Judge overturns ban on abortion in Ga. that starts at about 6 weeks
ATLANTA — A judge overturned Georgia’s ban on abortion starting around six weeks into a pregnancy, ruling Tuesday that it violated the U.S. Constitution and U.S. Supreme Court precedent when it was enacted and was therefore void.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney’s ruling took effect immediately statewide, though the state attorney general’s office said it appealed it.
The ban had been in effect since July. It prohibited most abortions once a “detectable human heartbeat” was present. Cardiac activity can be detected by ultrasound in cells within an embryo that will eventually become the heart as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. That means most abortions in Georgia were effectively banned at a point before many people knew they were pregnant.
McBurney’s ruling came in a lawsuit filed in July by doctors and advocacy groups that sought to strike down the ban on multiple grounds, including that it violates the Georgia Constitution’s right to privacy and liberty by forcing pregnancy and childbirth on women in the state. McBurney did not rule on that claim.
His decision agreed with a different argument made in the lawsuit — that the ban was invalid because when it was signed into law in 2019, U.S. Supreme Court precedent allowed abortion well past six weeks.
Andrea Young, executive director of the ACLU of Georgia, said Tuesday was a “great day for Georgia women and for all Georgians.” The ACLU of Georgia was one of the groups that filed the case.
Andrew Isenhour, a spokesperson for Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, said McBurney’s ruling placed “the personal beliefs of a judge over the will of the legislature and people of Georgia.”
Georgia’s law was signed by Kemp in 2019 but had been blocked from taking effect until June when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which had protected the right to an abortion for nearly 50 years.
Ga. election probe: A Florida judge Tuesday said former national security adviser Michael Flynn must testify before a special grand jury in Atlanta that’s looking into whether then-President Donald Trump and his allies illegally tried to influence the 2020 election in Georgia.
Sarasota County Chief Judge Charles Roberts ordered Flynn to testify before the panel Nov. 22.
Attorneys for Flynn, a retired lieutenant general who served briefly as national security adviser under Trump, had argued that the special grand jury’s investigation was a civil matter, rather than a criminal one. For that reason, Flynn should not be compelled to testify, they argued.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney, who’s overseeing the special grand jury, has said that the special grand jury’s investigation is a criminal proceeding. McBurney also certified Flynn as a “necessary and material witness.”
Asylum restrictions ruling:
A federal judge Tuesday ordered the Biden administration to lift Trump-era asylum restrictions that have been a cornerstone of border enforcement since the beginning of COVID-19.
U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan ruled in Washington that enforcement must
end immediately for families and single adults, saying it violates federal rule-making procedures.
However, his ruling conflicts with another in May by a federal judge in Louisiana that asylum restrictions remain in place.
If Sullivan’s ruling stands, it would upend border enforcement. Migrants have been expelled from the United States more than 2.4 million times since the regulation took effect in March 2020, denying migrants rights to seek asylum under U.S. and international law on grounds of preventing the spread of COVID-19.
The regulation was authorized under Title 42 of a broader law covering public health.
A police commander at the scene of the Uvalde, Texas, massacre was informed that children were alive in a classroom with the gunman more than 30 minutes before officers breached the room and ended one of the deadliest
Texas school shooting:
school shootings in U.S. history.
A dispatcher can be heard on recordings obtained by CNN telling the acting city police chief that “eight to nine” kids were alive and in need of help in the classroom. The call came as hundreds of officers gathered in and around Robb Elementary School, where 19 students and two teachers were killed.
The dispatcher spoke with Lt. Mariano Pargas minutes after a 10-year-old girl dialed 911 from inside the adjoining rooms where the gunman had holed up.
The City of Uvalde placed Pargas on administrative leave in July following a damning report from lawmakers on the response to the shooting.
A man accused in last month’s attack on U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband pleaded not guilty Tuesday to federal charges of attempting to kidnap a federal official and assaulting
Paul Pelosi attack:
a federal official’s family member.
David DePape, appearing without handcuffs, was assigned a public defender who entered the plea on his behalf during a brief court appearance.
DePape, 42, of Richmond, California, was indicted last week on the federal charges arising from an Oct. 28 break-in at the Pelosis’ San Francisco home ahead of the midterms.
Harvey Weinstein trial: The judge at the Los Angeles trial of Harvey Weinstein dropped four of the 11 sexual assault charges against the movie mogul Tuesday after prosecutors said they would not proceed with the counts involving one of his accusers.
Superior Court Judge Lisa Lench dismissed two counts of forcible rape and two counts of forcible oral copulation against Weinstein, 70.
The move had appeared likely since the trial’s opening statements three weeks
ago, when prosecutors during opening statements only mentioned four women Weinstein was charged with assaulting, leaving out the accuser identified as Jane Doe #5.
Iran protests: Shops in Tehran’s historic Grand Bazaar and across Iran closed their doors Tuesday amid protests gripping the nation.
The shop closures came amid calls for a three-day national strike to mark protests in 2019 against Iran’s theocracy that ended in a violent crackdown by authorities.
However, this round of demonstrations after the September death of a 22-year-old woman earlier detained by the country’s morality police have continued despite activists recording at least 344 deaths and 15,820 arrests so far.
Shuttered storefronts could be seen across Tehran on Tuesday. Several shops did remain open, however, amid heavy security