American Samoans’ appeal for U.S. citizenship rejected by Supreme Court

U.S. law declares them 'nationals, but not citizens,' which limits their participation in civic life

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS |

PUBLISHED: October 17, 2022 at 7:54 a.m. | UPDATED: October 17, 2022 at 9:50 a.m.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday rejected an appeal seeking to give people born in American Samoa U.S. citizenship.

In leaving in place an appeals court decision, the court also passed up an invitation to overturn a series of decisions dating back to 1901 known as the Insular Cases, replete with racist and anti-foreign rhetoric. Justice Neil Gorsuch had called for the cases to be overturned in April.

But the justices refused to take up the case — filed by three American Samoa natives now living in Utah — that argued a federal law declaring that they are “nationals, but not citizens, of the United States at birth” is unconstitutional.

A trial judge in Utah ruled in their favor. The federal appeals court in Denver then said Congress, not courts, should decide the citizenship issue. The appeals court also noted that American Samoa’s elected leaders opposed the lawsuit for fear that it might disrupt their cultural traditions.

merican Samoa is the only unincorporated territory of the United States whose inhabitants are not American citizens at birth.

Instead, those born in the cluster of islands are granted “U.S. national” status, meaning they can’t vote for U.S. president, run for office outside American Samoa or apply for certain jobs. The only federal election they can cast a vote in is the race for American Samoa’s non-voting U.S. House seat.

The Biden administration joined the American Samoa government in calling for the court to reject the appeal. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, the administration’s top Supreme Court lawyer, wrote that “the government in no way relies on the indefensible and discredited aspects of the Insular Cases’ reasoning and rhetoric” that was highlighted in the appeal.

The Insular Cases, which arose following the Spanish-American War, dealt with the administration of overseas territories.

In their conclusion that residents of territories had some, but not all, rights under the Constitution, justices wrote in stark racial and xenophobic terms. Citizenship could not be automatically given to “those absolutely unfit to receive it,” one justice wrote.

That history prompted Gorsuch to comment in a case involving benefits denied to people who live in Puerto Rico, decided in April. He wrote that the Insular Cases were wrongly decided because they deprived residents of U.S. territories of some constitutional rights.

“It is past time to acknowledge the gravity of this error and admit what we know to be true: The Insular Cases have no foundation in the Constitution and rest instead on racial stereotypes. They have no place in our law,” Gorsuch wrote.

https://www.ocregister.com/2022/10/17/american-samoans-appeal-for-u-s-citizenship-rejected-by-supreme-court/

Coronavirus Update

CDC identifies new COVID variants that accounted for 11.4% of new cases in week ending Oct. 15

Last Updated: Oct. 18, 2022 at 7:08 a.m. ET

First Published: Oct. 17, 2022 at 11:36 a.m. ET

By Ciara LinnaneFollow

7

BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 went from fewer than 1% of new cases to more than 10% in the space of a month

Referenced Symbols

MRNA -4.59% PFE 0.30% BNTX -1.91% JETS 1.54%

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said a new COVID variant dubbed BQ.1 and a descendant called BQ.1.1 have gained traction in the U.S., accounting for 11.4% of new cases across the nation in the week ending Oct. 15.

The two variants are lineages of BA.5, the omicron subvariant that remains dominant but has shrunk to account for just 67.9% of circulating variants, the agency said in a Friday update. The CDC had previously combined BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 with BA.5 cases because the numbers of the new variants were so small. BQ.1 was first identified by researchers in early September and has been found in the U.K. and Germany, among other places.

New York and New Jersey currently have the highest proportion of BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 infections, at about 20% of overall cases, according to CDC estimates.

“When you get variants like that, you look at what their rate of increase is as a relative proportion of the variants, and this has a pretty troublesome doubling time,” Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser, said in an interview with CBS News.

Adding to concerns, the variant seems “to elude important monoclonal antibodies,” he added.

