Alabama Republicans

President Joe Biden and Donald Trump square off for their first debate tonight. The Alabama Republican Party will be watching how the ground rules for the event impact Trump. The microphones will be muted after each candidate has spoken and there will be no audience at the debate. John Wahl is chairman of the Alabama Republican Party. APR News Director Pat Duggins spoke with Wahl on a range of issues surrounding the debate and the election.

Alabama lawmakers have advanced a revamp of the state ethics law. Lawmakers said the legislation would provide clearer rules for public officials and employees about what they can and can't do.

CNN says it will host two debates, in Iowa and New Hampshire, next month as the dust settles from the event on the campus of the University of Alabama. If Tuscaloosa’s event is any indication. Nikki Haley will be the focus of attention and attacks. APR news worked with NPR to provide national coverage of the first ever Presidential debate in Alabama.

Republican presidential candidates will debate Wednesday within walking distance of where George Wallace staged his "stand in the schoolhouse door" to oppose the enrollment of Black students at the University of Alabama during the Civil Rights Movement.

Alabama GOP house member Gary Palmer is no longer running for Speaker of the U.S. House. He was one of nine names floated to replace former leader Kevin McCarthy. One, House member Dan Meuser of Pennsylvania, dropped out. Palmer is the second.

Gary Palmer (pictured left) is one of eight candidates to replace Kevin McCarthy. A closed door Republican meeting failed to reach consensus on who should hold the gavel. Palmer’s record is coming under scrutiny following his decision to run for Speaker. The UCLA Promise Institute lists him as an election skeptic regarding the 2020 Presidential race. Axios ranks Palmer with the highest number of bills making it out of the House.

A three-judge panel are preparing to approve new congressional districts for Alabama after ruling that state lawmakers flouted their finding the state should have a second district where Black voters are the majority of the electorate or close to it.

The Alabama attorney general's office said that it opposes all three congressional maps proposed by a special master as federal judges begin drawing new districts. The plaintiffs, who won before the U.S. Supreme Court in the redistricting case, wrote that two of the proposed plans are acceptable.

The Supreme Court allowed the drawing of a new Alabama congressional map with greater representation for Black voters to proceed, rejecting the state's plea to retain Republican-drawn lines that were struck down by a lower court.

A court-appointed special master submitted three proposals for new congressional districts in Alabama as federal judges oversee the drawing of new lines to provide greater representation for Black voters. The results reflected the views of political observers APR listeners heard from yesterday.