After resoundingly losing the Hispanic vote in 2012, Republicans are making their pitch to Hispanic voters. These new efforts range from pushing for immigration reform to Sen. Marco Rubio’s (R-FL) plan to deliver the GOP’s State of the Union response in both Spanish and English. However, the House Republican Conference’s new “GOP en Español” initiative to distribute Spanish translations of Republican State of the Union reactions proved to be the last straw for some factions of the party.

Opposition from Rep. Steve King (R-IA), who has sponsored “English-only” legislation to make English the official language of the US, stalled the launch of GOP en Español. In an interview with the National Journal, King explained:

“There’s a conflicting message that comes out from the Republicans if we want to recognize the unifying power of English, and meanwhile, we send out communications in multiple languages. Official business and documents needs to be in English.” [...] He says that English is “empowering and unifying” and that the GOP en Español program “sends a subliminal message in contradiction.”

The English only movement has gained traction in sixteen states, and even more extreme legislation is being considered by some Republican-dominated legislatures. “English only” laws often prohibit state and local government officials, and sometimes private companies, from conducting any business in Spanish or providing translations of certain documents, cutting off the 25.2 million Americans who speak limited English.

Hispanic voters are the fastest growing minority in the US, and supported Obama by 75 percent in the November election. Though some Republicans are trying to change this by pushing for immigration reform and greater tolerance, former Secretary of State Colin Powell (R) blasted his party for “a dark vein of intolerance” that alienates minorities. Past GOP outreach efforts have fallen flat; during the election, the Republican National Committee’s Hispanic outreach site took flack for using a stock photo of Asian children, while multiple candidates’ Spanish language websites either avoided or altered their stances on immigration.

GOP plans to rig the Electoral College to all but ensure that future presidents will be Republicans have been widely panned even by top GOP lawmakers such as Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell and former vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan. Yet Pennsylvania Republicans still plan to move forward with an election-rigging plan that will ensure that a large chunk of Pennsylvania’s electoral votes go to the Republican candidate even though the state voted for the Democratic candidate in every election since 1992.

A spokesperson for Pennsylvania’s Republican Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi tells the Philadelphia Inquirer that hearings will likely begin on Pileggi’s election-rigging plan this spring. According to state Rep. Mike Sturla (D-PA), once Pennsylvania Republicans start the legislative process moving on their election-rigging plan, they can ram it through both houses of the state legislature and have it on GOP Gov. Tom Corbett’s desk in as little as four days.

Under Pileggi’s election-rigging plan, Pennsylvania will allocate most of its electoral votes proportionally — so if the Republican candidate wins 40 percent of the popular vote they will also receive 40 percent of these electors. Meanwhile, red states such as Texas or South Carolina will continue to award 100 percent of their electoral votes to the Republican. Earlier this year, Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus encouraged Republican lawmakers in “states that have been consistently blue that are fully controlled red” to pass election-rigging plans, thus ensuring that red votes remain in Republican hands while many blue votes are also shifted to Republicans:

Two years ago, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg lamented that if she were nominated today to her current job on the Supreme Court, her “ACLU connection would probably disqualify” her from being confirmed. Before becoming a judge, Ginsburg led the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project, where she was literally the single most important women’s rights attorney in American history. As Dahlia Lithwick explains, Ginsburg “almost single-handedly convinced the courts and legislatures to do away with gender classifications” in a range of cases and ushered in modern constitutional doctrine protecting women in the process.

At an event sponsored by the San Diego Association of Business Trial Lawyers on Friday, Ginsburg offered even stronger words of condemnation for our broken senate-confirmation process:

There were only three votes in opposition when she was confirmed to the court by the Senate, but in the past she has said that she doubts if in today’s more partisan political environment if she would be confirmed for the court.

She said Friday that she was hopeful that someday soon the partisan battles over court nominees will fade.

“I’m hoping there will be members of Congress who will say enough. We are destroying the United States’ reputation in the world as a beacon of democracy, and we should go back to the way it was, and the way it should be,” she said of the confirmation process.

