Media coverage of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s all-but-announced candidacy for president is already in full frenzy, and so far the script is exactly as his handlers would like it to be. The governor regularly opens up new fronts in the culture wars, sowing alarm over critical race theory, transgender rights, or border policies. In response, liberal pundits fall into the trap of accentuating the very issues DeSantis has chosen to fire up his base.

Omitted from the public debate about DeSantis’s policies is almost any discussion of his actual record of governance—what exactly he has delivered to the citizens of his state, especially those without seven-figure incomes and lush investment portfolios.

Even a cursory dip into the statistics of social and economic well-being reveals that Florida falls short in almost any measure that matters to the lives of its citizens. More than four years into the DeSantis governorship, Florida continues to languish toward the bottom of state rankings assessing the quality of health care, school funding, long-term elder care, and other areas key to a successful society.

Florida may be the place where “woke goes to die”—as DeSantis is fond of saying—but it is also where teachers’ salaries are among the lowest in the nation, unemployment benefits are stingier than in any other state, and wage theft flourishes with little interference from the DeSantis administration. In 2021, DeSantis campaigned against a successful ballot initiative to raise the state’s minimum wage, which had been stuck at $8.65 an hour. Under DeSantis’s watch, the Sunshine State has not exactly been a workers’ paradise.

Six years after ruling Iowans could bring suit against the state over violations of their state constitutional rights, the Iowa Supreme Court reversed itself Friday, holding that plaintiffs can seek damages for constitutional violations only where specifically permitted by the Legislature.

Friday's decision, which involved an Iowa City-area garbage truck driver arrested for refusing to cooperate in a police inspection of his truck, overturns the 2017 decision known as Godfrey II. In that case, the court considered what to do with violations of Iowa constitutional rights for which no statute, such as the Iowa Civil Rights Act or Iowa Tort Claims Act, explicitly authorized lawsuits against the state.

The court in that case ruled that such lawsuits were permissible, even without legislative authorization. But on Friday, the court, which has seen more than 50% turnover since 2017, held that decision and all its successor cases were decided wrongly.

Justice Edward Mansfield wrote for the now-unanimous court that Friday's decision will "restore the law as it existed in this state before 2017."

John Doe
@fedjudges

Today, the Iowa Supreme Court overruled its precedents allowing for damages suits under the state constitution (analogous to Bivens claims).
https://iowacourts.gov/courtcases/17340/embed/SupremeCourtOpinion

Mark Joseph Stern
@mjs_DC

NEW: Supreme Court issues a temporary stay of execution for Richard Glossip. No noted dissents; Gorsuch recused.

The decisive factor here is almost certainly Oklahoma's Republican Attorney General urging the Supreme Court to stay the execution. The AG believes Glossip's conviction and death sentence should be vacated. https://supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22A941/265824/20230501154508421_2023.05.01%20Response%20Stay-Final.pdf

TALLAHASSEE — After the Legislature and Gov. Ron DeSantis approved a law to prevent abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, abortion-rights supporters want to take the issue to voters.

Floridians Protecting Freedom, a newly formed group, will hold a news conference Monday in Tallahassee to begin a campaign to pass a constitutional amendment supporting abortion rights, according to a news release Friday.

“Floridians Protecting Freedom is launching a ballot initiative campaign to give Florida voters the chance to ensure their personal medical decisions are theirs and theirs alone to make,” the news release said. “The decision to have an abortion belongs to Floridians, their families, and those they trust — this campaign is an opportunity to ensure those protections remain in our state Constitution.”

The news release did not provide details of the proposal, but it comes after lawmakers and DeSantis this year approved the six-week limit — and as a legal battle plays out about whether a privacy clause in the Florida Constitution protects abortion rights.

TALLAHASSEE — After the Legislature and Gov. Ron DeSantis approved a law to prevent abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, abortion-rights supporters want to take the issue to voters.

Floridians Protecting Freedom, a newly formed group, will hold a news conference Monday in Tallahassee to begin a campaign to pass a constitutional amendment supporting abortion rights, according to a news release Friday.

