The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Trump rejects ruling on embryos
After political backlash, he questions Alabama on personhood issue.
ROCK HILL, S.C. — Former President Donald Trump called on the Alabama Legislature to pass a law to protect in vitro fertilization during a rally Friday at Winthrop University.
In a campaign stop on the eve of the South Carolina Republican primary, Trump questioned a recent ruling by the Alabama Supreme Court that deemed embryos have the same rights as a living child.
Many couples who struggle to conceive children turn to in vitro fertilization, or IVF, to improve their chances of a successful pregnancy. The process involves fertilizing multiple eggs and implanting them in the would-be mother’s uterus one at a time. Oftentimes, this results in unused embryos, which are discarded, given to other people seeking children or donated to science.
The Alabama Supreme Court decision would make destroying embryos or using them for scientific research a crime. Several Alabama providers have said they would stop IVF treatments for fear of legal ramifications.
Trump has asked Alabama lawmakers to address the issue legislatively. “The Republican Party should always be on the side of the miracle of life,” Trump told attendees, who responded with a standing ovation.
A sequel stop for Trump
Trump’s rally at the Winthrop Coliseum was return visit — he held a campaign event at the same venue during his first presidential bid in 2016.
Eight years ago, Trump drew a capacity crowd in the 6,250seat arena, a show of support that foreshadowed his convincing win in the state’s primary. He won every South Carolina congressional district and all the state’s delegates in a victory that, coupled with his New Hampshire primary victory weeks earlier, propelled him into the Super Tuesday elections.
He formally captured the GOP nomination that May, outlasting Texas U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, Florida U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio and former Ohio Gov. John Kasich.
Trump nearly packed the house at Winthrop again on Friday and the large crowd brought the raw enthusiasm that has come to mark his rallies. He called the Winthrop Coliseum a “lucky arena.”
‘Nikki who?’
Attendees waiting to enter the Rock Hill rally had only one Trump opponent in mind, and that wasn’t Nikki Haley, the other Republican on the South Carolina primary ballot.
With baseball caps reading “BYEden” and chants of “Joe has to go,” the Trump loyalists waited in a line that took 10 minutes to walk end to end. The chatter centered on Trump’s likely general election rematch with Biden and not the next day’s GOP primary.
Greenville resident Gabriel Schmidt offered a frequently heard response to questions about Haley, a South Carolina resident and former two-term governor: “Nikki who?”
Greene on the stump
A Georgian led the parade of elected officials who warmed up the crowd ahead of Trump’s remarks. U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene spoke for four minutes, encouraging voters to “send a message” to Haley and the Washington, D.C. establishment that Trump is the Republican champion.
“Tell them we won’t tolerate or elect a candidate who is delusional about her chances of becoming president,” Greene said. “Tell them you won’t support even the former governor of this state when she’s a Democratic rubber stamp.”
Trump thanked Greene during his remarks, calling her “very respected in Congress.” Greene has been a fixture on the campaign trail as a Trump surrogate. She spoke Thursday at a campaign event in Greenville, S.C., located a two-hour drive from Rock Hill, and told the AJC’s Greg Bluestein of her desire to be Trump’s homeland security secretary should he win the presidency.
Another Georgia Trump loyalist who was present but did not speak was U.S. Rep. Mike Collins. The Jackson Republican has urged support for the former president on his social media accounts.
NEW YORK — The longtime head of the National Rifle Association, Wayne LaPierre, misspent millions of dollars of the organization’s money, using the funds to pay for an extravagant lifestyle that included exotic getaways and trips on private planes and superyachts, a New York jury determined Friday.
The jury found LaPierre, 74, must repay almost $4.4 million to the powerful gun rights group that he led for three decades, while the NRA’s retired finance chief, Wilson Phillips, owes $2 million. Jurors also found that the NRA failed to properly manage its assets, omitted or misrepresented information in its tax filings and violated whistleblower protections under New York law.
LaPierre, who announced his resignation from the NRA on the eve of the trial, sat stone-faced in the front row of the courtroom as the verdict was read aloud, and did not speak to reporters on the way out.
New York Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat who campaigned on investigating the NRA’s notfor-profit status, declared the verdict a “major victory.”
