logo
Missouri governor expands call for special session

Missouri governor expands call for special session

Yahoo05-06-2025
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Republican Missouri Governor Mike Kehoe has expanded on what can be discussed in the 2025 special legislative session at the state capitol.
In a news release late Wednesday afternoon, the governor announced that property tax relief could now be discussed. He's also entertaining additional funding for both disaster relief and budget appropriations.
KC leaders looking to fill vacant businesses ahead of KC2026 World Cup
Wednesday, May 28, Republican State Senator Joe Nicola of Eastern Jackson County told FOX4 he wanted property tax relief for Missourians before he would support a stadium package for the Kansas City Chiefs and the Royals.
Early Wednesday evening, he seemed to be filibustering, saying the stadium package 'needed to die' unless Missourians first get property tax relief. On Friday, May 30, Republican State Senator and Freedom Caucus Chair Rick Brattin of Cass County told FOX4 something similar to Nicola's remarks.
Monday, June 2, Kehoe told FOX4 Capitol Bureau Reporter Mark Zinn that he did not know if property tax relief would be discussed this session. Two days later, that apparently changed.
Download WDAF+ for Roku, Fire TV, Apple TV
One of the agenda items now for the session is to consider withholding money from counties where the State Tax Commission's (STC) required a modification of assessments. .
If lawmakers approve the proposal, that could impact a county like Jackson, .
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

California is set to act fast after Texas advances congressional maps to boost Republicans
California is set to act fast after Texas advances congressional maps to boost Republicans

Boston Globe

time6 minutes ago

  • Boston Globe

California is set to act fast after Texas advances congressional maps to boost Republicans

Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up The added complexity is because California has a voter-approved independent commission that Newsom himself backed before Trump's latest redistricting maneuver. Only the state's voters can override the map that commission approved in 2021. But Newsom said extraordinary steps are required to counter Texas and other Republican-led states that Trump is pushing to revise maps. Advertisement 'This is a new Democratic Party, this is a new day, this is new energy out there all across this country,' Newsom said Wednesday on a call with reporters. 'And we're going to fight fire with fire.' Texas Democratic lawmakers, vastly outnumbered in that state's legislature, delayed approval of the new map by 15 days by fleeing Texas earlier this month in protest. They were assigned round-the-clock police monitoring upon their return to ensure they attended Wednesday's session. Advertisement That session ended with an 88-52 party-line vote approving the map after more than eight hours of debate. Democrats have also vowed to challenge the new Texas map in court and complained that Republicans made the political power move before passing legislation responding to deadly floods that swept the state last month. A battle for the US House control waged via redistricting In a sign of Democrats' stiffening redistricting resolve, former President Barack Obama on Tuesday night backed Newsom's bid to redraw the California map, saying it was a necessary step to stave off the GOP's Texas move. 'I think that approach is a smart, measured approach,' Obama said during a fundraiser for the Democratic Party's main redistricting arm. The incumbent president's party usually loses congressional seats in the midterm election. On a national level, the partisan makeup of existing districts puts Democrats within three seats of a majority. Trump is going beyond Texas in his push to remake the map. He's pushed Republican leaders in conservative states like Indiana and Missouri to also try to create new Republican seats. Ohio Republicans were already revising their map before Texas moved. Democrats, meanwhile, are mulling reopening Maryland's and New York's maps as well. However, more Democratic-run states have commission systems like California's or other redistricting limits than Republican ones do, leaving the GOP with a freer hand to swiftly redraw maps. New York, for example, can't draw new maps until 2028, and even then, only with voter approval. The struggle for — and against — Texas redistricting Texas Republicans openly said they were acting in their party's interest. State Rep. Todd Hunter, who wrote the legislation formally creating the new map, noted that the U.S. Supreme Court has allowed politicians to redraw districts for nakedly partisan purposes. Advertisement There was little that outnumbered Democrats could do other than fume and threaten a lawsuit to block the map. Because the Supreme Court has blessed purely partisan gerrymandering, the only way opponents can stop the new Texas map would be by arguing it violates the Voting Rights Act requirement to keep minority communities together so they can select representatives of their choice. House Republicans' frustration at the Democrats' flight and ability to delay the vote was palpable during the Wednesday vote. House Speaker Dustin Burrows announced as debate started that doors to the chamber were locked and any member leaving was required to have a permission slip. The doors were only unlocked after final passage more than eight hours later. Republicans issued civil arrest warrants to bring the Democrats back after they left the state Aug. 3, and Abbott asked the state Supreme Court to oust several Democrats from office. The lawmakers also face a fine of $500 for every day they were absent. Associated Press journalists John Hanna in Topeka, Kansas, and Sara Cline in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, contributed to this report.

