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☆ The case to block Biden's student-loan forgiveness keeps getting weaker, legal experts say
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-25 | by ( Ayelet Sheffey | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Some legal experts say the lawsuit's standing is questionable due to MOHELA's involvement. The latter case has had some legal experts particularly confounded due to the central role MOHELA has taken in the case. "There's no threat that Missouri may suffer harm to the Lewis and Clark fund when the Lewis and Clark fund hasn't been paid into for over a decade," Nahmias said. Even two law professors who believe Biden's plan to cancel student debt broadly is illegal aren't convinced by the states' lawsuit. "On one hand, when the state created MOHELA over 40 years ago, it made clear that MOHELA is separate," Nahmias said.

☆ The Supreme Court's investigation raises questions about the justices' determination to find the abortion draft leaker
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-20 | by ( Oma Seddiq | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

The Supreme Court could not determine who leaked a draft abortion ruling last May. Yet the 20-page report has raised concerns about the rigor of the court's investigation. "During the course of the investigation, I spoke with each of the Justices, several on multiple occasions," Supreme Court Marshal Gail Curley, who conducted the investigation, said in a statement. An executive-branch investigation may have led to the justices speaking under oath, a line the Supreme Court marshal did not cross, according to her statement. The Supreme Court's marshal did not note any new leads in her report.

☆ Nikki Haley hints at 2024 presidential run, while taking a dig at elderly politicians like Trump: 'We need to go in a new direction'
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-20 | by ( Joshua Zitser | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Nikki Haley heavily hinted at a 2024 presidential bid in an interview with Fox News. Haley said politics need to go in a "new direction," adding that she could be the leader to do that. Nikki Haley dropped strong hints of a 2024 presidential bid on Thursday, calling for a "new direction" and more youthful leadership, despite a past pledge not to run against former President Donald Trump. In April 2021, Haley said she would not make a bid for the White House in 2024 if Trump was running. Though Trump is the only Republican to so far announce a 2024 presidential run, his influence on the GOP seems to be faltering amid political and legal troubles.

☆ Missouri's abortion ban declares 'Almighty God is the author of life.' Faith leaders beg to differ in new suit.
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-20 | by ( Stephanie Russell-Kraft | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Missouri's abortion ban completely outlaws abortion with limited exceptions. The clergy, who come from denominations of Christianity, Unitarian Universalism, and Judaism, said the abortion ban violates their religious freedom and subjects them to "the religious dictates of others." "It came from religious leaders and communities, who have been explaining for decades that they see reproductive freedom as essential to religious freedom." But Missouri lawmakers openly discussed their religious beliefs on abortion while writing the abortion ban in 2019 according to the lawsuit, saying things like "Life begins at conception. There have also been more than a dozen cases challenging abortion restrictions on religious freedom grounds since the Supreme Court's decision, according to Platt.

☆ How Scripps News, the streaming and broadcast network formerly known as Newsy, is pivoting to anti-partisan, 'fact-based' reporting
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-19 | by ( Claire Atkinson | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Streaming and broadcast news network Newsy has been rebranded as Scripps News. The network formerly known as Newsy has a presence on TV stations owned by Scripps and its ION Media stations and is accessible via free over-the-air digital antenna and several streaming platforms — including Roku, Amazon Fire and Apple TV. The company, which pulled Newsy from cable packages in 2021, boasts that Scripps News offers the only free 24/7 national news broadcast. Scripps News is also absorbing scores of executives from a national desk that fed the company's 61 local stations. Its local stations pulled in $208 million in ad revenue thanks to the midterm elections.

[1/2] Former U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a rally in Commerce, Georgia, U.S. March 26, 2022. Trump's company faces only a maximum $1.6 million penalty, but has said it plans to appeal. Bragg and James are Democrats, as is Bragg's predecessor Cyrus Vance, who brought the criminal case. "The whole narrative that Donald Trump was blissfully ignorant is just not real," Assistant District Attorney Joshua Steinglass told jurors in his closing argument. State law limits the penalties that Justice Merchan can impose on Trump's company.

