RALEIGH, N.C. — A coalition of over 200 North Carolina jurists, senior state government officials, bar leaders, legal educators, and practicing attorneys issued a joint letter to Jefferson Griffin, urging him to drop his lawsuit challenging the 2024 election results for a seat on the North Carolina Supreme Court. The letter, sent Tuesday, emphasizes the importance of upholding the integrity of the judicial system and respecting the will of the voters.



The letter comes as the North Carolina Court of Appeals prepares to hear arguments in Griffin’s case later this week. Last month, the Wake County Superior Court denied Griffin’s demand to discard over 65,000 ballots, a decision he is now appealing. Despite multiple recounts confirming his loss, Griffin continues to seek a reversal of the election outcome.

“The arguments you have advanced ask our judicial system to change the rules in place for the 2024 election after it has run its course. Indeed, if you succeed, tens of thousands of voters will lose their voice after they voted,” the letter states. “For the sake of our judicial system, we ask you to terminate your litigation now.”

The signatories of the letter include prominent figures such as former NC Supreme Court Chief Justices Jim Exum and Henry Frye, former NC Supreme Court Associate Justices J. Phil Carlton and Willis Whichard, and former NC Court of Appeals Judges Gerald Arnold, Linda McGee, Wanda Bryant, Jack L. Cozort, Martha A. Geer, Reuben F. Young, Linda Stephens, and Ralph A. Walker.

In total, 226 members of the legal community have endorsed the letter.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, says he will introduce legislation to curb what he says is a “dramatic abuse of judicial authority” by courts that have issued injunctions against President Trump’s agenda, including the deportation of alleged gang members.

“District Court judges have issued RECORD numbers of national injunctions against the Trump administration — a dramatic abuse of judicial authority. I will introduce legislation to stop this abuse for good,” Hawley posted on the social platform X.

Hawley issued the statement amid several ongoing court battles between the Trump administration and federal judges.

James Boasberg, the chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, issued an order over the weekend halting the deportation of a group of Venezuelans, including alleged members of the Tren de Aragua gang, to El Salvador.

The Trump administration continued the deportation of the migrants after a stopover in Honduras despite a verbal and written order by Boasberg attempting to halt two deportation flights.

Kyle Cheney
‪@kyledcheney.bsky.social‬

NEW: Judge Chutkan has blocked the EPA from terminating grants for climate programs held by Citibank, saying the Trump administration failed to abide by legal procedures and provided no evidence of impropriety.

https://ecf.dcd.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/show_public_doc?2025cv0698-28

On Monday, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced what is believed to be the first arrest and prosecution under an abortion ban since the reversal of Roe v. Wade. Paxton’s office announced the arrest of Maria Margarita Rojas, a Houston midwife who allegedly operated a network of clinics, for violating the state’s abortion law and practicing medicine without a license. This is almost certainly not the first prosecution that Paxton could have brought; it’s hard to believe that the attorney general’s office hasn’t uncovered a single illegal procedure in the nearly three years since the Supreme Court destroyed the right to choose abortion. Instead, Paxton likely picked Rojas for a reason: not just to send the message that “every life is sacred,” as Paxton told the press, but also to signal that midwives who provide abortions are unsafe, unqualified, and dishonest. Paxton’s strategy fits into a pattern of pre-Roe prosecutions, all while concealing the ways in which the criminal law related to abortion has become far harsher than it was before 1973.

Few details about Rojas’ case are publicly available, but Paxton arrested her and a staff member, alleging that they worked in four clinics across Texas’ Waller County. According to Paxton, Rojas and her colleague provided illegal abortions and falsely held themselves out as licensed medical professionals. (Rojas herself has been a licensed midwife since 2018, but Paxton appears to allege that she identified as a physician.)

The fact that Rojas is not a physician is central to Paxton’s strategy: He claims that the prosecution will protect women from unlicensed and presumably unsafe providers. His office seems to be hearkening back to horror stories like that of Dr. Kermit Gosnell, who was convicted of murder in 2013, and was accused of killing viable infants who were born alive, illegally dispensing opioids, and killing several patients. To date, Paxton hasn’t laid out evidence that Rojas harmed her patients beyond employing unlicensed staff.

The more we understand the history of criminal abortion laws, the less surprising Paxton’s move is. The physicians who crusaded in the 19th century to criminalize abortion throughout pregnancy claimed to protect unborn life, safeguard marriage, and ensure that white Protestant women, rather than Catholic immigrants, populated the nation. The laws these doctors championed sometimes seemed to authorize the punishment of women as well as doctors. But in and beyond the 19th century, prosecutors mostly charged providers, not patients, believing the testimony of the latter to be necessary to get enough evidence for a conviction.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin voters began casting ballots Tuesday in a state Supreme Court election that has become a proxy for the nation’s political battles while attracting a massive amount of spending, led by groups affiliated with Elon Musk and other billionaires.

Voters at the polls on the first day of early voting said they were motivated by the role the court will play in issues such as abortion and immigration. Some also mentioned concerns about how national money and influence could sway the outcome of a race that will determine whether the court remains under liberal control or flips to a conservative majority.

Republican-backed Brad Schimel and Democratic-supported Susan Crawford are running in the April 1 election for an open seat on a court that faces cases on abortion, public sector unions, voting rules and congressional district boundaries. Who controls the court also could factor into how it might rule on any future voting challenge in the perennial presidential battleground state — raising the stakes for national Republicans and Democrats.

Retired electrician Maggie Freespirit, 58, was among the first to vote at a polling site in downtown Madison, the heavily Democratic state capital. She said she voted for Crawford because she knows the Democratic-backed candidate will support abortion rights. But she is nervous about Crawford’s chances.

The Pentagon cannot enforce President Donald Trump’s order banning transgender people from serving in the military, a federal judge ruled Tuesday, saying it is “soaked in animus” and unconstitutionally discriminates on the basis of sex.

“The cruel irony is that thousands of transgender servicemembers have sacrificed — some risking their lives — to ensure for others the very equal protection rights the Military Ban seeks to deny them,” U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes wrote in a 79-page opinion.

HOUSTON (KIAH) — Three health clinics in the northwest Houston area remained closed Tuesday as Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s Office announced that a third person is connected to those facilities where he said an investigation uncovered alleged illegal abortions.

On Monday, officers with Paxton’s office arrested Maria Margarita Rojas, 49, and Jose Manuel Cendan Ley, 29, charging Rojas with the illegal performance of an abortion and practicing medicine without a license and Ley with unlawful performance of an abortion and the unlicensed practice of medicine.

Rojas and Ley remained in the Waller County Jail Tuesday afternoon, Rojas on $1.4 million bond and Ley on $700,000 bond.

Also on Tuesday, Paxton’s office announced that a third person faces charges as part of their investigation into Clinica Waller Latinoamericana in Waller, Clinica Latinoamericana Telge in Cypress, and Latinoamericana Medical Clinic in Spring.