Latest news with #Beetlestone
Time of India
a day ago
- Health
- Time of India
US judge blocks Trump religious exemption to birth control coverage
A U.S. judge on Wednesday struck down rules adopted during President Donald Trump's first term that exempt employers with religious or moral objections from having to provide workers with insurance coverage for birth control. U.S. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone in Philadelphia said the 2018 rules were not justified, rejecting the Trump administration's claims that they were necessary to protect the rights of religious employers. The ruling came in a lawsuit by Pennsylvania and New Jersey that reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which in 2020 upheld the rules on technical grounds but did not address their merits. The U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Little Sisters of the Poor, a Roman Catholic order of nuns that intervened in the case to defend the rules, will appeal the ruling, according to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a nonprofit that represents the order. The federal Affordable Care Act requires employers to provide insurance coverage for contraception but allows those with religious objections to seek exemptions. The 2018 rules created a blanket exemption for employers with religious or moral objections to contraception. The Trump administration said that even requiring employers to apply for an exemption could burden their religious practice, in violation of federal law. But Beetlestone on Wednesday said there was a mismatch between the vast scope of the exemption and the relatively small number of employers who may need it. That "casts doubt on whether ... there is a rational connection between the problem the Agencies identified and the solution they had chosen," wrote Beetlestone, an appointee of President Barack Obama, a Democrat.
The Hill
a day ago
- Health
- The Hill
Federal judge blocks Trump administration's broad birth control mandate exemptions
The Trump administration's religious and moral carve-outs to an ObamaCare requirement that all employer health plans cover contraception at no cost were blocked on Wednesday by a federal judge. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone in Philadelphia issued a summary judgment that the rules were arbitrary, capricious and an overreach of the authority of the agencies that wrote them in 2017. Under the rules, essentially any for-profit or nonprofit employer or insurer was allowed to exempt themselves from following the birth control mandate on moral and religious grounds. The rules also let publicly traded companies obtain a religious exemption, but not a moral one. The Affordable Care Act required employer health plans to cover at least one of 18 forms of birth control approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Religious groups and employers sued, and the Supreme Court in 2014 ruled 5-4 that the contraceptive mandate violated the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) rights of closely held corporations whose owners had religious objections. Subsequent agency actions tried to find a balance, but the Trump administration in 2017 issued a blanket exemption. The rules didn't require employers to apply for an exemption because the administration said that would be a violation of their religious rights. Pennsylvania, New Jersey and dozens of other states sued to halt that broad expansion of exemptions and accommodations. That lawsuit reached the Supreme Court in 2020, where the justices upheld the Trump rules on technical grounds but did not address the underlying merits of the case. The case was sent back to the lower court, where a religious group, Little Sisters of the Poor, joined the lawsuit alongside the federal government in asking for summary judgment. Beetlestone, an appointee of former President Obama, wrote that the Trump administration's religious rule did not accomplish what the agencies purportedly wrote it to do, which was to resolve a conflict between the contraceptive mandate and RFRA. But the rule exemptions to organizations that are 'unlikely, if ever, to be capable of maintaining a religious objection, raising further doubts as to any 'rational connection' between the Rule and remedying potential conflicts with RFRA,' Beetlestone wrote. The Little Sisters of the Poor will appeal the ruling in the coming weeks, according to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a nonprofit that represents the order.
