President Donald Trump paved the path for year-round E15 sales this week, but the road ahead is promised to be challenging. The President directed the EPA to move forward with allowing year-round sales, but the National Wildlife Federation says the move is not allowed under the Clean Air Act. Collin O’Mara, president and CEO of the National Wildlife Federation says the action “is simply not legal” and would “accelerate the vast damage to our wildlife habitat.” The Federation is a long-time critic of the Renewable Fuel Standard, and pointed to an Environmental Protection Agency report that they say shows the RFS “was responsible for widespread negative natural resource impacts.” The Federation is one of many organizations considering legal challenges. Ranking House Agriculture Committee Democrat Collin Peterson, like several other ag-lawmakers and farm groups, applauded the announcement. Peterson, however, stated the action “will likely get tied up in the courts,” adding that action by Congress to support the move is “the most reliable avenue to finally getting this done.”
Category: News
Former inmate admits using scissors to attack NE Kan. prison guard
KANSAS CITY, KAN. – A former Kansas inmate was sentenced Wednesday to 15 years in federal prison for attacking a Leavenworth prison guard with a pair of scissors, according to U.S. Attorney Stephen McAllister. The defendant also was ordered to pay $18,692 in restitution.
Richard A. James, Jr., 27, who is in federal custody, pleaded guilty to one count of assaulting a federal officer.
In his plea, he admitted he attacked Joseph Brian Wilson, a unit manager for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons. James admitted he sharpened the ends of a pair of grooming scissors and stabbed Wilson.
Corrections officers had to pull James off Wilson to stop the attack. James later told investigators he wanted a “change of scenery” and hoped he would be moved to another prison because of the attack.
UPDATE: GOP official resigns over social media attack of Kan. congressional candidate
SHAWNEE, Kan. (AP) — A local GOP official has resigned his party post in Kansas after fellow Republicans condemned his social media attack saying a Native American congressional candidate will be “sent back packing to the reservation.”
The Kansas City Star reports that Michael Kalny of suburban Kansas City resigned Wednesday as a Republican precinct committee member.
In his Facebook message, Kalny called Democratic candidate Sharice Davids a “radical socialist kick boxing lesbian Indian.” He sent the message Monday to the president of a local Democratic women’s group.
Davids is an LGBT lawyer and member of the Wisconsin-based Ho-Chunk Nation running against Republican Rep. Kevin Yoder. She also has fought mixed martial arts bouts.
Yoder’s spokesman and the Kansas GOP’s executive director repudiated Kalny’s remarks. Kalny did not return a telephone message seeking comment.
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SHAWNEE, Kan. (AP) — Fellow Republicans are condemning a local GOP official’s social media attack that says a Native American congressional candidate in Kansas would be “sent back packing to the reservation.”
In the same Facebook message, Republican precinct committee member Michael Kalny of suburban Kansas City also called Democratic candidate Sharice Davids a “radical socialist kick boxing lesbian Indian.” He sent the message Monday to the president of a local Democratic women’s group.
Davids is an LGBT lawyer and member of the Wisconsin-based Ho-Chunk Nation running against Republican Rep. Kevin Yoder. She also has fought mixed martial arts bouts.
Yoder’s spokesman and Kansas GOP Executive Director Jim Joice repudiated Kalny’s remarks. Kalny did not return a telephone message Wednesday seeking comment.
ENDORSEMENT ALERT: We are proud to announce that @JoeBiden has endorsed our campaign for Congress! We share a commitment to service & a strong desire to expand the opportunities available to everyone. I look forward to working w/ him to create a better future for #KS03. pic.twitter.com/iOObQciCdf
— Sharice Davids (@sharicedavids) October 9, 2018
It wasn’t clear whether the GOP will sanction Kalny. Precinct committee members are elected in the GOP primary.
Missouri woman sentenced in abandonment death of elderly man
FORSYTH, Mo. (AP) — A southwest Missouri woman who authorities say planned the death of a 72-year-old Missouri man who was left beaten and bound in a vehicle has been sentenced to life in prison.
