Moderate Republicans Lobby House Speaker to Fix Energy Credits
Moderate House Republicans are lobbying House Speaker Mike Johnson to lessen cuts to several clean energy tax credits in the broad tax and spending bill prior to the GOP's plans to bring it to the floor next week.
Virginia's Jen Kiggans led a statement backed by 13 other GOP lawmakers asking House leadership to make the phase-outs of several clean energy tax credits more generous. She said Thursday the group was still negotiating with leadership over proposed changes.
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Yahoo
29 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Primary election 2025: Berks officials certify election results
Berks County election officials have finalized the tally of results from the primary election. During a special meeting Friday, the elections board voted unanimously to certify the vote totals and authorize the submission of the results to the secretary of the commonwealth. There is now a clear picture of which Democratic and Republican candidates will be on the November ballot for municipal, school, county and judicial races. In addition to those candidates who appeared on the primary ballot, nearly 100 candidates were added to the fall election through successful write-in campaigns. Independent and third-party candidates still have a chance to petition to be on the ballot before the lineup is finalized. Elections Director Anne Norton told the elections board that her term performed the required reviews and audits of the May 20 primary, finding no variations or discrepancies with the official tally. The official results of the election will be posted on the county elections website. Overall, just over 21% of registered Democrats and Republicans voted. Voter turnout was slightly lower than recent, similar elections. In the 2023 municipal primary, for example, turnout was about 24%. The elections board thanked the election services team as well as those who worked the polls and handled mail ballots for the hard work and long hours they put into making sure every vote was counted. 'A huge thank you to everyone involved,' Commissioner Michael Rivera said. Commissioner Dante Santoni Jr. also commended those who ran to represent their fellow residents in local positions. 'When you run for office it takes time away from other things,' he said. 'You stick your neck out for your community at all levels of government and I give kudos to everyone who participated in the democratic process.'
Hamilton Spectator
32 minutes ago
- Hamilton Spectator
A Virginia Democrat hunts for votes in rural pockets where MAGA has strengthened its grip
CULPEPER, Va. (AP) — Democratic politics in rural Virginia are not of a bygone era, according to Abigail Spanberger. The former congressional representative, now the Democratic nominee in the race to be Virginia's next governor , posts videos online of herself sitting in a car on an interstate highway that goes up and down the Appalachian Mountains. She has toured a small, family-owned oyster shucking and packaging operation along a quiet boat haven on the northern neck of Virginia. And last month, the nominee held a news conference at a small pharmacy in an agrarian hamlet outside of Richmond. In 2020, Spanberger narrowly ran ahead of former President Joe Biden in her congressional district, and she posted her best results by comparison in rural counties that heavily favored President Donald Trump, including Nottoway, Powhatan, Amelia and Louisa, according to an Associated Press analysis. It's a challenge that might be growing more formidable with each passing election cycle. Trump made gains in those counties in 2024, data show, and Republicans think they have solidified a shift in their direction in rural areas. In Virginia, rural residents made up about 2 in 10 voters last November, according to AP VoteCast. About 6 in 10 small-town or rural voters voted for the Republican candidate in the last two presidential elections and the last two midterm congressional elections. Spanberger became the nominee when no other Democrats ran for governor. Her opponent in the general election, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears , was the only Republican who gathered enough signatures to qualify for the top of the GOP ticket, leaving both parties with no contested race at the top of their June 17 primary ballots. A spokesperson for Earle-Sears said in an email that Spanberger's efforts to portray herself as an advocate for small-town Virginians would fall short. 'Rural voters see right through the rhetoric,' said press secretary Peyton Vogel. 'Democrats consistently push policies that hurt energy jobs, raise costs, and grow Washington DC's overreach. That's not a winning message in communities that value freedom, faith, and hard work.' Still, Spanberger seems determined to campaign beyond known Democratic strongholds, vying to winnow down conservative votes in ruby-red parts of Virginia. From the rolling hills of the Piedmont, where Trump won last year by some 20 points, to the Roanoke valley out west, Spanberger is seeking voters in the districts where Democrats once were competitive but Republicans now rule. 'We have to show how we govern,' Spanberger said in explaining her messaging. 'And the governing isn't just standing up to Donald Trump. It is clear and consequential, right?' Last month, Spanberger sat in a booth by the window of Frost Cafe in downtown Culpeper, Virginia, in the Piedmont region between Washington and Charlottesville. As she drank her coffee in the small town that was once part of her congressional district, constituents tapped on the window, pressing their noses to the glass and making hearts with their hands. A young boy hid behind a newspaper stand, peeking up at Spanberger as if she were a celebrity. When his family began to walk away, he knocked on the window and waved. Spanberger's presence in Trump territory comes as Democrats have nationally shown renewed interest in small-town America, launching listening tours in Kentucky, courting Minnesota farmers and looking for other ways to connect. In some ways, rural Virginia feels like Spanberger's home turf. Once a member of the U.S. House Committee on Agriculture, she has built a legacy tethered to touring farms and strolling through small towns where everybody knows everybody. She focused on low-profile , bucolic-minded bills such as expanding broadband , which was incorporated into the bipartisan infrastructure law passed by Congress in 2021. She helped pass another law making it easier for farmers and forestry professionals to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Some analysts say Trump's pillaging of federal contracts and volatile tariffs have given Spanberger and the Democrats an opening. 