Politics

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr., the key player in a North Carolina absentee ballot fraud probe that led to a do-over congressional election, has died.

His daughter, Andrea Dowless Heverly, wrote that her father “passed away peacefully” Sunday morning, according to a social media post. He had been diagnosed with an advanced form of lung cancer and died at his daughter’s home in Bladen County, his friend Jay DeLancy told The Associated Press in a brief interview. Dowless was in his mid-60s.

The political operative was set to go on trial this summer on more than a dozen state criminal counts related to absentee ballot activities for the 2016 general election and the 2018 primary and general elections. A half-dozen others were also charged.

Witnesses told state officials that Dowless, with help of his assistants, gathered hundreds of absentee ballots from Bladen County in 2018. Those workers testified they were directed to collect blank or incomplete ballots, forge signatures on them and even fill in votes for local candidates.

The 2018 general election results for the 9th Congressional District were ultimately thrown out and a new vote for the seat was ordered by the State Board of Elections, following an inquiry.

Dowless was working in the 2018 congressional race for then-Republican candidate Mark Harris. No charges were filed against Harris, who didn’t run in the subsequent election.

Dowless was later accused of charges related to the 2016 elections and the 2018 primary.

Dowless’ health had become an issue while receiving a six-month prison sentence for federal crimes involving benefits fraud that was tangentially related to the broader state probe.

A federal judge delayed Dowless’ reporting date from last December to April 1 after his defense attorney said Dowless had a stroke in August and learned in the fall about a potential cancer diagnosis.

Dowless’ federal attorney filed another motion in March that she requested be sealed “due to the inclusion of sensitive health information.” The Federal Bureau of Prisons never reported Dowless as being in custody.

Dowless’ state and federal attorneys didn’t immediately respond to emails on Sunday seeking comment. But with Dowless’ death, the absentee ballot case against him is now moot.

Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman said legal delays caused by COVID-19 contributed to the inability to bring Dowless to trial sooner.

While expressing condolences to Dowless’ family, Freeman said Sunday her office would move forward with the prosecution of other defendants, even though Dowless had been seen as the principal in the probe.

“All of the other cases to some degree were derived from what the state thought was his master plan and coordination,” Freeman told the AP. She said each individual case would be evaluated before deciding how to proceed.

Dowless declined to accept a plea agreement on the state charges in November. The charges against him included obstruction of justice, possessing absentee ballots and perjury.

DeLancy, who saw Dowless last week, said Dowless “wanted the chance to defend himself against the state’s indictments” and rejected the plea deal “in hopes of being given his day in court.”

Dowless was “a man who was quick to trust and even love others by his acts of service,” DeLancy said in a text message.

Dowless had pleaded guilty last June in federal court to obtaining illegal Social Security benefits while concealing payments for political work he performed.

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This story has been corrected to show that Dowless declined a plea agreement in November, 2021, not that summer.

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OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — With violent crime increasing in many parts of the U.S., Republicans see a winning strategy in portraying Democrats as soft on crime ahead of this year’s elections. In ads, campaign appearances and interviews, the GOP has ripped liberal policies and blamed Democratic lawmakers from the White House to city councils for the violence.

But in Oklahoma, where Gov. Kevin Stitt is being targeted for mass commutations and a crime that involved cannibalism, the attacks are different: Stitt is a Republican.

In one ad, a woman’s voice says Stitt commuted the prison sentence of a man who later “brutally murdered his neighbor, then tried to feed her organs to his family.” The ad, paid for by a group called Conservative Voice of America, concludes, “Oklahomans deserve a governor who cracks down on violent criminals, not one who lets them go.”

Democrats have borne the brunt of the political blame for the increase in homicides and other violent crime in recent years. In some cases that’s meant backpedaling on major criminal justice overhauls or insisting they don’t want to defund police departments, as some activists have advocated.

But now the attacks on some fellow Republicans are intensifying a split within the GOP between hard-liners and those conservatives who have shifted to support alternatives to prisons, largely as a way to save money. Groups that advocate various types of criminal justice reform worry the attacks could jeopardize meaningful changes that have occurred, many in heavily Republican states, such as Oklahoma, which has one of the highest incarceration rates, and Texas.

