UNBIASED - Alabama's Embryo Ruling, NYC Offers Debit Cards to Migrants, Biden's $1.2B Loan Forgiveness, SCOTUS Rulings, Good News of the Week, and More.

Episode Date: February 23, 2024

1. DEEP DIVE: Alabama Supreme Court Says Embryos Are Children for Purposes of Wrongful Death (1:27)2. QUICK HITTERS: New NYC Pilot Program Offers Pre-Paid Debit Cards to Migrants (15:13); Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Killer's Double Jeopardy Defense (17:17); Supreme Court Declines High School Admissions Policy Case (19:14); Delta Offers Flight for April Total Solar Eclipse (20:47); Biden Administration Announces $1.2B in Loan Forgiveness (21:59)3. ONE-LINERS (22:59)4. NOT EVERYTHING IS BAD: Good News of the Week (24:19)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave me a review and share it with those you know that also appreciate unbiased news!Watch this episode on YouTube.Follow Jordan on Instagram and TikTok.All sources for this episode can be found here.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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call the Conax Ontario helpline at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Welcome back to Unbiased, your favorite source of unbiased news and legal analysis. I'm your host, Jordan, and I hope you enjoy the show. Welcome back to Unbiased. Today is Friday, February 23rd, 2024. This episode was recorded yesterday around 5.30 p.m. Eastern Time. In this episode, first we're going to deep dive into the recent controversial Alabama Supreme Court ruling regarding IVF or in vitro fertilization. We will then discuss some quick hitters. My quick hitters are stories in under three minutes. And then we'll get into

one-liners and we will finish with not everything is bad, which is the good news segment of the week. I like to do it on Fridays to leave you feeling a little bit lighter going into the weekend. Before we get into today's stories, this is your reminder that this episode is available in video format on both YouTube and X. So if you are a YouTuber, please just go ahead and hit that thumbs up button below this video, subscribe to the channel so you don't miss the next episode, and at the same time, you can show your support. If you are not a YouTube watcher, that is okay too, but if you love what you hear today and you feel smarter and more informed after listening, please go ahead and leave me a

review on your preferred podcast platform. Without further ado, let's get into today's stories. Last Friday, the Alabama Supreme Court released a ruling which held that frozen embryos are considered children for purposes of liability under Alabama's wrongful death of a minor act. Within the last two days, people have really started to talk about this case, so let's dive in. First and foremost, what is IVF or in vitro fertilization? IVF is the process that involves the removal of eggs from a woman's ovaries and then combining those eggs with a man's sperm in a lab. For purposes of this explanation, I'm going to run through a hypothetical so that you have sort of a better understanding of how this works.

So let's say a woman has 19 eggs retrieved, but only 15 of those are mature eggs. Those 15 eggs will then be combined with a man's sperm, and on average, about 80% of those eggs will fertilize. So let's assume a woman gets 12 fertilized eggs. From here, you have to wait to see how many of the fertilized eggs reach the blastocyst stage. At this stage is when doctors can do genetic testing so that they can get an idea of the reproductive success of each embryo. Usually about 30 to 50 percent of the embryos will reach this stage. So now you're down to six. Then comes the actual testing. This is when you would test for any genetic defects

that could cause implantation failure, miscarriage, or birth defects. Things like a missing chromosome, an extra chromosome, single gene disorders, the rearrangement of genes, things like that. Not all embryos will make it past this stage either. Some embryos have defects that make them unviable. So let's say that of the six, three test normal. These three embryos are the embryos that have the best chance of implantation. Now, only about 65%

of normal embryos will lead to pregnancy, but statistically, if you have three normal healthy embryos, your chances of getting pregnant with one of those three is about 95%. So even though you start with 19 eggs retrieved, you may be down to three at the end of the whole process. And those eggs that have not yet been implanted can be stored in a cryo chamber for future use. So frozen in time so that you can use them at a later date. That's a little bit about the IVF process. Now in this case, three sets of parents were going through separate IVF treatments in Alabama. They opted to have their extra embryos frozen. These embryos were stored in a fertility clinic within a hospital

