Groups sue Texas governor to block ballot drop-off limits
AUSTIN, Texas — Civil rights and voter advocacy groups have filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block an order by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott that dramatically reduced the number of dropoff locations for mail ballots.
The lawsuit filed late Thursday could be the first of many legal challenges against Abbott’s order that assigns just one drop-off location in each of Texas’ 254 counties and allows poll watchers to observe ballot deliveries.
The order, which took effect Friday, shutters dozens of sites statewide, including in Texas’ largest cities and Democratic strongholds.
The Republican governor said the order is needed to ensure election security — echoing calls from President Donald Trump for his supporters to keep close watch on mail-in voting, but Democrats blasted it as blatant voter suppression.
Abbott’s order would eliminate 11 drop-off locations in Harris County, which includes the nation’s fourth-largest city, Houston.
Harris County Clerk Chris Hollins, who is named in the lawsuit, said during a news conference Friday that Abbott’s move would force elderly and disabled people to drive long distances and wait in long lines to cast their ballot. He said he, too, would fight Abbott’s order.
Abbott’s staff said he was not limiting voting, pointing out that he has increased the period during which voters can submit their mail-in ballots in person to include anytime up to Election Day.
France ‘ s e parati s m’:
President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities call a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, laid out a series of measures Friday in a proposed law that would disrupt the education, finances and other means of indoctrination of the vulnerable.
Macron has coined the term “separatism” to describe the underworld that thrives in some neighborhoods around France where Muslims with a radical vision of their religion take control of the local population to inculcate their beliefs.
Macron stressed in a speech that stigmatizing French Muslims would be falling into a “trap” laid by radicals. He blamed France itself for organizing the “ghettoization” of a population that could easily fall prey to the preaching of those whose goal is to substitute their laws for those of the nation, and reiterated that secularism is the “cement” of France.
Campaign spending:
Nearly $11 billion will be spent by federal candidates and political action committees during the 2020 election cycle, a jaw-dropping sum that will far surpass records set in the past.
The projection was contained in a new report released by the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan Washington-based group that tracks the money coursing through the U.S. political system.
The projected spending by presidential, Senate and House candidates, as well as political action committees and super PACs, is more than 50 percent greater than what was spent in the 2016 election. It also surpasses 2012, the most expensive election cycle until now at $7.1 billion when adjusted for inflation, the group’s analysis found.
Currently, about $7.2 billion has been spent. But that’s poised to increase dramatically when House and Senate candidates and committees supporting them report their spending for the past quarter Oct. 15.
And even if all federal candidates didn’t spend another dollar, this election would still be the most expensive in history.
Wisconsin voting: A federal appeals court on Friday asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court to essentially determine whether the Republican-controlled Legislature has standing to challenge a federal court ruling that extends the period that absentee ballots can be counted in the battleground state until Nov. 9, six days after the election.
The case is moving rapidly as the election is just over four weeks away. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Friday it wants to have a final decision by no later than next week.
The case is being closely watched in Wisconsin, which President Donald Trump won by fewer than 23,000 votes four years ago. More than 1.2 million absentee ballots have been requested and more than a third of them have already been returned.
Armenia-Azerbaijan con
flict: Armenia said Friday it is ready to discuss a cease-fire in the separatist re g i on of Nagorno - Karabakh, where heavy fighting between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces have killed dozens and left scores wounded.
The fighting is the biggest escalation in years in the decadeslong dispute over the region, which lies within Azerbaijan but is controlled by local ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia. Cease-fire calls have come from around the globe.
On Thursday, leaders of
Russia, France and the United States — co-chairs of the so-called Minsk Group, which was set up by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe in 1992 to resolve the conflict — issued a joint statement calling for an immediate cease-fire and “resuming substantive negotiations under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group cochairs.”
Armenia’s Foreign Ministry said the country stands “ready to engage” with the co-chairs of the group “to reestablish a cease-fire regime based on the 19941995 agreements.”
Azerbaijan’s president says Armenia’s withdrawal from Nagorno-Karabakh is the sole condition to end the fighting. Armenian officials allege Turkey is involved in the conflict and sending fighters from Syria to the region. Ankara has denied that while publicly siding with Azerbaijan in the dispute.
Asian giant hornets: Agricultural officials in Washington state said Friday they are trying to find and destroy a nest of Asian giant hornets believed to be near a small town amid concerns the hornets could kill honey bees crucial for pollinating raspberry and blueberry crops.
Evidence of six of the hornets, sometimes called murder hornets, were found over the last week near the town of Blaine in northeastern Whatcom County, the Washington state Department of Agriculture told reporters.
The number of hornets found, nearly doubling the previous number discovered in Washington, would indicate a nest has been established in the area, the agency said. One of the hornets was trapped alive, a first for the agency, spokeswoman Karla Salp said.
The Asian giant hornet, the world’s largest at 2 inches, can decimate entire hives of honeybees and deliver painful stings to humans.
Farmers in the northwestern U.S. depend on those honey bees to pollinate many crops.