Outcry over push to oust judge
Amid threats to supply, economists expect surge in energy demand.
The NASHVILLE, TENN. — Republican-dominated Tennessee House is sparking fears of an unprecedented breach of judicial independence by moving forward with a proposal to remove a judge for expanding absentee voting in 2020 due to the pandemic.
A resolution with nearly unanimous House GOP support is calling for proceedings that could remove Davidson County Chancellor Ellen Hobbs Lyle, whose ruling was overturned by the state Supreme Court but only after the state promised to allow people at higher risk of COVID-19 complications to vote by mail.
House Speaker Cameron Sexton said the resolution seeks to “truly see if she was legislating from the bench, which we don’t think should be allowed.”
Many states expanded access to absentee balloting or other voting methods due to concerns about the coronavirus spreading at crowded Election Day polling places, despite arguments by former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies that any expansions should have legislative approval.
The proposal has uncertain prospects in the Senate, where GOP Speaker Randy McNally said it’s “definitely not a slam dunk.” Instead of removing Lyle, McNally said he would rather reconfigure where constitutional challenges against the state are heard, moving more of them to Republican-leaning areas instead of Nashville.
Oil prices remained elevated Monday as Saudi Arabian oil facilities were targeted by drone strikes just days after the largest crude exporting nations in the world said they would not increase output.
Brent crude, the international standard, surpassed $70 per barrel for the first time in over a year. Even after it lost ground in afternoon trading, at $68.19 a barrel prices are still hovering at levels not seen since the early days of last year. Benchmark U.S. crude oil also gave up early gains but at $65 per barrel, it’s up 12% over just the past month. Crude prices have surged more than 30% this year as massive vaccination campaigns gain momentum, potentially signaling the beginning of the end of a global pandemic.
The attacks in Saudi Arabia follow a devastating winter freeze in Texas and other parts of the southern U.S. last month knocked out production of roughly 4 million barrels per day of U.S. oil, pushing prices above $60 a barrel for the first time in more than a year.
The threats to the global oil supply are taking place with economists expecting energy demand to surge as nations recover from the pandemic.
In that environment, many energy analysts had expected the OPEC cartel and its allies to lift more restrictions and let the oil flow more freely. But OPEC, rattled by plunging prices over the past year, chose not to open the spigots, sending prices higher still.
The strikes on Saudi sites have increased in frequency and precision in recent weeks, raising concerns about Saudi Arabia’s air defenses and the expanding capabilities of the Iran-backed rebels across the border in Yemen.
A Saudi-led coalition launched an air campaign on war-torn Yemen’s capital and on other provinces Sunday in retaliation for missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia that were claimed by the Iranian-backed rebels.
The official Saudi Press Agency quoted an anonymous official in the Ministry of Energy as saying that a drone flew in from the sea and struck an oil storage site in Ras Tunura, the port run by Saudi Arabia’s state oil company, Aramco.
It claimed the strike did not cause any damage. Saudi Aramco, the kingdom’s oil giant that now has a sliver of its worth traded publicly on the stock market, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Ministry of Energy denounced the strike as “an act of sabotage” targeting not only Saudi Arabia “but also the security and stability of energy supplies to the world.”