June 2025

Attack on public media will hurt Kansas

On May 27, National Public Radio and three public radio stations sued the Trump administration in response to the May 1 executive order that sought to strip public media of its funding in the United States. The NPR lawsuit, filed in the District of Columbia, asserts that Trump’s executive order “violates the expressed will of Congress and the First Amendment’s bedrock guarantees of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of association, and also threatens the existence of a public radio system that millions of Americans across the country rely on for vital news and information.” The 43-page filing pokes holes in Trump’s executive order: a brazen attempt to extinguish public media throughout the country — and harm its audience in Kansas — based on a partisan grudge.

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DIFFERENT STRIPES

Flags of different colors fly side by side on North First Street last week. Pride Month, for people of alternative sexual orientation or identity, began Sunday.

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Kansans without health insurance higher than U.S.

As of 2023, the most recent data available, both Kansas and the United States had historically low rates of people without insurance, 8.3 and 7.9 percent, respectively, since the Affordable Care Act took effect in 2010. But Kansas has not expanded its Medicaid coverage like most other states, and it has made an 11-state shift from having a lower rate of uninsured than the nation to a higher rate.

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