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The cloud-based software giant Salesforce is offering to help relocate employees out of Texas following the state’s enactment of its extreme new abortion law.
Referring to the “incredibly personal issues” that the law creates, a message to the company’s entire workforce sent late on Friday said any employee and their family wishing to move elsewhere would receive assistance.
“Ohana if you want to move we’ll help you exit TX. Your choice,” the Salesforce chief executive, Marc Benioff, said in a tweet featuring a CNBC article about the offer, and using a term common in Hawaii for “family”.
In its message to workers, Salesforce, which is headquartered in California, did not directly mention Texas, where about 2,000 of its 56,000 global workers are based, or take a stance on the law. But its intention was clear.
“These are incredibly personal issues that directly impact many of us – especially women,” it said.
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Supreme court justice Amy Coney Barrett spoke on Sunday at the McConnell Center at the University of Louisville, a venue created by and named for Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate.
In 2016, McConnell ruthlessly blocked Barack Obama’s final pick for the court, Merrick Garland, claiming it was too close to an election and the next president should decide.
Between 2017 and 2020, McConnell shepherded through three picks made by Donald Trump. Barrett was the last – in place of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a heroine to US liberals – shortly before an election Trump lost.
McConnell, the Louisville Courier-Journal reported, praised Barrett for not trying to “legislate from the bench” and for being from “Middle America”. Barrett is from Indiana and, unlike the other eight justices, did not attend Harvard or Yale.
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Barrett defends integrity of the court after widely criticized abortion ruling
Greetings from Washington, live blog readers.
Supreme court justice Amy Coney Barrett defended the integrity of the country’s highest court yesterday, almost two weeks after she and four of her conservative colleagues allowed a six-week abortion ban to go into effect in Texas.
“My goal today is to convince you that this court is not comprised of a bunch of partisan hacks,” Barrett said during a Sunday event at the McConnell Center at the University of Louisville.
“Judicial philosophies are not the same as political parties,” she added. “And here’s the thing: Sometimes, I don’t like the results of my decisions. But it’s not my job to decide cases based on the outcome I want.”
Barrett was confirmed to the supreme court just days before the 2020 presidential election, even though Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell had refused to consider Barack Obama’s supreme court nominee in 2016 because it was an election year.
Barrett’s confirmation shifted the ideological balance of the court, given that she replaced the late liberal justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. That shift enabled the 5-4 ruling in the Texas abortion case.
Barrett’s Louisville appearance was picketed by protesters who expressed outraged over the abortion decision. One of the protesters told the Louisville Courier Journal, “With what’s been happening in Texas, I don’t want it to spread to Kentucky. … And so, we’re just coming to let Mitch know how a lot of citizens feel about this issue.”
The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
