Louisiana’s Liz Murrill has joined attorneys general from 13 other states in asking the Trump administration to challenge a 2008 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that placed the death penalty off limits for persons who rape children. The case in question involves a Louisiana man who was sentenced to death for sexually assaulting his 8-year-old stepdaughter. […]
One morning earlier this year, as Deb Capistrano came on duty for her shift as a nurse in her hospital’s stroke unit, her colleagues from the night shift warned her that one of her patients for the day was a man who’d been threatening to harm them. Capistrano has been a registered nurse for 17 […]
For a local Alaska resident who didn’t qualify for Medicaid because she made a few dollars over the income threshold, Title X family planning funding would have been an option for care at Planned Parenthood in Anchorage. The federal money is used by many clinics to provide low-cost or free services such as birth control […]
A federal case challenging the safety of mifepristone, used to treat miscarriages and to induce abortions early in pregnancy, is being transferred out of Texas to a federal court in Missouri. The lawsuit demands the federal government restore its previous restrictions on mifepristone by requiring three in-person doctor visits, reducing the gestational period during which […]
WASHINGTON — Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday the administration is looking for ways to get a handful of additional U.S. Senate Democrats to vote for Republicans’ stopgap spending bill to reopen government. But, in the meantime, White House officials plan to lay off federal workers en masse, a dramatic and unsettling step that’s not […]
Joshua Arnold bounced his young daughter on his shoulders, as he and a crowd of Boeing Defense workers yelled, “Stand together, fight together, win together” at a union rally Wednesday in St. Louis. Arnold and about 3,200 Boeing machinists in the St. Louis area have now been on strike for more than eight weeks, demanding […]
WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Democrats and Republicans remained at a stalemate Wednesday as government offices closed and hundreds of thousands of federal workers faced furloughs on the first day of a government shutdown that showed no sign of ending. Proposals from each side of the aisle to fund and reopen the government failed again during […]
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court will take up in January the question of President Donald Trump’s firing of Federal Reserve Board governor Lisa Cook, according to an order filed by the court Wednesday. The unsigned order states Trump’s application to stay a lower court’s decision to keep Cook on board while the case plays […]
Home sales closings dropped in August and remain well below pre-pandemic levels as high prices and interest rates weighed on the market, according to an analysis this week by the Calculated Risk blog. Home sales are on track for the worst year in decades, matching the 4 million annual sales in 1995, according to a […]
Nearly half of U.S. Department of Agriculture employees will be furloughed during the federal government shutdown, though key programs that support nutrition, forest preservation and wildfire prevention, the most pressing plant and animal diseases and agricultural commodity assessments will continue. Many offices, including county USDA service centers, will be closed or operating with minimal staff […]
Louisiana has issued an arrest warrant for a California doctor for allegedly mailing abortion pills to a Louisiana woman — the latest legal volley in an ongoing fight between states with abortion bans and those that have enacted protections for abortion providers who use telemedicine to send abortion medication over state lines. The existence of […]
WASHINGTON — The chairwoman of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee said Tuesday the Government Accountability Office should sue the Trump administration over its efforts to freeze or unilaterally cancel spending approved by Congress. “I believe that GAO, which is empowered under the Impoundment and Budget Control Act of 1974 to sue in cases, should do […]
A large majority of Jackson County voters have cast ballots to recall County Executive Frank White Jr. Preliminary results from Sept. 30 reveal 85% of voters supported the recall. The open question is whether those results will stand up against ongoing legal challenges. As soon as the vote is certified, White’s position will be considered immediately […]
WASHINGTON — A large crowd gathered on Capitol Hill Tuesday hours before a federal government shutdown to protest rising health care costs — the crux of Democrats’ stand against approving a temporary Republican funding bill. More than a dozen Democratic lawmakers joined activists and people who shared stories of rising health insurance premium costs at […]
Third in a five-part series. It had been a decade since Jess Deis’ last women’s wellness exam when Kentucky expanded Medicaid and she finally qualified for the state insurance program. Physicians recommend a cervical cancer screening — also referred to as a Pap smear, which is a swab of the cervix — as part of […]
As a middle-school student in 1980s Philadelphia, Shelley Hunter remembers getting to and from school pretty easily thanks to the city’s public transit service, SEPTA, which had bus and train routes near her home and her school. Sometimes, she even felt comfortable enough to take a city cab. Now, Hunter is a single mother of […]
More than 400 people were charged with pregnancy-related crimes during the two years after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned federal abortion rights, research released Tuesday shows. Prosecutors across the country often charged people with some form of child neglect, endangerment or abuse based on allegations of substance use during pregnancy, according to an annual report from […]
Nothing reminds you of the constantly-changing needs of humanity quite like a tornado ripping through your community. When the May 16 storm hit St. Louis, it devastated neighborhoods and left a lasting impact on hundreds of residents who were already at higher risk of food insecurity. Combine that with upcoming changes to SNAP benefits and […]
David Tomber-Young, 9, of St. Louis, has always been musical and expressive. According to his mom, Lizzy Tomber, he can sing the theme song to his current favorite movie, “K-Pop Demon Hunters,” from memory, including the parts in Korean. And when he watches movies, he has a knack for imitating the actors’ facial expressions. But […]
This report has been updated. WASHINGTON — The federal government started shutting down early Wednesday after Congress failed to approve a funding bill before the beginning of the new fiscal year — resulting in widespread ramifications for hundreds of programs and giving the Trump administration an avenue to fire federal workers en masse. The U.S. […]
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