Journalist arrested after asking HHS Secretary Tom Price a question

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National and international headlines

Comey’s removal sparks fears about future of Russia probe

President Donald Trump’s sudden removal of James Comey as director of the FBI sparked immediate fears among legislators and others that the bureau’s probe into possible collusion between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign might be upended now that Trump himself can handpick its new supervisor.

Reuters

The investigation is still in its infancy, but the probe’s sensitive subject matter has already created a political quagmire for the Justice Department. Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the case in March after it was revealed that he had spoken twice with Russia’s ambassador to the United States and not disclosed that during his confirmation hearing.

The matter is now overseen by Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein – the man who authored the three-page rationale for removing Comey from the bureau because of his handling of the Hillary Clinton email investigation.

Journalist arrested after asking HHS Secretary Tom Price a question

As Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price walked through a hallway Tuesday in the West Virginia State Capitol, veteran reporter Dan Heyman followed alongside him, holding up his phone to Price while attempting to ask him a question.

Heyman, a journalist with Public News Service, repeatedly asked the secretary whether domestic violence would be considered a pre-existing condition under the Republican bill to overhaul the nation’s health care system, he said.

“He didn’t say anything,” Heyman said later in a news conference. “So I persisted.”

Then, an officer in the Capitol pulled him aside, handcuffed him and arrested him. Heyman was jailed on the charge of “Willful Disruption of State Government Processes” and was released later on $5,000 bail.

Authorities said while Secret Service agents were providing security in the Capitol for Price and Kellyanne Conway, special counsel to the president, Heyman was “aggressively breaching” the agents to the point where they were “forced to remove him a couple of times from the area,” according to a criminal complaint.

Tunnel collapses at nuclear waste site in Washington state

The Energy Department ordered hundreds of workers at its Hanford nuclear site in Washington state to “take cover” Tuesday morning after the collapse of 20-foot-long portion of a tunnel used to store contaminated radioactive materials.

Reuters

The Energy Department said it activated its emergency operations protocol after reports of a “cave-in” at the 200 East Area in Hanford, a sprawling complex about 200 miles from Seattle where the government has been working to clean up radioactive materials left over from the country’s nuclear weapons program.

The German military has a Nazi problem

The European migrant crisis and antipathy toward outsiders have sparked disdain and even violence toward refugees in Germany and the rest of the continent. But if there’s one country that knows just how extreme xenophobia can get, it’s the nation that birthed the Nazis.

Now German officials have turned their focus on the country’s military, trying to weed out groups that have a dangerous combination of extreme, Nazi-idealizing views and access to military weapons, according to the BBC.

Officials in the Bundeswehr, or German armed forces, plan to search every barracks for any memorabilia that honors Adolf Hitler’s regime or the army that served it.

Germany has long had a ban on symbols that glorify the Nazis, but officials found two instances of Nazi material displayed at an army barracks, the BBC reported.

Bambi’s revenge? Deer photographed nibbling on human bones, a first

Although they are herbivores, deer have been spotted eating meat and gnawing on bones before. But not this kind of bones.

Peer closely at the accompanying photos, and you might discern that dem bones are people bones. More precisely, they are rib bones.

We’ll get right out of the way that no horrified relatives are just now learning that their missing loved one’s fate was to be deer dinner. The body from which these bones came was placed with the highest scientific goals in mind on the floor of that forest, which is better known as the Forensic Anthropology Research Facility in San Marcos, Texas.

The 26-acre facility is one of several “body farms” around the nation where researchers plunk donated bodies out in the elements to study the process of human decay and decomposition. Usually the bodies are placed inside a cage to prevent the interference of scavengers. But sometimes they’re left unprotected to see just who might come along to snack on the carcass. Images from remote cameras have revealed that regular diners include rodents, coyotes, raccoons and foxes.

South Koreans elect liberal Moon Jae-in president after months of turmoil

SEOUL — South Koreans have elected a new president who is wary of the United States and wants to foster warmer ties with North Korea, opening a new and potentially difficult chapter in relations with Washington.

Reuters

Moon Jae-in, the candidate of the liberal Democratic Party, claimed victory Tuesday night after securing an unassailable lead. With 40 percent of the votes counted by midnight local time, Moon had 39.5 percent.

His closest rivals, conservative Hong Joon-pyo and centrist Ahn Cheol-soo, had 26.5 and 21.2 percent, respectively. Hong and Ahn conceded while the votes were still being counted.

Local headlines

Trump health chief Tom Price coming to Maine on Wednesday

U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price will be in Augusta on Wednesday to discuss opiate addiction with Gov. Paul LePage amid the White House’s parallel push to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.

Reuters

President Donald Trump’s top health care lieutenant will hold a roundtable on Maine’s opiate crisis on Wednesday morning with the Republican governor that will be followed a news conference, according to a statement from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

But it comes at a crucial time for health care reform, as Republicans in Congress used Maine’s 2011 health care reform law as a model for the American Health Care Act, which passed the U.S. House of Representatives last week.

Pantsuit Nation stories published in Maine nonprofit’s first book

BROOKLIN, Maine — Personal experiences of hate, racism, sexism, discrimination, hardship, empowerment and hope that Hillary Clinton supporters across the country shared in the Facebook group Pantsuit Nation will be forever immortalized in a new book that serves to document some of the members’ personal stories.

The Facebook group, which Brooklin resident Libby Chamberlain, 33, started in October 2016, has nearly 4 million members now, six months after the President Donald Trump defeated Clinton, the first woman nominated by a major party to be president.

Chamberlain said Tuesday that the Pantsuit Nation wanted to publish a book so its member stories could be presented in a way detached from the Internet, which can be noisy and distracting.

