SUMMARY: Now that 2020 has arrived, scores of new laws are going into effect across the country. From legalization of marijuana and criminal justice reform to raising minimum wage and the cost of electric cars, state legislatures are having a major impact on the nation’s laws. The Hill’s Reid Wilson joins Lisa Desjardins to discuss specific changes as well as three broader trends to watch going forward.
SUMMARY: This week saw President Trump resurface the political debate over health care, as he declared his intention to repeal the Affordable Care Act. At the same time, a federal judge blocked work requirements the administration had tried to implement on Medicaid benefits in two states. Amna Nawaz reports and talks to The Washington Post’s Catherine Rampell about health care policy and legal challenges.
SUMMARY: As the calendar turned to 2019 this week, new laws are taking effect, and new state legislatures are looking to push even more changes. In some states, these measures will address gun safety, roll back business licensing regulations and legalize marijuana. Amna Nawaz checks in with The Hill national correspondent Reid Wilson who tracks changes to state policies, for an overview.
SUMMARY: The NAACP issued a travel advisory about the state of Missouri for women, minorities and LGBT people, asking those travelers to use “extreme caution.” The NAACP's first statewide alert comes after Missouri passed a law that the organization says permits legal discrimination. President Rod Chapel Jr. of the Missouri NAACP joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss how and why the advisory came about.
MEGAN THOMPSON (NewsHour): And now an update to a story we first reported in January about the increasing number of pregnant women who are struggling with opioid addiction.
As a result, the number of babies born withdrawing from those drugs taken by their mothers, has also skyrocketed.
Tennessee is among the states hardest hit by this epidemic. It has the second-highest rate of opioid prescribing in the U.S. And the rate of babies born withdrawing from opioids is three times the national average.
In response, two years ago, Tennessee became the only state that explicitly allowed prosecutors to charge a mother with “fetal assault” for using drugs while pregnant.
Sponsors of the law say it was not intended to penalize women but to get them into treatment and protect the welfare of their babies.
But in a hearing this past week, Tennessee representatives voted to discontinue the controversial law which is set to expire in July 2016.
The measure was found not to help those women and to have unintended consequences.
Doctors testified that the threat of arrest kept many addicted pregnant women from seeking treatment and medical care. Other critics say addicts were choosing abortion over being found out and prosecuted.
At the hearing, lawmakers also discussed increasing funding for drug treatment programs.
