by Lilly Gioia

In 1972 when President Richard Nixon signed the Consumer Products Safety Act into law, Republicans and Democrats believed the things Americans buy every day should not poison, maim or kill them. Over the years we’ve mostly taken for granted that dangerous items will be recalled, the public will be warned about poorly designed baby cribs, or toys from China containing lead. When companies violated rules and endangered the public, the Consumer Products Safety Commission took action.

Since President Trump’s election things have changed dramatically. Many staff chose buyouts offered by Musk’s Dept. of Government Efficiency. Ports are no longer adequately staffed with inspectors to check for lead and other harmful chemicals on goods entering American ports from overseas.

In 2024 the Consumer Products Safety Commission issued an order against Amazon targeting 400,000 products it found dangerously below safety standards. Among the products were faulty carbon monoxide detectors, hairdryers without electrocution protection, and children’s sleepwear that violated federal flammability standards.

The Commission needs five commissioners on their board in order to function. President Trump promptly fired three of the required FIVE commissioners, all Democrats. Under the law commissioners can only be fired for neglect of duty or malfeasance in office. When Congress created important independent agencies, the intention was to protect regulators from politically motivated firings.

The fired Democrats sued and were reinstated by a federal judge. That was until last week, when the Trump administration appealed to the Supreme Court. By a 6-3 ruling on the emergency Shadow Docket, the Supreme Court ruled that President Trump can just fire regulators he doesn’t like.

The court heard no oral arguments and gave no reasons for this decision. In a vehement dissent, Justice Elena Kagan protested writing, “by such actions this Court may facilitate the permanent transfer of authority, piece by piece, from one branch of Government to another.” All Trump’s firings in many agencies are not making us safer and violate Supreme Court precedent.

by Matthew Thornburg

This Social Action Minute serves first to remind us that we are a bit atypical politically up in Northeast Pennsylvania. While many of our elections are competitive here, owing to a balance among Democrats and Republicans, the norm nation- and state-wide is uncompetitive general elections where one party stands very little chance of victory. In such a situation, often the only opportunity for real choice by the voters is in the primary elections to pick party nominees. These primary elections--owing to the fact the Framers did not foresee political parties, and an expansive Supreme Court ruling in Tashjian v. Connecticut--have different rules depending on which state you are in.

Pennsylvania is one of twelve states with closed primaries--meaning that only those who register or affiliate with a party may vote in its primary elections. Everyone else must pay the cost of these primaries while sitting on the sidelines waiting for the party registrants to decide their choices in November. There are a variety of possibilities for electoral reform to this system, such as the ranked choice voting Maine has implemented, all the way to the unlikely hope of proportional representation someday. However, a more modest reform would be to allow unaffiliated voters to participate in primary elections--so called semiclosed primaries.

There is a robust movement alive in Harrisburg to open our primaries to the unaffiliated, with new bills introduced in the House and Senate this cycle. House Bill 280 and Senate Bill 400 would open PA primaries to the unaffiliated. Those who feel--as I do--that primaries should be open to all voters, regardless of registration, are encouraged to learn about the issue at ballotpa.org and contact their local state legislative delegation.

by Dave Nichols

This note is intended to promote a clearer understanding of the debate going on in this country regarding the Palestine-Israel conflict. We need clarification because our government over recent years has cast anyone’s criticism of Israel as a form of antisemitism. We can see this conflation fostered through publicized congressional hearings against university presidents, congressional resolutions, and State Department actions against non citizens who protest in favor of the Palestinians. This has led to the suppression of protests against Israel‘s human rights abuses, charging people who have broken the law protesting against Israel as hate crimes, and the mainstream media routinely referring to violence against people who support Israel as antisemitic hate crimes. The British-Israeli historian, Ilan Pappé, distinguishes Judaism from Zionism by calling the former a religion and the latter an ideology. He explains that a religion is a broad abstract collection of ideas whereas an ideology is more concrete and limited in scope. 

Judaism dates back more than 2000 years. Zionism is a more recent idea and it didn’t originate with Jews. It was actually suggested by the Puritans in the 1600’s to promote the return of Jews to Israel in order to accelerate the 2nd coming of Christ and the end of the world. In the 1800’s, Evangelical Christians promoted the plan among central and eastern European Jews. The first formal Jewish Zionist meeting didn’t occur until 1897 in Switzerland. The movement was attended by both secular and religious Jews. Zionism for them meant that Jews were a people requiring its own nation in Palestine. Most Jews at that time had little interest in the project. However, since Israel’s founding in 1948 a large fraction of Jews and Evangelical Christians in Europe and Americans have become ardent supporters of Zionism. Ilan Pappé estimates about 1⁄2 the Jews today worldwide adhere to Zionism*. In the United States there are more Evangelicals supporting Israel than there are Jewish Americans supporting Israel.

The US has decided to classify anti-Zionism as antisemitic to tamp down protest against Israel’s human rights abuses in Gaza and the West Bank. I believe that this is having a negative effect on both Jews and Americans in general who wish to live in a country that abhors cruelty and treasures the separation of Church and State.

* Conversation with Ilan Pappè, Lobbying for Zionism on Both Sides of the Atlantic

by Brian Dugas

Supreme Court decision to limit federal judges ability to pass nationwide injunctions.

The President issued an Executive Order ending birthright citizenship for US born children of parents who are in the country illegally. Judges in three states: Maryland, Washington, and Massachusetts issued nationwide injunctions saying that was unconstitutional.

The 14th Amendment of the US Constitution provides that all children born in the United States are automatically American citizens.

The administration brought this case to the Supreme Court in Trump v. CASA, but not to address the issue of the legality of ending birthright citizenship, but to restrict judges from having the authority to issue nationwide, or universal injunctions that have blocked many orders from being implemented by numerous Presidents, not just the current President. The administration complained that the judges are overreaching by issuing orders that apply to everyone, not just the parties involved.

The Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision to restrict federal judges ability to issue nationwide injunctions allows the administration to move forward with the Executive Order that is redefining birthright citizenship. This will most likely end up back in the Supreme Court in the future, since it is spelled out in the 14th Amendment of the Constitution. On the issue of limiting judges ability to issue injunctions - one of the three dissenting Justice’s Justice Sotomayor read a scathing dissent out loud saying that this decision is a “gross mistake, no right is safe now in this country” she used the example that a President could issue an order seizing guns, and they could do that until the Supreme Court had a chance to review it. Some of the recent Federal judges injunctions now in question - mass federal layoff’s, freezes on funding - now no longer in effect?

The Department of Justice has just recently posted a memo online prioritizing its efforts. 

• Gives attorney’s wide discretion to decide when to pursue the denaturalization process in order to advance the administration's policy objectives. And while the priority goes to individuals who pose a danger to national security, the memo also states that it can seek out cases that are sufficiently important to pursue including cases “involving undisclosed criminal records or procedural errors during naturalization”. (ABC News, Armando Garcia, July 1, 2025)
• The other priorities in the DOJ’s memo are: ending Anti-Semitism
  
• Taking legal action against sanctuary states and jurisdictions.

Reminders:

• Social Action Committee is working with the Community Justice Alliance on Latino issues
• PA Pardons Project
• Need to start collecting for the Bear Creek Camp