☆ Rep. Jason Smith Picked to Lead House Ways and Means Committee
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-10 | by ( Richard Rubin | Siobhan Hughes | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Rep. Jason Smith of Missouri had been the top Republican on the House Budget Committee. WASHINGTON—House Republican leaders chose Rep. Jason Smith (R., Mo.) to run the House Ways and Means Committee, giving him a prime perch to shape the party’s approach to tax, trade and health policy. As chairman, Mr. Smith will lead a committee with broad power over economic policy and healthcare that is poised to receive an influx of new Republican members. He will help guide the party’s oversight work as the Internal Revenue Service starts spending the $80 billion it received last year.

☆ It's still not clear what the Senate Ethics Committee is doing with a 2-year-old January 6 probe into Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-06 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

Democrats lodged an ethics complaint against Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz nearly two years ago. No one's heard anything since from the Senate Ethics Committee, which one advocate calls a "black hole." Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island led the complaint against Cruz and Hawley. Democratic Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware and Republican Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma, the chairman and vice-chairman of the Senate Ethics Committee. Little has emerged in the last two years to suggest that Cruz and Hawley were intimately involved in the assault on the Capitol.

☆ AOC says chaos in the GOP House shows that the Squad is pretty reasonable in comparison
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-06 | by ( Tom Porter | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez addressed the ongoing chaos in the Republican Party. She said it showed the group of progressives she's a member of is reasonable in comparison. The GOP has failed to elect a House speaker during three days of voting, paralyzing Congress. "The more days that this goes on the more this truly starts to have a corrosive impact on our country," Ocasio-Cortez said. The group have regularly clashed with Democratic Party leadership on issues including the Green New Deal and expanded Medicare provisions.

The group of hard-line Republicans standing firm in opposing Rep. Kevin McCarthy’s bid for speaker has coalesced around an alternative: Rep. Byron Donalds, a conservative two-term lawmaker from Florida who is considered a rising star in the GOP but is still relatively unknown nationally. Donalds said the incident inspired him to change his life and eventually emerge from businessman to politician. In 2021, Donalds was denied membership in the Congressional Black Caucus and insisted it was because of his conservative views. Donalds’ wife, Erika Donalds, with whom he has three children, is also a conservative Republican and involved in state politics. Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., center right, speaks with a colleague in the House chamber at the U.S. Capitol, on Wednesday.

☆ Amber McLaughlin, the first openly transgender person to be executed in the U.S., dies by lethal injection
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-04 | by ( Doha Madani | The Associated Press | Doha Madani Is A Senior Breaking News Reporter For Nbc News. Pronouns | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +3 min

Amber McLaughlin, the first openly transgender woman to be executed in the U.S., died by lethal injection Tuesday night in Missouri. McLaughlin later led police to a location near the Mississippi River in St. Louis where Guenther's body had been dumped. She suffered from depression, according to the clemency petition. Advocates also expressed concern that McLaughlin would be put to death even though the jury was not unanimous. McLaughlin began her transition in prison about three years ago, according to a fellow inmate and friend, Jessica Hicklin.

☆ There are currently zero members of the US House of Representatives
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-04 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

The US House currently has no duly-sworn members, and won't until a Speaker is chosen. It's the first time in a century that the House has been vacant for more than a day. Hours later, the chamber re-convened for the 118th Congress, ready to elect a new Speaker of the House and organize itself. The House is scheduled to reconvene at noon at Wednesday, with the first order of business being the election of a Speaker. asked former Republican Rep. Billy Long of Missouri, noting the role that members play in assisting their constituents with federal agencies.

☆ What millions of student-loan borrowers need to know as 2023 shapes up to be a year of uncertainty for Biden's relief
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-02 | by ( Ayelet Sheffey | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Student-loan borrowers are facing a year of uncertainty in 2023. Broad student-debt relief is up in the air as the Supreme Court will make a decision on its legality. The other lawsuit was filed by two student-loan borrowers who sued because they did not qualify for the full $20,000 amount of debt relief. Student-loan payment resumptionWhen federal borrowers resume payments is entirely dependent on how the legal challenges play out. Reforms to targeted loan forgiveness programsThe summer of 2023 should bring borrowers some changes to specific student-loan forgiveness programs.

