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People like Mary Dickson aren’t legally considered downwinders, the term used to describe those exposed to radiation during Cold War-era nuclear weapons testing in Nevada and New Mexico.  “Every time I say I’m a downwinder, I get ‘Oh, you grew up in St. George?’” said Dickson, of Salt Lake City, who was diagnosed with thyroid […]

The post ‘How much money are our lives worth?’: Utah downwinders call RECA expansion failure a betrayal appeared first on Missouri Independent.

WASHINGTON — Republican U.S. House lawmakers, led by Rep. Glenn Grothman of Wisconsin, conducted a hearing Thursday to examine the possibility that “wokeness” hurts U.S. military readiness and effectiveness. The winding, over two-hour hearing by a subpanel of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability broached topics including, but not limited to, recruitment, benefits for military families, […]

The post U.S. House Republicans probe DEI policies in the military appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Last year, a sign on Interstate 44 near Kirkwood in St. Louis County told motorists they were driving on a highway where litter cleanup was done to honor Kevin “Rockhead” Johnson. The sign was up until a motorist recognized the name as a man executed by the state in November 2022 for the killing of […]

The post Missouri ‘Adopt-a-Highway’ program in limbo over sign honoring convicted murderer appeared first on Missouri Independent.

A Missouri law passed in 2022 deletes the names of victims and witnesses in court documents, which experts say has made Missouri courts the least transparent in the nation. Among the witness names deleted are police officers. Eugene Volokh, a nationally known libertarian legal commentator, called the law “a very serious problem” under the headline “Missouri ‘Stealth […]

The post Missouri hides more court information from the public than other states appeared first on Missouri Independent.

WASHINGTON — Meetings on Thursday between U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson and conservative lawmakers led to speculation he was about to walk away from the bipartisan spending agreement he signed off on just this past weekend — a decision that would greatly increase the chances of a partial government shutdown next week. Also Thursday, Biden […]

The post New turmoil over possible shutdown in D.C. amid warnings of a WIC food program shortfall appeared first on Missouri Independent.

The first pill for postpartum depression approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is now available, but experts worry that minority and low-income women, who are disproportionately affected by the condition, won’t have easy access to the new medication. About 1 in 8 women experience symptoms of postpartum depression, federal data shows. Suicide and drug […]

The post There’s a new pill for postpartum depression, but many at-risk women face hurdles appeared first on Missouri Independent.

At a desk wedged between a hallway vent and a classroom door, Marge Mangelsdorf coaxed Harlan to write down what he remembered.  The two had just finished reading Hi! Fly Guy, a popular children’s book about a boy and his pet bug. Now it was time for Harlan, a first grader at Bayless Elementary School […]

The post At Oasis, St. Louis tutors reach across generations to foster learning appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Those living nearest to the first nuclear blast in history have suffered for generations.  In New Mexico, Trinity Test site neighbors weren’t warned or evacuated before the U.S. government detonated the atomic bomb in 1945. The light was so bright it could be seen hundreds of miles away. Nearly half a million people resided within […]

The post ‘They scrapped us’: The Trinity downwinders and New Mexico mine workers who remain unrecognized appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Missouri law won’t allow Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft to unilaterally disqualify President Joe Biden from the ballot, as he has threatened to do if Donald Trump is kept off the ballot in other states, according to  participants in a decade-old case that set limits on the authority of the office. Only a court can […]

The post Can Ashcroft boot Biden from Missouri’s ballot? A 2014 appeals court ruling says ‘no’ appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Income and geographic restrictions would be loosened for a tax-credit program that provides scholarships to help pay for private school tuition under a bill debated Wednesday by the Senate’s education committee. Sen. Andrew Koenig, a Manchester Republican and the committee’s chairman, is sponsoring the legislation seeking to expand MoScholars. Koenig is running this year to […]

The post Missouri Senate panel debates expanding tax credit scholarships for private school tuition appeared first on Missouri Independent.