“In New York, you cannot get away with corruption and greed, no matter how powerful or influential you think you may be,” James said in a post on X. “Everyone, even the NRA and Wayne LaPierre, must play by the same rules.”
The group, which has in recent years has been beset by financial troubles and dwindling membership, was portrayed in the case both as a defendant that lacked internal controls to prevent misspending and as a victim of that same misconduct.
The jury found NRA general counsel John Frazer had violated his duties, but not that he owed any money or that there was cause to remove him from the organization.
In a statement, the NRA highlighted that part of the verdict in casting the outcome as proof it was “victimized by certain former vendors and ‘insiders’ who abused the trust placed in them.”
The jury found the NRA violated state laws protecting whistleblowers who raised concerns about the organization, a cohort that included the group’s former president, Oliver North.
“To the extent there were control violations, they were acted upon immediately by the NRA Board beginning in summer 2018,” NRA President Charles Cotton said in the statement.
The jury found LaPierre liable for $5.4 million, but determined he’d already paid back a little over $1 million.
Another former NRA executive turned whistleblower, Joshua Powell, settled with the state last month, agreeing to testify at the trial, pay the NRA $100,000 and forgo further involvement with nonprofit organizations.
James’ office said Friday it wants an independent monitor to be appointed to oversee the NRA’s administration of charitable assets. It is also seeking to ban LaPierre and Phillips from serving in leadership positions at any charitable organizations that conduct business in New York, and wants the NRA and Frazer barred from collecting funds on behalf of any charitable organization operating in the state.
A judge will decide those questions during the next phase of the trial.
James sued the NRA and its executives in 2020 under her authority to investigate not-for-profits registered in the state.
She originally sought to have the organization dissolved, but Manhattan Judge Joel M. Cohen ruled in 2022 that the allegations did not warrant a “corporate death penalty.”
The trial, which began last month, cast a spotlight on the leadership, organizational culture and finances of the powerful lobbying group, which was founded more than 150 years ago in New York City to promote rifle skills and grew into a political juggernaut that influenced federal law and presidential elections.
Before he stepped down, LaPierre had led the NRA’s day-to-day operations since 1991, becoming one of the country’s most influential figures in shaping gun policy.
During the trial, state lawyers argued he dodged financial disclosure requirements while treating the NRA as his personal piggy bank, liberally dipping into its coffers for African safaris and other questionable expenditures.
His lawyer cast the trial as a political witch hunt.
LaPierre billed the NRA more than $11 million for private jet flights and spent more than $500,000 on eight trips to the Bahamas over a three-year span, the state said. He also authorized $135 million in NRA contracts for a vendor whose owners showered him with free trips to the Bahamas, Greece, Dubai and India, as well as access to a 108-foot (33-meter) yacht.
On the stand, LaPierre claimed he hadn’t realized the travel tickets, hotel stays, meals, yacht access and other luxury perks counted as gifts, and that the private jet flights were necessary for his safety.
But he conceded that he had wrongly expensed private flights for his family and accepted vacations from vendors doing business with the NRA without disclosing them.
Among those who testified at the trial was North, a one-time NRA president and former National Security Council military aide best known for his central role in the Iran-Contra scandal of the 1980s. North, who resigned from the NRA in 2019, said he was pushed out after raising allegations of financial irregularities.
After reporting a $36 million deficit in 2018 fueled largely by misspending, the NRA cut back on longstanding programs that had been core to its mission, including training and education, recreational shooting and law enforcement initiatives. In 2021, it filed for bankruptcy and sought to incorporate in Texas instead of New York, but a judge rejected the move, saying it was an attempt to duck James’ lawsuit.
The NRA remains a political force. Republican presidential hopefuls flocked to its annual convention last year and Donald Trump spoke at an NRA event this month.
COLUMBIA, S.C. — A South Carolina man was found guilty Friday of killing a Black transgender woman in the nation’s first federal trial over a hate crime based on gender identity.
After deliberating for roughly four hours, jurors convicted Daqua Lameek Ritter of a hate crime for the murder of Dime Doe in 2019. Ritter was also found guilty of using a firearm in connection with the fatal shooting and obstructing justice.
A sentencing date has not yet been scheduled. Ritter faces a maximum of life imprisonment without parole.
