(WASHINGTON) — U.S. Marshals Service Director Ronald Davis said protecting Supreme Court justices from threats has been a key part of his agency’s mission even before the leaked draft of the opinion overturning Roe v. Wade in May, noting there were more than 4,500 threats to federal judges last year, including against those on the nation’s high court.
“It is something that is a top priority of the agency,” Davis told ABC News Chief Justice Correspondent Pierre Thomas in an interview set to air on ABC News Live “Prime” on Thursday.
“To allow judges to be intimidated, to allow judges to be threatened with violence, to influence those kind of decisions is a threat to our very democracy,” he said. “So we have to make sure that the third branch of government can operate without the threat of violence and can do without fear.”
When a California man allegedly traveled to the Washington, D.C., area with the intent to kill Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanagh, it “sent a chill” through him, Davis said, adding he was proud of the deputy U.S. Marshals who first spotted the man and dissuaded the man from carrying out his alleged attack attempt.
“And it would be horrific to think that we could have had a Supreme Court justice assassinated in his home,” he said.
That man has pleaded not guilty.
Amid demonstrations outside of Supreme Court justices’ homes before and after the decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, Republican governors and members of Congress have urged Attorney General Merrick Garland to enforce a 1950s law prohibiting anyone “with the intent of interfering with, obstructing, or impeding the administration of justice,” near a judge’s residence.
Davis said enforcing the law prohibiting picketing outside federal judge’s homes is not a “priority” but rather the safety and security of the justices is the Marshals Service’s mission.
“If so, directed, as you know, we would enforce the laws if directed to do so,” he said. “As far as the enforcement of that, that’s not our priority. That’s not our role right now, because we’re focusing on the residents and the justices at home and in travel.”
Last weekend, Supreme Court marshal Gail Curley wrote to Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, Montgomery County, Maryland, executive Mark Erlich, Virginia Gov. Glen Youngkin and Fairfax County, Virginia, Board chairman Jeff McKay asking them to enforce state and local laws that prohibit picketing outside justices’ homes.
“I am writing to request that the Virginia State Police, in conjunction with local authorities as appropriate, enforce state law that prohibits picketing outside of the homes of Supreme Court Justices who live in Virginia,” the letter to Youngkin said.
In her letter to Hogan, Curley cited threatening language and over 100 protesters who gathered outside the home of a Supreme Court justice in Maryland.
(WASHINGTON) — The Internal Revenue Service is asking a government watchdog to review a pair of exceedingly rare and invasive tax audits targeting James Comey and Andrew McCabe, a spokesperson confirmed to ABC News.
The matter will be analyzed by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration.
Comey, the former director of the FBI, and McCabe, his deputy at the time, both drew the ire of former President Donald Trump for positions they took both in and out of office.
The New York Times reported Wednesday that Comey and McCabe were two of only several thousand Americans a year to attract these particular types of audits.
For 2017 tax year returns, the return for which Comey was audited, only 5,000 Americans were chosen. For 2018 tax year returns, the year for which McCabe was audited, 8,000 were chosen. More than 150 million Americans filed taxes in each of those years.
An IRS spokesperson said any suggestion that these two individuals were targeted would be “ludicrous and untrue.”
IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig “personally reached out” to the inspector general after receiving a press inquiry about the audits, the spokesperson added.
The Times reported that Comey’s audit began in November 2019 and McCabe’s began in October 2021. Rettig, a Trump appointee, was IRS commissioner at the time both audits began and remains commissioner at this time. His term expires in November.
“Federal Privacy laws preclude us from discussing specific taxpayer situations. Audits are handled by career civil servants, and the IRS has strong safeguards in place to protect the exam process — and against politically motivated audits,” the IRS spokesperson said.
The Treasury Department’s inspector general for tax affairs did not respond to ABC News’ requests for comment. A spokesperson for Trump told The Times that he had no knowledge of these audits.
McCabe told ABC News he has questions about why he was chosen for this rare audit.
“It is essential that institutions like the IRS can maintain the trust of the people they serve,” McCabe said. “While the IRS investigator I dealt with was professional and responsive at all times, I have questions about how I was selected for this audit. I look forward to hearing the results of their internal inquiry to understand more about how this supposedly random enforcement effort is conducted.”