GMA Network
2 days ago
- Health
- GMA Network
US judge blocks Trump religious exemption to birth control coverage
A U.S. judge on Wednesday struck down rules adopted during President Donald Trump's first term that exempt employers with religious or moral objections from having to provide workers with insurance coverage for birth control. U.S. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone in Philadelphia said the 2018 rules were not justified, rejecting the Trump administration's claims that they were necessary to protect the rights of religious employers. The ruling came in a lawsuit by Pennsylvania and New Jersey that reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which in 2020 upheld the rules on technical grounds but did not address their merits. The U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Little Sisters of the Poor, a Roman Catholic order of nuns that intervened in the case to defend the rules, will appeal the ruling, according to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a nonprofit that represents the order. The federal Affordable Care Act requires employers to provide insurance coverage for contraception but allows those with religious objections to seek exemptions. The 2018 rules created a blanket exemption for employers with religious or moral objections to contraception. The Trump administration said that even requiring employers to apply for an exemption could burden their religious practice, in violation of federal law. But Beetlestone on Wednesday said there was a mismatch between the vast scope of the exemption and the relatively small number of employers who may need it. That "casts doubt on whether ... there is a rational connection between the problem the Agencies identified and the solution they had chosen," wrote Beetlestone, an appointee of President Barack Obama, a Democrat. The administration of President Joe Biden, a Democrat, had proposed withdrawing the Trump administration rules in 2023 but that proposal was withdrawn weeks before Biden left office in January. — Reuters
Edmonton Journal
29-07-2025
- Edmonton Journal
Wife fends off two bears, husband seriously injured in B.C. grizzly attack
Article content A grizzly bear was acting defensively when it mauled a man on an electric bike near Creston on Saturday, according to B.C. Conservation Service investigators. Article content As a result, the two bears involved will not be captured, relocated, or killed. Article content Article content The encounter unfolded Saturday around 4:40 p.m. in the Creston Valley Wildlife Management Area, where the man and his wife were riding on a trail beside the Kootenay River. Article content Article content Conservation Officer in charge of the Kootenays, Sgt. Ben Beetlestone, said the pair were 'bear aware' and had horns on their bikes as well as bear spray, but startled the two bears as they came around a corner with heavy brush on either side. Article content Article content 'They came around the corner and the bears were right there,' Beetlestone said. 'One bear ran past the man but the other one jumped onto the bike and knocked him off and mauled him.' Article content The man's wife used bear spray to scare both bears off. Article content The man was taken to East Kootenay Regional Hospital in Cranbrook, where he had surgery for significant injuries to his torso and arm. He is expected to recover. Article content Beetlestone said the bears were either two juveniles or a sow and an older cub roughly the same size. Article content Article content 'A lot of grizzly bears use the valley,' he said. Article content Article content Beetlestone said there was no evidence to suggest either bear had been stalking or hunting the couple, and there were no reports of bear activity or aggressive bear behaviour in the area prior to the Saturday afternoon attack. Article content Conservation officers spoke with the man and his wife and also assessed the surrounding area as part of the investigation. A regional large carnivore specialist was also consulted and agreed that 'the bear's behaviour appeared to be defensive.' Article content Because the bears active defensively, there will be no efforts made to capture or relocate the bears. Article content Bear expert Michael Procto r said people riding mountain bikes and electric bikes in bear country was an emerging problem in North America. Article content 'Bikes that are quiet and fast travelling in bear habitat is not a good recipe,' he said.
CNBC
28-06-2025
- Politics
- CNBC
Trump loses latest bid to get Central Park Five defamation lawsuit tossed
A federal judge on Friday dealt another blow to President Donald Trump's efforts to throw out a defamation lawsuit against him filed by plaintiffs formerly known as the Central Park Five. U.S. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone said that Pennsylvania's Anti-SLAPP law, designed to protect defendants from lawsuits targeting protected speech, does not apply in federal court, rejecting Trump's motion to dismiss the case. "The only issue before the Court is whether Plaintiffs' claims for defamation, false light, and intentional infliction of emotional distress ("IIED") can survive given Pennsylvania's Uniform Public Expression Protection Act, otherwise known as its Anti-Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation Statute," Beetlestone wrote in a 13-page filing. "Pennsylvania's Anti-SLAPP Statute (a state law) does not apply here, in federal court," she wrote in the filing, adding: "Accordingly, Defendant's Motion shall be denied." Five men who as teenagers were wrongfully convicted in the so-called Central Park Five jogger rape case sued Trump in October, accusing the then-Republican presidential nominee of defaming them. They cited a number of statements Trump made during his Sept. 10 presidential debate against former Vice President Kamala Harris, accusing him of falsely stating that the men killed somebody and pled guilty to the crime. "These statements are demonstrably false," they wrote in their filing against Trump. The five men — Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Kevin Richardson, Antron McCray and Korey Wise — spent years in prison for the rape and assault of a white female jogger, a crime they were later exonerated of and did not commit. Trump has tried to dismiss the defamation lawsuit against him, but has not been successful. Judge Beetlestone in April also threw out Trump's motion to dismiss the case against him in a different filing.
