Ohio’s unemployment rate for July dropped to 8.9 percent, down from the revised June rate of 11 percent, according to new data from the state.
In a clear sign of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on the state’s economy, the unemployment rate in July is up from 4.2 percent in July 2019, state numbers show.
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Virginia State Health Commissioner Dr. Norman Oliver said on Friday that he would mandate a COVID-19 vaccine if publicly available, according to 8News, but a bill under consideration in the Virginia General Assembly would provide a religious exemption.
Under Virginia state law, the commissioner of health has the authority to mandate immediate immunizations during a public health crisis like COVID-19 if a vaccine is available to the public.
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The Minnesota Freedom Fund (MFF) bailed another violent criminal, Lionel Melaki Timms, who reoffended three days after failing to appear in court. Timms’ most recent victim now suffers from a traumatic brain injury, fractured skull, and brain bleed.
Police responded to a call about a robbery and assault on August 14. The victim, a local manager at Mac’s Industrial Sports Bar, was discovered face-down in an alleyway. Eyewitnesses described a suspect that matched Timms’ description. One witness’s photo of the suspect helped police identify Timms in the area later that afternoon.
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The six-year battle in Minnesota over Enbridge’s 1960’s-era Line 3 pipeline will continue.
The Minnesota Department of Commerce (DOC) on Wednesday will appeal the Public Utilities Commission’s (PUC) February decision that approved the project’s certificate of need.
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Four business groups sent Gov. Gretchen Whitmer a letter asking to reopen industries that have been closed for five months, although they’re open in certain parts of Michigan and surrounding states.
After five months with no revenue and continued fixed costs, some gyms, movie theaters and bowling alleys are on the brink of bankruptcy.
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The Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance (TDCI) Securities Division will participate in the COVID-19 Enforcement Task Force, an international investor protection initiative to crack down on schemes related to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
The North American Securities Administrators Association, of which Tennessee is a member, is coordinating the task force.
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One of the candidates from the House District 18 Republican primary has notified Chairman Scott Golden and State Executive Committee (SEC) of the Tennessee Republican Party (TRP) that they are contesting the results, because of crossover voting from Democrats.
A member of the SEC, who wished to remain unnamed until it was discussed with the chairman, provided The Tennessee Star with a copy of the emailed letter from House District 18 Republican primary candidate Gina Oster dated August 18.
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This past week at the Democrat’s low energy Zoom convention, we heard a lot about what a good guy former Vice President Joe Biden is, that he’s a man of “faith” and “character.” We heard almost nothing about his accomplishments. That’s because after fifty years as a politician, Biden has accomplished almost nothing of significance.
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Portland police arrested a man who’s accused of violently beating a motorist whose pick-up truck crashed near a Sunday demonstration.
Marquise Love, 25, has been charged with felonious assault, coercion and riot participation, and was transported to the Multnomah County Detention Center early Friday morning after he turned himself in, according to a Portland Police news release.
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An all new LIVE STREAM of War Room: Pandemic starts at 9 a.m. Central Time on Saturday.
Former White House Chief Strategist Stephen K. Bannon began the daily War Room: Pandemic radio show and podcast on January 25, when news of the virus was just beginning to leak out of China around the Lunar New Year. Bannon and co-hosts bring listeners exclusive analysis and breaking updates from top medical, public health, economic, national security, supply chain and geopolitical experts weekdays from 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 noon ET.
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The Democratic National Convention’s final night will feature a performance from the rapper Common, who has long-standing ties to Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan.
Farrakhan has repeatedly referred to Jewish people as “satanic,” blamed them for both the Holocaust and the Sept. 11, 2011, terrorist attacks, and once praised Adolf Hitler as a “very great man.” Farrakhan has also denounced interracial marriage, which he said has “mongrelized” the black race.
