NATION/WORLD
Tuesday, May 17, 2016
MEDAL OF VALOR
East Oregonian
Short-handed Supreme Court
dodges birth control decision
By MARK SHERMAN
Associated Press
AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster
President Barack Obama shakes hands with Oficer
Niel Johnson of the North Miami Police Department
after presenting him with the Medal of Valor during
a ceremony Monday in the East Room of the White
House in Washington.
Obama says U.S.
must heed police
By JOSH LEDERMAN
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Pres-
ident Barack Obama called
on the nation Monday to
support and listen to its law
enforcement oficers as he
bestowed the Medal of Valor
on 13 oficers who risked
their lives to save others.
In a ceremony in the East
Room, Obama draped the
purple-and-gold
ribbons
around the necks of oficers
who intervened in shooting
rampages, hostage situations
and an armed robbery. He
pledged to keep working
toward a bipartisan overhaul
to make the criminal justice
system fairer, smarter and
more effective so that oficers
are well-equipped to enforce
the country’s laws.
“We can show our respect
by listening to you, learning
from you, giving you the
resources that you need to
do your jobs,” Obama said.
“Our country needs that right
now.”
Three Santa Monica,
California, oficers — Jason
Salas, Robert Sparks and
Capt. Raymond Botten-
ield — were honored for
their response to a 2013
rampage on a community
college campus that left ive
people dead. Confronting
23-year-old gunman John
Zawahri in the campus
library, the oficers shot and
killed him when he pointed
his assault weapon at them.
Obama also honored
Gregory Stevens of suburban
Dallas, who exchanged
gunire with two armed
men outside an exhibit hall
holding a provocative contest
for caricatures of the Prophet
Muhammad. Both gunmen
were killed, heading off what
investigators suspected was a
planned mass shooting.
The Medal of Valor
ceremony comes amid a
simmering public debate
about police tactics and
racial disparities in the
justice system. Obama has
walked a careful line on
the issue — expressing
support for most law
enforcement oficials, while
also endorsing protesters’
complaints about racial
proiling and mistreatment
by police.
In his remarks on
Monday, Obama steered that
conversation toward his push
for a sentencing overhaul and
other changes to the justice
system, an effort that has
found backing in both camps.
Obama said he holds out
hope that legislation can be
passed this year despite the
heavily politicized climate
ahead of the November elec-
tion. The need for change has
been a rare point of common
ground between Democrats
and Republicans, and though
momentum appeared to
have sputtered earlier this
year, a new Senate proposal
has raised hopes that the
issue could be successfully
revived.
One of those honored,
Police Maj. David Huff of
Midwest City, Oklahoma,
saved a 2-year-old girl being
held at knifepoint after
negotiations with her captor
deteriorated.
“Obviously, the last few
moments were tense. There
was a countdown going on,”
Huff told reporters after the
ceremony. “There was just
no way I was going to let that
little child get hurt.”
Attorney General Loretta
Lynch, the nation’s top
law enforcement oficial,
said there were no words
or medals that could begin
to pay the debt the country
owes the oficers.
“It has often been said
that the price of freedom is
constant vigilance,” Lynch
said. “Know this: they pay
that price on our behalf.”
One Philadelphia oficer
died from a gunshot wound
and was honored posthu-
mously. Sgt. Robert Wilson
III drew ire from assailants
during a robbery while
saving store employees and
customers. Wilson’s family
accepted the award on his
behalf.
“We honor those who
didn’t come home,” the
president said.
WASHINGTON — A
short-handed
Supreme
Court dodged but kept alive
a legal challenge Monday
from faith-based groups
over the Obama adminis-
tration’s rules for cost-free
access to birth control. It
was the latest sign of justices
struggling to ind a majority
for cases taken up before
Justice Antonin Scalia’s
death.
The unsigned, unanimous
opinion paved a way out of
a politically thorny dispute
for the eight-member court,
which has split twice in 4-4
ties since the conservative
jurist’s death in February.
Yet it hardly settled the
matter, even if President
Barack Obama said the
“practical effect is right
now that women will still
continue to be able to get
contraception.”
Deciding nothing but
perhaps buying time, the
justices asked lower courts
to take another look at the
issue in search of a compro-
mise. The case concerns the
administration’s arrange-
ment for sparing faith-based
groups from paying the birth
control costs of women
covered under their health
plans.
“The court expresses no
view on the merits of the
cases,” the justices wrote,
ending a major confronta-
tion over Obama’s health
care law with a whimper.
The matter almost certainly
will not return to the
Supreme Court before the
2016 presidential election,
and perhaps not until a new
justice is conirmed to take
Scalia’s seat, if at all.
The outcome suggested
the court lacked a majority,
underscoring the effect of
Scalia’s absence. And it
pointed to the prospect of
other cases ending in a tie
among the 31 that remain
unresolved.
For now, the government
will be able to continue
ensuring
that
women
Carbon-cutting plan could be
on fast-track to Supreme Court
WASHINGTON (AP) — The full appeals court in
Washington will hear arguments in the legal ight over
President Barack Obama’s plan to curtail greenhouse gas
emissions, potentially accelerating the case’s path to the
Supreme Court.
