NEAR THE CATHEDRAL
Supreme Court sets Barrett ceremonial swearing-in for Oct. 1
WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court says it will hold a ceremonial swearingin for Justice Amy Coney Barrett on Oct. 1, delayed by nearly a year because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Attendance for the courtroom ceremony will be by invitation only, the court said Friday. The building remains closed to the public.
There was no word Friday whether former President Donald Trump and Melania Trump would be at the swearing-in, known as an investiture. They did attend the ceremony for Trump’s other two high court appointees, Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh.
Barrett was confirmed by the Senate, 52-48, just days before the 2020 presidential election to take the seat of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and entrench a conservative majority on the high court. She was officially sworn in in late October.
Court indicates it may wait to rule on Georgia abortion law
ATLANTA – A federal appeals court seemed to indicate Friday that it would wait until the U.S. Supreme Court rules on a case that seeks to overturn its landmark decision guaranteeing a woman’s right to an abortion before ruling on the appeal of a lower court’s ruling blocking a restrictive Georgia abortion law.
The U.S. Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in December on an attempt by Mississippi to overturn the high court’s decision in Roe v. Wade, which affirmed the right to an abortion. Mississippi’s law would ban abortions later than 15 weeks into a pregnancy.
A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments Friday on whether it should overturn a lower court ruling that permanently blocked a 2019 Georgia law that would have banned most abortions once a “detectable human heartbeat” is present. As early as six weeks into a pregnancy, before many women realize they’re expecting, cardiac activity can be detected by ultrasound in cells within an embryo that will eventually become
the heart. Abortion is currently available in Georgia up to 20 weeks into pregnancy.
Groundbreaking for Obama presidential center slated
WASHINGTON – Former President Barack Obama’s presidential center will move another step closer to its brickand-mortar future next week when ground is broken after years of reviews, other delays and continued local opposition.
Obama and his wife, Michelle, will join Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Tuesday for a groundbreaking ceremony for the Obama Presidential Center.
“Michelle and I could not be more excited to break ground on the Obama Presidential Center in the community that we love,” the former president says, seated beside his wife, in a video announcement
shared first with The Associated Press.
The former president in 2016 chose a site in a historic lakefront park on the South Side of Chicago to build his presidential library, near where he began his political career, met and married his wife and lived with their family.
Driver involved in Boston rail crash now facing charges
BOSTON – The operator of a light rail train that crashed into the rear of another train on the Boston area’s public transit system in July, sending more than two dozen people to the hospital, now faces criminal charges, according to court records.
Owen Turner, 50, is charged with gross negligence of a person in control of a train and gross negligence of a person having care of a common carrier, The Boston Globe reported Thursday.
Turner declined to comment to the newspaper.
The crash on the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority’s Green Line B branch on July 30 near Boston University sent 27 passengers and workers to the hospital with minor injuries.
1 arrested in banquet hall shooting that killed 3 near Miami
MIAMI – A South Florida man has been arrested in connection with a shooting that killed three people and injured 20 others outside a banquet hall in May.
Davonta Barnes, 22, of Miami Gardens, was arrested late Thursday. He is charged with three counts of first-degree murder and 20 counts of attempted murder. He remained in the Miamidade County Jail early Friday, where he was being held without bond, according to jail records.
Miami-dade police believe Barnes acted as a suspected lookout for the men who opened fire on the crowd gathered at the El Mula banquet hall in Miami Gardens on May 30, the Miami Herald reported.
Thousands participate in climate rally ahead of Germany election
Tens of thousands of environmental activists staged a rally outside Germany’s parliament Friday, two days before the country holds a national election, to demand that politicians take stronger action to curb climate change.
The protest outside the Reichstag in Berlin was part of a string of rallies around the world, from Japan and Italy to Indian and Britain – amid dire warnings the planet faces dangerous temperature rises unless greenhouse gas emissions are cut sharply in the coming years.
The idea for a global “climate strike” was inspired by teenage Swedish activist Greta Thunberg’s solo protest in Stockholm three years ago. It snowballed into a mass movement until the coronavirus pandemic put a stop to large gatherings. Activists have only recently started staging smaller gatherings.