SOCIAL ISSUES

Hospitals across the state have already started restricting critical treatment as health care providers fear legal consequences and worry they could lose their medical licenses. Meanwhile, teenagers are already leaving the state to get care or avoiding medical care altogether.

The bill aims to ban critical race theory in public and open-enrollment charter schools. Supporters say it merely ensures students aren't taught that one race or gender is superior to another. Critics say it limits how race in America is taught.

New York Police Department officers attempt to detain a protester who defaced with black paint the Black Lives Matter mural outside of Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue Saturday, July 18, 2020, in the Manhattan borough of New York. The Black Lives Matter street mural in front of Manhattans Trump Tower has been defaced with paint for the third time in a week. In the latest incident, two women were arrested around 3 p.m. Saturday after police said they poured black paint on the block-long mural outside Trump Tower on Manhattans chic Fifth Avenue. Meanwhile, police are continuing to look for a man in black shorts and a dark blue T-shirt who was seen splashing red paint on the Black Lives Matter mural around noon on Monday. Mayor Bill de Blasio helped paint the mural in front of President Donald Trumps namesake tower last week.

The sculpture of protester Jen Reid was installed without the knowledge or consent of Bristol City Council and was removed by the council 24 hours later. (Ben Birchall/PA via AP)LONDON Officials in the English city of Bristol on Thursday removed a statue of a Black Lives Matter activist that was installed on a plinth once occupied by a monument to a 17th-century slave trader. City authorities fished the Colston statue out of the harbor and say it will be placed in a museum, along with placards from the Black Lives Matter demonstration. Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees said the decision about what replaces it must be made by the people of Bristol. This is not about taking down a statue of Jen, who is a very impressive woman, Rees told the BBC.

A Black Lives Matter billboard is seen next to a Confederate flag in Pittsboro, N.C., Thursday, July 16, 2020. (AP Photo/Gerry Broome)A Black Lives Matter sign now fills a billboard next to a big Confederate flag that greets people coming into a small town outside Raleigh, thrilling some community organizers and angering the property owner. Friends called and asked if they could put a Confederate flag on my property," White said. He says they did it because the county commissioners had removed the Confederate statue.White has leased the billboard to Lamar Advertising, which sent representatives to notify him before putting up the Black Lives Matter sign on it. They wanted to know how I would react to it, and I told them I would not want a Black Lives Matter sign on that billboard, he said.

(AP Photo/Matt Dunham)LONDON An artist has erected a statue of a Black Lives Matter protester atop the plinth in the English city of Bristol once occupied by the toppled statue of a slave trader. Marc Quinn created the likeness of Jen Reid, a protester photographed standing on the plinth after demonstrators pulled down the statue of Edward Colston and dumped it in Bristols harbor on June 7. The statue, titled A Surge of Power (Jen Reid) was erected before dawn on Wednesday without approval from city officials. Colston was a 17th-century trader who made a fortune transporting enslaved Africans across the Atlantic to the Americas. Now were crystallizing it.Reid told The Guardian newspaper that the new statue was incredible and would help continue the conversation.City authorities fished the Colston statue out of the harbor and say it will be placed in a museum, along with placards from the Black Lives Matter demonstration.

(AP Photo/John Raoux)KISSIMMEE, Fla. Nearly 200 players took the field for an 8-minute, 46-second moment of silence to protest racial injustice before Major League Soccers return to action Wednesday night. Players wore black T-shirts, black gloves and black facemasks emblazoned with Black Lives Matter. The shirts had varying slogans that included Black And Proud, Silence Is Violence and Black All The Time. The group was formerly called the Black Players Coalition of MLS but changed its name this week to Black Players for Change. MLS players had weeks to decide what to do prior to the MLS is Back tournament at ESPNs Wide World of Sports complex at Disney World.

