Latest news with #HalRogers
Yahoo
13 hours ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump Administration seeks to rescind $500 million for Eastern Kentucky prison
Federal authorities have asked Congress to cancel $500 million designated to build another large prison in Eastern Kentucky. The U.S. Department of Justice included a request to rescind the funding in its budget request for the upcoming federal fiscal year, which starts in October. The proposed Letcher County prison has been a source of controversy, lauded by supporters as an economic boon for a county hit hard by job losses in the coal industry but decried by opponents as an unnecessary boondoggle. This is not the first time officials have tried to scotch money for the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) project. The administration of President Donald J. Trump tried to cancel it in his first term, and the administration of President Joe Biden did the same. Now Trump's administration is trying again. However, U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, a Republican who represents Eastern and Southern Kentucky and has been a key supporter of the project, has been able to beat back several prior efforts to cancel the funding. Rogers said he's ready to defend the project again. 'The people of Letcher County have invested nearly 20 years of planning and preparation for a new federal prison to bring more than 300 much-needed jobs to our region,' Rogers said in a statement to the Herald-Leader. 'As a senior appropriator, I have helped secure more than half a billion dollars in federal funding that remain available exclusively for this facility, which will help address BOP's need for modernized facilities. 'The proposed prison has surpassed multiple environmental studies and every ounce of red tape that has been doled out. Years of investments have been made in good faith to support this project at the federal, state and local levels, and I will continue working to see it to completion.' There are four federal prisons in the eastern end of the state, in McCreary, Martin, Clay and Boyd counties. The Bureau of Prisons, which is part of the Justice Department, approved building the prison last October after years of study. The agency chose a site at Roxana, about 10 miles from Whitesburg, that was surface mined decades ago, leaving a flat spot atop a steep hill. Developing the site would require extensive excavation and compacting, driving the estimated cost of the project to more than $500 million. The prison would house more than 1,100 prisoners in the main medium-security section and about 250 others in an adjacent minimum-security camp, according to an environmental assessment by the BOP. The prison is projected to employ 300 to 350 people, though in the early years many of those employees would transfer in from other facilities. Those jobs are a key reason many residents support the project. In addition to rescinding $500 million from the Letcher County project, the budget request from the Department of Justice includes rescinding $50 million from a prison project in Kansas and $60 million for a law enforcement training center. Opponents have raised a number of complaints about the proposed Letcher County prison, including that it would perpetuate high rates of incarceration; that it could hinder efforts to attract other kinds of jobs to the county; and that it would damage the environment. 'This prison would be very harmful if built. It would harm my family, our history, our use of the land and our way of life,' Wayne Whitaker, a resident of Letcher County, said Friday in a release from an organization called Building Community, Not Prisons. 'It would also harm the future of Letcher County as a tourist, educational, and recreational destination.' Opponents of the prison bought a parcel of land at the site to try to block the project.
Yahoo
04-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Here's where Laurel, Pulaski County residents can get Social Security card replaced following tornadoes
KENTUCKY (FOX 56)—Tornado survivors in need of a replacement Social Security card will be able to get them on Wednesday and Thursday. Congressman Hal Rogers posted on Facebook around 2 p.m. that the multi-agency recovery centers in Laurel and Pulaski counties would be issuing replacement Social Security cards from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Wednesday and Thursday, June 4 and 5. Here's where Laurel, Pulaski County residents can get Social Security card replaced following tornadoes Second Publix location opens in Lexington Kentucky considers new area code as 502 nears exhaustion The Laurel County Multi-Agency Recovery Center is at the Laurel County Public Library. The Pulaski County Multi-Agency Recovery Center is at the Center for Rural Development in Somerset. Tornado survivors in need of a replacement Social Security card who are unable to get to a recovery center on Wednesday or Thursday can still request a replacement online here. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
02-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Opinion - Medicaid cuts will harm rural Republican communities most
