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New parents score a win in the U.S. House, and GOP leaders cancel votes for the week

Published

3 months ago

April 1, 2025

Staff Editor

kentuckylantern.com – Jennifer Shutt – 2025-04-01 14:21:00

by Jennifer Shutt, Kentucky Lantern
April 1, 2025

The Kentucky context From Kentucky Lantern

Kentucky roll call:

AYE: Comer, Guthrie, Massie, Rogers

NO: McGarvey

NOT VOTING: Barr

This story was updated at 3:02 p.m. EDT.

WASHINGTON — U.S. House Republican leaders on Tuesday were unable to use a procedural maneuver to block a Florida Republican and a Colorado Democrat from bringing a resolution to the floor that would allow expecting mothers and new parents to vote by proxy.

GOP leaders tried to block their discharge petition from moving forward by putting language in a rule that would have set up House floor debate on separate pieces of legislation.

That provision and the rule were blocked following a 206-222 vote, with nine Republicans voting to buck party leaders. GOP leaders opted to cancel votes for the rest of the week afterward.

“People have emotional reasons for doing what they’re doing,” Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters after the failed vote. “But we’re going to keep governing. This is a small, razor-thin majority and we have to build consensus on everything. I wish they had not taken this course, but we’re not shaken by this.”

The discharge petition from Florida GOP Rep. Anna Paulina Luna and Colorado Democratic Rep. Brittany Pettersen received signatures from 218 lawmakers, indicating it has the support needed to change the House’s rules when a vote is held.

Florida Rep. Byron Donalds, Georgia Rep. Richard McCormick, New Jersey Rep. Jeff Van Drew, New York Rep. Michael Lawler, Ohio Reps. Michael Rulli and David Joyce, Pennsylvania Rep. Daniel Meuser, Tennessee Reps. Tim Burchett and Andy Ogles and Texas Reps. Dan Crenshaw and Wesley Hunt were the Republicans who signed the discharge petition.

A newborn on the House floor

Pettersen, holding her newborn in her arms, urged House lawmakers to ensure that women who cannot travel to the Capitol due to their pregnancies and new parents can still represent their constituents.

“When I was pregnant, I couldn’t fly towards the end of my due date because it was unsafe for Sam, and you’re unable to board a plane,” Pettersen said during floor debate. “I was unable to actually have my vote represented here and my constituents represented.”

“After giving birth I was faced with an impossible decision: Sam was four weeks old and for all of the parents here we know that when we have newborns it’s when they’re the most vulnerable in their life, it’s when they need 24-7 care, when taking them even to a grocery store is scary because you’re worried about exposure to germs and them getting sick — let alone taking them to an airport, on a plane and coming across the country to make sure you’re able to vote and represent your constituents.”

Pettersen said she was “terrified that no matter what choice” she made about whether to vote in-person, she would have “deep regrets.”

“So Sam and I made the trip out and this is our third time coming to the floor for a vote,” she said.

Pettersen said it was “unfathomable that in 2025” Congress had not modernized to have basic parental leave and said the institution has “a long ways to go to make this place accessible for young families like mine.”

Luna said she had spent years trying to convince Republican leaders to allow new parents to vote by proxy. But after exhausting all of her options, worked with her colleagues to gather signatures for a discharge petition.

“Now, leadership, because of the fact they don’t like that I was successful at this, is trying to change the rules,” Luna said, calling GOP leaders’ choice “fundamentally dangerous.”

‘A new laptop class in America’

Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Jim McGovern, ranking member on the Rules Committee, said Republican leadership was “trying to overturn the Democratic process of majority rule.”

“When 218 of us sign a petition, the House rules say it can be brought up for a vote,” McGovern said. “But a backdoor provision slipped into this rule is being used to shut down that process — an unprecedented step. Literally, it has never been done before in the history of the House.”

House Rules Chairwoman Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., opposed moving forward with the discharge petition and a floor vote on proxy voting.

“I know there’s a new laptop class in America that seems to operate increasingly in a virtual space, but that’s simply not a fact of life for most American workers and I believe Congress should live by that standard,” Foxx said.

Members of Congress, including dozens of Republicans, voted by proxy during the coronavirus pandemic.

Speaker Johnson has also allowed discharge petitions to move forward before. Just last year Congress cleared a bill making changes to Social Security benefits for some Americans after members from both political parties signed a discharge petition.

