This is the Tangle Sunday Edition, a brief roundup of our independent politics coverage plus some extra features for your Sunday morning reading.
What the left is doodling.
What the right is doodling.
Reader essay.
Two years ago, Tangle Managing Editor Ari Weitzman wrote a piece examining the inner conflict many people experience about deciding to have kids. This week, Jonathan Kass examined the same issue, but from a more satirical and playful direction. His essay is seriously funny, and probably all too relatable for many. You can read the full piece here.
Have a local or personal story you want to write about? Pitch us! Fill out this form or reply to this email, and we’ll get back to you if we’re hooked.
Reader review.
In this section, we like to include reader responses that counter or challenge opinions we publish in the newsletter. In response to our edition on the mifepristone, Abigail Welborne supported our “Have a nice day” story but challenged our opinion on our main topic:
re: Have a nice day. I think if you're a centenarian you deserve to skip the TSA line! 😆
re: mifepristone: The misoprostol-only route is quite safe and almost as effective. It would be a viable alternative should mifepristone be challenged again (although its safety is also well-established). https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/abortion-pills-an-option-not-talked
Tangle’s main stories this week were the abortion-pill ruling, the bump-stock ruling, and Biden's new executive order on immigration. For full versions, you can find all of our past coverage in our archive.
Monday, June 17.
The Supreme Court’s abortion pill ruling. On Thursday, June 13, the court unanimously rejected a lawsuit brought by pro-life medical groups and doctors that aimed to restrict access to mifepristone, a drug commonly used in medication abortions. The court’s 9-0 decision firmly rejected the plaintiffs’ core argument to establish their standing: That they could be harmed if made to care for patients who took mifepristone prescribed by another doctor. Since 2000, more than 6 million patients in the U.S. have taken mifepristone, and 63% of U.S. abortions in 2023 were medication abortions. As of 2022, the FDA reported 32 deaths related to the drug.
- From the left. The left was relieved by the decisive ruling but alarmed that the case reached the Supreme Court. In Slate, Reva Siegel and Mary Ziegler argued the court “just created a road map for Trump to ban abortion nationwide.”
- From the right. The right was disappointed by the ruling but sees a path to regulating mifepristone with a Republican president. In The Daily Signal, Thomas Jipping said the court’s decision ”does not mean that mifepristone is safe.”
- Our take. “The court was right to shut down this case due to lack of standing. Even if the court heard the case on its merits, I still don’t think this challenge had any real chance of going anywhere. The only reason this case got so far is due to judge shopping, and I hope that issue gets addressed soon.”
Tuesday, June 18.
The bump-stock ban. On Friday, a divided Supreme Court struck down a Trump-era ban on bump stocks, the gun attachment used to make semi-automatic weapons fire at a rate similar to fully automatic firearms. The court broke 6-3 along ideological lines, with all three liberal justices in dissent. In the majority opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas emphasized that Congress has not enacted a law to ban weapons capable of high rates of fire, so the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) was wrong to apply a machine-gun ban to bump stocks. The challenge in Garland v. Cargill on whether the federal government's 1934 machine-gun ban could apply to a gun fitted with a bump stock. In his 19-page majority opinion, Thomas argued that semiautomatic rifles with a bump stock do not technically fit that definition.
- From the right. The right supported the decision, noting the court has taken a consistent stance against federal agency overreach. The Wall Street Journal editorial board called it a “welcome” ruling.
- From the left. The left criticized the decision and called on Congress to reinstate the ban. The Washington Post editorial board wrote “the court misfired on bump stocks. Congress can still succeed.”
- Our take. “Left-leaning authors are giving some classic signals that the conservative justices’ opinion is justified. Thomas went into painstaking detail for why the machine-gun ban doesn’t apply to bump stocks. Congress can and should take control of the situation and ban them.”
Wednesday, June 19.
We did not have a full newsletter in observance of Juneteenth, but we released a new YouTube video exploring the new federal holiday.
Thursday, June 20.
Biden’s new immigration policy. On Tuesday, June 18, President Biden announced a large-scale immigration program offering unauthorized immigrants married to American citizens legal status and an expedited pathway to citizenship for them and their children. The executive order will allow applicants to live and work in the United States legally under an existing policy called “Parole in Place,” which grants temporary legal status for immigrants seeking long-term residency. Immigrants who have been living without authorization in the U.S. for at least ten years, have not previously been paroled into the country, do not pose a security threat, and have been married by June 17, 2024 will be eligible to apply with the Department of Homeland Security “by the end of summer.”
