Arizona's Supreme Court upholds 160-year-old abortion ban | The Excerpt

On Wednesday’s episode of The Excerpt podcast: Arizona Republic State Politics Reporter Stacey Barchenger puts the Arizona Supreme Court abortion decision in context. James and Jennifer Crumbley have been sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison after being convicted of involuntary manslaughter for their son's mass shooting attack. Plus, a Virginia assistant principal has been charged with felony child abuse in a 6-year-old's shooting of a teacher. The Justice Department’s COVID-19 Enforcement Task Force has charged thousands of people with federal crimes. Former President Donald Trump loses a bid to delay his New York hush money trial while appealing a gag order. USA TODAY National Correspondent Trevor Hughes looks at young voters' priorities this election cycle.

Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it.  This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

Podcasts:  True crime, in-depth interviews and more USA TODAY podcasts right here

Taylor Wilson:

Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson, and today is Wednesday, April 10th, 2024. This is The Excerpt. Today: What an Arizona court decision means for abortion, plus the Crumbley parents have been sentenced, and we take the temperature on young voters this election season.

♦

The Arizona Supreme Court yesterday upheld a 160-year-old abortion ban that could close clinics across the state. I spoke with Arizona Republic state politics reporter, Stacey Barchenger, to learn more.

Stacey, thank you so much for hopping on The Excerpt today.

Stacey Barchenger:

Of course. Happy to be here.

Taylor Wilson:

Stacey, let's just start here. What exactly did the state Supreme Court rule on this?

Stacey Barchenger:

The Arizona Supreme Court has said that a state law that bans abortions in Arizona, except for to save the life of a mother, is the prevailing law. This is a law that was first enacted in Arizona in 1864 and affirmed a couple of times since then. It requires two to five years in prison for anyone who aids in an abortion.

Taylor Wilson:

What does this really now functionally mean for both the abortion clinics and patients in the state?

Stacey Barchenger:

Well, it means that in the very near future, anyone who provides an abortion could be prosecuted for doing so. There is a little bit of uncertainty around this. The Arizona Supreme Court put a 14-day stay in its order, so no prosecutions for at least 14 days. And then, there are some groups, actually on both sides of the abortion argument, who say that there is another court opinion that means this won't go into effect for roughly 60 days. So, it could be May that providers are still able to continue providing abortion care, although I just have to put the caveat that there is some uncertainty around when these providers will have to stop providing abortion care because of the decision.

Taylor Wilson:

Stacey, I'm curious whether this was a surprise. What's been happening on the Arizona abortion front in the build up to this decision?

Stacey Barchenger:

Things have been very uncertain here since the US Supreme Court overturned Roe versus Wade. Just right before SCOTUS made that decision, our Republican legislature and governor enacted a law banning abortions after 15 weeks. So, when you saw Roe overturned, you had two laws on the books in Arizona, the one that was upheld by the court, and then this fifteen-week ban. Those have been tossed back and forth in courts, and all along the way the impact of that on the ground is providers don't know if they can give women abortion medication or the surgical abortion procedure, so it just has been unsettled for at least two years now.

And as we have seen nationally, there's a political side of this, which is you're hearing democrats in the state talk a lot about this uncertainty and the need to protect abortion rights in a pivotal election year. And as your listeners know, Arizona is a pretty swingy state, and so we could see some really important impact of this decision.

Taylor Wilson:

You mentioned Democrats. We've learned through exclusive USA Today network reporting that Vice President Kamala Harris is set to visit Arizona after this decision. Stacey, what's the significance of this trip?

Stacey Barchenger:

She has made touring the country to speak about reproductive rights and the need to protect those rights since Roe was overturned a forefront of her pitch to voters. She was here in Phoenix last month and then announced she was making a stop in Tucson. I think this is a ruling that we will hear Democrats at all levels of the political hierarchy speaking about as they make their pitch to voters in November, that Democrats are the way to go, that Republicans would want to restrict this right if given the opportunity.

