--:-- Georgia Howe: Welcome to Morning Wire. I'm Georgia Howe, and I'm here with Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley. It's May 21st.
--:-- John Bickley: Thanks for waking up with us, Georgia.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Several Fortune 500 companies are pledging to pay for employee abortions if they're no longer available in the state in which they live and work. Which companies are on the growing list?
--:-- John Bickley: And gas prices soared to new record highs this week at more than $450 per gallon. We talked to an expert about the Biden administration's energy policies and what Congress can do to address the crisis.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- Announcer: And now, a word from our sponsor. Thuma.co slash wire for an exclusive $25 credit towards your purchase of the bed, plus free shipping in the continental U.S.
--:-- Georgia Howe: In February, Texas Governor Greg Abbott directed family protective agencies to begin investigating child gender transition treatments as child abuse. Last week, the Texas State Supreme Court ruled that those investigations may continue, but they won't be compulsory.
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--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: So, this goes back to February when Republican Governor Greg Abbott wrote a letter to the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services. In which he said the Office of the Attorney General will now consider so-called sex change procedures on minors to be child abuse under existing Texas law.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, basically, because the Department of Family and Protective Services is responsible for protecting children from abuse, the governor's letter was a directive for them to investigate any reported instances of these procedures in the state of Texas.
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: He pointed out that Texas law has mandated reporting standards for professionals like doctors, teachers, and nurses. So, this directive made it mandatory for those professionals to report the parents of children who are, as he put it, subjected to these abusive gender transitioning procedures.
--:-- Georgia Howe: He also said other state agencies have to investigate licensed facilities where such procedures are thought to occur.
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: Yes. And this was met with pushback from LGBT activists at the time. The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Texas, and Lambda Legal filed a lawsuit over Abbott's direction on behalf of the family of a 16-year-old who claimed to be transgender.
--:-- Georgia Howe: A district judge then blocked an investigation by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services into the parents of that 16-year-old. After that decision, that same judge temporarily halted these investigations throughout the entire state.
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: That ruling was later upheld by a Texas appeals court. Then, last week, the Texas Supreme Court struck down that ruling and reaffirmed that DFPS could resume the investigations but it up to them whether they do or not.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, big picture, the Texas DFPS can still investigate these cases, but they're no longer mandated to.
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: The state's high court decided that Abbott and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton are allowed to share their viewpoints, but the Child Welfare Agency is not compelled by law to follow them.
--:-- Georgia Howe: It's a little confusing, but basically, the state Supreme Court struck down the lower court's rulings, which would have blocked investigations statewide. However, the high court is still allowing an injunction against investigating that specific family at the center of the case.
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: As for the case brought by the family of the 16-year-old, that's still ongoing. So, as of now, these investigations can continue, but agencies and individuals are just not compelled to participate.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, this is kind of a mixed outcome for both sides. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has stated that his office sees this as a win, but LGBT activists have also said the same.
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: In a statement to the Texas Tribune, LAMB Legal and the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas appeared to celebrate the decision, calling it a win for our clients and the rule of law.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, gender transition surgeries and treatments in kids are obviously pretty controversial right now. Do we know how Americans in general feel about this?
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: Well, a recent poll by Summit Ministries and McLaughlin and Associates found that of the people who had an opinion on this topic, 90% said that minors should be required to wait until they are legal adults before they go through permanent gender alteration.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Voters were also asked whether medical professionals performing gender-altering procedures should be required by law to disclose the common long-term medical and psychological impact of such procedures. And again, 90% said yes.
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: So, pretty widespread caution on the part of voters.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Charlotte, thanks so much for bringing us this story.
--:-- Charlotte Pence Bond: Thank you, Georgia.
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--:-- Georgia Howe: Coming up, several companies pledge to pay for their employees' abortions, even if that means traveling out of state.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: Hi, Georgia. Thanks for having me.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, Corinne, which major companies are offering to pay for travel expenses for abortions?
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: Starbucks is the latest major corporation to make this promise, but they are joined by Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Citigroup, Levi Strauss, Lyft, Uber, MasterCard, Tesla, and Yelp.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Quite a few. Tesla is an interesting case because, as you might have heard, they relocated their headquarters to Texas, which has some of the most restrictive abortion laws in the country.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: Now, what's the key motive for these companies? Is this primarily a PR move? Are these strong convictions on the part of CEOs? Or is this just a strategic financial decision?
--:-- Georgia Howe: You know it may be a mix, but you may be on to something when you ask about financial motives. On a purely brass tax level, a lot of people have pointed out that it is advantageous for these companies to avoid things like maternity leave for pregnant employees.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: There's no denying minimizing employee pregnancy helps companies' bottom line. However, the financial incentives may go beyond that. Companies also face pressure from investment firms to make policies that support certain social agendas.
--:-- Georgia Howe: As you reported before on the show, this incentive structure is called the Environmental, Social, and Governance, or ESG Index. It's likely these companies see this move as an opportunity to court investment from ESG funds at firms like Vanguard and BlackRock.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: So, what would these benefits look like for employees? Would they cover the cost of the procedure, travel, time off? Each company has a different plan for how much it will cover.
