AP PA Headlines 6/29/18
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — An architect of Britain’s vote to leave the European Union is coming to Pennsylvania to raise money for Republican U.S. Senate candidate Lou Barletta. Barletta’s campaign said Thursday that Nigel Farage is a friend of one of the hosts and has never met Barletta. The men have at least one thing in common: they are staunch allies of President Donald Trump.
Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant also is expected to speak at the July 20 event at a private residence near Wilkes-Barre. Barletta is challenging two-term Democratic Sen. Bob Casey in November’s election. No independent poll puts Barletta within striking distance of Casey. Farage formerly headed the UK Independence Party and remains a member of European Parliament. He also campaigned for the GOP’s failed Senate candidate in Alabama, Roy Moore.
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Gov. Tom Wolf is raising the minimum wage for a second time for Pennsylvania government employees and contractors under his jurisdiction. Wolf on Thursday signed an executive order increasing it to $12 an hour starting Sunday. It orders an annual boost of 50 cents-an-hour until it reaches $15 in 2024. The administration says wages will rise immediately for 879 employees.
Wolf raised the minimum wage to $10.15 in 2016, which was expected to benefit a few hundred state employees. Ensuing governors could undo the order. Wolf’s term ends in January and he’s seeking a second four-year term against Republican Scott Wagner in November’s election. Pennsylvania’s wages are set at the decade-old federal minimum of $7.25 an hour, like 20 other states, and the Republican-controlled Legislature has rejected Wolf’s overtures to raise it.
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A new Pennsylvania law automatically seals lower-level, nonviolent crimes from public review after 10 years, a change designed to lessen the stigma for people seeking jobs or housing.
The so-called “clean slate” legislation that was signed Thursday by Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf also seals records of arrests that didn’t result in convictions.
The law doesn’t expunge convictions, and after they’re sealed the convictions are still available to police, courts and prosecutors. A provision expressly allows those with sealed records who are asked about them to “respond as if the offense did not occur,” although there are exceptions that include criminal justice agencies. The misdemeanor records will be automatically sealed if the defendant has gone a decade without a new conviction.
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Pennsylvania’s 13 licensed casinos are telling the Wolf administration Pennsylvania’s new iLottery online games violate state law and warning they plan to take action if they aren’t stopped. The casinos wrote Revenue Secretary Daniel Hassell Wednesday to argue the games , which mimic slot machines, violate the law passed last year authorizing them.
A Revenue Department spokesman says the agency is reviewing the letter and expects to comment about it later. The casinos say they want the current iLottery games halted by Tuesday or they will “consider all actions” available to them. Casinos expressed concerns about the games infringing on their business when the law was being debated last year. The iLottery games began several weeks ago, with prizes up to $250,000 and plays costing as little as a penny.
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A former Pennsylvania state lawmaker has been sentenced to seven months in federal prison for her role in a money laundering scheme. Former state Rep. Leslie Acosta was forced to resign in 2016 after her state House colleagues discovered she had run for re-election and won despite secretly pleading guilty that year to a felony crime.
The Philadelphia Inquirer reports the Democrat told a judge at Thursday’s sentencing she knows what she did was wrong. The judge credited her cooperation with the feds in pursuing a case against another politician, Renee Tartaglione. Tartaglione was convicted last year of defrauding a nonprofit mental health clinic out of about $1 million for her personal benefit through a pattern of self-dealing when she was its landlord.
Acosta could have faced more than three years in prison.
Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved
Features
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — As an actress, Cynthia Nixon is used to drawing on the experiences of others to inspire her performances. And now that she’s in the world of politics, the former “Sex and the City” star is looking to Tuesday’s primary election results as motivation in her quest to be governor of New York State. Nixon says she believes Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s long-shot win in the Democratic congressional primary in New York is a big deal. Like Ocasio-Cortez, Nixon is considered a longshot in her effort to unseat two-term incumbent governor Andrew Cuomo in September’s Democratic primary.
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A Missouri man is suing his state representative after being blocked by her Twitter account in a case reminiscent of a recent ruling against President Donald Trump. The lawsuit was filed Wednesday in federal court on behalf of Mike Campbell, a personal injury lawyer living in Centralia. He was blocked from Republican Rep. Cheri Toalson Reisch’s account after he retweeted another state representative who criticized her. The lawsuit argues that Twitter is a public forum and blocking constituents because of their political views violates their First Amendment rights. Other officials around the country are being sued on similar grounds. A federal judge ruled in May that Trump violated the First Amendment when he blocked critics on Twitter.
