The Jim Bakker Show

Explainer: Drought creates a perfect storm for wildfires in U.S. West

Firefighters battle a fast-moving wildfire in Goleta, California, July 7, 2018. REUTERS/Gene Blevins

By Andrew Hay

TAOS, New Mexico (Reuters) – Bigger and more “explosive” wildfires are raging across the U.S. West, with the area burned in Colorado already four times the size of last year’s total, as rising temperatures, drought and a buildup of forest fuels supercharge blazes.

So far this year, 3.3 million acres have burned in U.S. forests, just below the figure for this time in 2017. Last year was the second worst year on record with 10 million acres blackened, according to the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC).

Around 2,600 homes have been destroyed nationally by fires year to date, according to Forest Service data. Nine U.S. wildland firefighters have been killed up to this week, compared with 14 killed in all of 2017, according to the National Wildfire Coordinating Group. It was not immediately possible to verify how many civilians have died this year.

The number of wildfires larger than 25,000 acres on U.S. Forest Service land in the West nearly quadrupled in the decade to 2014, compared with the 1980s, according to data from the Department of the Interior.

The number of U.S. homes destroyed in wildfires almost tripled to 12,242 in 2017 from the previous year, according to U.S. Forest Service data, largely due to giant blazes in California that killed 43 people.

DROUGHT TURBOCHARGING FIRES

What’s driving the wildfires is exceptional drought conditions in large areas of Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and Colorado. Severe droughts used to happen every four to five decades but are becoming frequent. In New Mexico, such dry periods have occurred in five years since 2000, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Kerry Jones in Albuquerque.

Nearly all of California faces abnormally dry or drought conditions, according to the Drought Monitor agency.

The state has had its worst start to the fire period in a decade, with 220,421 acres burned through Thursday morning, according to NIFC data.

In Colorado, preliminary figures show 431,540 acres have burned year to date, nearly four times the 111,667 acres blackened during all of 2017, according to NIFC data.

By August, the risk of large wildfires will be at normal levels in much of the Southwest and Rocky Mountain areas, thanks to a forecast for strong summer rains, but risk levels will remain above normal in California through October, according to NIFC data.

RISING TEMPERATURES

Rising average temperatures in the West are also stoking fires. Areas such as northern New Mexico and southern Colorado have been in long-term drought since around 2000.

“We’re in a global (temperature) change drought,” said Peter Brown, director of Rocky Mountain Tree-Ring Research in Fort Collins, Colorado.

Higher temperatures have helped extend the period of wildfires by 60 to 80 days each year, NIFC spokeswoman Jennifer Jones said.

“We’re not calling it a fire season anymore, we’re referring to a fire year,” she said.

An expected 1.8 Fahrenheit (1C) temperature rise by mid-century is expected to double or triple the annual acreage burned from a current 7 million acres average, according to a study by the U.S. Forest Service and Department of Agriculture.

UNHEALTHY FORESTS

A fire needs fuel to burn, and there is a lot of that in the U.S. West’s overgrown and often unhealthy forests.

Since the 1950s, the U.S. government pursued a fire suppression policy that sharply reduced the acreage burned but caused forests to become choked with underbrush and trees, allowing invasive species to enter. In the southwest, bark beetles have killed billions of conifers now providing fuel for infernos.

In California, invasive species like cheatgrass offer the perfect fuel for fire to spread. Millions of trees and bushes killed by California’s 2012-2017 drought are another fuel source.

“TSUNAMIS OF FLAME”

Southeast Colorado’s Spring Creek fire, the second largest in the state’s history at 108,000 acres, is an example of the kind of “perfect fire storm” menacing the West, said firefighter Ben Brack, 42, information officer on the blaze.

Burning at thousands of degrees with 300-foot-high “tsunamis of flame” fanned by erratic winds, Brack called it the most “explosive” fire he has seen. The fire has destroyed upwards of 148 homes, according to Costilla County authorities.

Brack compares such blazes to hurricanes or tornadoes for firefighters’ inability to stop them.

Fire crews get people out of the way, save what homes they can, and create fire breaks many miles from the flames. These fires may only be fully extinguished by the first snows of winter, Brack said.

(Reporting by Andrew Hay; editing by Bill Tarrant and Leslie Adler)

Brush fire prompts evacuation of Los Angeles observatory

Firefighters work on a fire near the landmark Griffith Observatory in the hills overlooking Los Angeles, California, U.S. July 10, 2018. REUTERS/Patrick T. Fallon

By Steve Gorman

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The landmark Griffith Observatory, a popular tourist attraction in the hills overlooking Los Angeles, was evacuated on Tuesday due to a brush fire that scorched a nearby swath of the surrounding park, authorities said.