in Mobile. And in December 2020, a patient at the hospital walked into the unsecured, unlocked fertility clinic and removed several of these frozen embryos. Apparently, the patient didn't realize you can't just pick them up with your bare hands, ended up getting freeze-burned, and as a result, dropped the embryos on the ground and killed them. All three sets of parents sued the Mobile Infirmary Medical Center, which is where the embryos were kept, as well as the owner and operator of the facility, the Mobile Infirmary Association. The lawsuits specifically alleged wrongful death under Alabama's wrongful death of a minor act, negligence, wantonness, breach of contract, and bailment. For purposes of this discussion,

we are going to focus on the wrongful death claim. Alabama's Wrongful Death of a Minor Act says, when the death of a minor child is caused by the wrongful act, omission, or negligence of any person, persons, or corporation, or the servants or agents of either, the father or the mother can commence an action under this wrongful death statute. Following the lawsuit being filed, the hospital and the association filed motions to dismiss, which were in part granted. So first and foremost, the trial court dismissed the wrongful death claim, explaining that the in vitro embryos do not fit the definition of a person or child under the statute, and therefore the loss could not give rise to a wrongful death claim. As for the

other claims, the trial court also dismissed the negligence and wantonness claims, which left the parents only with their breach of contract and bailment claims. So the parents appeal the case, eventually it makes its way to the state Supreme Court. Now, I want to be clear, the dispute at the state Supreme Court wasn't whether an unborn child qualifies as a human life, the dispute wasn't at what stage of viability an unborn child is considered a human life. The dispute wasn't at what stage of viability an unborn child is considered a human life. The dispute wasn't whether life begins at conception. The dispute was whether embryos should be considered a child under this particular statute. So to illustrate this debate, I want to read an excerpt from the opinion. It says, quote, all parties to this case, like all members of this court,

agree that an unborn child is a genetically unique human being whose life begins at fertilization and ends at death. The parties further agree that an unborn child usually qualifies as a human life, human being, or person, as those words are used in ordinary conversation and in the text of Alabama's wrongful death statutes. That is true, as everyone acknowledges, throughout all stages of an unborn child's development, regardless of viability. The question on which the parties disagree is whether there exists an unwritten exception to that rule for unborn children who are not physically located in utero, that is, inside a biological uterus, at the time they are killed. The defendants argue that this court should recognize such exception because they say an unborn child ceases to qualify as a child or

person if that child is not contained within a biological womb. The plaintiffs argue that the proposed exception for extra uterine children would induce discontinuity with Alabama law, end quote. Then the opinion goes on to list some explanations of discontinuity given by the plaintiffs, examples such as if the proposed exception to the statute were true, parents would be left without remedy against a person who kills their unborn child during birth but before the child has actually been birthed. So specifically if the child were to die between the time that the child leaves the uterus and fully exits the birth canal. The plaintiffs also say that this proposed exception would raise constitutional concerns. The plaintiffs propose a

hypothetical in which one day babies are conceived and gestated to term in an in vitro environment, meaning brought to term having been grown outside of a human body. They say in that situation, under this proposed exception, you know, this would lead to an outcome in which the born baby would not qualify as a child or a person because that child would be both unborn, having never been delivered from a biological womb, and also not in utero. under Alabama law. And under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, states cannot withhold legal protection from people based on immutable features of their birth or ancestry. So these were the arguments put forth by both sides. And the Alabama Supreme Court held in short, quote, unborn children are children under the act, without exception, based on developmental state, physical location, or any other ancillary characteristics, end quote. And in coming to this conclusion, the court first looked at the history of the act and the definitions of child at the time of enactment in 1872.