Maine ticks toward a statewide vote on time zone change

AUGUSTA, Maine — Progress in the Legislature often can be measured with a sundial, but a bill that would eliminate daylight saving time and put Maine in a different time zone than most East Coast states took another step forward Tuesday.

The House and Senate have both preliminarily approved the bill, but there was disagreement over whether the change should be subject to a statewide referendum. Tuesday’s vote in the House put the two chambers in agreement that Maine voters should weigh in before changing their clocks.

The bill now faces enactment votes.

LePage: Democrats keep people on welfare to earn their votes

Gov. Paul LePage continued a familiar refrain Tuesday when he said Democrats in the Legislature are on a mission to keep people in poverty and dependent on social service programs.

LePage said during an interview on WVOM that Democratic House Speaker Sara Gideon’s bill, which would allocate $150 million in what she says is unspent federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program funding to augment social service programs, is based on false information.

Gideon and Democrats, citing a 2016 report from the Legislature’s Office of Fiscal and Program Review that showed $150 million in unspent TANF funds at the end of fiscal year 2016, are lining up behind the new bill, which also has four Republican sponsors from some of Maine’s more economically depressed areas.

Maine takes a step closer to charging deposits on ‘nip’ liquor bottles

A bill to include “nip”-sized liquor bottles in Maine’s bottle redemption system cruised through the House on Tuesday in a 111-34 vote.

Framed by some as an environmental bill and others as an economic development bill — Rep. Richard Campbell, R-Orrington said he has deposited $450 in a savings account for his 2-year-old grandson, just from roadside bottles and cans — LD 56 would put a deposit on all wine and spirits bottles instead of just on those more than 50 milliliters.

Living

German-Style Roasted Cauliflower Salad with Lovage

This salad has tender, caramelized pieces of roasted cauliflower, salty bits of bacon, piquant bits of red onion, bright freshness from lovage and parsley and a delightful sweet-tangy dressing. It’s fantastic — and perfect for all those barbecues that are sure to happen whenever the sun comes back.

1-minute hike: Annie Sturgis Sanctuary in Vassalboro

An excellent place to find woodland flowers and wildlife, the 40-acre Annie Sturgis Sanctuary in Vassalboro features a simple, two-mile trail network that open to foot traffic only.

Owned and maintained by the New England Wild Flower Society, this property is home to what’s known as the largest stand of wild ginger in Maine, as well as a variety of wildflowers, including bloodroot, trout lily and purple trillium.

Maine breweries are turning byproducts into tasty eats

From pizza dough to pretzels, dog treats to gourmet burgers, breweries across the state are finding creative ways to utilize the tens of thousands of pounds of spent grain produced across the state every week — well beyond simply feeding livestock.

“[Spent grain is] really a great addition to baking, because the grain used for brewing is whole, cracked grain, with the germ and the bran still intact,” Eric LeVine, pizza chef at Bigelow, said. Before working at Bigelow, LeVine was a miller at Maine Grains, the Skowhegan-based grist mill that makes flour from Maine-grown grains. “The germ and the bran are the most flavorful part of the grain, and soaking during the beer-making process releases all those natural flavors. … It’s nutty. It’s a very unique flavor, especially for pizza crust.”

Sarah Smiley | ‘I stand relieved’: Ceremony marks end of long, winding road

The path of a military career, for both the service members and the families supporting them, seems less like a straight line and more like one with peaks, valleys and curves. My husband, Dustin, and I have always called it a “long and winding road,” and it’s why our wedding song was the Beatles song by the same name.

From the first day of our marriage, we were on that long road, headed to flight school with a U-Haul towing behind us. And every day since, although we’ve both been moving toward the same goal, we’ve had many moments in which it felt like we were moving in separate, parallel tracks. This is probably true of all marriages, but when your relationship is punctuated by periods of extreme differences (even different time zones), it sometimes feels like you are leading different lives.

Maine lobster buoy floated 2,500 miles, ended up in France

While lobsters are a year-round product for Maine fisherman, the season won’t be in full swing until summer hits. Before the work really ramps up, even the buoys want to take a quick vacation. Where better to go than France?

The photo was posted Sunday in a Facebook group called “Lost At Sea.” The poster asked the members of the group to help identify the owner of a buoy they found in Brest, France, who was thought to be from Maine, Florida or Massachusetts. A buoy from Massachusetts would never make it that far, obviously.

Events

Guardsmen recognized in joint ceremony at the Blaine House

Governor Paul R. LePage and First Lady Ann M. LePage hosted the inaugural Maine National Guard Outstanding Airmen and Best Warrior ceremony held Sunday, May 7, at the Blaine House.

The event recognized the top enlisted members of the entire Maine National Guard – a pool of over 3,100 service members with approximately 2,000 from the Army National Guard and 1,100 from the Air National Guard. The Air National Guard recognizes Outstanding Airmen, while the Maine Army National Guard recognizes Best Warriors.

Baked bean supper slated at Winn church
A baked bean supper will be held 4-6 p.m. Friday, May 12, at Sacred Heart Church, junction of routes 2 and 168. The menu will include homemade baked beans, hot dogs, salads, rolls and assorted pies. Prices are $6, $3 for children.
Service at Veteran’s Memorial on Bucksport waterfront

The Bucksport United Methodist Church will host a public Memorial Day service at 10 a.m. Sunday, May 28, at the Veteran’s Memorial on the waterfront.

All branches of the military will be remembered during the service and wreathes will be laid at the memorial in memory and honor of all those who have served.

Community college graduates to be honored at ceremonies in May

Maine’s seven community colleges will hold commencement exercises around the state this month.