Though President Trump promised a 'big beautiful' budget bill, what narrowly passed the House of Representatives in the early morning hours of May 22 will be anything but a big beautiful win for millions of marginalized Americans, and Medicaid beneficiaries won't be the only ones who feel the pinch. In fact, if passed, this legislation would destabilize the publicly insured and privately insured alike, especially in America's many rural communities. Trump's budget dramatically reduces the robustness of the federal social safety net, on which three in ten Americans (including nearly half of children) rely for critical programs ranging from health care to food security. Most drastically, the bill is set to cut Medicaid by nearly $800 billion over 10 years, add burdensome and ineffective work requirements and kick as many as 13 million people off their health insurance. These cuts will have demonstrably negative consequences for millions of Americans, including those who are not themselves enrolled in Medicaid. The irony is that despite nearly every Republican House member voting for its passage, it is rural, Republican majority communities that will face the most extreme consequences. Nineteen percent of Americans, or over 72 million, are insured by Medicaid and the share of the 66 million rural Americans on Medicaid is even higher at 23 percent. And not only do America's rural communities tend to vote more conservatively, but this is even true of Medicaid beneficiaries, the very people whose health coverage Republican legislators seek to strip away. Survey data from the Cooperative Election Study reveal that the majority of rural Medicaid beneficiaries in Republican states and districts are people who identify as Republicans. This is especially true in Republican congressional districts and states with Republican senators. For example, a majority of residents in districts held by some Republican congressmen — Reps. Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) and David Valadao (R-Calif.) come to mind specifically — are enrolled in Medicaid (54 percent and 64 percent, respectively). About 40 percent of residents of House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) are enrolled in Medicaid. What's more, in most of these cases, the beneficiaries are Republican voters themselves. Meanwhile, in states with two Republican senators like Arkansas and Kentucky, nearly 30 percent of residents are enrolled in Medicaid, and between 40 and 55 percent of Medicaid beneficiaries reside in Republican-leaning rural areas. In each of these instances, survey data from the Kaiser Family Foundation show that the majority of even Republican beneficiaries approve of Medicaid. Not only do 61 percent of Republicans see Medicaid as important to their communities, but 67 percent of Republicans want Congress to preserve or increase Medicaid funding. Political scientist David Mayhew famously argued that members of Congress are single-minded seekers of reelection. Yet even with broad public support for Medicaid and health care's salience in the minds of voters, Republicans' efforts to cut Medicaid would remove health insurance from their own voters. Beyond the effects experienced by enrollees directly, the proposed Medicaid cuts will reverberate throughout and harm all residents of rural communities by undermining the financial security of rural hospitals. According to estimates from the Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform, not only have nearly 200 rural hospitals already closed in the last two decades, but over 300 rural hospitals face 'immediate risk' of closure in the coming years. What's more, the vast majority of these vulnerable hospitals are in Republican majority communities in the Republican states that failed to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. A key reason why these hospitals face closure is due to 'uncompensated care' costs, which accrue when uninsured or underinsured patients seek medical treatment for which they are unable to pay. Not only do rural hospitals experience higher rates of uncompensated care, but it proves more debilitating than in the case of research hospitals, which can steady themselves with higher insurance reimbursement rates and subsidies. Medicaid expansion has proven critical in strengthening these hospitals' financial security, because it drastically decreased the percentage of people showing up at hospitals without health insurance. The result has been that more rural hospitals have been able to remain open. In contrast, roughly 80 percent of rural hospitals that have closed since the passage of the Affordable Care Act have been in the Republican states that failed to expand Medicaid. The economic and health effects of rural hospital closures are catastrophic for all residents of affected communities, regardless of their insurance status. Numerous studies have shown that rural hospital closures lead to significant increases in mortality. Additionally, birthing outcomes and access to obstetric-gynecological care tend to suffer following closures. Many of these negative effects are driven by the drastically increased distances individuals must travel to receive care. When a rural hospital closes, patients are left to travel on average 20 miles farther to receive common health care services, and 40 miles farther for specialized care. That time is precious in the setting of acute health problems. Regardless of one's insurance status or provider, the farther you are from a hospital following a car crash or after a stroke, the worse the consequences. For most closures, Republican voters themselves and those with lower incomes are the people who face the longest distances to care following closures. Cutting Medicaid will only further restrict access to care and worsen health outcomes for rural people, regardless of insurance status. Outside of the immediate health effects, hospitals are typically the largest employers in congressional districts, and that is no less true in rural communities. In fact, the health care sector can supply as many as 10 percent of the jobs in a rural community. While some have argued that rural hospital