It is likely that Ginsburg’s Court will soon take up a lower court’s decision that effectively eliminated the president’s power to make recess appointments. This decision came in the wake of an effort by Senate Republicans to effectively shut down entire federal agencies by filibustering anyone nominated to head them. A Supreme Court opinion reversing that lower court’s error will do little to address the problem of filibusters preventing judges from receiving lifetime appointments to the federal bench, but it will cut off the Senate GOP’s attempt to destroy entire agencies despite controlling neither the White House nor the Senate majority.

Michigan’s highest court issued a decision Friday that will likely shutter most of the state’s medical marijuana dispensaries. In a 4-1 ruling, the Michigan Supreme Court held that transfers of marijuana between two authorized medical marijuana patients are not legal under the Michigan Medical Marihuana Act.

To serve the state’s estimated 124,000 patients, businesses and not-for-profits have emerged that operate as “membership organizations” by facilitating the transfer of marijuana between various authorized patients and authorized caregivers. Members would rent lockers and set the price of their transaction with fellow members on their own. The court held that because patients cannot sell to one another, nor can designated “caregivers” sell to patients not their own, defendant Cannabis Collective is not immune from public nuisance actions:

In contrast to several other states’ medical marijuana provisions, the MMMA does not explicitly provide for businesses that dispense marijuana to patients. […]

Defendants transferred and delivered marijuana to patients by facilitating patient-to-patient sales; in doing so, they assisted those patients in acquiring marijuana. The transfer, delivery, and acquisition of marijuana are three activities that are part of the “medical use” of marijuana that the drafters of the MMMA chose not to include as protected activities within § 4(i). As a result, defendants’ actions were not in accordance with the MMMA under that provision.

In light of the court’s interpretation of the law, it appears the only ways in which a registered patient may obtain medical marijuana are by growing their own, or working with a caregiver, who is authorized to provide marijuana for up to five patients. According to Denise A. Pollicella, a Michigan lawyer specializing in marijuana law, some two-thirds of the state’s patients do not have an authorized caregiver. Pollicella points out that while medical marijuana dispensaries are able to operate economically to provide the range of options relevant to different types of patients, a caregiver who is providing marijuana to just five patients lacks the economies of scale to effectively serve patients.

Michigan’s law is not the only one that, while authorizing patients to legally possess and consumer marijuana, is hazy about how they can actually obtain that marijuana. In several states, including Washington and California, dispensaries have operated under a “collective gardens” provision in the laws that allows users to band together to produce and consume marijuana. Others, such as Colorado’s and Maine’s explicitly authorize dispensaries.

Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes has cited legal uncertainty about this collective gardens justification as one of the many reasons why law enforcers prefer Washington’s new medical marijuana legalization law, which clearly authorizes licensed dispensaries and producers.

In response to the ruling, State Rep. Mike Callton (R), said he would propose a bill to legalize dispensaries. He proposed a bill last year that never made it to the hearing stage. The legislature is already considering a bill to decriminalize marijuana. Just last week, reports showed that Michigan’s medical marijuana program netted state revenue of $6.3 million in application and renewal fees in the last fiscal year.

The National Rifle Association’s NRA Political Victory Fund PAC has distributed more than $1 million in career donations to current members of the United States Senate. And, like their House counterparts, the Senators who have received the most are also among the most vocal opponents of any new gun violence prevention legislation advanced in the aftermath of the school shooting at Newton, Connecticut.

A ThinkProgress analysis of data from Political MoneyLine reveals that the top 10 Senate beneficiaries of NRA money are all Republicans. Each has already indicated his opposition to President Obama’s gun violence proposals and each has received an “A” or “A+” rating from the NRA. They are:

SEN. JIM INHOFE (R-OK) — AT LEAST $64,900

Inhofe said last month, “I will continue to strongly oppose any effort to undermine the Second Amendment and an individual citizen’s right to keep and bear arms. … The text of the Constitution clearly confers upon an individual the right to bear arms – and not just for the purposes of hunting as many liberals will claim. Our Founders believed that the people’s right to own guns was an important check on the powers of the government and ‘necessary to the security of a free State.’ I couldn’t agree more and I stand firm in my support of this right.”

