Politics Election category, Page 51
New Pa. bill would relieve debt from childbirth, other medical care
This story first appeared in How We Care, a weekly newsletter by Spotlight PA featuring original reporting and perspectives on how we care for one another at all stages of life. Medical debt harms people in different ways. It can lead them to seek payday loans, take money out of...
Court asked to intervene after email tells USAID workers to destroy classified documents
WASHINGTON — A union for U.S. Agency for International Development contractors asked a federal judge Tuesday to intervene in any destruction of classified documents after an email ordered staffers to help burn and shred agency records. Judge Carl Nichols set a Wednesday morning deadline for the plaintiffs and the government...
Education Department plans to lay off 1,300 employees as Trump vows to wind the agency down
WASHINGTON — The Education Department plans to lay off over 1,300 of its more than 4,000 employees as part of a reorganization that’s seen as a prelude to President Donald Trump’s plan to dismantle the agency. Department officials announced the cuts Tuesday, raising questions about the agency’s ability to continue...
Pennsylvania Rep. Scott Perry co-sponsors bill to abolish Federal Reserve
A bill in the U.S. House to repeal the 112-year-old Federal Reserve Act and abolish the nation’s central bank has attracted several co-sponsors, including York County Republican Rep. Scott Perry. Kentucky GOP Rep. Thomas Massie introduced the bill on March 5 and Perry is one of 10 co-sponsors, all Republicans,...
Trump doubles tariffs on Canadian metals, causing Ontario to back down on electricity price hikes
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he would double his planned tariffs on steel and aluminum from 25% to 50% for Canada, a retaliation that prompted the provincial government of Ontario to back down on its planned surcharges on electricity sold to the United States. Tuesday’s escalation and...
Former U.S. Rep. Katie Porter steps into crowded California governor’s race
LOS ANGELES — Former Democratic U.S. House member Katie Porter announced Tuesday that she is entering the 2026 contest for California governor, joining a crowded field of candidates that could be upended if former Vice President Kamala Harris joins the race. Porter, who became a social media celebrity by brandishing...
Polls open in Greenland for parliamentary elections
NUUK, Greenland — Polls opened in Greenland for early parliamentary elections Tuesday as U.S. President Donald Trump seeks control of the strategic Arctic island. The self-governing region of Denmark is home to 56,000 people, most from Indigenous Inuit backgrounds, and occupies a strategic North Atlantic location. It also contains rare...
House passes bill to fund federal agencies through September, though prospects unclear in Senate
WASHINGTON — The House passed legislation Tuesday to avert a partial government shutdown and fund federal agencies through September, providing critical momentum as the measure now moves to the Senate, where bipartisan support will be needed to get it over the finish line. Republicans needed overwhelming support from their members...
Elon Musk eyes Social Security, benefit programs for cuts while claiming widespread fraud
WASHINGTON — Elon Musk pushed debunked theories about Social Security on Monday while describing federal benefit programs as rife with fraud, suggesting they will be a primary target in his crusade to reduce government spending. The billionaire entrepreneur, who is advising President Donald Trump, suggested that $500 billion to $700...
Senate confirms Lori Chavez-DeRemer as Trump’s labor secretary
The Senate voted Monday to confirm Lori Chavez-DeRemer as U.S. labor secretary, a Cabinet position that puts her in charge of enforcing federally mandated worker rights and protections at a time when the White House is trying to eliminate thousands of government employees. Chavez-DeRemer will oversee the Department of Labor,...
Homeland Security overhauls asylum phone app — now it’s for ‘self-deportation’
The Trump administration has unveiled an overhauled cellphone app once used to let migrants apply for asylum, turning it into a system that allows people living illegally in the U.S. to say they want to leave the country voluntarily. The renamed app, announced Monday and now called CBP Home, is...
Trump loves the Gilded Age and its tariffs. It was a great time for the rich but not for the many
WASHINGTON — In President Donald Trump’s idealized framing, the United States was at its zenith in the 1890s, when top hats and shirtwaists were fashionable and typhoid fever often killed more soldiers than combat. It was the Gilded Age, a time of rapid population growth and transformation from an agricultural...