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Apologizing publicly for the first time for crimes their lawyers insisted for months they didn’t commit, “Full House” star Lori Loughlin and her fashion designer husband, Mossimo Giannulli, were sentenced to prison Friday for using their wealth and privilege to cheat their daughters’ way into the college of their choice.
The two-month prison sentence for Loughlin and five-month term for Giannulli bring to a close the legal saga for the highest-profile parents ensnared in the college admissions bribery scheme — a scandal that rocked the U.S. educational system and laid bare the lengths some wealthy parents will go to get their kids into elite universities.
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Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed the original all-star panelist Crom Carmichael to discuss the Steve Bannon arrest and the violence sweeping the country.
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Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed Nashville attorney Jim Roberts to give updates on the Nashville Taxpayer Protection Act and discuss Metro government’s response.
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Friday morning on The John Fredericks Show, host Fredericks welcomed President and CEO of the Job Creators Network Alfredo Ortiz to weigh in on the Democratic Convention and Joe Biden’s America.
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Spurred by ultra-low mortgage rates, home buyers rushed last month to snap up a limited supply of existing houses, causing the pace of purchases to jump by a record-high 24.7%.
The July surge in sales reported Friday by the National Association of Realtors marked the second straight month of accelerating home purchases. The back-to-back increases have helped stabilize the home buying market, which all but froze early this spring when the viral pandemic erupted across the United States.
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Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden gave the shortest Democratic National Convention acceptance speech in four decades Thursday night.
Biden’s speech lasted just under 25 minutes, according to C-SPAN. An acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) hasn’t been that short since Walter Mondale’s 32-minute speech in 1984.
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A parent who said his daughter attends the Metro Nashville Public Schools tweeted that an English lesson plan tells her that White people are appalling racists.
That man, who uses the name GrantB911 on Twitter, also said he’s pulling his second grade daughter out of the public school system immediately.
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Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot defended the heavy police presence outside her home where protesters are being blocked, claiming she has a right to safety.
“Given the threats that I have personally received. Given the threats to my home and my family, I’m gonna do everything to make sure that they are protected. I make no apologies whatsoever for that,” the Democratic mayor said.
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A healthy political party—just like a healthy individual—has certain traits and habits that nourish overall wellness. A diversity of interests, a sense of humor, a curious mind, a measured temperament, and an occasional endorphin-release from physical activity are just a few things that contribute to the fitness of a human being. The same kind of characteristics should be found on a collective scale in a thriving, muscular, and stable political party.
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Representative Jena Powell (R-Arcanum) is a freshman legislator from Ohio’s 80th District with the tenacity of a rookie and the strategic thinking of a veteran. During a Friday afternoon phone call with The Ohio Star, Powell said “everyone can speak on things, but it takes a plan to get there. I am not the kind of person that says ‘open Ohio’ and doesn’t have a plan – you have to have a plan to get to the endpoint.”
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The Detroit Federation of Teachers (DFT) voted Wednesday to authorize a strike if an agreement can’t be reached over COVID-19 concerns.
The vote, with 91 percent in favor, authorizes DFT leadership to call a strike if the union and the Detroit Public School Community District (DPSCD) don’t reach an agreement.
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Minneapolis City Council has approved the reinvestment of $1.2 million into a new department for Third Precinct police. The investment will be pledged annually for the next three years.
The decision took place in the council’s Policy & Government Oversight Committee meeting on Thursday afternoon.
Republican legislators in Virginia are sounding the alarm about risks with new provisions providing prepaid postage and drop boxes for absentee ballots. The provisions come as part of a budget amendment proposed by Governor Ralph Northam.
The amendment provides $2 million to create the ballot drop boxes and to pay postage so that voters do not have to pay to return their ballots. The General Assembly will consider the amendments sometime near the beginning of next week.
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Six Michigan businesses were fined more than $33,000 after they failed to follow safety protocol designed to prevent the spread of COVID-19, the state announced on Friday.
