exactly two years ago judge o connor halted those protection saying forcing doctors to perform transgender surgery could violate religious freedom. and appeals court stated the judge s ruling but it will come up again february 4th and that is not judge o connor s only controversial obamacare ruling. in august 2016 the judge appointed by george w. bush blocking obama administration order allowing transgender students to use bathrooms of their choice. judge o connor s ruling is getting hammered by obamacare supporters and opponents alike. university of michigan law professor nicholas bagley who supports the affordable care act calls judge o connor s decision quoting the judge s opinion is about as negative piece of judicial activism as i have ever seen. i don t even think it s close.
what can you tell us about how the community is reacting? well, thank you for the condolences. it is obviously an incredibly sad day for the city of pittsburgh and the very tight-knit squirrel hill community that i in part represent. and i can tell you that a set of elected leaders who were gathered near the site today, and participated in a press conference there, along with the other city councilman, corey o connor who also represents part of squirrel hill, we walked the streets of the downtown district after the event, and after the all clear was given, and it was a ghost town, frankly. and i think people are really hunkering down, spending time with friends and family, and like me, are probably in a state of shock. councilwoman, we did confirm through your colleague mr. o connor s office, that the ten people, that is the death toll, ten people have been killed. what more do you know? we are going to be finding out the details at a 4:00 p.m.
troy balderson ahead. that s kasich country. yeah, that s what was amazing. i saw that our friends at the new york times crunched some numbers. the raw vote turnout in those rural counties was, mediocre at best, 28% to 32%, compared to what we saw in o connor s strong holds. if the president s visit helped, then how bad could it have been? it could have been worse. we re potentially looking at a historic wave election. i think the tendency on the part of a lot of pundits is to be cautious, but this truly could turn into a big set of gains for democrats that goes beyond the 23 seats they need. all right. there s a man here who was in charge of the last major wave in the first term of a president. it s my man, michael steel, of the rnc. yeah. i remember democrats would eke out special election victories in 2010. republicans are eking out a bunch of them. i think wasserman noted it s actually the best record
balderson, who was backed by president trump, right? that big rally this weekend. o connor s trying to flip a seat that the gop has held for about 35 years. inside politics host john king is out front. john, obviously this is a very crucial race, right? and this is the last special election. dem versus republican. that we re going to get here before the ultimate test in november. what are you watching tonight? erin, just the fact that we re having this conversation, that we re worried about this race tipping, republicans are worried about this race tipping, tells us it s a problem for the republican party. this is the district here. here s the big question. we re going to learn tonight is this a very difficult year for republicans or is this potentially a disastrous year for republicans? as you noted the 12th district hasn t elected a democrat since ronald reagan was presidential. what are we looking for tonight? you mentioned the president going out there. let s start with that. the
down ballot positives. and where the data shows that is in every single congressional election since donald trump got elected, republicans have underperfo underperformed. it s why a seat in ohio tonight is competitive even though in the last hundred years republicans have controlled it for 90. do democrats face that same drag? if the general is where you get to the middle, what happens to democrats if they continue to push to the left? o connor s a good candidate. i m old enough to remember when conner lamb got elected, what was that, six months ago. the fact is we ve never had better candidates since i ve been in the house of representatives and you know i represent a district that voted for donald trump. i ll tell you what, he right now is kryptonite to those republicans in the suburbs where there are higher educated voters, where there s more diversity where people don t buy his brand of politics.