Monthly Archives: June 2024

‘Julian Assange Is Free’: WikiLeaks Founder Strikes Plea Deal With US

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“We thank all who stood by us, fought for us, and remained utterly committed in the fight for his freedom,” said WikiLeaks. “Julian’s freedom is our freedom.”

By Common Dreams. Published 6-24-2024

Free Julian Assange protest in Raleigh, NC April 2021. Photo: Anthony Crider/flickr/CC

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Monday reached a deal with the U.S. government, agreeing to plead guilty to one felony related to the disclosure of national security information in exchange for his release from Belmarsh Prison in the United Kingdom.

A related document was filed in federal court in the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. commonwealth. Under the plea agreement, which must still be approved by a judge, the Department of Justice (DOJ) will seek a 62-month sentence, equal to the time that the 52-year-old Australian has served in the U.K. prison while battling his extradition to the United States.

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Sotomayor: Ruling Against Foreign Spouses Will ‘Most Heavily’ Harm Same-Sex Couples

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“The majority’s failure to respect the right to marriage in this country consigns U.S. citizens to rely on the fickle grace of other countries’ immigration laws.”

By Brett Wilkins. Published 6-21-2024 by Common Dreams

United States Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor speaking to attendees at the John P. Frank Memorial Lecture at Gammage Auditorium at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona. in 2017. Photo: Gage Skidmore/flickr/CC

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor warned Friday that her right-wing colleagues’ finding that American citizens have no right to have their foreign spouses admitted to the United States will disproportionately harm same-sex couples—and could foreshadow a future reversal of federal LGBTQ+ marriage equality.

The justices ruled 6-3 along ideological lines in Department of State v. Muñoz that Sandra Muñoz, a civil rights attorney and U.S. citizen, “does not have a fundamental liberty interest in her noncitizen spouse being admitted to the country.”

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Brazilian rape victims who have abortions may face longer in jail than rapists

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Proposed law would further limit access to abortion for the 75% of reported rape victims in Brazil who are under 18

By Diana Cariboni. Published 6-20-2024 by openDemocracy

Demonstrators gathered in front of Brazil’s National Congress in Brasilia on Wednesday to protest a bill that would further criminalise abortions. Screenshot: Euronews

Abortion is illegal in Brazil with only three exceptions: risk to the life of the pregnant person, fetus anencephaly (a condition in which parts of the fetus’ skull and brain don’t develop) and rape. In these cases, people can seek an abortion with no time limits.

But a new bill that Brazilian conservatives are attempting to push through seeks to declare all abortions performed after week 22 of the pregnancy as homicide – and punishable with prison terms of up to 20 years.

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‘Truly Evil’ Clarence Thomas Offers Defense of Guns for Domestic Abusers

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“The Thomas dissent is only further proof that he is simply a threat to America,” said the father of a mass shooting victim.

By Jessica Corbett. Published 6-21-2024 by Common Dreams

Associate U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Screenshot: Library of Congress

“Thank goodness. Also, Clarence Thomas is truly evil.”

That’s how one progressive pollster responded Friday to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 8-1 ruling in United States v. Rahimi, which upheld a law prohibiting individuals subject to a domestic violence restraining order from possessing a firearm.

Critics across the political spectrum called Thomas’ lone dissent in the case “insane” and blasted the right-wing justice as “fucking awful,” a “corrupt lunatic,” and a “contemptible POS” who “continues to undermine the safety of women and disgrace the court.”

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Project 2025: How Trump Win Would Imperil Worker Organizing Gains Under Biden’s NLRB

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The right-wing agenda “offers a playbook for how an administration could jeopardize the NLRB’s ability to protect organizing workers.”

By Julia Conley. Published 6-20-2024 by Common Dreams

Just before oral arguments in an American Federation of Government Employees’ lawsuit against the Trump administration, AFGE and other unions rally to protest the Trump administration’s anti-union executive orders. in 2018. Photo: AFGE/flickr/CC

With longtime labor lawyer Jennifer Abruzzo at the helm of the National Labor Relations Board, serving as general counsel, the Biden administration has worked to reverse the decadeslong trend in the U.S. of weakened labor laws—achieving a high rate of workers voting to join unions, requiring thousands of workers to be reinstated at their jobs after being illegally fired for organizing, and increasing the number of workers who are eligible to unionize.

