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U.S. House votes to bar use of public lands for housing migrants

1 year 9 months ago

WASHINGTON — The U.S. House Thursday passed a bill to bar the use of public lands for temporary housing for migrants applying for asylum. The bill,Ā H.R. 5283, passed with a majority of Republicans in support,Ā 224-203.Ā  Six Democrats voted with Republicans: Reps. Henry Cuellar of Texas, Don Davis of North Carolina, Jared Golden of Maine, Vicente […]

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Ariana Figueroa

DeSantis and Newsom clash in TV debate, charging each other with lies and bullying

1 year 9 months ago

Ron DeSantis of Florida and Gavin Newsom from California, two of the nation’s most well-known governors who sit on opposite sides of the ideological spectrum, engaged in a fiery 90-minute debate on Thursday night broadcast live on the Fox News Channel. The stakes were undoubtedly higher for DeSantis, 45, who hopes that the primetime platform […]

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Mitch Perry

Missouri AG set to finally start work on public records requests submitted this year

1 year 9 months ago

By the end of the month, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey expects to complete work on the mountain of public records requests submitted to the office last year. That will allow the five-person team working through the Sunshine Law backlog to finally turn its attention to the nearly 300 pending requests filed since Bailey took […]

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Jason Hancock

GOP senators walk out of vote on subpoenas in U.S. Supreme Court ethics inquiry

1 year 9 months ago

WASHINGTON — South Carolina’s Lindsey Graham and Republican colleagues stormed out of a Democratic-led U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee vote on Thursday to authorize subpoenas for two high-profile GOP operatives as part of an ethics probe into undisclosed financial ties to U.S. Supreme Court justices. The panel voted 11-0 to subpoena billionaire Republican donor Harlan Crow […]

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Ashley Murray

Small meat processors say USDA measures don’t address consolidated industry’s root problems

1 year 9 months ago

Over the past two decades, Greg Gunthorp carved out a niche operating a small meat processing plant in northern Indiana. He sold several kinds of meat to chic Chicago and Indianapolis restaurants and to Chicago O’Hare International Airport, he said. He also sold direct to consumers. But selling in grocery stores was not an option, […]

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John McCracken

Ahead of climate conference, U.S. House panel tussles over curbs on emissions

1 year 9 months ago

Republicans on a U.S. House panel argued Wednesday against aggressive moves to meet carbon reduction goals, saying U.S. fossil fuel companies are working to make their products cleaner. Democrats on the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on the Environment, Manufacturing and Critical Minerals countered that to achieve further reductions, federal policies should be continued […]

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Jacob Fischler

Missouri politics proves that sometimes just entering a race makes you a winner

1 year 9 months ago

Sometimes, the true outcome of a political campaign isn’t reflected in the final vote count.Ā  Ā Jason Kander’s 2016 Senate race is a prime example. Despite Donald Trump winning Missouri by nearly 19 points, Roy Blunt only squeaked out a win with a margin under 3%, thanks in part to a viral advertisement featuring Kander assembling […]

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Jeff Smith

Democrats split on placing conditions on military aid to Israel

1 year 9 months ago

WASHINGTON — Democrats in Congress are divided on whether to set guardrails on additional military aid to Israel as that country responds to the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks with airstrikes and a ground war in Gaza. It’s not yet clear what those conditions would be or how they would affect congressional support for aid […]

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Jennifer Shutt

A St. Louis cop says he’s too sick to testify. Now murder cases are crumbling

1 year 9 months ago

ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox. Prosecutors routinely find ways to get key detectives to testify in criminal trials, even when they are retired, sick or otherwise reluctant. Some fly retirees in from Florida or other retirement locales […]

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Jeremy Kohler

ā€˜Food is medicine’: Farmers market, food bank dedicated to nourishing Missourians

1 year 9 months ago

When Katie Molitor joined the Columbia Center for Urban Agriculture in 2019, she knew Boone County needed to put nutritious, affordable food on more tables. Two years later, she came up with a plan: Give year-long prescriptions to patients for fresh fruits and vegetables to supplement their diet. The idea took root, and the result […]

