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WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden, who belatedly opted against seeking reelection, on Monday will pay a visit to the library of the last president to make the same difficult choice, more than a half-century ago.

Biden’s speech Monday at the LBJ Presidential Library in Austin, Texas, is designed to mark the 60th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act, enacted under President Lyndon Johnson. But the visit has taken on very different symbolism in the two weeks it took to reschedule it after Biden had to cancel because he got COVID-19.

The speech, originally set for July 15, was once seen by the White House as an opportunity for Biden to try to make a case for salvaging his sinking presidential campaign — delivered in the home district of Rep. Lloyd Doggett, the 15-term congressman who was the first Democratic lawmaker to publicly call for Biden to step aside.

Two weeks later, the political landscape has been reshaped. Biden is out of the race. Vice President Kamala Harris is the likely Democratic nominee. And the president is focused not on his next four years, but on the legacy of his single term and the future of democracy.

No American incumbent president has dropped out of the race as late in the process as did Biden. Johnson announced he would not seek reelection in March of 1968, at the height of the Vietnam War.

Biden has drawn a lot of comparisons to Johnson of late. Both men spoke to the nation from the Oval Office to lay out their decisions. Both faced pressure from within their own party to step aside, and both were ultimately praised for doing so.

But their reasons were very different. Johnson stepped away in the heat of the war and spoke at length about his need to focus on the conflict. Biden, 81, had every intention of running for reelection until his shaky June 27 debate performance ignited fears within his own party about his age and mental acuity, and whether he could beat Republican Donald Trump.

Biden has called Trump a serious threat to democracy, particularly after the ex-president’s efforts in 2020 to overturn the results of the election he lost and his continued lies about that loss. The president framed his decision to bow out of the race as motivated by the need to unite his party to protect democracy.

“I’ve decided the best way forward is to pass the torch to a new generation. That’s the best way to unite our nation,” Biden said in his Oval Office address. “Nothing, nothing can come in the way of saving our democracy. And that includes personal ambition.”

Biden decided to seek the presidency in 2020 after witnessing the violence at a 2017 “Unite The Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, where torch-wielding white supremacists marched to protest the removal of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee, chanting “You will not replace us!” and “Jews will not replace us!”

Biden said he was horrified by Trump’s response, particularly when the Republican told reporters that “you had some very bad people in that group, but you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides.”

During his presidency, Biden has often put equity and civil rights at the forefront, including with his choice for vice president. Harris is the first woman, Black person and person of South Asian descent to have the job. She could also become the first woman elected to the presidency.

Biden’s administration has worked to combat racial discrimination in the real estate market, he pardoned thousands of people convicted on federal marijuana charges that have disproportionately affected people of color and provided federal funding to reconnect city neighborhoods that were racially segregated or divided by road projects, and also invested billions in historically Black colleges and universities.

His efforts, he has said, are meant to push the country forward — and to guard against efforts to undermine the landmark legislation signed by Johnson in 1964, one of the most significant civil rights achievements in U.S. history.

The law made it illegal to discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. It was designed to end discrimination in school, work and public facilities, and barred unequal application of voter registration requirements.

Johnson signed the act five hours after Congress approved it, saying the nation was in a “time of testing” that “we must not fail.” He added: “Let us close the springs of racial poison. Let us pray for wise and understanding hearts. Let us lay aside irrelevant differences and make our nation whole.”

Eight years later, Johnson convened a civil rights symposium bringing together those who fought for civil rights to push for more progress.

“The progress has been too small; we haven’t done nearly enough,” he said in 1972 during the symposium. “Until we overcome unequal history, we can’t overcome unequal opportunity … There is still work to be done, so let’s be on with it.”

Biden has said he is “determined to get as much done” as he can in his final six months in office, including signing major legislation expanding voting rights and a federal police bill named for George Floyd.