Democrat Ron Wyden, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee — which has jurisdiction over taxes, IRS and the Treasury Department — said his panel will look at potential action on the issue.
“Donald Trump has no respect for the rule of law, so if he tried to subject his political enemies to additional IRS scrutiny that would surprise no one,” Wyden said in a statement shared with ABC News. “We need to understand what happened here because it raises serious concerns. Commissioner Rettig reached out to me to reiterate that any allegations of wrongdoing are taken seriously and are referred to the [inspector general] for further review.”
Democratic Rep. Bill Pascrell went a step further, calling on President Joe Biden to fire Rettig. Pascrell chairs the Oversight Subcommittee of the Ways and Means Committee, which is the House’s tax-writing panel.
When asked during Thursday’s press briefing if Biden still has confidence in the IRS chief, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre would only say he is “up in November.”
“He is a commissioner of the IRS. Part of the administration. I’m going to leave it at that,” Jean-Pierre said.
She would not comment further and referred questions to the IRS.
– ABC News’ Trish Turner and Alexander Mallin contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Ever since the mass shooting at a July Fourth parade in Highland Park, Illinois, which left seven people dead and dozens more seriously wounded, questions have been raised about whether the new federal gun safety law could have prevented the tragedy.
Would the enhanced background checks it requires for those under 21 have stopped the suspect, Robert “Bobby” Crimo III, from buying the high-powered rifle authorities said he used — since he’d had two prior run-ins with law enforcement, including both a suicide threat and one to “kill everyone” in his family?
And could the law’s red flag provisions have made a difference given that record and his apparent trail of violent social media posts?
Evidence about the exact circumstances is still being revealed as the investigation gets underway.
But authorities said Crimo, now 21, purchased the high-powered rifle and other guns he had legally, passing numerous background checks. And because he did so in 2020 and 2021 — when he was under 21 — some advocates say the new law, which allows checks of juvenile and psychiatric records, might have made a difference.
At the same time, while Illinois has an existing red flag law, Crimo appears to have slipped past the safeguard.
Advocates say more education and training, provided for in the new federal law, is needed for a red flag law to be used effectively.
“We still need to learn more, but it looks like the shooter exhibited some dangerous warning signs, exactly what Illinois’s red flag law is designed to address,” John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety., told ABC News in a statement. “But tools are only useful when they are taken out of the toolbox and so far it doesn’t look like anyone filed for an extreme risk protection order in this case. That’s why the federal funding for red flag law implementation and awareness in the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, combined with state action like lawmakers in Illinois are considering to prohibit the sale of possession of assault weapons and high capacity magazines, can make a big difference in preventing tragedies like the one in Highland Park.”
What’s in the new federal law
Gun violence experts said the $750 million allocated for red flag laws, also known as extreme risk protection orders, can be a critical tool for curbing these shootings.
“In my opinion, the federal funding that is now available for full implementation is exactly what this country needs to assure that extreme risk protection order laws are used to prevent the kinds of massacres that happened on the Fourth of July,” Dr. Shannon Frattaroli, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Research and Policy, told ABC News.
That money, Frattaroli explained, can go toward training law enforcement, judges and the community on how to use these laws to improve safety.
Illinois is one of 19 states with such a statute on the books, but Lake County State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart said this week that they “must vastly increase awareness and education about this red flag law.”
Enacted in 2019, the measure allows loved ones or law enforcement to intervene by petitioning a court for an order to temporarily prevent someone in crisis from accessing guns.
But Crimo seemingly eluded the law, as no arrests were made in either run-in with law enforcement. Highland Park police did notify Illinois State Police of the 2019 incident in which he allegedly threatened his family members in a “clear and present danger” report, but state police said their involvement in the matter ended because at the time Crimo did not have a FOID card or an application to deny.
Three months later, Crimo did apply for a FOID card — which is required for gun ownership — and had his application sponsored by his father. State police approved the request in 2020, stating at the time “there was insufficient basis to establish a clear and present danger and deny the FOID application.”
New information about Crimo’s personal history is also raising questions about whether the enhanced background check portion of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act could have applied.
Crimo just turned 21 last year, and purchased three guns in 2020 and one in 2021.
Under the new law, potential gun buyers under the age of 21 are placed under an investigative period to review juvenile and mental health records, including checks with state databases and local law enforcement.
