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Weekend, Saturday-Sunday, July 25-26, 2020

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A U.S. judge on Friday denied Oregon’s request to re-strict federal agents’ actions when they ar-rest people during chaotic protests that have roiled Portland and pitted local officials against the Trump administration.

Federal agents deployed by President Donald Trump to tamp down the unrest have arrested dozens during nightly demon-strations against racial injustice that often turn violent. Democratic leaders in Oregon say federal intervention has worsened the two-month crisis, and the state attorney general sued to allege that some people had been whisked off the streets in unmarked vehicles.

U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman said the state lacked standing to sue on be-half of protesters because the lawsuit was a “highly unusual one with a particular set of rules.”

Oregon was seeking a restraining order on behalf of its residents not for injuries that had already happened but to prevent inju-ries by federal officers in the future. That combination makes the standard for grant-ing such a motion very narrow, and the state did not prove it had standing in the case, Mosman wrote.

Legal experts who reviewed the case be-fore the decision warned that he could re-ject it on those grounds. A lawsuit from a person accusing federal agents of violating their rights to free speech or against uncon-stitutional search and seizure would have

a much higher chance of success, Michael Dorf, a constitutional law professor at Cor-nell University, said ahead of the ruling.

“The federal government acted in viola-tion of those individuals’ rights and prob-ably acted in violation of the Constitution in the sense of exercising powers that are reserved to the states, but just because the federal government acts in ways that over-step its authority doesn’t mean the state has an injury,” he said.

The clashes in Portland have further in-flamed the nation’s political tensions and triggered a crisis over the limits of fed-eral power as Trump moves to send U.S. officers to other Democratic-led cities to combat crime. It’s playing out as Trump pushes a new “law and order” reelection strategy after the coronavirus crashed the economy.

Protesters in Portland have been target-ing the federal courthouse, setting fires outside and vandalizing the building that U.S. authorities say they have a duty to protect. Federal agents have used tear gas, less-lethal ammunition that left one person critically injured and other force to scatter protesters.

The lawsuit from Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum accused federal agents of arresting protesters without prob-able cause and using excessive force. She sought a temporary restraining order to “immediately stop federal authorities from unlawfully detaining Oregonians.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — Unable to land the big deal with Congress to curb drug costs, President Donald Trump on Friday moved on his own to allow imports of cheaper medicines, along with other limited steps that could have some elec-tion-year appeal.

At a White House cere-mony, Trump signed four executive orders. One was about importation. The oth-ers would direct drugmaker rebates straight to patients, provide insulin and EpiPens at steep discounts to low-in-come people, and use lower international prices to pay for some Medicare drugs.

Trump cast his directives as far-reaching, but they mostly update earlier ad-ministration ideas that have not yet gone into effect.

“I’m unrigging the sys-tem that is many decades old,” he declared, promising “massive” savings.

Consumers may not no-tice immediate changes,

since the orders must be carried out by the federal bureaucracy and could face court challenges.

Democrats, meanwhile, are eager to draw a con-trast between Trump and their own sweeping plans to authorize Medicare to negotiate lower prices with pharmaceutical companies, an idea the president had backed as a candidate. A bill by Speaker Nancy Pelosi al-ready passed the House and aligns with presidential can-didate Joe Biden’s approach.

Friday’s event was defi-nitely not the bill-signing the White House had once hoped for. Trump came into office complaining that pharmaceutical companies were “getting away with murder” and promising to bring them under control. Nearly four years later, things are much the same despite some recent moder-ation in price increases.

Trump pulled his punch-es, Pelosi said in a state-

ment. “After promising that he would ‘negotiate like crazy’ for lower prescrip-tion drug prices, it is clear that President Trump meant not negotiate at all,” she said, adding that if Trump is serious about lowering prices he should tell Senate Republicans to pass her bill.

A drive to enact major legislation this year stalled in Congress. Although Trump told Republican senators that lowering pre-scription prices is “some-thing you have to do,” many remain reluctant to use fed-eral authority to force drug-makers to charge less.

Meanwhile, congres-sional Democrats calcu-late that the election will strengthen their hand, and they’ll finally be able to enact a law that authorizes Medicare to negotiate pric-es directly. Neither side in Congress has had an incen-tive to deal, and the White House has been unable to work Trump’s will.

Judge denies Oregon’s push to limit US agents

RENO, Nev. (AP) — A sharply divid-ed U.S. Supreme Court denied a rural Ne-vada church’s request late Friday to strike down as unconstitutional a 50-person cap on worship services as part of the state’s ongoing response to the coronavirus.

In a 5-4 decision, the high court refused to grant the request from the Christian church east of Reno to be subjected to the same COVID-19 restrictions in Nevada that allow casinos, restaurants and other businesses to operate at 50% of capacity with proper social distancing.

Calvary Chapel Dayton Valley argued that the hard cap on religious gatherings was an unconstitutional violation of its parishioners’ First Amendment rights to express and exercise their beliefs.

Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the liberal majority in denying the request without explanation.

Three justices wrote strongly worded dissenting opinions on behalf of the four conservatives who said they would have granted the injunctive relief while the court fully considers the merits of the case.

“That Nevada would discriminate in fa-vor of the powerful gaming industry and

its employees may not come as a surprise, but this Court’s willingness to allow such discrimination is disappointing,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in a dissent joined by Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh.

“We have a duty to defend the Con-stitution, and even a public health emergency does not absolve us of that responsibility,” Alito said. “The Con-stitution guarantees the free exercise of religion. It says nothing about freedom to play craps or blackjack, to feed to-kens into a slot machine or to engage in any other game of chance.”

Kavanaugh also wrote his own dis-sent, as did Justice Neil Gorsuch, who wrote “there is no world in which the Constitution permits Nevada to favor Caesars Palace over Calvary Chapel.”

David Cortman, senior counsel for Georgia-based Alliance Defending Free-dom representing the church, said in an email sent to The Associated Press late Friday that they were disappointed in the ruling but will continue to work to protect Calvary Chapel and others “from discrim-inatory policies that put religious groups at the back of the line for reopening.”

Supreme Court rejects Nevada church’s

appeal of virus rule

With no new law to curb drug costs, Trump tries own changes