Trump's immigration crackdown brings checkpoints and new fears to Washington
Trump's immigration crackdown brings checkpoints and new fears to Washington

Los Angeles Times

time6 minutes ago

  • Los Angeles Times

Trump's immigration crackdown brings checkpoints and new fears to Washington

WASHINGTON — Federal authorities have used checkpoints around the nation's capital to screen vehicles, sometimes asking people for their immigration status after stopping them, as President Trump's crackdown reaches the two-week mark in Washington. The use of checkpoints, which can be legally controversial, is the latest indication that the White House's mass deportation agenda is central to its assertion of federal power in Washington. Federal agents and hundreds of National Guard troops have surged into Washington this month, putting some residents on edge and creating tense confrontations in the streets. The city's immigrant population, in particular, is rattled. A daycare was partially closed on Thursday when staff became afraid to go to work because they heard about federal agents nearby. An administrator asked parents to keep their children at home if possible. Other day cares have stopped taking kids on daily walks because of fears about encountering law enforcement. D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser acknowledged Thursday that the proliferation of traffic checkpoints are an inevitable aspect of the federal law enforcement operations. 'The surge of federal officers is allowing for different types of deployments, more frequent types of deployments, like checkpoints,' Bowser said. Since Aug. 7, when Trump began surging federal agents into the city, there have been 630 arrests, including 251 people who are in the country illegally, according to the White House. Trump has been ratcheting up the pressure since then, seizing control of the D.C. police department on Aug. 11 and deploying more National Guard troops, mostly from Republican-led states. Soldiers have been largely stationed in downtown areas, such as monuments on the National Mall and transit stations. However, federal agents are operating more widely through the city — and some may soon get a visit from the president himself. Trump is expected to join a patrol in D.C. on Thursday night. He told his plans to Todd Starnes, a conservative commentator. On Thursday morning, as Martin Romero rode through Washington's Rock Creek Park on his way to a construction job in Virginia, he saw police on the road up ahead. He figured it was a normal traffic stop, but it wasn't. Romero, 41, said that U.S. Park Police were telling pickup trucks with company logos to pull over, reminding them that commercial vehicles weren't allowed on park roads. They checked for licenses and insurance information, and then U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents came over. Romero said there were two agents on one side of his truck and three on the other. He started to get nervous as the agents asked where they were from and whether they were in the country illegally. 'We just came here to work,' Romero said afterwards. 'We aren't doing anything bad.' Two people in his truck were detained and the agents didn't give a reason, he said. He also saw three other people taken from other vehicles. 'I feel really worried because they took two of our guys,' he said. 'They wouldn't say where they're taking them or if they'll be able to come back.' Romero said he called his boss, who told him to just head home. They wouldn't be working today. Enrique Martinez, a supervisor at the construction company, came to the scene afterwards. He pondered whether to call families of the detained men. 'This has never happened to our company before,' Martinez said. 'I'm not really sure what to do.' The Supreme Court has upheld the use of law enforcement and government checkpoints for specific purposes, such as for policing the border and for identifying suspected drunk drivers. But there are restrictions on that authority, especially when it comes to general crime control. Jeffrey Bellin, a former prosecutor in Washington and professor at Vanderbilt Law School who specializes in criminal law and procedures, said the Constitution doesn't allow 'the government to be constantly checking us and stopping to see if we're up to any criminal activity.' He said checkpoints for a legally justifiable purpose — like checking for drivers' licenses and registrations — cannot be used as 'subterfuge' or a pretext for stops that would otherwise not be allowed. And though the court has affirmed the use of checkpoints at the border, and even some distance away from it, to ask drivers about immigration status, Bellin said it was unlikely the authority would extend to Washington. Anthony Michael Kreis, a professor at Georgia State College of Law, said the seemingly 'arbitrary' and intrusive nature of the checkpoints in the capital could leave residents feeling aggrieved. 'Some of the things could be entirely constitutional and fine, but at the same time, the way that things are unfolding, people are suspicious — and I think for good reason,' he said. There are few places in the country that have been unaffected by Trump's deportation drive, but his push into D.C. is shaping into something more sustained, similar to what has unfolded in the Los Angeles area since early June. In Los Angeles, immigration officers — working with the Border Patrol and other federal agencies — have been a near-daily presence at Home Depots, car washes and other highly visible locations. In a demonstration of how enforcement has affected routines, the bishop of San Bernardino, California, formally excused parishioners of their weekly obligation to attend Mass after immigration agents detained people on two parish properties. Immigration officials have been an unusually public presence, sending horse patrols to the city's famed MacArthur Park and appearing outside California Gov. Gavin Newsom's news conference last week on congressional redistricting. Authorities said an agent fired at a moving vehicle last week after the driver refused to roll down his window during an immigration stop. The National Guard and Marines were previously in the city for weeks on an assignment to maintain order amid protests. A federal judge blocked the administration from conducting indiscriminate immigration stops in Southern California but authorities have vowed to keep the pressure on. Megerian and Martin write for the Associated Press. AP writers Eric Tucker and Ashraf Khalil in Washington and Elliot Spagat in San Diego contributed to this report.

