Kaitlyn Budion

1 week ago | mainepublic.org | Kaitlyn Budion

Republican Sen. Susan Collins said she is still evaluating all the provisions in the major spending bill before the Senate. President Donald Trump's "big, beautiful bill" passed in the House last week, but Collins said that the language is not final, and that amendments are likely. "We don't have to pass the same bill that the House passed, and I don't think we should," she said.

2 weeks ago | mainepublic.org | Kaitlyn Budion

Maine organizations researching PFAS are the latest groups to face sudden grant terminations, this time from the Environmental Protection Agency. And while some are appealing those decisions, they say even if funds are reinstated, this has delayed important research into how PFAS moves through the food chain. The EPA has terminated grants for the University of Maine, the Passamaquoddy Tribe at Sipayik, the Mi’kmaq Nation and the Central Aroostook Soil and Water Conservation District.

2 weeks ago | bangordailynews.com | Kaitlyn Budion

Right to repair advocates are calling on state lawmakers to block a bill that they say would gut the 2023 repair law passed by voters. The 2023 ballot initiative passed with 84 percent of the vote and allows independent repair shops and vehicle owners access to wireless diagnostic repair information collected by their car. Without the law, car manufacturers have exclusive access to the information and only share it with contracted repair shops and dealerships.

2 weeks ago | mainepublic.org | Kaitlyn Budion

Maine Audubon said that proposed changes to the Endangered Species Act would harm protected plants and animals across the country and in Maine. The Trump administration has proposed changing the law's definition of "harm" to exclude threats to a species' habitat, focusing only on direct injury or death to a species itself. Laura Minich Zitske, associate director of conservation at Maine Audubon, said that undercuts the effectiveness of the Act.

3 weeks ago | mainepublic.org | Kaitlyn Budion

Democratic state lawmakers are speaking out against proposed federal cuts to Medicaid- known in the state as MaineCare. A group called Protect Our Care said that the proposed cuts could deny health care access to more than 325,000 Mainers, including nearly half of Maine children that are on Medicaid. State Rep. Anne Graham, a retired pediatric nurse practitioner, called the cuts morally indefensible. "These families need MaineCare," she said.