Taylor Wilson:

What's next going forward? I know you wrote about a potential ballot measure coming up later this year.

Stacey Barchenger:

Yeah, absolutely. I think if you are an advocate for abortion rights in Arizona now your focus shifts to that ballot measure. Short version: There is a group of organizations like the ACLU and Planned Parenthood, they are trying to get voters to approve in November a ballot measure that would basically take the same protections of Roe versus Wade and make them protected in the Arizona State Constitution. So basically, you could have an abortion up to viability of the fetus as determined by your doctor.

And the other thing I should mention, again just the politics of it all, all 90 of our state lawmakers are on the ballot this year. So, if they weren't already talking about abortion access, you can very much expect that they will be now, or their democratic opponents will try to make them talk about it.

Taylor Wilson:

All right, fascinating stuff. All eyes on Arizona this week. Stacey Barchenger is a state politics reporter for the Arizona Republic. Thank you, Stacey.

Stacey Barchenger:

Yeah, thanks for having me on.

♦

Taylor Wilson:

Jennifer and James Crumbley were sentenced yesterday in a Michigan courtroom to 10 to 15 years in prison. They were previously the first parents of a mass school shooter in the U.S. to be convicted of involuntary manslaughter for the attack. The sentence came after the court heard statements from the family members of Tate Myre, Hana St. Juliana, Madisyn Baldwin, and Justin Shilling. They were all killed, aged 14 to 17, when the Crumbley son, Ethan, went on a shooting rampage at Oxford High School in Michigan on November 30th, 2021. Nicole Beausoleil, Baldwin's mother, said through tears, quote, "You created all of this. You failed as parents. The punishment that you face will never be enough." Unquote.

Meanwhile in a separate case, the assistant principal of the Virginia school where a six-year-old boy shot his first grade teacher, has been charged with eight counts of felony, child abuse and disregard for life. That's according to an indictment unsealed yesterday. Ebony Parker, who worked for Richneck Elementary School on January 6th, 2023 when Abigail Zwerner was shot by her student, was indicted last month. Zwerner filed a lawsuit in April of last year seeking $40 million in damages from school officials. In the lawsuits, Zwerner claimed Parker received multiple warnings of the boy's violent behavior, but failed to take action to prevent the shooting.

♦

During the last three years, the Justice Department's COVID-19 enforcement task force has charged more than 3,500 people with federal crimes, recovered more than $1.4 billion in stolen pandemic funds, and reached more than 400 civil settlements and judgments, according to officials yesterday. White House officials and lawmakers used the announcement as a springboard to propose legislation to provide more funding for anti-fraud enforcement, extend the statute of limitations on prosecuting crimes, and to improve government databases to better detect when payments should not be made. You can read more about some of the specific cases with a link in today's show notes.

♦

Former President Donald Trump lost a bid yesterday to delay his April 15th New York criminal hush money trial while a New York appeals court considers an emergency appeal to overturn a gag order imposed against him. New York appeals judge Cynthia Kern denied the trial delay bid after hearing arguments from Trump's legal team and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's office. A full panel of appellate judges will consider Trump's challenge to the gag order at a later point. In the gag order trial, Judge Juan Merchan barred Trump from making public statements about family members of Merchan or Bragg that are meant to significantly interfere with work in the case. The judge also prohibited Trump from making such statements when it comes to court staff and prosecutors other than Bragg himself, as well as those individuals' family members. Additionally, Trump cannot comment on potential and actual jurors were on the participation of witnesses in the case. Trump previously lost an emergency bid on Monday to delay the trial until after a decision is made on his request to move the case out of Manhattan.

♦

Many young voters are not warming up to President Joe Biden this election cycle, and they know it means Former President Donald Trump could win again. I spoke with USA Today national correspondent, Trevor Hughes, for more.

Hi there, Trevor.

Trevor Hughes:

Hey, good to be here.

