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      US supreme court rules against air force officer who refused Covid vaccine

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      US supreme court rules against air force officer who refused Covid vaccine Majority of court sides with Pentagon over challenge by lieutenant colonel who cited religious grounds for refusal to get vaccine The supreme court has allowed the US Department of Defense to take disciplinary action against an air force lieutenant colonel who refuses to get a Covid-19 vaccine.In a brief, two-sentence ruling on Monday, a majority of the court sided with the Pentagon. Three justices in the conservative majority – Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch – dissented.The ruling was merely the court’s latest on challenges to Covid-19 vaccine mandates.In January, the court blocked a Biden administration requirement that employees of large businesses be vaccinated and wear masks on the job.The court ruled in March that the US navy had the authority to determine the job assignments of 35 service members who refused to get vaccinated.The case in question on Monday involved Lt Col Jonathan Dunn, previously commander of a 40-member squadron in California, according to court documents filed by the US solicitor general, Elizabeth Prelogar.Prelogar argued that while Dunn cited religious grounds for his refusal to get vaccinated, he did not “assert that the Covid-19 vaccine or compulsory vaccination in general is inconsistent with his Christian faith”, noting that he has received other vaccinations without objection.Dunn instead cited a speech given by Joe Biden that led him to conclude that “the vaccine ceased to be merely a medical invention and took on a symbolic and even sacramental quality”.His religion, he said, forbade him from participating in such “religious ritual”.Upon denial of his exemption request, Dunn sent to a major general “a one-word memorandum that simply read: ‘NUTS!’”.Prelogar noted that while Dunn maintains he meant no disrespect, “NUTS!” has a “well-known ‘military historical connotation’”.She cited the case of Anthony McAuliffe, a key US military officer in the second world war who responded to a German message requesting American surrender with the one-worded answer. The American officer who delivered McAuliffe’s message to German officers clarified that, “If you don’t understand what ‘nuts’ means, in plain English, it is the same as ‘Go to hell.’”The court documents say that the air force took disciplinary action against Dunn, including his removal from command and non-punitive disciplinary measures, citing his commanding officer who said he had “lost trust in [Dunn’s] leadership and judgment” due to the memorandum and that he displayed a “pattern of a lack of respect for military authority”. Prelogar said that Dunn’s actions independent of his refusal to be vaccinated warranted the measures against him.The US solicitor general also said that Dunn’s unit has to be ready to be deployed anywhere in the world with as little as three days’ notice, including countries that require proof of vaccination for entry. Prelogar also noted that the military has a long history of requiring vaccinations and currently requires nine vaccinations for service members.The deadline for air force members to get vaccinated was 2 November. In December, an air force spokesperson told NBC News that the military branch discharged 27 active-duty members who refused to get the vaccination and were not exempted. The US military that same month said 97% of its service members had received the Covid-19 vaccine.TopicsUS supreme courtLaw (US)CoronavirusUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Mood as light as spring air as Ketanji Brown Jackson delivers words to remember

