The political stories and election updates you need to know to start your day- all in five minutes or less. Co Hosted by Sam Seder and Lucie Steiner. Powered by Majority.FM

July 14, 2020: Uninsured In The USA
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TODAY'S HEADLINES:

A new study finds that 5.4 million Americans have lost their employer-provided health insurance as the pandemic sweeps through the country.

Meanwhile, a federal court struck down Georgia’s puritanical 6-week abortion ban, ruling that the law preventing abortions anytime after the first 6 weeks of pregnancy was unconstitutional.

And lastly, Rep. Joaquin Castro is making a big move toward a key committee chair seat, as pressure mounts for Nancy Pelosi to nominate someone more progressive to the warhawk Democrat Eliott Engel’s seat at the top of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

THESE ARE THE STORIES YOU NEED TO KNOW:

The fact that healthcare is tied to full time employment is an almost uniquely American disgrace, and one that continues to harm everyday people at shocking rates.

Case in point, a distressing new study shows that 5.4 million Americans have lost their employer-provided health insurance over the course of the coronavirus pandemic. The study comes out today, but some news organizations got an early look at the data, which tells a brutal story: the jump in uninsured workers is 40 percent higher than it was in the 2008 recession.

And bear in mind, we’re nowhere near the end of the recession caused by the virus. Just today, the U.S. recorded its second highest ever day of new cases, logging more than 61,000 cases of the virus.

The new wave is so bad that many states are starting to shut back down again. Amidst a frankly insane debate about re-opening schools, some states have realized they may need to enact full lockdowns again to keep people safe. But those measures are sure to be inconsistently applied, and all of this makes the economic fallout even worse.

All of this is going to continue leaving more people uninsured, evicted, homeless, or unemployed. Joe Biden is campaigning on extending the Affordable Care Act, which provides opportunities for some people to get some modicum of care, but falls far short of universal healthcare. The hope is that at some point, elected officials will wake up to the fact that an employer-tied system is no longer feasible, and we’ll get some long-awaited change.

Courts Shoot Down Abortion Laws

Abortion rights activists and human beings in general scored a couple of huge court wins on Monday, as a federal district court shot down a draconian Georgia law that restricted abortions to only being performed in the first six weeks of pregnancy.

Almost simultaneously, a separate federal court in Tennessee blocked similar sweeping abortion restrictions just hours before Republican Governor Bill Lee would have signed them into law.

Both decisions are huge wins. Georgia’s decision is the final word, as well: the state is permanently blocked from enforcing the law, not just temporarily prevented from doing it. However, the case will now move up in the court system, so there’s a chance it could get overturned, but the district court was pretty explicit: the law, known as a “heartbeat bill,” was unconstitutional.

As the Huffington Post noted, many of these puritanical laws are part of an organized campaign by religious conservatives to erode the landmark Roe V Wade Supreme Court decision with constant legislation that they know will go to court battles.

These bills inevitably affect already-persecuted communities first: Georgia has the worst maternal mortality rate in the country, and in the state black women are 3.3 times more likely to die from pregnancy related complications than white women.

So far, the courts seem to be tossing out harmful laws that would worsen these circumstances, but it’s going to take a lot more concerted action to protect a woman’s right to choose.

Castro Hunts for House Committee Chair

The House of Representatives’ many, many committees don’t usually get a ton of attention in everyday politics, but they wield tremendous power over how the country is run. According to the Washington Post, Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro is expected to throw his hat in the ring for one of the most powerful on Monday.

In late June, Jamaal Bowman unseated Eliot Engel, a bajillion-term congressman who has spent his last term at the top of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, an extremely powerful body inside the House. That means Engel’s chair will be open assuming the Democrats hold the House in 2020, and Castro represents the more progressive wing of the party’s best shot at keeping another warhawk out of the seat.

Engel was for decades one of the biggest congressional supporters of Israel, and supported the war in Iraq.

Castro isn’t just going to walk into the seat, however. He’s up against two more senior Representatives: Brad Sherman of California and Gregory Meeks of New York.

What this comes down to is Pelosi, basically. Sherman and Meeks have a much better shot at the chair position, but more than 60 liberal groups signed an open letter recently urging Pelosi to replace Engel with someone more progressive. It appears that Castro is stepping up as the challenger. Sherman is almost as hawkish and Engle was, and while Meeks didn’t vote for the Iraq war, he doesn’t really have a stellar legislative record or strong background for the job.

Castro, meanwhile, is coming on strong, saying quote “Our foreign affairs committee needs to catch up with where Democrats are in terms of foreign policy,” endquote. We’ll see if Pelosi’s listening.

AND NOW FOR SOME QUICKER QUICKIES:

Tucker Carlson is probably frantically packing fishing gear in his car tonight, after he announced that he’d be going on a quote “long-planned” vacation. Surely this doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that one of his lead writers was forced to resign over the weekend after his old extremely racist message board posts got surfaced. Totally normal vacation here, nothing to see!

The Supreme Court cleared the way for federal inmate Daniel Lewis Lee to be executed by the state, overturning a D.C. district court judge’s injunction that stayed Lewis Lee’s execution just hours before it would have been performed on Monday. There are two more federal executions scheduled for this week, besides Lewis Lee.

California’s Orange County made the near-unanimous decision to send kids back to school in the fall, as the school board voted 4-1 in favor of in-person instruction with no masks or social distancing requirements. The only saving grace is that the board left the decision to re-open up to individual school districts, so if individual districts are wiser than their bosses, they could keep their kids safe.

And finally, Hong Kong’s citizens are still pushing back against the Chinese government’s crackdown on civil rights in the semi-autonomous territory, voting in massive numbers for primary election candidates that oppose the pro-mainland incumbents in power.

July 14, 2020 - AM Quickie

HOSTS - Sam Seder & Lucie Steiner

WRITER - Jack Crosbie

PRODUCER - Dorsey Shaw

EXECUTIVE PRODUCER - Brendan Finn