North Carolina

The Republican governor of North Carolina, Pat McCrory, has expressed interest in expanding Medicaid in that state, the Associated Press reports. While North Carolina was one of 24 Republican-helmed states that initially resisted expanding healthcare coverage for the poor under President Barack Obama's signature law, "McCrory said he is open to expanding Medicaid coverage after he and the General Assembly revamp the program to control costs," according to the AP. Medicaid expansion in North Carolina would benefit 320,000 low-income workers.

The Fourth Circuit struck down North Carolina's requirement that doctors and ultrasound technicians perform an ultrasound at least four hours but not more than 72 hours before the abortion is to take place, display an image of the sonogram and "and specifically describe the fetus to any pregnant woman seeking an abortion, even if the woman actively 'averts her eyes' and 'refuses to hear,'" Slate's Dahlia Lithwick reports. The court ruled the requirement violates the First Amendment rights of healthcare providers. Doctors who did not follow the law could face damages and lose their licenses to practice, Lithwick also notes.

Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III, who authored the opinion for the panel, is a conservative jurist and was shortlisted for John Roberts' seat as chief justice of the Supreme Court, Lithwick notes.

The ruling presents a circuit split with the Fifth and Eighth Circuits, which have upheld similar laws.

The New York Times' Michael Corkery reports that legislators in at least eight states have "voted to increase the fees or the interest rates that lenders can charge on certain personal loans used by millions of borrowers with subpar credit." There has been a lobbying push by the consumer loan industry, which argues that caps on interest rates have not kept pace with the costs of doing business. Efforts in North Carolina initially failed because of opposition from military leaders, but the industry was able to get the law amended when the commanding officers changed at some of the state's military bases and did not feel as strongly about the issue. The law changed from allowing lenders to charge 30 percent interest on loans up to $1,000 and 18 percent on a remaining balance of $6,500 to charging up to 30 percent on loans up to $4,000 and 24 percent on a remaining balance of $4,000.

A liberal Protestant denomination filed a lawsuit last week challenging North Carolina's ban on same-sex marriage, arguing that the freedom of religion of its clergy members is violated because they are not able to join same-sex couples in matrimony, the New York Times reports.  The lawsuit is the "first such case brought by a national religious denomination challenging a state’s marriage laws," the Times further reports.

North Carolina's law criminalizes the religious blessing of weddings that do not involve state-issued marriage licenses.

A clerk in North Carolina will begin to accept same-sex marriage applications, but there's a caveat. He won't sign the applications unless he gets the permission of the state attorney general. And according to this Chicago Tribune article, the attorney general personally supports same-sex matrimony but will defend North Carolina's Defense of Marriage Act barring same-sex unions.