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Lawmakers seek permanent restrictions on transgender Missourians’ IDs

5 months 4 weeks ago
Two bills pre-filed before the 2025 legislative session seek to put restrictions on how Missourians can change their gender marker on their state-issued IDs. From 2016 until this August, transgender Missourians could change their gender designation on their licenses with a form and physician signature. The Missouri Department of Revenue pulled the form after a […]
Annelise Hanshaw

Mercy for convicted ex-Kansas City cop will condone reckless policing in Missouri

5 months 4 weeks ago
Eric DeValkenaere is going to have his prison sentence commuted. The only suspense remaining is whether the ex-Kansas City cop convicted of murder in the death of a Black man will be back with his family for Christmas.  Gov. Mike Parson is on record saying that he “doesn’t like” the fact that DeValkenaere is serving […]
Barbara Shelly

USDA launches national testing of milk from dairy farms to track bird flu outbreak

6 months ago
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Friday it will require dairy farms to share samples of unpasteurized milk when requested, in an effort to gather more information about the spread of highly pathogenic avian influenza. Public health officials have tracked the spread of bird flu or H5N1 in domestic poultry flocks for years […]
Jennifer Shutt

US adds 227,000 jobs in what analysts say is a healthy economy

6 months ago
The economy added 227,000 jobs in November, making for a strong jobs report despite a slight increase in the unemployment rate. Although the labor market has cooled this year, the Trump administration stands to inherit a fairly healthy labor market, with decent job growth across many sectors. The number of jobs was bolstered by the return of […]
Casey Quinlan

Federal appeals court upholds rapidly approaching TikTok ban

6 months ago
The law Congress passed this year to force the Chinese parent company of social media giant TikTok to either sell the service or face a U.S. ban is constitutional, a panel of federal appeals judges ruled Friday. The order from a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals preserves the bipartisan law President Joe Biden […]
Jacob Fischler

Missouri student asserts district discipline violates free speech rights

6 months ago
A case filed in Cape Girardeau County could have implications for students’ rights to due process and free speech. The case involves a 12-year-old girl identified only by her initials, A.N., who is serving a 180-day suspension from Jackson Junior High School. According to her petition in Cape Girardeau County Circuit Court, the punishment stems […]
Annelise Hanshaw

Missouri Planned Parenthood clinics hold off resuming abortions, await court ruling

6 months ago
It’s been more than twelve hours since Amendment 3 went into effect in Missouri. No abortions have begun again at the state’s Planned Parenthood clinics. That’s because officials with Planned Parenthood, which operates health centers across the state, said they are still waiting on a judge’s decision on whether to grant an injunction that would […]
Anna Spoerre

Panel on Trump assassination attempts wraps up with Secret Service pledge of improvements

6 months ago
WASHINGTON —  Acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe Jr. touted multiple changes and improvements on Thursday to his agency in the wake of two assassination attempts against Donald Trump earlier this year. Rowe testified before the bipartisan congressional task force investigating the two separate attempts on the now president-elect’s life. The hearing wrapped up the […]
Shauneen Miranda

Republican AGs sue BlackRock, other investment firms over ‘woke’ climate action efforts

6 months ago
Major institutional investors have artificially lowered coal production and raised energy costs for consumers in an effort to lower global carbon emissions, a federal lawsuit claims. Republican attorneys general in 11 states filed a joint lawsuit last month against BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street, claiming the organizations’ efforts to pressure coal companies to lower carbon […]
Allison Kite

Unifying St. Louis through public education

6 months ago
“What stands in the way becomes the way” is among the timeless perspectives of Marcus Aurelius. The mounting challenges now facing local school districts could reveal the elusive path toward unifying the city and county of St. Louis. Though the city and county have been separate since 1876, the ongoing municipal divide contributes to regional […]
Peter Gariepy

Growth of sports betting may be linked to financial woes, new studies find

6 months ago
While states have cheered the new tax revenue from sports gambling, some new studies have linked the burgeoning industry to lower consumer credit scores, higher credit card debt and less household savings. With access on their cellphones, gamblers can bet more often and easily than in traditional casinos, heightening concerns about problem gambling and the […]
Kevin Hardy

Christmas tree from Alaska, gingerbread Capitol sweeten the season in D.C.

6 months ago
WASHINGTON — The holiday season kicked off on Capitol Hill this week with the official Christmas tree lighting ceremony and the unveiling of a gingerbread replica of the U.S. Capitol — complete with sugar flowers representing all 50 states. U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana and the Alaska congressional delegation illuminated the 80-foot 2024 […]
Ashley Murray

‘Critical race theory’ takes heat from GOP lawmakers on House education panel

6 months ago
WASHINGTON — Republican lawmakers railed against what they called “woke” curriculum in schools during a Wednesday hearing in a U.S. House education panel, the latest example of culture wars rocking public education policy. The hearing brought “critical race theory” to the forefront. The academic framework focuses on the social construction of race and has drawn strong […]
Shauneen Miranda

Where should Missouri Democrats go from here?

6 months ago
The 2024 election was yet another devastating one for Missouri Democrats.  In fact, the party hasn’t had a truly successful cycle since 2012, when former U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill won re-election and Democrats captured nearly every statewide office. Lucas Kunce lost by 14 points last month to U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley, and he still came […]
Jeff Smith

Judge could allow Planned Parenthood to begin performing abortions in Missouri Friday

6 months ago
Missouri’s trigger law banning nearly all abortions remains in place. But at 12:01 a.m. Friday, Amendment 3 will go into effect.  The constitutional amendment, which received 51.6% of the nearly 3 million votes cast, prohibits the legislature from regulating abortion prior to the point of fetal viability — generally seen as the point at which […]
Anna Spoerre

Donald Trump picks Missouri’s Billy Long to lead the IRS

6 months ago
Former Missouri Congressman Billy Long was tapped on Wednesday evening by President-elect Donald Trump to lead the Internal Revenue Service. Trump called Long — who served six terms representing a Southwest Missouri district — a “consummate people person,” adding “taxpayers and the wonderful employees of the IRS will love having Billy at the helm.” The […]
Jason Hancock

Conservative justices lean toward allowing Tennessee’s ban on gender affirming care

6 months ago
A conservative U.S. Supreme Court appeared ready to side with Tennessee Wednesday in upholding the state’s ban on gender affirming care for children, a case likely to set legal precedent on equal protection for transgender minors. A decision from the court isn’t expected until June 2025, but Republican-appointed justices such as Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas […]
Sam Stockard

Will Trump and Republicans quash the FBI headquarters move to Maryland?

6 months ago
WASHINGTON — The decade-long endeavor to move the Federal Bureau of Investigation out of its crumbling headquarters in downtown Washington, D.C., and into a new facility outside the city could face roadblocks next year. President-elect Donald Trump and some of his top allies in Congress have rebuked the federal agency that undertook the search for […]
Jennifer Shutt