By Donald H. Harrison
SAN DIEGO COUNTY (Thursday, May 11, 2023)
Yvonne & Jeffrey Bloom, major backers along with Ralleen Ratzlaff, are active supporters of the Home of Guiding Hands, which provides services to people with mental disabilities and their parents. This month’s L’Chaim Magazine notes in a cover story that Ratzlaff is the chair and the Bloom Family the honorees at the organization’s June 10 “Bootleggers Ball.”
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U.S. Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-San Diego) offered these thoughts on surging immigration: “The Biden-Harris Administration has prepared for the end of Title 42, but no amount of planning can make up for the fact that Congress has abdicated its responsibility to pass comprehensive and inclusive immigration reform for decades. Ultimately, it’s on Congress to restore our asylum and refugee systems, expand legal pathways for migration including for Dreamers, address the immigration case backlog by hiring more immigration judges, and properly support local and state governments so they can welcome and care for those arriving at our border. I stand ready to do that work and urge my Republican colleagues to finally come to the table. In the short term, I’m leading the call for additional funds – which Congress already secured last year – to be directed to non-profits and service providers in border communities like San Diego. San Diego has proven that – with adequate resources and strong partnerships on the ground – we can welcome and care for asylum seekers fleeing violence and unrest in an orderly and humane way.”
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Ruth Mastron, president of the House of Israel in Balboa Park, advises that for the May 21 celebration of the 75th anniversary of Israel independence “we will have professional security personnel on duty and are working closely with the San Diego Police Department, Balboa Park rangers, and other services to ensure a safe event for everyone.”
CALIFORNIA
Washington Post reporter Ben Terris, in The Big Break, tells of U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-California) confusing the identities of two African-American U.S. Senators. In 2021, after Raphael Warnock (D-Georgia) won a special election, Feinstein stuck out her hand, told the senator she encountered that she had been rooting for him, and congratulated him on his election. But the man she congratulated wasn’t Warnock, it was Sen. Tim Scott (R-South Carolina) who had already been serving in the U.S. Senate for eight years. Scott didn’t correct her mistake, Terris wrote in his forthcoming book. Instead, he thanked her and said her support meant a lot. Critics of Feinstein says this is an example of how the 89-year-old Feinstein has been losing her mental acuity.
NATIONAL
Actress Mayim Bialik has withdrawn as a host of television’s Jeopardy quiz show, pending resolution of the writers’ strike, leaving the filming of the final season episodes May 16 through May 19 for co-host Ken Jennings to host. The quiz show’s writers Jim Rhine, Michele Loud, and Billy Wisse have been walking the picket lines, according to Variety.
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Atlanta Braves pitcher Max Fried, recovering from a left forearm strain since last pitching on May 5, may be out of the lineup for as long as two months, according to Major League Baseball writer Mark Bowman.
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Supreme Court Justice Elana Kagan was part of a unanimous decision that a transgender woman from Guatemala, Estrella (né Leon) Santos-Zacaria, has the right to appeal the rejection of her bid for asylum by U.S. immigration authorities. Court watchers noted that the opinion, written by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, referred to the transgender woman with the pronouns “she” and “her.” …. In another case, Kagan voted with the majority in a 5-4 decision upholding a California law requiring that pigs, calves, and egg-laying hens be provided with freedom of movement and not be treated cruelly. In a decision written by Justice Neal Gorsuch, the Supreme Court said such regulations are within the power of individual states and that those who challenged the law did not raise any issues applicable to the U.S. Constitution
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Roberta Kaplan, attorney for E. Jean Carroll who won $5 million in a sexual battery and defamation civil suit again former President Donald Trump, said in the wake of Trump’s comments on a CNN Town Hall, that she and Carroll are considering suing Trump again. During his CNN performance on Wednesday night, in a session moderated by Kaitlan Collins, Trump said about Carroll: “This is a fake story. Made-up story. I have no idea who the hell she is. She’s a whack job.” Carroll responded to The New York Times: “It’s just stupid, it’s disgusting, vile, foul, it wounds people.” Meanwhile, Trump’s attorneys, as expected, filed notice in federal court that they would appeal the juryt verdict.
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Jeffrey Katzenberg, cofounder of DreamWorks and a large donor to Democratic party candidates, told The Financial Times that he will deliver “all the resources” President Joe Biden may need to defeat former President Donald Trump.
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Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas contends Congress is to blame for the chaotic migrant situation at the Mexican border. During a White House briefing, he told reporters: “This is an ongoing challenge that quite frankly has vexed this country for decades because this country has been unable, Congress has been unable, to pass immigration reform that everyone agrees and understands is desperately needed.” Mayorkas also reiterated that the U.S. border is not open: “People who cross our border unlawfully and without a legal basis to remain will be promptly processed and removed,” he said.
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Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, a Democrat, slammed the choice of the Peoria and Tazewell County GOP to have Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as its Lincoln Day Dinner speaker on Friday. Saying DeSantis represents the reverse of what Abraham Lincoln stood for, Pritzker commented that the Florida governor “swears that he is fighting to protect people’s freedoms, but he has no problem taking away reproductive rights, attacking schools and libraries to limit what parents and teachers want for their students, disregarding the humanity of LGBTQ people, and failing to protect people of color seeking to live free from discrimination…. In Illinois, we reject the cruelty he espouses and stand firmly against his hateful agenda.”
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Actress Jacklyn Lee Zeman, who over 45 years played nurse Bobbie Spencer in 800 episodes of the daytime television drama, General Hospital, has died at age 70, a victim of cancer.
INTERNATIONAL
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, speaking at a Freedom House Annual Awards Ceremony, accused Russia of continuing to “push a steady, relentless stream of disinformation about its war of aggression against Ukraine, to lie about and cover up horrific abuses its committed, to try to justify committing others.” The State Department has responded by developing “an AI-enabled Content Aggregator to collect verifiable disinformation and then to share that with partners around the world,” he said.
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U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (Ind-Vermont) helped pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel Congresswoman Rashida Tlaid (D-Michigan) stage her “Nakba Day” observance by authorizing her to use the hearing room used by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Hearing Room., which he chairs. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California) had banned the event which accuses Israel of expelling Arab residents during the War of Independence and discriminating against Arabs ever since. Tlaib was joined by Congresswoman Cori Bush (D-Missouri) at the event, which filled the room to capacity.
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Donald H. Harrison is editor emeritus of San Diego Jewish World. He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com