SEN. ROY BLUNT (R-MO) — AT LEAST $60,550

Blunt said last month, “Unfortunately, the president’s proposals today fundamentally fail to address ways that we can prevent tragic events like Sandy Hook, and instead, he’s attempting to restrict the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding Americans.” Last week, he expressed doubt that the Senate would even expand background checks.

SEN. SAXBY CHAMBLISS (R-GA) — AT LEAST $56,950

Chambliss said last month, “While I am certain that the president’s proposal is well-intentioned, it is Congress’ responsibility to make sure that Americans’ constitutional rights are protected.”

SEN. JOHN THUNE (R-SD) — AT LEAST $48,605

Thune said last month, “There is a lot of emotion driving this debate. We need to prevent this in the future, and make the schools and our kids safer. And frankly, I don’t think it has to do with restrictions on the Second Amendment.”

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC) — AT LEAST $46,600

Graham said last month, “One bullet in the hands of a homicidal maniac is one too many. But in the case of a young mother defending her children against a home invader — a real-life event which recently occurred near Atlanta — six bullets may not be enough. Criminals aren’t going to follow legislation limiting magazine capacity. However, a limit could put law-abiding citizens at a distinct disadvantage when confronting a criminal. As for reinstating the assault weapons ban, it has already been tried and failed.”

SEN. RICHARD SHELBY (R-AL) — AT LEAST $43,755

Shelby said on his Congressional website, “We all mourn the victims of shocking tragedies that have resulted from senseless acts of violence perpetrated by seriously disturbed individuals. However, such tragedies should not be viewed as an indictment of America’s precious Second Amendment rights. Thus, we should not react in a manner that would unnecessarily and improperly infringe upon the rights of tens of millions of law-abiding American gun owners. Unfortunately, it seems that some zealous gun rights opponents are seeking to leverage tragedies to further their long-held agenda of unduly restricting Americans’ Second Amendment rights.”

SEN. MIKE CRAPO (R-ID) — AT LEAST $43,700

Crapo said last month, “The President’s proposal on gun control is very disappointing. Any discussion about restricting the Constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans deserves, at minimum, a full and public debate in Congress. Burdening law-abiding citizens of this country with additional gun restrictions is not the answer to safeguarding the public from further attacks.”

SEN. ORRIN HATCH (R-UT) — AT LEAST $41,750

Hatch said last month that even passage of universal background checks would be “the way reductions in liberty occur.” He added, “When you start saying people all have to sign up for something, and they have a database where they know exactly who’s who, and where government can persecute people because of the database, that alarms a lot of people in our country, and it flies in the face of liberty,” noting that gun rights are “an express provision in the Constitution, unlike the penumbras and other conjured-up provisions that aren’t there that the court has come up with over the years. This is express, and many people are very, very concerned about any infringement on it, and I’m one of them.”

SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY (R-IA) — AT LEAST $41,200

Grassley said last month, “The Second Amendment is more than just words on paper. It’s a fundamental right that ensures citizens the ability to protect themselves against the government. Unfortunately, the President seems to think that the Second Amendment can be tossed aside. Using executive action to attempt to poke holes in the Second Amendment is a power grab along the same pattern we’ve seen of contempt for the elected representatives of the American people. Some of these directives clearly run afoul of limitations Congress has placed on federal spending bringing the President’s actions in direct conflict with federal law. More importantly, it’s hard to see how any of these executive actions would have prevented the tragedies that precipitated this effort.”

