Evening Wrap

There is a possibility that I had bird flu last week, based on a fun assortment of flu-like symptoms, a recent (and disappointing) encounter with some pigs*, and the fact that by the time I emerged from my fever dream, a former president had been convicted of a whole bunch of felonies.

If it’s any consolation, you can be pretty sure that at least one person in America had a worse day on Thursday than you did. 

Two parents, a public school teacher and a state board of education member joined Utah’s largest teacher union in a long-awaited lawsuit seeking to overturn a newly implemented voucher program, the Utah News Dispatch reported. The case, announced Wednesday, challenges the constitutionality of the so-called Utah Fits All Scholarship program, which pulls more than $82 million from public school funding each year to offset private and home-school costs for eligible students.

President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris appeared in Philadelphia Wednesday to launch Black Voters for Biden-Harris, an outreach campaign with an eight-figure investment in programming with Black student groups, community centers and faith-based organizations nationwide. The effort underscores the importance of Black voters, who broke decisively for Biden in 2020 but have drifted away this cycle, jeopardizing his chances in a handful of key swing states, the Pennsylvania Capital-Star reported.

Ohio lawmakers reconvened Tuesday for a special legislative session called last week by an exasperated Gov. Mike DeWine, who said he’d “run out” of patience waiting for the GOP-majority legislature to fix an obscure state law currently preventing President Joe Biden from appearing on the state’s ballot in November, per the Ohio Capital Journal.

Just in time for Memorial Day, Congress is considering a bill to right a historic (though probably inadvertent) wrong. American service members who receive the Purple Heart, the medal for those wounded or killed in the line of duty, are entitled to pass on their educational benefits under the G.I. Bill to their children.

Memorial Day provides an opportunity to remember those who’ve made the greatest sacrifice so that we might enjoy the freedom our country guarantees. Yet conservative officials on multiple fronts are attacking some of the basic rights of marginalized communities.

As we have observed before, in an ideal world, government would protect those who need protection most. Sadly, those people do not usually have money and political power, so they tend to fall through the cracks.

You could be forgiven for thinking that primary season is all over. I mean, we know which old white guys will be running for president, so on to November!

In Wisconsin, proposed compromise legislation would have allowed the state to direct $125 million meant to clean up “forever chemicals” to new programs. Both environmental and business groups thought they could reach an agreement. Given that PFAS, the chemicals in question, don’t break down and cause long-term health effects, that would have been good!

The first months of the year are legislative season in most states, and the sessions that began in January are wrapping up. That means May is the annual time for recounting all of the soul-crushing disappointment over things that legislators should have done but for some reason didn’t.

Democrats have coasted to victory on the coattails of abortion rights since 2022, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, clearing the way for a host of restrictive policies and outright bans to take effect in red states across the country. Abortion was a key factor in Democrats’ strong performance in both the 2022 midterms and last fall’s state contests, and party leaders believe it couldprovide a similar boost this year, particularly in places like Arizona and Florida, where restrictions have only recently taken effect.