“We had been seeing sort of growing bipartisan consensus on reforms,” said Kevin Ring, president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums. But that’s gotten tougher because of rising crime and politics.

“There’s still some of those old holdouts who just are ‘lock them up, throw away the key’ types,” Ring said. “They’ve always been there, and I think that they have used the increase in crime to argue for a return to that posture by the party.”

Brett Tolman, executive director of the conservative criminal justice advocacy group Right on Crime, said “the accusation of being weak on crime gets thrown around very quickly,” causing “a lot of hesitation” in Congress. The former U.S. attorney said he now has to work with people mostly behind the scenes.

Republicans who support the changes say they can reduce crime as well as costs to taxpayers. When Stitt approved the 2019 mass commutation of more than 450 inmates in a single day, he said the release would save Oklahoma an estimated $11.9 million over the cost of keeping them behind bars. The commutations primarily benefited those convicted of drug possession or low-level property crimes.

Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, says his state saved billions of dollars by investing in alternative sentencing and closing prisons. He’s now defending Stitt, who’s facing an avalanche of attack ads as he seeks a second term as Oklahoma governor.

“I see the Texas reforms have proven tough on crime but soft on the taxpayer, as any conservative policy should be,” Perry wrote in a newspaper column defending Stitt.

The attack ads targeting Stitt were paid for by dark money groups, which don’t have to make their donors public. They criticize Stitt for signing off on the parole of a man now accused of three killings, including those of a 4-year-old girl and a neighbor whose heart he cut out and tried to feed to relatives, according to authorities.

Donelle Harder, a spokesperson for Stitt’s reelection campaign, said it’s not clear who is funding the groups.

“The undisclosed, special interest groups are not conservatives, and they are not being honest about their intentions,” Harder said. “Gov. Stitt’s commitment to lead as a conservative political outsider is clearly upsetting a small few.”

Trebor Worthen, a GOP political consultant who is running one of the dark money groups, Sooner State Leadership PAC, said it is dedicated to public safety and has raised $10 million. Worthen declined to identify specific donors.

“We are funded by business and community leaders who care deeply about our future and wish to exercise their First Amendment rights to advocate for policy changes that Oklahoma needs and deserves,” Worthen said.

The issue also has surfaced in the GOP primary for governor in Nevada. Former Sen. Dean Heller has criticized Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo, saying he wants to defund the police. Lombardo told The Associated Press and other media outlets that he has no problem with his department losing funding if the money is used in another area that would benefit law enforcement.

“Who goes on NPR and says they want to defund the police?” Heller told a Nevada TV station during an interview, comparing Lombardo with progressive Democrats who often draw conservative ire, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. “AOC, the Squad, and Sheriff Lombardo. They’re the ones that say that.”

In Illinois, Democrats who control state government hurriedly worked this spring to provide more funding to law enforcement after passing a major criminal justice overhaul last year that set strict standards for police behavior and eliminated cash bail beginning next year. Republicans have blasted the criminal justice legislation.

Among the most vocal critics is GOP candidate for governor Richard Irvin, a former prosecutor and defense attorney who is now mayor of Aurora, a Chicago suburb. Irvin, who faces several Republicans in the GOP primary, often touts his prosecutorial background as he blasts Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker.

The Democratic Governors Association and Irvin’s GOP rivals have questioned his tough-on-crime credentials, however. In an ad, the DGA criticized Irvin’s work as a defense attorney, and fellow Republicans have attacked Irvin, who is Black, for expressing support for Black Lives Matter.

A spokesperson for Irvin dismissed the attacks. Eleni Desmertzis said Pritzker is “running scared” and facing “a former criminal prosecutor, tough-on-crime-mayor and strong supporter of law enforcement who has proven he’s not afraid to stand up for all lives in Illinois.”

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Burnett reported from Chicago.

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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Utah Democrats pulling hard to defeat Republican Sen. Mike Lee took the unusual step Saturday of spurning a party hopeful to instead get behind an independent, former presidential candidate Evan McMullin.

Democrats were swayed by calls from prominent members who said McMullin, a conservative who captured a significant share of the vote in Utah in 2016, was the best chance to beat Lee in the deeply conservative state that hasn’t elected a Democratic U.S. senator for more than 50 years.

