Free Republic

The drummer for the jam band Phish has been elected to his Maine town’s Board of Selectmen. Jon Fishman will take a place on Lincolnville’s five-seat board after winning Tuesday’s nonpartisan election. He and his wife, Briar, have five children and have lived in the seaside town for the past decade.

The American Civil Liberties Union launched a vocal opposition this week against a Maine bill criminalizing female genital mutilation (FGM), Mainely Media reports.Republican Rep. Heather Sirocki is sponsoring the bill, saying that it would classify performing FGM as a Class B crime in the state, punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a $20,000 fine. The bill would also punish the parent or guardian of the victim.However, the Maine ACLU staunchly opposes the protection. ACLU spokesman Oamshri Amarasingham said that the risk of mutilation isn’t worth expanding Maine’s criminal code. The Maine Coalition Against Sexual Assault also supported the ACLU, arguing...

The president of Evergreen State College has announced he will comply with the demands of students who protested professor Bret Weinstein, who refused to participate in a campus event where white students and staff were asked to leave school grounds. Although Evergreen President George Bridges announced that progressive professor Bret Weinstein wouldn’t be suspended, Bridges announced that he would comply with the long list of demands that the students brought before him. “I’m George Bridges, I use he/him pronouns,” he began, before stating that he would comply with most of the student protester’s demands. Bridges went as far to say that...

Pennsylvania State Rep. Jamie Santora (R-163) is pushing a ban on private gun sales nearly identical to the ones Michael Bloomberg-funded Moms Demand Action pushed in Washington state, Maine, and Nevada. Santora’s bill would bar the private sales that Americans have enjoyed since the Second Amendment was ratified in 1791 and would require that every sale be processed in front of an agent of the government via a background check. This means that law-abiding Pennsylvanians selling a gun to a fellow hunter, lifelong co-worker, or childhood friend would have to seek out a Federal Firearms License (FFL) holder and the...

PORTLAND, Maine — A judge has blocked state prosecutors’ efforts to reinstate criminal charges against 17 Black Lives Matter protesters who were arrested in Portland last summer and ordered the protesters and Portland police to try again at talking through their differences in a so-called “restorative justice” session. Cumberland County Superior Court Justice Lance Walker’s Tuesday ruling orders protesters and prosecutors to try to fulfill the conditions of a plea deal that broke down earlier this year. The restorative justice agreement called for the protesters to sit down with city police to talk over their differences, to encourage mutual understanding...

A convicted killer, sentenced to life in prison two decades ago, wants his case reviewed. Robert Wayne Lonardo says his lawyer didn't tell him about the possibility of a plea deal. Lonardo was convicted in 1994 of killing Marianne Pembrook in Waterville. Prosecutors say he shot her while he was burglarizing her home. Lonardo's lawyer says his client would have taken the 60-year plea deal if he had known, because he might have been able to get early release. Prosecutors say too much time has passed.

Three Republicans joined Senate Democrats on Wednesday to reject an effort to overturn an Obama administration rule limiting methane emissions from oil and natural gas drilling. Only 49 senators voted to move forward with debate on legislation to undo the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) rule, short of the 51 votes needed.   Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham (S.C.), Susan Collins (Maine) and John McCain (Ariz.) joined all 48 members of the Democratic caucus in rejecting the resolution under the Congressional Review Act (CRA). 

Sen. Susan Collins on Sunday called it a “mistake” for the House Republicans’ health care bill to defund Planned Parenthood. “That is an important issue to me because I don’t think that low-income women should be denied their choice of health care providers for family planning, cancer screenings, some well-women care,” the Maine Republican said on ABC’s “This Week.” “It’s not the only issue in this huge bill, but I certainly think that it’s not fair and it is a mistake to defund Planned Parenthood,” said Ms. Collins. “But it’s one of many issues.” The American Health Care Act, passed...

The Democrat Party held its first Unity Rally in Portland, Maine. DNC Chair Tom Perez and Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders headlined the event. The Socialist crowd cheered loudly for Bernie… But when Tom Perez was mentioned they crowd booed loudly. https://youtu.be/BKCffeFlh5s

The idea of doing away with the Maine Turnpike Authority and eliminating tolls has a long and unsuccessful history through both Democratic and Republican administrations.Gov. Paul LePage revived the concept at a town hall meeting in Gorham on Wednesday night, saying he would like to see the turnpike authority merged with the Maine Department of Transportation and the elimination of almost all tollbooths, having one only in Kittery to collect tolls from out-of-state drivers. “The only toll we should have is for the visitors coming in and out of the state in the summer months,” LePage said, adding that Mainers...