Mayor Bill de Blasio, third from left, participates in painting Black Lives Matter on Fifth Avenue in front of Trump Tower, Thursday, July 9, 2020, in New York. Al Sharpton as he helped paint the racial justice rallying cry in giant yellow letters on Fifth Avenue in front of Trump Tower. Our streets!When we say Black Lives Matter, there is no more American statement, there is no more patriotic statement because there is no America without Black America, de Blasio said. We are acknowledging the truth of ourselves as Americans by saying Black Lives Matter. We are righting a wrong.The mayor announced the plan to paint Black Lives Matter in front of Trump Tower last month after earlier saying the slogan would be painted on streets at several locations around the city. Trump lived in Trump Tower before he took office as president but has spent little time there since.

Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard marches alongside protesters towards downtown Portland on the Morrison Bridge, on June 4, 2020. Im going to have my PS3, my PS4. Im going to have my studio equipment, my mike, my laptop. Im going to have all my books. Im going to be in the room, chillin'.

Four months after the opening race was called off amid last-minute pandemonium the Formula One season finally gets underway this weekend in Austria. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)SPIELBERG Four months after the opening race was called off at the last minute, the Formula One season finally gets underway this weekend on another continent and in a different-looking world. It is so important that we seize this moment, said Hamilton, the only Black driver to become F1 champion. F1 still hopes to rearrange some of the postponed races in order to finish the season with 15-18 of the scheduled 22. The 22-year-old Verstappen showed last season that he is closing the gap to Hamilton in terms of wheel-to-wheel driving.

MILWAUKEE Harley-Davidson said it is pulling its Facebook ads for the month of July and severing ties with a Tennessee dealership whose owner was accused of posting racist comments on social media disparaging Black Lives Matter protesters. The post was allegedly made on the Facebook page of Abernathy's Cycles, a Union City, Tennessee, motorcycle and ATV dealership, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported Thursday. The derogatory nature of the comment in no way aligns with my personal beliefs or that of Harley-Davidson Motor Co. Racism, hate or intolerance have no place in the Harley-Davidson community or anywhere in person or online. More than 500 companies that officially kicked off an advertising boycott Wednesday intended to pressure Facebook into taking a stronger stand against hate speech.

(AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)Chicago Red Stars teammates Julie Ertz and Casey Short say hard conversations over the past several weeks led to their vulnerability in the moment they shared an emotional embrace while they knelt during the national anthem as the NWSL opened its season. Short sobbed as she was held by Ertz before Chicago's match against the Washington Spirit on Saturday night, the second game of the National Women's Soccer League tournament in Utah. Currently, every time the national anthem is played, our country continues to become more and more divided on what the visual symbol of unity looks like, Short and Ertz said in a joint statement they released Tuesday. Often these opinions are presented through the individuals lens and do not accurately portray how the two of us truly feel, Short and Ertz said. The NWSL players association released a statement in support of all players, no matter their decision.

Protesters take part in a rally in favor of migrants who live in Greece, in Athens, on Saturday, June 20, 2020. Some hundreds of protesters marched against the possible discontinuation of a migrants' housing program which will leave thousands without a place to stay. But political opponents say they plan to defeat the proposals with mass demonstrations. Under draft legislation submitted to parliament late Monday, participation in a protest rally held without police permission could be punishable by up to a year in prison. A labor union backed by the Greek Communist Party said it planned to organize mass rallies against the proposals.

THE HAGUE Consumer products giant Unilever said Thursday it is aiming for a more inclusive vision of beauty in its skin care products and will remove words such as fair, whitening and lightening from its products, a move that comes amid intense global debate about race sparked by the Black Lives Matter movement. As part of the shift, Unilever will in coming months change the name of its Fair & Lovely product that is used for skin-lightening and sold in Asia, the company said. We are fully committed to having a global portfolio of skin care brands that is inclusive and cares for all skin tones, celebrating greater diversity of beauty," Sunny Jain, the head of Unilevers Beauty & Personal Care. Unilever said that its Fair & Lovely range has never been, and is not, a skin bleaching product. The global consumer company said its advertising for Fair & Lovely products has been changing since 2014. In 2019, we reflected this evolution on the Fair & Lovely pack in India, removing before-and-after impressions and shade guides that could indicate a transformation; and we have progressed all communication of product benefits towards glow, even tone, skin clarity and radiance, the company said.