Forty-year-old Brandy Shaddox, of Hollister, was sentenced Wednesday in the November 2015 death of Larry Adams, of Hollister. Adams died of hypothermia after he was abandoned in a car near Walnut Shade.
Shaddox was sentenced to two life terms plus 39 years on three other charges, all to be served consecutively.
Prosecutors say after Adams was abandoned, Shaddox continued to live in his home, use his vehicle and make purchases with his credit cards.
Earlier this year, 54-year-old Mark Travis Bailey, of Highlandville, was sentenced to 20 years for second-degree murder for his role in Adams’ death.
UPDATE: 1 man has died after small plane flips at Missouri airport
CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. (AP) — Authorities say one of two longtime pilots hurt when a small plane flipped at the Cape Girardeau Regional Airport has died.
The Southeast Missourian reports 74-year-old Lowell Peterson, of Jackson, died from injuries he suffered in the accident Tuesday.
Cape Girardeau police say Peterson and Jack Mehner were the only ones on the plane. The cause of the accident is under investigation. Authorities have not said who was flying the plane.
A message distributed on behalf of the family said Mehner had successful surgery Wednesday on a neck injury.
Both men had extensive piloting experience. Last year, the FAA designated Mehner a “Master Pilot” for exhibiting flying skill for 50 years. He told the newspaper at the time that he and Peterson enjoyed flying an airplane they built together in Peterson’s garage.
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CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. (AP) — Authorities say two longtime pilots were seriously hurt when a small plane flipped at the Cape Girardeau Regional Airport.
Saint Francis Medical Center says Lowell Peterson is hospitalized in critical condition and Jack Mehner in serious condition after Tuesday crash.
It is unclear which man was flying the plane. They were the only people aboard. Cape Girardeau police say the cause of the crash is under investigation.
Last year, the FAA designated Mehner a “Master Pilot” for exhibiting flying skill for 50 years. He told the Southeast Missourian at the time that he and Peterson often enjoyed flying an airplane they had built together in Peterson’s garage.
It is unclear whether that plane was the one they were flying at the time of the crash.
Mo. man gets life sentence for killing over objections of victim’s son
NEOSHO, Mo. (AP) — A Missouri man has been sentenced to life in prison in the killing of an 82-year-old man over the objections of the victim’s son.
Clay Karch says he believes 46-year-old Shannon Hensley is innocent in the 2016 death of his father, Nolan Karch, in Aurora. Clay Karch says it doesn’t serve his father or the community to “send the wrong man to prison.”
Police found items stolen from Karch in Hensley’s camper when they arrested him in January 2017. Hensley says he didn’t have anything to do with the stolen items and blamed the killing on a co-defendant.
Circuit Judge Tim Perigo said he wouldn’t sentence Hensley for first-degree murder, robbery and other charges if he “thought for a second the defendant was innocent.”
UPDATE: Vice President Pence will visit Kansas next week
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Vice President Mike Pence is planning to visit Kansas next week for events to help Republicans Kris Kobach and Steve Watkins in their campaigns for governor and Congress.
Kobach’s campaign says Pence will come Sept. 18 to Wichita for an event to show his support for Kobach, the Kansas secretary of state. Kobach’s campaign said the details still are being worked out.
Watkins’ campaign announced Wednesday that Pence will have a private Sept. 19 fundraiser for the candidate’s campaign in the 2nd Congressional District of eastern Kansas. While the details still are being settled, tickets will start at $250.
Pence’s events will come less than two weeks after President Donald Trump had a rally in Topeka aimed at helping Kobach and Watkins in a state Trump carried easily in 2016.
SEDGWICK COUNTY – Vice President Mike Pence is coming to Kansas to campaign for gubernatorial candidate Kris Kobach.
According to the Kobach campaign, the rally is scheduled for Thursday October 18 in Wichita. The Vice President’s office has not released the exact time or location of the rally.
President Trump held a campaign rally for Kobach and other GOP candidates Saturday in Topeka.
Kobach is in a battle with Democrat Laura Kelly and Independent candidate Greg Orman for governor. The election is November 6.
