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Uganda President Will Sign Anti-Homosexuality Life-In-Jail Bill Into Law

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var addthis_config = {“data_track_addressbar”:true};Yoweri Museveni, the president of Uganda, in an about face clearly tied to his upcoming re-election efforts, has decided to sign the highly-contested and highly-controversial Anti-Homosexuality Bill (AHB) into law. The legislation, which the president had stated was passed illegally late last year, was formerly known worldwide as the “Kill The Gays” bill. Many believe — although it is still unconfirmed — that the death penalty provision has been removed.

LOOK: Comparing Gays To ‘Mongols,’ Ugandan President Ridiculously ‘Explains’ Homosexuality

Buzzfeed, which broke the news today, just reported that “Museveni had been facing stiff pressure from his colleagues to accept the bill.”

Museveni had told lawmakers he would sign the bill if “I have got confirmation from scientists that this condition is not genetic.”

The committee chairman of Museveni’s party, the National Resistance Movement, told BuzzFeed yesterday, “Speaking as a medical doctor … homosexuality is just deviant behavior. It can be learned, and it can be unlearned.”

Of course, every major medical organization in the United States, if not the Western World, has stated that is false, and that homosexuality is neither a “behavior” nor “deviant.”

Ugandan parliament Speaker Rebecca Kadaga late last year kept her promise — one year late — to pass Uganda’s internationally infamous “Anti-Homosexuality Bill” as a Christmas present to her country’s Christians. She did so reportedly without a quorum in place and without advance notice.

The bill is largely the result of America’s Christian Evangelicals working in Uganda and other underdeveloped countries around the world, especially in Africa.

One in particular, hate group leader Scott Lively, on trial in the U.S. for crimes against humanity, has bragged about his work in Uganda against the LGBT community. In late 2012, with the death penalty believed to be still attached, Lively called the AHB’s expected passage a “huge blessing.”

Another hate group leader, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, has voiced support for the legislation. In 2010, when the bill still had the death penalty included, Perkins claimed the legislation merely was an effort “to uphold moral conduct that protects others.”

And in late 2012, again, with the death penalty still believed to have been included, Perkins praised President Museveni for “leading his nation” with the “Kill The Gays” bill, and called Uganda “a modern example of a nation prospered by God.”

The Anti-Homosecuality bill today provides for life in prison for “aggravated homosexuality,” a broad and legally insufficiently defined term. It also provides for mandatory jail terms for those who engage in sexual activities with a member of the same gender. The AHB also demands that any person who knows of someone who is gay must report them to law enforcement or face jail themselves, and provides for stiff penalties for any person, company, corporation, media outlet or other entity that knows or supports LGBT people or LGBT civil rights.

The law will also extend beyond Uganda’s borders, mandating extradition for Ugandans who violate the law abroad.

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‘Oddest’: Legal Experts Mock Trump’s ‘Nutty’ and ‘Doomed to Fail’ Emergency Supreme Court Motion

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October 4, 2022

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It weighs in at 240 pages but legal experts are still mocking Donald Trump’s emergency petition to the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn an 11th Circuit Court ruling and allow the special master to continue to inspect the 103 classified documents retrieved from him Mar-a-Lago home.

“Oddest SCOTUS petition. Very technical and not terribly logical,” observed Andrew Weissmann, an NYU School of Law law professor and former DOJ official who served as the General Counsel for the Federal Bureau of Investigation and as special counsel to then-FBI Director Robert Mueller.

The motion was addressed to Justice Clarence Thomas,  who oversees the 11th Circuit courts. His wife, Ginni Thomas, is an avowed supporter of Trump and his “Big Lie” claims he won the 2020 election.

READ MORE: Trump Asks Supreme Court to Intervene for Him in Classified Documents Case

“SCOTUS should send him packing,” tweets former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance, now an MSNBC/NBC News legal analyst. “No surprise here, this was why he paid former Florida Solicitor General Chris Kise $3 million to sign on, no one else on his team could handle this.”

“Just watch SCOTUS turn Trump down 9-0. (Or 8-1 if Thomas dissents . . . ),” writes retired Harvard professor of law Laurence Tribe. “Will The Donald start calling ‘his’ three justices traitors? Will he say they have a ‘death wish’ as he did with McConnell?”

Weissmann took another hit at Trump’s Lawsuit, declaring it “nutty.”

“Trump argument to SCOTUS: 11th circuit had power to stay Cannon decision BUT it [could] not take the classified docs away from SM Dearie review. Nutty and if he won Dearie wd just say he won’t review the docs bc they are not Trump’s.”

