This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
It was none other than the U.S. Supreme Court that a few years ago struck down a state program in Maine that attacked religious schools.
The state had said a program to provide tuition to students in locations where there were not public schools, so they could be at private schools, excluded any institution linked to faith.
But when that ruling came down, the state simply adopted another law to accomplish the same discrimination through another method, and now that fight is pending before the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
"Three years ago in the Carson case, the Supreme Court ordered Maine to stop leaving families like the Radonises out in the cold," said Adèle Keim, senior counsel at Becket. "But Maine wouldn't listen.
"Now Maine wants to have bureaucrats in Augusta tell St. Dominic how Catholic it can be. Maine should drop its newest effort to 'end run' the Supreme Court and let St. Dominic get back to serving the Maine families that need it most."
Explained Becket, "The Radonis family and a Catholic school in Maine were in federal appeals court today challenging a state law that excludes most faith-based schools from serving rural families through the state's tuition assistance program. Even though the Supreme Court struck down Maine's religious ban in 2022, state officials continue to exclude faith-based schools and families who want to participate in the program. In St. Dominic Academy v. Makin, Becket argued on behalf of the Radonises and St. Dominic Academy to restore their ability to access state funding."
Becket noted Keith and Valori Radonis are Catholic parents in rural Maine "who live in an area without a public high school and want their children to attend a school that upholds their beliefs."
They chose St. Dominic Academy.
Another family involved in the case, Daniel and Nancy Cronin, also live in an area without a public high school and want their son, who has dyslexia, to attend St. Dominic so that he can receive the academic support he needs, the legal team explained.
Their attendance was allowed for several years through the state's tuition assistance program, which provided help to parents in rural areas where public schools don't exist.
Then the state targeted the faith schools, and when it's agenda was stymied by the Supreme Court, lawmakers simply wrote a way around the legal decision.
"As Catholics, we want to raise our children in an environment that teaches them to put their faith at the heart of everything they do," said Keith and Valori Radonis. "Unfortunately, Maine is cheating us of this choice by cutting faith-based schools out of Maine's tuition program. We pray the court puts an end to this exclusion once and for all."
A statement from First Liberty Institute, which also is participating in the dispute on behalf of Crosspoint Church, Bangor Christian Schools and Consovoy McCarthy, explained the new Maine law allowing discrimination is just wrong.
"Maine excluded religious schools from its school choice program for over 40 years, but the U.S. Supreme Court made it clear in Carson v. Makin that such religious discrimination is unconstitutional," said Jeremy Dys, of First Liberty Institute. "Now, our clients would be punished with heavy fines if they hold to their religious beliefs. We hope the court puts an end to Maine's tactics, which are odious to our Constitution."
The institute explained, "Maine's tuitioning program is the second oldest school choice program in the nation. It allows parents to send their children to the public or private school of their choice—something that is especially important in the rural areas of Maine. From 1980 until the Supreme Court's 2022 decision in Carson v. Makin, parents could not use their tuition benefit at a religious school. But in anticipation of the Supreme Court's decision striking down Maine's religious discrimination, the Maine legislature changed the law, imposing its nondiscrimination laws on religious schools in such a way that would require BCS either to violate its sincerely held religious beliefs or face hefty fines for operating their school according to religious beliefs government officials believe to be discriminatory."
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
JERUSALEM – The U.K.'s Lancet medical journal recently published a report in which it claims the number of traumatic deaths in Gaza between Oct. 7, 2023 and June 30, 2024 is actually closer to 64,000 than the semi-official account according to the Gaza Health Ministry, a.k.a. Hamas, which over that period stood at some 38,000.
According to the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine website, which authored the report, the findings "indicate that approximately 3% of the population of Gaza has died due to violence with an analysis showing that 59% of these deaths were women, children, and the elderly."
Apparently, the researchers used a statistical method known as "capture-recapture analysis" to estimate the number of traumatic injury deaths, the LSHTM reported. This method overlaps data from multiple sources to arrive at estimates of deaths when not all data are recorded. The sources included Palestinian Ministry of Health hospital morgue records, a respondent-driven online survey, and social media obituaries. Needless to say, this method of data collection came in from some stern criticism, particularly from NGO Monitor.
