More Missouri educators are staying in their jobs following efforts to raise teachers’ base pay and provide alternative measures for certification, the State Board of Education learned last week. The Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education predicts schools will have fewer vacancies in the future, speaking positively about small gains and outlining a path […]
The press, so critical to our democratic process, is facing threats on multiple fronts — from the growing influence of social media to the frontal and legal attacks coming from elected officials and others with power. Facebook, the largest social media platform, has decided to end its fact-checking processes, apparently bowing to political pressure and […]
U.S. Supreme Court justices on Friday questioned why they should intervene to block a law forcing the sale of TikTok in nine days, saying the short-form video platform’s Chinese parent company does not enjoy First Amendment rights. Lawyers for TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, and a group of the platform’s users faced sharp questions from justices […]
Over her three-decade career, weight management physician Dr. Sarah Ro has seen hundreds of patients. Many of them are on Medicaid and have become yo-yo dieters who, despite their best efforts at changing their eating habits and lifestyles, cannot seem to shed the pounds hurting their health. “They have a tremendous amount of disease burden,” […]
The minimum wage will increase in nearly half the states this year even as the federal wage floor remains stuck at $7.25 per hour. In many states, the minimum wage is automatically adjusted upward as inflation rises. But voters in several states, including deeply red ones such as Alaska and Missouri, chose in November to […]
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump was sentenced Friday in his New York hush money case just days before his inauguration, making him the only past and future U.S. president with a criminal record. Trump has faced four criminal prosecutions but the New York state case was the sole one that went to trial. A jury convicted […]
As the Kansas City Royals scour the region for a new stadium site, and as the Chiefs weigh whether to renovate Arrowhead or move, a familiar story unfolds. The two states are at it again. Soon after Jackson County voters soundly rejected a â…ś-cent sales to fund a downtown Royals ballpark and similar subsidies to […]
Seven years ago, Missouri banned the shackling of pregnant women in state prisons. State Sen. Mary Elizabeth Coleman, a Republican from Arnold, is hoping to expand the law this year to include city and county jails. “Now we have seven years of data that this is a fairly small number of inmates and it is […]
The warden and a top supervisor at the South Central Correctional Center in Licking have been replaced amid allegations contraband was entering the prison through a poorly screened gate. Michele Buckner, a 25-year employee of the Department of Corrections, officially ended her employment with the department on Tuesday, spokeswoman Karen Pojmann wrote in an email […]
A committee dedicated to the security of the Missouri Capitol convened Thursday to raise concerns ahead of Monday’s inauguration of Gov.-elect Mike Kehoe. Lawmakers are not only worried about the inauguration ceremony and governor’s ball but also the everyday operations of the Capitol Police. President Pro Tem of the Missouri Senate Cindy O’Laughlin read a […]
WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Republicans gained more than enough Democratic support Thursday to advance a bill that would greatly expand immigration detention, following a presidential election in which border security was a main theme for President-elect Donald Trump. In an 84-9 procedural vote, 32 Senate Democrats and one independent backed the bill, S. 5, sponsored by Alabama’s […]
WASHINGTON — On a wintry Thursday morning, mourners and dignitaries gathered at Washington National Cathedral to honor the life of former President Jimmy Carter. Speakers at Carter’s state funeral, including President Joe Biden and the sons of Carter’s political contemporaries delivering eulogies written by their fathers, described the Georgia native and U.S. Navy veteran as a […]
Missouri lawmakers are proposing bigger scholarships for students with financial need, allowing more universities to grant engineering and medical degrees, and supporting aid to victims of hazing. Ahead of the 2025 legislative session’s launch on Wednesday, members of the Missouri General Assembly filed more than two dozen bills affecting higher education. To be signed into […]
A St. Louis man sentenced to 25 years in prison based solely on the testimony of one police officer is asking a federal court to vacate his conviction.
WASHINGTON — Tennessee Democratic U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen and two former police officers who protected the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, on Wednesday condemned President-elect Donald Trump’s pledge to pardon those charged in connection with the insurrection. Cohen, former U.S. Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonell and former D.C. police officer Michael Fanone said on a […]
WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Democrats raised concerns Wednesday that Republicans have scheduled a hearing for one of President-elect Donald Trump’s nominees before he completed the necessary paperwork and an FBI background check. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and Energy and Natural Resources Committee ranking member Martin Heinrich separately criticized the decision, saying it sets a […]
The Missouri legislature made history Wednesday as Republicans elected the first Asian-American speaker of the House and the first woman to be president pro tem of the state Senate. In the House, state Rep. Jon Patterson of Lee’s Summit won an overwhelming victory over a challenger from within the Republican conference, state Rep. Justin Sparks, […]
WASHINGTON – President-elect Donald Trump asked the U.S. Supreme Court late Tuesday to pause his sentencing in a New York hush money case, arguing it cannot go forward in light of the high court’s presidential immunity ruling last summer. Trump, who is days away from his second inauguration, is scheduled to be sentenced Friday in Manhattan […]
A few months ago, children in the Child Development Lab on the University of Missouri’s Columbia campus were taking orders, measuring ingredients, cooking and reading menus with a server. A cow was scheduled to visit the lab at the end of the year for a lesson about farming. Learning involves real-life scenarios under the “project […]
Republican factional fights are nothing new in the Missouri General Assembly. But what is new this year is the venue — the House of Representatives, where a sophomore lawmaker accusing his colleagues of corrupt politics seeks to upset the usually routine election of a speaker. State Rep. Justin Sparks of Wildwood admits history is against […]
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