The blaze erupted shortly after 2 p.m. (2100 GMT) and charred 10 acres of drought-parched chaparral and grass on the slopes of Griffith Park at the edge of the observatory grounds before firefighters brought the flames under control about 90 minutes later, fire officials said.

No injuries were reported from the fire, which followed a weekend heat wave that baked Los Angeles and much of the rest of Southern California, causing widespread power outages and contributing to a destructive wildfire in Santa Barbara County.

Smoke rises from a brush fire near the Giffith Observatory in Los Angeles, United States, in this still image taken from a July 10, 2018 video footage by Elizabeth West obtained from social media. Elizabeth West/Social Media/via REUTERS

The fire in Griffith Park burned to within a quarter-mile of the observatory but never posed a direct threat to the building, which is situated on the southern slope of Mount Hollywood, according to city fire department spokesman Brian Humphrey.

Authorities, however, decided to evacuate the site “out of an abundance of caution,” Humphrey said. A pall of smoke from the blaze was visible throughout much of the surrounding metropolitan area.

About 600 to 700 visitors and staff were in the building at the time of the evacuation, observatory museum guide Juan Gutierrez told Reuters by telephone.

Gutierrez said he saw flames burning “pretty close” to outdoor restrooms located near the parking lot outside the main observatory entrance and along a road leading up to the site.

It was the third time the observatory was evacuated in the past two months because of a fire, Gutierrez said, adding that he overheard one park ranger say to another that the latest blaze appeared to have been ignited by a careless smoker.

Humphrey said the cause of the fire was under investigation.

The observatory, dedicated to astronomy for public viewing and education rather than research, was opened in 1935 and draws about 1.5 million visitors a year to Griffith Park, one of the largest municipal parks in the United States.

Providing a real-life backdrop for various Hollywood movies ranging from “Rebel Without a Cause” to “La La Land,” Griffith Park was the scene of a 1933 wildfire that killed 29 people, ranking as the single deadliest blaze on record in California.

The 4,300-acre park and observatory are both named for Griffith J. Griffith, an investor and developer who donated much of the land to the city of Los Angeles in the late 1890s before he was tried, convicted and sent to prison for shooting his wife in the eye. Left blind and disfigured, she divorced him.

(Reporting by Steve Gorman; Editing by Rosalba O’Brien and Leslie Adler)

Firefighters gain on California wildfires as weather cooperates

A USGS geologist making observations of the fissure 8 lava channel at sunset is pictured in this July 3, 2018 fisheye lens handout photograph near the Kilauea volcano eruption in Hawaii, U.S. USGS/Handout via REUTERS

(Reuters) – Firefighters are gaining momentum as they battle several wildfires that have destroyed dozens of homes and forced the evacuation of thousands of residents in California.

Across the state, milder weather over the last couple of days has helped firefighters to hold the line against several blazes, allowing them to lift evacuation orders for residents forced to flee their homes.

Temperatures are expected to fall this week in parts of the state, the National Weather Service said, after scorching heat, high winds and low humidity fanned dozens of fires this summer in a particularly intense fire season across the U.S. West.

“The weather is starting to cooperate, so it’s letting firefighters get the upper hand on the fires,” said Lynette Round, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, called Cal Fire.

U.S. wildfires have already burned more than 3.3 million acres (1.3 million hectares) this year, more than the annual average of about 2.6 million acres over the past 10 years, according to the National Interagency Fire Center.

One person has been killed and three firefighters injured in a wildfire on the California-Oregon border. That blaze, the Klamathon Fire, has torched 36,500 acres (14,770 hectares) and destroyed 82 homes since erupting on Thursday.

Shifting wind patterns remained a concern, but that fire was not expected to grow significantly overnight, a spokesman for Cal Fire said.

In western Nevada, a fire weather watch will be in effect on Wednesday as winds up to 50 miles (80 km) per hour and thunderstorms with lightning are expected in the area.

Elsewhere in the U.S. Southwest, dozens of active fires remained burning, including the 107,900-acre Spring Creek Fire, which is on pace to become the second-largest fire in Colorado’s history, according to the Denver Post newspaper.