Not least among the complaints regarding the findings is they did not provide an estimate of the number of fatalities of combatants, upon which it has proved extremely tricky to get an exact picture. Hamas and other Islamist groups, who for the exact purposes of being able to expand casualty numbers do not wear uniforms, and their numbers – at a minimum thought to be some 14,000 – were not separated out from the alleged overall number.
NGO Monitor has recorded its issues with the Lancet for more than a decade, remarking in Jan. 2015, "The Lancet has ostracized, and to a large extent, demonized Israel and the Israeli medical community."
In this latest case, NGO Monitor founder and president Prof. Gerald Steinberg, excoriated the flawed methodology. In a lengthy X post, Steinberg outlined the problems with the data, including accepting it uncritically from Hamas/Palestinian sources and parroting the information, as well as using the findings of something called Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, a Hamas-run NGO. He called on serious medical professionals to unsubscribe from the journal.
"The 'capture-recapture' analysis that is the heart of the statistics-heavy paper works like this. The authors took three different lists of victims – the hospital records, the online survey, and those found on social media obituaries," Sternberg wrote on X.
"Between the three they found very little overlap: Only about 15% of people in hospital records appeared on other lists. About 33% of people in the survey appeared on other lists.About 54% of people in social media appeared on other lists They used these overlap patterns to estimate how many deaths likely occurred but weren't captured on any list. A low overlap, they say, indicates that each list is a gross undercount of the total. Based on their analysis of the low overlap, they suggest that the three lists combined only captured about 45% of total deaths. This led to their estimate of about 64,260 total deaths during the study period, compared to the official count at the time of about 37,900 (which included unnamed people.) The assumptions behind this methodology are wrong."
"The third list, from multiple social media sources like Instagram, is not a random sample of the deceased at all. It could be updated by anyone anywhere in the world. It is self-defining and impossible to verify. Using it as an input to the analysis is questionable at best. To give it the same weight as the other two sources for the purposes of statistical analysis and estimations based on low overlap is almost certainly a poor assumption.
"There are other potential problems. The survey form does not distinguish between 'martyrs' and 'missing persons,' and many of those assumed to be dead may in fact be missing – the ICRC has managed to reunite thousands of people thought to be missing.(Albeit not something they've managed to achieve with the hostages). Altogether, this is a case where the authors try to misdirect the reader with lots of statistical formulas but their basic assumptions that the statistics are based on are worthless to begin with," he added.
Avi Bitterman MD responded to a X post about the Lancet report with a critique of his own. "Number 1 question about the methodology that makes all the difference here. Regarding the social media obituary list: When the authors say they 'excluded deaths attributed to non-traumatic injuries,' what did the authors do for obituaries that simply did not mention the death attribution?
"Recall that for the other data, the status was specifically asked. For example, for the survey data: 'The survey specifically asked respondents to enter details of those martyred, a term commonly understood to signify victims of war.' However for obituaries, this is not listed as the sort of information typically included in obituaries by the authors. Perhaps it is and perhaps it isn't."
In July, a non-peer reviewed letter published in the Lancet claimed the overall death toll in the Strip was some 186,000 people. This was a figure both disputed and ridiculed, not least for the insinuation that the IDF was responsible for all of those fatalities.
For those who wanted to belive the scale of the so-called "genocide" was indeed underreported it was proof-positive of Israel's crimes in Gaza; for many others it seemed to be yet more evidence of the slide in the veracity of so-called experts. There was significant pushback, the Lancet even published a letter rebutting the claim, but as is so often the case, deliberate misinformation was put into the public domain to create headlines for the news cycle.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
A lawsuit over whether parents are allowed to know about what their schools are telling their children is going to continue.
Officials with the Thomas More Society say that U.S. District Court Judge Roger T. Benitez in California has denied in a court order all Motions to Dismiss in Mirabelli v. Olson.
That lawsuit challenges "Parental Exclusion Policies" adopted by schools that specifically prevent parents from knowing about some of their own children's activities in school.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta and members of the California Department of Education and the Escondido Union School District had demanded the case be thrown out.
They had claimed that their rules limiting what parents are allowed to know was "just a suggestion" so there was nobody really harmed by their agenda.