Drawing huge crowds, Bernie Sanders steps into leadership of the anti-Trump resistance
WARREN, Mich. — Bernie Sanders is standing alone on the back of a pickup truck shouting into a bullhorn. He’s facing several hundred ecstatic voters huddled outside a suburban Detroit high school — the group that did not fit inside the high school’s gym or two overflow rooms. The crowd...
Canada’s next prime minister has managed the financial crisis, Brexit and now Trump’s trade war
TORONTO — Canada’s next prime minister has already helped run two Group of Seven economies in crisis and now will try to steer Canada through a looming trade war brought by U.S. President Donald Trump, a threat of annexation and an expected federal election. Former central banker Mark Carney will...
Secretary of State Rubio says purge of USAID programs complete, with 83% of agency’s programs gone
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Monday the Trump administration had finished its six-week purge of programs of the six-decade-old U.S. Agency for International Development and he would move the 18% of aid and development programs that survived under the State Department. Rubio made the announcement in a...
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick says Trump sticking to U.S. aluminum-steel tariff timelineVideo
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick signaled he doesn’t expect a reprieve on 25% tariffs for steel and aluminum imports scheduled to take effect on Wednesday. The levies, ordered by President Donald Trump in February, include imports from Canada and Mexico — which are among the top foreign suppliers — and apply...
Kristi Noem taps new ICE leaders, moves to identify leakersVideo
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Sunday announced new leadership at the agency tasked with immigration enforcement as she also pledged to step up lie detector tests on employees to identify those who may be leaking information about operations to the media. “The authorities that I have under the Department...
Top health agency makes $25,000 buyout offer to most of its employees
WASHINGTON — Most of the 80,000 federal workers responsible for researching diseases, inspecting food and administering Medicare and Medicaid under the auspices of the Health and Human Services Department were emailed an offer to leave their job for as much as a $25,000 payment as part of President Donald Trump’s...
House Republicans unveil bill to avoid shutdown and they’re daring Democrats to oppose it
WASHINGTON — House Republicans unveiled a spending bill Saturday that would keep federal agencies funded through Sept. 30, pushing ahead with a go-it-alone strategy that seems certain to spark a major confrontation with Democrats over the contours of government spending. The 99-page bill would provide a slight boost to defense...
Iran’s top leader rejects talks with the U.S. over missile range, regional influence
TEHRAN, Iran — Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said he rejects a U.S. push for talks between the two countries because they would be aimed at imposing restrictions on Iranian missile range and its influence in the region. Speaking to a group of officials on Saturday, Khamenei did not...
Deluzio urges fellow Democrats to rethink stance on tariffs
A Democratic congressman from Western Pennsylvania has found some common ground — albeit, a small patch of it — with Republican President Donald Trump on the issue of tariffs. In an op-ed published Friday in The New York Times, U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio, D-Fox Chapel, said members of his party...
Lawsuit aims to strike down LGBTQ antidiscrimination protections in Pennsylvania
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Two public school districts and several parents have sued the state in a bid to undo antidiscrimination protections for gay and transgender people in Pennsylvania, saying that the two-year-old regulation is illegal because it goes beyond what lawmakers intended or allowed. The lawsuit, filed in the statewide...
Why should America worry about Trump? Try the price of eggs, say some Democrats
NEW YORK — As their party struggles to navigate the early days of Donald Trump’s second presidency, some Democrats are convinced that their road to recovery lies in the price of eggs. Instead of leaning into Trump’s teardown of the federal government or his alliance with billionaire lieutenant Elon Musk,...
Trump’s erratic trade policies are baffling businesses, threatening investment and economic growth
WASHINGTON — Marc Rosenberg, founder and CEO of The Edge Desk in Deerfield, Illinois is getting ready to introduce a fancy ergonomic chair designed to reduce customers’ back pain and boost their productivity. He figures the most expensive one will sell for more than $1,000. But he can’t settle on...
Elon Musk tells Republican lawmakers he’s not to blame for federal firingsVideo
WASHINGTON — It’s not his fault. Billionaire Elon Musk is telling Republican lawmakers that he is not to blame for the firings of thousands of federal workers, including veterans, as pushes to downsize the government. Instead, he said in private talks this week that those decisions are left to the...