“I want to represent you. I’m committed to that. I will maintain my independence,” McMullin told Democratic delegates.

Lee also faced two GOP challengers at his party’s nominating conventions. He handily won in front of the right-leaning crowd with over 70% of the vote. But those candidates will still appear on the primary ballot because they used the state’s other path to the primary ballot and gathered signatures.

Former state lawmaker Becky Edwards garnered about 12% of the vote Saturday. Former gubernatorial deputy chief of staff Ally Isom came in third.

Lee’s relationship with former president Donald Trump has been front and center since CNN reported on text messages showing that the senator was involved in early efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, though Lee later pivoted and voted to confirm the election results after no widespread fraud emerged.

“I did my job,” Lee said about the messages. “I did my job the way that I’ve always promised I would go about doing my job.”

McMullin is a former CIA officer ran for president in 2016 and made inroads in the deeply conservative state where where many GOP voters had reservations about then-candidate Trump. Lee himself cast a protest vote for McMullin, though he later became as staunch Trump ally, and the former president has endorsed him.

A Democrat ran for the nomination, Kael Weston, but the pro-McMullin camp ultimately convinced party delegates to nominate no one, clearing the path for the independent as much as possible. His supporters included prominent Democrats like former Congressman Ben McAdams.

“I know Evan. I trust Evan,” McAdams told delegates during the contentious debate, framing McMullin as the best possible chance to unseat Lee in a state where Republicans outnumber Democrats 4-to-1.

Republican Party Chair Carson Jorgensen took aim at the Democrats’ decision, arguing it showed a weakness in the other party’s platform. “We as Republicans, now’s our time to shine,” he said. “I don’t know if everyone quite understands the gravity of this.”

Also Saturday, moderate Republican Congressman John Curtis was forced into a primary, coming in second in a crowded field that included a challenger who brought in longtime Trump confidant Roger Stone. The effort didn’t carry candidate Jason Preston beyond the first round of voting, however.

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(Reuters) – Republican U.S. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene on Friday told a lawyer for voters seeking to disqualify her from running for re-election that she did not know how to answer a question about whether she advocates violence against people with whom she disagrees.

Greene testified in a Georgia state court in Atlanta in a novel legal challenge to her candidacy accusing her of violating a U.S. Constitution provision called the “Insurrectionist Disqualification Clause” by supporting an incendiary rally that preceded last year’s attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Andrew Celli, a lawyer for the voters, asked Greene during the hearing before administrative law judge Charles Beaudrot whether she has advocates political violence against people with whom she disagrees.

“I don’t think so,” Greene replied. “I don’t know how to answer that.”

Greene is a prominent supporter of former President Donald Trump. In comments to the media, she has downplayed and justified the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol assault by Trump supporters in their failed bid to block congressional certification of President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.

Trump at the preceding rally told his supporters to march to the Capitol and “fight like hell,” repeating his false claims that the election was stolen through widespread voter fraud. The Trump supporters attacked police, ransacked parts of the Capitol and send lawmakers into hiding for their own safety.

“I was asking people to come for a peaceful march, which everyone is entitled to do,” Greene told the hearing. “I was not asking them to actively engage in violence.”

The constitutional clause, added after the U.S. Civil War of the 1860s, prohibits politicians from running for Congress if they have engaged in “insurrection or rebellion” or “given aid or comfort” to the nation’s enemies.

Greene, who represents a Georgia district in the U.S. House of Representatives, is seeking re-election this year, with the Republican primary scheduled on May 24 and the general election on Nov. 8.

Celli also questioned Greene about a video she recorded in 2019, before she took office, calling U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi a “traitor.” Greene at first denied making the statement, but then admitted to it under questioning by the Celli and the judge.

Greene’s lawyer argued that the statement was “hyperbole” and irrelevant to the case.

The voter challenge is being spearheaded by a group called Free Speech for People that advocates for campaign finance reform. A similar challenge backed by the same group against Republican U.S. Representative Madison Cawthorn failed when a federal judge in North Carolina dismissed that suit on March 4.

Ron Fein, a lawyer for the voters seeking Greene’s disqualification, said in his opening remarks that the congresswoman played an “important role” in instigating the attack on the U.S. Capitol.