However, Benitez found that the parents "enjoy standing and have stated plausible claims upon which relief can be granted."
"The Supreme Court has long recognized that parents hold a federal constitutional Due Process right to direct the health care and education of their children," the judge said.
"The Defendants stand on unprecedented and more recently created state law child rights to privacy and to be free from gender discrimination."
Paul Jonna, special counsel with the society, explained, "We are incredibly pleased that the Court has denied all attempts to throw out our landmark challenge to California's parental exclusion and gender secrecy regime. Judge Benitez's order rightly highlights the sacrosanct importance of parents' rights in our constitutional order, and the First Amendment protections afforded to parents and teachers."
The judge said, "By concealing a child's gender health issues from the parents, parents are precluded from exercising their religious obligations to raise and care for their child at a time when it may be highly significant. [T]he teachers make out a plausible claim for relief under the First Amendment's Free Exercise Clause."
The judge added, "This Court concludes that, in a collision of rights as between parents and child, the long-recognized federal constitutional rights of parents must eclipse the state rights of the child.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
PALM BEACH, Florida – What did two American presidents – Donald Trump and Barack Obama – say to each other at Thursday's funeral for Jimmy Carter, another commander in chief?
While the official discussion remains a mystery, Trump on Sunday shared a hilarious dubbed version of the pair's talk on Truth Social.
"Well, Mr. President," Obama says at the outset of the spoof.
"For a second time," Trump replies. "Barack, very nice to see you."
"Congratulations," Obama responds. "So how you doing?"
Trump: "A lot better now."
Obama: "Yeah, I bet. [I] knew you'd win."
Trump: "Oh really? Oh come on. Anyone could beat her."
Obama: "[You] kidding me? I was just as appalled. You know what happened? He [Biden] just didn't wanna leave."
Trump: "I know."
Obama: "… Is what happened. I did what I could to help her. She was horrendous."
Trump: "I know. You know what I realized? Hillary still hates me. So much. I know. She'll never forgive me.
The camera then focuses on a stoic-looking Hillary Clinton at the funeral.
Obama: "I think so too. We can definitely set something up. Let me know whatever works best for you."
Trump: "Over golf? I was gonna fly back to Florida tomorrow for the golf."
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
JERUSALEM – Almost since the start of the hostilities between Israel and Hamas, various U.S. airlines – along with other major European carriers – have had extended periods of several months where they have refused to fly to and from the Jewish state.
While this has had the effect of burgeoning El Al – Israel's national carrier's – profits, it has caused consternation among Israel's defenders on Capitol Hill, who see this as part of the effort to delegitimize the country and punish it for its continued war against Hamas.
Indeed, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz R-Texas, who chairs the influential Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, has called on U.S. airlines to rethink the services they suspended last summer amid an escalation of the hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.
Fears the Iranian-backed Islamist group would target Ben-Gurion International Airport outside the central Israeli city of Lod proved to be unfounded, as the IDF largely managed to contain and destroy a large percentage of the group's longer-range missiles. If the airport had come under significant attack one may understand the flight suspension; it didn't, and yet U.S. airlines are continuing to act as if the hostilities are still at their height.
According to Jewish Insider, Cruz made his comments on the "Nothing But The Truth" podcast, hosted by NORPAC New York's co-president, Trudy Stern.
"I think it is time for American airlines to resume flights to and from Israel. At this point with every day that goes on, it appears more and more to be a politically motivated boycott instead of a genuine safety concern. It was one thing right at the outset of the war when it was unclear what was going to happen," Cruz told Stern.
"It was one thing to take a step potentially in terms of preserving safety. It's another thing now. Right now today, El Al is flying every day. You have regional airlines in Europe that are flying regularly to Israel. The UAE's airline flies three times a day to Israel. And I got to say, every indication is that this is, this is a politically motivated boycott.
"One example is if you look at the largest of the flight attendant unions, they have been vigorously anti-Israel, calling for boycotts of Israel, and sadly, speaking out in support of the antisemitic protests on college campuses here in the United States. I think it's time for the American airlines to return to flying to and from Israel," he continued.
Cruz, who only assumed his new congressional role 24 hours prior to his interview, has jurisdiction over the airline industry, and he made it clear he would be pushing for a resumption of flights from the main U.S. carriers.