“I’ll keep defending our personal freedoms and our civil rights, from the right to vote to the right to choose,” Biden said from the Oval Office. “I’ll keep calling out hate and extremism, make it clear there is no place, no place in America for political violence or any violence ever, period.”

Later Monday, Biden will also travel to Houston to pay his respects to the late Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, who died July 19 at age 74.

HOUSTON (THE TEXAS TRIBUNE) — President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, will each travel to Houston this week to pay their respects to former U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, according to statements from the White House.

Jackson Lee died at age 74 on July 19 amid a battle with pancreatic cancer. The Houston Democrat was one of the longest serving members of Texas’ congressional delegation, known as a staunch advocate for progressive causes.

Harris called Jackson Lee a “dear friend” in a statement following the Congresswoman’s passing and lauded her work on disaster relief following Hurricane Harvey, and as an advocate for women’s rights. Harris and Jackson Lee were both members of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, a historically Black sorority, and worked together on legislation, including the law that made Juneteenth a national holiday.

“Sheila Jackson Lee was, first and foremost, a leader dedicated to serving the people of her beloved city,” Harris said in a statement. “No task was too small as long as it was the right thing to do.”

Biden and Harris’ trips to Houston are not expected to overlap. Biden will travel to Houston on Monday and is expected to visit Houston City Hall, where Jackson Lee is lying in state.

Harris will be in Houston on Wednesday to deliver remarks at a political event, according to a Sunday evening press release. And she will deliver a eulogy at Jackson Lee’s homegoing service on the following day. The Celebration of Life Service on Thursday will take place at Fallbrook Church and will be livestreamed, according to a schedule of events shared by Jackson Lee’s family.

The trip will mark Harris’ third visit to Texas in the last month. On July 10, Harris traveled to Dallas where she spoke to about 20,000 members of Alpha Kappa Alpha at their annual convention.

Last week, Harris traveled to Houston and received a briefing on the ongoing recovery efforts following Hurricane Beryl. The following day, she delivered a keynote address at the American Federation of Teachers’ national convention in Houston.

Biden was scheduled to visit Texas on July 15 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That trip was postponed after an attempted assassination on former U.S. President Donald Trump and has been rescheduled for Monday. The president will travel to Houston after delivering his speech at the Lyndon B. Johnson presidential library.

Biden withdrew from the presidential race on July 21 and quickly endorsed Harris, urging Democrats to rally around the vice president to defeat Trump, the Republican challenger.

The article was originally posted in The Texas Tribune

HOUSTON (AP) — The lawyer of a powerful Mexican drug cartel leader who is now in U.S. custody pushed back Sunday against claims that his client was tricked into flying into the country, saying he was “forcibly kidnapped” by the son of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán.

Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada had eluded authorities for decades and had never set foot in prison until a plane carrying him and Joaquín Guzmán López, a son of notorious drug kingpin “El Chapo,” landed at an airport in Santa Teresa, New Mexico, near El Paso, Texas, on Thursday. Both men, who face various U.S. drug charges, were arrested and remain jailed.

Frank Perez, Zambada’s attorney, said his client did not end up at the New Mexico airport of his own free will.

“My client neither surrendered nor negotiated any terms with the U.S. government,” Perez said in a statement. “Joaquín Guzmán López forcibly kidnapped my client. He was ambushed, thrown to the ground, and handcuffed by six men in military uniforms and Joaquin. His legs were tied, and a black bag was placed over his head.” Perez went on to say that Zambada, 76, was thrown in the back of a pickup truck, forced onto a plane and tied to the seat by Guzmán López.

Known as an astute operator skilled at corrupting officials, Zambada has a reputation for being able to negotiate with everyone, including rivals. He is charged in a number of U.S. cases, including in New York and California. Prosecutors brought a new indictment against him in New York in February, describing him as the “principal leader of the criminal enterprise responsible for importing enormous quantities of narcotics into the United States.”

