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North Carolina school board votes to make masks optional as 430 students are under quarantine

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — A North Carolina school board voted Monday to make masks optional for students and staff indoors, even as 430 students are under quarantine.

The Harnett County School Board voted 4 to 1 for the optional mask policy Monday and it takes effect Tuesday.

Prior to Tuesday, masks were mandatory in the school district, which has more than 19,600 students.

The board also voted to pass an amended quarantine policy allowing students exposed to COVID-19 who haven’t tested positive to return after seven days instead of 10 days. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that those who are unvaccinated should quarantine at home for 14 days after exposure. However, 10-day or seven-day quarantines are acceptable if combined with testing and a negative test result.

According to the school district’s COVID-19 dashboard, as of Monday there are 53 positive virus cases among students and 13 among staff. Further, seven staff and 430 students are currently under quarantine.

The school district has not responded to ABC News’ request for comment.

Mask mandates in schools have been an ongoing heated debate as more than 48 million children under the age of 12 are still ineligible to be vaccinated.

Pediatrician Dr. Lori Langdon spoke at the boarding meeting, saying: “Your students are my patients. I want you to remember that not all students in Harnett County are healthy … Some of them live in homes with immunocompromised parents and grandparents.”

“Our concern is that if we don’t have a mask mandate, we’re just going to be on the countdown back to virtual school and that’s not what any of us want,” she added. “My mask protects you and your mask protects me from you.”

Local residents shared their opinions both for and against the mask during the virtual meeting Monday night.

Parent Gina Carucci said during the meeting, “Obviously this is very political. Masks and virus has nothing to do with the virus, it has to do with complying with the government.”

“You’re taking away their freedom of speech, their freedom to talk to their friends, their freedom to show their smiles,” she said. “These children … it should be their choice.”

Board member Vivian Bennett was the lone member to vote against making masks optional.

“I think the best interest for the people of this county is for there to be masks,” she said before the vote. “My neighbor died, and her sister is taking care of her daughter. She says that she wears a mask every minute, even sleeps in one … I could never vote to think that I might hurt some of the people that I know and don’t know in this county.”

The move by Harnett County Schools comes as a slew of other school districts have imposed mask requirements for students and staff, at times in defiance of state -level bans on mask mandates.

Vaccinations for students will likely be the next frontier of debates. In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Friday a state requirement for COVID-19 vaccines for all school children between 12 to 17 once the U.S. Food and Drug Administration grants full approval of the vaccine for that age group.

Parole board asks Texas governor to pardon George Floyd in 2004 drug bust

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — A request to grant George Floyd a full posthumous pardon is headed to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk after a public defender alleged Floyd was framed in a 2004 drug bust by a former Houston police detective now indicted on murder charges.

In a letter sent Monday to Floyd’s one-time public defender Allison Mathis, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles wrote it has “completed their consideration of your client’s application requesting a Full Pardon and have voted to recommend clemency.”

The board forwarded its recommendation to Abbott for final disposition. Abbott has not said whether he will grant the pardon.

Mathis filed the request in April, writing in the petition that a “pardon is being sought because it is just and right to clear a conviction that is not supported by evidence.”

Floyd was arrested on Feb. 5, 2004, by then-Houston undercover narcotics detective Gerald Goines, who alleged Floyd provided a second suspect .03 grams of crack cocaine to sell, according to the petition. The man Floyd allegedly gave the drugs to turned out to be a police informant who sold the drugs to Goines as part of a sting operation and was not arrested or identified, according to the petition.

Floyd eventually pleaded guilty to a drug charge and was sentenced to 10 months in state jail, authorities said.

In August 2019, Goines was charged with two counts of murder related to a botched narcotics raid at a home in southeast Houston. Goines’ police colleague, Steven Bryant, pleaded guilty in June to federal charges of falsifying records and interfering with a government investigation in an attempt to help Goines cover up an illegally obtained “no-knock” warrant on the Houston home of Rhogena Nicholas and her husband, Dennis Tuttle.

During the Jan. 28, 2019, raid, a shootout erupted in which Nicholas, Tuttle and their dog were killed and four police officers, including Goines, were shot and wounded.

