Vermont news

• Sen. Patrick Leahy statement on election security grants

  07-08-2018 20:00 via vtdigger.org
  News Release — Sen. Patrick LeahyJuly 23, 2018
  Press Contact:David Carle(202) 224-3693
  Remarks Of Senator Patrick Leahy, Vice Chairman, Senate Appropriations Committee, Supporting Appropriations Amendment On State Election Security GrantsSenate Floor
  July 23, 2018I come to the floor today to talk about an amendment I will be offering that provides $250 million dollars for State Election Security Grants to protect our upcoming elections from attacks by Russia and other hostile foreign power
  
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• Jordana Churchill and Kate Paarlberg-Kvam: You don’t get to choose the facts 

  19-02-2026 23:23 via vtdigger.org
  This letter is from Jordana Churchill, an educator and member of the Vermont Coalition for Palestinian Liberation, and Kate Paarlberg-Kvam, who has spent time in the West Bank as a human rights observer.Dear Editor,As Vermonters, we write to agree with the title of Mark Treinkman’s recent opinion piece. Facts do matter in Vermont’s discourse about the actions of the State of Israel.As people of conscience whose tax dollars and elected officials have made these actions possible, the
  
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• Poultney man charged with first-degree murder in deadly quarry beating

  19-02-2026 22:56 via vtdigger.org
  RUTLAND — Two men have been arrested in a monthslong investigation into the beating death of a Rutland County man at a West Pawlet quarry, with one of the suspects facing a charge of first-degree murder.Court records made public following the arrests over the past week show that police say the beating stemmed from a drug robbery turned deadly on the quarry property where the man who was killed lived in a camper and worked for over 20 years. Richard Mattison, 42, of Poultney, pleaded
  
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• Former Caledonia County victim’s advocate charged with sexually exploiting crime victim

  19-02-2026 19:28 via vtdigger.org
  Vermont State Police cruiserThe Vermont State Police arrested on Thursday a former Caledonia County victim’s advocate on charges he used his position to sexually exploit a crime victim and then tried to cover it up.State Police say that last May, Anthony Jackson-Miller, 39, allegedly entered into a sexual relationship with a victim he was assigned to represent and then took steps to cover up that relationship. At the time, he was employed by the Caledonia County State’s Attorney&rsq
  
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• Beta Technologies board member resigns after appearance in Epstein files

  19-02-2026 18:21 via vtdigger.org
  Dean Kamen. Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/APTheo Wells-Spackman is a Report for America corps member who reports for VTDigger.Dean Kamen resigned from the Beta Technologies board of directors Wednesday, following revelations surrounding his relationship with Jeffery Epstein.“Dean Kamen has voluntarily stepped down,” read a statement from the South Burlington-based electric airplane company in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Thursday morning. “
  
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• Vermont legislators elect Henry ‘Hank’ Harder to lead state’s National Guard

  19-02-2026 17:53 via vtdigger.org
  Hank Harder, a retired general and candidate to be the next Adjutant General of the Vermont National Guard, speaks before a joint meeting of the House and Senate government operations committees at the Statehouse in Montpelier on Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerMONTPELIER — Henry “Hank” Harder was elected to serve as the next leader of the Vermont National Guard on Thursday by the state House and Senate. Harder is a retired Air National Guard genera
  
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• Bernie heads to California to talk AI with tech leaders

  19-02-2026 16:45 via vtdigger.org
  U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, speaks during a press conference with U.S. Senator Peter Welch, D-Vermont,at the Statehouse in Montpelier on Friday, February 6, 2026. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerThis story was produced in partnership with NOTUS, a publication from the nonprofit, nonpartisan Allbritton Journalism Institute. VTDigger has partnered with NOTUS to cover federal actions affecting Vermont.U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt, is in California this week during the Senate’s r
  
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• Peggy Stevens: Keep poison out of our water

  19-02-2026 12:00 via vtdigger.org
  Dear Editor,H.652, a bill banning landfill leachate disposal in the Lake Memphremagog watershed, is an important piece of legislation. Sponsored by Reps. Woodman Page, R-Newport City, and Larry Labor, R-Morgan, and co-sponsored by 19 bipartisan representatives — Republicans, Democrats, Progressives and Independents — the bill would prohibit the disposal of landfill leachate, treated or not, anywhere in the Memphremagog watershed. The current experimental leachate treatment
  
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• Vermont’s county fairs are thriving. Now they worry updated water rules could threaten that.