AUSTIN, Texas A suspect has been arrested and charged with vandalizing the Texas Capitol during a May 30 Black Lives Matter demonstration. During the protest, monuments and fixtures were damaged, as well as DPS patrol vehicles, according to the statement. The Capitol grounds were closed during the protests, and the DPS said several of its troopers were injured. Greg Abbott called in the National Guard to help guard the Capitol and reinforce state and local law enforcement officers. Read also:Photos: Christopher Columbus statue at San Antonio park vandalized amid criticismSan Antonio councilman calls for removal of Columbus statue, renaming of park

Alexander Lawrence, who runs Mountainside Tattoo from a storefront in the village of Bellows Falls, Vermont, says hes always offered to remove hateful images or cover scars for free. When asked why he got the tattoo, Graves answered, Stupidity, partying when I was younger. So not only are they racist, but they're crappy.Graves said his swastika tattoo hasnt drawn a lot of attention because its hidden, but he was still eager to get rid of it. Since Graves' tattoo already has the image of a skull, Alexander used a pen to outline the image of the grim reaper. What do you think, man? Alexander asks Graves as he gives the arm a final wipe-down.

CLEVELAND A bean bag shooting by law enforcement at a Cleveland Black Lives Matter protest that left a man blinded in one eye is under investigation by state and local authorities, an official said. It was unclear in reports last week who fired the bean bag at John Sanders, 24, on May 30 outside the Cuyahoga County Justice Center in downtown Cleveland. Cuyahoga County spokeswoman late Tuesday confirmed that sheriff's deputies deployed non-lethal weapons that resemble shotguns to fire bean bags that day. Murray said he has received photographs showing officers firing weapons through a broken window at the Justice Center that day. He was on a sidewalk when he was struck by a bean bag fired from behind a broken window.

A plane towing a banner reading White Lives Matter Burnley flies above the stadium during the during the English Premier League soccer match between Manchester City and Burnley at Etihad Stadium, in Manchester, England, Monday, June 22, 2020. (AP Photo/Shaun Botterill,Pool)BURNLEY Police are looking into an incident in which a plane pulled a banner with the words White Lives Matter Burnley on it over Manchester Citys Etihad Stadium at the start of a Premier League match between the teams. The aircraft came into view moments after players and coaches from both clubs took a knee at kickoff on Monday in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. When the league season resumed last week amid the coronavirus outbreak, Black Lives Matter replaced player names on the backs of shirts. Iffy Onuora, the equalities officer for English soccers players union, said he hoped the widespread condemnation of the banner will act as a catalyst for further conversations about the Black Lives Matter movement.

Sundays work follows the removal of two other Confederate statues on the state Capitol grounds in Raleigh on Saturday. Cooper ordered the statues removed after protesters toppled two other Confederate statues Friday night, stringing one up by the neck and hanging it from a light pole. Cooper has advocated the statues removal for years. In another case in California, symbols of the Black Lives Matter movement have been targeted in recent weeks with vandalism. The Ventura County Sheriffs Office said late Saturday that a tarp painted with the letters BLM has been repeatedly damaged in Thousand Oaks.

President Donald Trump, center, walk toward the stage while supporters cheer during his campaign rally at BOK Center in Tulsa, Okla., Saturday, June 20, 2020. (Ian Maule/Tulsa World via AP)OAKLAND, Calif. Did teens, TikTok users and Korean pop music fans troll the president of the United States? Reached by telephone Sunday, Schmidt called the rally an unmitigated disaster days after Trump campaign chairman Brad Parscale tweeted that more than a million people requested tickets for the rally through Trumps campaign website. Reporters who wrote gleefully about TikTok and K-Pop fans without contacting the campaign for comment behaved unprofessionally and were willing dupes to the charade." No matter who signs up or if they go to a rally, Trump gets data to train retargeting on Facebook.