Judge Valerie Stanfill said she didn’t believe Dakota’s new owner, Linda Janeski, had standing to ask that the original judgment that declared Dakota a dangerous dog, and ordered her destroyed within 48 hours, be withdrawn. [Snip] Gov. Paul LePage granted a pardon to Dakota on March 30 after a member of the Humane Society’s board sent him a letter. His news release stated “the dog ought to be provided a full and free pardon.”

A bill that would prohibit discriminating against people based on their beliefs about climate change is up for a hearing in the Maine state capital. Republican Rep. Larry Lockman says his bill would prohibit the state from favoring or penalizing a person based on how they feel about climate change. It's up for a hearing on Thursday before the Legislature's Committee on Judiciary. Lockman says climate change doubters get treated like "heretics'' and they deserve to be protected. He also says his bill would protect people who feel strongly that climate change is real. Democrats and environmental groups in Maine...

Senator Eric Brakey is a resident of Auburn, with five generations of family roots in the town of New Gloucester. He was elected to the Maine State Senate in 2014 at the age of 26, making him the youngest State Senator in the state and in the nation. Senator Brakey received a majority of votes in all five municipalities, making him the only Republican challenger to win a majority in Auburn since Olympia Snowe’s 1976 State Senate race. Senator Brakey is a leader in the state house and serves as the Senate Chairman of the Health and Human Services Committee,...

WASHINGTON—Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) signaled she might vote for the constitutional option to confirm Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, which would make her the second member of the Gang of 14 to do so, and move Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) one vote closer to the 50 that he needs to make it happen. Last week Collins said Gorsuch was “unquestionably qualified” for the Supreme Court, and that by trying to filibuster President Trump’s chosen successor to Antonin Scalia, Senate Democrats were “playing politics with judicial nominees,” damaging the Senate as an institution and in the eyes...

The GOP was forced to keep a procedural vote open for just over an hour after two Republicans senators, Alaska's Lisa Murkowski and Maine's Susan Collins, voted against moving ahead on the measure. During that time, the GOP got Pence to the Senate to break a 50-50 tie and cast the deciding vote. He previously broke a tie on the nomination of Betsy DeVos to be education secretary. A final vote on the bill is expected later Thursday, when Pence's vote likely will be needed again.

Portland officials estimate that more than 100 asylum seekers may be cut off from the state’s General Assistance program after July 1 and question whether the city can step in to help without violating federal law. Immigrants who have come to the United States legally to seek asylum from persecution have long received General Assistance in Portland. But it wasn’t until 2015 that assistance was solidified in Maine law. However, under the new law, asylum seekers can only receive benefits for 24 months. That means some asylum seekers will become ineligible for state assistance during the fiscal year that begins...

A class-action lawsuit about overtime pay for truck drivers hinged entirely on a debate that has bitterly divided friends, families and foes: The dreaded — or totally necessary — Oxford comma, perhaps the most polarizing of punctuation marks. What ensued in The United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, and in a 29-page court decision handed down on Monday, was an exercise in high-stakes grammar pedantry that could cost a dairy company in Portland, Me., an estimated $10 million.

One of the teens charged in an alleged sex assault in Westbrook last month is from Lisbon Falls, according to a report from the Portland Press Herald. The newspaper identified 15-year-old Rick Powers as one of three teens charged with gross sexual assault in the Feb. 5 incident at the Super 8 Motel. Also charged were Ernest Lorange, 16, of Portland, and Garang Majok, 19, of Lewiston.

A coalition of commercial fishing groups filed a lawsuit on Tuesday to challenge the creation of a national monument off the coast of New England. President Barack Obama created the monument in September using executive authority under the Antiquities Act. The monument is called the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, and it is made up of nearly 5,000 square miles of underwater canyons and mountains. The creation of the monument closed the area to most commercial fishing and has been opposed by fishing groups for months. A coalition of the groups filed their lawsuit Tuesday in federal court....

Households in New England paid electricity prices last month that were 47 percent higher than the national average.. Consumer energy information released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics for its Boston region showed the area's households paid an average of 19.5 cents per kilowatt hour for electricity, compared to the national average of 13.3 cents. The region includes Hampden and Worcester counties as well as Greater Boston and parts of New Hampshire, Connecticut and Maine. The figures came out one day after energy utility Eversource proposed a 10 percent increase in its electricity distribution rates beginning early next year. The...