Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill creating a fund for victims of the now-closed boys’ school, and the Supreme Court upheld red flag laws.
Governor DeSantis signs Dozier School Fund bill
Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill Friday authorizing a $20 million fund for victims of Dozier School for Boys in Marianna.
The funds will be distributed to hundreds of now elderly men known as the “White House Boys” who endured horrific abuse while in state custody.
The school closed in 2011 after decades of physical, sexual and psychological abuse of students. Several boys died there.
Then in 2013, more than 50 bodies were discovered buried in unmarked graves at Dozier.
Some of the surviving victims traveled to Tallahassee in February to tell their stories to lawmakers.
“I was a victim. Let’s change that. I am a hero and a survivor of Dodger School for Boys,” Ralph Freeman said at the time. “I can’t let Dodger win. I was tortured. To this day, I can’t have children because of what happened to me at Dodger.”
The bill will come into effect on July 1st.
State Sen. Darryl Rouson is one of the biggest supporters of the Senate version of the bill.
Supreme Court upholds gun ban for domestic abusers
The Supreme Court on Friday upheld a ban on domestic violence perpetrators possessing firearms, marking the court’s first major Second Amendment decision since a 2022 case that significantly expanded gun rights.
Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion for the near-unanimous majority, with only conservative Justice Clarence Thomas, who wrote the decision in the 2022 firearms case, dissenting.
“Individuals that the Court determines pose a credible threat to the physical safety of others may be temporarily disarmed pursuant to the Second Amendment,” Justice Roberts wrote in the 8-1 majority opinion.
The lawsuit was filed by Zackie Rahimi, a Texas man accused of punching his girlfriend after an argument in a parking lot in 2019 and later threatening to shoot her. Rahimi was issued a restraining order in 2020 but “repeatedly violated the order,” including being involved in five separate shootings, the federal government said in a lawsuit filing. After it was determined that Rahimi was a suspect in the shootings, police obtained a warrant and searched his home, where they “found a .45 caliber pistol, a .308 caliber rifle, magazines, ammunition, and a copy of the protection order.”
Rahimi argued that the federal government violated his Second Amendment rights by denying him firearms. But during oral arguments last year, the Biden administration argued that the 1994 regulation at the center of the case – which bans people who have restraining orders keeping them away from their spouses or partners from owning firearms – is consistent with longstanding practice of taking weapons away from dangerous people.
“When a restraining order includes a finding that an individual poses a credible threat to the physical safety of an intimate partner, that individual may be prohibited from possessing a firearm for the duration of the order pursuant to the Second Amendment,” Justice Roberts wrote in his ruling. “Since our founding, our firearms laws have contained provisions prohibiting individuals who pose a threat of physical harm to others from misusing firearms.”
“The combined Surety and Armed Acts confirm what common sense would suggest: that when an individual poses a clear threat of physical violence to another person, that threatener may be disarmed,” he added.
During arguments last year, some justices expressed concern that a ruling in Rahimi’s favor could jeopardize a background check system that the Biden administration claims has prevented more than 75,000 firearms sales based on domestic violence protective orders over the past 25 years.
Thomas, who authored the landmark 2022 decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen that struck down the state’s requirement that people show “good cause” for a concealed carry permit, argued that “no single historic regulation justifies the law at issue.”
“The Framers and ratifiers of the Constitution understood that the right to keep and bear arms was essential to the preservation of liberty,” Thomas wrote. “But by allowing the government to regulate certain segments of society, today’s decision puts Second Amendment rights at risk for many more people.”
How Democrats are trying to maintain control of the U.S. Senate this fall
Democrats in the U.S. Senate face an uphill battle this fall to hold on to their slim majority.
In total, Democrats will defend 22 Senate seats in November, double the number Republicans must defend.
Michigan Sen. Gary Peters is chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which is tasked with keeping the Senate in Democratic hands.
The Senate is currently narrowly split, 51-49. The majority is made up of 47 Democrats and four independents who join them. Twenty-two of those seats are up for grabs in November. West Virginia’s 23rd seat is widely expected to flip to Republican because of the retirement of Sen. Joe Manchin, a Democrat-turned-independent.
Ten states stand out as notable Senate races: five where Democratic incumbents are seeking to keep their seats (Montana, Nevada, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin), three where retirements have left the race deadlocked (Arizona, Maryland, and Michigan), and two Republican-held seats where Democrats see a chance to retake (Florida and Texas).
Peters argued that Democrats have an advantage in what he calls “quality of candidates.” He said most of the candidates in battleground states have deep roots in their states and are well-known political brands. He noted that Republican candidates in battleground states for the Senate, such as Montana, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Nevada, have either moved to their states in recent years or have lived elsewhere for years.
“What I’ve found about Republicans is that they have a lot of very wealthy people who can self-fund their campaigns, but they don’t really have much to do with the state,” Peters said. “They often come from out of state and just land in the state and say, ‘Hey, I want to be your state senator.’ That never works.”
The toughest races for Democrats are in Montana and Ohio, where incumbent Senators Jon Tester and Sherrod Brown are each seeking fourth terms in states won twice by former Republican President Donald Trump.
Tester is adamant that he is a third-generation Montana farmer who lost three fingers in a meat grinder, while Brown has consistently touted his origins as an Ohio native and an advocate for the common worker.