“Near critical fire weather conditions are possible across portions of eastern Colorado Tuesday afternoon,” the National Weather Service said in an advisory.

Showers and thunderstorms are also in the forecast for parts of the region through Wednesday, the weather service said, warning of lightning and gusty winds that could create and fan wildfires.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee, editing by Larry King)

Thousands evacuated ahead of fast-moving California wildfire

A house burns as firefighters battle a fast-moving wildfire that destroyed homes driven by strong wind and high temperatures forcing thousands of residents to evacuate in Goleta, California, U.S., early July 7, 2018. REUTERS/Gene Blevin

By Dan Whitcomb

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Santa Barbara County officials declared a local emergency on Saturday as a fast-moving wildfire driven by strong winds and triple-digit temperatures destroyed 20 homes and other structures and forced thousands of residents to evacuate.

The Holiday Fire, one of more than three dozen major blazes burning across the U.S. West, broke out on Friday evening near the beach community of Goleta, California, west of Santa Barbara, and raced through the seaside foothills.

Firefighters work at the site of a wildfire in Goleta, California, U.S., July 6, 2018 in this image obtained on social media. Mike Eliason/Santa Barbara County Fire/via REUTERS

The flames forced more than 2,000 people to flee their homes, and left thousands more without power, prompting the emergency declaration which frees additional funds for the firefighting effort.

Some 350 firefighters took advantage of a period of light winds early on Saturday to contain as much as possible of the blaze, which has burned through 50 to 80 acres (20 to 32 hectares), fire officials said.

“It was a small fire but it had a powerful punch to it,” Santa County Fire spokesman Mike Eliason said. “We’re going to hit it hard today.”

Winds were expected to pick up again as temperatures rise in the afternoon, he said.

Dozens of blazes have broken out across the western United States, fanned by scorching heat, winds and low humidity in a particularly intense fire season.

This year’s fires had burned more than 2.9 million acres (1.17 million hectares) through Friday, already more than the annual average of about 2.4 million acres (971,000 hectares) over the last 10 years, according to the National Interagency Fire Center.

On Friday, the remains of an unidentified person were found near a home burned to the ground by the Klamathon fire, which broke out on Thursday near California’s border with Oregon. It marked the first fatality of the fire season in California.

A boat burns as fast-moving wildfire that destroyed homes driven by strong wind and high temperatures forcing thousands of residents to evacuate in Goleta, California, U.S., early July 7, 2018. REUTERS/Gene BlevinsThe Klamathon, which has destroyed 15 structures and blackened nearly 22,000 acres (8,900 hectares), was only 5 percent contained as of Saturday.

Elsewhere in Northern California, the County Fire has charred 88,375 acres (35,764 hectares) in sparsely populated wooded areas of Napa and Yolo Counties.

Some 3,660 firefighters faced with inaccessible terrain, high temperatures and low humidity, were battling the fire, which was only 48 percent contained. It has destroyed 10 structures, damaged two and threatened 110.

In Colorado, officials said fire crews had made “much progress” battling the Spring Creek fire, which broke out on Juornia, ne 27 and has consumed 106,985 acres (43,295 hectares). It was 43 percent contained on Saturday, the officials said.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee, Peter Szekely in New York and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Editing by John Stonestreet, Franklin Paul and David Gregorio)

U.S. seeks court guidance on deadlines to reunite migrant families

FILE PHOTO: Immigrant children, many of whom have been separated from their parents under a new "zero tolerance" policy by the Trump administration, are being housed in tents next to the Mexican border in Tornillo, Texas, U.S., June 18, 2018. REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo

The U.S. government is seeking guidance from a federal court over its efforts to reunite migrant parents and their children before court-imposed deadlines, after the administration separated the families for crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally.

In a filing overnight, U.S. Department of Justice officials asked the United States District Court for the Southern District of California for more details about procedures to reunite migrant families, saying in some cases the government may need additional time.

The separations have sparked a fierce outcry and numerous protests, part of a political firestorm over U.S. President Donald Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy and beefed-up efforts to deter illegal U.S. entry.

The Trump administration had implemented the separation policy as part of stepped-up efforts to deter immigrants from crossing the U.S. border from Mexico.

But it reversed course last month amid a groundswell of global opposition and said it would keep families together if possible.

U.S. officials are now rushing to reunite more than 2,000 children separated from their parents at the border after the court in San Diego ordered the government last month to halt the practice.