Removing him from the criminal landscape could set off a turbulent internal war for control over the cartel, as has occurred with the arrest or killings of other kingpins. Experts say it could also open the door for a more violent, younger generation of Sinaloa traffickers to move up.

Perez declined to offer much more comment beyond his Sunday statement, saying only that his client had been traveling with a light security detail and was set up after being called to a meeting with Guzmán López.

Perez’s comments were first reported by the Los Angeles Times.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Justice Department did not immediately return an email seeking comment Sunday on Perez’s claims. Court records did not list an attorney for Guzmán López, whose father is serving a life sentence in a U.S. prison.

According to a U.S. law enforcement official familiar with the matter, Zambada was duped into flying into the U.S.

The cartel leader got on an airplane believing he was going somewhere else, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter. The official did not provide details such as who persuaded Zambada to get on the plane or where exactly he thought he was going.

Zambada appeared in federal court in El Paso on Friday morning, where a judge read the charges against him and informed him of his rights. He is being held without bond and has pleaded not guilty to various drug trafficking charges, court records show. His next court hearing is scheduled for Thursday, Perez said.
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AMES, Iowa (AP) — Iowa’s law banning most abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy went into effect Monday, a drastic change that enrages — but doesn’t surprise — Sarah Traxler.

When Traxler, an OB-GYN based in Minnesota and the chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood North Central States, went to high school in a conservative Louisiana town in the 1990s, she saw abortion rights losing ground even then, decades before the U.S. Supreme Court and Iowa’s high court would say there isn’t a constitutional right to abortion.

“The protections of Roe have just been chipped away at slowly through time,” she told The Associated Press.

At 8 a.m. Monday in Iowa, the state will join more than a dozen others where abortion access has been sharply curbed in the roughly two years since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

It’s an outcome Iowa’s abortion providers have been fighting but still prepared for, shoring up abortion access in neighboring states and drawing on the lessons learned where bans went into effect more swiftly.

States with restrictive laws are “glimpses of our future,” Traxler said. Even with the ability to prepare, she told reporters Friday, “this transition is devastating and tragic for the people of Iowa.”

Iowa’s Republican-controlled Legislature approved the law last year, but a judge blocked it from being enforced shortly after the measure went into effect because of a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa, Planned Parenthood and the Emma Goldman Clinic in Iowa City.

The Iowa Supreme Court reiterated in June that there is no constitutional right to an abortion in the state and ordered the hold to be lifted. The district court judge’s July 22 orders set July 29 as the first day of enforcement.

The law prohibits abortions after cardiac activity can be detected, which is roughly at six weeks of pregnancy and before many know they are pregnant. There are limited exceptions in cases of rape, incest, fetal abnormality or when the life of the mother is in danger. Previously, abortion in Iowa was legal up to 20 weeks of pregnancy.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found 44% of the 3,761 total abortions in Iowa in 2021 occurred at or before six weeks. Only six abortions were at the 21-week mark or later.

Alex Sharp, senior health center manager who runs the Planned Parenthood abortion clinic closest to Des Moines, said staff members overbooked schedules this week, moving up appointments for people seeking abortions who likely would be past the legal limit as of Monday.

Still, that wasn’t an option for everyone. Almost a third of the people Sharp spoke to said they couldn’t get off work or find daycare before next week. Those patients could work with staff members to find appointments out of state, she said.

Across the country, the status of abortion has changed constantly since the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, with trigger laws immediately going into effect, states passing new restrictions or expansions of access and court battles putting those on hold.

In states with restrictions, the main abortion options are getting pills via telehealth or underground networks and traveling, vastly driving up demand in states with more access.

The Guttmacher Institute, which supports abortion rights, projected last month that about 20,000 abortions were performed in Kansas in 2023, or 152% more than in 2020. Near Iowa, Illinois saw a 71% increase and Minnesota went up 49%. Providers there expect to see more influx after Monday.

