US

This afternoon, at the direction of President Biden, U.S. fighter aircraft assigned to U.S. Northern Command successfully brought down the high altitude surveillance balloon launched by and belonging to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) over the water off the coast of South Carolina in U.S. airspace. The balloon, which was being used by the […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. February 1, 2023 — In an egregious attempt to evade accountability and hide the truth from the public, the Arizona Legislature last week implemented rule changes that instruct lawmakers to delete communications, thus allowing them to avoid releasing documents under the state’s public records law.  Had these rules existed in 2021, the public would […]

WASHINGTON, January 30, 2023 — The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Virginia, along with eight Federal Public Defender offices, filed an amicus brief on Friday in United States v. Chatrie, the first geofence search case to reach a federal court of appeals.  In the brief, the ACLU asserts that police should not be able to exploit […]

WASHINGTON, January 31, 2023 – After more than 20 years of short-sighted proposals aimed at destroying Alaska’s Bristol Bay watershed, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today rejected a long-sought permit and once and for all prohibited the proposed Pebble Mine. The Pebble Mine and related construction activity would have directly jeopardized the highest concentration of brown […]

January 31, 2023 – Acute care surgeons should prepare to treat complications of forced pregnancies and unsafe abortions following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v Wade in the USA in 2022, argue experts in an opinion piece published in the journal Trauma Surgery & Acute Care Open.  The decision will disproportionately affect poor women […]

January 30, 2023 – Congress has been gridlocked due in large part to the Senate filibuster, a tactic used to delay or block a vote on a measure by preventing debate on it from ending. Even bills that enjoy broad public support are often unable to pass through Congress. This gridlock negatively impacts families’ economic […]

January 27, 2023 – Americans United for Separation of Church and State urged a federal appeals court to recognize that religious employers are not above the law and allow to proceed the civil rights lawsuit of Shelly Fitzgerald, a high school guidance counselor fired by Roncalli High School and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis […]

January 27, 2023 – The EACH Act was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by Representatives Barbara Lee, Diana DeGette, Jan Schakowsky, and Ayanna Pressley. This bill would guarantee that people using Medicaid have coverage for abortion services. Statement from Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights: “Even before the Supreme Court […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. January 26, 2023 – U.S. Senator Bob Menendez (D-N.J) and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.-14), alongside Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas-35), and Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.-07), today led a bicameral group of nearly 80 lawmakers urging President Joe Biden to reverse his administration’s expansion of […]

WASHINGTON, Jan. 25, 2023 — The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) today finalized protections for the Tongass National Forest in Alaska, the world’s largest intact temperate rainforest. USDA’s final rule, announced today, repeals the 2020 Alaska Roadless Rule and restores longstanding roadless protections to 9.37 million acres of roadless areas that support the ecological, economic and […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. January 24, 2023 – To protect the safety of consumers, meat processing workers and farming communities, a coalition of public health advocacy groups have filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) and its Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM), challenging their refusal to phase out unnecessary uses of antibiotics in […]

January 23, 2023 – Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Michael J. Driscoll, Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), announced the unsealing of a five-count Indictment charging CHARLES MCGONIGAL and SERGEY SHESTAKOV with violating and conspiring […]

Fifty years ago, on January 22, 1973, the Supreme Court issued its landmark 7–2 decision in Roe v. Wade, protecting a woman’s constitutional right to choose.  This case reaffirmed basic principles of equality, reinforced the fundamental right to privacy, and resolved that women in this country could control their own destinies — making deeply personal decisions […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice reflects on the great progress – and deep frustration – of the second session of the 117th Congress with the release of NETWORK’s 2022 Congressional Voting Record. This annual scorecard reflects how often Members of Congress voted in accordance with the principles of the Catholic Social […]

January 18, 2023 – Twenty-two states, including Colorado, that have not banned abortion still do require those under age 18 to involve their parents before terminating a pregnancy. Their only other option: to seek approval from a judge via a process called judicial bypass. New University of Colorado research published Jan. 12 in the American Journal […]

January 17, 2023 – Over 80% of premature deaths caused by small smoke particles in the United States result directly from human-ignited fires. This is the outcome of a study published in IOP Publishing’s journal Environmental Research Letters. The new study, led by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, analyses the impact of smoke particles on air […]

January 13, 2023 – Over the last two days, Israeli forces invaded multiple cities and villages across the occupied West Bank, killing five Palestinians and arresting dozens, including children. The new Israeli government — the most extremist, supremacist government in Israel’s history — is rapidly accelerating the rate of its brutal attacks against Palestinians. During […]

Earth’s average surface temperature in 2022 tied with 2015 as the fifth warmest on record, according to an analysis by NASA. Continuing the planet’s long-term warming trend, global temperatures in 2022 were 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit (0.89 degrees Celsius) above the average for NASA’s baseline period (1951-1980), scientists from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) […]

January 12, 2023 – Since the late 1970s and early 1980s, climate models used internally by ExxonMobil’s own scientists accurately projected and skillfully modeled global warming due to fossil fuel burning and produced results that were consistent with independent academic and government climate models at the time, according to a new Review. Although it has […]

Washington, DC, January 10, 2023 —The Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) and the Humane Farming Association commend today’s introduction of the Emergency and Disaster Preparedness for Farm Animals Act led by Congressman Steve Cohen (D-TN). This legislation would enhance the welfare of America’s farm animals by ensuring that producers take appropriate measures to protect livestock from […]