Democrats and even some allies of the Republican president as well as foreign leaders and the Pope have condemned the separations, and protests continued over the weekend in cities across America over the issue.

Advocacy groups including the ACLU, which filed the lawsuit, have questioned the government’s contention it may need more time to safely reunite families, and have raised concerns about whether it has a comprehensive plan to bring families together.

The U.S. government is scheduled to update the federal judge in the San Diego case on the reunification process later on Friday.

U.S. Judge Dana Sabraw last month ordered that children under 5 years old be reunited with their parents by July 10, and for all children to be reunited by July 26. He also ordered that parents have phone contact with their children by Friday.

On Thursday, U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar told reporters there were now “under 3,000” children in HHS care, including about 100 under the age of 5.

Azar said the U.S. government was relocating parents of children under 5 years old to detention facilities close to their children to help speed up family reunification.

The government, in its filing overnight, said the process could further be delayed by steps that were required before parents could be reconnected with their children, according to its interpretation of the court order: DNA testing to verify parentage, a criminal history check, and assurance that parents could provide for the child’s physical and mental well being.

As a result, some cases may require more time than allotted by the court, officials said, asking the court for guidance.

“HHS anticipates, however, in some instances it will not be able to complete the additional processes within the timelines the Court prescribed, particularly with regard to class members who are already not in Government custody,” they wrote.

(Reporting by Susan Heavey and Yeganeh Torbati; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

Fast-spreading California wildfire forces evacuations in Yolo County

Smoke rises in distance from County Fire near County Road 63 and Highway 16 in Rumsey Canyon in this #CountyFire image on social media in Brooks, California, U.S., July 2, 2018. Courtesy California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection/Handout via REUTERS

By Jon Herskovitz

(Reuters) – A fast-growing wildfire that broke out over the weekend in Northern California, fueled by parched lands and high winds, prompted evacuations on Sunday and sent ash spewing over a wide area of the region, officials said.

More than 1,200 people were fighting the so-called County Fire, located about 75 miles (120 kms) northeast of San Francisco. It has blazed through around 32,500 acres (13,150 hectares) and was 2 percent contained as of Sunday evening, officials said.

The sky turned orange in parts of the San Francisco Bay area due to the blaze, with many residents waking up to a thin coating of ash on windows, cars and lawns.

Residents in some rural areas of Yolo County were ordered to leave their homes as the flames advanced, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire.

“It’s going to be headed into some populated areas of small communities in the near future if it is not curtailed,” Cal Fire spokesman Scott McLean said in an interview.

As of June 29 of this year, wildfires have burned through nearly 2.5 million acres (1 million hectares) in the United States, well above the average of about 2 million acres for the same calendar period over the last 10 years, according to the National Interagency Fire Center, a monitoring group.

Parched conditions in the U.S. West and Southwest have led to a rash of wildfires this year, with about 40 major blazes burning as of the end of June in an area from Washington State to New Mexico, the agency said.

More than 9,000 firefighters and 100 helicopters have been dispatched to battle the various blazes, cutting containment lines on the ground and dropping fire retardant from the air, the agency said.

California and Colorado have been hard hit this year, with the largest wildfire in Colorado, the 416 Fire, charring almost 47,000 acres about 13 miles (21 km) north of Durango in the southwestern part of the state. It is 37 percent contained, according to state data.

An ongoing drought across much of the Southwest and West and a ridge of warm air that can produce high winds have made the area susceptible to wildfires, said Scott Marsh, a meteorologist with the U.S. National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma.

“In a drought-stricken area, once you get a spark, it is off to the races,” he said.

(Reporting by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Paul Simao & Simon Cameron-Moore)

Supreme court strikes down California law on anti-abortion centers

Anti-abortion activists (L-R) Terrisa Bukovinac, Megan Lott and Peter Hinman stand outside of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, U.S., June 26, 2018. REUTERS/Leah Millis

By Andrew Chung

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday struck down a California law requiring clinics that counsel women against abortion to notify clients of the availability of abortions paid for by the state, ruling it violated the free speech rights of these Christian-based facilities.

The Supreme Court legalized abortion in 1973, and while the broader issue of abortion rights was not at issue in the case, the 5-4 ruling represented a significant victory for abortion opponents who operate these kinds of clinics – called crisis pregnancy centers – around the country.

The court’s five conservative justices were in the majority in the ruling authored by Justice Clarence Thomas, with the four liberals dissenting.

Crisis pregnancy centers have said they offer legitimate health services but that it is their mission to steer women with unplanned pregnancies away from abortion.

