Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Ky. governor signs bipartisan measure to open early voting
FRANKFORT, Ky. — Gov. Andy Beshear signed legislation Wednesday expanding early voting in Kentucky, a rare display of bipartisan cooperation in the heart of Trump country at a time of national conflict over restrictive election measures.
The Democratic governor called it “a good day for democracy.” The bill’s GOP sponsors and Republican Secretary of State Michael Adams joined him at the signing ceremony.
“This new law represents an important first step to preserve and protect every individual’s right to make their voice heard by casting their ballots in a secure and convenient manner on the date and time that works best for them,” Beshear said.
Adams said it represents Kentucky’s most significant election law updates in more than a century.
The measure provides for three days of no-excuse, early in-person voting — including a Saturday — before Election Day. It also allows counties to establish voting centers where any registered voter in each county can cast their ballot, regardless of their precinct.
These key provisions relax the state’s strict pre-pandemic voting laws. Before the coronavirus hit, Kentucky prohibited early voting by mail or in person unless a person could not vote on Election Day because of advanced age, illness, severe disability or temporarily residing out of the county or state.
But the new law backs off from Kentucky’s temporary, pandemic-related accommodations, which allowed widespread mail-in absentee balloting and seemed to minimize the long lines and confusion seen in some states during last year’s elections.
While the measure delivers more opportunities for early voting, Beshear acknowledged he would have preferred other steps to relax voting-access rules.
“Today Kentuckians got more access to the ballot box,” the governor told reporters after the signing ceremony. “Now did I want more in this bill? Yes, I did. I believe that we need no-excuse absentee ballots. I think it’s true that we can substantially increase access without any fraud concerns.”
Georgia voting bill protest:
The Georgia lawmaker who was arrested after knocking on the door of Gov. Brian Kemp’s office as he made televised comments in support of the sweeping, controversial new election law he’d just signed will not be charged, a prosecutor said Wednesday.
Rep. Park Cannon, an Atlanta Democrat, was arrested March 25 and charged with obstruction of law enforcement and disruption of the General Assembly. She was released from jail later that evening.
“While some of Representative Cannon’s colleagues and the police officers involved may have found her behavior annoying, such sentiment does not justify a presentment to a grand jury of the allegations in the arrest warrants or any other felony charges,” Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis said in an emailed statement.
Cannon tweeted after Willis’ decision was announced: “Doors of injustice are everywhere and we cannot stop knocking.”
Republican supporters of the law have said it was necessary to restore confidence in the state’s elections, but Democrats and other critics have said it restricts voting access, particularly for communities of color.
Iran ship attacked: An Iranian ship believed to be a base for the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and anchored for years in the Red Sea off Yemen has been attacked, Tehran acknowledged Wednesday.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry confirmed the attack on the MV Saviz, suspected to have been carried out by Israel — though Tehran did not immediately blame its regional archenemy.
The assault came as Iran and world powers sat down in Vienna for the first talks about the U.S. potentially rejoining the tattered deal aimed at curbing Iran’s nuclear program, showing events outside the negotiations could derail those efforts.
The ship’s long presence in the region, repeatedly criticized by Saudi Arabia, has come as the West and U.N. experts say Iran has provided arms and support to Yemen’s Houthi rebels in that country’s yearslong war. Iran denies arming the Houthis, though components found in the rebels’ weaponry link back to Tehran.
Myanmar town stormed:
Security forces Wednesday stormed a town in northwestern Myanmar where some residents had used homemade hunting rifles to resist the military’s February seizure of power, killing at least 11 civilians and injuring many others, local news reports said.
If the 11 deaths are confirmed, it would be one of the highest singleday death tolls outside the country’s two largest cities, Yangon and Mandalay.
The online news site Khonumthung Burmese said the attack on Kalay began before dawn.
Videos on the site included what appeared to be sounds of rifle fire, high-caliber weapons and grenade explosions. Posts on social media said rocket-propelled grenades were used in the attack, but provided no evidence.
Navalny’s health:
A lawyer for imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who has complained of serious back and leg pain in custody, said Wednesday that doctors have found him to be suffering from two spinal hernias.
Vadim Kobzev told the Interfax news agency that Navalny also has a spinal protrusion and is beginning to lose feeling in his hands.
Navalny went on a hunger strike last week to protest what he called poor medical care in a Russian prison.
On Tuesday, the leader of the Navalny-backed Alliance of Doctors union was detained by police after trying to get into the prison to talk to doctors.
Six former staffers at New
NH sex abuse probe:
Hampshire’s state-run youth detention center were arrested Wednesday in connection with the abuse of 11 children over the course of a decade, including one who continued working with children for nearly 20 years after he was accused of holding a boy down while colleagues raped him.
The Sununu Youth Services Center, formerly known as the Youth Development Center, has been under investigation since July 2019, when two former counselors were charged with raping a teenage boy 82 times in the 1990s.
Those charges were dropped last year in order to strengthen the expanded investigation, but both men were arrested again Wednesday and charged with rape, the attorney general’s office said.
Two others also were charged with rape, while the other two were charged with being accomplices to rape. The allegations span from 1994 to 2005.