This story was updated at 3:02 p.m. EDT. WASHINGTON — U.S. House Republican leaders on Tuesday were unable to use a procedural maneuver to block a Florida Republican and a Colorado Democrat from bringing a resolution to the floor that would allow expecting mothers and new parents to vote by proxy. GOP leaders tried to […]
Under an emerging Republican plan to require some Medicaid recipients to work, between 4.6 million and 5.2 million adults ages 19 to 55 could lose their health care coverage, according to a new analysis. The study, conducted by Urban Institute researchers with support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, calculated that up to 39% of […]
Legislation that would bar Missouri universities from penalizing student groups for their beliefs faced pointed criticism during a Monday evening House committee hearing from Democrats who say it would open the door for discrimination and hate speech. “Some people call it ‘religious beliefs,’ and some people call it ‘discrimination,’” said state Rep. Elizabeth Fuchs, a […]
The Missouri House on Monday advanced legislation that would reinstate state-run presidential preference primaries and extend the no-excuse absentee voting period from two to six weeks. Supporters of House Bill 126 cited a widespread positive response to the recently enacted no-excuse voting period as a motivating factor. They also noted negative feedback on the 2024 party-run […]
A revamped constitutional amendment moving forward in the Missouri House would ban nearly all abortions in Missouri. But most voters likely wouldn’t know that just by reading the drafted ballot language. The Republican-backed amendment, if passed out of the legislature and approved by voters, would outlaw abortion with limited exceptions for medical emergencies and survivors […]
Two identical bills to give state backing for a new sports and convention center in Clay County are not an attempt to poach the Kansas City Chiefs or Royals from Jackson County, legislators were told Monday during a Senate committee hearing. Instead, the bill sponsors said, the intent is to provide another location for new […]
The decades-old federal law protecting the privacy of individual health information is threatened by multiple lawsuits that seek to throw out a rule restricting disclosure of information in criminal investigations, including for those seeking legal abortion and other reproductive health care. In one of the cases, the Texas federal judge who has been at the […]
Dr. Fred Levin has been watching with growing alarm the national debate around federal cuts to Medicaid. He’s responsible for the medical care of about 100 older adults at the Community PACE center in rural Newaygo, Michigan. For his patients, Medicaid isn’t just a safety net — it’s a matter of life or death. “If […]
For 10 years, Missouri had no incentive for production companies to film in the state. Now, more TV and film sets are coming to Missouri thanks to help from a tax credit established in 2023. The “Show MO Act” gives up to a 42% tax credit on eligible film productions. Productions initially have the option for a […]
A bill to authorize video gambling machines commissioned by the Missouri Lottery got off to a fast start in the Missouri House, clearing a committee just 12 days after it was introduced in late January. The bill then stalled on the next step, and a month passed before the House Rules-Legislative Committee approved it for […]
Friends and family arrived bearing flowers. Smiling volunteers pointed the way to seats. Everyone loves a naturalization ceremony. I attended one recently at a branch of the Kansas City Public Library and watched 71 new American citizens swear allegiance to the Constitution of the United States. Even more immigrants had taken the oath earlier in […]
U.S. Supreme Court justices will hear arguments Wednesday about whether South Carolina can remove Planned Parenthood clinics from the state’s Medicaid program because they offer abortions in a case that could imperil health care options for patients with low incomes. At the center of the lawsuit is a conflict over whether a section of the Medicaid Act […]
Missouri’s Senate Bill 196 is a dangerous throwback to a bygone era of criminal justice. The bill aims to make certain crimes where no death occurred, such as statutory rape and child sex trafficking, eligible for the death penalty — a direct violation of the 8th Amendment as established in the 2008 U.S. Supreme Court case Kennedy […]
Missouri Planned Parenthood clinics remain unable to offer medication abortions after the state rejected their complication plans this week. Planned Parenthood Great Rivers, which operates clinics in the St. Louis region, Rolla and Springfield, and Planned Parenthood Great Plains, which operates clinics in Kansas City and Columbia, received a letter from the Missouri Department of […]
While the role and actions of the Elon Musk-headed Department of Government Efficiency remain somewhat murky, data privacy experts have been tracking the group’s moves and documenting potential violations of federal privacy protections. Before President Donald Trump took office in January, he characterized DOGE as an advisory body, saying it would “provide advice and guidance from […]
Health insurance companies are under increasing scrutiny for allegedly using artificial intelligence bots and algorithms to swiftly deny patients routine or lifesaving care — without a human actually reviewing their claims. The high-profile killing late last year of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson has focused even more attention on so-called prior authorization, the process by which […]
An initiative effort begun Friday by a well-known Missouri Democrat would, if passed by voters next year, force Tesla to close its St. Louis and Kansas City showrooms. Brad Ketcher, a St. Louis attorney who was chief of staff to Democratic Gov. Mel Carnahan in the 1990s, said he hopes the effort spreads to other […]
Lexis Dotson-Dufault’s second pregnancy, like her first, was marked by incessant vomiting. She suffered from the pregnancy-related condition hyperemesis gravidarum, and she wasn’t prepared to parent. So in late summer of 2022, after deciding to terminate at a California reproductive health clinic where she was already a patient, she was surprised when the doctor refused […]
More than a dozen states in the past two years have launched or expanded programs that allow families to use taxpayer dollars to send their students to private schools. Now, President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress want to supercharge those efforts. Trump in January issued an executive order directing several federal agencies to allow […]
As Missouri lawmakers debate the $47.9 billion state budget, they are also deciding how to spend an unexpectedly large chunk of cash from sales taxes collected from marijuana dispensaries. The nearly $86 million paid by recreational cannabis users is constitutionally required to be divided up evenly between funds benefiting veterans, public defenders and programs that […]
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