The Chicago Tribune on how When it comes to stopping Trump, CNN was the sideshow and a courtroom the main event:

Many on the left were apoplectic over CNN’s decision to hold a so-called town hall event Wednesday night, not just with the former President Donald Trump, but with a room full of Trump’s supporters all hooting and hollering for their man.

“This is CNN’s lowest moment as an organization,” tweeted writer James Fallows. Even Trump’s niece, Mary L. Trump, weighed in: “CNN is anti-American,” she wrote, absurdly.

With so few defending CNN, we’ll step into the breach. Trump is the leading Republican candidate for president. He has many supporters, and while some viewers clearly were shocked to see them show up in all their glory on their screens, they are not going away anytime soon. CNN has the right, and arguably also the obligation, to interrogate all of that.

And while we sympathize with the argument about delivering oxygen to a liar, that has not worked in the past with this aberration of American politics. We got yet more of Trump’s unhinged blather, insults, offensive observations and lies.

The real scandal this week has not been CNN but the reaction of Republicans to what happened in a New York courtroom this week. In a civil case that concluded Tuesday, a jury of six men and three women awarded writer E. Jean Carroll $5 million in damages after finding Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation. His lawyers have said he will appeal.

Trump called the verdict a “disgrace.” In fact, Trump and his defenders are the disgrace.

To listen to some Republican lawmakers, the verdict merely was the continuance of the political attacks on Trump. “It’s just one more story focusing on my former running mate that I know is a great fascination to members of the national media, but I just don’t think it’s where the American people are focused,” said former Vice President Mike Pence.

Say what, Mr. Pence? As you know, or should know, a jury verdict is not a “story.” And it is not the act of a politically motivated prosecutor, either. Nor a partisan publication. Nor Twitter. Nor a town hall on CNN or any other network.

A jury verdict is a verdict. And, in this case, a verdict that should be cause for Republicans to banish this man from their midst, and their political affections. We’re still waiting for the party to come to its senses.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch on how the trend toward loosening child-labor laws is a dangerous ploy to tamp down wages:

Anyone familiar with America’s labor history knows there are good reasons for the strict child-labor laws in place across the U.S. Yet in Missouri and around the nation now, business groups, aided by Republican politicians, are working to loosen those laws and allow younger children to work more hours, or in previously prohibited settings, with less oversight. They can talk all they want about creating opportunity for young people, but the clear intent is to secure cheaper labor in a tight market. The potential for abuse isn’t something that has to be imagined; it’s right there in the not-so-distant past.

Child labor was common in the U.S. until the early 20th century. That began to change with The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. In addition to creating a national minimum wage and standard workweek, it prohibited “oppressive child labor” for kids under 16 in factories and mines. Various state laws took it further, requiring work permits and additional restrictions on kids in the labor force.

Now, in one of the more chilling political trends, the same industrial and political forces that have been undermining labor rights for the sake of profit are also working to roll back child-labor laws. In Missouri, legislation advanced this session to extend legal working hours for teens from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. on school nights, along with a separate measure to eliminate the teen work permits that ensure schools are kept in the loop when kids have jobs.

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds last week said she will sign into law a bill allowing children as young as 14 to work in roofing, construction and demolition, and loosening restrictions on work hours. In all, almost a dozen states have passed or proposed the unwinding of state child-labor laws.

This retrograde movement is rising in the shadow of new revelations regarding injuries and deaths to underaged migrant workers who are illegally hired by unscrupulous employers seeking to pay rock-bottom wages. As Reid Maki of the Child Labor Coalition told States Newsroom: “While we’re finding out that child labor is more pervasive and more dangerous than we thought, states have decided: Oh, now’s a good time to weaken the child labor laws. … That’s really just mind-boggling.”

A look at who is behind these measures says it all: business groups, industry and anti-labor-rights politicians who have long sought to keep wages low. One conservative policy group pushing these measures, the Foundation for Government Accountability, is blunt about it, calling teens “a critical source of labor for businesses struggling to find help.” They didn’t say cheap help, but they might as well have.

The timing here isn’t mysterious. Tight labor markets naturally drive up wages. Industry and its political allies seek to sidestep that economic reality on the backs of children. Their constituents shouldn’t let them.