Robin Lloyd, the managing director at the gun control group Giffords, said the enhanced background checks are designed to increase communication between different agencies.
“The idea here is that there might be more information about that individual that exists in other places that the background check doesn’t check under current law,” she said, “and it also gives an opportunity to contact local law enforcement.”
But Lloyd said there is more work to be done in order to curb gun violence.
“The holistic picture is that we have very weak federal gun laws,” she told ABC News.
While Illinois has the eighth-strongest gun laws in the nation, according to Giffords, Lloyd noted that neighboring states have less restrictions and firearms can easily move across borders.
“So while the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act is a very significant step forward in terms of federal gun safety policy, it is not the only thing that needs to be done,” Lloyd said. “It is not going to prevent every shooting from happening.”
What lawmakers are proposing next
In the wake of the shooting, some lawmakers are once again calling for stronger legislation that would ban the sale, transfer, manufacture and importation of military-style assault weapons, ban certain high-capacity magazines, and enact universal background checks.
“There are things we can do,” Rep. Brad Schneider, an Illinois Democrat whose district includes Highland Park, told ABC News on “GMA3.”
“The House has passed legislation to require universal background checks. Ninety percent of the country supports that legislation,” Schneider said. “We need to pass it and make it law. We can ban the sale of these assault weapons, make it harder for people to get the large capacity magazines that allow them to fire off 60 rounds in just a matter of seconds.”
Vice President Kamala Harris also made an impassioned plea for an assault weapons ban during a visit to Chicago on Tuesday.
“An assault weapon is designed to kill a lot of human beings quickly. There is no reason that we have weapons of war on the streets of America. We need reasonable gun safety laws,” Harris said as she addressed the National Education Association. After that meeting, Harris visited the Highland Park shooting scene.
But any additional gun restrictions will face an uphill battle in the Senate, where Democrats need 10 Republican votes to clear the filibuster.
Republicans responded to Monday’s shooting by continuing to blame mental health issues rather than access to assault weapons.
Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell, who backed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, said Tuesday that the “problem is mental health and these young men who seem to be inspired to commit these atrocities.”
Democrats are encouraging voters ahead of the 2022 midterm elections to support candidates who back stronger gun control.
“It’s not going to happen tomorrow,” said Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois. “It’s going to happen when the American people speak up and elect those who really want to make a change that’ll make America safer.”
(WASHINGTON)– The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating Texas’ “Operation Lone Star” border security initiative for potential civil rights violations, according to a letter obtained by ABC News.
The operation, a Texas Department of Public Safety program, targets migrants coming across the U.S.-Mexico border. It was rolled out by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in March 2021 to curb migrant traffic into the state.
The DOJ is seeking information to determine whether Texas DPS is in compliance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
“The Department is seeking this information after receiving information indicating that DPS may be discriminating on the basis of race and/or national origin in its activities related to Operation Lone Star by targeting certain individuals for arrests for misdemeanor trespass violations and traffic stops based on their perceived or actual race or national origin,” reads the letter dated May 16 and sent by the Justice Department’s Federal Coordination and Compliance Section Chief Christine Stoneman.
A Texas DPS spokesperson said the department is complying with all federal civil rights inquiries. Texas DPS is a recipient of both DOJ and Department of Homeland Security funding, per the letter.
The news of the DOJ probe comes a week after 53 migrants, who were being smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border, were found dead in a sweltering tractor-trailer in San Antonio.
Through Operation Lone Star, Abbott has deployed around 10,000 DPS officers and soldiers from the Texas National Guard to the border to assist with the arrest of migrants.
Immigration lawyers and rights groups have sounded the alarm over the program, which they say has ramped up arrests of migrants on allegedly spurious trespassing charges. Many arrestees have been detained for weeks at a time. Some have not been given adequate resources to obtain legal representation.
In interviews with ABC News, current and former national guardsmen also spoke out about low morale and even several suicides among the troops deployed at the border, citing issues with payment, unstable housing conditions and a lack of proper training. One national guardsman assigned to the operation died while trying to save drowning migrants.
In response to the DOJ probe, Abbott’s press secretary, Renae Eze, slammed President Biden’s “open border policies” and accused the administration of “attacking the only state taking unprecedented actions to do the federal government’s job.”
“It’s time for President Biden to fulfill his oath of office and secure our southern border,” she said in a statement.