Specifically, it's headed to an 1864 definition from Webster's Dictionary, which defined child as, quote, the immediate progeny of parents, end quote. However, the definition also goes on to say, quote, this term child is applied to infants from their birth, but the time when they cease ordinarily to be so called is not defined by custom, end quote. And because of this added context, the only dissenting justice in this case argued that the 1864 definition of child indicates that infants prior to birth were not considered children at the time of the law's enactment. The majority of justices disagreed with this. The majority argued that the language, the 1864 definition, draws distinction between newborns and older children in order to make the point that there is no clear-cut time at which a young person transitions from childhood to adulthood,

but the language does not indicate that infants were considered something other than children prior to their birth. And in support of this contention, the majority opinion cites to a related definition from the Bible, which describes a pregnant woman as being with child. But the majority says that even if the word child were ambiguous, Article 1 of the Alabama Constitution declares that it is public policy of the state to ensure the protection of the rights of the unborn children in all manners and measures lawful and appropriate. Therefore, the court says, we would have to resolve any ambiguity in favor of protecting unborn life. So then the opinion shifts to the defendant's proposed exception because the defendants didn't

really focus on the text or the history of the act too much. Instead, they wanted the court to recognize an exception to the act, an exception for extra uterine children in the wrongful death context. And I mentioned this argument briefly earlier, but to go into this in a little bit more detail, the reason the defendants argued that there should be an exception is because of the state's criminal homicide laws. So they say that state court precedent requires complete congruity between the definition of who is a person under Alabama criminal homicide laws and who is a person under Alabama civil wrongful death laws. And extra uterine children are not within the class of persons protected by the criminal homicide laws, and therefore, extra uterine children cannot be protected by the

wrongful death of a minor act. And in a nutshell, the court said no. The defendants misread our past opinions. What we said is that it would be incongruous if a defendant could be responsible criminally for the homicide of a fetal child, but would have no similar responsibility civilly. child while immunizing the defendant from civil liability for the same offense, because criminal liability is, by its nature, more severe than civil liability. So the set of conduct that can support a criminal prosecution is almost always narrower than the conduct that can support a civil suit. And according to the court, the defendants flipped this rationale on its head. The court said, quote, instead of concluding that civil homicide laws should sweep at least as broadly as criminal ones, the defendants insist that the civil law can never sweep more broadly than the criminal law. End quote.

The court said that this is illogical. And finally, the court briefly addresses the public policy concerns of the defendants. So the defendants argued that if the court didn't create an exception for extra uterine children, the cost of IVF in Alabama would increase substantially and could make cryogenic preservation onerous. And the court said, quote, while we appreciate the defendant's concerns, these types of policy-focused arguments belong before the legislature, not this court, end quote. So the fact of the matter is that this is a first of its kind ruling, and it does not apply to any other state other than Alabama, but it definitely opens the door for other states to issue similar rulings

and perhaps paves the way for other states to issue similar rulings and perhaps paves the way for the Supreme Court to hear this case. This is completely uncharted territory, right? When Roe v. Wade was argued before the Supreme Court in 1973, the issue was whether the Constitution recognizes a woman's right to terminate her pregnancy by abortion. And in answering that question, the court also determined a point of viability in which that constitutional right attaches. Then in 2022, obviously Roe was overturned and Dobbs, but now in this case out of Alabama, you have this question

of what constitutional protections do embryos have, if any? Embryos not yet in the mother's womb. This is an entirely new question. Before we move on, I do just want to mention that at least one major hospital in Alabama, that being the University of Alabama at Birmingham Health System, said that it will be pausing fertilization services effective immediately until it assesses the potential for criminal prosecution or civil liability. The hospital will still be retrieving eggs from women, but the next step in that process is to fertilize the eggs, and that is what the hospital is pressing pause on because fertilization is where potential implications come into play. With that, let's move on to Quick Hitters.

Quick Hitters is my segment where we cover stories in under three minutes. The first being that New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced a new controversial taxpayer-funded $53 million pilot program that provides prepaid debit cards to migrant families staying in short term hotels in the city. Here's how it'll work. So initially 500 prepaid debit cards will be given out, one per family. The cards have a maximum of $10,000, but they can be refilled every four weeks. Each person gets $12.52 a day. So a family of four would get roughly $50 a day or around $1,500 a month. A family of six would get roughly $75 a day or around $2,200 per month. And then of course, a single person would get $12.52 per day or about $375 per month. The city's contract with

