Reuters US Domestic News Summary

In a 7-4 vote, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the St. Johns County school board did not violate the U.S. Constitution or federal civil rights law by requiring students to use bathrooms corresponding to their biological sex. U.S. ramps up immigration arrests mostly at Mexican border Immigration arrests nearly doubled in 2022 compared to 2021 as border authorities apprehended more migrants and courts blocked efforts by U.S. President Joe Biden to more narrowly target detentions to focus on serious criminals.

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

Special Report-Boy Scouts, Catholic dioceses find haven from sex abuse suits in bankruptcy

Lawmakers around the United States have tried to grant justice to victims of decades-old incidents of child sexual abuse by giving them extra time to file lawsuits. Now some of the defendants in these cases, including church and youth organizations, are finding a safe haven: America’s bankruptcy courts. In New York, nearly 11,000 cases flooded state courts, many seeking to hold Catholic dioceses responsible for sexual abuse by clergy, after a 2019 law suspended statutes of limitations that would have otherwise barred many of the lawsuits. In response, four New York dioceses that collectively faced more than 500 sexual-abuse claims filed for bankruptcy. That halted the cases — and blocked those from anyone who might sue later — and forced the plaintiffs to negotiate a one-time settlement for all abuse claims in bankruptcy court.

Biden's pardons show focus on easing drug punishments, and women's rights

U.S. President Joe Biden on Friday pardoned six people who have already served time for crimes, including five convicted of drug or alcohol-related offenses and a woman who killed her allegedly abusive husband nearly five decades ago. The latest pardons showed Biden nudging U.S. criminal justice policy away from the war-on-drugs ethos that he and other liberal lawmakers once championed.

New Fed research flags rising risk of U.S. recession

Just over half of the 50 U.S. states are exhibiting signs of slowing economic activity, breaching a key threshold that often signals a recession is in the offing, new research from the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank report said. That report, released Wednesday, followed another report from the San Francisco Fed from earlier in the week that also delved into the rising prospect that the U.S. economy may fall into recession at some point in coming months.

Over 40% of U.S. COVID cases caused by Omicron subvariant XBB.1.5 - CDC

Over 40% of COVID-19 cases in the United States are now caused by the highly contagious Omicron XBB.1.5, data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed on Friday, with the subvariant doubling from the previous week. Although many public health experts are expressing concern about the rising COVID cases in China, infectious disease experts have been increasingly worried about the XBB.1.5 variant.

Grad student from Washington state charged with murders of four Idaho students

A graduate student from Washington state has been arrested in Pennsylvania and charged with first-degree murder in the stabbing deaths of four University of Idaho students six weeks ago, authorities said on Friday. Pennsylvania State Police took Bryan Christopher Kohberger, 28, into custody Thursday night on a fugitive warrant from Idaho, according to James Fry, chief of police in Moscow, Idaho, where the University of Idaho campus is located.

Southwest Airlines operations back to normal after being crippled by storm

Southwest Airlines was up and running on a normal schedule on Friday after a massive winter storm crippled operations this week and exposed problems at the low-cost carrier. Dallas-based Southwest struggled to recover from a mammoth weekend storm, cancelling at least 16,000 flights since last Friday and leaving passengers as well as its own crews stranded during the busy Christmas holiday rush.

U.S. House committee releases Trump tax returns he sought to keep secret

Democrats in Congress released six years of Donald Trump's tax records to the public on Friday, disclosing documents the former president long sought to keep secret and dealing another setback as he again seeks the White House in 2024. A Democratic-controlled U.S. House of Representatives committee released Trump's redacted returns for 2015 through 2020, capping a multi-year battle between the Republican former president and Democratic lawmakers that was settled only last month by the U.S. Supreme Court.

North Carolina won't charge Trump's ex-staff Meadows with voter fraud

The U.S. state of North Carolina will not charge former Republican President Donald Trump's chief of staff Mark Meadows with voter fraud, the state's Justice Department said on Friday.

In April, North Carolina removed Meadows from the voter roll after state authorities said they were investigating his voter registration. Meadows has previously echoed Trump's false claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 election.

U.S. appeals court upholds Florida high school's transgender bathroom ban

A sharply divided federal appeals court on Friday upheld a Florida high school's policy forbidding transgender students from using bathrooms that accord with their chosen identities. In a 7-4 vote, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the St. Johns County school board did not violate the U.S. Constitution or federal civil rights law by requiring students to use bathrooms corresponding to their biological sex.

U.S. ramps up immigration arrests mostly at Mexican border

Immigration arrests nearly doubled in 2022 compared to 2021 as border authorities apprehended more migrants and courts blocked efforts by U.S. President Joe Biden to more narrowly target detentions to focus on serious criminals. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested nearly 143,000 immigrants in the 2022 fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30, close to double the number in 2021, according to data released on Friday. Around two-thirds of those arrests were of people with only immigration violations, the data showed. Most were migrants apprehended at the U.S.-Mexico border with no criminal convictions or charges pending and who were transferred to ICE, officials said on a call with reporters.