In announcing the indictments of Goines and Bryant, Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg alleged that Goines made “numerous false statements” in the affidavit presented to the judge who signed the ‘no-knock” warrant.

The scandal prompted the Harris County District Attorney to review at least 1,400 criminal cases tied to Goines.

Ogg released a statement on Monday supporting the Board of Pardons and Paroles’ recommendation to grant Floyd clemency.

“We lament the loss of former Houstonian George Floyd and hope that his family finds comfort in Monday’s decision by the Texas State Board of Pardons and Paroles to recommend clemency for a 2004 conviction,” Ogg’s statement reads.

Mathis also praised the board’s decision.

“A man was set up by a corrupt police officer intent on securing arrests rather than pursuing justice,” Mathis said in a statement. “No matter what your political affiliation is, no matter who that man was in his life or in his death, that is not something we should stand for in the United States or in Texas.”

Ben Crump, an attorney for the Floyd family, urged Abbott to grant the full pardon.

“This drug charge, which led to George Floyd’s conviction based on false evidence, helped to unravel his life,” Crump said in a statement. “Similarly, tens of thousands of Black lives are ruined by a criminal justice system that uses the war on drugs to target Black people, force them into felony pleas, incarcerate them, take away their voting rights, and destroy their families.”

Floyd died on May 25, 2020, as the result of injuries suffered when police in Minneapolis attempted to arrest him on suspicion of using a phony $20 bill to buy cigarettes. Former police officer Derek Chauvin, who pressed his knee into the back of Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes as the 46-year-old Black man lost consciousness after repeatedly claiming of not being able to breathe, was convicted in April of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.

Chauvin was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison. Three other police officers charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter are scheduled to go on trial next year.

Lawmakers grill Facebook exec over Instagram’s impact on teens after internal research leak

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Facebook’s safety head was questioned by lawmakers on Thursday over what the company knew about the potential for Instagram to be harmful to young users’ mental health.

The Senate Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety and Data Security convened the hearing in the wake of a Wall Street Journal investigation citing Facebook’s own internal research, allegedly leaked by a whistleblower, which found Instagram adversely impacted mental health issues in teens, especially girls. Among the findings were that Instagram made body image issues worse for 1 in 3 teens.

The Journal’s reporting has sparked a fierce backlash amid accusations the tech giant publicly downplayed what it knew about how potentially harmful Instagram could be while also doing nothing to prevent it.

“We’re here today because Facebook has shown us once again that it is incapable of holding itself accountable,” Committee Chair Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said in his opening remarks. “This month, a whistleblower approached my office to provide information about Facebook and Instagram. Thanks to documents provided by that whistleblower, as well as extensive public reporting by The Wall Street Journal and others, we now have deep insight into Facebook’s relentless campaign to recruit and exploit young users.”

“We now know that Facebook routinely puts profits ahead of kids’ online safety,” he added. “We know it chooses the growth of its products over the well-being of our children, and we now know that it is in defensively delinquent in acting to protect them.”

In the wake of the Wall Street Journal expose, Facebook announced earlier this week that it was “pausing” development of an Instagram for Kids platform, but stopped short of scrapping it.

Antigone Davis, Facebook’s global head of safety, faced bipartisan scrutiny as she defended the company during the hearing that lasted some three hours. She denied Blumenthal’s claims.

“We understand that recent reporting has raised a lot of questions about our internal research, including research we do to better understand young people’s experiences on Instagram,” Davis stated in written testimony. “We strongly disagree with how this reporting characterized our work, so we want to be clear about what that research shows, and what it does not show.”

“We undertook this work to inform internal conversations about teens’ most negative perceptions of Instagram,” she added. “It did not measure causal relationships between Instagram and real-world issues.”

Davis said the reporting “implied that the results were surprising and that we hid this research,” which she said wasn’t true and that the company has discussed the “strengths and weaknesses of social media and well-being publicly for more than a decade.”

She also highlighted aspects of Facebook’s in-house research that she said the Journal didn’t include in recent stories, such as reports that Instagram made “sadness” and “loneliness” better for a majority of teenage girls.