The businesses were fined under “general duty” citations through the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA), rather than through any of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s executive orders. The “general duty” clause requires employers to provide a workplace free from recognized harms and carries a fine of up to $7,000.
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Richmond and Virginia State Police got into a confrontation with a group of people and arrested four individuals Thursday night for obstructing justice by not showing identification, according to Richmond resident Jimmie Lee Jarvis who witnessed the event firsthand.
Yet another incident between police and citizens has taken place in Richmond, this time outside of GWARbar, a local heavy-metal themed bar in the Jackson Ward neighborhood.
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Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine wants the board of directors for the Bureau of Workers’ Compensation (BWC) to approve sending up to $1.5 billion in dividend payments to employers across the state.
If approved, it would be the second dividend of $1 billion or more since April, DeWine said during a Thursday press conference. The $1.5 billion totals the premiums paid during the 2019 policy year, and officials say the payout is possible because of several factors, including a lower number of claims and strong returns on investment.
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Legislation that would have banned the enforcement of mandatory minimum sentencing in Virginia was killed in the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday after some Democrats joined Republicans in their opposition.
Senate Bill 5046, sponsored by Sen. John Edwards, D-Roanoke, effectively would have ended all mandatory minimums in Virginia by halting their enforcement for offenses committed on or after Jan. 1, 2021. Although reforming mandatory minimum laws has bipartisan support, SB 5046 did not provide exemptions for violent crimes, such as murder or rape, which led to it ultimately failing.
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Tennessee Department of Education (TDOE) Commissioner Penny Schwinn is a leftist and a statist who wants the government to have too great of a role developing public school students, according to a video one organization released this week.
Gary Humble, speaking for Tennessee Stands, criticized Schwinn and the TDOE for proposing that state officials go to people’s homes to perform wellness checks on children.
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Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee said this week that protecting public safety while also protecting the state’s small businesses during COVID-19 is his administration’s primary “balancing act” and it was “heartbreaking” to watch small businesses close.
Lee also said he and other state officials used stimulus money to help the state’s business owners.
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There was a time when a kind of nobility still existed among our leaders. In Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, delivered March 4, 1865, while the nation was still riven by a bloody Civil War, he envisioned a future of national healing. In words now carved in the marble of the Lincoln Memorial, he pledged, “With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right,” to go on “to bind up the nation’s wounds,” and to “do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a lasting peace, among ourselves . . .”
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In testimony to the Joint Ad Hoc Committee to Study Emergency Powers Thursday, retired Tennessee Supreme Court Justice and president and dean of Nashville School of Law William C. Koch, Jr. said Governor Bill Lee’s executive orders are entirely consistent with the inherent power in his office and granted to him in state statute.
The 17-member ad hoc committee, consisting of five senators and 12 representatives, was established by the respective speakers of each house at the request of members in light of the emergency status caused by COVID-19.
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The state of Michigan has agreed to pay $600 million to Flint, Michigan residents in a settlement stemming from the 2014 water crisis.
The settlement established a court-monitored compensation fund, which will send payments Flint residents, CNN reported Thursday. The majority of the money, about 80%, will be paid to residents who were younger than 18 at the time of the crisis.
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Facebook’s effort to build a landing site in a village on the Oregon coast for a fiber optic cable linking Asia and North America has run into serious trouble.
First, a drill pipe snapped under the seabed. Workers left 1,100 feet of pipe, 6,500 gallons of drilling fluid, a drill tip and other materials under the seabed as they closed down the site, aiming to try again next year.
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The Democratic National Convention on Tuesday featured a panelist who identifies as a “nonbinary/gender transcendent mermaid Queen-King” and who called for the abolition of the police, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and prisons.
According to the panelist’s Wake Forest University bio, J Mai is a “Black-Vietnamese, transgender nonbinary/gender transcendent mermaid Queen-King,” who recently became a “licensed minister in the Progressive National Baptist Church.”