Texas has allocated more than $4 billion of Texas taxpayer money for border security, including building the state’s own border wall and erecting other “strategic barriers,” according to Eze.
She added that the program has resulted in more than 274,000 migrant apprehensions, more than 16,900 criminal arrests, including smugglers and human traffickers, more than 22,000 turn backs and the seizure of millions of lethal fentanyl doses.
A Justice Department spokesperson did not return ABC News’ request for comment.
The Texas Tribune and ProPublica were the first to report news about the investigation based on emails the outlets obtained. ABC News has not obtained those emails.
(WASHINGTON) — In a new statement following the resignation of U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, President Joe Biden on Thursday stressed “the special relationship” between the U.S. and U.K. “remains strong and enduring.”
Biden did not mention Johnson by name or his resignation explicitly, but underscored that the U.S. will continue to work with the U.K. government on critical issues, including the war in Ukraine — an issue Biden and Johnson have worked closely on together.
“The United Kingdom and the United States are the closest of friends and Allies, and the special relationship between our people remains strong and enduring,” Biden said in the statement. “I look forward to continuing our close cooperation with the government of the United Kingdom, as well as our Allies and partners around the world, on a range of important priorities. That includes maintaining a strong and united approach to supporting the people of Ukraine as they defend themselves against Putin’s brutal war on their democracy, and holding Russia accountable for its actions
Nevertheless, Johnson’s resignation could complicate Biden’s goal to strengthen the Western alliance in the face of Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
The two spoke on the issue during a call in April, and “affirmed their commitment to continue providing security and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine in the face of ongoing atrocities by Russia,” according to a White House readout of the conversation.
The two leaders then met in June at a summit of G-7 countries, where they both urged nations to remain united against Russia amid its ongoing invasion of Ukraine. The conflict, entering its fifth month, has roiled global energy markets.
In his remarks Thursday announcing his resignation, Johnson cited Britain’s support of Ukraine as a top achievement.
“I’m immensely proud of the achievements of this government, from getting Brexit done to settling our relations with the continent for over half a century … and, in the last few months, leading the West in standing up to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s aggression in Ukraine,” he said.
“And let me say now, to the people of Ukraine, that I know that we in the U.K. will continue to back your fight for freedom for as long as it takes,” he added.
The White House on Wednesday declined to comment on the political drama surrounding Johnson, but press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the United States’ “partnership with the United Kingdom continued to be strong.”
ABC News’ Alexandra Hutzler contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — In his first network interview, the director of the United States Marshals Service told ABC News the U.S. Marshals Service is focusing on “trigger pullers” — repeat offenders who shoot and kill.
Director Ronald Davis told ABC News Chief Justice Correspondent Pierre Thomas that he is using his nearly 30 years in law enforcement to help push the effort.
The U.S. Marshals’ most recent operation, which spanned the entire month of June, dubbed “Operation North Star,” made more than 1,500 arrests in cities such as Washington, D.C., Memphis, New York and Philadelphia among others, and took hundreds of guns as well as narcotics off the street.
“I believe that if you are focusing on those who create the most violence that are responsible for the most violence, two things end up happening. One, you do remove trigger pullers off the street, those who are shooters, and it impacts crime and violence. You also bring justice to the families that have been terrorized by them,” he said in the interview, set to air Thursday evening on ABC News Live “Prime.”
Last year, the Marshals Service arrested nearly 6,000 murder suspects, Davis said.
Speaking in the wake of the July 4 mass shooting in Highland Park, Illinois, he said violent crime is an “us problem,” meaning that it touches everyone, regardless of race, creed or background.
“It’s such a ‘we’ problem that you don’t have to be the victim of a violent crime to be impacted by violent crime,” Davis said. “If it is causing you not to go shopping, you’re a victim of violent crime. If it’s caused, you know, not to go to a parade, you’ve been influenced by violent crime.”
It spans political ideology, he continued.
“It’s not left or right,” he said. “There’s no leaning to this. We’re just trying to save lives. And I think that’s the key for the Marshals Service, we look at it as when we’re arresting a fugitives, that we’re bringing justice. But ultimately, we’re hoping that we’re saving lives.”
When there is not a crisis, Davis said that is when community engagement is best.
