Wisconsin
Attorney general candidates look to expand gun rights
MILWAUKEE (AP) — The two frontrunners for the Republican attorney general nomination say they want to expand gun rights for nonviolent felons.
The Wisconsin State Journal reported that former state Rep. Adam Jarchow and Fond du Lac County District Attorney Eric Toney both said during a debate in Milwaukee on Tuesday night that gun rights should be restored for people convicted of nonviolent felonies when they re-join society. Jarchow said he’s heard from nonviolent felons who are frustrated they can’t use guns to hunt with their grandchildren.
“Is there a narrow way we can restore Second Amendment rights to folks without giving career criminals guns?” Jarchow said. “Maybe.”
Jarchow also jabbed Toney for charging 10 people with violating Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ stay-at-home orders at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
Tony said he later dropped the charges and his office never convicted anyone or shut down a business or church and attacked Jarchow over his lack of prosecutorial experience.
Karen Mueller, a conservative attorney also running for the GOP nomination, said she wants to investigate baseless claims that hospitals routinely killed patients with COVID-19 vaccines. The vaccines have proven safe.
The primary is Aug. 9. The winner will face incumbent Democrat Josh Kaul in the November general election.
North Carolina
Man sentenced to prison for illegal firearms
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A North Carolina man has been sentenced to 12 years in prison and three years of supervised release for his conviction on charges of possessing a firearm as a convicted felon.
U.S. Attorney Michael Easley said Edward Shaquille Alford, 29, of Lumberton was indicted last July on two counts of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. On March 9, Alford entered a guilty plea to a single count, Easley said in a news release.
In February 2021, the Lumberton Police Department and the Robeson County Sheriff’s Office executed a search warrant at a residence in Lumberton and found a loaded .45 caliber firearm with an extended magazine in the room where Alford was staying, the news release said
Alford made bond on state charges but was arrested again on a firearm charge in May 2021, when Lumberton Police tried to make a traffic stop on Alford. He fled the scene but was apprehended nearby and found with an AR-15 rifle in the driver’s side door, according to prosecutors.
Alford had previously been convicted of robbery with a dangerous weapon as well as a prior conviction for possessing a firearm as a convicted felon.
Missouri
Judge throws out $4 million award for transgender student athlete
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A judge has thrown out a $4.2 million jury award in a lawsuit filed by a transgender student in the Blues Springs School District who was denied access to male locker rooms and bathrooms.
The student, identified in court documents as R.M.A., sued in 2015. A Jackson County jury found in December that the Blue Springs School District had discriminated against the student while he attended middle and high school.
He participated in male sports but was required to use separate unisex bathrooms.
Jackson County Circuit Judge Cory Atkins ruled last month that R.M.A. had not proven that his male sex was “a contributing factor” in the district’s refusal to let him use male facilities, KCUR reported.
Atkins ruled the sole, uncontradicted evidence at the trial was that the student was excluded from male facilities because of his female genitalia.
The Missouri Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that the state’s human rights laws against sex discrimination could be extended to those who don’t conform to gender stereotypes, which was considered a significant decision for transgender rights at the time.
New York
Police: Anti-abortion center damaged by arson
AMHERST, N.Y. (AP) — Police are investigating a fire at an anti-abortion center in a Buffalo suburb early Tuesday as a likely arson — one the center’s operators suspect is the work of women’s rights extremists.
The fire was reported at about 3 a.m. and left the building temporarily unusable, CompassCare Chief Executive Jim Harden said.
“Essentially, they firebombed the operation,” Harden said. “They broke the two main windows in the reception area and the nurse’s office and lit the fires.”
The Amherst police news release announcing the investigation did not include a suspected motive. The FBI declined to comment on whether it was involved in the arson investigation.
On its website, the center said it and others like it have faced online and in-person threats in recent weeks following the leak of a draft opinion that suggests the U.S. Supreme Court could be poised to overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade case that legalized abortion nationwide.
Last month, the office of a prominent Wisconsin anti-abortion lobby group was damaged by fire after two Molotov cocktails were thrown at it. Police said an anti-abortion organization in Salem, Oregon, also recently was damaged by two Molotov cocktails during an unsuccessful break-in attempt.
Harden said CompassCare provides free health care to women and encourages them to seek alternatives to abortion. The Buffalo office serves about 20 patients each week, he said.
Services will resume Wednesday at an undisclosed location, he said. The Rochester-based organization has increased security at its Rochester and Albany locations and plans to install armored glass in the Buffalo office.
At a news conference, Harden said the vandals who set the fire wrote “Jane was here” on the building.
“This is the face of abortion,” he said. “They’re revealing it to us.”
The fire took place in the same Buffalo suburb where Dr. Barnett Slepian was murdered by an anti-abortion extremist in 1998.
That killing followed a period in which Buffalo was ground zero in the nation’s anti-abortion movement, with protesters converging on the city from around the U.S. in an attempt to close clinics down.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul announced last month the state would give abortion providers $35 million to expand services and boost security in anticipation of the Supreme Court decision. Besides Slepian, at least 10 other people have been slain across the U.S. by anti-abortion zealots since 1993 in attacks on clinics and health care providers.
Harden said the fire shows that groups opposed to abortion deserve security help, too.
“We haven’t gotten a single dime for security,” Harden said.
In an emailed statement, Hochul’s office said the governor “condemns violence of any kind, and the State Police stand ready to assist local authorities with the investigation.”