Senate judicial confirmation delays spark President Trump's ire
Senate judicial confirmation delays spark President Trump's ire

The Hill

time6 minutes ago

  • The Hill

Senate judicial confirmation delays spark President Trump's ire

The recent flare-up between President Trump and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) conjures the image of two elderly neighbors quarrelling over a back fence about property line disagreements. That metaphor is not far from the reality of the latest clash. Presidents and Congress have been tangling over turf from the beginning of the republic. Who is encroaching on whose constitutional prerogatives. In the present instance, the president has attacked Grassley for allowing so-called 'blue slips' — 'an ancient and probably unconstitutional custom' — to get in the way of confirming nominees for federal district court judgeships and U.S. attorney posts. Grassley says he was especially 'offended' and 'disappointed' by the president's personal insults on his Truth Social platform. He called Grassley a RINO ('Republican in name only') for protecting Democratic senators and went on to call for term limits (Grassley was first elected to the Senate in 1981 and is 91 years old), saying it's time to 'dethrone the kings.' Fellow senators of both parties rallied to Grassley's defense. They like the seniority system (especially the closer they get to a committee chairmanship). They like the blue-slip system when it comes to confirming judicial nominees from their home states. And they dislike it when a president meddles in their chamber's internal rules and procedures since, as the Constitution makes clear, ' Each house may determine the rules of its proceedings.' What is a blue slip? It is a document, written on blue paper, on which the home state senators of presidential nominees for federal district court judgeships and U.S. attorney positions indicate their approval or disapproval of those nominees. In other words, only two senators are eligible to submit blue slips for each nominee. The blue slip process is not written in Senate rules or even in the rules of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Instead of a rule, it has been variously described as a 'custom' or 'tradition.' The Judiciary Committee chairmen set the ground rules for the confirmation process in each Congress. The president was correct when he said Chairman Grassley could abolish the blue slip requirements with 'just a flick of the pen.' In 2017, for instance, Judiciary Chairman Grassley declared that blue slips would no longer be required for appeals court judgeships, and that is still the case. The committee has gone through multiple iterations of the custom dating back to 1917. In many of those instances, the lack of both senators' approval would be taken into consideration by the committee in determining whether to proceed with confirmation hearings and whether to vote on sending the nomination to the Senate floor for debate and a vote. As it now stands, a covered nominee must have blue slip approvals from both senators for the nomination to move forward in committee, though a Judiciary Committee chair may declare an exception for any reason on any occasion — that was done twice during Joe Biden's tenure as Senate Judiciary Committee chairman. The president, in his attack on Grassley in July, incorrectly stated that presidents would never be able to appoint judges in liberal strongholds if even one senator in the opposition party refuses to submit a blue slip of approval. In fact, only the two senators from the home state of the judicial nominee may do so. Still, the president is understandably peeved that his judicial and executive nominees are taking too long to be confirmed. President Trump set two confirmation process records during the first 200 days of his second non-consecutive term. According to Chris Piper of Brookings, based on data compiled by his colleague Kathryn Dunn Tenpas, Trump submitted more executive and judicial nominations over that period (401) than any previous president. The second record he set, though, was that he faced more confirmation delays than any of his predecessors. Piper offers several explanations for the current delays, most notably that Senate Democrats are slow-walking nominations because they are not satisfied with their quality. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) attributes it to the nominees' lack of experience, ethical conflicts of interest and perceived extreme views. Consequently, Senate Democrats are demanding full debates and recorded votes on nearly every nominee, both in committee and on the floor. When Trump demanded that Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) cancel the August recess and keep the Senate in session until all pending nominations were dealt with, Thune extended the session by one day only and was able to clear the docket of several of the longstanding and most controversial nominees. It is doubtful that confirmations will pick up significantly in the fall, with critical budget-related deadlines once again pressing. The flurry of negative blue slips may still resemble record snowfalls by winter. Don Wolfensberger is a 28-year congressional staff veteran, culminating as the House Rules Committee chief of staff in 1995. He is author of, 'Congress and the People: Deliberative Democracy on Trial' (2000), and, 'Changing Cultures in Congress: From Fair Play to Power Plays' (2018).

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store