- From the left. The left supported the order, calling it both compassionate and politically savvy. In The New York Times, Farah Stockman wrote “Biden courts some liberal love on immigration.”
- From the right. The right opposed the order, arguing it’s a political ploy that doesn’t address the immigration crisis. The Dallas Morning News editorial board said “Biden errs with parole for undocumented spouses of U.S. citizens.”
- Our take. “The best framing of this action is that it’s a popular policy affecting only people already integrated into the U.S. The worst framing is that it affects a large number of people and could be a moral hazard or strong incentive for illegal immigration. I worry about the signals and timing, but think the combination of Biden’s recent actions are directionally correct.”
Friday, June 21.
In a subscribers-only Friday edition, Tangle editor Will Kaback examined what may be the biggest deciding factor in the 2024 election: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. You can read the full piece here.
Reader surveys.
Monday, the abortion pill ruling:
Tuesday, the bump-stock ruling:
Thursday, Biden's new executive order on immigration:
Recommended reading.
We're thrilled to announce that Tangle is partnering with The Sunday Long Read this week, our first-ever partnership in The Sunday Edition! We have linked to articles from The Sunday Long Read before as part of our 'Recommended reading,' and partnering with them felt like a natural step.
Each Sunday, right before our edition goes out, Pulitzer Prize recipient Don Van Natta Jr. and his team send out a selection of the best stories of the week from dozens of sources in a free email newsletter. If you're interested in curated stories from across the web without the clickbait, subscribe to The Sunday Long Read here!
In real life, I was healthy and young. If I were to die, it would likely be sudden. I’d be killed in a car crash, or fall down a staircase, and I’d have no time to make arrangements. But to complete my beginner training with the International End of Life Doula Association (INELDA), to be qualified to guide another person through the process of dying, I first had to plan for my own death.
In one of our favorites from this week’s edition, Meg Bernhard explores the training process required to guide a person through the end of their life. Who are death doulas, what are their stories, what do they do, and what does it mean to die a good death? n + 1 magazine has the story.
On the channels.
Sunday Podcast: On this week’s Sunday podcast, Isaac and Ari go over the busy summer ahead of the Supreme Court, discuss a Louisiana law requiring the Ten Commandments to be displayed in classrooms, and mull over Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s campaign. Plus, an abrupt edition of grievances. Listen here.
Instagram: We posted a clipped version of our YouTube video where we go into the history of Juneteenth, and Isaac and Jon ask people on the street in Philadelphia and Colorado about the new holiday. You can check that out here.
YouTube: If you liked the Instagram reel of our Juneteenth video — or if you just want to see the whole thing — check out the full version!
Tweet of the week.
With baseball season in full swing, how about a double-header of quality tweets? Leading off, Reggie Jackson gives a full, honest, and powerful testimony of the racism he experienced when he was in the league (courtesy of @GaryParrishCBS):
Alex Rodriguez asked a question. Reggie Jackson answered it.
— Gary Parrish (@GaryParrishCBS) June 21, 2024
(Shouts to the producer and rest of the desk for staying out of Reggie’s way and just letting him talk. I doubt they expected this answer. But it’s a great few minutes of television.)pic.twitter.com/7WqjlppvF8
On deck, @RossBarkan throws out a strange fact about Reggie Jackson:
One of the odder historical facts I can think of is that Reggie Jackson and Benjamin Netanyahu went to high school together
— Ross Barkan (@RossBarkan) June 21, 2024
Tangle’s favorites.
Today, a New York-style favorites edition:
Infotainment
We’re trying out a new feature this week. Inspired by our “Numbers” section in our daily newsletter, here are three stats to illustrate an interesting story developing outside of politics. Today, we’re diving into the Stanley Cup Finals, where the Edmonton Oilers have come back from a 3-0 deficit to force a game seven against the Florida Panthers in Florida Monday night.
- 1942: The last time a team came back from 3-0 down to win the Stanley Cup.
- 16: The number of goals scored this postseason by the Oilers’ Zack Hyman, the most of any player in the NHL’s salary cap era, surpassing marks by Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin.
- 34: The number of assists recorded this postseason by Oilers captain Connor McDavid, the most by any player ever and a rarity in the hockey world: a record taken from Wayne Gretzky.
What do you think of this feature? You can always send in your feedback by simply replying to this email.
Ask the readers.
Last week, Jeff asked readers what they do to escape the daily grind.
Since we chose his answer, we gave Eric a chance to ask our readership anything.
You can let us know your thoughts by replying to this email or through this form.
Starting with the first letter, add one letter in any position to the preceding line to answer the clue to each line.
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