“In some cases, the mask falls and she shows us exactly what she intended,” Fein said.

Greene’s lawyer, James Bopp, argued during his opening remarks that removing her from the ballot would be both unfair to her and to voters in her conservative-leaning district. Greene is expected to appeal any ruling against her, and has already brought parallel litigation in U.S. federal court seeking to halt the administrative proceeding.

In a recent court filing, Greene’s lawyers said she “vigorously denies that she aided and engaged in insurrection to obstruct the peaceful transfer of presidential power.”

“Fundamentally, First Amendment rights are at stake, not only the right to vote, as I’ve mentioned, or the right to run for office,” Bopp said during the hearing, referring to the Constitution’s free speech protections.

Absentee ballots will start to be mailed on April 25.

(Reporting by Jan Wolfe; Editing by Will Dunham, Scott Malone and Daniel Wallis)

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By Joseph Ax

LAWRENCE, N.J. (Reuters) -Last year, Xavier Rodriguez got two convictions for marijuana possession expunged from his record, thanks to a new law legalizing the drug in New Jersey.

On Thursday, the 28-year-old was among the initial wave of New Jerseyans waiting in long lines to buy marijuana lawfully, as 13 dispensaries around the state began selling to all residents 21 and older for the first time.

“No more being hassled and having to hide out,” said Rodriguez, standing outside the Zen Leaf dispensary in Lawrence, New Jersey, with his 60-year-old mother, Debra, who uses marijuana for pain caused by rheumatoid arthritis.

Thursday’s debut marked the culmination of a decade-long effort by advocates in the state to legalize recreational use and end years of racially unbalanced criminal prosecution. New Jersey is one of 18 states and the District of Columbia to have legalized adult marijuana use.

“We see it as the end of Prohibition 2.0,” said Ben Kovler, chief executive of Green Thumb Industries, which operates dispensaries in Paterson and Bloomfield.

The 13 locations are owned by Ascend Wellness Holdings Inc, Columbia Care Inc, Acreage Holdings Inc, Green Thumb Industries Inc, Curaleaf Holdings Inc, Terrascend Corp and Verano Holdings Corp.

Industry executives and analysts expect the market will eventually exceed $2 billion. Governor Phil Murphy’s proposed budget anticipates $121 million in cannabis revenue, mostly from taxes and fees, in fiscal year 2023.

There are currently 130,000 medical marijuana patients in New Jersey, and the state’s Cannabis Regulatory Commission estimates there are roughly 800,000 potential recreational customers.

“The goal here is to take people away from the black market and bring them into the safe, legal market,” said George Archos, chief executive of Verano, which owns the Zen Leaf in Lawrence.

More than 100 people stood in a line snaking around Zen Leaf’s building on Thursday morning. Employees with tablets offered advice on choosing from a menu of products ranging from Ethos Cookies (“frosty and delicious”) to Chemlatto 33 (“earthy and rich”) – both hybrid strains of smokable cannabis.

Dean Miller, 39, said he has a medical card for marijuana but chose to wait in the adult-use line to show support for what he called “a big day for New Jersey.”

He said he hoped legalization would help educate people on marijuana’s therapeutic effects, without the downsides of substances such as alcohol.

“I’m not just looking to get high,” said Miller, who relies on daily marijuana to cope with pain from six surgeries.

‘PURSUING EQUITY’

Only medical marijuana dispensaries can sell to adults for now, but the commission is weighing hundreds of applications from start-up businesses. Those owned by people with marijuana convictions, as well as minorities, women and disabled veterans, receive priority consideration under the law.

The law requires much of the state’s cannabis revenue to be invested in communities most harmed by the “war on drugs.”

In 2018, Black people were arrested more than three times as often as white people for marijuana offenses despite similar usage rates, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey.

“That’s the whole point here: making sure we’re pursuing equity every step of the way and ending our reliance on a criminal response for something that people consume all over the country,” said Amol Sinha, the group’s executive director.

Cannabis executives hope a successful launch in New Jersey will spur other East Coast states to take action, noting that polls show a majority of Americans support legalizing marijuana.

“It’s time for legislators to catch up with the American consumer,” said Joe Bayern, the chief executive of Curaleaf.

