7. Municipal run-off election leads to close races and a fired poll worker
- The mayor of Decatur was reelected, a city councilman was obliterated in Huntsville, another city councilman lost in Madison, the mayor of Florence appears to have lost by 11 votes and two separate city councilman kept the seats in Russellville in elections that were decided by two votes as some voters in Alabama returned to the polls to decide who would lead their cities.
- But all did not go smoothly. In Prichard, a poll worker was fired after a citizen reported that the employee was tampering with their ballot. The mayor of Prichard released the following statement: “The poll workers are hired by the Secretary of State and trained accordingly. The incident that occurred this morning was summarily handled and the poll worker was removed per Alabama’s Poll Worker Guidelines. I applaud the entire team from poll workers to poll watchers to law enforcement that efficiently and professionally helped to address the situation.”
6. Ivey asked to pick a different location for prison site
- Governor Kay Ivey previously announced the new proposed sites for three men’s prisons across the state, one of the locations being in Elmore County, but now officials are asking that she reconsider this chosen location.
- Tallassee Mayor John Hammock and county officials have written a letter to Ivey, saying that the site should be pushed to the western part of Elmore County, closer to where two other correctional facilities already are. In the letter, they note the economic benefit of the area and the fact that there’s already state-owned land there.
5. Changes for H-1B visas
- In an attempt to protect American jobs and wages, President Donald Trump’s administration has announced some changes to the H-1B guest worker program. Deputy Secretary of Labor Patrick Pizzella said that “immediate action is needed to guard against the lower cost foreign labor can post to the wellbeing of U.S. workers.”
- The change is in the way the “prevailing wage” is determined, which is what the Department of Labor uses to determine what workers should be paid depending on similar employment. Pizzella described this as “one of the more significant reforms made to the H-1B program in the last 20 years.”
4. Precautions being made for Wednesday VP debate
- The first vice presidential debate is happening Wednesday night, and there have been new precautions put in place by the Commission on Presidential Elections after President Donald Trump’s coronavirus diagnosis and suspicion that he had the virus during the first presidential debate.
- U.S. Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) and Vice President Mike Pence will be spaced at least 12 feet apart, there will be a shield between the candidates, and while they won’t have to wear a mask on stage, they will be tested before they can debate.
3. Increase of teachers seeking retirement
- Since the school year began in the middle of a pandemic, there has been a steep increase in teachers seeking retirement, according to new information put out by the Alabama Teachers Retirement System.
- Retirements in August, September and October of this year have already been much higher than the last two years, with almost twice as many retirements in September than in 2019 and 2018. This is mostly being attributed to health risks and “technology issues,” according to the president of the Central Alabama chapter of the Alabama Federation of Teachers Marrianne Hayward.
2. Brennan briefed Obama on Clinton’s Russia gambit
- In the latest news that shows the media and their Democrats’ Russian collusion narrative was a completely fabricated story, Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe on Tuesday declassified documents that show former CIA Director John Brennan briefed former President Barack Obama on former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s “plan” to distract the American public from the use of her private email server by alleging Russian collusion ahead of the 2016 presidential election.
- The media could not be bothered to cover this, but the notes are believed to reference then-FBI Director James Comey, former National Security Adviser Susan Rice and Obama chief of staff Denis McDonough. It led to an investigative referral on Clinton for allegedly launching the scheme, but it went nowhere and they focused on the Clinton-originated Trump-Russia collusion.
1. No more stimulus talks until after November 3 but…
- President Donald Trump has returned to the White House, and he’s now announced that he’s asking Republicans to halt all negotiations on a coronavirus stimulus package until after the general election, saying that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) isn’t “negotiating in good faith.”
- But that is not the end of the story. Shortly after shutting down the stimulus talks, the president tweeted that he wants to see standalone bills that provide $1,200 stimulus checks to some voters, extend the Paycheck Protection Program and provide relief to airlines with money already approved by Congress.
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