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      Mood as light as spring air as Ketanji Brown Jackson delivers words to remember After 232 years, a Black woman is on the supreme court – and the atmosphere on a sunny Washington day was celebratoryThey could all feel the weight of history. Yet the mood was as light as spring air when Ketanji Brown Jackson looked out at the crowd of smiling faces.‘It means the world to us’: Black lawmakers’ euphoria greets Jackson confirmationRead more“It has taken 232 years and 115 prior appointments for a Black woman to be selected to serve on the supreme court of the United States,” the judge said in bright sunshine. “But we’ve made it!”The audience on the South Lawn of the White House rose and clapped and hollered with a rare purity of emotion.Jackson added: “We’ve made it – all of us. All of us. And our children are telling me that they see now more than ever that here in America anything is possible.”It felt like the culmination of a journey. A day earlier, Jackson was confirmed by the Senate as the first African American female supreme court justice. In moving remarks on Friday, she spoke not only of her journey but that of her ancestors: the 400-year story of African Americans meeting slavery and segregation with resilience, creativity and hope.The atmosphere at the White House was joyful and celebratory – not a sentence there has been much cause to write over the past five years. No doom and gloom over Donald Trump’s lies, the deadly pandemic or the war in Ukraine. Instead, the marine band played songs from the shows, including West Side Story. (“I like to be in America…”)And after a week of sombre grey skies, lashing rain and surging coronavirus, the White House looked a little more majestic than usual in radiant sunlight. Fifty Stars and Stripes flags fluttered in a row. Birds could be heard singing. The relaxed, jovial crowd of hundreds erupted as Joe Biden, wearing shades, Vice-President Kamala Harris and Jackson strode to the podium, to the strains of “Hail to the chief”.But it was Jackson’s grace note at the end of the 45-minute pageant that will linger in the memory – and the heart – and be studied by future historians and, she evidently hoped, generations yet unborn.The 51-year-old invoked figures such as Martin Luther King, the civil rights leader, Thurgood Marshall, the first Black supreme court justice, and her “personal heroine”, Judge Constance Baker Motley, a former district court judge and New York state senator.“They and so many others did the heavy lifting that made this day possible. And for all the talk of this historic nomination and now confirmation, I think of them as the true path-breakers. I’m just the very lucky first inheritor of the dream of liberty and justice for all.”Becoming tearful, putting a tissue to her nose, Jackson continued: “To be sure, I have worked hard to get to this point in my career and I have now achieved something far beyond anything my grandparents could have possibly ever imagined. But no one does this on their own.“The path was cleared for me so that I might rise to this occasion, and, in the poetic words of Dr Maya Angelou, I do so now, while ‘bringing the gifts my ancestors gave’.”There was applause and she took a deep breath.“‘I … I am the dream and the hope of the slave’.”It was a quotation from Angelou’s poem Still I Rise.A shiver of emotion ran through the crowd, which rose as one. It included Jesse Jackson, 80, a civil rights veteran who was there when King was assassinated.Her voice quivering with feeling that seemed to match the enormity of the moment, Jackson, watched by her parents, husband and daughters, went on.“So as I take on this new role, I strongly believe that this is a moment in which all Americans can take great pride.“We have come a long way toward perfecting our union. In my family, it took just one generation to go from segregation to the supreme court of the United States.”It was hard to believe this was the same country that less than two years ago staged a similar outdoor event for the justice nominated before Jackson, Amy Coney Barrett.On that grey day, Trump gloated at the prospect of tipping the court firmly in conservatives’ favour. The audience was appreciably less than diverse than for Jackson. It also proved to be a Covid super-spreader event. Time will tell if Friday goes the same way.Ketanji Brown Jackson brings a personal narrative no other justice can matchRead moreJackson is replacing the retiring Stephen Breyer, 83, and so liberals will remain firmly in the minority when, from October, she begins hearing vital cases on affirmative action, gay rights and voting rights.This week, Mitch McConnell refused to say whether he would even grant another Biden pick a hearing if Republicans regain the Senate majority. Friday’s heady euphoria was only a brief respite from demands for structural reform to restore balance to the court.But what a respite it was. Trump presented one vision of America, infused with white identity politics and great men of history. This presented another, more generous in spirt, more authentic to the nation’s true origin story.Biden said: “This is not only a sunny day. I mean this from the bottom of my heart. This is going to let so much sun shine on so many young women, so many young Black women, so many minorities that it’s real. It’s real! We’re going to look back – and nothing to do with me – we’re going to look back and see this as a moment of real change in American history.”TopicsKetanji Brown JacksonThe US politics sketchUS politicsDemocratsUS supreme courtUS constitution and civil libertiesLaw (US)RacenewsReuse this content More

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      Ketanji Brown Jackson confirmed as first Black woman on US supreme court – as it happened

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      Key events

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      Closing summary

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      White House: Jackson confirmation ‘a tremendously historic day’

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      Senate confirms Ketanji Brown Jackson to US supreme court

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      NY attorney general seeks contempt ruling on Trump

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      How the supreme court confirmation vote will work

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      Senate confirms Ketanji Brown Jackson to US supreme court