There are roughly 2,700 crisis pregnancy centers in the United States, including around 200 in California, according to abortion rights advocates, vastly outnumbering abortion clinics. California officials said some of the centers mislead women by presenting themselves as full-service reproductive healthcare facilities, going so far as to resemble medical clinics, down to lab coats worn by staff.

California’s Reproductive FACT Act, passed by a Democratic-led legislature and signed by Democratic Governor Jerry Brown in 2015, required centers licensed by the state as family planning facilities to post or distribute notices that the state has programs offering free or low-cost birth control, prenatal care and abortion services. The law also mandated unlicensed centers that may have no medical provider on staff to disclose that fact.

(Reporting by Andrew Chung; Editing by Will Dunham)

Supreme Court poised to rule on Trump travel ban, California law on anti abortion clinic regulations

FILE PHOTO: The U.S. Supreme Court is seen after the court revived Ohio's contentious policy of purging infrequent voters from its registration rolls, overturning a lower court ruling that Ohio's policy violated the National Voter Registration Act, in Washington, U.S., June 11, 2018. REUTERS/Erin Schaff/File Photo

By Lawrence Hurley and Andrew Chung

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court, winding down its nine-month term, will issue rulings this week in its few remaining cases including a major one on the legality of President Donald Trump’s ban on people from five Muslim-majority nations entering the country.

The nine justices are due to decide other politically sensitive cases on whether non-union workers have to pay fees to unions representing certain public-sector workers such as police and teachers, and the legality of California regulations on clinics that steer women with unplanned pregnancies away from abortion.

The justices began their term in October and, as is their usual practice, aim to make all their rulings by the end of June, with more due on Monday. Six cases remain to be decided.

The travel ban case was argued on April 25, with the court’s conservative majority signaling support for Trump’s policy in a significant test of presidential powers.

Trump has said the ban is needed to protect the United States from attacks by Islamic militants. Conservative justices indicated an unwillingness to second-guess Trump on his national security rationale.

Lower courts had blocked the travel ban, the third version of a policy Trump first pursued a week after taking office last year. But the high court on Dec. 4 allowed it to go fully into effect while the legal challenge continued.

The challengers, led by the state of Hawaii, have argued the policy was motivated by Trump’s enmity toward Muslims. Lower courts have decided the ban violated federal immigration law and the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition on the government favoring one religion over another.

The current ban, announced in September, prohibits entry into the United States by most people from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen.

In a significant case for organized labor, the court’s conservatives indicated opposition during arguments on Feb. 26 to so-called agency fees that some states require non-members to pay to public-sector unions.

Workers who decide not to join unions representing certain state and local employees must pay the fees in two dozen states in lieu of union dues to help cover the cost of non-political activities such as collective bargaining. The fees provide millions of dollars annually to these unions.

The justices seemed skeptical during March 20 arguments toward California’s law requiring Christian-based anti-abortion centers, known as crisis pregnancy centers, to post notices about the availability of state-subsidized abortions and birth control. The justices indicated that they would strike down at least part of the regulations.

(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley and Andrew Chung; Editing by Will Dunham and Grant McCool)

In Missouri, J&J faces biggest trial yet alleging talc caused cancer

FILE PHOTO: A Johnson & Johnson building is shown in Irvine, California, U.S., January 24, 2017. REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo

By Tina Bellon

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A lawsuit by 22 ovarian cancer patients against Johnson & Johnson went to trial on Wednesday in Missouri state court, marking the largest case the company has faced over allegations its talc-based products contain cancer-causing asbestos.

The women and their families suing in the Circuit Court of the City of St. Louis say decades-long use of J&J’s Baby Powder and other cosmetic talc products caused their disease. They allege the company knew its talc was contaminated with asbestos since at least the 1970s but failed to warn consumers about the risks.

J&J denies both that its talc products cause cancer and that they ever contained asbestos.

J&J is battling some 9,000 cases brought by users of its Baby Powder and Shower to Shower talc products, the latter of which was sold to Valeant Pharmaceuticals in 2012.

The majority of those lawsuits claim talc caused ovarian cancer in women who used it for feminine hygiene. A smaller number of cases allege talc contaminated by asbestos in the mining process caused mesothelioma, a tissue cancer closely linked to asbestos exposure.

The cases that went to trial on Wednesday effectively combine those claims by alleging the women’s ovarian cancer was caused by asbestos in J&J talc products.