  19-02-2026 00:30 via vtdigger.org
  The 4-day-long Tunbridge World’s Fair’s first day on Thursday, September 11, 2025. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerNine million dollars: That’s how much Vermont’s county fairs bring in, Vermont Farm Bureau lobbyist Jackie Folsom told the Senate Institutions Committee Wednesday afternoon. That’s a whole lot of creemees. It’s such an influx of cash that, in Bondville, fairgoers completely wipe out the two local ATMs and organizers have had to import two add
  
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• How the Rev. Jesse Jackson helped shape Vermont’s progressive moment

  19-02-2026 00:04 via vtdigger.org
  Presidential candidate Jesse Jackson speaks in St. Albans during a 1984 bus tour of the state. Photo by Glenn Russell“We are nothing, here in Vermont, if not tenacious.” So began a letter to the Rev. Jesse Jackson from Ellen David Friedman, then-committee member of the Rainbow Coalition of Vermont, asking him — for the second time — to visit the state for his 1988 presidential campaign. Jackson eventually agreed, speaking in Montpelier in December 1987, and at
  
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• How the Rev. Jesse Jackson helped shape the Vermont’s progressive moment

  19-02-2026 00:04 via vtdigger.org
  Presidential candidate Jesse Jackson speaks in St. Albans during a 1984 bus tour of the state. Photo by Glenn Russell“We are nothing, here in Vermont, if not tenacious.” So began a letter to the Rev. Jesse Jackson from Ellen David Friedman, then-committee member of the Rainbow Coalition of Vermont, asking him — for the second time — to visit the state for his 1988 presidential campaign. Jackson eventually agreed, speaking in Montpelier in December 1987, and at
  
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• Lawrence Ross Simmons

  18-02-2026 23:42 via vtdigger.org
  Born: July 22, 1943Kenmore, New York
  Died: Feb. 16 2026Colchester, VermontDetails of service:
  There is no service planned at this time.Lawrence Ross Simmons of Jericho, Vermont, died on Feb. 16, 2026, from complications related to Crohn’s disease. He is survived by his wife of 65 years Marjorie Lynde Simmons; daughter Lori Hollander; brother David and sister-in-law Pam and their daughters Lauren Gray and Megan O’Donnoghue; sister-in-law Sue Simmons, her son Drew Simmons and daughter
  
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• Senator’s school consolidation proposal would allow 2-year period for voluntary mergers

  18-02-2026 23:17 via vtdigger.org
  Sen. Seth Bongartz, D-Bennington, waits for the Senate to convene at the Statehouse in Montpelier on Monday, June 16, 2025. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerSen. Seth Bongartz, D-Bennington, the Senate Education Committee chair, introduced a school consolidation proposal Tuesday that would create a two-year on-ramp period for school districts to voluntarily merge.Bongartz’s map overlays 11 new supervisory unions over the state’s existing supervisory unions, and seeks to halve the stat
  
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• MaryDiane Baker: No war vote, no Guard

  18-02-2026 22:50 via vtdigger.org
  Dear Editor,There’s a bipartisan state-level effort in the Vermont House for the Defend the Guard Act, H.355. This bill declares that our Guard can only be deployed to participate in an armed conflict when the U.S. Congress has used its constitutional power to declare war. This power resides solely with Congress, not the White House. Two recent events bring this to the forefront and underscore the need to pass H.355 now. The White House deployed Vermont Air National Guard units to Pu
  
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• Can Vermont lawmakers ease the housing crisis by helping renters — and also landlords?