'If you look at the trade, if you look at Trump's tariffs, those have a huge impact on the price of agricultural products,' said Stephen Farnsworth, a political science professor at the University of Mary Washington. 'The potential reduction in Medicaid, that's another area where there's going to be a disproportionate impact on rural areas.' Cue Spanberger's eight-point plan to make healthcare coverage more affordable in Southwest Virginia, which was published just as Congress weighs a budget bill that the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates could reduce the number of people with health care by 8.6 million over a decade . Neal Osborne, a Bristol councilman representing the nearly 18,000-person city along the border with Tennessee, said Medicaid expansion and healthcare are top of mind for many people there. He pointed out that 150 people showed up when Spanberger visited Bristol back in January. 'We are a Republican stronghold,' said Osborne, who already has endorsed the Democrat. 'But if you do 2% better with southwest Virginia, that could be your margin of victory in a statewide. ... I am willing to go on a limb to say she will be back in southwest between now and before the election.' It's a strategy Spanberger has tapped before. After winning a tea party district in 2018, which had been represented by Republicans for decades, the moderate Democrat made a point of working on behalf of conservative strongholds in her district. Her ability to connect with farmers, fishermen and agricultural interests helped her keep her seat for three terms. Michael Carter Jr., of Carter Farms, said he was one of those rural constituents. A Black farmer in Orange County, he said that while Spanberger was in office, there was a continual back-and-forth between her staff and his family, which has owned their farm since 1910. He and his father would see her staff at community events. Spanberger's office asked for his feedback on legislation, he said. It was a meaningful relationship he had with a politician, and that meant something to him. 'It's not always the case that small farmers or even African Americans really feel like we get our voices heard,' Carter said. ___ Olivia Diaz is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. ___ The Associated Press' women in the workforce and state government coverage receives financial support from Pivotal Ventures. 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Yahoo
35 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Perspective: From Trump v. Musk to Carlson v. Levin, are Republicans losing sight of the mission?
What started as something like a barroom brawl devolved quickly into a cage fight, which was distressing for those of us who don't drink and don't enjoy mixed martial arts. The symbolism, however, was rich. Just two months ago, Elon Musk and Donald Trump were ringside in Miami watching the Ultimate Fighting Championship; this week, they were the ones pummeling each other while all of social media watched, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. But Trump and Musk are not the only ones sparring. Political brawling has broken out across the country in ways that feel unusual, as if we are just a couple of social-media fisticuffs away from bringing back the great American duel, the kind that killed Alexander Hamilton. Dueling, however, has been called 'the violence of gentlemen,' so maybe we are safe because gentlemen are scarce in the current political landscape. It's not just Trump and Musk. Tucker Carlson and Mark Levin are feuding, so are Ben Shapiro and Matt Walsh, and we're not that far past Shapiro's epic battle with Candace Owens and Marjorie Taylor Greene's heated drama with Lauren Boebert. There are other battles not suitable for mention in a family publication. It's tempting to say that the recent infighting is all within the GOP, and all about divisions between MAGA versus Never Trump, but it's not. Witness the Democrats' piling on Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary under Joe Biden, who is about to scorch Democrats in her forthcoming book. For Republicans, who under Trump have grown accustomed to governing with the gloves off, the infighting may be accelerating because they've temporarily lost their chief rival, the Democratic Party. The fortunes of the Democratic Party have fallen so low that they're spending millions on initiatives designed to win back young men while one of their star contenders for 2028, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, is picking the brains of conservatives on his podcast. Absent a robust foe, Republicans are like a desolate Rocky Balboa with no one to fight, and so have turned on their own tribe. But what is happening is also a predictable result of when politics turns transactional instead of relational. Once the transactions are over, or once the transactions curdle and sour, there's nothing foundational to sustain the human relationship. We've seen this before with Trump, in his transactional relationship with Mike Pence. Many of us had hoped that there was something deeper there with Musk, with whom Trump seemed to have an almost fatherly relationship. It was not coincidence that much of the social media discourse about their 'breakup' was couched in terms of family — either divorce or estrangement. And while it was, on one level, train-wreck, cringe entertainment, like watching 'Housewives' or 'Tiger King,' it was also painful since so many of us know what it's like to have a close relationship implode. Utah Sen. Mike Lee spoke for many when he posted a photo of both men, with the caption 'But ... I really like both of them.' On his radio show Friday, Glenn Beck urged Trump and Musk to reconcile and to keep sight of their shared mission. It is that mission that is too often a casualty when two formerly aligned parties or individuals fall out, whether in politics or in a marriage. A mission can be hard to define; it can be too vague or have too many components. 'Essentialism' guru Greg McKeown says that a 'priority' is one thing, not many, and we risk failure when we set 'priorities.' Maybe that's part of what happened here. Trump and Musk had priorities, and some were in conflict with each other. It's much too early to say that the breakup is permanent; the men have mutual alliances and shared friends who presumably will work hard to bring about a reconciliation. But if the fissure lasts, the relationship that unfolded over the past year — with iconic moments like Musk jumping on the stage at a campaign event and Musk's son trotting after Trump on the White House lawn — was not really a relationship, but a transaction between two powerful men. And Democrats stand ready to reap the rewards.
