Treasury officials question legality of taxpayers paying for security upgrades at Shapiro’s family home
Spotlight PA is an independent, nonpartisan, and nonprofit newsroom producing investigative and public-service journalism that holds power to account and drives positive change in Pennsylvania. Sign up for our free newsletters. HARRISBURG — Late last year, Pennsylvania’s top law enforcement agency revealed taxpayers would pick up the tab for more...
Stephen Colbert says CBS lawyers pulled James Talarico interview as early voting begins in Texas
AUSTIN — Late-night host Stephen Colbert said his interview with Democratic Texas Senate candidate James Talarico was pulled from Monday night’s broadcast over network fears it would violate regulatory guidance from the Trump administration on giving equal time to political candidates. The issue came just hours before early voting opened...
Reschenthaler weds Fox News’ Brooke Singman
Guy Reschenthaler, a Republican congressman from Peters, married Fox News reporter Brooke Singman over the weekend in a ceremony at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Midtown Manhattan. Social media posts show the festivities were attended by luminaries including FBI Director Kash Patel, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt and Mike Waltz,...
New subpoenas issued in inquiry on response to 2016 Russian election interference, AP sources say
WASHINGTON — The Justice Department has issued new subpoenas in a Florida-based investigation into perceived adversaries of President Donald Trump and the U.S. government’s response to Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, according to multiple people familiar with the matter. An initial wave of subpoenas in November asked recipients...
White House orders Homeland Security shutdown as funding lapses
WASHINGTON — The White House ordered the Department of Homeland Security to begin shutdown procedures as its funding from Congress expires at midnight — the third time parts of the U.S. government will have shut down in the past six months. The shutdown will affect DHS functions other than immigration...
A lawsuit seeks to stop Trump’s overhaul of a 100-year-old public golf course in Washington
Two golfers in Washington, D.C., sued the federal government on Friday to try to prevent the Trump administration from overhauling a more than 100-year-old public golf course, accusing the administration of violating environmental laws and polluting a park that is on the National Register of Historic Places. The suit is...
Judge says she’ll rule U.S. cannot force states to provide data on SNAP recipients
President Donald Trump’s administration cannot force states to hand over detailed information on people who have applied for or received aid from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, a judge said in a tentative ruling Friday. San Francisco-based U.S. District Judge Maxine Chesney last year blocked the U.S. Department of Agriculture...
What to know about the Homeland Security shutdown starting this weekend
Another shutdown for parts of the federal government is expected this weekend as lawmakers debate new restrictions on President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda. Funding for the Department of Homeland Security is set to expire Saturday. Democrats say they won’t help approve more funding until new restrictions are placed on...
Trump boasts of over $1.5B in political funds. How he chooses to spend it could rock the midterms
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has bragged about building a political war chest exceeding $1.5 billion — a staggering sum that he can wield at his whim to shape November’s midterms and the 2028 race to succeed him. Trump’s stockpile — which dwarfs any amounts raised by his predecessors in...
Trump pardons 5 former NFL players for crimes ranging from perjury to drug trafficking
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Thursday pardoned five former professional football players — one posthumously — for various crimes ranging from perjury to drug trafficking. The pardons were announced by White House pardon czar Alice Marie Johnson. Ex-NFL players Joe Klecko, Nate Newton, Jamal Lewis, Travis Henry and the...
CBO: Federal deficits and debt to worsen over next decadeVideo
WASHINGTON — The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office’s 10-year outlook projects worsening long-term federal deficits and rising debt, driven largely by increased spending, notably on Social Security, Medicare, and debt service payments. Compared with the CBO’s analysis this time last year, the fiscal outlook has deteriorated modestly. Major developments over the...
Trump’s EPA revokes scientific finding that underpinned U.S. fight against climate change
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Thursday revoked a scientific finding that long has been the central basis for U.S. action to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and fight climate change, the most aggressive move by the president to roll back climate regulations. The rule finalized by the Environmental Protection Agency...
Homeland Security shutdown seems certain as funding talks between White House and Democrats stall
WASHINGTON — A shutdown for the Department of Homeland Security appeared certain Thursday as lawmakers in the House and Senate were set to leave Washington for a 10-day break and negotiations with the White House over Democrats’ demands for new restrictions had stalled. Democrats and the White House have traded...
