MoInd 📰

A lawsuit filed Wednesday seeks to knock a proposed constitutional amendment off Missouri’s 2026 ballot that would give lawmakers new power to expand sales taxes to eliminate the income tax, arguing legislators bundled too many subjects into one proposal and wrote misleading ballot language. The lawsuit, filed in Cole County Circuit Court by attorney Chuck […]

Healthcare providers could face the death penalty if they don’t provide life-saving care to a baby born after an attempted abortion under legislation headed to Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe. The legislation — approved by the House Wednesday on a 102-46 vote — has been a top priority of Republicans this year and was the only significant anti-abortion […]

Boone County Clerk Brianna Lennon on Wednesday said she won’t revise voter lists to reflect the gerrymandered congressional districts approved last year until Secretary of State Denny Hoskins decides whether there will be a referendum on the map. The Missouri Supreme Court decision Tuesday denying a request to put the map on hold until a […]

A bill requiring pornography websites to conduct age checks before granting access is headed to Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe. Commercial websites and platforms must already verify that users are at least 18 if more than a third of their content is sexually explicit as part of a rule enforced by Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway […]

WASHINGTON — U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson on Wednesday pressed for increased funding for the Secret Service, arguing most of the money Senate Republicans included for the agency in their immigration enforcement bill is for security needs, not building a new ballroom at the White House.  But the Louisiana Republican added during a morning press […]

WASHINGTON — Long-time federal immigration official David Venturella will lead U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency spearheading President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign, according to a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson. Venturella will replace outgoing ICE acting Director Todd Lyons, who last month announced he would leave his position by May 31, the DHS […]

A Missouri House committee voted down legislation on Tuesday aimed at establishing safeguards on the use of artificial intelligence over concerns that the bill lacked enforcement mechanisms and included drafting errors.  The bill, sponsored by Republican state Sen. Joe Nicola of Grain Valley, would have specified that liability for harm caused by an AI system […]

A growing number of incarcerated people across the country now have access to free phone calls and other communication services, a shift some advocates say is strengthening family connections, improving prison conditions and easing reentry after release. A new report from Worth Rises, a nonprofit that advocates in opposition to the prison industry,  found that […]

An increasing number of conservative states are mandating that state and local social service providers verify and report the immigration status of the people they serve — in some cases threatening stiff penalties for public employees who fail to comply. Under federal law, immigrants who are in the United States illegally are generally barred from […]

Missouri Education Commissioner Karla Eslinger will step down at the end of the month — two years after taking her position at the top of the state’s education department. She announced her retirement Tuesday afternoon in a closed session of the State Board of Education and in a note to department staff, saying she “decided […]

WASHINGTON — Several Republican U.S. senators left a closed-door lunch with Secret Service Director Sean Curran on Tuesday saying they still have questions about how the agency would spend an additional $1 billion.  “I’ve asked for a lot more data,” said Senate Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins, R-Maine. “If there are needs for new training […]

WASHINGTON — The cost of the Iran war has increased to $29 billion to date, Pentagon officials told lawmakers in both chambers Tuesday. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine and Department of Defense acting comptroller Jules Hurst faced questions from House and Senate appropriators over several hours […]

Control of the U.S. House may run through a courtroom in Missouri. In a red brick courthouse across the street from the state Capitol, the seven black-robed judges of the Missouri Supreme Court on Tuesday morning weighed the fate of a Republican gerrymander aimed at ousting U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a 11-term Democrat from Kansas […]

A congressional map drawn last year in a special session is constitutional and will be used in the August primary because it is uncertain whether a referendum petition seeking to repeal it will succeed, the Missouri Supreme Court ruled Tuesday. The court was unanimous in the two decisions delivered just a few hours after oral […]

As appeals courts split on the constitutionality of mandatory detention for millions of immigrants, the U.S. Supreme Court is likely to decide the matter. A Trump administration policy threatening imprisonment without bond has been struck down by three appeals courts, which could soon be joined by a fourth, but upheld by two others. The conflicting […]

On paper it makes little sense. Ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, roughly 7,000 miles from the United States, is restricted and gasoline prices in this country soar?  The strait is the major export route for oil produced by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar, Iraq, Bahrain and Iran, according to the International Energy […]

The Missouri Supreme Court will hear arguments in two cases Tuesday that will decide whether the state’s gerrymandered congressional map approved in 2025 meets constitutional standards and if a referendum petition puts the map on ice until after an election. If the court decides the first question by ruling the map is unconstitutional, the answer […]

In Missouri and states across the country, testing and accountability stand at a crossroads. While states still administer annual assessments and hold schools accountable for their students’ performance, there are growing calls to reduce testing and deemphasize accountability. Last summer, Missouri received approval from the federal government to pilot a new way to test students […]

Sam Lee has spent years helping draft and promote a Missouri version of the “Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act.” But on Monday, the longtime anti-abortion advocate and lobbyist with Campaign Life Missouri sat before the House Children and Families Committee and declined to support the bill in its current form. The problem, Lee said, was […]

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday extended a highly anticipated stay blocking an appellate court’s pause on telehealth abortion access until May 14. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s approved medication-abortion regimen remains available via telehealth until then, following a week of uncertainty among abortion patients and providers. “With this critical temporary administrative stay extended, […]