If you find yourself be willedered by this moment where there's so much reaso...
and so much reason to hope all at the same time, let me say a hear you. I'm Ezra Klein from New York Times opinion, host of the Ezra Klein Show.
“And for me, the best way to beat back that be willedered feeling is to talk it out with”
the people who have ideas and frameworks for making sense of it. Here's going to be plenty to talk about. You can find the Ezra Klein Show wherever you get your podcasts. From the New York Times, it's the headlines.
I'm Tracy Mumford. Today's Monday May 4th, here's what we're covering.
A federal appeals court ruling on Friday has upended abortion access in the U.S. and put the issue back in front of the Supreme Court. Here's what to know about the case. It centers on the abortion pill, Miffa Pristone. Since 2021, the FDA has allowed medical providers to send that drug through the mail.
It made that change at the height of the pandemic when a lot of people couldn't get to the doctor. After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade the next year, telemedicine appointments for abortion pills became even more popular. Patients in states with bands or restrictions on the procedure turned to out-of-state providers, and just in general nationwide, abortion through telemedicine has become more and more common.
By one count, more than a quarter of all abortions in the first half of last year were provided that way.
But now Louisiana has sued to stop that, claiming the practice has allowed patients to get around the state's near total abortion ban and put the state on the hook for Medicaid bills for women harmed by the drug. On Friday, a federal appeals court ruled that while Louisiana's lawsuit is moving forward, the FDA must require patients to visit medical providers in person to get Miffa Pristone. Two manufacturers of the drug filed an emergency request with the Supreme
Court over the weekend, asking the justices to step in and immediately restore full access.
“One called the lawsuit, a baseless attack on an essential medication. More than a hundred studies”
have found Miffa Pristone to be safe and effective. In the meantime, abortion providers have already been forced to adapt over the last few days, either cancelling telehealth appointments, or prescribing a medication that's considered somewhat less effective and more likely to have side-effects. The change is upending care not just for women getting medication from out of state, but also for patients in rural areas, or those who can't find child care or get time off work
to see a doctor in person. The only abortion clinic in Wyoming told the times that it has temporarily suspended all telehealth abortion appointments for now. In another quick update related to the Supreme Court, now that we're on the other side of this Louisiana decision, it is time for us to redraw these maps. After the Justice's decision last week, weakened the Voting Rights Act, southern states are now launching new redistricting efforts. The governors of Alabama and Tennessee
moved to call special sessions. As some Republicans rushed to dilute majority black districts before the midterms. The way they're going to change it, it looks ten these districts out of 120 miles out of Memphis, they'll probably split it into the thirds. That's alarmed Democrats, especially in Memphis, where Republicans are clamoring to split up a district that's the only one in state history to ever elect a black lawmaker to the U.S. House of Representatives. The state's lieutenant
governor said, "Tenacy now has the opportunity to send another Republican voice to Washington. We intend to seize it." Now, in the latest on the war with Iran, President Trump announced yesterday that the U.S. is launching a new effort this morning to try to help the ships that have been stranded in the state of Hormuz. Hundreds of cargo ships have been stuck near the waterways since the war began. They're carrying
not just oil and natural gas, which has driven up fuel prices, but also things like fertilizer
“and helium, which is crucial for making the computer chips that power artificial intelligence.”
Traffic's been pretty much at a standstill for two months now due to fears about Iran attacking
ships with drones or laying mines. Iran has also floated charging tools upwards of two million dollars
a ship. Trump is calling his effort to fix that project freedom, saying the U.S. will now quote "guide ships" through the waterway. It's not clear what that will look like, though the U.S. military followed up with a statement that indicated it would be coordinating traffic, rather than directly escorting any ships through the street. Trump's announcement is essentially
A challenge to Iran.
and risk being the first to break the ceasefire. Meanwhile, any talks between the U.S. and Iran
“on a potential long-term deal to end the war remain stalled.”
I'm actually stranded in Dallas now currently stuck in the Orlando airport trying to get home. I flew Spirit to Miami yesterday and I just woke up to the text message that Spirit has literally shut down. Spirit Airlines closed down in dramatic fashion over the weekend, stopping all operations and leaving tens of thousands of passengers out of luck. If you have a flight schedule with Spirit Airlines, don't show up at the airport. There will be no one
I hear to assist you. This was not a total surprise. The company was in its second bankruptcy in
two years and had been asking the White House for a bailout which did not come through. The rising
“fuel prices from the war in Iran didn't help either. Almost 20,000 employees have lost their jobs,”
though other airlines may quickly snap them up, especially pilots and mechanics who are in high demand. The other airlines have also been offering discounted fares to try and help out any stranded spirit customers. In terms of what this could mean for air travel in the long run, Spirit leaves kind of a complicated legacy. In a day, the ultra low cost airline was credited
with essentially democratizing air travel by offering such low fares. People who might never have
been able to afford, say, a trip to Fort Lauderdale now could. It also helped keep ticket prices down in general at airports where it operated. A phenomenon economists dubbed the Spirit Effect. But Spirit also created a kind of race to the bottom by charging for things like printing your boarding pass, choosing a seat ahead of time or having a carry on bag. It's competitors started to do the same and other airlines also started introducing their own super-no-frills option,
dubbed Basic Economy. With Spirit now totally out of the market, some experts think prices could go up somewhat across the board, though just how much remains to be seen. I'm about to walk into Andon Market, which was founded by Andon Labs that opened a few weeks ago and it's an experiment to see what happens when you put an AI agent in charge of a boutique. My colleague Heather Knight has been reporting on a shop in San Francisco that is run by AI,
“specifically an AI agent called Luna. There are some greeting cards, mugs, what is that?”
Dates, multiple types of dates. I guess Luna's gotten into dates now. Lots of books is getting a little bit better at picking products. I think there's more here than there was last time and it was pretty empty. The shop is being build as the first in the country to let AI run the show, choosing the products, doing the ordering, setting the prices, etc. There are a few things Luna can't do though, like unpack boxes or ward off shop lifters. So the AI agent posted some job openings,
interviewed people and brought on staff. Heather says so far there have been some hiccups. Luna ordered 1000 toilet seat covers for the employee bathroom, then seemed to get confused and listed them as merchandise. It also messed up the employee schedule so much at one point that the store had to close for a few days. And for some reason, it seems like Luna just can't stop ordering candles. Every shape, size and smell, which Luna of course can't. The whole thing is either an
experiment or a stunt, depending on who you ask. The company behind it and in labs is committed. They have signed a three year lease and not in a cheap neighborhood. And they gave Luna the explicit mission to make money. So far, the shop has lost $13,000. Those are the headlines. I'm Tracy Mumford, we'll be back tomorrow.
