TV News LIES

A legal challenge brought against the Department of Defense by a group of LGBTQ veterans who were dismissed under a former military policy that prevented them from serving openly will move forward after a federal judge denied the Pentagon’s motion to dismiss it.

Five LGBTQ veterans filed the class action lawsuit last summer in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, arguing that the Defense Department violated their constitutional rights by failing to update them to honorable discharges after repealing its “Don’t ask, don’t tell” (DADT) policy, which dismissed them with less-than-honorable discharges, more than a decade ago.

Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson says he had mixed emotions going back to Birmingham, Alabama, where Major League Baseball put on a showcase Thursday night highlighting the accomplishments of players from the Negro Leagues.

The game between the San Francisco Giants and St. Louis Cardinals at Rickwood Field was a backgdrop for the emotions felt by players who either played in Birmingham during the throes of Jim Crow and the Negro League players who never got to play in the majors.

A federal judge on Monday temporarily blocked an Iowa law that allowed law enforcement in the state to file criminal charges against people with outstanding deportation orders or who previously had been denied entry to the US.

US district court judge Stephen Locher issued a preliminary injunction because he said the Department of Justice and civil rights groups who filed suit against the state were likely to succeed in their argument that federal immigration law pre-empted the law approved this spring by Iowa legislators.

“As a matter of politics, the new legislation might be defensible,” Locher wrote in his decision. “As a matter of constitutional law, it is not.”

The Iowa law, which was set to take effect on 1 July, would let law enforcement officers file charges to be brought against people who have outstanding deportation orders or who previously have been removed from or denied admission to the US.

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Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee recently signed a bill into law that allows public officials to refuse to solemnize marriages.

When I initially heard about the bill, I was under the mistaken impression that it applied only to ministers. However, upon further examination, I realized that it goes much further than that. Rather than simply reaffirming the right of ministers to refuse to perform marriages, the law also allows for discrimination by public officials in the solemnization of marriages. I believe this aspect of the law raises serious equal protection questions.

I have been a strong supporter of the freedom of private individuals to associate – or choose not to associate – with whomever they please.

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A Missouri woman who was imprisoned for more than 40 years for murder has had her conviction overturned after a judge found “clear and convincing” evidence that she was innocent of the killing in question.

Sandra “Sandy” Hemme, 63, was convicted of – and sentenced to life imprisonment for – the 1980 slaying of Patricia Jeschke, a library worker in St Joseph, Missouri, after Hemme made statements to the police incriminating herself while she was a psychiatric patient.

On Friday, Livingston county circuit judge Ryan Horsman ruled that “evidence directly” ties the killing of Jeschke to a local police officer who later went to prison for another crime and has since died.

Hemme, who has spent the last 43 years behind bars, must be freed within 30 days unless prosecutors decide to re-try her, the judge said. The ruling came after an evidentiary hearing in January where Hemme’s legal team presented arguments supporting her evidence.

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