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Alabama schedules March execution for Charles Lee Burton

Gov. Kay Ivey Thursday set the execution for Charles Lee Burton for March 12. He was convicted in 1992 of the capital murder of Doug Battle in 1991. If the execution goes forward, Osgood will be the first person put to death by the state of Alabama this year. (Alabama Department of Corrections) Gov. Kay Ivey Thursday scheduled a March 12 execution of Charles Lee Burton for his role in the death of Doug Battle. The execution of Burton, 75, would be the first of the year. Alabama carried out five executions in 2025, tied for the second-highest next to Florida , which carried out 19 executions. The state plans to carry out the execution by nitrogen gas. According to court documents, Burton and five other people entered an Auto Zone in Talladega in August 1991 with the intention of robbing the store. Battle was shot and killed during the robbery attempt. Burton did not shoot Battle. Derrick DeBruce, the man convicted of shooting Battle, had his sentence reduced to life without parole ...

US Senate Republicans block attempt to sue Trump administration over Epstein files

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer speaks to reporters at the U.S. Capitol on June 17, 2025. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom) WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans blocked a Democratic proposal Thursday to sue the Trump administration over allegations that it did not fully release the Epstein files, as mandated under a law unanimously approved by senators and signed by the president nearly three months ago. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., asked for unanimous consent on a resolution compelling the Republican-led Senate to challenge President Donald Trump in court to release more records from the government’s investigation into convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, who died in 2019 awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges. Department of Justice Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, Trump’s former personal defense attorney, said Jan. 30 that the department had finished complying with the new law after a final release of 3 million pages, con...

Alabama Legislature sends bill extending death penalty to child sexual assault to Gov. Kay Ivey

Sen. April Weaver, R-Alabaster, walks to her seat in the Alabama Senate on May 1, 2025 at the Alabama Statehouse in Montgomery, Alabama. The Senate passed HB 41, sponsored by Rep. Matt Simpson, R-Daphne, which Weaver carried in the Senate, that extends the death penalty to those convicted of child sexual assault. (Brian Lyman/Alabama Reflector) The Alabama Senate gave final approval to a bill Thursday that would allow prosecutors to seek the death penalty for those convicted of sexual assault of a child under the age of 12, setting up a possible court battle over its constitutionality. HB 41 , sponsored by Rep. Matt Simpson, R-Daphne, passed the Senate 33-1 with no changes. It goes to Gov. Kay Ivey. Sen. April Weaver, R-Hoover, who sponsored the Senate version of the legislation, cited the discovery of a child sex trafficking ring last summer in Bibb County, in her district. GET THE MORNING HEADLINES. SUBSCRIBE “I believe child sexual abuses like this de...

Alabama plans to spend $203 million federal grant on rural health, workforce

ADECA Director Kenneth Boswell speaking to lawmakers about the Rural Health Transformation Program on Feb. 4, 2026, in the Alabama State House in Montgomery, Alabama. Boswell said that for the federal grant to be "transformational" and sustainable, the state, hospitals and physicians will have to think outside the box. (Anna Barrett/Alabama Reflector) A state official Wednesday briefed lawmakers on the state’s plans to spend just over $200 million in federal grants meant to partially offset Medicaid cuts , mostly on rural health and workforce. Kenneth Boswell, director of the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs (ADECA), told a group of lawmakers that make up the Alabama Rural Health Transformation Advisory Group the distribution of the awarded funds between the 11 initiatives the state submitted in its November application. The state will receive $203.4 million from the program , part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) that was signed into law...

House committee passes bill allowing public K-12 schools to have volunteer chaplains

Rep. Mark Gidley, R-Hokes Bluff, listens during a session of the Alabama House of Representatives on Tuesday, March 14, 2023. An Alabama House committee Wednesday approved a bill sponsored by Gidley that would allow chaplains in K-12 schools. (Stew Milne for Alabama Reflector) An Alabama House Committee passed a bill that would allow local school boards to allow chaplains in public K-12 schools . HB 8 , sponsored by Rep. Mark Gidley, R-Hokes Bluff, is the latest iteration of legislation filed for the past several years in the Alabama Legislature. The bill would allow but not mandate schools boards to vote on authorizing chaplains. “This bill does not require a school board to adopt this. It just requires them to make a decision,” Gidley told the House Education Policy Committee Wednesday. GET THE MORNING HEADLINES. SUBSCRIBE Gidley said the bill would help teachers that have “a lot of stress and anxiety that may not feel comfortable going to some of their peers.” Un...

Top Dems in Congress list ICE constraints they want in funding bill

A demonstrator waves a red cloth as hundreds gather after ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot and killed Renee Good through her car window Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2026 near Portland Avenue South and East 34th Street in Minneapolis. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer) WASHINGTON — The top two Democrats in Congress on Wednesday outlined their proposal for restrictions on immigration enforcement, including body cameras and a ban on masks, though they had no details to share about when actual negotiations would begin. Lawmakers from both political parties have less than two weeks to find a solution before the stopgap law funding the Department of Homeland Security expires Feb. 13, which could force all of its components, including the Coast Guard and Federal Emergency Management Agency, into a shutdown. However, Immigration and Customs Enforcement still has access to $75 billion in funding included in the massive tax cuts and spending package signed into law last year. House Minority L...