Politics

The Democratic majority in the Maryland House of Delegates gave initial approval to abortion rights legislation on Wednesday after a lengthy debate and attempts to amend the legislation by Republicans. The House ultimately gave approval to two abortion rights bills, including a measure sponsored by House Speaker Adrienne A. Jones (D-Baltimore County), House Bill 1171, which would allow voters to decide whether to enshrine access to abortion services in the Maryland Constitution.

President Biden signed an executive order Wednesday for a sweeping review of the government’s approach to cryptocurrencies, aiming to secure the nation’s position as a leader in the rapidly growing industry while containing risks to consumers and the financial system itself. Ultimately, some structure could be imposed on what has been a fractured regulatory response to the rise of digital assets in a global market now valued at roughly $1.85 trillion.

Move over, liquor lobby. Step aside, Big Pharma. The cat lobby has arrived in Annapolis and already notched a win: Maryland is poised to become the second state in the country to ban declawing. The procedure, commonly performed for decades but now deemed barbaric and unnecessary by pet owners and some veterinarians, is banned in many parts of the world and also in several cities across the country, including Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, San Francisco and Denver. New York passed a statewide ban in 2019.

Baltimore County waited until the eleventh hour to submit a redrawn map to a federal judge Tuesday night — and the county council’s revised map still included only one majority Black Council district. U.S. District Court Judge Lydia Kay Griggsby issued an order in February requiring county officials to adopt a new plan that “either includes two reasonably compact majority-Black Districts for the election of County councilmembers, or an additional County District in which Black voters otherwise have an opportunity to elect a representative of their choice” and complies with the Voting Rights Act on or before March 8.

Baltimore State’s attorney candidate Roya Hanna announced Tuesday that she’s dropping out of the Democratic primary and running as an independent in the general election. A defense attorney and former prosecutor, Hanna said party affiliation hinders elected prosecutors and declared that she’s running as an independent because “the business of prosecution is too important for politics.”

Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman said he will testify Wednesday in support of a bill creating a commission to study the health and environmental impacts of Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport. Since the 2015 implementation of the Federal Aviation Administration’s Next Generation Air Transportation System, which allows for more flights in the air by guiding planes with satellite instead of radar, the noise for nearby communities has gotten worse, he said.

A series of challenges to Maryland’s legislative redistricting plan will go to trial starting March 22, the state court system announced Tuesday. The bench trial will take place before Special Magistrate Alan M. Wilner, a retired Court of Appeals judge who also handled redistricting challenges a decade ago.