Most recent political stories
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at 11:14 AMGov. Janet Mills said early Thursday that she plans to sign the $430 million budget into law.
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at 12:40 PMThe case centers on a payment made to porn actor Stormy Daniels to prevent her claims of a sexual encounter with the former president from becoming public shortly before the 2016 election.
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at 10:27 AMBoth chambers of the Maine Legislature voted to add $60 million in storm relief into the budget proposal, but the Senate also added $7 million in additional spending on other items.
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at 12:20 AMA dozen House members reversed themselves from an April 9 vote that rejected changes in environmental rules, in order to allow an offshore wind terminal to be built.
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at 9:24 AMThe proposal would give family members a path toward restricting access to weapons for a person in crisis without a mental health evaluation.
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The effort is nationwide, and in February, a federal appeals court ruled that Maine had to release its voter rolls to the Public Interest Legal Foundation.
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at 11:14 AMThe state's business leaders fiercely opposed the restrictions they said would have limited their ability to target ads to potential customers.
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April 17The Republican speaker is expected to start a dayslong push to vote on 3 funding packages for Ukraine, Israel and allies in the Indo-Pacific, as well as a several other foreign policy proposals in a 4th bill.
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April 17Four U.S. senators offer framework to guard against 'bad actors looking to cause harm.'
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April 17The governor sent a letter to lawmakers outlining a path forward on two of the most significant items still before the Legislature, which is scheduled to adjourn Wednesday.
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April 16A law signed by Gov. Janet Mills allows the public to access records about hazardous materials moving along Maine tracks, but only after a derailment or spill.
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April 16The legislation aims to regulate the collection, use, processing, transfer, sale and deletion of non-publicly available personal data. Business groups say the bill would detach Maine's businesses from the global online marketplace.
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April 16The speaker is considering a complicated approach that would break apart the Senate's $95 billion aid package – for separate votes on Ukraine, Israel and the Indo-Pacific region.
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April 16The speaker is considering a complicated approach that would break apart the Senate's $95 billion aid package – for separate votes on Ukraine, Israel and the Indo-Pacific region.
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April 16While the Senate is obligated to hold a trial under the rules of impeachment once the charges are walked across the Capitol, Democrats are expected to try to dismiss or table the charges.
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April 16The bill had been rejected in the House and Senate, but Sen. Mattie Daughtry asked that it be reconsidered Tuesday. It passed in the Senate only to fail again hours later in the House.
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April 16The House voted in support of a bill that would give the team a tax credit of up to $133,000 per year, or $2 million total, over 15 years for upgrades at Hadlock Field.
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April 16Maine's 2nd District congressman says the USPS' plan, which includes shifting some mail processing operations from Hampden to Scarborough, would be detrimental to reliable mail delivery.
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April 17Both proposals also received initial support from the Senate last week and now head to another round of votes in each chamber.
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April 17In the latest vote, the House stripped the bill's emergency status, meaning that the $60 million in funding wouldn't be available for 90 days, delaying repairs to areas of Maine's working waterfront that were damaged by winter storms.
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April 16The high court case focuses on whether the anti-obstruction provision of a law that was enacted in 2002 in response to the financial scandal that brought down Enron Corp. can be used against Jan. 6 defendants.
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April 17In 2nd District Republican primary, Austin Theriault holds big fundraising lead.
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April 16A federal appeals court found that the law violates Title IX, the federal civil rights law that prohibits sex-based discrimination in schools.
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April 16It's the first of Trump's 4 criminal cases to go to trial and may be the only one that could reach a verdict before the November election.
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April 16Still, half of Americans would consider Trump unfit to serve as president if he is convicted.
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April 16The House rejected the measure last week and will now reconsider the Senate version, which would exempt sand dunes from environmental protection in a bid to advance Maine's drive to generate offshore wind.
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April 15The House voted 62-78 Monday against a bill that would provide up to $2 million in income tax credits to upgrade the facility.
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April 15The bill now requires second votes in both the House and Senate before it heads to Gov. Mills' desk.
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April 16The proposal now faces votes in the full House and Senate. If it passes unchanged, Gov. Janet Mills' spokesperson says she would not veto it.
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April 16Gov. Mills allowed the proposal, in which Maine joins 16 other states and the District of Columbia in changing how it allocates Electoral College votes, to become law without her signature.
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April 15Many key bills, including the supplemental budget, remain on the table. But lawmakers don't appear poised to call for a special session to give themselves more time.
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April 15A conviction would force the U.S. legal system to wrestle with unprecedented questions.
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April 14While Trump, who did not participate in debates for the Republican nomination, has indicated a willingness to take on his 2020 rival, the Democratic president has not committed to debating him again.
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April 14Amid biting criticism for the department's failings before the tragedy on Oct. 25, incumbent Sheriff Joel Merry and Sgt. Aaron Skolfield forge ahead.
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April 13In Georgia, Democrat Shea Roberts first ran for the state House in 2018 but lost to Republican Deborah Silcox. In 2020, Roberts shared her abortion story while running once again and won.
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April 14The fixes would restore pension tax breaks for retirees, boost pay for ed techs and increase support for dairy farmers, Senate President Troy Jackson said.
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April 12The Senate took up 5 bills that would put stricter gun laws in place and passed 4 of them.
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April 12Donald Trump flashed some criticism over efforts to oust the speaker calling it 'unfortunate,' saying there are 'much bigger problems' right now.
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April 12The law allows the attorney general’s office to file for a court injunction to stop the activity and penalize anyone breaking the law with a Class D crime, which is punishable by fines of $500 to $1,000 and up to a year in jail.
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April 12A Senate version of a bill to ban tobacco sales within 300 feet of a school would allow existing, licensed stores to keep tobacco sales.