(Reporting by Joseph AxEditing by Bill Berkrot)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Congress will have to act if it wants to extend a sweeping, pandemic-related expulsion policy known as Title 42 that has effectively closed down the U.S. asylum system, the White House said on Wednesday.

“Right now we are planning and preparing for the end of Title 42 enforcement on May 23rd,” White House spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters.

She noted that President Joe Biden wanted to reform the immigration system and that some lawmakers favored a delay of Title 42 implementation while others oppose it. “This would all require congressional action. We’re happy to have that conversation with them.”

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Jeff Mason; Editing by Leslie Adler)

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WASILLA, Alaska (AP) — Sarah Palin isn’t used to sharing the spotlight.

In the nearly 14 years since she burst onto the national political scene, the former Alaska governor has appeared on reality television programs, written books, spent time as a Fox News contributor, formed a political action committee in her name and been a rumored White House contender. She more recently revived her status as a conservative sensation with an ultimately unsuccessful lawsuit against The New York Times.

Now, the first Republican female vice presidential nominee is vying for what could be considered a less glamorous role: a member of the U.S. House.

Palin is among 48 candidates running for Alaska’s lone House seat following the death last month of Republican Rep. Don Young, who held the job for 49 years. If successful, Palin would be one of 435 members in a chamber where ambition runs deep but legislating is tough, in no small part because of the populist politics that took hold in the aftermath of the 2008 election.

Given those dynamics, it would be easy to dismiss Palin’s candidacy as the latest headline-grabbing twist in an unconventional career. Some of her critics have sought to cast her as an opportunist seeking to bolster her brand. The opinion section of the website of Alaska’s largest newspaper is dotted with letters to the editor urging Alaskans to reject her run. Some remind readers she left the last major job she had in politics, as Alaska’s governor, with about 16 months left in her term.

But in a recent interview with The Associated Press, Palin, 58, dismissed such critiques. She insisted her commitment to Alaska has not wavered and those who suggest otherwise “don’t know me.” She said she is serious about seeking the House seat and doesn’t need a “launching pad for anything else.”

In fact, she said, her unique place in American politics would put her in a stronger position in Washington. Unlike other freshmen lawmakers, she said, she could “pick up the phone and call any reporter and be on any show if I wanted to, and it would be all about Alaska.”

“I love to work, and anyone who is around me, they know,” she said. “What I’m doing is applying for a job, for Alaskans, saying: ‘Hey, you guys would be my boss. Do you want to hire me? Because if you do, I’ll do a good job for you, and I won’t back down.’”

There’s only one former governor who is currently a member of the House — Democrat Charlie Crist of Florida. Palin faces several hurdles to get there.

One is navigating elections that will unfold in rapid order. A June 11 special primary will be the first statewide by-mail election. The four candidates who get the most votes will advance to an Aug. 16 special election, in which ranked-choice voting will be used. The winner will serve the remainder of Young’s term, which expires in January.

There also will be an August primary and November general election to determine who will serve a two-year term starting in January. Palin is one of 16 candidates so far to have filed for the regular primary.

Some voters question Palin’s decision to leave the governor’s office, a move she has attributed to an onslaught of records requests and ethics complaints she said were frivolous and had become distractions.

She has spent time out of the state but maintains a home in Wasilla, her hometown and where she got her start in politics.

“Well, I’m sorry if that narrative is out there because it’s inaccurate,” she said of the perception she had left Alaska behind. She said Alaska is her home and that she was “shoveling moose poop” in her father’s yard on a recent sunny day before calling a reporter.

She has regularly voted in state elections since leaving office, according to the Division of Elections.

“I’m still all about Carhartts and steel-toed boots and just hard work,” Palin said, referring to a popular brand of outerwear. “I just have been blessed with opportunities and a platform to get out there and tell and show other people the beauty of being an Alaskan.”

She mentions Alaskans’ hunting lifestyles and the importance of responsibly developing the state’s oil and gas resources. She said she plans to attend events, including this week’s state Republican Party convention.

The contest in Republican-leaning Alaska will do little to change the balance of power in Washington. But the election is being closely watched as a barometer of former President Donald Trump’s connection to the GOP’s most loyal voters.