Davis said they have removed some 600,000 accounts on Instagram alone between June and August for not meeting the age requirement of 13 years old. She also said the company has “put in place multiple protections to create safe and age-appropriate experiences for people between the ages of 13 and 17.”

The hearing comes as Big Tech has come under increased scrutiny from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle over myriad issues, from allowing the spread of misinformation to allegations of political censorship. Lawmakers on Thursday compared Instagram’s policies to Big Tobacco’s previous tactics to attract users before there was government intervention.

Brooke Erin Duffy, a professor of communication at Cornell University whose research focuses on the intersection of media, culture and technology, told ABC News via email on Thursday that Big Tech’s self-regulation hasn’t worked.

Remarks from Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., referring to “traditional media’s regulation of material for children — including limitations on advertising that have long guided the television industry — attest to a growing recognition that external regulation of the platforms is critical,” Duffy said. “While Big Tech has long flaunted its mechanisms of self-regulation, these have failed — and continue to fail — its users.”

Duffy said another key takeaway from Davis’ testimony was “a refusal to agree to a long-term promise to abandon plans of further developing Instagram for Kids.” She called the initiative “part of a long-term strategy by Big Tech to court younger — and less witting — users who the platforms can inevitably collect data from.”

Lawmakers on Thursday called for the need to update the 1998 Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act.

In prepared remarks, Davis defended building an Instagram “for tweens,” noting that other companies such as YouTube and TikTok already have developed versions of their app for those under 13.

“The principle is the same: It’s much better for kids to use a safer, more age-appropriate version of social media apps than the alternative,” Davis said. “That said, we recognize how important it is to get this right.”

“We have heard your concerns, and that is why we announced that we are pausing the project to take more time,” she added. “We’ll keep listening to parents, keep talking with policymakers and regulators, keep taking guidance from experts and researchers, and we’ll revisit this project at a later date.”

Suspicious vehicle near Supreme Court, man in custody: Police

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — A man is in custody after he was removed from a suspicious SUV near the Supreme Court Tuesday morning, Capitol police said.

The suspect, 55-year-old Dale Paul Melvin of Kimball, Michigan, was removed from the car and placed under arrest around 11 a.m. local time, police said.

Earlier in the morning Melvin had allegedly parked illegally and refused to talk to responding officers, authorities said. Police then brought in crisis negotiation officers.

There’s no information on motive and no weapons have been found, police said.

Everyone is safe, police said.

There were no disruptions to operations at the Supreme Court; oral arguments began as planned at 10 a.m.

The Supreme Court building remains closed to the public.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

ABC News’ Devin Dwyer contributed to this report.

Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine 90% effective at preventing hospitalization, even with delta variant: Study

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — The Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine remains 90% effective at reducing a person’s risk of hospitalization from the virus six months after it is administered, a new study has found. This is true even in the face of the delta variant as well as if the person has not received a booster shot.

Still, when it comes to preventing infections, the vaccine’s effectiveness wanes rapidly as time passes, the study found. After five months, it is just 47% effective at preventing infection.

In the study, funded by Pfizer, researchers assessed data from Kaiser Permanente and calculated the percentages of fully vaccinated patients who contracted COVID-19 on a monthly basis after vaccination. Data from roughly 3.4 million people was analyzed between December 2020 and August 2021.

The results of the study are in line with previously published data from Israel and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that looked at vaccine effectiveness over time, but the Pfizer-funded study is the first to consider how the delta variant may impact Pfizer vaccine effectiveness over time.

“The effectiveness of the vaccine against the delta and non-delta variants remained high during the study, suggesting that the vaccines worked well even when a variant was present,” Dr. Simone Wildes, an infectious disease specialist and ABC News contributor, said.

The delta variant was virtually non-existent in the United States when mass vaccinations began in the winter, but it now comprises more than 99% of all coronavirus cases in the country.

Vaccines might be less effective for older adults and people with underlying medication conditions, the study found.

The new data is particularly timely given that the Food and Drug Administration and the CDC recently authorized Pfizer vaccine booster shots in people who fall into certain risk categories — many of whom are over six months past their first dose.

