A campaign ad from Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders portraying a Medicaid recipient playing video games and eating junk food instead of working has prompted backlash from the right and left, but for very different reasons.

BATON ROUGE, La. — Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill and the attorneys general in Arkansas and Alabama filed a lawsuit Tuesday in the U.S. Supreme Court, suing California, Massachusetts and New York to invalidate the so-called “shield laws” that have allowed providers in those states to send abortion medication to people in states with abortion bans.

LINCOLN — Nebraska’s highest court heard arguments Wednesday in a Republican National Committee challenge seeking to overturn a state law allowing certain overseas voters to vote.

HUNTSVILLE — After nearly a year of discussion among the governing body for Alabama Public Television to drop Public Broadcast Service programming, a survey released Tuesday showed majority support from the public to continue its affiliation with PBS.

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​A federal appeals court has temporarily stopped the execution of a Tennessee woman set to be the first female put to death in the state in nearly two centuries.​Christa Pike, 50, was set to be executed Wednesday for the 1995 murder of classmate Colleen Slemmer.

SIOUX FALLS — Opponents of a Nov. 3 ballot measure to end Medicaid expansion if federal funding is cut said Monday that the measure would reduce access to care and shift more health care costs onto people with private insurance.

The Trump administration’s tax and spending plan, signed last year, made major changes to the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) and Medicaid, including new eligibility and work…

President Donald Trump is tapping $20 million in Homeland Security funding to pay for TV ads that heavily feature him ahead of the midterm elections, Democrats said Tuesday as the promos critics call propaganda come under bipartisan attack.The Trump administration recently moved the funds into a U.S. Customs and Border Protection budget line intended for “commemorative events” related to border security, according to federal records. Congressional Democrats said the dollars appear to be funding the ad campaign.

Thirty people who say they endured sexual abuse while incarcerated as minors sued the state Tuesday for negligence, accusing officials of hiring, training, and supervision failures that created a decades-long “culture of abuse” in New Jersey’s youth prisons.

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Despite the Trump administration’s hostility towards renewable energy, information released by the U.S. Energy Information Administration shows that utility solar capacity — large scale projects that provide electricity to power grids — has increased 33% since 2025.

Monthly health insurance costs are set to rise by double-digit percentages for the second consecutive year, though the sticker shock won’t be quite as sharp as last year.

WASHINGTON — The three news organizations that President Donald Trump barred from entering the White House grounds earlier this month have asked a federal judge to ensure their reporters continue to have access after a temporary restraining order expires in early October.

Federal prosecutors have charged the Austin man an ICE agent shot earlier this month with a single count of resisting and assaulting a federal officer, according to court documents.Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, a Venezuelan national, was shot by an ICE officer in Austin on Sept. 20. He was taken to Dell Seton Medical Center, where he was released and taken into ICE custody three hours later with the bullet remaining in his back. He had been held at a detention center in Pearsall.

WASHINGTON — Former special counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday defended before a U.S. Senate panel his past investigations of President Donald Trump’s possession of classified documents and alleged role in attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

Dr. Ellen Essick said there is a lot of good news about mental health in the 2025 North Carolina High School Youth Risk Behavior Survey. But there are areas that clearly need attention when it comes to the overall well-being of North Carolina’s young people.

Editor’s Note: This is the third and final installment of a three-part Idaho Capital Sun series examining a proposal to bring a new Nuclear Lifecycle Innovation Campus to Idaho. Part one focused on Gov. Brad Little’s role in negotiations and his priorities for Idaho.

Years after attacks over stock trades helped push Rep. Tom Malinowski out of office, candidates in New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District are again in a squabble over securities.

Flock cameras, a type of automatic license plate reader, have attracted controversy in recent months. Across states, there have been several incidents where law enforcement has misused the…

A favorable diesel price lock that helped the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority (RIPTA) narrow last year’s budget gap ended three months ago. But the financial woes facing the statewide bus agency from skyrocketing fuel prices is just beginning with the cost of diesel now over two and a half times what was budgeted for this year.

A group of New Hampshire disability rights advocates, families and care agency professionals want to see reform in the state’s disability care system.

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In the early months of 2022, Democrats in Congress came close to passing an appropriations bill that did not include a provision barring federal funding for abortions — maybe the closest it had ever come in more than 40 years.

Gov. Patrick Morrisey is hoping to finally get the state’s Military Hall of Fame up and running, but his administration’s draft rules for its operation face legal scrutiny.Four years after lawmakers created the special hall of fame, Morrisey wants to see it come to fruition under his administration.

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OKLAHOMA CITY — Amid the largest single-year decline in decades for Oklahoma public school enrollment, the state’s largest district announced the potential closure of 17 schools as it grapples with a long-term trend of decreases.