Missouri woman among 2 dead after head-on Kan. crash
COWLEY COUNTY —Two people died in an accident just before 7:30a.m. Wednesday in Cowley County.
A 1996 Chevy pickup driven by Timothy Call, 22, Cedar Vale, was westbound on Highway 160 near 141st Road, according to a media release from the Cowley County Sheriff’s
The vehicle crossed the center line and struck a 2004 Ford truck driven by Geraldine Patrick, 64, Shell Knob, MO., head-on.
A passenger in the Ford Patricia Blake, 58, Dallas, GA., was pronounced dead at the scene.Patrick was transported to a Wichita hospital where she died. Call was transported to the hospital in Winfield. Authorities released no additional details.
Kansas man catches record trout in Arkansas
BAXTER COUNTY, Arkansas– A Kansas man set a fishing mark that had held for nearly 33 years while making an annual trek with friends to the White River earlier this month.
According to a media release from the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, Mike Bowers of Abilene pulled in a cutthroat trout weighing 10 pounds, 2 ounces. The catch was certified by the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission’s chief of fisheries October 5.
Bowers has fished the area for longer than the record had held and said he makes two or three trips to Arkansas’ northern trout streams each year. He caught the 26-inch-long trout on a No. 15 baitholder hook with salmon eggs in the Norfork Tailwater (North Fork of the White River).
He landed it in front of Gene’s Trout Fishing Resort. At first, he and his fishing partner, Jack Wickersham, thought Bowers had a brown trout on the line before pulling it in and noting the distinctive cutthroat marks. Onlookers at Gene’s sensed it was something special, and the scale on the dock indicated as much.
“Several of them said, ‘That’s a new state record.’ Those guys all started taking pictures and I didn’t know a one of them,” Bowers said. “Guys were coming down to the dock from out of their cabins or floating over there to see it.”
The previous record from the White River was 9 pounds, 9 ounces, set Oct. 6, 1985.
“To be honest, it didn’t fight real hard,” Bowers said. “It was a much older fish, the biologist said, and it was docile. We drifted downstream with it naturally, had the drag out about 70-80 percent, I’d feel the drag and I’d pull it back in.”
The trout was caught during a minimum flow period on the river, about 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 29. Bowers and Wickersham docked immediately to weigh the fish and, knowing it was likely a record-breaker, headed to Mountain Home for official weigh-in with Arkansas Game and Fish Commission fisheries biologists. Christy Graham, the AGFC’s trout management program supervisor, certified the weight.
Graham says the cutthroat was confirmed to be one raised by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Norfork National Fish Hatchery and stocked in either 2008 or 2011 – she said there was no way to confirm which of those years exactly.
Bowers said he plans to have the record fish mounted by a taxidermist with a natural bed mount to resemble the bottom of the Norfork Tailwater. He said he and the 29 other friends from coast-to-coast that were making a long weekend of fishing out of Gene’s Resort for the 18th straight year pride themselves on turning most of their catch back to the river.
He hooked the fish in the mouth and said a pair of forceps could have removed the hook and it could have been released. However, the age of the fish and the stress it seemed to have endured that afternoon, Bowers said, made this one a keeper that many people can marvel at forever. “Surely that’s a once-in-a-lifetime deal,” he said. “It’s a beautiful fish.”
Missouri US Senate candidate cancels event with anti-LGBT pastor
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Missouri has canceled a campaign event with a preacher who once called for government regulation of homosexuality.
Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley was scheduled to appear in Springfield on Wednesday with Texas pastor David Barton.
The newspaper asked the campaign Tuesday whether Hawley agreed with Barton’s views about the LGBT rights movement, which he has compared to Nazism. Hawley spokeswoman Kelli Ford said later Tuesday that the event had been canceled because of a scheduling conflict.
Barton suggested in 2010 that the federal government should regulate homosexuality. And in 2017, he compared LGBT rights activists to Nazis.
Ford didn’t immediately respond to an inquiry from The Associated Press about whether Hawley agrees with Barton. Hawley seeks to unseat Democrat Sen. Claire McCaskill.