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tennessee
10 Million Kids at Risk of Hunger Unless GOP-Led States Embrace Summer EBT Program
"Summer can be the hungriest time for children," said one anti-hunger advocate.
Dec 16, 2024
A dozen states are poised to walk away from a combined $1.14 billion in federal funding that would help alleviate hunger for nearly 10 million children next summer, according to Food Research & Action Center, or FRAC, a nonprofit that addresses poverty-related hunger.
The 12 states, all of which are GOP-led, face a January 1 notice of intent deadline to participate in the Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) Program, also known as SUN Bucks. Under the food assistance program, families with eligible school-age children can get $120 per summer to buy food.
"Summer can be the hungriest time for children," said Crystal FitzSimons, FRAC's interim president, in a Monday statement. "This funding is an opportunity for states to ensure children have access to the nutrition they need to grow, thrive, and return to school ready to learn. No child should have to go hungry during the summer months, especially when solutions like Summer EBT exist."
Currently, Idaho, Alaska, Wyoming, South Dakota, Iowa, Oklahoma, Texas, Mississippi, Tennessee, Georgia, South Carolina, and Florida are set to potentially not participate in the program for this coming summer, according to FRAC. All other U.S. states, Washington, D.C., all U.S. territories, as well as the Cherokee Nation and the Chickasaw Nation are participating this coming summer.
The Summer EBT Program is one of multiple Summer Nutrition Programs administered through the U.S Department of Agriculture. Last summer, the SUN Bucks "bridged the gap" for some 21 million children in 37 states, as well as D.C., all U.S. territories, and multiple Native American tribes, per FRAC.
While the Summer EBT Program, or SUN Bucks, doesn't have widespread name recognition, a poll conducted by Data for Progress this past summer found that once voters read a description of the policy, it enjoyed strong bipartisan support from voters.
The governor of Tennessee has indicated that he will not renew the Summer EBT Program for the state, according to NBC News, despite the fact that FRAC estimates that hundreds of thousands of children would be eligible for the benefit this coming summer. According to FRAC, the program would result in approximately $77.2 million in benefits for struggling families in Tennessee.
FRAC and at least one other group are urging the governor to change course. According to NBC's reporting, advocates say Tennessee presents a particularly acute need for the program because the state's topography can make it hard for families to reach food banks or other meal distribution sites. Also, some communities in the eastern part of the state that struggle with hunger and poverty were also impacted by Hurricane Helen earlier this year.
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Supreme Court Signals It Will Uphold 'State-Sanctioned Discrimination' in Transgender Care Case
"We the people means all the people," said the ACLU. "There is no 'transgender' exception to the U.S. Constitution."
Dec 04, 2024
Attorneys who argued against Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming healthcare at the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday expressed hope that the court's nine justices will take "the opportunity to affirm the essential freedom and equality of all people before the law," while reports indicated that the right-wing majority is inclined to uphold the ban.
"Every day this law inflicts further pain, injustice, and discrimination on families in Tennessee and prevents them from receiving the medical care they need," said Lucas Cameron-Vaughn, staff attorney at the ACLU of Tennessee, which represented three families and a physician. "We ask the Supreme Court to commit to upholding the promises of the U.S. Constitution for all people by putting an end to Tennessee's state-sanctioned discrimination against trans youth and their families."
The law, S.B. 1, which was passed in March 2023, bars medical providers from prescribing puberty-delaying medications, other hormonal treatment, and surgical procedures to transgender minors and youths with gender dysphoria.
The Supreme Court case, United States v. Skrmetti, applies only to the ban on puberty blockers and hormonal therapy for minors; a lower court found the plaintiffs did not have legal standing to challenge the surgery ban.
The ACLU, the ACLU of Tennessee, Lambda Legal, and a law firm were joined by the Biden administration in arguing that Tennessee allows doctors to prescribe puberty blockers and other hormonal treatments for youths with congenital defects, early puberty, diseases, or physical injuries.
As such, said the plaintiffs, Tennessee's ban for transgender and nonbinary youths violates the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment, which guarantees equal treatment under the law.
"My heart—and the heart of every transgender advocate fighting this fight—is heavy with the weight of what these laws mean for people's everyday lives."
The court's three liberal justices—Justices Sonya Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson—all indicated they believed Tennessee has tried to classify people according to sex or gender with the law.
"One of the articulated purposes of this law is essentially to encourage gender conformity and to discourage anything other than gender conformity," said Kagan. "Sounds to me like, 'We want boys to be boys and we want girls to be girls,' and that's an important purpose behind the law."
Matthew Rice, the lawyer representing Tennessee in the case, claimed the state simply wants to prevent "regret" among minors, and the court's six conservative justices signaled they were inclined to allow Tennessee to ban the treatments—which are endorsed by the American Academy of Pediatrics and other top medical associations.