University of Texas School of Law professor of law Steve Vladeck says that while the lawsuit is “not *entirely* laughable,” but he thinks “it’s both (1) doomed to fail; and (2) unlikely to accomplish much even if it succeeds.”

Former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti says, “I would not be surprised if the Supreme Court decides not to hear it.”

 

 

 

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BREAKING NEWS

Trump Asks Supreme Court to Intervene for Him in Classified Documents Case

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October 4, 2022

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Donald Trump on Tuesday petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in his classified documents case, and reverse a ruling from the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals that allowed the U.S. Dept. of Justice access to the more than 100 classified and top secret documents federal agents recovered from his Mar-a-Lago residence and resort.

Trump is asking the nation’s highest court to order a special master to continue to inspect the 103 classified documents, despite the special master emphatically stating the government, not Trump, gets to decide what is classified and what is not, especially when Trump refused to provide a list of what he considered declassified.

The lawsuit, which is a massive 240 pages, mostly made up of other documents including the now infamous FBI photo of the classified documents on the Mar-a-Lago rug, is addressed to “The Honorable Clarence Thomas, Circuit Justice for the Eleventh Circuit,” and refers to the former president as “President Trump.”

The lawsuit also mentions the contents that federal agents took, including “89 empty envelopes,” while not noting they were classified document envelopes.

“As part of the 11th Circuit’s decision, the panel allowed the criminal investigation to use the seized documents, something [Judge] Cannon had previously barred,” The Washington Post notes. “Trump’s filing seeks only to reverse the appeals court’s ruling on the special master’s access to the documents, not the part of the decision concerning the investigation.”

This is a breaking news and developing story. Details may change. 

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Biden Will Include DeSantis in His Visit to Support Florida Hurricane Victims

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October 4, 2022

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President Joe Biden will travel to Florida Wednesday to support families devastated by Hurricane Ian, and will include the state’s GOP governor, Ron DeSantis, in his trip, the White House announced Tuesday.

Last week, asked if he would meet with DeSantis, a top detractor of the president, Biden told a reporter who asked, “I’ll meet with everybody who’s around. The answer is yes, if he wants to meet.”

“This is not about anything having to do with our disagreements politically, this is about saving people’s lives, homes and businesses,” Biden also said last week.

DeSantis asked President Biden for financial assistance for his state, battered by what experts say is one of the worst hurricanes in U.S. history. DeSantis voted against relief aid for victims of Hurricane Sandy when he served in Congress.

President Biden and the First Lady, Dr. Jill Biden, will travel via Air Force One to Fort Myers, one of the hardest-hit areas of Florida by Hurricane Ian.

READ MORE: Watch: 2024 Presidential Hopeful Ron DeSantis Says ‘Cause for Concern Cause’ With Democrats Moving to Florida

But Fort Myers is also part of Lee County, where officials delayed evacuation orders.

“Lee County, which includes the hard-hit seaside community of Fort Myers Beach, as well as the towns of Fort Myers, Sanibel and Cape Coral, did not issue a mandatory evacuation order for the areas likely to be hardest hit until Tuesday morning, a day after several neighboring counties had ordered their most vulnerable residents to flee,” The New York Times reported. “By then, some residents recalled that they had little time to evacuate.”

“Lee County, which includes the hard-hit seaside community of Fort Myers Beach, as well as the towns of Fort Myers, Sanibel and Cape Coral, did not issue a mandatory evacuation order for the areas likely to be hardest hit until Tuesday morning, a day after several neighboring counties had ordered their most vulnerable residents to flee,” the Times added. “By then, some residents recalled that they had little time to evacuate.”

The St. Louis Post Dispatch blasted the Florida GOP governor, calling his “flip-flop on hurricane relief” a “study in right-wing hypocrisy.”

READ MORE: ‘Premeditated, Fraudulent, and Illegal’: Asylum Seekers Sue DeSantis After Being Sent to Martha’s Vineyard

“DeSantis’ willingness to shelve his usual attacks on the Biden administration to politely request emergency federal aid in the wake of Hurricane Ian is an inspiring example of constructive bipartisanship — as is Biden’s announcement that the government will bear a big part of the expense,” the Dispatch Editorial Board stated. “It’s interesting, though, that DeSantis took exactly the opposite stance a decade ago when he joined other hard-right members of Congress who argued against generous federal recovery aid when Hurricane Sandy ravaged the Northeast.”

Over the weekend DeSantis was blasted by volunteer relief aid workers who were delayed for hours in distributing “food, water, medicine, diapers, and anything else people needed” so Gov. DeSantis could get a photo-op.

 

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