“Our findings support policymakers who continue to monitor vaccine effectiveness over time,” Sara Y. Tartof, PhD, MPH, an infectious disease epidemiologist with the Kaiser Permanente Southern California Department of Research & Evaluation, and a lead author on the study, said. “Given the observed waning, it will be vital for policymakers to assess whether recommendations for booster doses may be warranted … to help control heightened transmission of delta, especially as we enter the upcoming fall/winter viral respiratory season.”

The study followed patients for nearly half a year, but experts still don’t know if Pfizer vaccine effectiveness continues to decrease over time or plateaus. It is also unclear what happens to vaccine effectiveness after the third shot or how factors such as adherence to mask mandates and social distancing measures could impact the data.

Facebook hearing live updates: Whistleblower Frances Haugen to testify

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — A Senate subcommittee on Tuesday is hearing from a whistleblower who claims Facebook manipulated content it knew was harmful to young users, a day after the social media giant experienced an apparently unrelated massive outage.

Frances Haugen, who revealed her identity during a Sunday interview on CBS’ “60 Minutes,” has been cooperating with a Senate Commerce subcommittee as part of its ongoing efforts to assess potential regulations for the platform. Haugen is expected to tell lawmakers on Tuesday about evidence she reportedly has showing that the company intentionally ignored proof of its potentially harmful impact on users.

“Facebook has realized that if they change the algorithm to be safer, people will spend less time on the site, they’ll click on less ads, they’ll make less money,” she told “60 Minutes.”

Facebook has publicly refuted Haugen’s claims.

Here are the latest developments. All times Eastern:

Oct 05, 8:57 am
Whistleblower to testify before Senate panel

Frances Haugen, a former Facebook data scientist turned whistleblower, is scheduled to testify before the Senate Consumer Protection Subcommittee at 10 a.m. on Facebook and Instagram’s impacts on young users in a hearing entitled, “Protecting Kids Online: Testimony from a Facebook Whistleblower. “

Beyond alleging Facebook’s knowledge of its platforms’ negative impact on teenagers and young girls, Haugen has reportedly come forward with documents showing the social media giant has also ignored but is aware of how hate speech and misinformation are emphasized on their sites.

Haugen, who revealed her identity during a Sunday interview on CBS’ “60 Minutes” has been cooperating with the offices of Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., chair and ranking member of the Senate committee that is assessing potential regulations for the social media giant.

Facebook whistleblower to testify on tech giant before Senate committee

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — The Facebook whistleblower who unearthed documents she says shows the company had knowledge of its platforms’ negative impact will appear before a Senate subcommittee Tuesday.

Frances Haugen, who revealed her identity during a Sunday interview on CBS’ 60 Minutes has been cooperating with a Senate Commerce subcommittee as part of its ongoing efforts to assess potential regulations for the social media giant.

Documents obtained by Haugen, a former product manager at Facebook, led to a series from the Wall Street Journal that reported that Facebook commissioned studies about and knew of potential harm that it was causing from negative or inflammatory content and did not act to stop it. Among the findings cited in the report were that Instagram made body image issues worse for one in three teens.

ABC News has not independently reviewed these documents, but Haugen is expected to tell the Senate subcommittee about the evidence she reportedly has that she says shows that the company intentionally ignored evidence of its potentially harmful impact.

“There were conflicts of interest between what was good for the public and what was good for Facebook,” Haugen alleged on 60 Minutes on Sunday. “And Facebook over and over again chose to optimize for its own interests like making more money.”

Facebook has publicly refuted Haugen’s claims, pointing to investments in security that the company has made in recent years.

“Every day our teams have to balance protecting the ability of people to express themselves openly with the need to keep our platform a safe and positive place,” Lena Pietsch, the director of policy communications for Facebook, said in a statement Sunday. “To suggest we encourage bad content or do nothing is just not true.”

Nick Clegg, Facebook’s vice president of global affairs, said in a CNN interview on Sunday those making accusations that the company is commissioning research to “deliberately” brush it aside have it “back to front.”

