01/12/24

Good morning! It’s Friday, January 12th.

Kiss a Ginger Day. Ed Sheeran, did you invent a holiday?

And hey, how about consensually kiss a ginger day, ED??

And now, the news.

Trump Crime Update Time

-via NBC News

So today is one of those days where I’m gonna cover something, and then I’m gonna get into the big story. So just two stories but it’s Friday, it’s the end of the first week back in the news… let’s do this.

First, we start with…

Trump Crime Update Time

Who Made You Like This? Edition

As I mentioned on yesterday, Trump’s New York civil money crimes case is coming to a close and Trump was given a chance, many a chance, in fact, to give a closing statement. Provided, of course, that he could do these two things:

Not lie. Not threaten.

As I mentioned yesterday, these feel like the bare dang minimum but whatever. His lawyers said it couldn’t be done, so he wasn’t allowed to give a closing statement.

Except… except that, on Thursday, as lawyers gave their summaries of the case, Team Trump again asked if Trump could have some time to talk (even though they’d been given the chance over and over again, and they made the choice to never answer the judge’s emails about how he could absolutely give a closing statement if he could promise not to lie or threaten.

But whatever. The lawyers asked again, again the judge said only if he could promise to abide by the literal bare minimum of rules.

And instead of agreeing, Trump was allowed to launch into a six minute diatribe about how bad the judge, the case, and New York AG Tish James all were.

Let’s play the hits!

“What’s happened here, sir, is a fraud on me.”

When the judge asked his lawyer to control him, Trump said - “I know this is boring to you,” Trump said. “You have your own agenda. You can’t listen for more than one minute.”

And my personal favorite: the judge said: “By the way, you said you’ve never had a problem — haven’t you been sued before?”

And Trump said: “I should have won it every time.”

Well ya didn’t. Including this one. This one here, where you’re fighting with the judge… the judge already ruled you’re guilty. Your big brain move has been to fight with the judge whose only job right now is to decide how much you own in damages.

Incredible.

Brittany Watts

-via CNN

And here’s the story I want to talk about.

Let me start by saying – I should have covered this earlier. I didn’t. Today I’m frustrated that it’s not getting more coverage, but I can’t be that frustrated since I also didn’t cover it until now.

I’m going to also warn you that this story has some difficult and graphic details about a miscarriage.

Brittany Watts is a 34-year-old woman in Ohio who, late last year, went to the hospital for treatment 21 weeks and 5 days into her pregnancy, before ultimately suffering a miscarriage at home and passing the nonviable fetus in the toilet. That term, nonviable, came from a coroners’ office report, which also noted that the fetus died in the womb.

Prior to that, she’d gone to the hospital twice for bleeding, where the hospital told her that the fetus was nonviable, but signed out against medical advice both times. It’s unclear why she left the first time, but the second time it appears to be because, although she was expecting to be induced to deliver the fetus, she had to wait while the staff debated the ethics of it.

Two days after that, she went back for bleeding after the miscarriage.

The hospital told the police, who then went to her home and I will spare you the details of what they found.

This was in September and, following that, she was charged with felony abuse of a corpse. A woman who was 21 weeks pregnant. Who had the trauma of a miscarriage. Now being charged with a felony.

And again, I will own my part and say I should have been talking about this way more. Especially because, over in Texas, at the same time, Kate Cox was in the news because Texas was also using state law, like Ohio did, to punish a pregnant woman. In Cox’s case it was because she needed an abortion to save her life and the state said no.

A lot of people covered Cox, while few people covered Watts. And I’m sure there are a lot of reasons for that – not the least of which is because Watts is Black, Cox is white.

The point is, this story should have been covered a whole lot more than it was, because while the details are different, the story is the same – since the fall of Roe, states have found more and more ways to cruelly punish pregnant people. Forcing them to stay pregnant, even if it puts them in danger. Retraumatizing them after a miscarriage.

The cruelty is the point.

On Thursday a grand jury dismissed the case and to be honest, my first thought was – great. I’m going to talk about this on the news and it’ll be like a good ending to this horrible story.

But that’s not what this is. This is just… the bare minimum.

Brittany Watts is a not a criminal. She didn’t do anything wrong.

This will not stop legislatures like those in Ohio, in Texas, in any state that wants to limit the rights of people who can get pregnant from finding new and worse ways to be as cruel as possible.

And so today is a great time to remind you to make sure your voter registration is updated and you know when your next election is.

Brittany Watts deserved better.

And that’s it. That’s the news.

Not sure how to end this one fun and whimsically for a Friday show…

Hey, you know what? It’s also hot tea day. So put on some Ed Sheeran, drink some tea, and have a great weekend. Because you deserve nice things, and you know something else?

I’m proud of you.