New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) issued an emergency executive order that restricts bus arrivals in the city to curb the migrant surge as more asylum-seekers are sent via bus from Texas.

Adams is requiring bus operators who know they are transporting migrants to the city with fares paid for “by a third party” to provide notice at least 32 hours ahead of their anticipated arrival.

Operators must provide the number of passengers on their bus and the number of passengers who will require emergency shelter and “other immediate services” upon their arrival. He also is asking for operators to provide the number of passengers who are children, according to the executive order released Wednesday.

Bus drivers also must provide their name and information on the bus “that could assist City employees with identifying the bus,” and they can only drop off passengers at designated locations during specific hours.

A federal judge has ruled in a closely watched redistricting case out of Georgia, preserving a Republican gerrymander that dismantled the district represented by Rep. Lucy McBath (D).

McBath said shortly after the decision that she would run in a new district. The Atlanta Journal Constitution reported that the maps would likely remain in place through at least Election Day 2024.

The maps, approved by the Georgia legislature and signed into law by Governor Brian Kemp (R) earlier this month, maintain Republicans’ 9-5 advantage in the state’s congressional representation. They protect Republican members of Congress who may have faced a challenging reelection, and show the impact of years of efforts by the Supreme Court to carve away chunks of the Voting Rights Act.

U.S. District Judge Steven Jones, who issued today’s ruling, had ordered the legislature to draw new maps earlier this year after finding that its 2021 redistricting diluted the strength of Black voters.

https://twitter.com/bluestein/status/1740461235408413009

The U.S. Department of Justice has threatened to sue to stop a new Texas law that allows state police to arrest people suspected of illegally crossing the border — unless Gov. Greg Abbott backs off of enforcing the law.

The new law, known as Senate Bill 4, is “unconstitutional and will disrupt the federal government’s operations” vis-à-vis immigration and border enforcement, an agency official told Gov. Greg Abbott in a letter first reported Thursday by the Houston Chronicle and later posted on social media by a CBS News reporter.

If Texas does not formally refrain from enforcing the law by Jan. 3, the agency will “pursue all appropriate legal remedies to ensure that Texas does not interfere with the functions of the federal government.”

A person with knowledge of the letter confirmed that it had been sent.

An Abbott spokesperson did not immediately return an email requesting comment. But on X, formerly known as Twitter, he said the Biden administration "not only refuses to enforce current U.S. immigration laws, they now want to stop Texas from enforcing laws against illegal immigration."

"I’ve never seen such hostility to the rule of law in America," Abbott wrote. "Biden is destroying America. Texas is trying to save it."

The DOJ did not respond to a request for comment.

Before settling in New York City like thousands of other migrants this year, Abdoul, a 32-year-old from West Africa, took an unexpected detour: Weeks in a remote Texas jail on local trespassing charges after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

"I spent a lot of hours without sleeping, sitting on the floor," said Abdoul, a political activist who fled Mauritania, fearing persecution. He spoke on the condition that his last name not be published for fear of jeopardizing his request for asylum.

Starting in March, Texas will allow police to arrest migrants who enter the state illegally and give local judges the authority to order them out of the country. The new law comes two years after Texas launched a smaller-scale operation to arrest migrants for trespassing. But although that operation was also intended to stem illegal crossings, there is little indication that it has done so.

The results raise questions about the impact arrests have on deterring immigration as Texas readies to give police even broader powers to apprehend migrants on charges of illegal entry. Civil rights organizations have already sued to stop the new law signed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, calling it an unconstitutional overreach that encroaches on the U.S. government's immigration authority.

The Colorado Republican Party on Wednesday appealed that state's supreme court decision that found former President Donald Trump is ineligible for the presidency, the potential first step to a showdown at the nation's highest court over the meaning of a 155-year-old constitutional provision that bans from office those who “engaged in insurrection.”

The first impact of the appeal is to extend the stay of the 4-3 ruling from Colorado's highest court, which put its decision on pause until Jan. 4, the day before the state's primary ballots are due at the printer, or until an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court is finished. Trump himself has said he still plans to appeal the ruling to the nation's highest court as well.

The U.S. Supreme Court has never ruled on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which was added after the Civil War to prevent former Confederates from returning to government. It says that anyone who swore an oath to “support” the constitution and then “engaged in insurrection” against it cannot hold government office.

The Colorado high court ruled that applies to Trump in the wake of his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, intended to stop the certification of President Joe Biden's victory in the 2020 presidential election. It was the first time in history that the provision was used to block a presidential contender's campaign.

A new California law that would bar licensed gun holders from carrying their firearms into an array of public places will not go into full effect on Jan. 1 as scheduled, after a federal judge blocked major parts of it as unconstitutional Wednesday.

The law, Senate Bill 2, was part of a slate of new gun control measures passed this year by California Democrats in response to two things: a sweeping U.S. Supreme Court ruling that reined in gun control measures nationally last year, and several high-profile mass shootings in the state this year — including in Half Moon Bay and Monterey Park.

In his decision to block the law Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney wrote that the law's "coverage is sweeping, repugnant to the Second Amendment, and openly defiant of the Supreme Court."

Gov. Gavin Newsom, who signed the bill into law and has called for tougher gun restrictions in the state and at the national level, immediately swung back with his own statement in defense of the measure.

"Defying common sense, this ruling outrageously calls California's data-backed gun safety efforts 'repugnant,'" Newsom said. "What is repugnant is this ruling, which greenlights the proliferation of guns in our hospitals, libraries, and children's playgrounds — spaces which should be safe for all."

AUSTIN (KXAN) — The Seattle Children’s Hospital filed a lawsuit in Travis County District Court on Dec. 7 against the Texas Office of the Attorney General (OAG), after that agency requested documents related to gender transition policies and any such care provided to Texas children.

However, hospital claims that the OAG lacks jurisdiction to demand such records from the hospital, and that Washington’s “Shield Law” protects it from requests made by states that “restrict or criminalize reproductive and gender-affirming care.”

“The Shield Law prohibits Washington-based entities such as Seattle Children’s from ‘[c]omply[ing] with subpoena, warrant, court order, or other civil or criminal legal process for records, information, facilities, or assistance related to protected health care services that are lawful in the state of Washington,'” the lawsuit stated.

KXAN reached out to the OAG multiple times prior to publication; however, the agency never replied to our requests.

Backers of a proposed constitutional amendment protecting abortion rights say they have hit a major milestone needed to get the issue before Florida voters in next year’s election.

Floridians Protecting Freedom reported Tuesday it will submit 1.4 million signatures to election supervisors by the end of the year, well above the nearly 900,000 needed to make the ballot.

“We’re confident we’re going to submit enough petitions to get on the ballot,” said campaign director Lauren Brenzel.

If it makes the ballot, the amendment must win at least 60% of the vote to secure passage.

The state has until Feb. 1 to verify the signatures to ensure they come from eligible voters and meet other requirements. As of Tuesday, the state reported that 753,762 of the required 891,523 signatures had been verified.

Abortion rights supporters are making a final push for outstanding petitions to be signed and submitted by Friday.