      The US Senate has voted to confirm Joe Biden’s pick Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to a seat on the US supreme court.
      The historic vote makes her the first Black woman to sit on the nation’s highest court.
      Full story here:

      Updated
      at 2.06pm EDT

      4.44pm EDT

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      Closing summary

      We’re closing down the blog now after a day dominated by the historic confirmation by the US Senate of the first Black judge, Ketanji Brown Jackson, to a seat on the US supreme court.
      Please join us again tomorrow, when Joe Biden will talk about Jackson’s confirmation from the White House, and for what will surely be another busy day in US politics.
      Remember you can continue to follow developments in the Russia-Ukraine conflict on our live blog here.
      Here’s where else our day went:

      The New York attorney general Letitia James filed for a contempt order against Donald Trump for his refusal to cooperate with her inquiry into his business dealings.
      The House speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that she had tested positive for Covid-19.
      The justice department blocked the House 6 January inquiry from accessing 15 boxes of Trump’s White House records, according to reports.

      3.56pm EDT

      15:56

      One other issue to emerge from this afternoon’s White House press briefing: the Biden administration dismissed as “a publicity stunt” a declaration by the Texas governor Greg Abbott that he was going to bus undocumented migrants to Washington DC.
      Abbott floated the plan as his response to the upcoming termination of Title 42, a Trump-era immigration policy blocking migrants at the US southern border because of Covid-19. Critics of the administration, and the homeland security department, predict a surge of migrants when the program ends next month.
      “I’m not aware of any authority the governor would be doing that under,” Psaki said.
      “I think it’s pretty clear this is a publicity stunt, his own office admits that a migrant would need to voluntarily be transported and he can’t compel them to because enforcement of our country’s immigration government lies with the federal government, not a state.”

      3.47pm EDT

      15:47

      Inevitably, questions in the White House briefing room turned to Covid-19 and the announcement earlier today that the House speaker Nancy Pelosi, who was twice in Joe Biden’s close company without a mask in recent days, had tested positive.
      Psaki said the administration was not concerned for the 79-year-old president’s age because, under centers for disease control and prevention (CDC) guidelines, the two are not considered “close contacts.”
      “It’s not arbitrary. It’s not something made up by the White House,” Psaki said of the guidelines. “They define it as being within six feet for a cumulative total of 15 minutes over a 24 hour period that they were not.
      “In terms of additional testing or anything along those lines, those assessments would be made by the president’s doctor. He was tested last evening and tested negative.
      “We have incredibly stringent protocols at the White House that we keep in place to keep the president, to keep everybody safe. Those go over and above CDC guidelines, and that includes ensuring that anyone who is going to be around the president is tested.”

      3.39pm EDT

      15:39

      Over at the White House, press secretary Jen Psaki has been answering questions about US arms shipments to Ukraine, given military leaders’ assessments that the war against Russia could take years.
      “There are transfers of systems nearly every single day,” Psaki said, hours after the Ukraine defense minister Dymtro Zulebi told journalists in Brussels that there were only three items on his country’s wish list for the US and its allies: “Weapons, weapons and weapons.” More

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      ‘So much joy’: Ketanji Brown Jackson’s confirmation lauded as ray of hope