closures are a symptom of communities' economic decline, their effects are also unmistakable, leading to a marked increase in unemployment and a reduction in residents' average income. In his recent New York Times op-ed, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) argued against Trump's budget. He wrote that while Trump promised to protect working-class tax cuts and social insurance programs such as Medicaid, the 'Wall Street wing' was instead seeking to slash health insurance for the working poor in a manner that he characterized as 'both morally wrong and politically suicidal.' The data are clear and Hawley is correct. Trump's budget will actively harm the health and incomes of rural communities and Republican voters, well beyond those who themselves are enrolled in Medicaid. Michael Shepherd is an assistant professor of Health Management and Policy at the University of Michigan. Miranda Yaver is an assistant professor of Health Policy and Management at the University of Pittsburgh. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Hill
02-06-2025
- Health
- The Hill
Medicaid cuts will harm rural Republican communities most
Though President Trump promised a 'big beautiful' budget bill, what narrowly passed the House of Representatives in the early morning hours of May 22 will be anything but a big beautiful win for millions of marginalized Americans, and Medicaid beneficiaries won't be the only ones who feel the pinch. In fact, if passed, this legislation would destabilize the publicly insured and privately insured alike, especially in America's many rural communities. Trump's budget dramatically reduces the robustness of the federal social safety net, on which three in ten Americans (including nearly half of children) rely for critical programs ranging from health care to food security. Most drastically, the bill is set to cut Medicaid by nearly $800 billion over 10 years, add burdensome and ineffective work requirements and kick as many as 13 million people off their health insurance. These cuts will have demonstrably negative consequences for millions of Americans, including those who are not themselves enrolled in Medicaid. The irony is that despite nearly every Republican House member voting for its passage, it is rural, Republican majority communities that will face the most extreme consequences. Nineteen percent of Americans, or over 72 million, are insured by Medicaid and the share of the 66 million rural Americans on Medicaid is even higher at 23 percent. And not only do America's rural communities tend to vote more conservatively, but this is even true of Medicaid beneficiaries, the very people whose health coverage Republican legislators seek to strip away. Survey data from the Cooperative Election Study reveal that the majority of rural Medicaid beneficiaries in Republican states and districts are people who identify as Republicans. This is especially true in Republican congressional districts and states with Republican senators. For example, a majority of residents in districts held by some Republican congressmen — Reps. Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) and David Valadao (R-Calif.) come to mind specifically — are enrolled in Medicaid (54 percent and 64 percent, respectively). About 40 percent of residents of House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) are enrolled in Medicaid. What's more, in most of these cases, the beneficiaries are Republican voters themselves. Meanwhile, in states with two Republican senators like Arkansas and Kentucky, nearly 30 percent of residents are enrolled in Medicaid, and between 40 and 55 percent of Medicaid beneficiaries reside in Republican-leaning rural areas. In each of these instances, survey data from the Kaiser Family Foundation show that the majority of even Republican beneficiaries approve of Medicaid. Not only do 61 percent of Republicans see Medicaid as important to their communities, but 67 percent of Republicans want Congress to preserve or increase Medicaid funding. Political scientist David Mayhew famously argued that members of Congress are single-minded seekers of reelection. Yet even with broad public support for Medicaid and health care's salience in the minds of voters, Republicans' efforts to cut Medicaid would remove health insurance from their own voters. Beyond the effects experienced by enrollees directly, the proposed Medicaid cuts will reverberate throughout and harm all residents of rural communities by undermining the financial security of rural hospitals. According to estimates from the Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform, not only have nearly 200 rural hospitals already closed in the last two decades, but over 300 rural hospitals face 'immediate risk' of closure in the coming years. What's more, the vast majority of these vulnerable hospitals are in Republican majority communities in the Republican states that failed to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. A key reason why these hospitals face closure is due to 'uncompensated care' costs, which accrue when uninsured or underinsured patients seek medical treatment for which they are unable to pay. Not only do rural hospitals experience higher rates of uncompensated care, but it proves more debilitating than in the case of research hospitals, which can steady themselves with higher insurance reimbursement rates and subsidies. Medicaid expansion has proven critical in strengthening these hospitals' financial security, because it drastically decreased the percentage of people showing up at hospitals without health insurance. The result has been that more rural hospitals have been able to remain