Mobility Capital Finance provides that the cards can only be used to buy food, baby supplies, and necessities, and can only be used at local bodegas, convenience stores, grocery stores, and supermarkets. Mayor Adams says that he thinks this plan will actually reduce food waste and stimulate the economy because now instead of having to hand out free food and supplies, which he says often ends up in the trash anyway, these migrants can spend this money at local shops and put it back into the economy. He says the plan is expected to save the city $600,000 per month, which equates to about $7.2 million annually. Critics of this plan think that this will only entice more migrants to come to the city. Moreover, they're not keen on the no-bid contract with Mobility Capital

Finance, which provides for a large amount in fees for the firm, specifically a $125,000 one-time setup fee, $250,000 annually for management fees, and also fees depending on how much money is distributed to the migrants. So $1.5 million to the firm for the first 50 million handed out, 2.5 million for the next 100 million handed out. Critics are also skeptical of the oversight. In other words, how can the firm be sure as to what the money is being spent on? How will they track it? Quick hitter number two. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of a man charged with murder who said double jeopardy prohibits his retrial. Here's what happened. Damien McElrath, who suffers currently, I should say,

from bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, stabbed his mother more than 50 times in 2012. He was charged with felony murder, malice murder, and aggravated assault. He went to trial in 2017, and the jury found him not guilty of malice murder by reason of insanity, and guilty but mentally ill as to the felony murder and aggravated assault. As you can imagine, this was a bit contradictory. How can you be determined insane but also found both guilty and not guilty as a result of the same action that took place at the same time. The Georgia Supreme Court ruled that the verdicts were repugnant under Georgia's repugnancy doctrine, which says that a verdict can be set aside if it involves findings by the jury that are not legally and logically possible of existing simultaneously. The Georgia Supreme Court ordered a new trial as a result. Prior to the start of the new trial, Damien argued that double jeopardy prohibited a retrial on the malice murder charge because the jury found him not guilty. The state

of Georgia argued that there wasn't a valid verdict pursuant to state law, and therefore, he was never officially acquitted so as to warrant double jeopardy. The district court sided with the state, and eventually this case made its way to the Supreme Court. And here is what the Supreme Court's unanimous ruling said, quote, once there has been an acquittal, our cases prohibit any speculation about the reasons for the jury's verdict, even when there are specific jury findings that provide a factual basis for such speculation. We simply cannot know why the jury in McElrath's case acted as it did, and the double jeopardy clause forbids us to guess." End quote. In some other Supreme Court news, the Supreme Court declined to hear a case challenging the

admissions policy at a prestigious Northern Virginia high school. In 2020, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology adopted a new admissions policy, which no longer relied on standardized tests. Previously, admission into the school required four total standardized exams, and students were then selected based on a review that included test scores and teacher recommendations. But as of 2020, the district overhauled the process to instead evaluate students based on their GPA, written assessments, and experiences. The goal of this overhaul was to mitigate socioeconomic obstacles. A group of parents then sued, and they alleged that the new policy sought to balance the student body's racial makeup by excluding Asian Americans. According to data, Asian American students had made up 73%

of enrollment before the changes, dropped to 54% immediately after the changes, and is now back up to 62%. Ultimately, the Supreme Court declined to hear this case, and they let the appellate ruling stand, which permits the admissions policy. Justice Alito dissented. Justice Thomas joined him in the dissent. Justice Alito wrote, quote, the court's willingness to swallow the apparent decision below is hard to understand. We should wipe the decision off the books, and because the court refuses to do so, I must respectfully dissent. End quote. Quick hitter number four. Earlier this week, Delta Airlines introduced a new flight that will fly from Austin, Texas to Detroit, Michigan on April 8th for the sole purpose of seeing the total solar eclipse from 30,000 feet up. The press release on the website reads, quote, If you've ever wanted to experience a total solar eclipse from the sky, Delta has you covered this April. Delta Flight 1218 will be specifically operated on an A220-300, which will offer especially premium viewing due to the aircraft's extra large windows. The flight will depart from Austin at 12.15 p.m. Central Time and land in Detroit at 4.20 p.m.