“It’s when there’s not a surge in violence that you have to engage the community so that when there is a crisis that you come together, you already have a relationship to respond,” he explained.
Davis said that it is now more important than ever for the police to have a relationship with the community, and that for him, policing and community relations is personal.
“It goes with trust and building trust one interaction at a time, one city at a time,” Davis said. “But it is really making sure that our strategies to reduce crime and violence don’t call the kind of collateral damage that we talked about that we are enforcing and protecting the Constitution of the United States, but being very effective and bringing justice to communities.
“As an African-American male, it’s not just communicating to my community, but quite frankly, communicating to my deputies. And with inside the agency, the experience of growing up as a black man in America is unique. And I would hope that that experience that I bring to the job helps me, helps guide me in the decisions that need to make in understanding and having empathy, why people may be hesitant, why there may be apprehension, why there could be a lack of trust,” he said.
Davis said he hopes his experience in law enforcement and as an African American man can help build trust amongst law enforcement, but that even in his own personal life, and as a high-ranking law enforcement official, he still has to sit his son down and have a conversation about how to interact with the police as an African American male.
“The fact that I have to have that conversation, the fact that it’s a mandatory course for families of color means we have a lot of work to do,” he said. “And so there’s this I’ve struggled with over the years, but I’ve come to a reconciliation that both of these truths can coexist. I can accept that the vast majority of men and women in law enforcement are outstanding, but also can accept that we have historical context and practices that still have disparate impacts. And so we need to address both use the outstanding men and women to do so.”
Davis said he is seeing an increase in law enforcement assaults, but does not know the root cause of the increase in violence.
“We’re definitely seeing an increase in assaults against law enforcement, against our deputies, within the Marshal Service, our task force officers that the agencies we’re working with,” he said.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden on Thursday will award 17 individuals with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.
The medal is given to those who made “especially meritorious contributions to the security or national interests of the United States, to world peace, or to cultural or other significant public or private endeavors.”
Olympic gymnast Simone Biles, soccer star Megan Rapinoe and actor Denzel Washington are among this year’s recipients.
The ceremony will be held at the White House.
Rapinoe, an advocate for gender equality and LGBTQ rights, said she received a call in between practices from the White House informing her she had received the honor.
“In that moment I spoke to the President, I was, and still am, totally overwhelmed,” Rapinoe said in a statement shared by U.S. Soccer. She also said that she is thinking of “all the people who I feel deserve a part of this medal.”
Late Sen. John McCain will be awarded the honor posthumously, as will Apple co-founder Steve Jobs and former AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka.
McCain, a Purple Heart recipient and prisoner of war in Vietnam, has been lauded as a war hero and spent decades serving the people of Arizona in the Senate. The Republican died in 2018 after succumbing to glioblastoma in 2018.
“My family and I are extremely honored that my dad will posthumously be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. As a man who dedicated his life in service of his country, I know my dad would be humbled to receive the nation’s highest civilian honor,” Jack McCain, McCain’s son, said in a statement.
Other former lawmakers to receive the honor are Gabby Giffords, who became a leading voice for gun control after surviving a 2011 mass shooting, and Alan Simpson, who served in the Senate for nearly two decades.
The list of awardees also includes several social justice advocates, including: Sister Simone Campbell, a member of Sisters of Social Service; Fred Gray, a distinguished civil rights attorney whose clients included Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.; Diane Nash, a founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee; and Raúl Yzaguirre, who served as CEO and president of National Council of La Raza for 30 years.
Other recipients include Wilma Vaught, one of the most decorated women in U.S. military history; Sandra Lindsay, a nurse who was the first American to receive the COVID-19 vaccine; Khizr Khan, the father of U.S. Army captain who was killed in Iraq; Father Alexander Karloutsos, a priest who advised several U.S. presidents; and Dr. Julieta García, who was the first Hispanic woman to serve as a college president.
Biden will be the first president to give out these medals after receiving one himself in 2017. Former President Barack Obama awarded Biden for his “lifetime of service that will endure through the generations.”
Earlier this week, Biden presented four U.S. Army veterans with the Medal of Honor for their “acts of gallantry and intrepidity” during the Vietnam War.
Specialist 5 Dwight W. Birdwell, Major John J. Duffy and Specialist 5 Dennis M. Fujii were awarded the honor at a White House ceremony on Tuesday. John Kaneshiro, the son of Staff Sergeant Edward N. Kaneshiro, accepted the award on his late father’s behalf.