  18-02-2026 22:20 via vtdigger.org
  Tenant Nora Aronds outside her home in Burlington on Monday, February 16, 2026. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerThis story, by Report for America corps member Carly Berlin, was produced through a partnership between VTDigger and Vermont Public.Each time the nonrenewal notice came, Nora Aronds felt the same sinking feeling. The 29-year-old social services worker has lived in seven Burlington apartments in the nearly eight years since she graduated from the University of Vermont. Three of tho
  
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• Samantha’s road to a brighter future

  18-02-2026 16:32 via vtdigger.org
  Samantha’s been behind the wheel since she graduated from high school. First for her own small business, Little Taxi LLC in Franklin County, and later for Special Services Transportation Agency (SSTA), she drives those who don’t or can’t drive from here to there and back again—to medical appointments, the grocery store, or the pharmacy. Several years ago, Samantha was struggling with a tough relationship, parenting, and her own health. She was sinking into mental he
  
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• Vermont-schooled Mikaela Shiffrin wins gold, Ben Ogden a second silver in Olympic skiing

  18-02-2026 15:32 via vtdigger.org
  Mikaela Shiffrin celebrates winning a gold medal Wednesday in the women’s Alpine slalom at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy. Photo by Jacquelyn Martin/Associated PressThe Green Mountain State has two more winners at the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Games in Italy.Vermont-schooled skier Mikaela Shiffrin continued her redemption tour after a 2024 crash at the Killington World Cup by winning gold Wednesday in the women’s slalom.Shiffrin, a 30-year-old Burke Mountain Academy graduate, is
  
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• Dana Fowler: Wake boats shouldn’t push others off the water

  18-02-2026 12:00 via vtdigger.org
  The Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) is in the middle of yet another rulemaking process, proposing to revise its Use of Public Waters Rules as they relate to wakesports on Vermont’s inland lakes. I thought we had finished this process two years ago, and yet here we go again. As the DEC has reopened the process, wakesports proponents have mobilized to prevent any changes to the rules the DEC adopted in 2024. They have brought in a lobbyist, boating industry repre
  
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• It’s not just state government facing transportation funding challenges. Ask Morristown.

  18-02-2026 00:30 via vtdigger.org
  Catlin and Keshia Passonno, who are married, remove line striping targets along South Street in Woodstock on July 7, 2021. The street was recently resurfaced as part of the town’s paving project.Photo by Jennifer Hauck/Valley NewsIt’s common sense that changing your oil is more cost-effective than waiting for your engine to seize and replacing it wholesale. So why do we handle roads differently? That was the metaphor Jordan St. Onge, Morristown’s highway superintendent, u
  
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• Vermont skier Mac Forehand wins Olympic silver in big air 

  18-02-2026 00:20 via vtdigger.org
  Vermont skier Mac Forehand celebrates his silver medal Tuesday in the men’s freestyle big air finals at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy. Photo by Lindsey Wasson/Associated PressVermont skier Mac Forehand, offering what the New York Times deemed “a sport-defining performance,” won a silver medal Tuesday in the big air event at the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics.The 24-year-old Stratton Mountain School graduate from Winhall has a history of amazing spectators each time he
  
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• Mike Fry: The naked truth about Vermont’s nudity bill

  17-02-2026 23:47 via vtdigger.org
  The Vermont legislators who introduced H.683 have the best of intentions, no doubt. If passed, the bill would make public nudity throughout Vermont illegal — as it already is in Burlington — and punishable by a $500 fine. But it wouldn’t solve any real-world problems, and would exacerbate the scourge of body shaming, which is associated with issues like low self-esteem, anxiety, depression, eating disorders, body dysmorphic disorders and many other challenges. That is one
  
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• Allen Gilbert: Police shootings are rising — again

  17-02-2026 23:43 via vtdigger.org
  This commentary is by Allen Gilbert, a former journalist, teacher and executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in Vermont. In 2014, when I worked at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), I was surprised when an Associated Press reporter, Wilson Ring, called me and asked if I knew anybody who kept a list of police fatalities in Vermont. This was at the time of the police shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, which became a national issue.&n
  
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• Hancock man turns himself into police, denies murder charge

  17-02-2026 23:34 via vtdigger.org
  A hearing on the fatal shooting of a 14-year-old boy in Bristol concluded Wednesday, Nov. 1, 2023, in Addison County Superior criminal court in Middlebury. Photo by Alan Keays/VTDiggerA Hancock man pleaded not guilty Tuesday afternoon to a charge of second-degree murder in the shooting death of another man earlier this month in Addison County.Tanner Leary, 23, appeared in handcuffs in Addison County Superior criminal court in Middlebury after turning himself into authorities hours earlier. 
  
