said in an interview. “Light regulation let these smaller companies come in and cherry pick what they want to cover. When there is no hurricane, they can make a tremendous amount of money. When there is one, executives can walk away without much liability and a lot richer.”
“If You Go After Me, I’m Coming After You!” Seems to me that Trump has already violated the court order against witness intimidation:
Prosecutors on Friday night called a judge’s attention to a social media post from Donald Trump — issued hours earlier — in which they say the former president appeared to declare that he’s “coming after” those he sees as responsible for the series of formidable legal challenges he is facing.
Attorneys from special counsel Jack Smith’s team said the post from Trump “specifically or by implication” referenced those involved in his criminal case for seeking to subvert the 2020 election.
The prosecutors said Trump’s post raised concerns that he might improperly share evidence in the case on his social media account and they urged that he be ordered to keep any evidence prosecutors turn over to his defense team from public view.
“All the proposed order seeks to prevent is the improper dissemination or use of discovery materials, including to the public,” Gaston and Windom wrote. “Such a restriction is particularly important in this case because the defendant has previously issued public statements on social media regarding witnesses, judges, attorneys, and others associated with legal matters pending against him. … And in recent days, regarding this case, the defendant has issued multiple posts—either specifically or by implication—including the following, which the defendant posted just hours ago.”
Good Year For Environmental Legislation In Delaware. Those who complain that the General Assembly didn’t do anything are either uninformed or willfully obstinate:
BEAR — A bundle of bills aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions and developing Delaware’s electric vehicle infrastructure was signed into law by Gov. John Carney at Lums Pond State Park on Thursday.
The slate of legislation was led by the Climate Solutions Act of 2023 (Heffernan), also known as House Bill 99, which sets net reduction targets of 50% by 2030 and 100% by 2050. This requires the state to develop a plan to meet those goals in line with existing initiatives undertaken by the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control.
Including HB 99, she also backed House Bill 10, which implements a gradual increase of electric school buses in the state’s fleet, and House Bill 11, requiring certain new commercial buildings to include roofs able to support solar energy infrastructure.
And, while Delaware continues to consider Advanced Clean Cars II regulations for the availability of zero-emission vehicles, other efforts seek to support an embrace of such cars and trucks.
For example, House Bill 12, sponsored by Rep. Sophie Phillips, D-Bear, codifies the Clean Vehicle Rebate Program for the purchase of both new and used electric vehicles, providing maximum rebates of $2,500 for EVs and $1,000 for plug-in hybrids that retail up to $50,000.
Additional measures to receive final approval from the governor Thursday included Senate Substitution 1 to Senate Bill 103, sponsored by Sen. Sarah McBride, D-Wilmington, which mandates that new single-family residences have at least one electric vehicle-capable parking space. The law also requires at least 5% of parking spots be capable for car charging at multifamily dwellings.
Sen. Stephanie Hansen, D-Middletown, who chairs the Senate Environment & Energy Committee, sponsored two bills in the package that also aid Delaware’s commitment to being a leader in climate control measures.
Her work included Senate Bill 170, which tasks the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control with determining the state’s viability for offshore wind energy, and Senate Substitution 1 for Senate Bill 7, to expand the duties of the State Energy Office by providing it additional resources, such as staffing.
To those who criticize incremental progress as being ‘niche’, I’ll simply point out that fighting climate change is not a niche issue. I’ll also emphasize that, with the exception of LEOBOR reform, this was a productive legislative session.
What do you want to talk about?
Maybe father paid $7,000 a year on a Florida homeowners policy that he was sure wouldn’t pay out shit if he made a claim. He was just going through with the pantomime and keeping his fingers crossed. I’m sure a great many Floridians are doing that.