Fauci is confident that Moderna MRNA, -4.59%, as well as Pfizer PFE, 0.30% and German partner BioNTech BNTX, -1.81%, will be able to update boosters to target the new subvariant. “The somewhat encouraging news is that it’s a BA.5 sublineage, so there are almost certainly going to be some cross-protections that you can boost up,” he said.

So far, only 14.8 million people living in the U.S. have taken advantage of the new bivalent boosters that were authorized by the Food and Drug Administration in late August. That’s equal to about 7% of the 209 million who were initially eligible.

The FDA authorized the Pfizer booster for use in people aged 12 and older and the Moderna booster for adults aged 18 and older. Last week, the FDA added children aged 5 to 11 to the Pfizer program and children aged 6 through 17 to the Moderna one.

Experts are concerned that the low number of vaccinations is due to a sense that the pandemic is over and no longer poses a major risk for most people. U.S. cases are steadily declining and now stand at their lowest level since mid-April; however, the true tally is likely higher than the official count, because many people are testing at home, where data are not being collected.

The daily average for new cases stood at 37,649 on Sunday, down 19% from two weeks ago, according to a New York Times tracker.

The daily average for hospitalizations was down 5% to 26,475, while the daily average for deaths was down 8% to 374.

But cold weather is expected to bring a new wave of cases, and hospitalizations are rising again in much of the Northeast, the Times tracker is showing.

“That’s the thing that’s so frustrating for me and for my colleagues who are involved in this, is that we have the capability of mitigating against this. And the uptake of the new bivalent vaccine is not nearly as high as we would like it to be,” said Fauci.

(cont…)

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/cdc-identifies-new-covid-variants-that-accounted-for-11-4-of-new-cases-in-week-ending-oct-15-11666021004

Wow! Man Breaks Window to Steal Car across Street from Tim Michels Presser in Tony Evers’s Crime Ridden Milwaukee

By Jeremy Segal

Published October 17, 2022 at 9:35pm

110 Comments

Surveillance camera image of the man who attempted steal a car during a Tim Michels press conference in Milwaukee.

At a press conference for Trump-endorsed candidate for Governor, Tim Michels, in Milwaukee, a man tried to steal a Fox producer’s Kia in broad daylight.

The break-in and attempted theft occurred last Thursday, right across the street from the press conference.

Here is coverage from Fox 6.

Michels went on camera at the scene of the crime and called out left-wing Democrats, Governor Tony Evers and Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes (challenger to Republican Senator Ron Johnson) for their horrendous failure to manage the crime spiking epidemic in Milwaukee.

While walking around the vehicle’s smashed window, Michaels said, “this is what happens when you have weak leadership–The bad guys are so emboldened, they’re like I don’t care if there’s cameras around people around… future governors around…I know I’m going to get away with it.”

Their failure is so bad, it almost seems like they are intentionally trying to make crime worse in Wisconsin.

As we previously reported, more than 800 violent felons from murderers to child rapists have been released from prison on early parole under the Evers/Barnes administration.

In 2019, Evers nominated Black Lives Matter supporting city councilman, John Tate, as chairman of the Parole Commission. Tate was an outspoken advocate for prison reforms and reduction in sentencing. Given the mile long list of hardened-violent criminals he released, it must be asked if Tate intentionally chose the most dangerous to live free once again among law abiding Wisconsinites.

Since 2019, during his first term as Governor of Wisconsin, at least 884 convicted prisoners have been released under Evers Parole Commission, including more than 300 convicted murderers, attempted murderers and child rapists.

The list of those paroled early, obtained by Freedom of Information requests and compiled by WRN is both staggering and shocking.

1st Degree Intentional Homicide 171

1st-Degree Reckless Homicide 62

Felony Murder 18

2nd-Degree Intentional Homicide 18

2nd Degree Reckless Homicide 3

Homicide by Intoxicated Use of Vehicle 2

1st Degree Sexual Assault 24

2nd Degree Sexual Assault 15

1st Degree Sexual Assault of Child 26

2nd Degree Sexual Assault of Child 5

Repeated Sexual Assault of Same Child 13

Mass murderer and Christmas parade killer Darrell Brooks was let out of jail before his deadly rampage thanks to Democrat politicians in the state.