--:-- Georgia Howe: For example, Starbucks pledged to reimburse employees for an undisclosed amount of travel expenses related to abortion. In that same memo, the company also announced that they would cover the cost of gender transition procedures.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: However, Starbucks stipulated that the nearest available care must be over 100 miles away from the employee's home in order to qualify. Amazon, by contrast, is offering up to $4,000 annually for women to be reimbursed for travel expenses associated with the same procedures.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And then there's Salesforce, who made an entirely different promise. Their company will not only cover travel expenses, but relocate employees and their immediate family if they desire to leave states that ban abortion.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: Now, what about coverage for employees who choose to continue with pregnancy? Are these companies also generous with things like family leave?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Again, each company offered a different level of incentives. Many do offer paid family leave. Starbucks, again, for example, extends six weeks paid leave to those who welcome a new child by birth, foster care, or adoption.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: That's compared to, say, Microsoft, who offers 20 weeks of paid leave for birth mothers and 12 weeks for all other new parents like adoptive and foster parents.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, is there pressure on companies that haven't extended these benefits?
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: It's interesting you ask. Eyes are on a number of major corporations that historically have been pretty outspoken about social issues. So, we can think of Disney, Netflix, Walmart, Facebook, PayPal, and even Target, to name a few.
--:-- Georgia Howe: After the controversy with Governor DeSantis last month, it's likely that Disney might stay quiet on this, but we could very well see more announcements of this kind from some of these other big-name companies.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: Right. We could see another wave of announcements when that happens.
--:-- Georgia Howe: All right, well, we'll keep an eye on it. Corinne, thanks so much for reporting.
--:-- Corinne Murdoch: Thank you, Georgia.
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--:-- Georgia Howe: With gas prices climbing to record highs this week, debate over government energy policies are assuming a heightened importance once again.
--:-- Alex Epstein: So, it definitely will. And the mechanism by which it affects those prices is by being a signal that the administration is committed to defunding investment in the industry, stopping production in the industry, and stopping transportation in the industry.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Alex Epstein, founder and president of the Center for Industrial Progress, joins us now to lend his insight into the fuel crisis.
--:-- Alex Epstein: And it is that threat right now that is suppressing a lot of investment because oil and gas companies want to make money legitimately. And if they're being told that they don't have a future and that their projected projects are at risk, then they won't engage in drilling.
--:-- Georgia Howe: I know this firsthand from talking to many CEOs. It's the threat that's suppressing a lot of potential production.
--:-- Alex Epstein: So, this reveals the current attitude of this administration toward this industry.
--:-- Georgia Howe: This recent decision is particularly notable because Biden had seemed to be changing course. Is there potential for new oil drilling and some other contracts that aren't as high-profile?
--:-- Alex Epstein: All the potential for drilling relies on confidence that there is a profitable future doing it. And unfortunately, what we have is we've had for the last 15 years an anti-fossil fuel movement that has been against fossil fuel investment, against production, against transportation.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And that's really put us in a hole. We know how to extract this stuff really well. But there are many, many political limitations as well as kind of quasi-political corporate such as ESG limitations. And those are very entrenched.
--:-- Alex Epstein: And Biden has sent a signal that those are going to continue or even increase.
--:-- Georgia Howe: What kinds of changes would we need to see to reverse this trend?
--:-- Alex Epstein: So, I work with a lot of elected officials, and what I tell them is what we really need, the best-case scenario, is a congressional commitment to liberate oil, gas, and coal for the long term.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Even if you look at what President Trump did, which in many, many ways was good, it was mostly executive orders that we now know can easily be reversed.
--:-- Alex Epstein: But we really need a congressional commitment saying we reject the Paris Agreement. We reject net zero. We recognize that fossil fuels are crucial for the future.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And insofar as we're dealing with CO2 emissions, we're going to deal with that through innovation and through liberating technologies like nuclear and natural gas.
--:-- Alex Epstein: If you had that kind of commitment in law that could not easily be overturned by the whims of an anti-fossil fuel president, then you would have the next explosion in American oil and gas productivity.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, another energy solution in America is nuclear. This is something that we're seeing actually debated right now in California.
--:-- Alex Epstein: Unfortunately, with nuclear, what we're not seeing is anything promising that's new. The very few projects that have been allowed to proceed are incredibly expensive.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And this, I believe, is because the government has effectively criminalized nuclear, which is a whole discussion we could get into.
--:-- Alex Epstein: So, what the nuclear discussion has degenerated into is, do we save certain plants from being prematurely shut down?
--:-- Georgia Howe: And so, Exhibit A in California is the Diablo Canyon plant. And the administration in California, including Gavin Newsom, had committed to shutting it down.
--:-- Alex Epstein: They've expressed some wavering. I'm not sure what his latest expressed whim is.
--:-- Georgia Howe: But this should be very disturbing to the country that we have this amazing source of energy that has a history of being low cost. It's extremely reliable. You can control it, unlike solar and wind.
--:-- Alex Epstein: It's incredibly clean. It's actually the safest form of energy. And yet we've demonized and criminalized it to the point where you can't accomplish anything new and we're prematurely shutting down the old plants.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That shows that we need a massive reform in our policy, not just on fossil fuels, but also on nuclear.
--:-- Alex Epstein: All right, Alex, thank you so much for talking with us.
--:-- Alex Epstein: Thank you, Georgia.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Thanks for listening to Morning Wire. We created this show to bring more balance to the national conversation. If you love our show and you stand with our mission, please consider subscribing, leaving us a five-star rating, and most importantly, sharing our podcast with a friend.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back tomorrow with the news you need to know.