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Kasey Dunnavant

Gun violence as a public health crisis explored by U.S. Senate Democrats

1 year 9 months ago

WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats on Tuesday discussed how to treat gun violence as a public health crisis, in hopes of building upon last year’s federal gun safety legislation. ā€œAcross the country, gun violence is a public health epidemic,ā€ Illinois Democrat Dick Durbin, the chairman of the committee, said in his opening remarks. […]

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Ariana Figueroa

Missouri attorney general opposes proposed federal rule supporting LGBTQ foster kids

1 year 9 months ago

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey this week joined with 18 other states to oppose a proposed federal rule that aims to protect LGBTQ youth in foster care and provide them with necessary services. The attorneys general argue in a letter to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services that the proposed rule — which […]

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Clara Bates

Every state is about to dole out federal funds for broadband. Not every state is ready

1 year 9 months ago

When the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act was signed in late 2021, it included $42.5 billion for broadband internet access as part of the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment Program. The program aims to ensure that broadband access is available throughout the country. This effort differs from previous federal broadband programs because it promised to […]

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Brian Whitacre

New life for old coal: Minelands and power plants are hot renewable development spots

1 year 9 months ago

PETERSBURG, Ind. — AES Indiana’s Petersburg Generating Station, which towers over the White River here in southwest Indiana, has been burning coal to generate electricity since the late 1960s. That era, though, will come to an end soon. Two of the power plant’s four coal-burning units have already retired and the last is planning to […]

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Robert Zullo

Ameren seeks to shutter Missouri coal plant early, recoup investment from ratepayers

1 year 9 months ago

Missouri’s largest electric provider hopes to use a state law meant to help utilities add renewable energy to close a coal plant found in violation of federal clean air laws.Ā  St. Louis-based Ameren Missouri, which serves 1.2 million customers, is planning to close its Rush Island Energy Center in Jefferson County next year under a […]

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Allison Kite

Around the country, some states are mandating cursive writing in public schools

1 year 9 months ago

In 2016, California Democratic state Assemblymember Sharon Quirk-Silva sat with then-California Gov. Jerry Brown at an event where he signed baseball-type cards featuring the image of his dog, Colusa. But many of the recipients of the cards couldn’t read his cursive signature, Quirk-Silva recalled, much to the Democratic governor’s dismay. ā€œThe governor asked me what […]

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Elaine Povich

Donald Suggs’ legacy with St. Louis American: ā€˜Local history would look entirely different’

1 year 9 months ago

The St. Louis American first hit newsstands on March 17, 1928. At that time, the Black weekly newspaper was an eight-page tabloid with a circulation of about 2,000.Ā  More than 95 years later, The American reaches about 300,000 people each month through the print newspaper and website. It’s the largest weekly newspaper in Missouri and […]

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Rebecca Rivas

Missouri farmers adopt practices that improve their land, support environment

1 year 9 months ago

On a small farm near Laddonia, Brian Willott waded through fields of dried corn stalks that had already been crushed into the ground. He had just finished harvesting his corn and soybeans and was preparing his empty fields to plant cover crops, which will hold his soil together and replenish its nutrients over the winter. […]

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Ceilidh Kern

Some states act to protect residents from extreme heat — with a new focus on young people

1 year 9 months ago

After two years of record-breaking heat that brought a surge of deaths and health emergencies, several states have enacted or are considering measures designed to protect residents — with a new focus on younger people whose vulnerability is rising with the temperatures. Nationally, heat-related deaths rose from about 1,000 in 2018 to 1,722 in 2022 […]

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Tim Henderson

Missouri rape hotline reporting requirement in abortion-rights petition draws criticism

1 year 9 months ago

When Trish Mitchell got an abortion three decades ago in Missouri, she didn’t tell the doctor her pregnancy was a result of sexual assault. She couldn’t bring herself to. It would be years before she told anyone that she had been raped. ā€œSpeaking for myself, it was literally almost impossible,ā€ said Mitchell, who was 21 […]

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Anna Spoerre