Two vacant seats in the Virginia Supreme Court hang in the balance in the political standoff in the Virginia Assembly.

State lawmakers said in interviews this week that their negotiations over the justices continue but indicated they are no closer to resolution.

“We do not have an agreement on how to proceed with the Senate,” Del. Rob Bell, R-Albemarle, chair of the House Courts of Justice committee, told the Mercury. Bell declined to comment further on the specifics of the negotiations.

At issue are two of the seven seats in the state Supreme Court. The two seats opened in the last year after Chief Justice Donald Lemons and Justice William Mims announced their retirements.

Selecting justices is a constitutional duty of the General Assembly, which elects the justices by a majority vote. Once elected, a justice can serve for a 12-year term. In recent history Republican legislatures have elected justices as a matter of course. But this year, the appointments are one of many political deadlocks in the current divided legislature.

“We’ve been talking about this since January but there are a couple things that get hung up in it,” Sen. Creigh Deeds, D-Bath, co-chair of Senate judiciary committee, told the Mercury.

Deeds said the “obvious solution” would be to give House Republicans one choice and Senate Democrats another choice. But even if they could agree on those appointments, there are other cascading effects, like if a justice is elevated from the appeals court and has to be replaced.

“The solutions are within grasp, we are still talking, still being civil with one another, but the discussions continue,” Deeds said. “And right now I don’t know if there is anything we can do to force the situation ahead.”

Republicans have less incentive to negotiate because if lawmakers adjourn without an agreement, Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin has authority to put his own judges on the bench without the legislature’s involvement.

Those justices could serve until the end of the year but would have to be confirmed by the legislature when it reconvenes in January.

Camila Cabello spent Mother’s Day (May 8) hosting a benefit concert to support the emergency “Protect Our Kids” fund. The singer has teamed with Lambda Legal and Equality Florida to help protect LGBTQ+ students and their families from Florida’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay or Trans” bill, which bars public school teachers in Cabello’s home state from discussing sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through 3rd grade.

“I am sooo honored to have spent Mother’s Day supporting @lambdalegal and @equalityfl in launching the Protect Our Kids Fund which supports litigation against the hateful Don’t Say Gay or Trans law in FL,” Cabello wrote alongside a series of pictures from the event. “What’s happening in my home state is unacceptable and is harming LGBTQ+ youth and families. Some of the most special people in my life are in this community and it breaks my heart to see their identities try to be erased. We have to demand equal rights and respect for all.”

WASHINGTON — Two senators are hoping to pass bipartisan legislation this week that would extend security protections to immediate family members of Supreme Court justices amid heightened tensions over a forthcoming abortion ruling.

Sens. Chris Coons, D-Del., and John Cornyn, R-Texas, aim to pass the Supreme Court Police Parity Act through an expedited process as soon as Monday or Tuesday, an aide to Coons confirmed to NBC News.

The bill, which was introduced last week, would provide security in line with protections for family members of certain executive and legislative branch officials.

Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation establishing the day during a news conference at the Freedom Tower in Miami on Monday.

DeSantis said the legislation requires the state’s public schools to observe the day and educate students on “the evils of communism.”

During the news conference, DeSantis also approved $25 million to support repairs and renovations to the Freedom Tower and the renaming of three roads for Cubans who fought against Fidel Castro in Cuba.

Stacey Abrams’s campaign for Georgia governor is in line for a seven-figure fundraising boost, but it has to wait a bit for the check to clear.

George Soros, the billionaire entrepreneur and philanthropist, is donating $1 million to Abrams’ campaign, but she won’t be able to spend any of the money until she’s officially crowned as the Democratic nominee for the seat, reports the Atlanta Journal Constitution. The hold-up is because of a new law that Georgia’s GOP-controlled General Assembly passed last year that was designed to put current Governor Brian Kemp at an early fundraising advantage, but because of lawsuits from Abrams and Kemp’s Republican primary challengers, hasn’t quite worked out that way.

The new law allows candidates for certain offices in Georgia to set up so-called leadership committees, which are a special kind of political organization allowed to skirt the usual campaign fundraising limits and collect unlimited amounts from donors. As originally written, Kemp could immediately begin using his leadership because he’s the gubernatorial incumbent. Abrams and others, including Kemp’s top GOP challenger, David Perdue, would have to wait until they officially won their party’s primaries. The primary contests are scheduled for May 24.

Tesla, the electric vehicle company owned by billionaire and soon-to-be Twitter owner Elon Musk, is paying for employees to get out-of-state abortions.

According to the company's 2021 Impact Report, Tesla began providing an "expanded Safety Net program and health insurance offering" last year, which includes "travel and lodging support for those who may need to seek healthcare services that are unavailable in their home state."

That came after the company relocated to Texas, where abortion was outlawed after the six-week mark in August 2021.

That policy places Tesla among a growing list of companies that are helping employees access abortion care in the wake of new restrictions passed at the state level, as well as fresh concerns that Roe v. Wade could be overturned next month following the unprecedented leak of a draft opinion doing just that.

And it puts Musk — who's otherwise become a hero among conservatives following his purchase of Twitter last month — at odds with some of his cheerleaders.

A bill advanced Wednesday by Louisiana legislators would classify abortion as a homicide, potentially allowing authorities to charge women and girls with murder and criminalize in vitro fertilization, critics said.

The bill, dubbed the Abolition of Abortion in Louisiana Act, passed 7-2 out of a state House subcommittee two days after Politico published a leaked Supreme Court draft opinion suggesting that the court is poised to overturn Roe v. Wade.

The bill will now move to a full House vote. The legislation would still need support from the Senate and the governor before it could become law.