☆ No more Newsy: The streaming and broadcast network rebrands as Scripps News under Warren Buffett-backed E.W. Scripps
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-31 | by ( Claire Atkinson | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Streaming and broadcast news network Newsy is being scrapped and rebranded as Scripps News. Parent company E.W. Bellini is a San Francisco-based reporter for Newsy, the 14-year-old streaming news platform owned by E.W. Scripps News is also absorbing scores of executives from a national desk that fed the company's 61 local stations. Its local stations pulled in $208 million in ad revenue thanks to the midterm elections.

☆ Sen. Mike Braun's Indiana gubernatorial bid jump-starts the GOP's first open Senate seat race of 2024
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-26 | by ( Warren Rojas | Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Republican Sen. Mike Braun is running for governor of Indiana in 2024. He filed the paperwork to create the new Mike Braun for Indiana, Inc., campaign committee in late November and has since rolled out a promotional website. "I'm very confident Indiana will stay in Republican hands," Daines told Insider between votes at the US Capitol. And fortunately for the Hoosier State, we have a lot of talented people who might run for that seat," Young told Insider at the US Capitol. The Banks and Spartz campaigns did not immediately respond to requests for comment about prospective Senate runs in 2024.

☆ Live updates: Powerful winter storm to bring heavy snow and ‘dangerous’ cold, forecasters warn
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-22 | by ( Https | Media-Cldnry.S-Nbcnews.Com Image Upload Newscms Phil-Helsel-Circle-Byline-Template.Jpg | Nbc News | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +2 min

Temperatures in Denver are expected to sink below zero by Thursday morning, the National Weather Service has warned. Snow appears to blow across the runway at Denver International airport on Wednesday. More than 59 million people, including most of Missouri, Iowa and Minnesota east to parts of Ohio, were under winter storm warnings Wednesday night, according to the National Weather Service. Another 7 million were under blizzard warnings, and wind chill warnings covered 57 million people, as far west as Washington state and including Texas and Tennessee, according to the agency. Airlines have pledged to waive change fees or to take other steps to help passengers in anticipation of travel disruptions.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed Congress in a moving Wednesday speech. Zelenskyy's speech came after the Ukrainian president joined Biden for a joint press conference on Wednesday afternoon, during which the latter reaffirmed ongoing support to Ukraine from the US. The Ukrainian president told reporters that he was grateful for US assistance and emphasized that the two countries are fighting for "common victory against this tyranny." President Joe Biden speaks during a news conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 21, 2022. Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky assailed Senate GOP leaders for agreeing to the latest tranche of Ukraine aid already baked into the year-end spending deal.

☆ Biden invited the gay nephew of the GOP congresswoman who decried marriage equality to the White House to watch him sign it into law
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-21 | by ( Sophia Ankel | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Andrew Hartzler said Monday he was invited to the White House to watch Biden sign the bill into law. On Monday, Andrew Hartzler, the nephew of GOP Rep. Vicky Hartzler of Missouri, posted a TikTok video of him attending the signing ceremony at the White House on December 13. "So I made a TikTok and it kind of bopped and then I got invited to the White House to watch President Biden sign the bill into law," he added. The TikTok video shows Hartzler walking around the White House during the ceremony, saying "Aunt Vicky, who?" Responding to his aunt's speech in a TikTok video, Hartzler said she was crying "because gay people like me can get married."

☆ The Supreme Court just set a date to hear Biden's student-loan forgiveness case, which will decide the fate of millions of borrowers
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-19 | by ( Ayelet Sheffey | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

The Supreme Court will hear arguments on Biden's student-loan forgiveness on February 28. On Monday, the nation's highest court announced it will be taking on both lawsuits that challenged Biden's debt relief on February 28. The question of authority has loomed over Biden's debt relief plan even before he officially announced it. For now, millions of borrowers remain in limbo as they wait for a Supreme Court ruling. But should Biden's broad debt relief plan ultimately get struck down, it's unclear at this point what would come next for borrowers.