U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., talk with reporters inside the Capitol building on Tuesday, April 1, 2025. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

Tuesday’s measure, titled Proxy Voting for New Parents Resolution, would allow House members who just gave birth, or had a spouse give birth, to designate another lawmaker to vote on their behalf for 12 weeks.

The resolution would also allow House lawmakers to vote by proxy before giving birth if their health care providers advised the “pregnancy presents a serious medical condition or that she is unable to travel safely.”

The legislation would not affect the Senate. Generally, each chamber of Congress sets its own rules and does not try to tell the other chamber how to operate.

Luna quits Freedom Caucus

Luna left the far-right Freedom Caucus on Monday over the group’s efforts to block her discharge petition from moving forward, writing in a two-page letter that “the mutual respect that has guided our caucus” for years was “shattered last week.”

“This was a modest, family-centered proposal,” Luna wrote. “Yet, a small group among us threatened the Speaker, vowing to halt floor proceedings indefinitely — regardless of the legislation at stake, including President Trump’s agenda — unless he altered the rules to block my discharge petition.”

Luna rebuked several of the Freedom Caucus members, without naming names. She said their choice to try to block the discharge petition from moving forward by embedding language in a rule that set up debate on a separate bill was duplicitous.

“This tactic was not just a betrayal of trust; it was a descent into the very behavior we have long condemned — a practice that we, as a group, have repeatedly criticized leadership for allowing,” Luna wrote. “To those involved, I ask: Why? Why abandon the principles we’ve championed and resort to such conduct?

“The irony in all of this is that I have never voted by proxy, yet one of our own on the Rules Committee that is so adamantly opposed has done so over 30 times.”

Last updated 3:36 p.m., Apr. 1, 2025

Kentucky Lantern is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Kentucky Lantern maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jamie Lucke for questions: info@kentuckylantern.com.

The post New parents score a win in the U.S. House, and GOP leaders cancel votes for the week appeared first on kentuckylantern.com

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News from the South - Kentucky News Feed

Kentucky State Police arrests Somerset man after standoff

Published

14 hours ago

June 16, 2025

Staff Editor

www.wnky.com – WNKY Staff – 2025-06-16 08:48:00

SUMMARY: In Somerset, Kentucky, 69-year-old John Woody barricaded himself in his home after shooting into neighboring residences. Authorities were alerted Sunday evening, and after unsuccessful negotiations, the Kentucky State Police Special Response Team was called in. Woody then fired at troopers, prompting the use of less-lethal force to apprehend him. He faces charges including first-degree wanton endangerment for discharging a firearm and attempted murder of a peace officer. Additional charges were filed by the Somerset Police Department. The investigation, involving multiple law enforcement agencies, is ongoing.

Read the full article

The post Kentucky State Police arrests Somerset man after standoff appeared first on www.wnky.com

News from the South - Kentucky News Feed

Report: Childhood trauma costs Kentucky nearly $300 million every year

Published

16 hours ago

June 16, 2025

Staff Editor

kentuckylantern.com – Sarah Ladd – 2025-06-16 07:00:00

by Sarah Ladd, Kentucky Lantern
June 16, 2025

Adverse experiences in childhood and their lasting consequences cost Kentucky nearly $300 million a year, a new report says.

Kentucky Youth Advocates and Bloom Kentucky, a KYA initiative focused on reducing childhood adversity, on Monday released an analysis, called “The Economic Impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences in Kentucky” that shows health care costs and loss of workforce participation as a result of childhood trauma comes with a $295 million annual price tag.

Dr. Shannon Moody, Kentucky Youth Advocates’ Chief Officer of Strategic Initiatives.

The analysis is based on Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey data from 2015–20. At that time, 62% of Kentucky adults said they’d had at least one adverse childhood experience or ACE and 19% reported four or more.

ACEs are traumas or stressors in a person’s life before their 18th birthday. They include, but are not limited to, parental divorce, abuse, parental incarceration, substance use issues in the home and more. The more ACEs a person has, the more likely they are to have poor health, lower education and economic hardships.

When these stressors become chronic, it “has an impact on our physiology,” explained Shannon Moody, Kentucky Youth Advocates’ chief officer of strategic initiatives.