open. In contrast, roughly 80 percent of rural hospitals that have closed since the passage of the Affordable Care Act have been in the Republican states that failed to expand Medicaid. The economic and health effects of rural hospital closures are catastrophic for all residents of affected communities, regardless of their insurance status. Numerous studies have shown that rural hospital closures lead to significant increases in mortality. Additionally, birthing outcomes and access to obstetric-gynecological care tend to suffer following closures. Many of these negative effects are driven by the drastically increased distances individuals must travel to receive care. When a rural hospital closes, patients are left to travel on average 20 miles farther to receive common health care services, and 40 miles farther for specialized care. That time is precious in the setting of acute health problems. Regardless of one's insurance status or provider, the farther you are from a hospital following a car crash or after a stroke, the worse the consequences. For most closures, Republican voters themselves and those with lower incomes are the people who face the longest distances to care following closures. Cutting Medicaid will only further restrict access to care and worsen health outcomes for rural people, regardless of insurance status. Outside of the immediate health effects, hospitals are typically the largest employers in congressional districts, and that is no less true in rural communities. In fact, the health care sector can supply as many as 10 percent of the jobs in a rural community. While some have argued that rural hospital closures are a symptom of communities' economic decline, their effects are also unmistakable, leading to a marked increase in unemployment and a reduction in residents' average income. In his recent New York Times op-ed, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) argued against Trump's budget. He wrote that while Trump promised to protect working-class tax cuts and social insurance programs such as Medicaid, the 'Wall Street wing' was instead seeking to slash health insurance for the working poor in a manner that he characterized as 'both morally wrong and politically suicidal.' The data are clear and Hawley is correct. Trump's budget will actively harm the health and incomes of rural communities and Republican voters, well beyond those who themselves are enrolled in Medicaid. Michael Shepherd is an assistant professor of Health Management and Policy at the University of Michigan. Miranda Yaver is an assistant professor of Health Policy and Management at the University of Pittsburgh.
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Daily Weather Update from FOX Weather: Significant tornado threat Monday after weekend storms ravage heartland
Welcome to the Daily Weather Update from FOX Weather. It's Monday, May 19, 2025. Start your day with everything you need to know about today's weather. You can also get a quick briefing of national, regional and local weather whenever you like with the FOX Weather Update podcast. Significant damage was reported in western Kansas early Monday morning after powerful storms produced tornadoes that damaged numerous homes and brought down trees and power lines amid a rare Tornado Emergency. One of the hardest-hit areas appeared to be the city of Plevna, Kansas. The National Weather Service office in Wichita had issued a Tornado Emergency for Plevna, Sylvia and Abbyville early Monday morning. First responders are continuing their heroic recovery efforts to search and clear the countless piles of destroyed homes and businesses in Kentucky and Missouri, days after a disastrous tornado outbreak tore across those states, leaving dozens of people dead. Kentucky suffered widespread damage, especially in London and Somerset. Gov. Andy Beshear said at least 19 people were killed in his state, although Kentucky Rep. Hal Rogers believes that number could be closer to two dozen. At least seven others were also killed in Missouri. The central U.S. will remain under a heightened risk of severe weather on Monday, including parts of tornado-ravaged Missouri, where at least seven people were killed during Friday's outbreak. The FOX Forecast Center warns that a wide region from Kansas and Oklahoma extending into parts of Missouri and Arkansas is expected to experience severe thunderstorms. A concerning Level 4 out of 5 severe weather threat includes major cities like Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Norman and Broken Arrow in Oklahoma, as well as Fort Smith, Arkansas. While all eyes were on Oklahoma and Kansas on Sunday for severe weather, several tornadoes were also reported in eastern Colorado. A massive tornado stopped people in their tracks outside of Denver, just as the twister descended from the clouds. Here are a few more stories you might find interesting. London, Kentucky, tornado survivors piled into bathtubs, emerged to find everything gone Kentucky firefighter likely died shielding wife from catastrophic London tornado: 'Public servant at heart' St. Louis food truck owner killed during storms leaves behind 7 children: 'He always showed up with a hug' Need more weather? Check your local forecast plus 3D radar in the FOX Weather app. You can also watch FOX Weather wherever you go using the FOX Weather app, at or on your favorite streaming service. It's easy to share your weather photos and videos with us. Email them to weather@ or add the hashtag #FOXWeather to your post on your favorite social media article source: Daily Weather Update from FOX Weather: Significant tornado threat Monday after weekend storms ravage heartland