Wisconsin Right Now reports “vehicle thefts are up 118% this year since the same time in 2020. Vehicle thefts were 3,032 in 2020 YTD, compared to 6,598 this year.”

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/10/wow-man-breaks-window-steal-car-across-street-tim-michels-presser-tony-everss-crime-ridden-milwaukee/

Sobbing Kevin Spacey reveals 'terrifying and humiliating' childhood at the hands of his 'white supremacist neo-Nazi' father who called him a 'f****t'

Spacey, 63, told New York court his father was a white supremacist and neo-Nazi

He said his father, Thomas Fowler, would call him a f****t' and yell at him as child

Spacey said his father's angry rants led him to hate bigotry and intolerance

By RACHAEL BUNYAN and DANIEL BATES FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

PUBLISHED: 06:38 EDT, 18 October 2022 | UPDATED: 07:07 EDT, 18 October 2022

Actor Kevin Spacey broke down in sobs as has revealed his father was a white supremacist and neo-Nazi who would scream at him when he thought he was gay, a New York courtroom heard.

Spacey, 63, said whilst taking the stand in a civil court case in New York that as a child, his father, Thomas Fowler, would call him a 'f****t' while lecturing him for 'hours and hours' about his racist and homophobic beliefs.

An emotional Spacey, giving an unprecedented view into his private life as he wiped away tears, told the court that his father's rants led him to hate bigotry and intolerance.

The House of Cards actor said it was 'terrifying' to consider bringing his school friends home because he was 'terrified' about what his father, who died on Christmas Eve 1992 aged 68, would say.

Spacey, choking up, said that when he became interested in theatre, he endured the screams of Mr Fowler, a failed writer, who 'used to yell at me at the idea that I might be gay.'

Spacey said he did not come out as gay publicly for years because his upbringing made him believe you should 'never ever, ever talk about anything.'

He told the New York courtroom: 'I grew up in a very complicated family dynamic. My father was unemployed a great deal of the time so therefore he was home a lot of the time.

'My father fell in with some ideas and people that I believe damaged his mind and sensibility and my father was a white supremacist and neo-Nazi.

'It meant we were forced to listen to hours and hours and hours of lectures about his beliefs and ideas.'

Spacey said it was these lectures that were the basis of his 'hatred of bigotry and intolerance.'

He said: 'I was humiliated and terrified of even considering bringing my friends home to my house because I was afraid of what my friends would say.

'My best friend was Jewish. I couldn't bring him to my house. Everything that was happening at that house was something I felt I had to keep to myself, keep private and never ever talk about anything.'

Spacey told the jury about his early life being born in New Jersey then moving to California when he was three years old.

His mother, Kathleen Fowler, worked as a secretary and was the breadwinner but they moved nine or 10 times by the time Spacey was 11.

His acting interest was piqued by his mother who 'loved music and movies' and introduced Spacey to movie stars of the 1930s, 40s and 50s.

He discovered he had an 'ear for impressions' and said that making his mother laugh was 'one of the greatest sounds I have ever heard.'

After being sent to military school, Spacey began to take acting workshops, including one with the actor Jack Lemmon who said his performance was a 'touch of terrific' - Spacey briefly impersonated Lemmon as he recounted the anecdote.

Spacey's friend Val Kilmer also pushed him to take up acting, Spacey said.

The actor, who came out as gay in 2017, said he didn't do it sooner because of his childhood.

He said: 'I grew up in a situation as a child where I wasn't comfortable talking about these things. My father used to yell at me about the idea I might be gay because I was interested in the theatre.

'My father used to scream at me don't be a F-word that is very derogatory to the gay community. It was very disturbing for me because I was beginning to discover my own sexuality. I think I had a degree of shame but I think also I wanted people to remember the characters I was playin and not to know too much about me.

'That's my reasoning, I was protecting the work.'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11326981/Sobbing-Kevin-Spacey-reveals-terrifying-childhood-hands-white-supremacist-neo-Nazi-father.html