☆ A college instructor explains her struggles with long COVID at work and why it's important to overcome the stigma of being sick
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-18 | by ( Jason Lalljee | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Renee Semarge has had long COVID symptoms for a year now, and it's making work much harder. Much of long COVID is a mystery to healthcare professionals — why it happens, how to treat it — but data shows that it has affected millions of Americans. Many other workers, however, may be hesitant to reveal that they have long COVID. Long COVID treatments "have eaten our savings"Semarge's candor about her condition at work is a departure from what her father always taught her. Long COVID treatments, she said, "have eaten our savings.

☆ First openly transgender woman set to be executed in the U.S. asks for mercy
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-15 | by ( The Associated Press | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +3 min

— The first openly transgender woman set to be executed in the U.S. is asking Missouri’s governor for mercy, citing mental health issues. There is no known case of an openly transgender inmate being executed in the U.S. before, according to the anti-execution Death Penalty Information Center. McLaughlin’s lawyers also listed the jury’s indecision and McLaughlin’s remorse as reasons Parson should spare her life. Missouri has only executed one woman before, state Corrections Department spokeswoman Karen Pojmann said in an email. McLaughlin’s lawyers said she previously was rooming with another transgender woman but now is living in isolation leading up to her scheduled execution date.

☆ The Senate has again voted to ban TikTok from all government devices over national security concerns
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-15 | by ( Matthew Loh | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

The Senate on Wednesday voted to ban TikTok from all government devices for a second time. The "No TikTok on Government Devices Act," sponsored by GOP Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, would "prohibit certain individuals from downloading or using TikTok on any device issued by the United States or a government corporation." The Senate also passed the same ban in 2020, but the measure did not move forward in the House. In a statement to Insider on Wednesday, TikTok called Hawley's bill "a proposal which does nothing to advance U.S. national security interests." "We hope that rather than continuing down that road, he will urge the Administration to move forward on an agreement that would actually address his concerns," TikTok said.

☆ Read the full text of Sam Bankman-Fried's planned testimony, which a congressional panelist called 'absolutely insulting'
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-15 | by ( Matthew Loh | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was arrested before he could testify about his exchange's collapse. He did prepare a testimony, which a member of the House Financial Services Committee called "absolutely insulting." It wasn't read out in full at the hearing, but congressional leaders had a copy of the draft on hand. Bankman-Fried's spokesperson, Mark Botnick, told Insider he had no comment on the planned testimony. Copies of the planned testimony were first obtained by Forbes and Bloomberg.

☆ Conservative senators hail member-led strategy session as 'good first step' in dealing with mounting frustrations about Mitch McConnell's leadership
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-14 | by ( Warren Rojas | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

A group of Senate Republicans hosted their first member-led policy discussion on Wednesday. Attendees said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was in the room but didn't participate. "Nothing was fleshed out," Braun told reporters at the US Capitol, adding that "I think it's the beginning, maybe, of a more participatory process." Still, convening more meetings, which Cornyn said this group seemed inclined to do, is preferable to the scorched-earth tactics others have embraced in the past. "I think they're good meetings to have," Rubio told Insider.

☆ I called out my aunt, Rep. Vicky Hartzler, after she made a homophobic speech in tears. Since surviving conversion therapy, I want people to know they don't have to accept the hateful rhetoric of thos
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-11 | by ( Hannah Getahun | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

Andrew Hartzler spent years in conversion therapy and attended a religious institution. He called out his aunt, Rep. Vicky Hartzler, after she spoke out against the Respect for Marriage Act. During my second year of college, however, my perspective changed when I came across a HuffPost article that revealed my aunt hosted a conversion therapy group at the US Capitol in 2019. Attending a religious university and experiencing conversion therapy led me to a life of advocating for LGBTQ peopleThe first time I went to conversion therapy, I was 14 going on 15. Conversion therapy makes you feel like you're using 50% of your mind to hide a fundamental part of who you are, and you're told to hate that part of yourself.

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