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — Afternoon light slipped through the curtains of a dimly lit room on Martin Luther King Boulevard in Chattanooga. Black residents, clergy members and activists gathered in early May to organize opposition to Tennessee state lawmakers’ congressional redistricting effort, aimed at eliminating the last Democratic-held seat in the state.

COLUMBIA — In a state where lawmakers have put a priority on keeping tuition steady for South Carolina graduates, students from outside the Palmetto State pay two to three times more to attend a public college here.Determining who qualifies as a South Carolinian can be complicated in one of the nation’s fastest-growing states. While state law governs who pays in-state tuition rates, each college decides whether an applicant meets them.

​A federal appeals court ruled that prediction market Kalshi’s sports-event contracts are subject to Tennessee’s sports-wagering laws, reversing a lower-court ruling.​A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit ruled that sports event contracts on prediction market websites like Kalshi and Polymarket are essentially the same as placing a legal sports bet.

OMAHA — A Douglas County district judge blocked part of an Omaha ordinance to require employers in city limits to pay youth workers the same minimum wage as adults as the legal fight plays out.

Across Michigan, school districts, food pantries, legal aid groups and nonprofits are preparing for another change in the distribution of SNAP benefits.Starting Oct. 1, states are required to pick up an increased share of the program’s administrative costs, a shift that analysts at the Michigan League for Public Policy estimate will cost the state about $95 million just for the first year.

States take the lead on regulating AI as federal action lags

Since its enactment in 2004, Maryland’s “flush tax” has raised $2.3 billion from property owners, funding pollution-saving upgrades at scores of wastewater treatment plants in the state and keeping hundreds of millions of pounds of nutrients out of the Chesapeake Bay.The fee for the Bay Restoration Fund is set to be cut in half in 2030, but a group of state legislators and Chesapeake Bay advocates want to step and head that off, possibly making it a subject of discussion in the 2027 legislative session.

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration has, once again, infuriated lawmakers from both political parties by using a controversial maneuver to cancel funding previously approved by Congress.

The 2026 election is already underway, with primary races kicking off across the states. The midterms will serve as a bellwether for Donald Trump’s final years of presidency as voters weigh in on…

The Trump administration has, once again, infuriated lawmakers from both political parties by using a controversial maneuver to cancel funding previously approved by Congress.

Mayo Clinic charged admitted patients on private insurance more than twice as much as Medicare patients in 2022, according to a RAND study from 2024 on hospital pricing.

A South Jersey lawmaker is pouring himself a cup of ambition with a bill that could bring Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library to New Jersey, just one month after the country music icon’s death.

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Earlier this month, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement operation targeted construction workers building an addition at the Geisinger Medical Center in Danville, Montour County.

Less than a week out from the annual deadline in Michigan’s Safe Homes, Safe Schools law, which requires school districts to distribute information about safe firearm storage each year, half of Michigan’s schools had not yet complied with that law, according to Sherri Masson, a member of Statewide Indivisible Michigan.Rep. Sharon MacDonell (D-Troy), a sponsor of that legislation, explained that the law requires the distribution of that information before October of each school year.

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To better identify escalating domestic abuse and intervene before it’s too late, Utah gave police a new mandate three years ago: ask 11 questions, and when the answers indicate the danger is high, bring in confidential advocates quickly. But thousands of Utahns deemed to be at high risk are not getting immediate help through the program, according to data provided by the Utah Domestic Violence Coalition and interviews with advocates.

Your 50-state snapshot to start the day informed

This fall, voters in at least nine states will decide whether to cut, cap or raise taxes through ballot measures that will give them a direct hand in steering state tax policy in a conservative or progressive direction.Some states, such as California, will weigh whether to tax — or untax — their wealthiest residents. Others, such as Florida, are considering a myriad of mostly conservative-backed measures to cut property or income taxes.

Clear waters in Moultonborough’s Lake Kanasatka this summer strengthened residents’ hopes that an expensive, last-ditch chemical treatment undertaken several years ago was paying off.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday drove a stake through the heart of Missouri’s undead congressional map, ordering it be buried for the year and for voters to cast ballots in the districts they’ve used the past two election cycles.

Planned Parenthood of Tennessee and North Mississippi petitioned a Nashville court on Wednesday to set aside a sweeping legal demand by Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti to turn over the organization’s donor details, healthcare provider information and the medical records of adult and minor patients.

Lt. Gov. Dale Caldwell has resigned, less than 24 hours after the Sherrill administration released a bombshell report accusing Caldwell of sexual harassment and multiple ethical lapses.Gov. Mikie Sherrill said Caldwell submitted his resignation Friday afternoon and she accepted it.