ST. LOUIS (AP) – Three grants worth more than $21 million combined have been awarded for transportation projects in Missouri.

Missouri’s U.S. senators, Republican Roy Blunt and Democrat Claire McCaskill, announced separately Tuesday that the grants were awarded under the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery, or TIGER, program.

The biggest Missouri grant is $10.3 million to the Cortex project in mid-town St. Louis. The money will be used by Metro Transit to build a new MetroLink light rail station.

Another $10 million was awarded to the Missouri Department of Transportation for a new Missouri River Bridge project at the eastern Missouri town of Washington.

The Kansas City Workforce Connex Project is getting $1.2 million.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Democratic candidate Chad Taylor has filed a petition with the Kansas Supreme Court to get his name removed from the Nov. 4 ballot in the U.S. Senate race.

Taylor filed his petition Tuesday, naming Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach as the defendant. Kobach is the state’s chief elections officer and has refused to take Taylor’s name off the ballot even though Taylor has ended his campaign.

Taylor was a candidate against three-term Republican Sen. Pat Roberts, but he announced last week he was ending his campaign in a move that boosted the chances of independent candidate Greg Orman.

Kobach ruled that Taylor failed to comply with state election laws by not stating in his withdrawal letter that he was incapable of fulfilling the duties of the office.

OLATHE, Kan. (AP) — Police in Olathe are seeking witnesses to a confrontation that left an officer with a broken leg.

The police department in the Kansas City suburb says officers responded to a call around 5 p.m. Monday about a man and woman involved in a disturbance at a park. Police say the man tried to leave the scene, then got into a fight with the officer who was injured.

The suspect was booked into the Johnson County Jail. The officer has been placed on medical leave.

Police said Tuesday they want to hear from anyone who saw the altercation.

DONNA CASSATA, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Republican-led House has voted to condemn President Barack Obama for failing to give 30-day notice to Congress about the exchange of American prisoner Bowe Bergdahl for five Taliban leaders.

The vote on Tuesday was 249-163 for the nonbinding resolution.

Democrats label the vote an election-year, partisan attack that is ill-timed considering Obama’s effort to rally support for combatting Islamic State militants.

Republicans insist that Obama clearly violated a law requiring the administration to notify Congress 30 days before transferring prisoners from the Guantanamo Bay prison.

In May, five senior Taliban were released from the U.S. prison in exchange for Bergdahl, a soldier who disappeared from his post in eastern Afghanistan on June 30, 2009.

JIM SALTER, Associated Press

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A federal appeals court has refused to halt the execution of a Missouri inmate, hours before he is scheduled to be put to death.

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ST. LOUIS (AP) — Missouri is preparing to execute a man convicted of killing two people while robbing a Columbia restaurant in 1998.

Earl Ringo Jr. is scheduled to die at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday at the state prison in Bonne Terre. Ringo would be the eighth person put to death in Missouri this year and the 10th since November.

Ringo’s attorneys have filed several court appeals to try to spare his life. One appeal questioned Missouri’s use of the sedative midazolam in the hours prior to executions, claiming it could dull the inmate’s senses to the point that he might not be able to express pain and suffering.

A clemency petition to Gov. Jay Nixon also cites concerns about the fact that Ringo, who is black, was convicted and sentenced by an all-white jury.

 

FORT LEAVENWORTH, Kan. (AP) — Officials at Fort Leavenworth are memorializing the late Missouri congressman Ike Skelton by renaming the northeast Kansas post’s library in his honor.

Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno is scheduled to speak Thursday morning at the naming ceremony for the Ike Skelton Combined Arms Research Library.

Skelton, a Democrat, was elected 17 times to the U.S. House before losing in 2010 to Republican Vicky Hartzler in Missouri’s 4th Congressional District. He chaired the House Armed Services Committee and was considered an astute military historian and a champion of the nation’s servicemen and women.

Skelton died last October at the age of 81.

The 320,000-volume library serves officers and civilians attending the Command and General Staff College and the Army Management Staff College at Fort Leavenworth.

 

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri Republicans are clashing again with Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon on gun legislation.

A vote scheduled for Wednesday could overturn his veto of a bill allowing specially trained teachers to carry guns in school and other residents to openly carry firearms in cities.

A veto override requires a two-thirds majority in both chambers. Republicans control enough seats to make that happen, but they were unsuccessful last year in an attempt to override a more expansive gun measure that sought to nullify some federal gun control laws.

This year’s measure would allow people with concealed gun permits to openly carry firearms, even in cities that have ordinances against that.

It also would create a special training program for school personnel wanting to carry guns in their buildings.

MARK SHERMAN, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Both sides in the gay marriage debate agree on one thing: It’s time for the Supreme Court to settle the matter.

JUAN A. LOZANO, Associated Press

HOUSTON (AP) — The FBI says a U.S. air marshal was attacked with a syringe at a Nigerian airport.