“If we didn’t want to address those questions, we wouldn’t commission the research in the first place,” Clegg said.

Haugen’s career has included stops at Google, Pinterest and other social media companies, but she claimed what she saw at Facebook was “substantially worse.”

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., who chairs the Senate Commerce subcommittee on Consumer Protections, Product Safety and Data Security, said in a tweet that he’s been speaking with Haugen in the lead-up to her testimony.

“From her first visit with my office, I’ve admired her backbone & bravery in revealing terrible truths about one of the world’s most powerful, implacable corporate giants,” Blumenthal said in a tweet. “Facebook’s actions make clear that we cannot trust it to police itself. We must consider stronger oversight, effective protections for children, & tools for parents, among the needed reforms.”

Sen. Marsha Blackburn, the top Republican on the Senate subcommittee that will hear from Haugen, said it has been “fascinating” to comb over documents that Haugen provided the committee.

“What we want to know is how much data is Facebook capturing and what are they doing with that data, how long do they keep it, are they sharing with third parties, are they getting permission when they are datamining these children,” Blackburn said on Fox Business on Monday.

It is not clear how much information Haugen has shared with the committee in advance of her testimony, but during her interview Sunday, Haugen said she took thousands of pages of documents from Facebook so that “no one can question that this is real.”

Haugen also alleged on CBS that Facebook decided to ease safeguards put in place to stop the spread of disinformation during the 2020 election season, which she says contributed to the Jan. 6 attack on the United States Capitol.

In an internal memo obtained by the New York Times, Clegg refuted that allegation as well.

“Social media has had a big impact on society in recent years, and Facebook is often a place where much of this debate plays out,” Clegg wrote. “But what evidence there is simply does not support the idea that Facebook, or social media more generally, is the primary cause of polarization.”

Haugen’s appearance before the committee Tuesday comes as part of an ongoing effort by Congress to assess how to regulate massive social media companies such as Facebook.

Last week, in a hearing before the same subcommittee that Haugen will appear before, lawmakers accused Facebook of taking a page from “big tobacco’s playbook” by hiding research about what they consider to be its addictive and harmful nature.

Antigone Davis, Facebook’s global head of safety, faced bipartisan scrutiny as she defended the company during the hearing that lasted some three hours.

COVID-19 live updates: J&J submits booster request to FDA

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — The United States has been facing a COVID-19 surge as the more contagious delta variant continues to spread.

More than 703,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 while over 4.8 million people have died from the disease worldwide, according to real-time data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.

Just 65.5% of Americans ages 12 and up are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the CDC.

Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:

Oct 05, 8:50 am
J&J submits booster request to FDA

Johnson & Johnson on Tuesday submitted its request to the FDA for a booster shot for J&J recipients.

The submission includes data showing that a booster increased protection to 94% against moderate to severe/critical disease in the U.S. (Peak efficacy from one shot is 72% in the U.S.)

The FDA’s independent advisory committee is holding a public hearing on J&J boosters on Oct. 15. The FDA may authorize J&J boosters after Oct. 15 and the CDC’s recommendation could follow.

Oct 05, 8:15 am
Francis Collins to step down as director of the National Institutes of Health

NIH Director Francis Collins announced that he’s stepping down, saying in a statement that no person should serve for too long and it’s time to give space for the next generation of scientists to lead.

He was in the role for 12 years.

Oct 04, 7:56 pm
Pentagon mandates vaccines for civilian employees

The Pentagon announced Monday that all of its civilian employees must be fully vaccinated by Nov. 22.

“Vaccinating (department) civilian employees against COVID-19 will save lives and allow for the defense of our nation,” Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks wrote in a memo sent out to Pentagon leadership Monday. “Thank you for your focus on this critical mission.”

There is already a vaccine mandate for military members, but each branch of service has its own deadline.

Oct 04, 6:02 pm
Newly approved rapid test will double US capacity, FDA says

The Food and Drug Administration approved a new rapid test Monday that it said will double the at-home testing capacity in the U.S. over the next few weeks.

The the ACON Laboratories Flowflex COVID-19 Home Test will ideally assuage the shortage of over-the-counter, at-home rapid testing that has gone on since schools and other businesses have returned to in-person work.

“By year’s end, the manufacturer plans to produce more than 100 million tests per month, and this number will rise to 200 million per month by February 2022,” the FDA said in a press release Monday.

Brian Laundrie’s sister urges him to ‘come forward’ amid nationwide search

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(NORTH PORT, Fla.) — Cassie Laundrie said she has a message for her missing brother, who has been the center of a nationwide manhunt after the body of his girlfriend, Gabrielle “Gabby” Petito, was found in Wyoming last month.

“I would tell my brother to just come forward and get us out of this horrible mess,” Cassie Laundrie told ABC News in an interview that aired Tuesday on Good Morning America.

Brian Laundrie, 23, and Petito, 22, were traveling across the country this summer in Petito’s white 2012 Ford Transit and were documenting their road trip on social media. On Sept. 1, Brian Laundrie returned to his parent’s home in North Port, Florida, by himself in Petito’s van, according to authorities. Petito was reported missing on Sept. 11 by her family in Long Island, New York, authorities said.

Cassie Laundrie, who lives in Florida with her husband and two sons, told ABC News that her brother and parents stopped by for an “ordinary” visit the day he returned.

“I really wish he had come to me first that day with the van,” she said, “because I don’t think we’d be here.”

Brian Laundrie was subsequently named a “person of interest” in Petito’s disappearance. He has refused to speak to investigators and has not been seen since Sept. 14, authorities said.

On Sept. 16, the Moab City Police Department in Utah released body-camera footage of their officers’ interaction with Brian Laundrie and Petito after pulling them over in Petito’s van on Aug. 12. The officers were responding to a 911 call that reported an incident between the couple, in which the caller claimed he witnessed Laundrie allegedly “slapping” Petito and chasing her up and down a sidewalk, hitting her.

The officers wrote in a report that Laundrie and Petito admitted to arguing and that Petito had slapped Laundrie. The couple also told the officers that Laundrie did not hit Petito, according to the report.

After speaking to Petito and Laundrie separately, the officers allowed the couple to continue on their way but ordered them to spend the night apart. No charges were filed.

Cassie Laundrie told ABC News that it was “pretty typical of them to argue and try and take space from each other.” But she said she never witnessed any signs of domestic violence.

On Sept. 19, the Teton County Coroner’s Office in Wyoming announced that a body was recovered in the Bridger-Teton National Park. Two days later, the coroner confirmed the remains were that of Petito and that an initial determination showed she had died as a result of homicide. A federal arrest warrant was later issued for Brian Laundrie in Wyoming, pursuant to a federal grand jury indictment related to his “activities” following Petito’s death, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The twist and turns of the case have grabbed national attention, as the search for Brian Laundrie continues.

Cassie Laundrie told ABC News that she does not know where her brother is and if she did, she would “turn him in.” She said the last time she saw or heard from him was on Sept. 6, when their family went to Fort De Soto Park in Florida’s Pinellas County.

“We just went for a couple of hours and we ate dinner and had s’mores around the campfire and left, and there was nothing peculiar about it,” she said. “There was no feeling of grand goodbye. There was no nothing.”

“I’m frustrated that, in hindsight, I didn’t pick up on anything,” she added. “It was jut a regular visit.”

She said it’s unusual for her brother to disappear for this long.

“I hope he’s OK, and then I’m angry and I don’t know what to think,” she said. “I hope my brother is alive because I want answers just as much as everybody else.”

She said she has been cooperating with authorities “since day one,” and she called on her parents to do the same.

“I don’t know if my parents are involved,” she said. “I think if they are, then they should come clean.”

While she remains concerned for her brother, Cassie Laundrie said she is also mourning for Petito and wants the Petito family to know that her heart is with them.

“They deserve answers,” she said.

Black woman in rural Texas unable to obtain ID needed to vote, advocates say system is unfair

October 5, 2021 by WDNY Radio

(OAKWOOD, Texas) — As voters across Texas submitted voter registration applications on Monday, Oct. 4, ahead of the Nov. 2 statewide election, 82-year-old Elmira Hicks was left out.

The Oakwood, Texas, native hasn’t been able to renew her voting license for more than a year because she has been unable to present the required birth certificate needed to verify her identity.

In the Lone Star State, election laws require voters to present a driver’s license, passport, military identification card, citizenship certificate, state election identification certificate or a personal identification card to cast a ballot or register to vote.

Hicks does not have a passport and without her driver’s license or the other approved documents, she said she will face obstacles that will make it difficult for her to participate in state and federal elections as a rural resident with limited transportation.

“My ability to get a license is completely impossible. They’ve completely shut me down,” Hicks told ABC News. “I can’t vote without proper identification. My voice does not count. It’s very important. People have died just to vote, people have stood in line, in the rain, women fought to vote and now I can’t vote,” Hicks added.

Like many Black elders in the South, Hicks was born with the help of a midwife, at a time when records weren’t kept. She never had a birth certificate. Her daughter, Jonita White, has helped her apply for one. The pair battled in court over the issue. A judge even ruled in their favor. Still, they said the Office of Vital Statistics has rejected Hicks on a technicality.

“I do feel like the laws right now are targeting my mother and other African Americans in this country,” White said.

Eight constitutional amendments ranging from taxes to judicial eligibility will be up for a vote on Nov. 2, an election Hicks will not be able to participate in.

Advocates warn that potentially thousands of predominantly minority voters could be disenfranchised due to voter identification requirements, which could have a large implications during next year’s midterm elections for state and congressional races.

“It’s often very common for people of a certain age not to have a birth certificate. I want to emphasize it’s not as uncommon as people might believe,” said Franita Tolson, the vice dean for faculty and academic affairs and a professor of law at the University of Southern California Gould School of Law.

“In this country, race correlates to a lot of different characteristics. So, for example, if you take voter identification laws … people of color, so African Americans, Latinos, will be less likely to have the underlying documents that you need in order to get the ID in the first place in order to get a driver’s license,” Tolson continued.

Texas recently passed the Election Integrity Protection Act, one of the most restrictive voting laws in the country. It bans drive-thru voting, enlists new regulations for early voting and enacts new ID requirements for mail-in voting.

While Tolson does not believe all voter identification requirements are discriminatory, she called Texas’ voter ID measures “racist” during a Congressional Subcommittee hearing, because she believes they disproportionately impact voters of color.

“Texas has a very restrictive voter ID law,” Tolson said. “If you read it, it doesn’t seem racist on its face, but if you think about how it operates in practice, as well as the intent behind it, it is fairly racist. For example, Texas’ law only allows voters to have a certain limited amount of IDs. You have to have a driver’s license, you can have a hand handgun license, you can have a military ID, but you can’t have a federal ID, or you can’t have a student ID, which are the types of IDs that people of color are more likely to have.”

Rep. Steve Toth R-Texas, vehemently disagreed with Tolson’s claim that the state’s election laws are discriminatory, telling ABC News that the latest legislation makes it easier for people to vote and harder to commit fraud.

“We expanded the number of hours for people to vote, we expanded the number of days so people could vote. We added criminal penalties to people that want to shut voting locations down early or open late. We made sure that employers had to allow people to leave early to vote,” Toth said, calling Tolson’s charge offensive.

Nationally, there is bipartisan support for voter identification requirements among the majority of Americans, and 62% of Democrats support photo ID requirements, along with 87% of Independents and 91% of Republicans, according to a Monmouth poll.

Toth told ABC News that voters like Hicks have recourse.

“If they can’t get a driver’s license, go to DPS {Department of Public Safety], with a social security card, or some other ID, and to get an ID [election identification card] so that you can vote. It’s free,” Toth said, acknowledging that most people vote using their driver’s license.

White said obtaining an election identification is not so easy for an 82-year-old woman who lives in a rural area without the convenient ability to drive herself to the Department of Public Safety.

“My challenge is it’s taking so long to get this done,” White said. “And to send my mother through all of these hoops at this age to go get documents notarized, to go get her Social Security application, We’re having to look for high school records and baptism information…To send her through such a process, it is really is ridiculous.”

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