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      ‘So much joy’: Ketanji Brown Jackson’s confirmation lauded as ray of hopeJoe Biden speaks of ‘historic moment for our nation’ as Democrats give standing ovation after judge’s ascent to supreme court Politicians and activists kept coming back to one word on Thursday after the confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson to the US supreme court: joy.After two grim years of a deadly pandemic and a democracy in peril, Jackson’s ascent as the first Black woman to serve on the nation’s highest court was lauded as a much-needed ray of hope.Ketanji Brown Jackson confirmed as first Black woman on US supreme court – liveRead more“Judge Jackson’s confirmation was a historic moment for our nation,” tweeted Joe Biden, posting a photo of himself with Jackson after they watched the Senate’s 53-47 bipartisan vote on TV.“We’ve taken another step toward making our highest court reflect the diversity of America. She will be an incredible justice, and I was honored to share this moment with her.”Democratic senators stood and applauded in celebration. Cory Booker, a member of the Senate judiciary committee who is African American, said in a statement: “Like many Americans, I feel immense pride and so much joy at this historic occasion.“As Judge Jackson ascends to the United States supreme court, I see in her the affirmation of our ancestors who suffered the indignities of this country yet sacrificed to bend the moral arc of our nation towards justice. They knew that America, though haunted by its past failings, was not bound by them and believed that a day like this would eventually arrive.”The sentiment was echoed by Pramila Jayapal, chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. She said: “This is truly a joyful day for the country. Judge Jackson is one of the most experienced nominees in decades.”Jayapal acknowledged the partisan attacks by Republicans during Jackson’s confirmation process, including misleading questions about her sentencing of child abuse images offenders and views on critical race theory.“The country saw her poise, grace, thoughtfulness, and brilliance as she handled every part of the confirmation process – including some outrageous attacks from Republican senators that damaged only their credibility, not hers,” she added.Jackson’s status as the first African American female justice in the 233-year history of the supreme court was also hailed by civil rights organisations, which pointed to its symbolic power for future generations of Black girls who will see her in school textbooks.Janette McCarthy Wallace, general counsel of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People said: “Today, Black women truly are supreme. Over the past few weeks, it has been an incredible privilege to bear witness to the rise of the first Black woman supreme court justice.“The significance of this moment for the Black community, especially for Black women like me who have spent decades in the legal profession, is tough to overstate.”Wallace added: “Representation is powerful – now, Black women and girls who dream of reaching the highest levels of our government can see that it is possible. While soon-to-be Justice Jackson’s confirmation did not come without racist, misogynistic attacks on her career and character, it is without question that Ketanji Brown Jackson is eminently qualified to serve on the supreme court of the United States.”Amanda Brown Lierman, executive director of Supermajority, a women’s equality organisation, added: “This is a historic moment for all women, but especially for women of color. Representation matters, and little Black girls everywhere will finally be able to see themselves represented on the highest court of the land.“I could not be more proud to have Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson on the bench. I will be celebrating her with my three daughters today, and every April 7 will be Ketanji Brown Jackson day in our house.”Republicans were unrepentant about their opposition to Jackson. Ronna McDaniel, chairwoman of the Republican national committee, said: “Biden’s pick Ketanji Brown Jackson is a radical, activist judge, one who failed to answer simple questions on her record, including leniency for child porn offenders and support of CRT.“Jackson has proved to be in lockstep with the far left’s political agenda, even refusing to define what a woman is.”But the vote represents a rare victory for progressives after years of setbacks and bitterly divisive hearings that saw conservatives on the court gain a 6-3 majority that will remain unchanged. Barack Obama, America’s first Black president, tweeted congratulations to Jackson and wrote: “This is a great day for America, and a proud moment in our history.”Meagan Hatcher-Mays, director of democracy policy for the grassroots movement Indivisible, said: “It’s not often we can describe a Senate vote as ‘joyous’, but that’s exactly what this was – for the first time in the supreme court’s 233-year history, a Black woman will serve as a justice.”TopicsKetanji Brown JacksonUS politicsUS supreme courtnewsReuse this content More

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      Ketanji Brown Jackson makes history as first Black woman confirmed to US supreme court

