Roman Mars

State attorneys general provide legal counsel to their state's government, oversee state prosecutions, and represent the public interest in a variety of cases.

They also have the responsibility of protecting their state's citizens from federal overreach.

What constitutes an overreach can vary widely depending on the state's political leaning and who's in control of the federal government.

During the Obama and Biden administrations, red states sued the federal government over issues like Medicaid expansion and environmental regulations.

Now, blue states like California have sued the Trump administration dozens of times for things like withholding federal funding and deploying the National Guard without consent of the state.

Attorney General Bonta talks about some of these lawsuits and why he believes the Constitution is on his side.

But first, Elizabeth takes us through what we need to know about Article 4 and the 10th Amendment.

OK.

Full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records and judicial proceedings of every other state.

And Congress may, by general laws, prescribe the manner in which such acts, records and proceedings shall be proved and the effect thereof.

Yeah, well, I think it's sort of metabolized into our way of being.

Like, I don't think that I'd have different rights in different states necessarily all that much.

I just think of the United States as one big thing, which is kind of how this works in practice.

I do remember that.

So how could Congress do that?

So what is the effect of Obergefell and why should we care about this anymore now that that's sort of settled?

So you said alarm bells went off, but like, did anything actually come of that?

Okay.

So what does RFMA do?

So is the reason why Congress can pass this law, is it still related to the Congress may, by general laws, the effect clause, all that sort of stuff?