“This case stands as a testament to our committed effort to fight violence that is targeted against those who may identify as a member of the opposite sex, for their sexual orientation or for any other protected characteristics,” Brook Andrews, an assistant U.S. attorney for the District of South Carolina, told reporters after the verdict.
While federal officials have previously prosecuted hate crimes based on gender identity, the cases never reached trial. A Mississippi man received a 49-year prison sentence in 2017 as part of a plea deal after he admitted to killing a 17-year-old transgender woman.
The four-day trial over Doe’s killing centered on the secret sexual relationship between her and Ritter, the latter of whom had grown agitated by the exposure of their affair in the small town of Allendale, according to witness testimony and text messages obtained by the FBI. Prosecutors accused Ritter of shooting Doe three times with a .22-caliber handgun to prevent further revelation of his involvement with a transgender woman.
Prosecutors presented police interviews in which Ritter said he did not see Doe the day she died. But body camera video from a traffic stop of Doe showed Ritter’s distinctive left wrist tattoo on a person in the passenger seat hours before police found her slumped in the car, parked in a driveway.
Defense lawyer Lindsey Vann argued at trial that no physical evidence pointed to Ritter. State law enforcement never processed a gunshot residue test that he took voluntarily, she said, and the pair’s intimate relationship and frequent car rides made it no surprise that Ritter would have been with her.
Doe’s close friends testified that it was no secret in Allendale that she had begun her social transition as a woman shortly after graduating from high school. She started dressing in skirts, getting her nails done and wearing extensions. She and her friends discussed boys they were seeing — including Ritter, whom she met during one of his many summertime visits from New York to stay with family.
But text messages obtained by the FBI suggested that Ritter sought to keep their relationship under wraps as much as possible, prosecutors said. He reminded her to delete their communications from her phone, and hundreds of texts sent in the month before her death were removed.
Shortly before Doe’s death, their exchanges grew tense. In one message from July 29, 2019, she complained that Ritter did not reciprocate her generosity. He replied that he thought they had an understanding that she didn’t need the “extra stuff.”
He also told her that Delasia Green, his main girlfriend at the time, had insulted him with a homophobic slur after learning of the affair. In a July 31 text, Doe said she felt used and Ritter should never have let Green find out about them.
Ritter’s defense attorneys said the sampling represented only a “snapshot” of their messages. They pointed to other exchanges where Doe encouraged Ritter, or where he thanked her for one of her many kindnesses.
Witnesses offered other damaging testimony.
On the day Doe died, a group of friends saw Ritter ride away in a silver car with tinted windows — a vehicle that Ritter’s acquaintance Kordell Jenkins said he had seen Doe drive previously. When Ritter returned several hours later, Jenkins said, he wore a new outfit and appeared “on edge.”
The friends built a fire in a barrel to smoke out the mosquitoes on that buggy summer day, and Ritter emptied his book bag into it, Jenkins testified. He said he couldn’t see the contents but assumed they were items Ritter no longer wanted, possibly the clothes he wore earlier.
The two ran into ran into each other the following day, Jenkins said, and he could see the silver handle of a small firearm sticking out from Ritter’s waistline. He said Ritter asked him to “get it gone.”
Defense attorneys suggested that Jenkins fabricated the story to please prosecutors and argued it was preposterous to think Ritter would ask someone he barely knew to dispose of a murder weapon. They said Ritter’s friends gave conflicting accounts about details like the purported burning of his clothes while facing the threat of prosecution if they failed to cooperate.
With Allendale abuzz with rumors that Ritter killed Doe, he began behaving uncharacteristically, according to witness testimony.
Green said that when he showed up days later at her cousin’s house in Columbia, he was dirty, smelly and couldn’t stop pacing. Her cousin’s boyfriend gave Ritter a ride to the bus stop. Before he left, Green asked him if he had killed Doe.
“He dropped his head and gave me a little smirk,” Green said.
Ritter monitored the fallout from New York, FBI Special Agent Clay Trippi said, citing Facebook messages with another friend, Xavier Pinckney. On Aug. 11, Pinckney told Ritter that nobody was “really talking.” But by Aug. 14, Pinckney was warning Ritter to stay away from Allendale because he had been visited by state police. Somebody was “snitching,” he later said.
Pinckney faces charges of obstructing justice. Federal officials allege he gave false and misleading statements to investigators.