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From our file named "Duh." The Alabama Department of Human Resources says 13 counties that reinitiated a work requirement for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as the food stamp program, saw an 85% drop in recipients. The counties had been exempt from the work requirement due to high levels of unemployment. But with the economy recovering, the state of Alabama restarted the work requirement on January 1 this year, which resulted in the massive drop in SNAP participants. ... Nationwide, there are about 44 million people receiving SNAP benefits at a cost of about $71 billion. The...

A Madison County mail carrier is charged in an animal cruelty case. Madison County Sheriff's deputies charged Susanna Burhans, 47, with aggravated animal cruelty after they say she fed meaty treats with dangerous ingredients to dogs along her route. Ed Glover tells WHNT News 19 Burhans was his mail carrier. He found one of the meatballs on the ground by his mailbox at his New Hope home, and discovered that the meatball was filled with nails. He believes the mail carrier had already fed one to his dog, Missy. He became worried about Missy, and tells us he took her...

If your teenage kids are trying to make some money cutting grass this summer, government is there to ruin it for them. A city ordinance in Gardendale, Ala., requires entrepreneurial teens to show a city-issued business license before they offer their lawn services for some extra summer cash. According to ABC’s Birmingham affiliate, a business license in Gardendale costs $110. Parents are complaining that their kids aren’t making enough money to recoup the cost of the license. "I have never heard of a child cutting grass had to have a business license," said Elton Campbell. Her granddaughter cuts grass around...

The new law attempts to preserve history by making it illegal to remove monuments that have been in place for more than 40 years. The Alabama Memorial Preservation Act of 2017, signed into law Wednesday by Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey (R), protects historical Confederate monuments which have come under fire in recent weeks by Democratic politicians. The new legislation prohibits: The relocation, removal, alteration, renaming, or other disturbance of any architecturally significant building, memorial building, memorial street, or monument located on public property which has been in place for 40 or more years.

Gregg Allman, whose hard-jamming, bluesy sextet the Allman Brothers Band was the pioneering unit in the Southern rock explosion of the ‘70s, died Saturday due to currently unknown causes. He was 69. As recently as April 24, reports surfaced claiming Allman was in hospice. His manager previously denied those reports to Variety, which Allman then substantiated in a Facebook post. However, he had suffered a number of ailments in recent years — including an irregular heartbeat, a respiratory infection, a hernia and a liver transplant — and cancelled many scheduled tour dates in recent months due to undisclosed health reasons.

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey (R) this week signed legislation that will preempt cities and counties from removing monuments to the Confederacy from public property, over the objections of black lawmakers and civil rights groups. The legislation comes after the city of New Orleans removed several statues honoring Confederate figures in recent weeks. The measure’s lead sponsor, state Sen. Gerald Allen (R), said he hoped to end the “wave of political correctness” sweeping the nation. “Where does it end? Are all parts of American history subject to purging, until every Ivy League professor is satisfied and the American story has been...

On Sept. 1, 1864, Union forces under Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, victorious at Jonesborough, burned Atlanta and began the March to the Sea where Sherman's troops looted and pillaged farms and towns all along the 300-mile road to Savannah. Captured in the Confederate defeat at Jonesborough was William Martin Buchanan of Okolona, Mississippi, who was transferred by rail to the Union POW stockade at Camp Douglas, Illinois. By the standards of modernity, my great-grandfather, fighting to prevent the torching of Georgia's capital, was engaged in a criminal and immoral cause. And "Uncle Billy" Sherman was a liberator. Under President Grant,...

Alabama Republican Gov. Kay Ivey signed legislation Wednesday that protects Confederate memorials from removal or modification. Specifically, the law bans the removal or modification of monuments that have been in place for more than 40 years, according to the Associated Press. Schools that have born an individual’s name for more than 40 years can also not be renamed, and a commission must decide whether changes to memorials or schools between 20 and 40 years of age is appropriate. Ivey’s signature comes following the Alabama Senate’s approval of the bill Friday. Republican Sen. Gerald Allen, the sponsor of the bill, blasted...

Republicans in Washington, D.C., are fiercely lining up behind Sen. Luther Strange in this year’s special election to finish the U.S. Senate term of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and the nation’s best known state judge says he is ready to battle big GOP dollars in the primary and defend the Constitution in Washington. Moore finds himself in a crowded field for the GOP nomination. With the filing deadline set for Wednesday, six Republicans are officially in the field. In addition to Judge Moore and Sen. Strange, the most recognizable name is Rep. Mo Brooks, best known for his work in...

Send a Proven Conservative Leader to the Senate Mo Brooks is a proven conservative leader. He's stood up to overspending and bad border policy in Washington at every turn. Now we need you to help him take that fight to the Senate.