SEN. ROGER WICKER (R-MS) — AT LEAST $36,750

Wicker said last month, “The President’s proposals would violate the Constitution and have been proven not to be effective in preventing gun violence, I will be part of a bipartisan coalition opposing this legislation and looking for real solutions such as school safety guards, mental health care, and addressing the culture of violence in the media. The Second Amendment rights of Americans must be preserved.”

The 10 have received more than $480,000 combined in career NRA PAC money.

The Senate Judiciary Committee’s Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights subcommittee will hold a hearing Tuesday to examine proposals to reduce gun violence. The four Republicans on the nine-person panel are Graham, Hatch, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), and Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX). Cruz (at least $9900) has blasted the President for “trying to exploit the tragic murder of children as an excuse to push his own extreme anti-gun agenda,” and Cornyn ($17,850) has said we must enforce existing gun laws before we consider any new ones.

While a series of procedural rulings have delayed execution for Warren Lee Hill, he faces imminent capital punishment by the state of Georgia a week from tomorrow, in spite of a U.S. Supreme Court decision that says executing the severely mentally disabled is unconstitutional. Hill, who was deemed “mentally retarded” at trial (an unfortunate legal term), has exhausted his appeals, and only U.S. Supreme Court action can stop his execution this time.

Among those who have advocated for Hill’s clemency are several jurors from Hill’s trial, disability groups, and President Jimmy Carter. Even the victim’s family has submitted an affidavit stating that they prefer clemency.

In its ruling in Atkins v. Virginia, the high court held that executing individuals deemed “mentally retarded” violated the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment because their disability “places them at special risk of wrongful execution.” Wrongful convictions are already rampant in the U.S. criminal justice system, and the unique irreversibility of capital punishment is one of the reasons why the remedy is becoming increasingly unpopular and uncommon.

In spite of the Supreme Court’s holding, a harsh procedural technicality has allowed the state to skirt existing Supreme Court precedent. While all other states require a finding that the defendant is meets the mental disability criteria by a “preponderance of the evidence”or some other moderate standard of evidence, Georgia imposes the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard — the equivalent of legal certainty. Psychologists have attested that this is a standard that is almost impossible to attain when it comes to mental disability.

Unfortunately, the statute that permits this standard survived legal challenge in a narrow 4-3 ruling. In her dissent in that case, Georgia Supreme Court Justice Leah Sears articulates the clear inconsistency of this statute with the prohibition on executing the severely mentally disabled:

Despite the federal ban on executing the mentally retarded, Georgia’s statute, and the majority decision upholding it, do not prohibit the state from executing mentally retarded people. To the contrary, the State may still execute people who are in all probability mentally retarded. The State may execute people who are more than likely mentally retarded. The State may even execute people who are almost certainly mentally retarded.

In its decision in Atkins, the U.S. Supreme Court said, “we leave to the State[s] the task of developing appropriate ways to enforce the constitutional restriction upon [their] execution of sentences.” It is now up to the justices to make clear that, by imposing an unattainable standard for proving “mental retardation,” Georgia is not enforcing this “constitutional restriction” at all.

Cleopatra Pendleton, mother of slain Chicago teen Hadiya Pendleton, will be Michelle Obama’s guest at the State of the Union on Tuesday.

Pendleton was part of the King Collage Prep High School band that performed at several inaugural events in Washington. The First Lady attended Pendleton’s funeral on Saturday.

Another mother, Carolyn Murray, who lost her 19-year-old son to a shooting, will also attend the speech as the guest of Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL). Murray began “a community gun buyback program” in response to her son’s death.

President Obama is expected to call on Congress to adopt his comprehensive proposal to reduce gun violence. Democratic lawmakers have already introduced various measures to ban military-style weapons and a bipartisan group of lawmakers are working on legislation to expand background checks to all gun purchases and crackdown on gun trafficking.

A few hundred pro-gun demonstrators rallied outside the Oregon state Capitol on Friday to protest efforts to enact gun safety laws. A handful of protesters also entered the Capitol building itself and brandished assault rifles and other guns in the Capitol rotunda:

The Oregonian has more pictures of the armed protesters here. Oregon law permits persons with concealed carry permits to openly carry weapons within public buildings, so the armed demonstrators behaved lawfully provided they had valid permits while standing inside the Capitol.

