Gavin Newsom buys ads for gun control in another major GOP state



California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) has purchased full-page ads in Texas newspapers boasting about a new gun law he will sign that is directly modeled after a fetal heartbeat law signed by Gov. Greg Abbott (R).

The ad tout's the gun control law as "California's answer to Texas' perverse bill," and it will run in the Austin American-Statesman, Houston Chronicle, and El Paso Times, according to NBC News.

“If Texas can ban abortion and endanger lives, California can ban deadly weapons of war and save lives. If Governor Abbott truly wants to protect the right to life, we urge him to follow California’s lead,” the ad states.

\u201chttps://t.co/dvyPy6SH38\u201d
— Gavin Newsom (@Gavin Newsom) 1658501299

It comes off the heels of a $105,000 ad purchase Newsom made in Florida TV markets, capturing national headlines and fueling speculation about the possibility the 54-year-old governor will mount a primary challenge to President Joe Biden, 79, for the 2024 Democratic presidential nomination.

Newsom traveled to Washington D.C. this month to visit the White House while Biden was abroad, and while he was there, he blasted Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and Texas for an alleged "assault on freedom" being led by GOP governors. He also accused Democrats of losing focus by neglecting to challenge Republican policy victories at the state and local level.

In picking fights with Florida and Texas, two of the largest GOP-controlled states, Newsom is setting himself up as a foil to Republican governors and potentially as someone "who fights" in a future Democratic presidential primary, although he strongly denies holding any ambitions for the White House.

"In no way, shape or form this has anything to do with that. Period. Full stop. Add six or seven exclamation points,” he told NBC News.

The gun control bill Newsom will sign Friday mimics how Texas is enforcing the state's abortion law. It will allow private citizens to file lawsuits against people who make or sell illegal "assault weapons" or so-called ghost guns, adopting what the Texas law's critics have called a "bounty" mechanism.

Texas' heartbeat law, enacted before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, was written so that it would survive expected legal challenges on constitutional grounds. Now that the Supreme Court has ruled there is no constitutional right to an abortion, states have more power to restrict abortion access — but the same is not true for guns, which remain explicitly protected by the Second Amendment.

Some critics of the Texas law have also opposed California's new gun law. The American Civil Liberties Union says both laws encourage "vigilantism" and has expressed concerns that red and blue states could "escalate an 'arms race' ... by setting up bounty-hunting schemes on politically sensitive issues."

But Newsom dismissed those concerns and told NBC News that Democrats need to start playing hardball. "I think Democrats have been playing a little soft," he said.

He said the gun law was "fair play" given the Texas abortion law, and that it was written in such a way to provoke the Supreme Court to "reconcile their decision" on permitting the Texas law to take effect.

“There’s no principled way for them to strike down this law and uphold Texas," Newsom asserted.

South Dakota Republicans kill fetal heartbeat bill without debate



Republican lawmakers in South Dakota have killed a pro-life heartbeat bill supported by Gov. Kristi Noem (R), claiming that the bill could interfere with a separate ongoing lawsuit against Planned Parenthood.

During the governor's state of the state address in January, Noem proposed a fetal heartbeat bill modeled after Texas' Heartbeat Act, which prevents a woman from seeking an abortion after her unborn baby develops a heartbeat, usually sometime around six weeks. Her proposal was received with a standing ovation from the legislature, including every member of the House State Affairs Committee, which oversees "policy decisions of overriding state concern."

Abortions have dropped by 80% in South Dakota over the last decade, but there is more that we can do to protect unborn lives.\n\nWe must end abortions once a heartbeat can be detected. Any abortion after that point stops that child's heartbeat -- stops that gift from God.pic.twitter.com/EUbHMTGsRA
— Governor Kristi Noem (@Governor Kristi Noem) 1642086505

However, on Wednesday the Republican-controlled House State Affairs committee refused to give the heartbeat bill a hearing, preventing it from being considered at all for the rest of the year.

The committee members, who say they are pro-life conservatives, told the Argus Leader that Noem's heartbeat bill would potentially jeopardize a pending lawsuit against Planned Parenthood in the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court. They claimed that this lawsuit has a chance to challenge the Supreme Court precedent in Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortions in 1973.

"I am as pro-life as can be, and because of that, I do not want to do something that will jeopardize our involvement in a court case that could abolish abortion in this country," said Republican House Speaker Spencer Gosch.

“It’s the Legislature’s job to legislate, not the governor’s,” he added. “What she had wasn’t a bill. It was language, and we said that it’s not going to be a bill, and therefore, it’s not going to be heard. End of discussion.”

Noem vehemently disagrees with the Republican leader's argument and has blasted the committee's decision to refuse to even give her heartbeat proposal a hearing.

“Every single life is precious and deserving of our protection — but apparently South Dakota legislators think otherwise,” the governor said. "It grieves me that they would take this unprecedented action at this time based on the advice of one out-of-state lawyer. National pro-life leaders believe that now is the time to have this sort of protection in law to save lives."

According to Noem's office, the governor was referring to Harold Cassidy, a New Jersey-based lawyer who previously defended South Dakota's 2005 Informed Consent Abortion Statute, a law that requires abortionists to inform women that an abortion takes the life of a "whole, separate, unique, living human being."

Cassidy's website describes him as "widely recognized as the leading attorney in the nation in protecting pregnant mothers against the excesses and abuses of an abortion industry.” It also states that he works as a consultant for pro-life legislators in various states, and Noem spokesman Ian Fury said he is advising Republican legislators.

The Daily Signal reported that the lawsuit at the center of Gosch's argument is Planned Parenthood v. Noem, a case involving a South Dakota law that requires women to consult with a crisis pregnancy center before they abort their unborn children. A federal judge blocked the law from taking effect in 2011 after the American Civil Liberties Union and Planned Parenthood filed a lawsuit against the state.

When Noem attempted to enforce the law in 2021, Planned Parenthood sued again, and a federal judge in August ruled the law does "infringe on women’s right to free speech secured in the First Amendment, and it presents an undue burden on a woman’s right to access abortion," according to the Daily Caller.

Noem's office disputes the claim that advancing a heartbeat bill would jeopardize the lawsuit with Planned Parenthood.

“Last year, there were 10 abortions in South Dakota before a heartbeat can be detected, so we do not believe this legislation would ‘moot’ Planned Parenthood v. Noem,” Fury told the Daily Signal.

“The only way that it possibly could [moot the lawsuit] would be if Planned Parenthood left the state entirely — in which case we would achieve our goal of protecting every unborn life in South Dakota, since Planned Parenthood runs the only abortion mill in the state,” he argued.

At a press conference Thursday, Noem said that debate about whether her heartbeat proposal would impact the lawsuit with Planned Parenthood should have been permitted to take place in the legislature.

"This is the first time in years that the legislature has refused to give a hearing to a bill. It was introduced under the same protocols, same mechanisms as every other bill governors have brought. This bill and myself were treated very differently than in the past," Noem told reporters.

She added that it is important for every bill to get a hearing in the legislature.

"This would have been a fantastic debate just to have in committee. And we can all disagree and still defend life. We can disagree on strategy. But let's have that in an open forum. And I, as governor, want to have a transparent process," Noem said. "What happened in Speaker Gosch's committee yesterday was not transparent."