Daily news coverage of politics, policy, and issues shaping the nation.
Update: Illinois’ Land of Lincoln Health announced Tuesday it will be closing its doors. The co-op became the 16th of 23 co-ops launched under Obamacare to collapse, following Oregon’s Health Co-Op. Land of Lincoln Health received $160.1 million in loans from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. More than 54,000 enrolled in coverage from…
KYIV, Ukraine—Over the weekend, as NATO leaders in Warsaw, Poland, were discussing ways to counter Russian aggression, the conflict in eastern Ukraine concurrently spiked to its worst level in months. “I don’t think it’s a coincidence,” Stephen Blank, senior fellow for Russia at the American Foreign Policy Council, told The Daily Signal. “It makes sense…
CLEVELAND—After fending off attempts to change the Republican Party’s official position on LGBT issues and traditional marriage, a coalition of social conservatives cautiously celebrated an early victory Monday afternoon. Before the Grand Old Party picks its presidential nominee formally, a select set of delegates on the platform committee will spend the week staking out Republican…
Iowa’s human rights agency, in a “clarification,” says it will not muzzle churches that teach on matters of biblical sexuality, nor force them to open single-sex restrooms to members of the opposite sex. The Iowa Civil Rights Commission said it has revised its brochure on “Sexual Orientation & Gender Identity” to state that churches generally are…
Members of Congress from both sides of the aisle are bracing for what is likely to be a contentious hearing Tuesday on Capitol Hill over legislation aimed at protecting individuals and organizations who hold traditional views about marriage and sexuality. The long-awaited hearing, called by Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, will…
U.S. taxpayers provide nearly $400 million a year to a United Nations program that critics say sends anti-Semitic, anti-Israel textbooks to schools for Palestinian refugees. An elementary school textbook calls the 1948 establishment of Israel a “disaster,” and a high school text tells of the “End of Days” when “Muslims fight the Jews,” among other…
Tommy Valentine still lives at home, hasn’t graduated from college yet, and barely looks old enough to buy a beer. But the baby-faced 22-year-old with thick glasses will help plot the course of the Republican Party—and perhaps the direction of national politics. Valentine isn’t just one of Virginia’s 49 delegates to the Republican National Convention….
WARSAW, Poland—Russian aggression, radical Islamist terrorism, the refugee crisis, Brexit, Afghanistan. The list of challenges NATO leaders faced at the biennial summit here over the weekend was diverse, highlighting what some consider to be a post-Cold War moment of truth for the alliance to prove it still matters. Speaking to reporters Saturday, President Barack Obama…
The police department that became the victim of the deadliest attack on American law enforcement officers since 9/11 is known for its innovative, community-focused approach to the job of protecting the public, and enforcing the law. The killing Thursday night of five police officers in Dallas, and the police shootings in Louisiana and Minnesota earlier…
FBI Director James Comey appeared before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Thursday to further detail the FBI’s yearlong investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server and handling of classified information while she was secretary of state. Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, hastily scheduled the hearing just…
The Obama administration’s decision to give up U.S. control of regulating the internet is likely illegal, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said. “The Obama administration does not have the authorization from Congress,” Cruz said Thursday, speaking at a Heritage Foundation event on internet freedom. “And yet they are endeavoring to give away this valuable, critical property….
Resigned to the strong possibility that the House will need to fund the government through a continuing resolution after this fiscal year, conservatives are warning party leaders of what it would take for them to support such a stopgap measure. With the much-hyped regular order appropriations process looking stalled—if not finished—before it really started, conservatives…
Increased Russian aggression will be among the central issues when President Barack Obama attends his final NATO Summit in Warsaw, as the United States and its allies will announce a stronger security presence in the Baltic states. “NATO must be the largest deterrent to Russian meddling,” Thomas Donnelly, a senior fellow in security studies at…
It was a crazy election. One of the candidates for president threw around wildly irresponsible ideas, perhaps for entertainment value, perhaps because he really meant them. He offended many of his countrymen, and generated angst among the country’s closest friends and allies. No one knows what vile thing the former mayor of Davao City, Rodrigo…
An Iowa pastor, saying the government needs to stop “meddling in religious affairs,” is at odds with the state over a law focused on sexual orientation and gender identity that he says hinders his First Amendment right to teach on matters of sexuality. “The state of Iowa is not the self-appointed pope of all churches,”…
President Barack Obama said he won’t withdraw nearly half the remaining U.S. troops in Afghanistan, much less completely withdraw as he originally intended, so the next president will have a stronger hand in a country where American forces have battled the Taliban and al-Qaeda for nearly 15 years. “Today’s decision best positions my successor to…
Another Obamacare co-op, Connecticut’s HealthyCT, is closing its doors, and at least two most could follow suit as the nonprofit insurers decide whether they will be able to remain on firm financial footing. The nine remaining co-ops of the original 23 co-ops must make payments totaling at least $130 million through Obamacare’s risk adjustment program,…
The Senate’s failure to advance legislation to punish “sanctuary” cities has put a spotlight on how local jurisdictions choose to interact with immigration-related requests from the federal government. Despite the Obama administration’s efforts to improve the cooperation between cities and counties, and federal immigration authorities, obstacles to bolstering those ties remain. The legislation that Democrats…
How do you deal with a person who steals thousands of dollars’ worth of your property and hard work, but less than the amount that makes it financially feasible for you to seek damages from them in court? That is the predicament of photographers and visual artists—the story of Kathy Keatley Garvey exemplifies it: She captured…
The 2014 Connecticut governor’s race was decided by about 30,000 votes statewide. Four years earlier, the contest was decided by just about 6,000 votes. So it’s a concern for state Rep. Arthur O’Neill, a Republican, that the Connecticut Department of Motor Vehicles—which recently misidentified more than 50,000 people for having unpaid taxes on their vehicles—will…