“They went far above and beyond the call of duty. It’s a phrase always used but it just — it takes on life when you see these men,” Biden said during the event.
(WASHINGTON) — Speaking alongside his British counterpart in London on Wednesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray called China the “biggest long-term threat” to both the U.S. and the U.K.
“The Chinese government is set on stealing your technology — whatever it is that makes your industry tick — and using it to undercut your business and dominate your market,” Wray said while giving remarks to international business leaders. “And they’re set on using every tool at their disposal to do it.”
Wray also warned of potential tactics by Chinese officials, saying they steal technology by using intelligence officers to “target” valuable pieces of information and companies.
“We’ve even caught people affiliated with Chinese companies out in the U.S. heartland, sneaking into fields to dig up proprietary, genetically modified seeds, which would have cost them nearly a decade and billions in research to develop themselves,” Wray said. “And those efforts pale in comparison to their lavishly-resourced hacking program that’s bigger than that of every other major country combined.”
The Chinese, Wray said, use cyber to “steal” volumes of information. He said U.S. officials are working with MI5, the British intelligence service, to identify other investments that the Chinese government makes in proxy relationships — a kind of third-party venue through which China steals information.
Wray said that U.S. companies should be wary of working with or in China, something about which he has warned before, and he urged business leaders to contact the FBI for further information on ways to mitigate the Chinese cyber threat.
His warning was the latest episode of the U.S. pushing back on what they describe as Chinese hostility. Relations between the U.S. and China have evolved since President Joe Biden took office — his predecessor Donald Trump embarked on a trade war with the country — and the U.S. and China remain deeply intertwined, though they are often opposed on various issues.
After one call between Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping earlier this year, the Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry said, “The U.S.-China relationship has not yet emerged from the predicament created by the previous U.S. administration but has instead encountered more and more challenges. The U.S. side has made a misreading and misjudgment of China’s strategic intentions.”
On Wednesday, Wray warned that if China were to invade Taiwan, U.S. companies could see a repeat, on a much larger scale, of the economic disarray from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the resulting international condemnation.
“Just as in Russia, Western investments built over years could become hostage capital stranded, supply chains and relationships disrupted,” he said. “Companies are caught between sanctions and Chinese law forbidding compliance with them. That’s not just geopolitics. It’s business forecasting.”
Wray concluded by saying the U.S. and U.K. were working together to combat this threat.
His remarks come as American law enforcement agencies and the Treasury Department cautioned the public of another overseas adversary, this one targeting hospital systems.
North Korean-backed cyber actors are targeting the health care and public health sector, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the FBI and Treasury Department said on Wednesday.
These actors use Maui ransomware, a specific technology that has a North Korean hallmark, to infiltrate health care sectors and hold their systems ransom in exchange for a payment, American officials said in an advisory.
The officials said that since May 2021, the agencies have observed and reacted to “multiple” Maui ransomware incidents indicating that they came from North Korea.
“North Korean state-sponsored cyber actors used Maui ransomware in these incidents to encrypt servers responsible for healthcare services—including electronic health records services, diagnostics services, imaging services, and intranet services,” the advisory states. “In some cases, these incidents disrupted the services provided by the targeted HPH Sector organizations for prolonged periods.”
The agencies believe that because health care organizations “provide services that are critical to human life and health,” they are likely to pay ransoms when attacked. Law enforcement advise not paying the ransom and to contact CISA or the FBI instead.
“Because of this assumption, the FBI, CISA, and Treasury assess North Korean state-sponsored actors are likely to continue targeting HPH Sector organizations,” the officials said.
(RALEIGH, N.C.) — North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper signed an executive order to strengthen access to reproductive health care in the state on Wednesday.
The order takes several steps to defend the existing services in North Carolina, including to state that patients who receive abortions or providers who perform abortions will not be penalized or criminalized for providing, receiving or inquiring about reproductive health care services.
The executive action comes almost two weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, which had guaranteed the right to abortion for almost 50 years.
Cooper’s order establishes that all cabinet agencies, or those who are part of the governor’s office, “should coordinate with each other and pursue opportunities to protect people or entities who are providing, assisting, seeking or obtaining lawful reproductive health care services in North Carolina.”