Judge blocks Pentagon from punishing Sen. Mark Kelly for call to resist unlawful orders
WASHINGTON — A federal judge agreed Thursday to block the Pentagon from punishing Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly, a former Navy pilot, for participating in a video that called on troops to resist unlawful orders. U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled that Pentagon officials not only violated Kelly’s First Amendment free...
Florida state official acknowledges opioid money funded anti-weed campaign
For the first time on Wednesday, the DeSantis administration acknowledged that it used opioid settlement money to campaign against a recreational marijuana amendment on the 2024 ballot. Shevaun Harris, the secretary for Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration, made the admission during an appearance before a Senate committee as part...
House GOP pushes strict proof-of-citizenship requirement for voters ahead of midterm elections
WASHINGTON — House Republicans rushed to approve legislation on Wednesday that would impose strict new proof-of-citizenship requirements ahead of the midterm elections, a long shot Trump administration priority that faces sharp blowback in the Senate. The bill, called the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE America Act, would require Americans...
House votes to overturn Trump’s tariffs on Canada in rare bipartisan rebuke of White House agenda
WASHINGTON — The House voted Wednesday to slap back President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canada, a rare if largely symbolic rebuke of the White House agenda as Republicans joined Democrats over the objections of GOP leadership. The tally, 219-211, was among the first times the House, controlled by Republicans, has...
Trump attacks Oklahoma’s GOP leader ahead of next week’s meeting of governors
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump attacked the Republican leader of the National Governors Association on Wednesday as tensions mounted between the White House and the bipartisan group of state leaders ahead of its annual meeting next week. In a social media post, Trump blasted Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican...
Deluzio says Trump administration abused its power in probe of ‘illegal orders’ video
Lawmakers targeted by the Justice Department after releasing a video telling servicemembers they have an obligation to refuse illegal orders said Wednesday they haven’t ruled out taking action against the Trump administration for “weaponizing the government” against them. “I’m not going to litigate and share our legal strategy here,” U.S....
ICE blames Biden administration for Brentwood man’s entrance into U.S.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on Wednesday blamed the Biden administration for allowing a Brentwood man, now in custody, into the United States. Maklim Gomez Escalante, 35, was detained Jan. 20 after arriving at a district court hearing where he had been subpoenaed to testify in an unrelated matter....
Pam Bondi clashes with Democrats as she struggles to turn the page on Epstein files furorVideo
WASHINGTON — Attorney General Pam Bondi launched into a passionate defense of President Donald Trump Wednesday as she tried to turn the page from relentless criticism of the Justice Department’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files, repeatedly shouting at Democrats during a combative hearing in which she postured herself as...
Russia says it will stick to New START’s nuclear arms limits as long as U.S. does
MOSCOW — Moscow will observe the limits of the last nuclear arms pact with the United States that expired last week as long as it sees that Washington is doing the same, Russia’s top diplomat said Wednesday. The New START treaty expired Feb. 5, leaving no restrictions on the two...
Potential conflicts over celebrating America’s 250th anniversary spill out in congressional hearing
WASHINGTON — Congressional Democrats on Tuesday accused the Trump administration of trying to hijack plans to celebrate America’s 250th anniversary and using the nonprofit National Park Foundation to solicit money from private donors for some of the president’s pet projects, including the massive arch he wants to build in the...
Report: Grand jury rejects indictment against Deluzio, other lawmakers over ‘illegal orders’ video
Federal prosecutors failed to secure an indictment against six Democratic members of Congress, including U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio of Fox Chapel, who released a video last year telling servicemembers they have an obligation to refuse illegal orders, The New York Times reported Tuesday night, citing four unnamed people familiar with...
Trump-appointed judge dismisses attempt to obtain Michigan voter data in latest rejection of DOJ
LANSING, Mich. — A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit from the Department of Justice that sought to obtain Michigan’s voter rolls, marking the latest judicial rejection in President Donald Trump’s wide-ranging attempts to gain access to voter data from states. The Justice Department has sued at least 23 states...
