Cross-Examination

• Federal court rules against sex-reassignment surgery mandate: The Biden administration cannot force doctors or hospitals to perform “transgender” procedures, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Friday. The appellate court upheld a lower court’s injunction against the Health and Human Services mandate. A Catholic hospital group first raised the lawsuit, arguing that it infringed on religious liberty. The court clearly agreed. Judge Don Willett wrote, “We have recognized that the loss of freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment, RLUIPA, and RFRA (Religious Freedom and Restoration Act) all constitute per se irreparable harm.” The counsel representing the physicians seeking religious liberty, Joseph Davis, praised the ruling as a “major victory for conscience rights and compassionate medical care.” He further observed, “Doctors cannot do their jobs and comply with the Hippocratic Oath if the government requires them to perform harmful, irreversible procedures against their conscience and medical expertise.” The real issue should be over allowing doctors to perform sex-reassignment procedures on anyone who is not a consenting adult.

• A test isn’t racist just because more whites pass than blacks: The simple existence of a disparity isn’t necessarily evidence of racism. The fact that white students on average outperform black students on a test doesn’t mean that the test itself is racist. Yet in this era of wokeness, that is exactly the rationale that is given to explain why certain race-based performance disparities exist. A petition from Change.org claims that the Association of Social Work Boards test required for social work licensure is racist due to the fact that, since 2018, 84% of white test-takers have passed the exam the first time while just 45% of black test-takers have done so. The petition says this disparity demonstrates “a failure in the exam’s design,” adding that the “assertion that the problem lies with test-takers only reinforces the racism inherent to the test.” The problem is that other than the racial disparity of test-takers’ passing rate, no other data from the test is offered to prove that the test is racist. In fact, Columbia University professor John McWhorter notes: “If there were clear evidence [of racism], presumably the petitioners would have outlined it in order to make their case. But the petition doesn’t prove the exam’s design is fatally flawed.” The irony here is that without providing evidence to justify the racism claim, the petition is “a squeak away from arguing that Black and Latino people just aren’t very quick on the uptake or can’t think outside the box,” as McWhorter puts it. “What kind of antiracism is that?”

• Students told to “avoid police” if they witness a crime: A Denver-area high school has drawn heat for showing students a video that instructed them to avoid calling the police if they witness a violently racist or homophobic incident. The video, titled “Don’t be a Bystander: 6 Tips for Responding to Racist Attacks,” claims that “in our current political moment, White supremacists and White nationalists have been emboldened, and as a result, public attacks are on the rise.” One of the tips following the witnessing of a violent racist or homophobic attack says to “not call the police” because it “escalates, rather than reduces” the violence. A letter signed by law enforcement associations in Colorado warned that the video presented “negative perceptions of law enforcement” and damaged efforts of the police “to build trusting relationships within the communities we serve.” Denver Public Schools responded by claiming that the video had not been “fully vetted” before it was shown and that the district does “not subscribe” to snubbing the police.

• Fathers of Marines killed in Kabul airport bombing blast Biden admin on one-year anniversary: Last Friday was the one-year anniversary of the deadly airport bombing in Kabul that claimed the lives of 13 U.S. military personnel and 170 Afghan civilians. Joe Biden issued a statement in which he recognized the sacrifice of those service members who died. The problem was that later in the day, Biden filmed a segment on Jay Leno’s show that one of the fathers of a Marine who died that day called insensitive. Marine Staff Sgt. Darin T. Hoover’s father blasted the Biden administration: “We didn’t hear on single word from the administration — not a single word — and still [haven’t].” He added: “Not that we would take it because of the way that this happened. Six months into it … the administration sent out letters to the families. And it was a canned letter. Everybody’s was exactly the same. They photocopied it … and then just stamped Mr. Biden’s name to it. And that was it. Nothing personal.” Another father of a Marine killed that day stated: “The word ‘Afghanistan’ has allegedly [been] banned from the White House. They don’t even want to talk about that word, that country, none of it.”

Headlines

• Congressional Democrats change direction and blame Trump for moving too fast on COVID (RedState)

• Moderna is suing Pfizer over alleged copyright infringement of its COVID vaccine (Not the Bee)

• U.S. intelligence community to evaluate national security risk of Trump documents — like they did with Clinton’s classified docs… (Washington Times)

• Biden loan cancellation could cost more than $1,000,000,000,000, says Penn Wharton Budget Model (Free Beacon)

• Conservative groups and AGs plot legal strategy to overturn Biden student debt relief (Washington Examiner)

• Biden was advised against loan forgiveness by Yellen and Jill, encouraged by Harris (Washington Examiner)

• Judge denies Michigan secretary of state’s motion to dismiss lawsuit removing 26,000 dead registrants from voter rolls (The Federalist)

• Biden’s DHS still knowingly releasing COVID-positive border crossers into U.S. (Breitbart)

• Federal agencies have no system to check whether remote employees are actually working (Free Beacon)

• $1.34 billion Mega Millions lottery winner still hasn’t come forward (Fox Business)

• Satire: FBI instructs Facebook to censor posts about the FBI instructing Facebook to censor posts about Hunter’s laptop (Babylon Bee)

• Related satire: Sharpie scores huge endorsement deal with FBI (Babylon Bee)

For more editors’ choice headlines, click here.