The more ACEs a person has, the more likely they are to turn to unhealthy practices like smoking, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. ACEs survivors also tend to report poorer mental health, may be unemployed and are more likely to have chronic health issues like diabetes and cancer, according to the CDC.

“The ways that our body absorbs stress or deals with stress has an impact on our physiology as well as on our mental health,” Moody said. “When that stress goes unaddressed in our bodies, it starts to take a toll on how our bodies’ function.”

The result is sicker people who may not be able to work and contribute to the economy.

“If we don’t invest in making sure that kids can overcome the adversity that they are (facing) — or maybe prevent it if it is preventable — we’re going to end up absorbing the costs through our state budget,” Moody said.

People with at least one ACE are more likely to be unable to work or be out of work. (Screenshot)

What’s in the report?

According to Monday’s analysis:

The most common type of ACEs in Kentucky is divorce with 32% of adults reporting they lived through their parents splitting when they were children. A close second, 31% of adults reported there were substance abuse issues in their childhood home.
ACEs cost Kentucky — both in medical spending and in lost income when people cannot work — nearly $300 million each year. Among these, smoking costs more than $107 million each year in lost wages.
Depression costs the state the most in treatment expenses at $728,000 annually.
Kentucky has higher expenses per person in treating ACEs than most of its neighboring states.
People with at least one ACE are more likely to be unable to work or be out of work.
Non-white Kentuckians are more likely to have experienced ACEs than their white counterparts. Multiracial Kentuckians have the highest rates of ACEs.

ACEs cost Kentucky — both in medical spending and in lost income when people cannot work — nearly $300 million each year. Among these, smoking costs more than $107 million each year in lost wages. (Screenshot)

“Given how common ACEs are in Kentucky, organizations, agencies and decisionmakers must take trauma into account when working to strengthen communities,” the report says. “Understanding the widespread impact of trauma begins with learning both its effects and the potential pathways to healing.”

That includes creating better access to quality child care, Moody said, and creating a state child tax credit. Combating poverty, which affects 20% of Kentucky’s children and for many means they don’t have reliable sources of nutritious food, is key as well.

She also stressed the importance of positive childhood experiences (PCEs), which can balance children’s adverse experiences. PCEs can include feeling supported by friends, having adults who care, the ability to talk with family members about feelings and more.

“Even if a child is experiencing adversity, even if they have an ACE score of 7, or they have had just a really tough environment in which they were raised, we can counterbalance those adversities with positive childhood experiences,” Moody said.

Kentucky has higher expenses per person in treating ACEs than most of its neighboring states. (Screenshot)

Why now?

The report is coming out now, Moody said, because work on the 2026 state budget is beginning and because proposed federal funding cuts to safety net programs like Medicaid and SNAP put people at risk of more instability and more adverse childhood experiences.

The report is a call to action, she said, to invest in child wellbeing and prevent ACEs.

“We need to get an understanding among all of our decision makers as far as what the implications of childhood adversity mean for our bottom line,” Moody said, “and for the investments that they’re making right now on behalf of kids.”

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The post Report: Childhood trauma costs Kentucky nearly $300 million every year appeared first on kentuckylantern.com

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

This content focuses on the social and economic impacts of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), highlighting public health, economic costs, and advocating for government investment in child wellbeing and social safety nets. The emphasis on expanding access to childcare, creating a state child tax credit, and protecting safety net programs such as Medicaid and SNAP from federal cuts are policy positions commonly associated with center-left perspectives that prioritize social welfare and preventative care. However, the article maintains a data-driven, policy-oriented tone without heavy ideological language, suggesting a moderate rather than overtly partisan approach.

News from the South - Kentucky News Feed

Evening Forecast 6/16/2025

Published

23 hours ago

June 15, 2025

Staff Editor

www.youtube.com – FOX 56 News – 2025-06-15 23:12:28

SUMMARY: Scattered showers and humid conditions continued across central Kentucky on June 16, with localized flooding in Mercer and Boyle counties prompting a flash flood warning set to expire by 12:30 a.m. Showers will taper overnight, with patchy fog developing by morning. Monday starts mostly dry but humid, with afternoon highs in the mid-80s and renewed scattered downpours expected. The pattern repeats through Tuesday and Wednesday. Humidity remains oppressive most of the week, with a slight dip Friday. By the weekend, a high-pressure system will bring hotter conditions, with highs near 90°F and heat indices possibly reaching 100°F across the eastern U.S.