Thats what we have all these prosecutions happening across the country. Jenna griswold, always great to see you. Thanks for being with, us thanks for the things you do to keep our elections actually safe. She is the Secretary Of State, for colorado. Coming up in our next hour, were gonna call to order a Special Edition of the Velshi Banned Book Club. Ominous discuss with two call scholars, one of americas most important most divisive documents, the constitution of the United States of america. Were gonna dig deeper into the section of that same constitution that legal experts say disqualifies donald trump from holding the office of the president ever again. Another hour of velshi begins right now. Right now. Good morning, its saturday, august 19th. Im ali velshi. In the span of just 12 months, the twice impeached President Donald Trump has been charged with a total of 91 felony count. Stemming from criminal cases against. Tim he remains firmly at the top of the field of the republican
we ve had a very long time in the united states where we successfully prescribe mifepristone, and it works. and even longer in europe, where this drug was developed. does that matter? does the fact that the underlying argument about the testing and approval process of mifepristone, perhaps being flawed, how does modern experience and modern testing in modern experience work in that case? well, i mean, for the plaintiffs, it doesn t matter. the plaintiffs are arguing from a deep, long-standing antiabortion talking point, the pregnancy isn t a disease. all of the evidence about safety, they discount. and they also discount the fact that they filed the lawsuit almost a quarter century after mifepristone was approved, which also should raise questions about timing this. this case, i think, would also set a pretty disturbing president when it comes to when you could challenge the fda s approval of other drugs, given that the complication rate of mifepristone, you know, is very
court is gonna take up next term in the case. essentially, although there s agreement about the individual rights core of the amendment, there is disagreement about the application of this new history and tradition test, lower court judges are all over the place about how to think about weapons the founders could not have anticipated, assault weapons, ak-47s, and the supreme court is really gonna have to sort this out. if they don t, a lot of gun regulations may be open to question. akhil, most, about whether we agree or disagree on various closet in the constitution, are not prepared to throw it out. with the exception of donald trump that time that he said so. in 2020, jeff wrote an article for the atlantic called, what if we wrote the constitution today? so, i want to ask you, because i know you to talk a lot, i want to ask you, akhil, what would a modern constitution look like? how would you even arrive at that process? so, i love the fact that you talked about not just the
constitution, even if you believe in reading its words and you don t think judges should evolve it, the people can. it s called amendments. i want to remind everyone, there are also 50 state constitutions. we don t have to just speculate as to what people might do today, because they actually do amend their state constitutions all the time. constitutions are easier to amend. then the federal. since jeff has over his shoulder, actually, his hero, louis brandeis, louis brandeis says let s take a look at state experimentation, state laboratories, and one of the best arguments for gun rights, i don t own a gun, one of the best arguments is, individual right to have a gun for self protection is in most modern state constitutions. in fact, in the bruen case, there is a concurrence by justice kavanaugh, joined by the chief saying, let s look at actually other states. in new york, in that case, was really an outlier, not to be an alternative test to the statute
the second part of that clause, the right to bear arms shall not be infringed. in practice, thanks in part to the scholarship of my dear friend and teacher, akhil reed amar, and it s no one will be in conversation with him, and professor tribe. that s a pretty broad consensus that at the time of reconstruction, the amendment was intended to protect individual rights and bear arms, in particular, african americans to defend themselves against mob violence before and after the civil war. the big debate in the country today, stemming from the supreme court s landmark decision recently in the bruen case, which said essentially, any regulation of the right to bear arms has to have a president in text, history in tradition. that s a new test that strong lower courts into chaos, it s forcing them to search back to the statute of northumberland in 13 92 to ask whether or not domestic violence orders, for example, maybe constitutional, which is a big case the course