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Texas Briefly

Monday, October 18, 2021

Biden administration asks Supreme Court to block Texas law banning most abortions

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration is asking the Supreme Court to block the Texas law banning most abortions, while the fight over the measure's constitutionality plays out in the courts.

The administration also took the unusual step of telling the justices they could grant the Texas law full review and decide its fate this term, which already includes a major case about the future of abortion rights in the U.S.

No court has yet reached a decision on the constitutionality of the Texas law, and the Supreme Court rarely grants such requests.

 

Texas passes new limits on transgender high school athletes

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Texas is poised to become the latest and most populous state to tighten restrictions on transgender athletes in public high school sports.

State lawmakers on Sunday approved a measure that requires transgender athletes to play on teams that align with the gender listed on their original birth certificate, not their current gender identity. The bill pushed by the Legislature's Republican majority now goes to GOP Gov. Greg Abbott, who is expected to sign it into law.

Texas would join at least five other states that have passed similar measures in recent months and the bill may yet face legal challenges.

Activists for transgender athletes and LGBTQ issues have called the bill mean-spirited and discriminatory.

“This cruel and grotesque ban puts a target on the backs of transgender children and adults, erases intersex people and sends a clear message that transgender and intersex people aren’t welcome or safe in Texas,” said Ricardo Martinez, chief executive officer of Equality Texas.

But supporters of the bill said it is needed to protect girls from athletes who might be bigger, faster and stronger.

“We have the opportunity today to stand up for our daughters, our granddaughters and all our Texas girls,” Republican state Rep. Valoree Swanson said before the bill passed the state house last week.

Texas already had a similar rule enforced by the University Interscholastic League, the state's governing body for public school sports and the nearly 850,000 athletes who participate. But that rule makes exceptions if a birth certificate is later changed to reflect a current gender identity. The new measure eliminates that exception, but the process for how schools will check original certificates has been left unclear.

UIL officials have said that checking participation eligibility is left up to schools and local school districts, and the agency does not track the number of transgender athletes.

 

Houston Holocaust survivor given France's Legion of Honor

HOUSTON (AP) — An 88-year-old Holocaust survivor from Houston who has spent decades educating people on the genocide of Jews during World War II has been honored by France.

The Houston Chronicle reports that Ruth Steinfeld was awarded the Legion of Honor, France's highest prize, in a ceremony Sunday at Holocaust Museum Houston. As children during the war, Steinfeld and her sister were saved by a French humanitarian organization.

French Consul General Valérie Baraban praised Steinfeld as an “invaluable witness” to the horrors of genocide, saying Steinfeld is “committed to speaking for the 1.5 million children who never had a chance to survive.”

Steinfeld's family was forced from their home in Germany to an internment camp in France. She and her sister and mother were sent to the women's barracks. Their mother released her daughters — ages 7 and 8 — to the care of humanitarian rescuers who got into the camp by posing as the Red Cross.

The girls at first lived in an orphanage and later went into hiding in a private home.

“Lea and I survived because of the goodness in people, in spite of the inhumanities,” Steinfeld said.

Her parents died at Auschwitz.

She and her sister eventually settled in Houston. Her sister died in 2008.

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