Things are going from bad to worse for Arsenal in the early days of the Premier Leagues resumption. Sure enough, it was the French striker who scored the winning goal in the fifth minute of stoppage time. Some of their players need to learn what is humility, especially one of them, Maupay said, without mentioning Guendouzi by name. Arteta lost midfielder Granit Xhaka and defender Pablo Mari to injury against City, with Mari unlikely to return before next season. Ben Chilwell was mobbed by his Leicester teammates after smashing home a rising, angled shot off the inside of the post in the 90th minute for what looked like the winning goal.

Climate activist Greta Thunberg during a radio statement at the 'Sveriges Radio' in Stockholm, Sweden, Sunday, June 14, 2020. The 17-year-old has become a global figurehead of the youth climate movement since she started her one-woman protests outside the Swedish parliament in 2018. To Thunberg's disappointment, her message doesn't seem to be getting through even to those leaders who applaud her work. Thunberg asks her audience on Swedish radio station P1. The climate and sustainability crisis is not a fair crisis, Thunberg says.

The Grade II-listed, brightly painted memorial to Scipio Africanus have been smashed and a message was scrawled in chalk on flagstones nearby. (Ben Birchall/PA via AP)LONDON British officials said Thursday the grave of an enslaved African man has been vandalised in an apparent retaliation attack after protesters in the city of Bristol toppled the statue of a prominent slave trader. Two headstones in memory of Scipio Africanus, who lived in Bristol in the 18th century, were smashed. This looks like a retaliation attack for the recent events involving the Colston statue, local official Mark Weston said. During his life, Scipio Africanus was a servant to Charles Howard, the 7th Earl of Suffolk.

EL PASO, Texas An El Paso man who allegedly threatened to kill Black Lives Matter protesters in a video posted online has been arrested and faces a federal charge of making a threat over the internet, the FBI said. He's accused of recording and uploading a video on YouTube making threats to shoot Black Lives Matter protesters in the Dallas area, daring activists to stop him, according to El Paso Times. The investigation began Saturday following an online tip where the FBI tracked down the posting to Flores' phone. Flores told agents he had been drinking and didn't remember what he said on the video, according to the complaint. Marshals Service awaiting transfer to El Paso.

In this June 14, 2020 photo, U.S. flag flutters next to a giant Black Lives Matter banner at the U.S. Embassy in Seoul, South Korea. The banner has been removed from the U.S. Embassy building in South Korea's capital three days after it was raised there in solidarity with protesters back home. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)SEOUL A large Black Lives Matter banner has been removed from the U.S. Embassy building in South Korea's capital three days after it was raised there in solidarity with protesters back home. The Black Lives Matter banner was seen as support of worldwide movements honoring George Floyd, a black man who died in handcuffs while a white Minneapolis police officer pressed a knee on his neck. His death last month has prompted weeks of protests in the United States and around the world with the same theme: Black Lives Matter.

Gundy is seen in a photograph on Twitter wearing the T-shirt with the letters OAN. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki, File)OKLAHOMA CITY One day after Oklahoma State running back Chuba Hubbard lashed out at coach Mike Gundy on social media for wearing a T-shirt promoting a far-right news channel, Gundy apologized. On Monday evening, Hubbard and Gundy appeared in a video together, with Gundy saying he would make changes. Our players matter to me.Gundy was seen in a photograph on Twitter wearing the shirt with the letters OAN. I will not be doing anything with Oklahoma State until things CHANGE.Hubbard's tweet drew support from past and present Oklahoma State players.

(AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, File)NEW YORK Jeremy Jeffress, Jordan Montgomery, Kevin Plawecki could be playing for free this season, earning salaries lower than what they already received as advances. MLB appears likely to announce a decision after Manfred confers with the 30 controlling owners. The union would claim MLB failed to schedule the longest season possible and ask for money damages. The average salary, stagnated around $4.4 million since 2016, is likely to fall sharply this winter. $40 million is an awful lot of money, but the tax on that is going to be extraordinary.___More AP MLB: https://apnews.com/MLB and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports

Hundreds of police disrupted plans for a Black Lives Matter rally but protest organizers have vowed that other rallies will continue around Australia over the weekend despite warnings of the pandemic risk. However, protesters in Sydney, Adelaide and Perth were urged to stay away by government officials concerned about the risk of spreading the new coronavirus. Police in New South Wales have warned anyone attending the Sydney protest risked being fined and arrested. Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders comprise 2% of the the country's adult population but 27% of the prison population. One woman was fined on Friday night for disobeying a police order to move on during a Black Lives Matter protest in Sydney.

SWAT team amid safety concerns. Judge orders pause on use of tear gas against protesters in Seattle. ___HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. Ten members of a South Florida police departments SWAT team have resigned from the team, citing safety concerns and local officials disdain for the unit. Police Chief Sonia Quinones received a memo from the SWAT team Friday morning, City Manager Greg Chavarria said in a statement, according to news outlets. Bowe, a 34-year-old black man, was killed in 2014 by Hallandale Beachs SWAT team as it carried out a search warrant and raided his home.

In this image provided by Hamilton City Council, council workers remove the bronze statue of British Captain John Fane Charles Hamilton from a square in central Hamilton, New Zealand, Friday, June 12, 2020. The New Zealand city of Hamilton on Friday removed a bronze statue of the British naval officer the city is named after a man who is accused of killing indigenous Maori people in the 1860s. (Hamilton City Council via AP)WELLINGTON The New Zealand city of Hamilton on Friday removed a bronze statue of the British naval officer for whom it is named a man who is accused of killing indigenous Maori people in the 1860s. The removal by city authorities came a day after a Maori tribe asked for the statue be taken down and one Maori elder threatened to tear it down himself. In the 1860s, it was renamed after Captain John Hamilton, a British officer who was killed in the infamous Gate Pa battle in the city of Tauranga.

Sister Mamie reposts signs that were removed form the Lafayette Park parameter fence at the site of protests, Wednesday, June 10, 2020, near the White House in Washington. Now, with much of the temporary fencing around the White House coming down, there's an effort to preserve hundreds of pieces of instant American history. The National Park Service originally told The Associated Press that most of the fence would be dismantled Wednesday, but it later reversed course. On the other, southern side of the White House, parts of the temporary fencing were also being dismantled. The messages, signs and artwork almost blotted out the view of the White House behind the fence.

Sister Mamie reposts signs that were removed form the Lafayette Park parameter fence at the site of protests, Wednesday, June 10, 2020, near the White House in Washington. Now, with expectations that the fence in front of the White House might be coming down, there's an effort to preserve hundreds of pieces of instant American history. On the other, southern side of the White House, parts of the temporary fencing were dismantled on Wednesday. At volunteer medical tents on Wednesday, the call went out for more string to continue hanging up the protest art. The messages, signs and artwork almost blotted out the view of the White House behind the fence.

Messages, posters and portraits, ranging from loving to enraged, almost blot out the view of the White House across the way. Police have turned a several-block area north of Lafayette Park, in front of the White House, into an open air pedestrian space. On Monday, White Press press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said there were no regrets on the part of this White House" over the handling of peaceful protesters that night. McEnany said it was Attorney General William Barr who made the decision to expand the security perimeter around the White House. As the violence subsided and the weather improved, the mood outside the the White House turned festive over the weekend.