Taylor Wilson:

Thanks for hopping on, Trevor. Let's just start with this. What does polling tell us right now about young voters and where they're bringing their support or maybe not bringing their support this election season?

Trevor Hughes:

Older voters in America tend to be partisan. They tend to be either Democrats or Republican. And what we're seeing is that young voters, even though they tend to vote liberal in general, and I'm using from very broad strokes here, they don't identify with a party. That means polling seems to indicate that President Biden's re-election might be a challenge, because a lot of young folks are not supporting him right now.

Taylor Wilson:

What are the major issues young voters care about this cycle, and how have we seen Biden try and address those concerns in recent months, Trevor?

Trevor Hughes:

Well, if you look at what Biden has done in the past year, the past six months, is literally a list of things young people want him to address. We're talking credit card fees, student loans, the cost of housing. He mentioned a ton of things in his State of the Union address that were directly aimed at young voters. But one of the things that I heard over and over was the war in Gaza and how frustrated and angry young people are that he hasn't used more of the U.S.'s influence to stop Israel.

Taylor Wilson:

I know we're speaking broadly here, Trevor, but are young voters prepared to let Trump win if it means preventing Biden's re-election?

Trevor Hughes:

I can't speak for every young voter, but a lot of the folks I talked to, they absolutely understand that Joe Biden won election in part because young people voted for him, and they understand that if they don't vote for him again, we may get a second Trump presidency. A couple of them I talked to are very aware that could happen. And they said, "That's okay." They are willing to see the Democratic Party suffer. They said, "... if that means it learns a lesson." They want to see the pendulum perhaps swing one way so it can swing back even further another.

Taylor Wilson:

You mentioned that 2020 election, Trevor. Let's just turn back the clock here. What role did young voters play in both 2016 and 2020? And what can those elections tell us about their potential impact later this year?

Trevor Hughes:

When we look at the 2016 election, Hillary Clinton got a lot of the same votes that every Democrat has always gotten. But what was really noteworthy in that election was that there were a fair number of people who stayed home. And then there were a lot of people who voted third party. And we know that young people are much more interested in issues than party-line voting, and so in 2016, it very much looks like young people voted for third party candidates at a much higher rate than normal. In 2020, the rate dropped to almost zero.

Taylor Wilson:

What are voting rights advocates doing to try and get out the young vote this fall? And what are some remaining obstacles they point to?

Trevor Hughes:

Older Americans vote more consistently. Younger Americans don't vote consistently. So, voting rights advocates say that there's any number of things that can be done in terms of same-day registration, being flexible with the kind of identification that you can use. All of those things help young people feel like it's something they can do and should do.

One thing I was really surprised to learn was that a lot of young people often are intimidated by the idea of voting because they feel like they don't have enough information and so they just hold off answering the question. Now, I've been around a long time and I can tell you a lot of older folks don't mind just making a decision without that information. They don't let that lack of information hold them up from having a choice. That's why we see so many Republicans and so many Democrats.

We see that party membership in older Americans, but we do not see that in younger Americans.

Taylor Wilson:

All right, interesting stuff. Trevor Hughes is a national correspondent with USA Today. Thank you, Trevor.

Trevor Hughes:

You bet.

♦

Taylor Wilson:

As Ramadan comes to an end, Muslims are marking Eid al-Fitr today. The holiday is Arabic for the celebration of breaking the fast. During the month of Ramadan, Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset, and spend time in self-reflection and prayer.

♦

And be sure to stay tuned later today for a special episode as best-selling author, James Patterson, is joined by viral librarian, Mychal Threets, to talk about their shared love of books with my colleague, Dana Taylor. You can find the episode right here, beginning at 4:00 P.M. Eastern Time.

Thanks for listening to The Excerpt. You get the podcast wherever you get your audio. And if you're on a smart speaker, just ask for The Excerpt. I'm Taylor Wilson, back tomorrow with more of The Excerpt from USA TODAY.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Arizona Supreme Court upholds 160-year-old abortion ban | The Excerpt