Texas is on the brink of passing a law which would effectively close most clinics providing abortion services in the state. But state Sen. Wendy Davis of Fort Worth is currently filibustering the bill. She started this morning just after 11 am and if she can make it through midnight she will effectively derail the bill since that will be the end of the current 30 day session of the state legislature.
This isn’t terribly surprising if you’ve been watching the New York City Mayor’s race. But NBC/WSJ just released a poll showing that former Rep. Anthony Weiner, the butt of so many jokes from the NY/DC media set is now the frontrunner in the race, having displaced Christine Quinn, who for most of the last year has carried a Hillary/2008 mantle of inevitability. Read More
After a marathon filibuster which was technically broken on procedural grounds just before midnight, pandaemonium breaks out and abortion bill still fails even after Texas Senate Republicans tried to fudge the clock and give themselves more time to pass the bill. Amazing story.
Just so everyone’s up to speed, SCOTUS has waited till the very last day, essentially. So we are basically guaranteed to hear the Court’s ruling today on the interrelated cases of DOMA (the Defense of Marriage Act) and Proposition 8, the 2008 California state ballot proposition to ban gay marriage in the state. We should get the initial word at about 10 AM eastern.
Of course, the Court has various potential outs, deferring the question on procedural grounds or finding other technical reasons why the case was brought with other technical shortcomings. But I don’t think that’s going to happen. For good or ill, I think we’re going to have some big decisions.
Republicans across the Old Confederacy prep voter ID bills and other voting restrictions in the aftermath of the Supreme Court ruling.
Only 20 or so minutes left. But if you care to take a stab at guessing what SCOTUS has in store for marriage equality today, we’ve opened a prediction thread at TPMPrime.