Last year, two national insurance companies dropped out of the marketplace in Alabama, leaving just one option for individuals who purchase insurance through the federal exchange set up under Obamacare. Lack of competition in areas with just one or two insurance providers has been linked to higher premiums in a recent study by the Urban Institute. Median benchmark monthly premiums in areas with just one insurance company averaged $451, compared to $270 for areas with six companies or more. Rural areas and Southern states tend to have less competition, according to the study. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Alabama is...

Alabama Rep. Mo Brooks isn't holding back on his feelings about Chelsea Clinton and her reaction to comments he made about healthcare coverage. On Monday, Brooks garnered national attention after he said people who "live good lives" shouldn't have to pay as much for healthcare as others. "Right now, those are the people--who've done things the right way--that are seeing their (health insurance) costs skyrocketing," Brooks said during a CNN interview. Those comments caught Clinton's attention, with the former First Daughter tweeting out a message to the Alabama Republican Tuesday morning.(snip) Speaking to an ABC reporter Tuesday, Brooks said Clinton...

Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore resigned from the bench on Wednesday and announced he is running for the U.S. Senate seat made vacant by Sen. Jeff Sessions' appointment as attorney general of the United States. The state's primaries are scheduled for Aug. 25 and the general election is Dec. 15. In announcing his run, Justice Moore, a West Point graduate and veteran who served in Vietnam, said, “My position has always been God first, family, then country. I think I share and I know I share the vision of our president, Donald Trump, to make America Great Again."...

The National Republican Senatorial Committee, which recruits and defends Republican candidates, could not immediately be reached for comment. But Politico first reported on the NRSC's stance, and it has been republished on political blogs. The NRSC's push to make it more difficult for Strange's opponents to hire political consultants gives the senator a larger advantage in holding on to his seat as the summer's special election looms. "We have made it very clear from the beginning that Sen. Luther Strange would be treated as an incumbent," NRSC spokeswoman Katie Martin told Politico, according to remarks posted the Andalusia Star. "It...

President Trump on Friday is expected to sign an executive order that could open large parts of the Pacific, Arctic and Atlantic oceans to new oil and gas drilling, a prospect that elicited a fierce backlash in California and elsewhere even before details of the order were clear. The move, which is certain to face legal and political challenges, could undo a plan finalized late in President Obama’s second term that sought to limit fossil fuel development and fight climate change by not including new drilling leases off the coast of California or Alaska during the current five-year federal offshore...

A good man has been suspended. Again. Ultimately he’s a victim of judicial activism---of judges making things up from the bench and saying it’s what our Constitution requires. The so-called “Ten Commandments judge,” Roy Moore won election as the chief justice of Alabama for the second time in 2012. Here’s a timeline of his suspension: November 7, 2006. 81 percent of Alabama voters vote on a state constitutional amendment that marriage in that state is one man, one woman. January 11, 2013. Roy S. Moore is sworn in again as Chief Justice. February 3, 2015. Chief Justice Moore wrote a...

The crowd of people throwing their hat into the ring to challenge Sen. Luther Strange to a full term in the U.S. Senate grew by one Wednesday when suspended Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore announced his intention to seek the seat. Moore made his plan official during a Wednesday afternoon news conference on the steps of the Alabama Capitol, also confirming he has submitted paperwork to officially tender his resignation from the bench. It had been rumored for some time that Moore might resign his seat and make a run for either the state's U.S. Senate seat or possibly enter...

The most important special election of the year, and perhaps in recent memory, is about to unfold in the Deep South in just a few months. This election cuts to the core of the divide within the party. What we are lacking in the Republican Party Democrats seek power while Republicans seek office as an end to itself. This is why it’s more important to observe what a candidate is made of rather than what he stands for in the abstract. Judge Roy Moore is everything we say we want and expect in a Republican politician but have become accustomed...

Long a controversial figure, Chief Justice Moore’s colleagues on the high court voted Tuesday to uphold his suspension, finding he tried to thwart the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 ruling recognizing a national right to same-sex marriage. “This was a politically motivated prosecution from the very beginning,” Chief Justice Moore said after a final ruling Tuesday by the other justices on the Supreme Court. “I’ve done my duty under the laws of this state to uphold the sanctity of marriage and the undeniable truth that God ordained marriage between one man and one woman. Mere human judges have no authority to...

In the latest incident of anti-gun hysteria to erupt in a school setting, officials overseeing a school district in Alabama have expelled a 16-year-old girl for an entire year because she had a water gun at school. Prior to her yearlong expulsion, the student, Sara Allena "Laney" Nichols, attended Prattville High School Prattville, a town of 35,229 just northwest of Montgomery. [Snip] Nichols and her mother, Tara Herring, say the teen girl did not bring the water gun to school. Instead, the mother and daughter claim, a male classmate gave Nichols the water gun to Nichols "as a joke."...