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      Ketanji Brown Jackson makes history as first Black woman confirmed to US supreme courtJackson confirmed 53 votes to 47, and will become first Black woman to serve in court’s more than 200-year history01:12Ketanji Brown Jackson, a liberal appeals court judge, was confirmed to the supreme court on Thursday, overcoming a rancorous Senate approval process and earning bipartisan approval to become the first Black woman to serve as a justice on the high court in its more than 200-year history.After weeks of private meetings and days of public testimony, marked by intense sparring over judicial philosophy and personal reflections on race in America, Jackson earned narrow – but notable – bipartisan support to become the 116th justice of the supreme court. The vote was 53 to 47, with all Democrats in favor. They were joined by three moderate Republicans, senators Mitt Romney of Utah, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine, who defied deep opposition within their party to support Joe Biden’s nominee. Their support was a welcome result for the White House, which had been intent on securing a bipartisan confirmation.Ketanji Brown Jackson poised to make history as first Black female supreme court justice – liveRead moreJackson, who currently serves on the US court of appeals for the DC circuit, will replace Stephen Breyer, 83, the most senior member of the court’s liberal bloc. Breyer, for whom Jackson clerked early in her legal career, said he intends to retire from the court this summer.At 51, Jackson is young enough to serve on the court for decades. Her ascension, however, will do little to tilt the ideological balance of the high court, dominated by a 6-3 conservative majority. But it does mean for the first time in the court’s history that white men are in the minority.Kamala Harris, the first Black woman to serve as US vice-president, presided over the Senate vote as Jackson became the first Black woman to join the supreme court, underscoring the historic nature of her confirmation. Harris called for the final vote on Jackson’s nomination with a smile on her face, and the chamber broke into loud applause when the judge was confirmed.“Today, we are taking a giant, bold and important step on the well-trodden path to fulfilling our country’s founding promises,” Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer said just before the final vote. “This is a great moment for Judge Jackson. But it is an even greater moment for America as we rise to a more perfect union.”The White House has announced that Biden, Harris and Jackson will deliver remarks on Friday to celebrate the confirmation. Jackson and Biden watched the final Senate vote together in the Roosevelt Room of the White House.Biden shared a photo taken with Jackson at the White House, saying on Twitter: “Judge Jackson’s confirmation was a historic moment for our nation. We’ve taken another step toward making our highest court reflect the diversity of America. She will be an incredible justice, and I was honored to share this moment with her.”Judge Jackson’s confirmation was a historic moment for our nation. We’ve taken another step toward making our highest court reflect the diversity of America. She will be an incredible Justice, and I was honored to share this moment with her. pic.twitter.com/K8SAh25NL5— President Biden (@POTUS) April 7, 2022
      Assailing Jackson’s record, but acknowledging Republicans did not have the votes to stop her confirmation, minority leader Mitch McConnell implored the judge to embrace the textualist approach of conservative justices.“The soon-to-be justice can either satisfy her radical fan club or help preserve the judiciary that Americans need, but not both,” McConnell said ahead of the vote on Thursday. “I’m afraid the nominee’s record tells us which is likely, but I hope judge Jackson proves me wrong.”Her confirmation to the lifetime post represents the fulfillment of a promise Biden made to his supporters at the nadir of his 2020 campaign for president, when he vowed to nominate the first Black woman to the supreme court, if elected president and a vacancy arose. The opportunity presented itself earlier this year, at another low point for Biden, with momentous domestic and foreign challenges weighing on his presidency.During the public hearings, Jackson vowed to be an independent justice who would seek to ensure that the words inscribed on the marbled supreme court building – Equal Justice Under the Law – were a “reality and not just an ideal”. With her parents and daughters present, Jackson recounted for the Senate judiciary committee her family’s generational journey, as the daughter of public school teachers raised in the segregated south who would rise to become a justice on a court that once denied Black Americans citizenship.Yet any hope by the White House that Jackson’s historic nomination might defuse some of the bitter partisanship that senators lament has turned the process into a “circus” quickly evaporated.With an eye to the November midterm elections, Republicans led an aggressive campaign against the judge during her confirmation hearings and in conservative media, raising questions about her record in an effort to paint her as an “activist judge” who is soft on crime. They used the confirmation proceedings to air conservative grievances about past supreme court nominations and to wage culture war battles over critical race theory, crime and transgender women in sports.Couched in thinly coded appeals to racism and the far-right fringes with nods to the QAnon conspiracy theory, some Republicans accused Jackson of being too lenient on child sexual abuse offenders, claims she forcefully rebutted “as a mother and a judge”. Legal experts have said her decisions in such criminal cases were within the mainstream while independent factcheckers concluded that the attacks were misleading and a distortion of her record.Democrats, and the handful of Republicans who supported her, praised her qualifications and demeanor, and in particular the restraint she showed during some stinging exchanges with conservative senators. They sought to defend her record, noting that her sentencing record was within the mainstream of the federal judiciary, while emphasizing the support she had earned from within the legal community, including among conservative justices, and her endorsement from the Fraternal Order of Police, which cited her family’s law enforcement background.In a mark of just how polarizing the process of confirming a supreme court nominee has become, the Senate judiciary committee deadlocked along party lines over her nomination. The resulting tie prompted Democrats to execute a rare procedural maneuver to “discharge” her nomination from the committee to the floor, with a vote by the full Senate. The NAACP said the vote by 11 Republicans against Jackson’s nomination was a “stain” on the committee.The final Senate vote on her confirmation was among the closest in supreme court history.A graduate of Harvard and Harvard Law School, Jackson served on the independent US sentencing commission, an agency that develops sentencing guidelines, before becoming a federal judge.While she shares an elite background with the other justices, her work as a public defender sets her apart. The last justice with experience representing criminal defendants was Thurgood Marshall, the towering civil rights lawyer who became the first Black member of the supreme court.TopicsKetanji Brown JacksonUS supreme courtLaw (US)US politicsUS SenatenewsReuse this content More