When the first restrictive laws went into effect, like in Texas, providers had to essentially “figure it out as we went,” said Amy Hagstrom Miller, founder of Whole Woman’s Health. And even though providers across the country have learned how to work within the limits, “I don’t ever want us to have this seem normal.”

Hagstrom Miller has been talking with leaders at the independent Emma Goldman Clinic about accepting referrals at the Whole Woman’s Health clinic in Minnesota, where 20% of abortion appointments go to out-of-state travelers, she said. That percentage is expected to increase under Iowa’s new law.

The region’s Planned Parenthood affiliate also has been making investments for over a year to prepare for Monday. A location added last year in Mankato, Minnesota, is only an hour’s drive from Iowa and recently began providing medication abortion. Just over the state line in Omaha, Nebraska, a facility is quadrupling exam rooms and adding staff.

Maggie DeWitte, who has worked for decades to advocate against abortion access in Iowa, said it’s to be expected after Dobbs that while some states work to regulate or even eliminate abortion, others are going to be less restrictive.

“We certainly hope that women would not travel out of state, but we know that that is going to happen,” she said. “So that just has to continue our education efforts to those women to let them know that there are other options out there.”

Many people don’t know the law was passed or is going into effect, making those conservations even more sensitive. Staff members have had to tell patients they are too far along and it’s too late unless they travel and miss more work, Planned Parenthood’s Sharp said.

It’s been difficult, she said, even though clinics are as ready as they can be for Monday.

“We are prepared operationally for it,” Sharp said, “but not emotionally or mentally for it, at all.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — A powerful Mexican drug cartel leader who eluded authorities for decades was duped into flying into the U.S., where he was arrested alongside a son of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, according to a U.S. law enforcement official familiar with the matter.

Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada got on an airplane to the U.S. believing he was going somewhere else, said the official, who spoke on the condition on anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter. The official did not provide additional details, including who persuaded Zambada to get on the plane or where exactly he thought he was going.

Upon arriving in the El Paso area, Zambada and Joaquín Guzmán López, a son of notorious drug kingpin “El Chapo,” who was sentenced to life in a U.S. prison in 2019, were immediately taken into custody by U.S. authorities, officials said.

Zambada, 76, appeared in federal court in El Paso on Friday morning, where a judge read the charges and informed Zambada of his rights. Zambada, who is being held without bond, has entered a plea of not guilty to slew of drug trafficking charges, court records show. His next court hearing is scheduled for Wednesday.

Frank Perez, a lawyer listed for Zambada, said in a message to AP that his client “did not come to the U.S. voluntarily.”

Zambada, one of the most powerful drug lords in the world, has been a key target for the U.S. government for years in its bid to take down leaders of the Sinaloa cartel that’s responsible for trafficking huge sums of drugs across the border. U.S. authorities had offered a reward of up to $15 million for information leading to his capture.

His arrest “strikes at the heart of the cartel that is responsible for the majority of drugs, including fentanyl and methamphetamine, killing Americans from coast to coast,” said U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration chief Anne Milgram.

“Fentanyl is the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced, and the Justice Department will not rest until every single cartel leader, member, and associate responsible for poisoning our communities is held accountable,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement Thursday.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said Friday that Mexico was still awaiting details about the arrests and was not involved in the operation. Although he hailed the arrests, he suggested others could step in to fill the vacuum. That’s why his administration has focused on addressing the root causes of drug use and the associated violence, he said.

Mexican Security Secretary Rosa Icela Rodríguez said the plane took off with only the pilot from the airport in Hermosillo, Mexico. Tracking service FlightAware showed the plane stopped transmitting its altitude and speed for about 30 minutes while it was over the mountains of northern Mexico before resuming its course to the U.S. border.

“It is a fact that one person went out from here, three people arrived there,” she said.

Zambada is charged in a number of U.S. cases, including in New York and California. Prosecutors brought a new indictment against him in New York in February, describing him as the “principal leader of the criminal enterprise responsible for importing enormous quantities of narcotics into the United States.”

One of the longest-surviving capos in Mexico, Zambada was considered the cartel’s strategist, more involved in day-to-day operations than his flashier and better-known boss, “El Chapo.”

Zambada is an old-fashioned capo in an era of younger kingpins known for their flamboyant lifestyles of club-hopping and brutal tactics of beheading, dismembering and even skinning their rivals. While Zambada has fought those who challenged him, he is known for concentrating on the business side of trafficking and avoiding gruesome cartel violence that would draw attention.

In an April 2010 interview with the Mexican magazine Proceso, he acknowledged that he lived in fear of going to prison and would contemplate suicide rather than be captured.

“I’m terrified of being incarcerated,” Zambada said. “I’d like to think that, yes, I would kill myself.”

The interview was surprising for a kingpin known for keeping his head down, but he gave strict instructions on where and when the encounter would take place, and the article gave no hint of his whereabouts.

Zambada reputedly won the loyalty of locals in his home state of Sinaloa and neighboring Durango through his largess, sponsoring local farmers and distributing money and beer in his birthplace of El Alamo.

Although little is known about Zambada’s early life, he is believed to have gotten his start as an enforcer in the 1970s. By the early 1990s, he was a major player in the Juarez cartel, transporting tons of cocaine and marijuana.

Zambada started gaining the trust of Colombian traffickers, allegiances that helped him come out on top in the cartel world of ever-shifting alliances. Eventually he became so powerful that he broke off from the Juarez cartel, but still managed to keep strong ties with the gang and avoided a turf war. He also developed a partnership with “El Chapo” Guzman that would take him to the top of the Sinaloa Cartel.

Zambada’s detention follows some important arrests of other Sinaloa cartel figures, including one of his sons and another son of “El Chapo” Guzmán, Ovidio Guzmán López.

Ovidio Guzmán López was arrested and extradited to the U.S. last year. He pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking charges in Chicago in September. The Bureau of Prisons inmate locator showed Ovidio Guzmán López was released Tuesday, but Rodríguez said U.S. authorities informed Mexico he was not freed but just had his custody changed.

In 2021, Zambada’s son pleaded guilty in federal court in San Diego to being a leader in the Sinaloa cartel.

In recent years, Guzman’s sons have led a faction of the cartel known as the little Chapos, or “Chapitos,” that has been identified as a main exporter of fentanyl to the U.S. market. Their security chief was arrested by Mexican authorities in November.

DALLAS – The Dallas Morning News reports Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, bucking guidance from Washington Republicans, called Vice President Kamala Harris — the daughter of a Jamaican father and Indian mother — the “queen of DEI” in an interview Thursday. Patrick disparaged Harris’ rapid rise as the Democrats’ likely presidential nominee, calling it the result of diversity efforts. “She would be the queen of DEI if elected. She is DEI,” Patrick said to Chris Salcedo on Newsmax. Patrick is the chair of former President Donald Trump’s campaign in Texas and helped lead the effort to end diversity, equity and inclusion programs at Texas public universities in 2023.

Several Washington Republicans were quick to refer to the vice president as a “DEI hire” after she emerged as the top prospect to replace President Joe Biden at the top of the ticket. In response, some Republican leaders such as House Speaker Mike Johnson have warned party members against alluding to Harris’ race or gender amid worries those attacks could push away key voters, including suburban women and people of color. “This election will be about policies and not personalities,” Johnson told reporters Tuesday after a private meeting of House Republicans. Patrick’s office did not immediately respond to a phone call and email seeking comment. Democrats, including U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Dallas, have called the DEI attacks a dog whistle for racism. “One of the things that they continuously push … are these unwarranted attacks on anyone that is diverse in any way, and they try to pretend as if we don’t have credentials,” Crockett, who is Black, said Wednesday on MSNBC. Harris campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika said Harris is focusing on the issues, not “B.S.” attacks.