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HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — About a year ago, veterinarian Melissa Ezell started noticing subtle changes at the midsized animal clinic in Huntsville, Alabama, where she works. She said she and other vets were feeling pressure from management to make a certain amount of money from every appointment. If a pet owner wasn’t going to spend enough, […]

The post Vets fret as private equity snaps up clinics, pet care companies appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Missourians overwhelmingly support access to contraceptives, but some fear their lawmakers could pass laws limiting that availability, a new poll shows. The survey, released Thursday by The Right Time, a family planning initiative through the Missouri Family Health Council Inc., polled 1,000 Missourians between the ages of 18 and 35, split almost evenly between Democrats, […]

The post Poll finds Missourians want better access to birth control. Bipartisan bill could grant it appeared first on Missouri Independent.

During the 2022 election cycle, I decided to combine two of my favorite hobbies – poker and politics. I wrote a series of columns depicting Missouri’s U.S. Senate race as a hand of Texas Hold ‘Em, with the final installment predicting an Eric Schmitt victory.  Recently in the Capitol, I was collared by a gubernatorial […]

The post What if the Missouri GOP gubernatorial primary were a hand of Texas Hold ‘Em? appeared first on Missouri Independent.

A recent legal settlement agreed to by the National Association of Realtors leaves Missouri realtors unsure of what the future holds. The association, which represents about 1.5 million realtors nationally, announced March 15 that it will settle several antitrust lawsuits, pending court approval. The industry group denied any wrongdoing, but it will pay out $418 […]

The post ‘Wait and see’: Missouri Realtors brace for changes after settlement over commissions appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Homeschooling families and lobbyists representing public school groups renewed their opposition to a wide-ranging education bill on Thursday, outnumbering advocates who testified during a House committee hearing. The criticism echoed previous concerns with the bill, despite a litany of new provisions added by the Senate designed to win over Democrats and public school advocates. The […]

The post Opposition remains for sprawling education bill expanding Missouri private school tax credits appeared first on Missouri Independent.

The Missouri House of Representatives is made up of 163 members, the fourth most of any state. Sen. Travis Fitzwater, a Holts Summit Republican, is looking to change the institution he once served in. Fitzwater is sponsoring a proposed constitutional amendment that would decrease the size of the House to 102 members. The measure also […]

The post Is the Missouri House of Representatives too big? One state lawmaker thinks so appeared first on Missouri Independent.

A fertilizer spill this month in southwest Iowa killed nearly all the fish in a 60-mile stretch of river with an estimated death toll of more than 750,000, according to Iowa and Missouri conservation officers. That is the biggest fish kill in Iowa in at least a decade and the fifth-largest on record, according to […]

The post Fertilizer killed more than 750,000 fish in Iowa and Missouri appeared first on Missouri Independent.

When Morgan Johnson walked into her annual well woman’s exam at the Little Rock Planned Parenthood in 2018, the Arkansas clinic had just gotten a call from the governor’s office. A new state law that had been working its way through the courts had just gone into effect — Planned Parenthood could no longer receive […]

The post Missouri looks to mirror Arkansas law that forced Planned Parenthood to turn away patients appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Missouri cannabis regulators have revoked nine of the 48 social-equity cannabis licenses issued in October, after finding the companies that obtained them didn’t meet eligibility requirements.  Eight were dispensaries linked to out-of-state groups and one was a wholesale facility. Among them is Canna Zoned, a Michigan company that secured two of the 16 dispensary cannabis […]

The post Missouri revokes nine social-equity cannabis business licenses for out-of-state companies appeared first on Missouri Independent.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg outlined Wednesday the immediate and longer-term priorities the Biden administration is pursuing in the aftermath of the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse in Baltimore that left six presumed dead. While many questions remained roughly 36 hours after a massive cargo ship struck the bridge and caused the deadly collapse, Buttigieg at […]

The post Federal rebuild of Baltimore bridge ‘will not be quick or easy or cheap,’ Buttigieg says appeared first on Missouri Independent.

This year’s presidential election will be the first since generative AI — a form of artificial intelligence that can create new content, including images, audio, and video — became widely available. That’s raising fears that millions of voters could be deceived by a barrage of political deepfakes. But, while Congress has done little to address […]

The post States across the country, including Missouri, rush to combat AI threat to elections appeared first on Missouri Independent.

This year’s elections will result in some of the biggest changes in Missouri Senate membership since term limits took effect 20 years ago, with at least nine members exiting the chamber and primary challenges that could send four incumbents home. The Senate, dominated by a Republican supermajority, is beset by GOP factional warfare that has […]

The post Open seats, primary challenges mean Missouri Senate will see most turnover in two decades appeared first on Missouri Independent.

WASHINGTON — The future of medication abortion access in the United States went in front of the U.S. Supreme Court justices on Tuesday, where several justices appeared somewhat skeptical as anti-abortion organizations argued use of the pharmaceutical should be moved back to what was in place before 2016. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, speaking on behalf […]

The post U.S. Supreme Court justices seem skeptical of limits on access to abortion medication appeared first on Missouri Independent.

For 200 miles, the Wabash River forms the border between Illinois and Indiana as it meanders south to the Ohio River. On the Illinois side, lawmakers are scrambling to pass a bill that would protect wetlands from development and pollution, in order to safeguard water quality and limit flooding. But in Indiana, state policymakers hastily […]

The post As feds stand down, states choose between wetlands protections or rollbacks appeared first on Missouri Independent.

The biggest fight Monday between Republicans and Democrats on the House Budget Committee as they finalized a spending plan for floor debate was over the time allotted to do the work, not any particular item in the $50.7 billion plan. Throughout the daylong hearing, Democrats said state Rep. Cody Smith, the committee’s chairman, wasn’t allowing […]

The post Democrats gripe over limited time for debating proposed $50 billion Missouri budget appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Denton “Denny” Loudermill, the Kansas man who was erroneously accused of being the shooter at the Kansas City Chiefs’ victory parade, has filed a defamation suit against U.S. Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Kansas, alleges Burchett shared photos of Loudermill on his personal social media account saying […]

The post Man wrongly accused in KC parade shooting sues Tennessee congressman over social media posts appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Self-managed abortions rose by more than 26,000 in the six months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade nearly two years ago, according to a peer-reviewed study published Monday in JAMA, the American Medical Association’s journal. Researchers determined that an increase of approximately 27,838 online orders of abortion pills between July and December 2022 corresponded […]

The post More than 26,000 self-managed abortions may have occurred post-Dobbs, study shows appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Fueled by public outrage over the 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer and other high-profile incidents of police violence, a seismic shift swept across the United States shortly afterward, with a wave of initiatives aimed at reining in police powers and reimagining criminal-legal systems. Yet less than half a decade later, […]

The post ‘Tough-on-crime’ policies are back in some places that had reimagined criminal justice appeared first on Missouri Independent.

WASHINGTON — The same U.S. Supreme Court that overturned the constitutional right to an abortion will hear oral arguments Tuesday over access to mifepristone, a pharmaceutical used in both medication abortion and miscarriage care. The nine justices will then decide whether to leave access to the drug intact or require the U.S. Food and Drug […]

The post U.S. Supreme Court to hear oral arguments Tuesday on abortion pill limits appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Missouri lawmakers return to the Capitol Monday with a long list of policy priorities still in flux and only eight weeks to get it all done before the legislative session ends in May. Yet despite a host of issues dominating debate during the first half of the session, the two top tasks lawmakers must complete […]

The post Budget, Medicaid funding could dominate final weeks of Missouri legislative session appeared first on Missouri Independent.