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      ‘Judge Jackson stands on the shoulders of giants’: women of color on a day to celebrate

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      ‘Judge Jackson stands on the shoulders of giants’: women of color on a day to celebrateKetani Brown Jackson becomes the first Black female justice on US’s highest legal body after her confirmation passes 53-47 Ketanji Brown Jackson’s nomination to the US supreme court has passed the Senate and she will now become the first Black female justice on America’s highest legal body after being nominated by Joe Biden earlier this year.Jackson’s nomination has been widely praised by women of color, especially after she sustained grueling confirmation hearings at the hands of some top Republicans who seemed dedicated to political points-scoring and whose criticisms often seemed like racist dog-whistling.Here are four women of color talking about Jackson and the significance of her nomination:Kamala Harris, US vice-president“I’ll tell you what I think you know. Judge Jackson is a phenomenal jurist,” Harris said last month in Selma, Alabama, during the 57th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday”.Jackson “proves her commitment not only to public service but to equal justice and equal rights”, Harris added.“As she makes history, Judge Jackson, like us all, stands on the shoulders of giants. She and we are their legacy.”Fatima Goss Graves, president and CEO of the National Women’s Law Center“The world demands untold levels of strength from Black women on a daily basis. The perseverance Jackson held close is all too familiar to Black women across this country,” Graves wrote in a CNN op-ed last month during Jackson’s confirmation hearings.“​​We hailed her career and celebrated not only her, but also the work of countless Black women silenced, erased and excluded from the top echelon of the legal profession,” she said, adding: “This will be the legacy of her rise to the supreme court: a young Black girl, one of a generation of Black girls, joyful at the sight of new possibilities for her own life.”Ann Claire Williams, retired US circuit judge of the US court of appeals for the 7th circuitIn a statement on behalf of the American Bar Association’s standing committee on the federal judiciary, Williams wrote: “Judge Jackson has a sterling reputation for integrity. Judges and lawyers who have known her in every capacity uniformly praised her character, calling her integrity ‘beyond reproach’, ‘first rate’, and ‘impeccable’.”“Our extensive review leads us to conclude that Judge Jackson meets the highest standards of integrity, professional competence, and judicial temperament,” Williams continued, granting Jackson the ABA’s highest rating.Angela Onwuachi-Willig, dean of Boston University School of Law“We don’t only get judged by our actions as individuals, all Black people get judged by our actions,” Onwuachi-Willig said in reference to Jackson’s confirmation hearings. “That’s an enormous weight. Judge Jackson was carrying that weight for hours and hours and hours, and I felt that was a human moment.”“With nearly 10 years of service as a federal judge, experience clerking for Supreme court justice Stephen Breyer and two lower-court judges, and a record of leadership on the United States Sentencing Commission, she will make an incredible supreme court justice,” Onwuachi-Willig also said in a letter, along with more than 200 other Black women law deans and professors, that urged the Senate’s confirmation of Jackson.TopicsKetanji Brown JacksonUS supreme courtLaw (US)US politicsnewsReuse this content More