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The logo for Alabama Power, as seen on January 24, 2023. The Alabama Public Service Commission Tuesday approved a solar facility proposal from Alabama Power that will support a data center in Montgomery. (Brian Lyman/Alabama Reflector) The Alabama Public Service Commission Tuesday approved a solar project aimed at supporting a Montgomery data center. Members unanimously approved a certificate of convenience and necessity for Alabama Power’s  “Clearview Ranch Project,” allowing the investor-owned utility to construct a 1,400 acre, 200-megawatt solar photovoltaic generating facility and a 200-megawatt, two-hour duration battery energy storage system in Macon and Bullock counties. The commission also approved an agreement that allows Alabama Power to pass the costs of the solar project to Dotier, a subsidiary of Meta, for a 20-year term. GET THE MORNING HEADLINES. SUBSCRIBE ...

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche walks by reporters at the U.S. Capitol on May 21, 2026. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom) WASHINGTON — U.S. acting Attorney General Todd Blanche was one step closer to permanently leading the Justice Department Tuesday, after two skeptical Senate Judiciary Committee Republicans voted to advance his nomination given Blanche’s signed promise that President Donald Trump’s nearly $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund is dead. Republican Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who had been withholding support for Blanche, voted with other members of the committee along party lines, 12-10, to send Blanche’s nomination to the full Senate. It is unclear how soon the Senate will vote on the confirmation. Blanche, Trump’s former criminal defense lawyer, issued a brief signed statement on social media Sunday night  promising the fund is “rescinded,” and an attached unsigned memo stated the tax immunity deal for Trump, his sons...

A 10-year-old Honduran immigrant who came into the United States as an unaccompanied minor carries her baby cousin on April 25, 2021, after reuniting with extended family in Sellersburg, Indiana. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images) WASHINGTON — More than 20,000 unaccompanied immigrant children Monday lost their legal representation because the Trump administration has not entered into a new agreement to take over their legal services after it let a longstanding contract with a nonprofit expire. Without legal representation, fewer than 10% of immigrant children win the right to remain in the United States while their case goes through immigration court. Immigration attorneys and advocates worry the loss in legal aid will put children on a fast track to deportations. “Right now we’re all in the dark, and the secrecy is a big part of the problem,” said Shaina Aber, the executive director of the Acacia Center for Justice, which previously held the contract that  expired July 31. Th...

A welder works at a Manitou factory in June 2023 at Madison, South Dakota. Labor shortages in North Dakota and South Dakota could be harbingers of a shortage of young people in coming years. (Photo by Joshua Haiar/South Dakota Searchlight) Today’s children could be the first generation since the 1970s to do better than their parents as young workers become more sought after and well paid. They may even see a surplus of housing to make their lives even easier after recent shortages.  An abundance of young workers will turn into an undersupply by 2040, with better pay and a surplus of housing, demographers predict. Immigration and artificial intelligence are wild cards, and young workers will still be saddled with taxes to support aging boomers for a while.  Some states are already seeing a shortage of young workers. North Dakota and South Dakota routinely have twice as many job openings as people looking for work, and those jobs often require physical labor that AI could never re...

The U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., amid fog on Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2024. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom) WASHINGTON — Leaders of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee announced a bipartisan deal over the weekend that would keep the federal government funded through Dec. 11 and pause the Trump administration’s effort to add controversial new criteria for federal grants. The  agreement — which Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins, a Maine Republican, and Vice Chair Patty Murray, a Democrat from Washington state, released Sunday — would avoid an Oct. 1 government shutdown and keep federal spending at current levels, punting debates about full-year spending past the midterm elections. It would also extend authorization for the federal fund for highway and transit. The Senate bill differs considerably from the more partisan stopgap spending measure the House  passed last month, with Republicans providing nearly all the votes in support. The Senate was sched...

Rhode Island Democratic Attorney General Peter Neronha in Providence earlier this year. Rhode Island is one of 25 Democratic-led states that sued the Trump administration over new Medicaid work requirements. (Photo by Christopher Shea/Rhode Island Current) States will have to meet a Jan. 1 deadline to implement new Medicaid work requirements, after a federal judge denied 25 Democratic-led states’ request to pause implementation of the rule. The broad tax and spending law President Donald Trump signed last summer, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, requires states that have expanded Medicaid to cover more adults under the Affordable Care Act — 42  states plus the District of Columbia — to mandate that those adults work, go to school or volunteer for at least 80 hours a month to keep their coverage. On June 29, the Democratic-led states sued the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), taking aim at new federal guidance, p...