But as the Center for American Progress (CAP) warned in an analysis published on Thursday, all that progress and more could be erased if former President Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee in the November election, were to win a second term in the White House—enabling him to put the right-wing plot Project 2025 into action.

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Rights Groups To Sue as Louisiana Requires Ten Commandments Displayed in Classrooms

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“Our public schools are not Sunday schools,” the groups said, “and students of all faiths, or no faith, should feel welcome in them.”

By Edward Carver. Published 6-19-2024 by Common Dreams

Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry. Photo:gov.louisiana.gov

Rights groups expressed outrage and promised legal action on Wednesday as Louisiana became the only state to require that the Ten Commandments be displayed in public classrooms.

The law requires all public classrooms, from kindergarten to university-level, to display the commandments in “large, easily readable font” by the start of 2025. Republican Gov. Jeff Landry signed House Bill 71 into law Wednesday after declaring recently that he “could not wait to be sued.”

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‘Love Wins’: Thailand Set to Be First Southeast Asian Nation to Legalize Same-Sex Marriage

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“While there is no doubt that the legalization of marriage for LGBTI couples is a key milestone for Thailand, much more must be done to guarantee full protection,” said one campaigner.

By Brett Wilkins. Published 6-18-2024 by Common Dreams

LGBTQ+ activists celebrate the Thai Senate’s passage of a bill legalizing marriage equality outside the Government House in Bangkok on June 24, 2024. (Photo: Irish Embassy Thailand)

LGBTQ+ advocates around the world on Tuesday cheered the Thai Senate’s passage of a bill legalizing same-sex marriage, a move that—if approved by the country’s king as expected—would make Thailand the first country in Southeast Asia to do so.

The Bangkok Post reported Thai senators voted 130-4, with 18 abstentions, in favor of a bill to legalize same-sex marriages in the country of 72 million people. The Thai House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved the legislation in March. The legislation would become law if it passes further review by the Senate and the Constitutional Court and is approved by King Rama X. Royal assent is a formality that will almost certainly be granted.

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Campaigners Decry ‘Dangerous Escalation’ as NATO Chief Floats Nuclear Deployment

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The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons said both NATO and Russia must “reverse course” and end their nuclear brinkmanship.

By Jake Johnson. Published 6-17-2024 by Common Dreams

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, Photo: NATO/flickr/CC

Nuclear disarmament campaigners on Monday implored NATO and Russia to step back from the brink after the head of the Western military alliance said its members are considering deploying additional atomic weapons to counter Moscow and Beijing.

“This is the dangerous escalation inherent to the deterrence doctrine,” the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) wrote on social media, referring to the notion that the threat of catastrophic nuclear retaliation prevents nations from using atomic weaponry.

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‘Unconscionable’: Prosecution of Arundhati Roy Sanctioned Under Indian Anti-Terror Law

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“This is horrifying—a clear case of political persecution by an authoritarian government,” one of Roy’s publishers wrote.

By Olivia Rosane. Published 6-16-2024 by Common Dreams

Arundhati Roy at Harvard for a lecture in 2010. Photo: jeanbaptisteparis/flickr/CC

Delhi Lieutenant Gov. V. K. Saxena has sanctioned the prosecution of world-renowned Indian author and activist Arundhati Roy over comments she allegedly made 14 years ago regarding Kashmir, officials from his office said on Friday.

Saxena is a member of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), and Roy has been a vocal critic of Modi and what she has described as India’s “descent… into full-blown fascism” under BJP leadership.

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In Snap Election, French Left Forms Alliance To Counter Far Right and Neoliberals

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Leaders of the new alliance vowed to “extinguish the flame” of Marine Le Pen’s far-right party and make a “total break” from President Emmanuel Macron’s anti-worker policies.

By Edward Carver. Published 6-14-2024 by Common Dreams

Image: Nouveau Front Populaire

France’s left-of-center parties announced on Thursday a new alliance aimed at countering both the ultranationalism of Marine Le Pen and the neoliberalism of President Emmanuel Macron in parliamentary elections that Macron called unexpectedly on Sunday.

The new alliance, called the Nouveau Front Populaire (NFP), formed following days of intense negotiations as several parties, most notably the center-left Parti Socialiste (PS) and the left-wing La France Insoumise (LFI), joined forces to put forth a common platform and avoid competing candidates in races for the 577 seats in the National Assembly.

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