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From The Reporter’s Notebook
In briefs filed in the Supreme Court case challenging the accommodation offered to religious non-profits objecting to Obamacare’s contraceptive mandate, the U.S. government pointed out that the formal written objection employers must submit in the current system (and to which the challengers are objecting) is how religious accommodations are handled in other instances, TPM’s Tierney Sneed reported. “Requiring a party seeking an exemption to certify its eligibility in writing is a common and appropriate way to effectuate a religious accommodation,” the brief said.
Agree or Disagree?
Josh Marshall: “You can say you’re going to dismiss Trump, the probable winner of a big plurality of the votes and the delegates. But that doesn’t mean you’re going to be able to pull it off. If Trump is close – and 1100 of 1237 seems like a decent definition of close – I think he will come into Cleveland with far more support for the legitimacy, the justice of his position than Republican insiders and pundits realize.”
BUZZING: Today in the Hive
From a TPM Prime member: “Trump winning over enough uncommitted delegates to take him to 1237 is a possibility. It depends on how many unbound delegates he needs. If he’s at say, 1220, I think he could do it. However, the trade wouldn’t be for golf rounds, but for a high-paying, do-nothing job three levels down the organization chart in the Department of Energy. As with everything else that requires campaign organizations at the state and local level, Trump is way behind on working the unbound delegates, as in still at the starting line. Cruz’s people are out in the field right now trying to win over unbound delegates while the RNC is telling them how it’s a shame that their kids go to school in a dangerous neighborhood. If Trump doesn’t win in the first round, he’s toast, and I have no idea what will happen in the gang warfare that will follow. In the vast majority of states, the candidates do not get to choose “their” delegates. The delegates are real people, not just numbers. It’s been decades since that mattered at a party convention, but it does now. Most often, the delegates are people who have been rewarded with a trip to Cleveland as a result of their years of hard work for the party at the state and local levels. In other words, the party establishment that Trump rails against day after day. Many (as in hundreds) of these people are “his” delegates. Most of them are required to vote for him only in the first round. After that, they are free agents, and they will NOT vote for him in later rounds.”
Related: Some vulnerable GOP senators suggested they’ll skip the convention.
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What We’re Reading
In India, husbands are legally free to rape their wives — an effort to change that is running into opposition. (NPR)
How urban farms are changing the way we eat. (Eater)
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