It further states that cabinet agencies may not require any pregnant cabinet agency employee to travel to a state that has restrictions on access to reproductive health care that do not include exceptions favoring the health of the pregnant employee.
The order says it does not change North Carolina law, but rather ensures that North Carolina residents will continue to have a protected right to access and perform abortions, alongside other reproductive care.
As other states uphold bans on abortion, North Carolina increasingly becomes a “critical access point” for those seeking reproductive health services, according to the order.
“Research demonstrates that unnecessary restrictions and bans on reproductive health care rights have harmful consequences on people’s health, safety and economic stability…[and] disproportionately impact people of color, people with disabilities, people with low incomes and people who live in rural areas,” the order reads.
Cooper spoke at a press conference when he signed the order.
“The Supreme Court ripped away the constitutional right to reproductive freedom that women have relied on for five decades,” Cooper said Wednesday.
“For now, it’s up to the states to determine whether women get reproductive health care, and in North Carolina they still can, thanks to my veto and enough legislative votes to sustain it. I am determined to keep it that way and people need to know that their votes in state legislative races this November will determine the fate of women’s health and freedom in our state,” Cooper continued.
Alexis McGill Johnson, president of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, was alongside Cooper at the signing of the executive order.
“Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, North Carolina has become an increasingly critical access point for people traveling for abortion care, including from neighboring South Carolina and Tennessee, where lawmakers in both states have swiftly banned most abortions,” Johnson said at the signing.
“Now we must continue to do everything in our power to ensure abortion remains accessible in North Carolina, both for North Carolinians and those forced to flee their own state amid mounting restrictions and cruel bans,” she added.
In a statement on Wednesday, Cooper said that North Carolina has already seen an influx of patients coming from other states to seek abortion care.
Citing data from Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, Cooper said that one third of abortion patients scheduled in North Carolina this week are from different states.
“That means there are projected to be at least 10,000 people coming to North Carolina to access reproductive health care services, mostly from states with bans and tighter restrictions. These are just numbers from Planned Parenthood, and do not include estimates from the state’s other trusted providers,” Cooper said in his statement.
Dr. Katherine Farris, chief medical officer at Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, was quoted in the governor’s press release Wednesday.
Farris said that the highest priority of abortion providers in North Carolina is to get patients the care that they need.
“Abortion is a normal part of reproductive health care. Every person is the expert in their own life, and we must trust them to make their own decisions about their health, their family, and their future,” Farris said in the statement.
“Planned Parenthood South Atlantic health center doors remain open, and we aren’t going anywhere,” she added.
Jenny Black, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Votes! South Atlantic, said in the release that North Carolina voters need to continue to support candidates that will keep abortion legal in the state.
“For now, abortion is still legal in North Carolina. But our reproductive freedom is hanging by a thread. The Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade has paved the way for state lawmakers to pass an all-out ban as soon as next year,” Black said.
“The future of abortion access not only for North Carolinians but potentially the entire Southeast region is on the line in 2022, and we thank Governor Cooper for his strong advocacy in support of reproductive freedom today,” Black added.
As states have continued to uphold abortion bans across the southeast, other eastern states have signed orders similar to Cooper’s in support of abortion access.
The Democratic governors of Maine and Rhode Island both signed executive orders on Tuesday in support of abortion rights, which ensure the protection of both patients and providers of abortion.
The Republican governor of Massachusetts signed an executive order last month to protect access to abortion in the state, ensuring its legality there.
In South Carolina, abortion has been banned past six weeks. In Tennessee, abortion has also become illegal after six weeks, with no exceptions for rape and incest.
Alabama has made abortion completely illegal, with no exceptions for rape and incest.
(WASHINGTON) — Senate Democrats have reached agreement on a key portion of a revised domestic policy bill, once known as Build Back Better, which would allow Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices, according to a source familiar with the matter.
Democrats have worked for years to give Medicare this power, always falling short in the face of GOP opposition, but this time they hope to move it forward as part of a broader, as-yet-unfinished economic package, anxious to provide relief to voters buffeted to tackle sky-high inflation and a possible recession.
Since centrist Democrat Joe Manchin of West Virginia abruptly scuttled President Joe Biden’s signature domestic agenda proposal last December over fears of rising inflation — surprising the White House and his party by announcing his decision on Fox News — he has been working intensely behind the scenes with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on a smaller bill that would still advance under special rules that require a mere simple majority — or in this case just Democratic votes — for final passage, with Vice President Kamala Harris breaking an expected tie.