Chief Justice John Roberts said the nine justices should not overrule the decision made by lawmakers representing Tennessee residents, considering there is debate over the issue, and pointed to changes some European countries have made to their gender-affirming care protocols for minors.
Representing the Biden administration, U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar acknowledged that there has been debate about gender-affirming care in the U.S. and abroad, but pointed out that countries including the U.K. and Sweden have not outright banned treatment.
"I think that's because of the recognition that this care can provide critical, sometimes lifesaving benefits for individuals with severe gender dysphoria," she said.
Following the arguments, plaintiff Brian Williams, who has a 16-year-old daughter in need of gender-affirming care, addressed supporters who had assembled outside the Supreme Court.
"Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming medical care is an active threat to the future my daughter deserves," said Williams. "It infringes not only on her freedom to be herself but on our family's love for her. We are not expecting everyone to understand everything about our family or the needs of transgender young people like our daughter. What we are asking for is for her freedom to be herself without fear. We are asking for her to be able to access the care she needs and enter adulthood knowing nothing is holding her back because of who she is."
Sotomayor said there is "very clear" evidence "that there are some children who actually need this treatment."
A 2022 study led by researchers at the University of Washington found that transgender and nonbinary youths aged 13-20 were 60% less likely to experience moderate or severe depression and 73% less likely to be suicidal after receiving gender-affirming care.
Prelogar asked the justices to "think about the real-world consequences of laws like S.B. 1," highlighting the case of a plaintiff identified as Ryan Roe.
Roe had such severe gender dysphoria that "he was throwing up before school every day," said Prelogar. "He thought about going mute because his voice caused him so much distress. And Ryan has told the courts that getting these medications after a careful consultation process with his doctors and his parents, has saved his life."
"But Tennessee has come in and categorically cut off access to Ryan's care," she added. "This law harms Ryan's health and the health of all other transgender adolescents for whom these medications are a necessity."
Tennessee is home to about 3,100 transgender teenagers, and about 110,000 transgender youths between the ages of 13-17 live in the 24 states where gender-affirming care is restricted.
More than 20 states have laws that could be impacted by the court's ruling in United States v. Skrmetti.
"My heart—and the heart of every transgender advocate fighting this fight—is heavy with the weight of what these laws mean for people's everyday lives," said Chase Strangio, co-director of the ACLU's LGBTQ & HIV Project. "But I also know that every out trans person has embraced the unknown in the name of living free from shame or the limits of other people's expectations."
"My heart aches for the parents who spent years watching their children in distress and eventually found relief in the medical care that Tennessee now overrides their judgment to ban," said Strangio. "Whatever happens today, tomorrow, and in the months and years to come, I trust that we will come together to fight for the realized promise of our Constitution's guarantee of equal protection for all."
A ruling in the case is expected in June.
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Climate Movement Says 'Hurricane Helene Must Be a Wake-Up Call'
"To those insisting that, 'This is not the time!' to have those other conversations, I say: This is *exactly* when we need to be having them," said one climate scientist.
Sep 29, 2024
As emergency crews have worked through the weekend to rescue people and restore essential services across several southeastern U.S. states, green groups in recent days have pointed to the death and damage from Hurricane Helene as just the latest evidence of the need for sweeping action on the climate emergency.
Helene made landfall as a Category 4 hurricane with 140 mph winds in Florida's Big Bend region late Thursday, then left a path of destruction across hundreds of miles of Georgia, the Carolinas, and Tennessee. As of early Sunday, at least 64 people are confirmed dead—including at least two people in Virginia—though that figure is expected to rise.
"Moody's Analytics said it expects $15 billion to $26 billion in property damage," The Associated Pressreported Sunday on what is now a post-tropical cyclone. "AccuWeather's preliminary estimate of the total damage and economic loss from Helene in the U.S. is between $95 billion and $110 billion."
The youth-led Sunrise Movementsaid Sunday that "any reporting about Hurricane Helene needs to be clear—this is not normal. This is not just a tragedy. This is a crime. Fossil fuel companies have known this would happen for the last 50 years. They lied to the public and bought out our government just to make a profit. Make them pay."
Greenpeace USA similarly declared on social media Saturday that "#HURRICANEHELENE MUST BE A WAKE-UP CALL FOR CLIMATE JUSTICE!"
"We are heartbroken," the group said, noting the dozens of people killed. "Communities have been devastated. The corporations heating the climate must be held accountable."
Dozens of communities across the United States have already
launched climate liability lawsuits against Big Oil, which knew for decades that fossil fuels would heat the planet but promoted disinformation and raked in huge profits. Recently there have been calls for legal action by the U.S. Department of Justice and potential homicide cases brought by state and local prosecutors.