In Wasilla, Trump 2020 or Trump 2024 banners fly from several homes, the few political signs seen so far this election year. Palin said if Trump runs for president in 2024 and asks her to be his running mate, she’d consider it, though she said he could choose anyone and they haven’t had such a candid conversation.

Palin said Trump was among those who contacted her after Young’s death asking if she would be willing to run. She said this is a good time in her life to seek a return to office, politically and personally. Her family life has changed, she noted, with her four older children grown. Her youngest, Trig, is in middle school. Palin was divorced from Todd Palin, her husband of more than 30 years, in 2020.

Palin said she feels like she has “nothing to lose” in running. After having her political and personal life in the media glare for so long, “what more can they say?” she said, adding later: “To me, it’s freedom.”

Trump has endorsed Palin and has made the state’s senior U.S. senator, Lisa Murkowski, one of his top targets this year after she criticized him and voted to convict him during his second impeachment trial.

Even if Palin doesn’t win the election, she could emerge as a high-wattage critic of Murkowski, who faces voters later this year. Palin said she disagrees with Murkowski on some of her positions, including her vote to convict Trump during his second impeachment trial. But on issues like resource development in Alaska, Palin said she believed they would be “on the same sheet of music.”

Palin has perhaps the highest profile among a list of candidates that includes current and former state legislators, a North Pole city council member whose legal name is Santa Claus, and Republican Nick Begich, who got into the race last fall and has been working for months to rack up conservative support.

Begich said he considers the Matanuska-Susitna region, a conservative hotbed that includes Wasilla, as one of his strongest areas. He said he is unaware of any of his supporters defecting since Palin joined the race.

“Everyone that has come to support me remains fully supportive, and that’s a strong statement because a lot has changed,” he said.

Tim Burney, who lives in Wasilla, said he supports Palin. He said she resigned “for the good of the state” after her detractors “came at her with guns ablazing.”

“She just lives right down the road here, and, you know, she grew up here,” he said while smoking a cigarette outside the Mug-Shot Saloon after finishing lunch on a recent day.

“Her heart’s here in Alaska, and I think that she’s good for Alaska,” he said.

Joe Miller, a former Republican and now Libertarian whom Palin endorsed in two of his unsuccessful Senate races, said Palin would be no ordinary House freshman and would have an “extraordinary” platform she could use to help Alaska. He said she’s the “only anti-establishment, truly conservative” candidate in the race and that she could be the “natural repository” for voter angst over economic and other issues.

Holly Houghton, who works as a pharmacy tech, is willing to hear Palin out. Houghton, who was eating a take-out lunch with her son outside a restaurant in Wasilla recently, said she has mixed feelings about Palin and is also considering Begich.

Houghton said she doesn’t like how Palin has carried herself in her personal life but also thought she was an “excellent” governor.

Houghton said she thinks of the Begich family as Democrats and wants to look more closely at Begich. Begich’s grandfather, Democrat Nick Begich, held the House seat before Young. His uncle Mark was a Democratic U.S. senator and his uncle Tom is the state Senate’s Democratic leader.

Jesse Sumner, a member of the Matanuska-Susitna Borough Assembly, said he thinks Begich is a good candidate. Sumner filed to run for the House seat as a joke at the filing deadline, on April Fool’s Day. He later withdrew.

He said he doesn’t see Palin around town much and that Palin’s run seems to be “more like it’s about the Sarah Palin show than about Alaska.”

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Bohrer reported from Juneau, Alaska.

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By Jeff Mason, Trevor Hunnicutt and David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration said on Tuesday it would appeal a judge’s ruling ending a mask mandate on airplanes if public health officials deem it necessary to stem the spread of COVID-19.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, to whom the administration was deferring, said that it would continue to study whether the mandates were still needed. The mandates apply to planes, trains and other public transportation and, prior to Monday’s ruling, had been due to expire on May 3.

“We will continue to assess the need for a mask requirement in those settings, based on several factors, including the U.S. COVID-19 community levels, risk of circulating and novel variants, and trends in cases and disease severity,” a CDC spokesperson said in a statement on Tuesday.

The Justice Department said it would appeal Monday’s ruling by U.S. District Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle that the 14-month-old directive was unlawful, if the CDC determined the mandate was needed to protect public health.

The ruling overturned a key presidential effort to reduce the spread of COVID-19.