J&J lawyer Peter Bicks told the jury on Wednesday that the causes for ovarian cancer are often unknown, according to an online broadcast of the trial by Courtroom View Network.

He said gene mutations and a family history of cancer played an important role and that asbestos was not known to cause ovarian cancer.

Bicks added that testing done by independent laboratories, universities, government agencies, talc suppliers and J&J itself has shown that there is no asbestos in the company’s talc.

But plaintiff’s lawyer Mark Lanier said asbestos and talc, which are closely linked minerals, are intermingled in the mining process, making it impossible to remove the carcinogenic substance. Lanier said there was “no doubt” that talc caused his clients’ ovarian cancer.

“This case is as simple as asbestos breathed in or put inside of you,” Lanier told the jury.

J&J has lost two talc mesothelioma jury trials in the past weeks. Those cases are currently under appeal.

Juries in California and Missouri have also issued verdicts in ovarian cancer cases totaling more than $720 million in damages. Those decisions have either been tossed out or are still under appeal.

(Reporting by Tina Bellon; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

Voters remove California judge criticized over rape sentencing

FILE PHOTO: Brock Turner, the former Stanford swimmer convicted of sexually assaulting an unconscious woman, leaves the Santa Clara County Jail in San Jose, California, U.S. September 2, 2016. REUTERS/Stephen Lam/File Photo

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Californians voted in a special election to unseat a state judge who drew worldwide condemnation for giving a six-month jail sentence to a Stanford University swimmer convicted of sexually assaulting an unconscious woman.

Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Aaron Persky, a former prosecutor appointed to the bench in 2003 by then-Governor Gray Davis next month will become the first sitting judge recalled in more than 80 years in the state.

In Tuesday’s election, 60 percent of the more than 176,058 voters who cast ballots approved a petition to recall Persky, according to unofficial results posted online by the county registrar. The registrar is expected to certify the results on July 5, spokesman Steven Spivak said.

“There is no such thing as an elected official who (is)independent of the electorate. That is not a thing,” Michele Dauber, a Stanford law professor who organized the recall petition, wrote in a Twitter message on Wednesday.

Persky came under fire in June 2016 for sentencing Brock Turner, then 20, to six months in the county jail and three years probation for three counts of sexual assault, a penalty widely denounced as too lenient.

Uproar over the sentencing was fueled in part by an open letter from the victim, who remains anonymous, recounting her ordeal in graphic terms. The letter was posted online and went viral, resonating with people around the world.

Turner’s sentence, which predated the #MeToo movement of women speaking out publicly against sexual harassment and abuse, was held up as a symbol of how the U.S. justice system fails to take sex crimes seriously enough.

The recall vote sparked came at a time that has seen hundreds of women publicly accusing powerful men in business, government and entertainment of sexual misconduct and harassment.

Persky is not planning to issue a statement about the election, according to LaDoris Cordell, a retired female judge who served with Persky on the Santa Clara County Superior Court and who led much of the opposition to the recall.

Persky had won re-election since his appointment, and his current six-year term would have expired in January 2023.

Persky, himself a former lacrosse player at Stanford in Palo Alto, California, said at a news conference last month that sentencing guidelines and probation department recommendations had limited his options in sentencing the former student. He has asserted that his recall would undermine the independence of the judiciary.

Under California law, voters can petition for elections to remove state officials from office for any reason.

“We ask judges to follow the rule of law and not the rule of public opinion,” Persky told the news conference.

Two women ran to succeed him in a separate, nonpartisan race. Under state law, Persky would leave office when the winner, Cindy Seeley Hendrickson, takes the oath of office. That must occur within 10 days of the July 5 vote certification, a Santa Clara County Superior Court spokesman Benjamin Rada said.

Prosecutors had asked that Turner be given six years in prison. He had faced up to 14 years behind bars, and under normal sentencing guidelines would have been likely to receive at least two years in prison.

Turner was released for good behavior in September 2016 after serving just three months of his six-month term and has since appealed his conviction. He returned to his parents’ home near Dayton, Ohio, where he was required to register as a sex offender, the Dayton Daily News reported at the time.

California’s judicial oversight commission received thousands of complaints about the sentencing but concluded in its report that Persky was unbiased and acted in accordance with a probation report recommending the lighter sentence in the county jail, rather than a state prison.

(Reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles and Peter Szekely in New York; editing by Paul Tait, Peter Graff and Jonathan Oatis)

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