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April 12Mike Johnson is set to travel to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club to meet with him and has been consulting him in recent weeks on the Ukraine funding to gain his support – or at least prevent him from openly opposing the package.
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April 12The bill, sponsored by Rep. Rebecca Millett, D-Cape Elizabeth, cleared the House of Representatives last night by a 4-vote margin, with at least 6 Democrats joining Republicans in opposition.
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April 12Both the House and Senate this week passed a bill that lowers state income taxes for low- and middle-wage earners.
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April 11Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told lawmakers he detected 'an undercurrecnt of self-doubt' among Americans about the U.S. role in the world.
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April 12The bill still needs to pass a second round of votes in both chambers and be approved for funding by the Legislature's appropriations committee before going to Gov. Janet Mills.
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April 11Gov. Janet Mills also has asked Senate President Troy Jackson to hold a floor vote on a $60 million proposal to rebuild storm-damaged coastal infrastructure.
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April 12House Speaker Rachel Talbot Ross requires Reps. Michael Lemelin and Shelley Rudnicki to read a formal apology on the House floor before restoring their right to speak during floor debates.
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April 11The fight is over a newly revived 1864 Arizona law criminalizing abortion throughout pregnancy unless a woman's life is at risk.
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April 11The legislation to shield providers of legally protected abortion and gender-affirming care from hostile, out-of-state litigation faces more votes in both chambers before going to the governor.
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April 11The move is criticized by union leaders and opposed by Sen. Susan Colllins and Rep. Jared Golden, who plans to introduce legislation freezing the consolidation mail processing centers nationwide.
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April 10L.D. 1929 received initial approval from the House of Representatives and Senate this week, but could face opposition from the Mills administration, which filed testimony against the bill last session.
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April 10Speaking in Atlanta ahead of a fundraiser, Trump renewed his criticism of Biden's reaction to the Israel-Hamas war.
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April 10Women who never intended to end their pregnancies have nearly died because they could not get emergency treatment. Miscarriage care has been delayed. And even routine reproductive medical care is drying up.
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April 11The House approved a bill Tuesday that would ban the sale of tobacco products within 300 feet of schools. But it would impact only 1 store in the state – and it's in Portland's West End.
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April 10Their target is the state’s atypical system of splitting its 5 presidential electoral votes. Maine is the only other state to split its electoral votes.
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April 10Weisselberg admitted lying when he testified during Donald Trump's civil fraud lawsuit that he had little knowledge of how Trump’s Manhattan penthouse came to be valued on his financial statements at nearly 3 times its actual size.
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April 10The official visit completes the administration’s feting of the leaders of the Quad, the informal partnership between the U.S., Japan, Australia and India that the White House has focused on elevating since Biden took office.
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April 10The bill received overwhelming support in the Senate on Wednesday, one day after narrowly winning support in the House of Representatives.
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April 10After a work session that stretched for more than 8 hours, Judiciary Committee members voted 6-5 late Tuesday in support of an amended version of L.D. 2283.
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April 9L.D. 2246, sponsored by Rep. David Sinclair, D-Bath, would prohibit charging a person who already has at least 2 prior theft convictions with a Class C felony if the third theft is of property valued at $500 or less.
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April 9The proposal sought to build off the tribe's exclusive rights to online sports gambling.
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April 9The visit comes after Biden announced last month that he opposes the planned sale of Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel to Nippon Steel of Japan.
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April 10In a late-night budget session, lawmakers cut funding for the Dairy Stabilization Program from about $8.9 million to $4.5 million.
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April 9Gov. Janet Mills has 10 days to decide whether to sign, veto or allow the bill to become law without her signature.
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April 10The proposal failed to get the necessary two-thirds support in a decisive vote late Tuesday, effectively ending the effort to amend the Maine Constitution.
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April 9It is unclear how severely the decision will delay the buildout of a wind port in Maine, which would create hundreds of high-paying jobs and advance the state's climate goals.
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April 9The proposal would make farmworkers eligible for the same minimum wage and cost-of-living increases as other types of workers in the state.
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April 9Republican House Minority Leader Billy Bob Faulkingham called for the removal of the Democratic House chair, Melanie Sachs, for creating a 'toxic and hostile' environment by dismissing Republican concerns.
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The plan is smaller and more targeted than Biden's original plan, which was killed by the Supreme Court last year.
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April 9Democrats used their majority to advance a state budget proposal – one that unravels a bipartisan effort to stabilize highway projects by moving away from fuel taxes and tapping a revenue stream from electric vehicles.
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April 8The former president also says he's 'proudly the person responsible for the ending' of the constitutional right to an abortion and thanks the conservative justices who overturned it.
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April 7Libby, of Auburn, was speaking in opposition to a proposal restricting paramilitary training, which she considers unconstitutional.
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April 6The high-dollar event is expected to include about 100 guests, including more than a few billionaires, and top a new single-event fundraising record set by Biden, who raised $26 million recently.
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April 7The Portland native also served in both chambers of the Maine Legislature and as state attorney general.
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April 5Authorities said a suspect still remains at large and no motive had been established.
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April 7Supporters say the bill would provide an important path forward for families seeking to restrict a loved one's access to firearms without stigmatizing mental illness, while opponents raise concerns about due process and Second Amendment rights.
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April 4Legislation headed to Gov. Mills grew out of concerns raised by property owners in the path of a transmission line that would have brought renewable power from northern Maine to the New England grid.
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April 4About 800 Maine voters rescinded their enrollment after Secretary of State Bellows sent letters to nearly 7,000 people who had agreed to change their party affiliation, telling them how to unenroll if they did not understand what they had signed.