“Floridians Protecting Freedom is launching a ballot initiative campaign to give Florida voters the chance to ensure their personal medical decisions are theirs and theirs alone to make,” the news release said. “The decision to have an abortion belongs to Floridians, their families, and those they trust — this campaign is an opportunity to ensure those protections remain in our state Constitution.”

The news release did not provide details of the proposal, but it comes after lawmakers and DeSantis this year approved the six-week limit — and as a legal battle plays out about whether a privacy clause in the Florida Constitution protects abortion rights.

A federal judge struck down portions of a controversial Kansas election law on Thursday, ruling them unconstitutional.

U.S. District Court Judge Kathryn Vratil struck down provisions in statute KSA 25-1122 banning out-of-state entities from mailing advance ballot applications and prohibiting the applications from containing any pre-filled information.

Both provisions had previously been temporarily blocked, and Vratil last year permanently enjoined the state from enforcing the out-of-state mail provisions.

That left only the personalized application ban remaining to address in Thursday's ruling from the federal courthouse in Kansas City, Kan.

"Defendants have not established that the Personalized Application Prohibition is narrowly tailored to achieve the state's alleged interests in the enhancement of public confidence in the integrity of the electoral process and avoiding fraud, the avoidance of voter confusion or the facilitation of orderly and efficient election administration," Vratil wrote. "The Personalized Application Prohibition cannot withstand strict scrutiny and is therefore an unconstitutional infringement on plaintiff’s First Amendment rights to speech and association."

Rob Romano
@2Aupdates

BREAKING: Barnett v. Raoul (7th Circuit): Judge Easterbrook stays the preliminary injunction against Illinois' "assault weapon" and magazine bans "pending further order of the court," requests a response to the state's motion by 5/9.

A Utah state judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked a new law, one day before it was scheduled to take effect, that would have banned abortion clinics and potentially put a halt to most abortions in the state.

Abortion is legal in Utah up to 18 weeks of pregnancy, and after that only in limited circumstances. But legislators have been trying in recent years to further restrict the procedure. A state law which would ban nearly all abortions is suspended while the Utah Supreme Court considers whether abortion is protected in the Constitution.

While the more stringent ban is temporarily blocked by the legal challenge, the Legislature, dominated by Republicans, passed another bill known as H.B. 467 that was signed into law by the Republican governor and zeroed in on something else: abortion clinics, where 95 percent of all abortions are performed in the state.

Among other provisions, the law makes it a crime to provide abortion anywhere other than a hospital. Abortion clinics would lose their licenses if they performed the procedure. And even if they stopped performing abortions, no new licenses would be issued after May.

Pablo Manríquez
@PabloReports

NEW: Florida Senate just passed a law that bans attorneys with DACA from practicing law in the state starting in Nov. 2028. It's headed to the governor's desk for signature.

Mark Joseph Stern
@mjs_DC

Remember the Texas man who sued his wife's friends after they helped her get abortion pills? He found the pill in his wife's purse while secretly searching it, then put it back—he wanted her to take it so he could then blackmail her into staying with him. https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23794899/23-cv-0375-deftscounter-plaintiffs-jackie-noyola-and-amy-carpenters-original-answer-and-counterclaims.pdf

The Texas man also searched his wife's phone and took screenshots of texts from her friends talking about medication abortion. Then he reported his wife to the police—an effort to prevent her from divorcing him after he emotionally abused her for years. https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23794899/23-cv-0375-deftscounter-plaintiffs-jackie-noyola-and-amy-carpenters-original-answer-and-counterclaims.pdf

Jonathan Mitchell, leading light of the anti-abortion movement, chose to represent an abusive husband who called his wife a whore in front of her coworkers, emotionally tormented her, then reported her to the police after she self-managed an abortion. https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23794899/23-cv-0375-deftscounter-plaintiffs-jackie-noyola-and-amy-carpenters-original-answer-and-counterclaims.pdf

It is very clear that Jonathan Mitchell is aiding and abetting the abusive manipulation of a violently jealous man who tried to blackmail his ex-wife out of divorcing him. It exemplifies the ends-justify-the-means mentality of the anti-abortion movement. https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23794899/23-cv-0375-deftscounter-plaintiffs-jackie-noyola-and-amy-carpenters-original-answer-and-counterclaims.pdf