The Republican senator is not the only lawmaker to have been perplexed by the Delta, United, and American Airlines' reticence to fly to Israel. In August, U.S. Rep. Richie Torres, D-N.Y., posted a letter on X, which he had sent to each of the CEOs of those three airlines.
I am calling upon the CEOs of American Airlines, Delta, and United to end the unilateral + indefinite suspensions of air travel to Israel. The operative words here are 'unilateral' and 'indefinite.'
Air travel suspensions should have time limits and FAA approval. Instead of… pic.twitter.com/J1uhKGg98k
— Ritchie Torres (@RitchieTorres) August 29, 2024
In his missive, he described that their refusal to fly had – at that time – made El Al, the only viable option, which made air travel to Israel "less available, and less affordable, putting customers at the mercy of a de facto monopoly that can easily gouge prices with impunity." This was indeed a criticism of Israel's national carrier; seeing how for months there were literally no other options if people wanted to fly in and out of Israel.
"It is one thing to temporarily suspend air travel to Israel on security grounds as defined by the FAA. But to unilaterally suspend air travel indefinitely until mid-2025, as American Airlines has done, has the practical effect of a boycott."
Less than a month after Torres' intervention, U.S. Rep. Marcus Molinaro R-N.Y., followed up by saying the FAA was stonewalling him after he demanded answers on what guidance it had given to U.S. airlines amidst their ongoing refusal to fly to Israel.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
Whether a school board member is allowed to quote from the Bible, in public, for encouragement is on the court docket in Arizona.
Officials with First Liberty Institute and the law firm Gibson Dunn & Crutcher have filed a brief encouraging the federal court there to affirm the right of Heather Rooks, the president of the Peoria Unif9ied School District Board, to recite from Scripture during meetings.
"Citing a quotation from any text, be it sacred or secular, for the purpose of encouragement or inspiration is completely protected under the Free Speech Clause of the U.S. Constitution," explained First Liberty Institute lawyer Erin Smith. "That conclusion is compelled by Supreme Court precedent and confirmed by history and tradition."
Matt Scorcio, of the Gibson law firm, said, "Our Nation's public officials have quoted scripture in performing their duties from the Founding through today. Heather Rooks' practice of opening her Board comments time with a brief quotation of scripture fits comfortably within that tradition, so it can't as a matter of law give rise to an Establishment Clause violation."
Rooks began her time with the board in January 2023, and she recently was elected president.
"During each Peoria School Board meeting, the agenda includes a brief 'Board comments' period where individual board members may offer remarks of their own choosing. Since the beginning of her public service on the board, Ms. Rooks opened her comments by quoting a short scripture from the Bible," the legal team said.
But various "anti-religious organizations" wrote to the board, demanding a complete censorship of her comments.
The previous board chief told her to stop using scripture, and a motion now filed with the court argues, "Far from being compelled by the Establishment Clause, the District's actions in this case violate Rooks' own rights of religious freedom and speech under state and federal law. As the Supreme Court put it recently in the landmark case of Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, a 'government entity's concerns about phantom constitutional violations' never 'justify actual violations of an individual's First Amendment rights.' The Court should grant summary judgment to Rooks, award her nominal damages, and grant her declaratory relief."
The Daily Caller News Foundation reported when the dispute arose that Rooks went to court after being ordered to censor her Bible references.
It was Lisa Anne Smith, the board's lawyer, who dictated that members were not allowed to "pray or recite scripture during board meetings."
The legal action complained," The District's official policy and actions—which purport to ensure Rooks does 'not read scripture' or 'offer bible verses'—regulate her speech based on its content, message, and viewpoint. The District's policies and actions therefore chill her ability to freely speak, in violation of the First Amendment."
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
President-elect Donald Trump's influence over world, national, and state affairs has been on display ever since his landslide victory, in both the Electoral College and popular vote numbers, in November.
He openly challenged Canada's leadership, and the prime minister's resignation followed shortly after. He promised action on illegal immigration and Mexican officials began diverting those caravans of would-be illegal aliens heading to the U.S.
Suddenly, too, there are comments that perhaps the Russia-Ukraine war might reach a settlement.
Now Trump's agenda is hitting at the state level.
