‘I had a good sense to believe this was going to be a massive story and that it was going to dominate the news cycle for the next several days.’
Public schools could not apply for the infrastructure grants, under the 2022 law passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature and signed by Republican Gov. Tate Reeves.
People would only be allowed to enter spaces that correspond to their sex assigned at birth, regardless of their appearance or any procedures they’ve had to affirm their gender identity.
School principals or vice principals also would have to notify parents or guardians if a child wanted to use a name other than their legal one, or a nickname or pronouns that did not match their sex assigned at birth.
State Rep. Rick Townsend, a Republican from coastal Brunswick, sponsored the legislation after he was contacted by Anne and Larry Rogers, a couple in his district whose son Wes died after using kratom.
The end of income caps to qualify for the Opportunity Scholarship program and the repeal of another eligibility requirement led to a six-fold increase in new applications for the coming school year.
The prosecution’s star witness has yet to take the stand in Donald Trump’s hush money trial. But jurors are already hearing Michael Cohen’s words as prosecutors work to directly tie Trump to payments to silence women with damaging claims about him before the 2016 election. The second week of testimony in the case will wrap up…
The plaintiffs — four transgender women born in Tennessee — argue in court filings that sex is properly determined not by external genitalia but by gender identity.
Any plan would have needed to pass with at least a two-thirds vote — a wide enough margin to survive an expected veto from Republican Gov. Tate Reeves, who refers to Medicaid as ‘welfare.’
Lawsuits also have been filed in federal courts in Texas, Alabama, Louisiana and Kentucky challenging the rule. The multiple challenges give the states a better chance that one of them will put the rule on hold nationally.
