House passes $715 billion infrastructure package
The House on Thursday passed a $715 billion infrastructure measure to extend funding for water and transportation projects –as Congress works on two separate, trillion-dollar infrastructure packages.
US News
Supreme Court Upholds Arizona Voting Rules in Heated Voting Rights Decision
In its first statement about voting rights since 2013, the Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a pair of Arizona voting regulations and gave a boost to Republican lawmakers enacting new election rules following the 2020 election.
Biden’s 2020 margins came from atheists, agnostics; Trump’s White evangelical backing rose: Study
People who don’t believe in God gave President Biden the winning edge in the 2020 popular vote, a Pew Research Study released this week revealed.
Trump Organization, CFO Allen Weisselberg plead not guilty to tax crimes
The Trump Organization and its finance chief Allen Weisselberg pleaded not guilty Thursday to criminal charges in an alleged 15-year tax evasion scheme.
Federal judge blocks Indiana ‘abortion reversal’ law
A federal judge on Wednesday blocked an Indiana law that would require doctors to tell women undergoing drug-induced abortions about a disputed treatment for potentially stopping the abortion process.
Newsom recall election set for Sept. 14
The recall election that could boot California Gov. Gavin Newsom out of office is scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 14, the state’s lieutenant governor announced Thursday.
Supreme Court Strikes Down Controversial California Donor Disclosure Law
The Supreme Court on Thursday said California violated the First Amendment by requiring charities that raise money in the state to disclose their top donors to the attorney general.
House, in party-line vote, approves select committee to probe Jan. 6 riot
The House on Wednesday approved Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s bill to establish a select committee to investigate the Jan. 6 pro-Trump attack on the Capitol, giving Democrats significant leeway to shape the inquiry after the Senate balked at establishing a bipartisan commission.
NYC election officials retract vote-count report amid ranked-choice confusion
The Democratic primary for mayor of New York City was thrown into a state of confusion Tuesday when election officials retracted their latest report on the vote count after realizing it had been corrupted by test data never cleared from a computer system.
Sen. Rand Paul slams delta variant ‘fear mongers,’ citing .08% death rate within unvaccinated group
Kentucky GOP Sen. Rand Paul is telling Twitter followers to not let the ‘fearmongers’ win, amid growing concerns about the newest delta variant of the coronavirus.
California bars state-funded travel to 5 more states over LGBT laws; 17 now banned
California added Florida, Arkansas, Montana, North Dakota and West Virginia to its list of states banned from state-funded, state-sponsored travel due to a wave recently passed legislation that California Democrats deems “discriminatory” toward LGBT individuals.
Trump visits Texas to tour U.S. border, says wall ‘really worked,’ completion ‘makes sense’
Former President Trump traveled Wednesday to Texas to tour the southwest U.S. border where he made a case for the completion of the security wall between the U.S. and Mexico.
Bush-era Defense Secretary Rumsfeld Dies At 88
Former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who oversaw the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and helped transform the American military, has died in Taos, New Mexico. He was 88.
Virginia Dept. of Education publishes new transgender policies, instructing schools to end gender-segregated activities
Virginia’s Department of Education has published a document titled Model Policies for the Treatment of Transgender Students, in which it instructs local school boards to end sex-segregated activities that may cause transgender students to feel marginalized or excluded, Just the News reports. School boards have until the start of the 2021-2022 school year in September to adopt policies in line with the Model Policies document.
California bill would legalize psychedelic drugs
Lawmakers in California have introduced a bill that would allow people aged over 21 to possess for personal use and “social sharing” a number of psychedelic drugs, including psilocybin, the hallucinogenic component of “magic mushrooms,” the Washington Times reports.
House passes bill to remove Confederate statues from the Capitol
The House passed a bill Tuesday that would remove Confederate statues from the U.S. Capitol as well as a bust of the former Supreme Court chief justice who wrote the 1857 Dred Scott decision that denied enslaved people the right to be citizens.
House Democrats take aim at Trump legacy in Homeland Security spending bill
House Democrats introduced a Homeland Security Department spending bill Tuesday that aims to wipe away large chunks of President Trump’s legacy, including restrictions on deploying agency personnel to police protests and clawing back more than $2 billion in border wall money that lawmakers had already approved.
Alabama Trump rally canceled over ‘partisan political’ concerns
An event planned for this weekend featuring former President Donald Trump has been canceled for fear it’d be a partisan rally.
Oakland votes to defund police, replace with unarmed “trained crisis workers”
On Thursday, the Oakland City Council passed a budget that redirects more than $17 million away from the police department to pay for social service programs over the next two years.
Proportion of children living with both birth parents increases to 70%
Having declined substantially between 1960-2012, the proportion of US children being raised by both birth parents has continued a gradual upward trend and reached 70% last year, the Institute for Family Studies (IFS) reports.