Messages, posters and portraits, ranging from loving to enraged, almost blot out the view of the White House across the way. Police have turned a several-block area north of Lafayette Park, in front of the White House, into an open air pedestrian space. On Monday, White Press press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said there were no regrets on the part of this White House" over the handling of peaceful protesters that night. McEnany said it was Attorney General William Barr who made the decision to expand the security perimeter around the White House. As the violence subsided and the weather improved, the mood outside the the White House turned festive over the weekend.

Queensland state police community liaison officers hand out face masks to people gathering for the Black Lives Matter protest in Brisbane on Saturday, June 6, 2020. Black Lives Matter protests across Australia proceeded mostly peacefully Saturday as thousands of demonstrators in state capitals honored the memory of Floyd and protested the deaths of indigenous Australians in custody. South Koreas caseload peaked in late February and early March when it recorded hundreds of new cases each day. The new cases in recent weeks have been linked to nightclubs, an e-commerce warehouse, church gatherings and door-to-door sellers in the Seoul metropolitan area. It is on guard against imported cases as it begins to ease restrictions on flights and people arriving from abroad.

The protest is sparked by the death of George Floyd, who died May 25 after he was restrained by Minneapolis police. (Jason Pierce/The Sacramento Bee via AP)SAN FRANCISCO Thousands of demonstrators filled the streets in San Francisco, Sacramento, Simi Valley, San Diego, Los Angeles and elsewhere across California on Saturday, continuing more than a week of protest marches expressing outrage over the death of George Floyd. The large turnout of white protesters "is sending a powerful message. It was there that four white Los Angeles police officers were found not guilty of beating motorist Rodney King, sparking riots in 1992. Police can't operate without community trust that is broken when officers act improperly as they did most recently with Floyd, he said.

City workers and activists paint the words Black Lives Matter in enormous bright yellow letters on the the street leading to the White House, Friday, June 5, 2020, in Washington. D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser tweeted aerial video of the mural shortly after it was completed Friday. The section of 16th street in front of the White House is now officially Black Lives Matter Plaza, Bowser tweeted. A black and white sign was put up to mark the change. She says their differences highlight the need for D.C. to be a state and have more control over its internal affairs.

Craig Gore, who has worked on the shows S.W.A.T. and Chicago P.D., was fired Tuesday from the forthcoming Law & Order: Organized Crime spin-off because of Facebook posts. Many others from public-facing institutions and businesses have been sanctioned, demoted, suspended or fired for impolitic statements online in recent days. A Denver officer was fired Tuesday for writing Lets start a riot as the caption to an Instagram picture of himself and two fellow officers smiling in riot gear. An officer in Fulton, New York, posted an Instagram image that read, Black lives only matter to black people unless they are killed by a white person and found himself out of a job. These people who are getting fired or resigning, they're not realizing this.___Follow AP Entertainment Writer Andrew Dalton on Twitter: https://twitter.com/andyjamesdalton.

FILE - This April 30, 2019 file photo shows actress Lea Michele at The Hollywood Reporter's Empowerment in Entertainment Gala in Los Angeles. Michele has apologized for being unnecessarily difficult on the set of the musical TV show "Glee" after a black co-star accused Michele of making her time there a living hell. She issued a statement saying that while she didn't recall any incident or judged anyone by their skin color, she was sorry and blamed immaturity. The apology came two days after former co-star Samantha Marie Ware accused Michele of traumatic microaggressions that made me question a career in Hollywood. Michele is white and Ware is black. Michele tweeted her support of Black Lives Matter movement and said police violence on black people must end.

Number one, we are here to peacefully protect small businesses, Aguayo co-founder of Increase the Peace, a community organizing group in the city told the small crowd. If that doesnt work, dont put your life at risk.There was no formal training, just a pep talk and a short prayer. Other people are creating more informal networks as protests pop up in new corners of their cities and states daily, with many attendees who've never protested before. Afterward, a younger crowd held another protest, and she said the veteran activists felt obliged to help. He encouraged people to informally monitor and help fellow demonstrators, to prevent violence from hijacking protests.