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• Hancock man turns himself in to police, denies murder charge

  17-02-2026 23:34 via vtdigger.org
  A hearing on the fatal shooting of a 14-year-old boy in Bristol concluded Wednesday, Nov. 1, 2023, in Addison County Superior criminal court in Middlebury. Photo by Alan Keays/VTDiggerA Hancock man pleaded not guilty Tuesday afternoon to a charge of second-degree murder in the shooting death of another man earlier this month in Addison County.Tanner Leary, 23, appeared in handcuffs in Addison County Superior criminal court in Middlebury after turning himself in to authorities hours earlier.&nbs
  
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• Burlington mayor signs executive order outlining local ICE protocols

  17-02-2026 23:17 via vtdigger.org
  Burlington’s Mayor Mulvaney-Stanak signed an executive order pertaining to ICE actions in City Hall on Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026. Photo by Auditi Guha/VTDiggerBURLINGTON — Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak signed an executive order Tuesday to establish citywide protocols in response to potential surge in ICE activity as has been seen throughout the country.Cities like Minneapolis and Portland, Maine have seen large-scale and violent immigration crackdowns in recent weeks.“There is no in
  
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• Gov. Scott says he’ll meet with Trump in DC — but only if event is bipartisan

  17-02-2026 22:06 via vtdigger.org
  Gov. Phil Scott pauses before speaking after a meeting of the Emergency Board at the Statehouse in Montpelier on Thursday, November 13, 2025. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerGov. Phil Scott announced Tuesday morning that he was heading to Washington, D.C., this week to meet with other governors and President Donald Trump.But soon after, Vermont’s Republican leader looked poised to possibly reverse course, with his office saying Scott was considering staying home. This morning, Scott&r
  
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• Immigration judge rules Mohsen Mahdawi can’t be deported

  17-02-2026 22:01 via vtdigger.org
  Mohsen Mahdawi speaks after being released in Burlington on Wednesday, April 30, 2025. Photo by Caleb Kenna/VTDiggerAn immigration judge has blocked the Trump administration from deporting Mohsen Mahdawi, a Columbia University student and pro-Palestinian activist who was arrested by federal agents in Colchester last year during a U.S. citizenship interview. The federal judge, Nina Froes, ruled Friday that evidence the Trump administration had submitted to show why Mahdawi should be removed
  
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• Kelly Stoddard Poor: Don’t leave older Vermonters stranded

  17-02-2026 13:00 via vtdigger.org
  This commentary is by Kelly Stoddard Poor, associate state director of AARP Vermont. As Vermont lawmakers confront a projected $33 million deficit in the state’s Transportation Fund, the Legislature faces tough decisions about what to cut. But one thing should be off the table: public transit. Cutting transit funding — especially at a time when reductions to Medicaid are imminent — would put thousands of Vermonters at risk and ultimately cost the state far more than
  
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• Thousands of Vermonters could lose food assistance as new work requirements take effect next month

  16-02-2026 23:28 via vtdigger.org
  A client visits the HOPE (Helping Overcome Poverty’s Effects) food shelf in Middlebury on Wednesday, November 5, 2025. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerTheo Wells-Spackman is a Report for America corps member who reports for VTDigger.New federal work requirements limiting eligibility for the nation’s largest food assistance program will take effect for many in Vermont on March 1. Roughly 3,000 people may lose benefits on that day, according to Ivy Enoch, director of policy a
  
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• This justice system experiment has seen little use in Vermont. Will lawmakers expand it?

  16-02-2026 23:01 via vtdigger.org
  Prosecutor Zach Weight, right, speaks with public defender Sandra Lee during a break at the Chittenden County Community Accountability Court in Burlington on Friday, November 21, 2025. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerMONTPELIER — Lawmakers are grappling with whether to continue a program designed to prevent defendants awaiting trial from committing more offenses. Two years ago, Vermont lawmakers noticed competing issues. State prisons were filling up with more detainees who were held
  
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