At approximately 3:30 p.m. on Friday, October 20th, news broke of Tax Commissioner Ryan Rauschenberger’s charge for driving under the influence. The news became public three weeks after the occurrence in what is termed a “Friday news dump.” A “Friday news dump” is when someone releases information that is less than flattering and is usually published […]
This morning the Grand Forks Herald published an interesting editorial about paid and unpaid internships in Congress. In it, they make the argument that internships should be paid because it costs these young adults about $6,000 in expenses to take the job. As a former Congressional intern, I completely agree. I was grateful to earn a […]
On October 15th, CBS “60 Minutes” aired an in-depth investigative report about the DEA, Congress, and the growing opioid crisis. The report rightly caused outrage among viewers and forced those involved to answer to the claims aired. Two days later on October 17th, one of the key Congressional figures in the report stepped down from […]
Congressman Kevin Cramer’s fundraising continues to plummet in 2017. As an incumbent, Cramer only raised $103,325 in the third quarter of this year. This is down from the second quarter where he raised $226,274.51 and quarter one where he raised $322,390.30. The slow fundraising leaves Cramer with $824,008 cash-on-hand according to his FEC report. You can view […]
Late last night President Trump, in his continued attempt to undermine insurance markets, decided to end the cost-sharing reductions (CSR) to insurance companies. The subsidies are to help low-income consumers with out-of-pocket costs. The late-night decision to destabilize markets comes down after many of the insurance companies have set their rates for the next year. The […]
According to a spokesperson, Sen. Heidi Heitkamp raised $1,038,434.65 and now has $3,760,739.79 cash on hand. This continues Heitkamp’s streak of out-raising any North Dakota U.S. Senate candidate during an off year. In fact, she raised almost twice as much as any other North Dakota U.S. Senate candidate in the third quarter of an off year before the […]
Here they go again. Governor Doug Burgum and Senator John Hoeven hosted a meeting in North Dakota and then closed the doors behind them. They banned the public and press from attending. The meeting was about the Fargo-Moorhead Diversion which happens to be the largest and most expensive infrastructure project in the state. Not only […]
The former CEO of Equifax, Richard Smith, had a tough week. Smith faced Congress to explain how in the world 145 million Americans’ personal information was compromised on his watch. His answer, blame it on one guy who was supposed to update software. U.S. Senator Al Franken was unimpressed with the answer and joined me […]
The Fargo-Moorhead Diversion debate has been ongoing for at least six years. Six years of heated back and forth, and we’re just now getting together? Six years of demonizing neighbors of differing interests, and now people are trying to get together and act in good faith? Six years and hundreds of millions of dollars spent, […]
In a Friday afternoon “news dump” Tom Price resigned from leading The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The resignation came after mounting public outrage at Price’s wasting of tax dollars on private jets. The next day, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) funding expired leaving an estimated nine million children in limbo. Another […]