"Our hearts and solidarity go out to everyone facing the devastation. Please support mutual aid relief efforts and demand oil companies #StartDrillingStartPaying!" Greenpeace said Saturday.
Sunrise executive director Aru Shiney-Aja on Sunday offered a "friendly reminder that fossil fuel companies get 20 BILLION dollars in [government] subsidies every year," while the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) "runs out of money to respond to disasters like Helene."
Both Shiney-Aja and Greenpeace shared footage from Asheville, North Carolina, which endured what Ryan Cole, the assistant director of Buncombe County Emergency Services, described as "biblical flooding."
Just two years ago,
The New Ledereported that "from wildfires racing through the drought-stricken West, to heavy flooding in the central and eastern regions of the United States, extreme weather events are spurring many Americans to seek refuge in more environmentally stable cities, so-called 'climate havens,'" including Asheville.
This weekend, Asheville—which is over 2,000 feet above sea level and more than 250 miles from the coast—and surrounding communities are contending with disrupted water, power, and communications services due to what officials are reportedly calling "Buncombe County's own Hurricane Katrina."
Noting Asheville's elevation and distance from the coast, Lucky Tran, director of science communications and media relations at Columbia University in New York City, said Sunday that "no place is safe from climate change. We all suffer the consequences. We must all take action. We are all in this together."
As
The New York Timesreported Sunday:
People across western North Carolina chainsawed their way to loved ones and drove for hours Saturday on dwindling gas tanks in search of food and power, in what one resident described as a "mini-apocalypse" after Hurricane Helene.
Authorities said the region was facing a historic disaster a day after the powerful storm swept through the Southeast, downing power lines and washing out highways. Landslides, spotty cellphone service, and a gas shortage complicated rescue and recovery efforts. Some stranded people were being airlifted to safety.
Antonia Juhasz, a leading climate and energy journalist and author, said Saturday that "Asheville, North Carolina is being wiped off the map by the worst storm to hit the region in a generation. This is what the climate crisis looks like: the production and use of fossil fuels changes the climate, intensifying extreme weather events and making them more frequent."
As hurricane scientist Jeff Masters detailed Friday, fossil fuel-driven climate change "makes the strongest hurricanes stronger," boosts rainfall from such storms, leads to more rapid intensification, and causes sea-level rise that increases storm surge damage.
In an effort to emphasize the climate change connection to extreme weather, from heatwaves to hurricanes, some climate campaigners have suggested naming such events after oil and gas companies.
"What did a Helene ever do to deserve getting this horrific hurricane named after her? We should be naming hurricanes after fossil fuel CEOs instead. How about Hurricane Darren?" said Fossil Free Media director Jamie Henn, taking aim at ExxonMobil's Darren Woods.
Daniel Swain, a climate scientist focused on extreme weather, said on social media Saturday, "The images and stories just beginning to emerge from eastern TN and western NC in the aftermath of widespread catastrophic flooding wrought by Helene are genuinely horrifying, and the full scale of the disaster is likely as yet untold."
"This was, by far, the most extreme rain event in observed record across much/most of the region, where reliable records date back over 100 [years]. Unsurprisingly, the flooding which resulted has also been widespread, historic, and generally catastrophic across a broad region," he explained. "These floods, which were concentrated in valleys containing rivers and typically modest creeks and streams, involved extremely large volumes of water moving downhill at high velocity. This was not a gradual or 'gentle' inundation by any means."
Swain stressed that "sometimes 'worst-case' scenarios really do come to pass, and I think we often lack the collective imagination to fully envision what that looks like. That's a problem, because being honest about risks that exist is [the] first step toward mitigating them and preventing harm!"
"Ultimately, there many folks in FL, GA, NC, and TN who are in need of urgent assistance—and that is/should be foremost priority," he added. "But to those insisting that, 'This is not the time!' to have those other conversations, I say: This is *exactly* when we need to be having them."
The AP reported that "in Atlanta, 11.12 inches (28.24 centimeters) of rain fell over 48 hours, the most the city has seen over two days since record-keeping began in 1878," while "in Florida's Big Bend, some lost nearly everything they own, emerging from the storm without even a pair of shoes."
Along Florida's Gulf Coast, "Helene shoved a wall of water estimated at least 10 feet high into the lowest-lying areas of Steinhatchee," according toUSA Today.
South of there, in Pinellas County, officials have identified over 18,000 homes damaged by Helene—and at least 11,000 are "uninhabitable," as the Tampa Bay Timesput it.
Highlighting the
connection between climate change and more intense hurricanes, Congressman Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) said Thursday that "the climate crisis is here. We must act to save lives."
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