WASHINGTON — Congress on Wednesday appeared to be on track to pass a third deadline extension for at least some of the government funding bills that were supposed to become law more than three months ago — putting off a potential government shutdown. The move, while not final, would give the Republican House, Democratic Senate […]

The post Another stopgap spending bill in the works as Congress struggles to avert shutdown appeared first on Missouri Independent.

WASHINGTON — U.S. House Republicans began their impeachment proceedings against Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas with a Wednesday hearing, a move Democrats called politically motivated. The House Committee on Homeland Security hearing aimed to set the stage for Mayorkas’ impeachment, with Republicans arguing that the Biden administration appointee has failed to fulfill his […]

The post U.S. House impeachment proceedings against Mayorkas over immigration feature state AGs appeared first on Missouri Independent.

A proposal to allow Missouri’s public school districts to open their boundaries is back this legislative session as the first education bill to get a hearing in the state House. The House Committee on Elementary and Secondary Education opened its first hearing of the year by considering Sedalia Republican Rep. Brad Pollitt’s open enrollment bill. […]

The post Open enrollment is the first education bill considered this year by Missouri House appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Growing up in Cut Bank, Montana, Patti Jo Ruegamer would spend most summer days going to the farm with her mother and father in Meriwether, about 25 miles west. While her parents worked, she would go to the neighbor’s place, where she and other children drank fresh milk from the cows there, and would spend […]

The post ‘What do we have to do?’: Fresh awareness of historic nuclear radiation in Montana neighborhoods appeared first on Missouri Independent.

A group of Republican lawmakers raised concerns about the death penalty and advocated for legislation that  would abolish it in Missouri during a Tuesday press conference at the state Capitol — characterizing it as an issue of restraining government overreach and protecting life.  Rep. Chad Perkins, a Republican from Bowling Green, has filed legislation to […]

The post Group of Republican lawmakers raise concerns about Missouri death penalty appeared first on Missouri Independent.

WASHINGTON —  A deal on changes to immigration policy remained elusive on Tuesday for top U.S. Senate negotiators. Those leading the talks — Sens. James Lankford, Republican of Oklahoma, Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut and Kyrsten Sinema, independent of Arizona — have worked for weeks to strike a deal between the White House and Senate […]

The post Immigration negotiations in Congress center on parole, asylum policy appeared first on Missouri Independent.

WASHINGTON — Former President Donald Trump appeared in federal court Tuesday seeking immunity from charges that he schemed to overturn the 2020 presidential election results and knowingly fed lies to supporters who turned violent on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump, who is leading polls in the 2024 Republican presidential primary field, watched while his attorney D. […]

The post Three-judge federal panel grills Trump lawyer on claim of presidential immunity appeared first on Missouri Independent.

Billy Winters’ childhood in Florissant in the 1960s sounds enviable.  His parents bought a new house as thousands of other families flocked to the growing St. Louis suburbs. Winters’ neighborhood was full of other kids to play with. He spent almost every day splashing in a creek that ran near his home. But Winters didn’t […]

The post ‘We got mad’: Years of pain after a childhood near radioactive Coldwater Creek in Missouri appeared first on Missouri Independent.

In the medical industry, the goal is increasingly straightforward: Get bigger. Or else. Consider, for example, the merger of Kansas City’s St. Luke’s Health System with St. Louis-based BJC Health System. When the deal closed Jan. 2, the cross-state neighbors had created one of the country’s largest nonprofit health care systems, with 24 hospitals, 44,000 […]

The post Merger between Kansas City and St. Louis hospital systems could mean bigger medical bills appeared first on Missouri Independent.

More than 70 years after workers first realized barrels of radioactive waste risked contaminating Coldwater Creek, the federal government has started work to put up signs warning residents. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said in a statement Monday that it was working with the Environmental Protection Agency to add signs along the creek to […]

The post Coldwater Creek to finally have warning signs after decades of nuclear contamination appeared first on Missouri Independent.