He already has set up his appointees in a "Department of Governor Efficiency," or DOGE, assigned to crack down on the hundreds of billions, even trillions of dollars in wasteful spending by the government. X's chief, Elon Musk, is one of his leaders in that campaign.
Now the Washington Examiner is reporting that Kelly Ayotte, a Republican governor in New Hampshire, is following suit, with a state Commission of Government Efficiency.
"Signed my first Executive Order to create the Commission on Government Efficiency – or as I like to call it, 'COGE'! We're going to roll up our sleeves and find ways to streamline government, cut spending, and create value for our taxpayers," she told her state's residents in a social media post.
"New Hampshire is moving in the right direction, and no one deserves more credit for that after four terms at the helm than Gov. Chris Sununu. Thank you, Governor," she added.
Democrats and other leftists in the state already are in an uproar, accusing Ayotte of "laying the groundwork for massive budget cuts to services that people rely on," according to state Democrat chief Ray Buckley.
The governor is scheduled to propose her budget to the legislature soon, and lawmakers are faced with state agency requests for nearly $17 billion.
Republicans held a differing perspective.
"I think it's a brilliant approach," Republican Manchester Mayor Jay Ruais told Fox News. "Appointing a commission like this to go after any kind of bloat, I think, is a perfect approach and certainly going to be really beneficial for state government and also certainly helps us downstream at the local level as well."
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
Many people consider the abuse of children for pornography to be one of the most egregious crimes around.
A recent case in which two homosexuals were convicted of abusing their adopted sons for that purpose got them sentences that essentially amount to life in prison.
But now a video report from OMG, O'Keefe Media Group, charges that the federal Bureau of Prisons is working to categorize such offenses as "low severity."
The organization said it has obtained documents "detailing a controversial proposal by the BOP to reclassify child exploitation offenses from 'high severity' to 'low severity.'"
The OMG report said, "Additionally, the new policy would classify terrorism-related offenses for female inmates as 'low security' and animal cruelty as a 'low-moderate' offense. These changes stem from a draft of the Security Designation and Custody Classification Manual, signed by BOP Director Colette S. Peters."
The plans were outlined in a recent memo from Christopher Wade, chief of labor relations, to Jennifer Hinton, a labor relations specialist.
A report from the Gateway Pundit said O'Keefe obtained the documents from a "high-level" source in the Bureau of Prisons.
The source said, "I can say with absolute certainty that the BOP is an agency in an existential crisis. If I looked at this agency through the lens of a CEO, I would probably think that complete privatization would be the most sensible route.
"We need at least $5B in infrastructure repairs agency-wide, our health care (especially at my institution) is in absolute shambles, fentanyl and other hard drugs are being used by inmates and can be found anywhere without much effort, contraband cell phones are abundant and we have a very serious drone problem (especially at my institution) that's uncontrollable and extremely dangerous. The BOP is a failed agency where corruption and incompetence, at the management level, run rampant."
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
A new report reveals that Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, who already is being blamed for contributing to this week's fire hellstorm that hit the city and destroyed thousands of homes by cutting some $17 million from the fire department's budget, did much worse.
In fact, the Daily Mail report accuses her of ordering another $49 million in fire department budget cuts only a few days before the city's world turned smoky as blazes erupted amid 100 mph winds, costing at least ten lives and literally uncountable home losses.
The report said the demands were found in a "leaked memo."
"The extra cuts, requested just days before fires broke out and devastated swathes of Los Angeles, would have shut down 16 fire stations and crippled the department's ability to respond to emergencies, sources said," according to the report.
The publication said current and former senior officers in the department were briefed on the "shocking" plan.
The memo comes from January 6, just hours before the Palisades Fire erupted.
The Daily Mail said the memo was sent by fire department officials at city hall to division chiefs and captains.
It threatened, "The LAFD is still going through an FY [financial year] 2024/2025 $48.8million budget reduction exercise with the CAO [City Attorney's Office]. The only way to provide cost savings would be to close as many as 16 fire stations (not resources, fire stations); this equates to at least one fire station per City Council District."
This week, an estimated 54 square miles of the city have been reduced to dirt, concrete, and rubble by five separate fires.