“If CDC concludes that a mandatory order remains necessary for the public’s health after that assessment, the Department of Justice will appeal the district court’s decision,” the Justice Department said in a statement.

The CDC reiterated that it recommends that people wear masks on public transportation while indoors.

That came hours after Biden, on a trip to New Hampshire, answered a question about whether people should continue to wear masks on planes, by saying, “It’s up to them.”

Monday’s court decision, made in response to a lawsuit filed last year in Tampa, Florida, means the CDC’s public transportation masking order is no longer in effect, a U.S. official said.

It comes as COVID-19 infections are rising in the United States, and more than 400 people are dying daily from the airborne disease, based on the latest seven-day average.

The ruling followed a string of judgments against Biden administration directives to fight the infectious disease that has killed nearly 1 million Americans, including vaccination or COVID testing mandates for employers.

“Public health decisions shouldn’t be made by the courts. They should be made by public health experts,” White House spokesperson Jen Psaki said.

(Reporting by Jeff Mason, Trevor Hunnicutt and David Shepardson; Editing by Scott Malone, Jonathan Oatis, Heather Timmons and Lincoln Feast)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A lawsuit seeking to block Republican representative Marjorie Taylor Greene from seeking reelection, alleging she is unfit for office because of her support of rioters who attacked the U.S. Capitol, can proceed, a federal judge ruled Monday.

In a legal challenge filed with the Georgia Secretary of State, a group of voters claimed Greene violated a provision of the U.S. Constitution passed after the U.S. Civil War known as the “Insurrectionist Disqualification Clause.”

Greene sought a temporary injunction against that lawsuit, arguing it was unlikely to be resolved before Georgia’s primary elections on May 24.

Judge Amy Totenberg of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia wrote in a 73-page ruling on the injunction that the court focused on whether Greene could “establish a strong likelihood of prevailing on the merits of her legal claims.”

Greene had failed “to establish a substantial likelihood of success on the merits,” Totenberg wrote.

Greene has downplayed and justified the Jan. 6, 2021, attack, in which supporters of Donald Trump stormed the Capitol, battling with police to gain entry to the building.

The attack followed a fiery speech by Trump near the White House repeated his false claims that his 2020 election defeat was the result of widespread fraud.

“Jan. 6 was just a riot at the Capitol and if you think about what our Declaration of Independence says, it says to overthrow tyrants,” Greene said during a radio program in October.

She said in a statement earlier this year that she opposes all forms of political violence.

(Reporting by Heather Timmons)

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ATLANTA (AP) — A federal judge on Monday ruled that a group of Georgia voters can proceed with legal efforts seeking to disqualify U.S Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene from running for reelection to Congress, citing her role in the deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol.

The challenge filed last month with the Georgia secretary of state’s office alleges that Greene, a Republican, helped facilitate the Jan. 6, 2021, riot that disrupted Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s presidential election victory. That violates a rarely cited provision of the 14th Amendment and makes her ineligible to run for reelection, according to the challenge.

The amendment says no one can serve in Congress “who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress . . . to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same.” Ratified shortly after the Civil War, it was meant in part to keep representatives who had fought for the Confederacy from returning to Congress.

Greene, 47, filed a lawsuit earlier this month asking a judge to declare that the law that the voters are using to challenge her eligibility is itself unconstitutional and to prohibit state officials from enforcing it.

Judge Amy Totenberg, in a 73-page ruling, denied Greene’s request for a preliminary injunction and temporary restraining order.

Totenberg, who was appointed to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia by President Barack Obama, wrote that Greene had failed to meet the “burden of persuasion” in her request for injunctive relief.

Georgia law says any voter who is eligible to vote for a candidate may challenge that candidate’s qualifications by filing a written complaint within two weeks after the deadline for qualifying. The secretary of state must then notify the candidate of the challenge and request a hearing before an administrative law judge. After holding a hearing, the administrative law judge presents findings to the secretary of state, who then must determine whether the candidate is qualified.

Free Speech for People, a national election and campaign finance reform group, filed the challenge March 24 on behalf of the group of voters.

Greene said in her lawsuit that she “vigorously denies that she ‘aided and engaged in insurrection to obstruct the peaceful transfer of presidential power.”

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