Last month, Maricopa County, Arizona’s notoriously anti-immigrant Sheriff Joe Arpaio announced that he would send armed “posses” to patrol schools in the wake of the Sandy Hook elementary school massacre. Arpaio’s band of armed volunteers, which now includes nearly 3,500 members, includes many people with criminal pasts.

Arizona residents can rest assured, however, that this band of armed vigilantes will not be sent out into the field without training. Rather, Arpaio will offer them the best preparation a washed up 1990s action star can provide:

Steven Seagal, 60, star of “Above the Law” and “Under Siege,” will lead members of the Arizona sheriff’s volunteer posse through a simulated school shooting today.

The volunteer posse, which is nearly 3,500-strong, has been used to patrol shopping malls during the holiday season and scope out undocumented immigrants, and now Arpaio plans to have them patrol areas surrounding schools in Arizona’s most populous county, Maricopa, which includes Phoenix.

“Volunteers will learn operating procedures on how to handle one, two and three shooter scenarios as well as room entry tactics and hand to hand combat,” the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release.

Arpaio said last month that some of his vigilante school patrol will carry automatic weapons.

WAUSAU, Wisconsin—The National Rifle Association will wait until the “Connecticut effect” has subsided to resume its push to weaken the nation’s gun laws, according to a top NRA lobbyist speaking at the NRA’s Wisconsin State Convention this weekend.

Though the NRA had been tight-lipped about how the Newtown tragedy would affect their efforts, lobbyist Bob Welch, who represents the Wisconsin NRA group, was anything but during their yearly meeting.

“We have a strong agenda coming up for next year, but of course a lot of that’s going to be delayed as the ‘Connecticut effect’ has to go through the process,” Welch, a former Republican state senator, told the Wisconsin’s NRA State Association during the legislative update. The group’s president, Jeff Nass, had previously mentioned that they would push the Republican-controlled legislature to pass a Stand Your Ground law, the likes of which became famous following the shooting death of Trayvon Martin in Florida.

Welch went on to bemoan the fact that the public’s focus on Newtown was preventing the NRA from pushing such bills through the legislature, but his remarks soon turned to braggadocio about the NRA’s legislative influence. He relayed an anecdote about how, following the Connecticut shooting, a pro-gun Democrat in the legislature had mentioned his desire to close the gun show loophole. “And I said [to him], ‘no, we’re not going to do that,” Welch boasted. “And so far, nothing’s happened on that.”

WELCH: We have a strong agenda coming up for next year, but of course a lot of that’s going to be delayed as the “Connecticut effect” has to go through the process. [...] What’s even more telling is the people who don’t like guns pretty much realize that they can’t do a thing unless they talk to us. After Connecticut I had one of the leading Democrats in the legislature—he was with us most of the time, not all the time—he came to me and said, “Bob, I got all these people in my caucus that really want to ban guns and do all this bad stuff, we gotta give them something. How about we close this gun show loophole? Wouldn’t that be good?” And I said, “no, we’re not going to do that.” And so far, nothing’s happened on that.

Listen:

One of the ways the NRA remains so effective is through a massive level of political spending. Last year alone, the group spent $32 million in an effort to weaken the nation’s gun laws, including $6 million on lobbyists. Such an onslaught of political spending gives Welch the belief, whether true or not, that even those who advocate for stronger gun laws “realize they can’t do a thing unless they talk to us.”

In reality, however, the NRA is much more of a paper tiger, and its weak record in elections hardly justifies the kind of deference lawmakers pay toward the gun lobby. An analysis of the NRA’s spending revealed that “NRA contributions to candidates have virtually no impact on the outcome of Congressional races,” and recent polling suggests voters are more likely to punish a candidate for having NRA backing than to reward allegiance to the gun lobby.