Family members and advocates rallied over the weekend in Augusta to remember the 15 people who have died in Maine prisons and jails this year and to demand accountability and action from state officials to prevent future tragedies. Advocates pointed out that over 100 people have died in state carceral facilities over the past decade.…
Abortion protections. LGBTQ rights. Equity and inclusion. Affordable housing and childcare. Climate change. Those were among the issues highlighted by youth leaders and activists during a forum Tuesday at which young Mainers asked questions of elected leaders and those seeking state office. The panel was organized by the group Maine Youth Power and co-hosted Maine…
Abortion rights in Maine are on the ballot in November, warned Nicole Clegg of Planned Parenthood Maine Action Fund, which endorsed Democratic incumbent Janet Mills for governor at a rally Wednesday morning. “There is simply too much at stake for the people of Maine,” Clegg said to a crowd in Portland’s Lincoln Park, pledging that…
Activists in Maine protested Saturday outside the Northeast Harbor home of Leonard Leo, the co-chairman of the Federalist Society who has played a leading role in building the conservative Supreme Court majority that recently overturned federal abortion rights. Leo famously developed a list of right-wing jurists that included all three of President Donald Trump’s eventual…
Donald Trump ignored White House staff, family members and outside advisers who urged the president to call off the mob attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, according to testimony before the U.S. House panel investigating the insurrection at its eighth and final hearing of the summer Thursday night. Instead, Trump sat in the…
Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision Friday to overturn Roe v. Wade and reverse nearly 50 years of federal abortion rights, Mainers across the state rallied to protest the ruling and speak out in support of reproductive health care. Close to a thousand people gathered in Portland on Friday as part of a march from…
Hoping to become the first Somali-American elected to the Maine Legislature, Mana Abdi of Lewiston officially launched her campaign Saturday, telling a crowd of over 60 people that she would bring her experience facing and overcoming systemic challenges to the policymaking debate in Augusta. Abdi, 26, is running for House District 95 as a Democrat.…
Maine Democrats finalized their party platform at a convention over the weekend in Bangor, including some progressive policy principles such as the right to health care, housing, food and reproductive freedom but also drawing the ire of youth advocates who pointed out the party’s failure to pass a bill recognizing the sovereignty of the Wabanaki…
Mainers from across the state will travel to Washington, D.C., next month as part of a march to demand that those in power stop ignoring the 140 million poor and low-income people living in the U.S and work with them on a moral agenda of justice and equality. The event, called the “Moral March on…
In April of 1959, former Gov. Paul LePage was just 10 years old. He often describes this time in his life as when he first internalized the saying, “If it is to be, it is up to me.” It’s his personal twist on that silly “bootstrap” mantra Republicans market as at the core of their…