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Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed Tennessee Star’s Senior Reporter Laura Baigert to discuss state Representative John DeBerry’s new opponent Torrey Harris.
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Indicted Tennessee state Sen. Katrina Robinson has traveled extensively to conferences on the state’s dime during her time in office, costing Tennessee taxpayers $17,934.56 in the past 20 months – nearly 10 times the average amount of state spending on conference travel for her Senate colleagues.
A federal grand jury indicted Robinson, D-Memphis, last month on 24 counts of embezzlement involving government programs and 24 counts of wire fraud.
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Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed Breitbart author Susan Berry to discuss the state of public education.
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Facebook announced Wednesday that it will take further action against pages, groups, and Instagram accounts associated with anarchist groups and other groups “tied to violence.”
The social media website said it will expand their “Dangerous Individuals and Organizations policy” to censor groups who reportedly pose a “significant risk” to public safety, such as QAnon, the company said in a statement. Facebook is also taking action against “offline anarchist groups that support violent acts amidst protests,” the statement said.
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Fall hasn’t even arrived yet, but some US schools are already announcing closures during the sixth month of the coronavirus pandemic.
On Sunday, news broke that a Georgia school district announced it will close a third high school after 25 students tested positive for the coronavirus.
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U.S. Attorney General William Barr this week announced that federal agents have arrested several people in Memphis on federal charges as part of Operation Legend.
This, according to a press release that U.S. Department of Justice officials published on their website Wednesday.
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Thursday morning on the Tennessee Report, host Leahy welcomed Jon Berlau to the show to talk about his book George Washington Entrepreneur and Washington’s many unknown accomplishments.
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With the COVID-19 pandemic, racial justice protests and the looming presidential election dominating the headlines, the upcoming Supreme Court case, Google v. Oracle, has been all but forgotten.
It may seem like an inconsequential lawsuit between two Silicon Valley rivals fighting over a coveted piece of technology. But that analysis is wrong. The case has enormous potential consequences, not just for the two companies in dispute, but for countless Tennesseans and the state’s economy.
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On July 2, Ohio Republican Governor Mike DeWine introduced the Ohio Public Health Advisory System (OPHAS). The color-coded map assigns a color to each of Ohio’s 88 counties that is supposed to be indicative of each county’s COVID spread.
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Thursday morning on The John Fredericks Show, host Fredericks was joined by Virginia House Delegate member Glenn Davis to speak about the Democrats move to Zoom meetings and keeping their per diem.
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While the House continued its quick, procedural sessions, the Senate and the Senate Judiciary Committee continued to advance bills centered around criminal justice reform and policing.
Before the Senate convened in-person in its new home for the 2020 special session at the Science Museum of Virginia, the Judiciary Committee held a meeting where it reported and referred more bills.
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Local Virginia Trump supporters have high hopes for the presidential election in November and believe that Trump will secure another four years in office.
At a gathering set up by the Trump Virginia campaign, people from various towns and counties surrounding Richmond came to show their support for the campaign and form a collective focus on the highly important last stretch before the election.
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Some scholars argue more parental choice could provide the best value for students as public schools across Virginia offer virtual learning or a combination of in-person and virtual schooling to curtail the spread of COVID-19.
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam will allow schools to reopen with a phased-in approach, which can lead to in-person schooling, but only if schools can maintain social distancing. Because of limited space, many schools are unable to provide in-person schooling for every student five days a week.
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The Ohio Department of Health (ODH) banned students last week from wearing face shields as a substitute for masks, according to Fox 19.
The ODH cited a CDC report that said “there is currently not enough evidence to support the effectiveness of face shields,” and the health organization also said it “does not currently recommend use of face shields as a substitute for masks.”
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A northern Virginia congressman is pursuing legislation to remove Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee’s name from the official designation at the historic mansion where he lived before the Civil War.
The home, overlooking the nation’s capital and surrounded by Arlington National Cemetery, is a National Park Service site officially known as “Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial.”
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