The United States Court of Appeals for the District
of Columbia Circuit issued an order Monday scheduling
oral arguments on the legality of the Clean Power Plan for
September 27.
A three-judge panel had been scheduled to hear the
case June 2, but whichever side lost was considered likely
to seek a review by the full appeals court. By using its
discretion to skip a step, the appeals judges are potentially
shaving months off the time before the case could be
heard by the high court.
It is rare for an appeals court to hold such an “en banc”
review prior to the smaller panel’s decision, but procedural
rules allow it when the case at issue “involves a question
of exceptional importance.”
About two dozen mostly GOP-led states sued the Envi-
ronmental Protection Agency over the new carbon-cutting
regulations, which aim to slow climate change by reducing
power-plant emissions by one-third by 2030. More than
100 conservative advocacy groups, electric utilities and
coal mining companies have also iled suit.
If the Clean Power Plan were to be struck down in
court, it would become more dificult for the United States
to meet its goals for cutting carbon emissions under the
landmark international climate treaty signed in Paris at the
end of last year. The U.S. is the world’s largest emitter of
harmful greenhouse gases.
covered by faith-based
groups’ health plans have
access to cost-free contra-
ceptives. But the groups,
which include not-for-proit
colleges and charities, won’t
face ines for not adhering to
administration procedures
for objecting to birth control
beneits.
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HELENA, Mont. — A
bison calf that tourists loaded
into their vehicle at Yellow-
stone National Park because
they were concerned for its
welfare could not be reunited
with its herd and had to be
euthanized, park oficials said
Monday as they reasserted
the importance of avoiding
wildlife.
The incident last week and
several other recent cases led
to fresh warnings that park
rules require visitors to stay at
least 25 yards from all wildlife
and 100 yards from bears and
wolves.
Visitors
brought
the
newborn calf to a park
facility on May 9, which
oficials called a dangerous
move because adult bison are
protective and will attack to
defend their young. Rangers
took the animal back to where
it was picked up, but they
could not get it back with the
herd after several tries.
“The bison calf was later
euthanized because it was
abandoned and causing a
dangerous situation by contin-
ually approaching people and
cars along the roadway,” the
park said in a statement.
The visitors were cited
for touching park wildlife
and ined $110, Yellowstone
spokeswoman Charissa Reid
said. She declined to name
the visitors or issue a copy of
the citation amid the investi-
gation.
In another recent high-pro-
ile case, a woman was seen
on video trying to pet an adult
bison as it rested on the board-
walk around Old Faithful.
In another, tourists posed for
photos dangerously close to
bison that had caused a trafic
jam on a road.
Five visitors were seriously
injured last year after getting
too close to the massive
animals.
Approaching
wildlife
also can affect their well-
being and survival, possibly
causing mothers to reject their
offspring, park oficials said.
Such
reminders
are
included on Yellowstone’s
website, in information handed
to visitors as they come in and
on signs throughout the park,
Reid said.
“This year we’ve added
translations of the safety
signage and provide park
newspaper
translations
in a number of different
languages,” she said in a
statement.
AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, File
In this June 30, 2014 ile photo, demonstrators
react to hearing the Supreme Court’s decision on the
Hobby Lobby birth control case outside the Supreme
Court in Washington. The court asked lower courts
to take another look at the issue in a search for a
compromise.
Compliance
would
violate
their
religious
beliefs, the groups argued,
because they would be
pushing responsibility for
providing birth control onto
their insurers or insurance
administrators.
The administration said
the buffer shielded groups
from paying for birth control
if they objected on moral
grounds. It said a ruling for
the groups would disadvan-
tage tens of thousands of
women.
“They are getting health
insurance, and we are
properly accommodating
religious institutions who
have objections,” Obama
said in an interview Monday
with BuzzFeed.
White House spokesman
Josh Earnest reiterated
demands for Congress to
conirm Scalia’s successor.
Obama has nominated
Judge Merrick Garland.
But opponents claimed
victory Monday, too.
The decision is “great
news for religious organi-
zations who will now have
a chance to make their case
to the lower courts,” Carrie
Severino, Judicial Crisis
Network’s chief counsel,
said. Severino, who opposes
Garland’s conirmation, said
the ruling underscores the
stakes in choosing the next
justice.
When the justices heard
arguments in March, they
appeared evenly divided.
The court then ordered the
two sides to ile a new and
unusual round of legal briefs
in search of a compromise,
perhaps by making contra-
ceptive coverage available
without requiring a notice of
objection.
Eight appeals courts
nationwide have sided with
the administration; four of
those were challenged in
the case before the Supreme
Court. One court has ruled
for the groups so far.
The justices threw out all
those rulings Monday. Only
groups that have challenged
the rules are exempt at the
moment. Even with them,
Local support. Lasting impact.
Bison euthanized after
tourists take it from herd
By AMY BETH HANSON
Associated Press
Page 7A
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