“Senator Manchin has long advocated for proposals that would lower prescription drug costs for seniors and his support for this proposal has never been in question. He’s glad that all 50 democrats agree,” Manchin spokeswoman Samantha Runyon told ABC News of the deal, first reported by the Washington Post.
Republicans have kept up a united front against the legislation, branding it Democratic socialism and claiming the broader legislation — originally carrying a $2.2 trillion price tag but is expected to be dramatically reduced in the revised version — would only exacerbate inflation.
The broader economic bill still has a long way to go and is not expected to be finalized for weeks, according to two Democratic aides, but this deal announced Wednesday was submitted to the Senate’s rules-keeper, the parliamentarian, for her to begin the lengthy and detailed process of ensuring the measure fits within the strictures of the expedited process Democrats intend to employ, called “reconciliation,” according to a source familiar with the matter.
The move by Sen. Schumer “demonstrates major progress and shows leadership’s commitment to trying to move forward with a bill on the floor as early as next month,” the source told ABC News.
The current deal, according to a summary of the provisions obtained by ABC News, would allow Medicare to begin negotiating the cost of certain prescription drugs next year; for the first time cap Medicare recipients’ out of pocket costs at $2,000 annually while offering premium assistance to more low income seniors; and penalize drug manufacturers that raise the cost of drugs higher than inflation by requiring companies pay a rebate back to seniors for those higher prices.
All vaccines would be available for free to seniors under the plan.
Also for the first time, Democrats — wary of a GOP administration not implementing this policy — plan to close what they call the “rogue HHS secretary loophole.” The aim of the provision, according to the summary, would be to require the secretary “to negotiate the maximum number of drugs each year, to the extent that number of drugs qualify for negotiation.”
Democrats also intend to pressure drug companies to bring more generics to market. “The new negotiation framework aggressively negotiates lower and lower prices if a drug company continues to block generic competition,” the summary states.
The Medicare drug negotiation deal was lambasted Wednesday by the drug industry’s powerful lobbying arm that holds tremendous sway in Washington.
“The prescription drug bill released today went from bad to worse for patients. Democrats weakened protections for patient costs included in previous versions, while doubling down on sweeping government price-setting policies that will threaten patient access and future innovations. In fact, they are proposing to repeal a policy that would have directly lowered costs at the pharmacy for millions of seniors in favor of a new price-setting scheme. The bill also ignores the role of middlemen and insurers in determining patient out-of-pocket costs,” said Debra DeShong, PhRMA’s Executive Vice President of Public Affairs, in a statement, adding, “Patients deserve better.”
The two major remaining items expected to be in the broader economic package — energy and climate provisions, along with tax reforms — are still being negotiated by Schumer and Manchin.
The original $1.75 trillion legislation passed the House in November, but Manchin – expressing fears of rising inflation, abruptly bowed out of negotiations with President Biden and administration officials, shocking all concerned.
The centrist Democrat took to “Fox News Sunday” in December to announce his opposition.
Just days later, Biden, in an exclusive interview with ABC “World News Tonight” anchor David Muir, said he still thought he could salvage his agenda.
“Well, look, I want to get as much as I can possibly get done, as much as we can possibly get done, and I still think we’ll be able to get a significant amount of what we need to get done, done,” Biden told Muir. “Particularly as the American people figure out what is in this legislation. It’s extremely consequential.”
Seven months later, Democrats have dramatically scaled back the original package which contained universal pre-kindergarten and significant funding for child care, paid family leave, education, health care and combating climate change.
The Medicare prescription drug negotiation component in that bill would have included up to 20 name-brand drugs by 2028. It is unclear if that would still be the case in the current deal.
Democrats involved in the matter dodged questions about timetables for passage of any final deal, cognizant of the fact that an intense focus on missed deadlines plagued the first iteration of the legislation.
But there is little doubt that the month-long August recess looms large with the focus afterward on funding the government by Oct. 1 and the crucial midterms that may very well alter the power structure in Congress. Democrats are also very wary of scaring off the mercurial Manchin with any pressure, despite knowing that a major economic package could potentially boost their political chances significantly.
