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MoInd 📰

Now that the elections are over, our most important work is just beginning

1 year 1 month ago
Votes have been cast and whether our candidates and issues won or loss, as concerned citizens, our most important work is ahead of us — in Missouri and Washington. Continued involvement and ongoing oversight should rule the day. This election cycle has been anything but politics as usual. But lest we forget, the people remain […]
Janice Ellis

What a Moberly court case in 1955 tells us about teacher diversity today

1 year 1 month ago
MOBERLY — Mayme Williams sat in the lobby of the Country Villa apartments in Moberly, reminiscing about the all-Black Lincoln School in the early 1930s, when the city’s public schools were still racially segregated. At 97, Williams still remembers her childhood years at the Lincoln School: her friends, the walk to school from her family’s […]
Olivia Gyapong

Trump rapidly unveils appointments to Cabinet, staff posts in dizzying post-election week

1 year 1 month ago
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump continued his blitz of Cabinet and senior staff selections, closing the week Friday with the announcement that North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, a former presidential rival turned Trump surrogate, is his candidate to lead the federal department responsible for vast swaths of federal lands and U.S. relations with Native American […]
Ashley Murray

U.S. House passes bill to move up annual FAFSA release deadline

1 year 1 month ago
WASHINGTON — A measure to ensure the federal student aid form opens up annually by Oct. 1 passed the U.S. House Friday with overwhelming bipartisan support. The effort — which passed 381-1 — came after the U.S. Department of Education faced major backlash over the botched rollout of the 2024-25 Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or […]
Shauneen Miranda

Missouri sees an uptick in emergency contraception requests after Election Day

1 year 1 month ago
Health care providers say they are seeing a drastic increase in the number of emergency contraceptive kit requests by Missourians since the election. The Missouri Family Health Council helps fund the state’s reproductive health care through Title X, a federal grant. It has a program that allows Missourians to order emergency contraception kits via mail […]
Tadeo Ruiz Sandoval

‘A little goofy’: Loopholes allow millions to flow around Missouri campaign donation limits 

1 year 1 month ago
After years of no-limit spending on Missouri politics, voters had enough in 2016. That year, as candidates raked in $65.5 million in donations larger than $100,000, Missourians overwhelmingly adopted a constitutional amendment capping donations to candidates, outlawing direct contributions from corporations and labor unions and banning efforts to conceal where money is coming from. The […]
Rudi Keller

Trump taps anti-vaccine activist RFK Jr. to lead federal health agency

1 year 1 month ago
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump announced Thursday he plans to nominate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to head the Department of Health and Human Services, another controversial candidate who could face a challenging confirmation process in the U.S. Senate given his non-scientific beliefs about public health, including his anti-vaccine stance. “I am thrilled to announce Robert […]
Jennifer Shutt

From swing state to red state: A peek below the surface of county results in Missouri

1 year 1 month ago
An analysis of Missouri election result maps shows a steady shift to Republicans, including smaller movement in urban Democratic strongholds. At the same time, the suburbs where Democrats nationally have seen the biggest promise for growth offer a more mixed message. In fact, the data show a steady shift toward the Republican Party in nearly […]
Josh Merchant

Republicans clinch 218 seats in U.S. House, scoring trifecta control in Washington

1 year 1 month ago
WASHINGTON — Republicans will hold on to their majority in the U.S. House and regain control of the Senate when Congress convenes in January, setting the party up to potentially make major policy changes during the next two years. The GOP hadn’t clinched the 218 House seats needed for a majority until late Wednesday, when […]
Jennifer Shutt

Ranked-choice voting faces cloudy future after election setbacks

1 year 1 month ago
Voters in several states, including Missouri, last week delivered a stinging rebuke to ranked-choice voting, clouding the future of an idea that had seen strong momentum in recent years. Ranked-choice voting, which allows voters to rank political candidates by preference, is used statewide in Alaska and Maine and in major U.S. localities such as New […]
Matt Vasilogambros

Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz tapped by Trump to be attorney general amid ethics probe

1 year 1 month ago
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump announced Wednesday that he intends to nominate U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz as the next attorney general of the United States, an unexpected pick as the Florida Republican remains the subject of a congressional ethics investigation for alleged sexual misconduct, illicit drug use and accepting improper gifts. House Speaker Mike Johnson […]
Ashley Murray

Missouri transportation commission taps 40-year agency veteran to lead MoDOT

1 year 1 month ago
Closing out a four-month search for the Missouri Department of Transportation’s new director, a 40-year veteran of the department stepped up Wednesday as the unanimous choice of the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission. Ed Hassinger, who has been serving as interim director, told reporters in a press conference that increasing staffing levels is a top […]
Annelise Hanshaw

South Dakota U.S. Sen. John Thune elected as next majority leader for Republicans

1 year 1 month ago
WASHINGTON — Republicans on Wednesday elected their leadership teams for the next Congress, opting for a new slate in the Senate while reelecting many of the same lawmakers in the House. South Dakota Sen. John Thune will become that chamber’s next majority leader, marking the first time since 2007 that Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell hasn’t […]
Jennifer Shutt

Missouri’s Andrew Bailey was a finalist to be Donald Trump’s U.S. attorney general

1 year 1 month ago
For a few hours on Wednesday, Andrew Bailey was considered among the frontrunners to be nominated as President-elect Donald Trump’s next U.S. attorney general. Just a week after winning his first full term as Missouri attorney general, Bailey reportedly spent time with Trump at Mar-a-Lago interviewing for the job, according to numerous sources close to […]
Jason Hancock

Manufacturing already has made a comeback

1 year 1 month ago
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, McLean County, Illinois, was known mostly as the home of State Farm Insurance in Bloomington and Illinois State University in Normal. Now, the area illustrates a trend that’s bringing more factories to small cities with lower costs of living: It has thousands of new jobs manufacturing Rivian electric vehicles and a […]
Tim Henderson

Trump pressures three senators vying to be U.S. Senate GOP leader

1 year 1 month ago
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump is making demands of the next Senate Republican leader ahead of a closed-door election this week, writing on social media that whoever is chosen should recess the chamber early next year so he can appoint whoever he wants without having to go through the confirmation process. “Any Republican Senator seeking […]
Jennifer Shutt