Evening Wrap

Republican Glenn Cook seems like a fairly conventional candidate for Georgia’s legislature: A former naval aviator, pilot for Delta Airlines, Rotary member, VFW officer, elected member of a soil and water conservation district.

Among the earliest — and worst — was a Tennessee proposal to bar the state from denying prospective foster and adoptive parents solely because of their “sincerely held religious or moral” objections to the existence of humans who identify as anything other than straight and/or cisgender — even if the child they hope to foster or adopt is one of those humans. The policy would also overhaul procedural guidelines for the Department of Children’s Services, striking explicit protections against LGBTQ+ discrimination and a requirement that the state consider a child’s background and specific needs when selecting a foster or adoptive home. The department can still do that. But it no longer has to.

Wisconsin voters this month approved a constitutional amendment banning the use of private grants to offset the cost of election operations, effectively guaranteeing that local administrators will be short-staffed and cash-strapped for the foreseeable future. The policy is a blow to democracy but a win for Republicans, who sought to restrict the use of outside money based on their own conspiracy theory that an influx of municipal grants disproportionately benefited Democrats in the 2020 election. This is dumb and untrue, which might matter if things like that still mattered. But they don’t, and that’s why 28 states now restrict the use of outside funding in elections, per Stateline.

My spring art project this year was having my kids paint some birdhouses so that we might play landlord to some bird families. (We don’t charge rent, but we do ask that you let us ogle you from time to time.) Once they were painted I applied a few coats of spray sealant, which I did outside over several days in a probably futile attempt to avoid inhaling carcinogens. We finally went out to hang them this weekend, at which point my son announced that his birdhouse had a bug inside.

School’s in session.

This is your semi-regular reminder that 2024 elections are not limited to November. That’s both a commentary on modern politics (in an election year, it is never not Election Day) and an accurate assessment of the daily shenanigans unfolding at the state level. It’s a new adventure, all the time.

U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) may fight federal bribery charges at trial next month by blaming his wife Nadine for hiding her allegedly illegal dealings with shady businessmen, leaving him in the dark about a scheme to swap his political influence for cash, gold bars and a Mercedes, according to a court filing unsealed Tuesday. Without that information, there was no way for Menendez to knowingly commit a crime or participate in the plot, the New Jersey Monitor reported.

A majority of U.S. Supreme Court justices appeared leery Tuesday of allowing the Department of Justice to prosecute Jan. 6 rioters under a federal obstruction statute, a stance that could derail more than 300 court cases and weaken the government’s election interference case against Donald Trump, per reporting from our D.C. bureau.

Donald Trump on Monday reported to court in New York for jury selection in his first trial, elevating American exceptionalism to new heights by cementing his place in history as the first former president to face criminal prosecution. Trump did not appear bowed by the weight of the moment. Mostly, he seemed annoyed — and tired, to the point of dozing off at least twice, our national bureau reported.

It’s been nearly two years since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion, which is another way of saying that it’s been two years since reproductive rights took center stage in American politics.

An Arizona appeals court on Tuesday declined to grant a new trial to Abe Hamadeh, a Republican seeking to overturn his 2022 loss in the state attorney general race while also running for Congress, the Arizona Mirror reported. (Abe Hamadeh gets more done before 9 a.m. than most people do all day!) 

Nebraska lawmakers on Tuesday night advanced a proposal to divert $10 million in public money to private school scholarships, voting 31-12 to move the bill forward after four hours of debate and a narrowly averted filibuster. The measure, if approved, would likely replace a 2023 law granting dollar-for-dollar tax credits for donations to private school scholarships, which public school advocates said was a blatant attempt to circumvent a voter referendum that could repeal the policy, the Nebraska Examiner reported.