"The billionaire and celebrity-inhabited neighborhood of Pacific Palisades was almost completely wiped off the map," the report said.
There have been multiple calls for Bass, as well as Gov. Gavin Newsom, to leave as they failed to address a long list of issues that impacted the fires' lethality. Among them was a failure to make sure there was water for fire hydrants, and a long-standing problem with a failure to create fire breaks in the region.
The firestorm was aggravated by Santa Ana winds, which pushed the sparks and flames from neighborhood to neighborhood in literally seconds.
There also are charges the city had shipped some of its equipment to Ukraine.
The report said the damages, so far, have been estimated at $49 billion in homes, businesses, schools, and churches lost to the 120-foot-tall flames.
Reports Friday said the Palisades Fire in 8% contained, the Eaton Fire uncontained, the Kenneth Fire and Hurst Fire 35%, and the Lidia Fire 75%.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
The judicial system in the state of New York once was "considered the premier legal system in the country."
Not anymore, according to constitutional expert "Jonathan Turley, a Fox contributor and Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University.
He cited the sentencing of President-elect Donald Trump on Friday on wild business records claims by Juan Merchan, a sentence of no jail or probation or fines under a "discharge" standard.
"With the sentencing of Donald Trump on Friday, the final verdict on the New York criminal trial of the president-elect is in. The verdict is not the one that led to no jail or probation for the incoming president. Acting Justice Juan Merchan has brought down the gavel on the New York legal system as a whole," Turley explained.
"Once considered the premier legal system in the country, figures like New York Attorney General Letitia James, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, Justices Arthur F. Engoron and Juan Merchan have caused the system to be weaponized for political purposes.
"Trump will walk away from this trial and into the White House in less than two weeks, but the New York system will walk into infamy after this day. The case has long been denounced by objective legal observers, including intense Trump critics, as a legal absurdity. Even CNN's senior legal analyst Elie Honig denounced the case as legally flawed and unprecedented while Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., simply called it total 'b—s–t.'"
He explained the New York system was unable to "handle the truth."
It was a "case based on a non-crime. DA Bragg took a long-dead misdemeanor and zapped it back into life with a novel and unfounded theory," he explained.
In fact, Bragg, who campaigned for office on the idea of prosecuting Trump, for something, anything, claimed that a "long-dead misdemeanor" actually was a live felony "by using federal violations that were never charged, let alone tried."
Then the judge, who has been known to financially support Democrats, and whose daughter was raising money for Democrats off her father's courtroom rulings against Trump, joined in.
Merchan "not only allowed those charges to be brought to trial but then added layers of reversible errors in the effort to bag Trump at any cost," Turley explained.
In the court of public opinion, the New York agenda failed, as Trump got 3.6 million New York votes, or 42.7%, in the 2024 election.
"Many polls showed that the public saw the Manhattan criminal case for what it was: raw lawfare targeting a leading political opponent. The election itself felt like the largest verdict in history as citizens rejected the political, legal and media establishments in one of our nation's most historic elections," Turley explained.
He said the state system still has a chance to redeem itself, but few "are holding their breath."
It still could toss James's "equally absurd civil lawsuit against Trump. Despite judges expressing skepticism over Engoron's use of a law to impose a grotesque $455 million in fines and interest, we are still waiting for a decision."
He said the Merchan agenda now will end up before the Supreme Court itself, after the judge's "lack of seriousness in the case" was on display.
In the case, Bragg claimed business reporting errata by Trump's companies amounted to felonies, even though they ordinarily would have been misdemeanors for which the statute of limitations had expired.
Bragg said they were felonies because they were in pursuit of some other, unidentified, crime. In fact, jurors failed to identify that crime, and Merchan inexplicably said their verdict didn't have to be unanimous in the case that was just one prong of Democrats' multi-jurisdiction lawfare campaign, a failed effort to use various created civil and criminal cases to keep him from running for president again..
Bragg brought to court, and Merchan allowed, salacious testimony from a former porn star and a discredited lawyer in order to convince jurors in the leftist enclave of Manhattan, which repeatedly has voted by vast majorities against Trump, to convict Trump of 34 counts.
The issue was that Trump's lawyer paid the porn star for silence about an alleged affair both denied happened. The payments made to the lawyer were labeled as legal expenses.