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Alabama lawmakers spent much of their first week of the 2022 legislative session in closed-door preparations on a plan to spend about $772 million in federal COVID relief money.

The court's conservative majority concluded the administration overstepped its authority by seeking to impose the Occupational Safety and Health Administration's vaccine-or-test rule on U.S. businesses with at least 100 employees. More than 80 million people would have been affected and OSHA had estimated that the rule would save 6,500 lives and prevent 250,000 hospitalizations over six months.

There was a closed-door huddle by an embattled President Joe Biden with his own party's senators, apparently for naught. An eyebrow-raising speech on the Senate floor by a recalcitrant Democrat. And a defiant news conference by the top House Republican.

While the supply is expected to improve dramatically in the coming months, doctors are clamoring for the pills now, not just because omicron is causing an explosion of cases but because two antibody drugs that were once the go-to treatments don't work as well against the variant.

Thursday's report came a day after the government reported that consumer inflation jumped 7% in December from a year earlier, the highest such inflation rate since 1982.

Auburn and Alabama athletes last year began taking advantage of endorsement deals. For example, Crimson Tide receiver Trashon Holden signed a deal with YOKE Gaming and Tigers basketball guard Allen Flanigan signed a deal with Guthrie's restaurants. The state's most marketable college athlete might be Auburn gymnast Sunisa Lee, whose Olympic gold medal win propelled her to a stint on Dancing with the Stars and several social media sponsorships.

Costs to the state would increase by an average of $225.4 million per year above current Medicaid expenditures over the next six years, but the state would also see estimated average annual savings of $397.8 million over those same six years, the analysis from the Public Affairs Research Council of Alabama and the Center for Economic Development and Business Research at Jacksonville State University. 

Republicans in Congress and even some liberal economists say Biden deserves at least some of the blame for high inflation, arguing that the financial rescue package he pushed through Congress last March added significant stimulus to an already strengthening economy.

Business owner Tim James appealed to evangelical Christian voters as he opened his Republican campaign for Alabama governor Wednesday, railing against the threat of "godless Marxism," quoting scripture and claiming God has called the conservative state to lead the nation.

The decision to revoke her passport was made under former President Barack Obama. The case gained widespread attention because former President Donald Trump tweeted about it, saying he had directed the secretary of state not to allow her back into the country.

Ivey is expected to meet with legislative leaders on Wednesday to discuss funding priorities as well as whether to call a special session to isolate the issue.

Durant entered the Senate race in mid-October, joining a GOP field led by Congressman Mo Brooks and former Business Council of Alabama chief Katie Britt.

The move comes roughly a month and a half after the board ordered a new union election for Amazon workers based on objections by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union to the first vote that took place in April.