Eastern Time, timed to give those on board the best chance of safely viewing the solar eclipse at its peak, end quote. The website does include a disclaimer that says that while this is the flight plan and the flight plan has been designed to maximize the time within the path of totality, things could change because of outside factors like weather and air traffic control. These one-of-a-kind tickets sold out within 24 hours, but Delta did note that there are five other flights that same day around that time that should offer passengers a look at the eclipse as well. Quick hitter number five. The Biden administration announced on Wednesday that it would be forgiving another $1.2 billion in student debt for roughly 153,000 borrowers enrolled in the SAVE plan.

Typically, borrowers are eligible for forgiveness under these income-driven repayment plans after 20 or 25 years of payments. But under Biden's newer SAVE plan, those who borrowed $12,000 or less and have been making payments for at least 10 years are also eligible for forgiveness. Under the save plan, for every $1,000 borrowed after the $12,000, a borrower is eligible for forgiveness after an additional year of payments. So $13,000 borrowed eligible for forgiveness after 11 years of payments, $14,000 borrowed eligible for forgiveness after 12 years of payments, so on and so forth. The save plan was actually part of President Biden's plan B once the Supreme Court struck

down his original plan last year. Now let's get into one liners, just one line headlines that I think you should know. Number one, Donald Trump confirmed during a Fox News town hall event this week that some of the individuals on his vice presidential shortlist include Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former Republican candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, Senator Tim Scott, Florida Representative Byron Daniels, political commentator and former representative Tulsi Gabbard, and South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem. Walmart is set to buy TV maker Vizio for $2.3 billion to allow it to better compete with Amazon's and Google's ad businesses. FUBU TV filed a $1 billion lawsuit on Tuesday

against Disney, Fox, Warner Bros., and Discovery, seeking to block a planned sports streaming service. The White House is expected to reveal an expanded sanctions package against Russia on Friday in the wake of Alexei Navalny's death. And while the source of the outage is unclear, AT&T customers experienced a massive outage on Thursday morning, affecting more than 74,000 customers at its peak. And finally, Boeing has replaced its head of its 737 MAX program, Ed Clark, with former vice president of 737 delivery operations, Katie Ringgold. And for my favorite segment, not everything is bad.

The first one I'm super excited about because it is a submission from a listener named Christy. Here is what she said. I'm coming up on the three-year anniversary of my heart transplant. I finally heard from my donor's family. Her name was Angie. She had three children. I updated my tattoo, which has my old heart rhythm, my donor's heart rhythm, and my husband's heart rhythm to include an A where her heartbeat and mine intersect. I can now thank her by name daily. Christy, and I think I speak for everyone listening, we are so happy for you. What a beautiful way to share such a special person and happy anniversary. The second one is about a very nice, thoughtful bus driver.

So you may have heard this story already. It went a little bit viral, but if you haven't, it's a good one. Kentucky school bus driver Larry Farish Jr. was driving his routine route when he stopped at a little boy named Levi's bus stop. And according to Farish, whenever he would pull up to Levi's bus stop, Levi was always smiling. But on this particular day, when he pulled up, Levi was sitting on the ground with a jacket pulled over his head. Farish asked Levi what was wrong. And while Levi was crying, Levi told him that it was pajama day at school, but that he didn't have any pajamas. So Farish noticed that Levi gets on the bus, he slides into his seat away from his friends where he normally sits,

and he's just super upset. Levi gets dropped off at school and Farish finishes the rest of his morning routes. But by now, he already knew he had to do something for Levi. He had to turn his day around. So once he was done with his routes, he headed to Family Dollar and bought two pairs of pajamas for Levi. Had to give him his options, you know? He drove back to the school. He hand-delivered the pajamas to Levi. Levi was so happy, hugged the pajamas to his chest and cried happy tears. And you should see this picture of Levi. He looks so cute in his little all-star pajamas. If you're watching on YouTube, I do have a picture on the screen. But that is why we all need to be kind. And remember, when you're kind to others, it not only changes you, it changes the world. If you have good news that you would like to share to be featured on this next Not Everything Is Bad segment, please go ahead and submit your

stories on jordanismylawyer.com. I do have a contact form there and that is where you can send in your stories. That is what I have for you today. Have a great weekend and I will talk to you next week.