PHOENIX (AP) — First lady Melania Trump made a second visit to a border state Thursday, meeting face to face with people directly affected by her husband’s hard-line immigration policies. This time, she chose less controversial apparel than her last trip, which was overshadowed by a jacket. “I’m here to support you and give my help, whatever I can” on “behalf of children and the families,” Mrs. Trump said as she sat down with officials at a U.S. Border Patrol facility in Tucson, Arizona, the first stop of her trip.
She later traveled to Phoenix, where she visited a complex that is housing dozens of migrant children separated from their parents. It was the first lady’s second trip to a border state amid an ongoing outcry over President Donald Trump’s now-suspended policy of separating migrant children from their families when they cross the border illegally. Many were placed hundreds of miles away from one another and have been struggling to be reunited.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Alec Baldwin is calling for citizens to support and for Congress to protect special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into the 2016 election. The actor, known for portraying President Donald Trump on “Saturday Night Live,” appears as himself in a video billed as an op-ed piece launched by Trump Crimes Watch. In the video, Baldwin points out guilty pleas stemming from the yearlong probe.
The campaign is coordinated by groups including We Stand United, Public Citizen, The Loyal Opposition and Stand Up America. Trump and his legal team have repeatedly attacked Mueller’s investigation as overly broad.
Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani has said the president might pardon those ensnared in the Russia investigation once Mueller is finished, if he believes they were treated “unfairly.”
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Cyndi Lauper is spearheading research into how state governments deal with youth homelessness — especially for LGBTQ youth. Lauper’s True Colors Fund released a report Thursday measuring how each state holds up on providing services such as housing and mental health for homeless youth. It finds that even the states with the best rankings — Washington, Massachusetts, California and Connecticut — scored less than 70 on a scale of 100 points.
The rankings consider whether states have mental health counseling and services aimed at transgender youth, including hormone therapy. The survey contains data collected in a partnership with the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. Lauper is best known for her hit songs “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” and “Time After Time.” Lauper founded the True Colors Fund in 2008. The fund provides support for services providers as well as outreach and advocacy for homeless youth.
Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved
Sports, Scores & Skeds
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Aaron Nola won his 10th game of the season, Rhys Hoskins homered and the Philadelphia Phillies beat the Washington Nationals 4-3. Hoskins hit a two-run shot in the seventh for his 13th homer of the year. That gave the Phillies a 4-1 lead on the way to climbing within two games of idle Atlanta for first place the NL East. Nola hasn’t lost in six turns since May 26.
The Phillies have won 11 of 17 since Hoskins returned from the disabled list and are 41-29 overall in the games he’s played in. This Phillies game, and all of the Phillies games (including the post season!) are on Newsradio 1070AM, while our normal programming (CBS Sportsradio, CBS News and AccuWeather) continue at WKOK.com.
Here are the scores from yesterday’s sports events:
———
AMERICAN LEAGUE
Final Oakland 4 Detroit 2
Final Minnesota 2 Chi White Sox 1, 13 Innings
Final Seattle 4 Baltimore 2, 10 Innings
Final Houston 1 Tampa Bay 0
Final Boston 4 L-A Angels 2
———
NATIONAL LEAGUE
Final Arizona 4 Miami 0
Final Chi Cubs 11 L-A Dodgers 5
Final Colorado 9 San Francisco 8
Final Philadelphia 4 Washington 3
Final Milwaukee 6 Cincinnati 4
———
WOMEN’S NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Final Washington 80 N-Y Liberty 77
Final Seattle 81 L.A. Sparks 72
TODAY’S SPORTS SCHEDULE
———
INTERLEAGUE
Minnesota at Chi Cubs 5:05 p.m.
———
AMERICAN LEAGUE
L-A Angels at Baltimore 7:05 p.m.
Boston at N-Y Yankees 7:05 p.m.
Detroit at Toronto 7:07 p.m.
Houston at Tampa Bay 7:10 p.m.
Chi White Sox at Texas 8:05 p.m.
Cleveland at Oakland 10:05 p.m.
Kansas City at Seattle 10:10 p.m.
———
NATIONAL LEAGUE
Washington at Philadelphia 7:05 p.m.
N-Y Mets at Miami 7:10 p.m.
Milwaukee at Cincinnati 7:10 p.m.
Atlanta at St. Louis 8:15 p.m.
San Francisco at Arizona 9:40 p.m.
Colorado at L-A Dodgers 10:10 p.m.
Pittsburgh at San Diego 10:10 p.m.
———
WOMEN’S NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Phoenix at Indiana 7:00 p.m.
Chicago at N-Y Liberty 7:30 p.m.
Atlanta at Minnesota 8:00 p.m.
L.A. Sparks at Las Vegas 10:30 p.m.
Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved
