--:-- Shamita Basu: Good morning. It's Friday, March 19th. I'm Shamita Basu. And I'm Duarte Giraldino. This is Apple News Today. Each morning, hear about some of the most fascinating stories in the news and how the world's best journalists are covering them.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Shouldn't it be called a hate crime? That's what a lot of Asian American advocates are asking after the murder of eight people in Georgia, six of whom were women of Asian descent.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Now, the answer to that question comes down to a strict legal definition that isn't applied very often. Time magazine breaks it down.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The bar for prosecuting something as a hate crime is really high. Law enforcement has to be able to prove an incident was motivated by hate or bias. So this is a very specific legal classification.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But so many Asian Americans and allies are saying this case seems so clear. Just look at the racial makeup of the victims, not to mention the spike of anti-Asian violence that we're seeing across the country.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: But Time explains the way that hate crime laws are written. Prosecutors would need more evidence to make this argument in court. For example, they'd need to be able to point to the suspect's past words, actions or membership in certain groups.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But things like the victim's race, gender, religion, or sexual orientation, those facts alone are not enough to rest a case on.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Reporting in prosecution of hate crimes is just really, really low. Justice Department crime victim surveys show there are some 250,000 suspected hate crimes in the U.S. each year. And I say suspected because most are never reported to police.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Time points to a 2019 study showing state attorneys referred suspected hate crimes to the federal government just 2 times. Only 15 of those referrals turned into prosecutions.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: And not only is prosecution of hate crimes very rare but record is spotty and inconsistent. Tracking at the federal level is based on voluntary participation by local law enforcement. Three states don't have any hate crime laws at all. Many that do have no requirement to track them.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Georgia does have a hate crime law on the books, but it's relatively new. It was just passed last year after the killing of Ahmaud Arbery.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: The filibuster is back in the news this week. President Biden signaled he's open to changing the Senate rule that allows the minority party to stop legislation from moving forward without 60 votes.
--:-- [Audio clip of President Biden]
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: I don't think you have to eliminate the filibuster. You have to do it what it used to be when I first got to the Senate and back in the old days when you used to be around there. And that is that a filibuster, you had to stand up and command the floor. And you had to keep talking alone. You couldn't call for...
--:-- Shamita Basu: So let's go back to the old days.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: In the Washington Post, two historians write about how this tactic, the filibuster, has been used to deny fundamental rights to African Americans.
--:-- [Audio clip of historian]
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: They bring up the dire anti-lynching bill in 1922 as a case in point. It was meant to stop widespread violence against Black people in the decades after the Civil Rights War. Southern Democrats used the filibuster to squash this bill in a way that really hadn't been done before.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Yeah, they gummed up the Senate with procedural moves. They held the floor hostage by reading pamphlets and newspapers.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Eventually, the anti-lynching bill failed. And this set the stage for senators to block future civil rights bills. Senator Strom Thurmond held the floor for a record 24 hours to stall the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1957.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And opponents of the 1964 Civil Rights Act stopped the Senate for 60 working days.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: There's some poetic timing to this filibuster discussion. This week, the Senate introduced voting rights legislation that could impact tens of millions of people in the U.S. That is, unless it's filibustered.
--:-- Shamita Basu: This week, the governor of Nebraska held a press conference inside a butcher shop. He stood there under the yellowish lights with gleaming cuts of meat on display behind him. And he told his constituents. That is a direct attack on our way of life here in Nebraska.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: That's Governor Pete Ricketts, who is declared tomorrow meat on the menu day. It's in response to what's happening in neighboring Colorado, where the governor declared tomorrow meat out day.
--:-- Shamita Basu: It's a way to encourage Coloradans to consider not eating meat for the day. It was just a ceremonial proclamation, the kind of thing that most people never really pay attention to.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: But it's become a big issue in these two states. Political Magazine has this story.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Colorado Governor Jared Polis is a Democrat, and he may have thought he was just discouraging eating meat for a day, something he saw as promoting good health and environmental policies.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: But some of his critics want him to choke on that message. Raising and processing meat is big business in Colorado. And the governor's political enemies have jumped on the issue, too.
--:-- [Audio clip of Dan Kaplis]
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Be like Gavin Newsom saying, let's do a day without beaches in California. I mean, it's to attack a state's own industry. 170,000 jobs. This isn't just some political theater.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Politico reports Colorado conservatives see their power slipping away. This was once a state where power swung back and forth between the parties. But since 2008 the state has voted blue in every presidential election.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: And now Democrats hold every statewide elected office.
--:-- Shamita Basu: After a pandemic hiatus, March Madness is officially back. ESPN says you're going to want to keep your eyes on two players. One of them plays in the women's tournament, the other in the men's.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: And they're both super talented. But this story is not just about their skills. It's about their close, lifelong friendship. Jalen Suggs and Paige Bueckers are both freshmen who've had phenomenal seasons.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Suggs plays for Gonzaga, which is undefeated, ranked number one, and could win its first national championship this year. He's also on track to be one of the hot picks in the 2021 NBA draft.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Bueckers plays for UConn. She's also having an outstanding season. She's trying to win the title for her school for the first time since 2016.
--:-- Shamita Basu: This ESPN article tells the story of these two superstar players and their bond that goes back to their elementary school years in the Twin Cities in Minnesota.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: They grew up obsessing over the game together, cheering each other on and, of course, trash talking sometimes, but mostly just celebrating each other's victories.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And they stayed in touch through the amateur leagues and eventually both made it to basketball powerhouses on opposite sides of the country.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: One of the best parts of this story is really just the pictures. You see them hugging each other, smiling, and then intensely watching each other on the court.
--:-- Shamita Basu: It makes you feel good. Now, Suggs will take the court for Gonzaga tomorrow. Bueckers and UConn play on Sunday.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: You can find all these stories and more in the Apple News app. And while you're there, check out some of our audio stories.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Have a great weekend. And for those who celebrate the Persian New Year, Ede Shema Mubarak.
