While National Newswatch does not keep an archive of external articles for longer than 6 months, we do keep all articles written by contributors who post directly to our site. Here you will find all of the contributed and linked external articles from John Hanna, The Associated Press.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Even as Democratic officials fight the effort in court, the Trump administration has run millions of voter registrations through government databases to determine their eligibility in a process that critics worry could end up purging valid voters from the rolls before the November elections.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Even as Democratic officials fight the effort in court, the Trump administration has run millions of voter registrations through government databases to determine their eligibility in a process that critics worry could end up purging valid voters from the rolls before the November elections.
A Montana judge has blocked the state from limiting voter registration on Election Day, concluding the move would disproportionately harm Native American and young voters.
Candidates and political groups are pouring money into Texas' hotly contested U.S. Senate race at a record pace, partly fueled by Democrat James Talarico's fundraising and allies of Republican Sen. John Cornyn trying to save his long career.
Jasmine Crockett's most-watched TikTok clip is a five-second interview outside the U.S. Capitol. Someone asks the Democratic congresswoman what she would tell billionaire Elon Musk, and Crockett replies with a vulgar, two-word phrase. It's been viewed 20.7 million times.
Democrat Christian Menefee won a Texas U.S. House seat in a Saturday special election that will narrow Republicans' already-slim majority.
Democrats Christian Menefee and Amanda Edwards are competing Saturday for a vacant U.S. House seat from Houston, a special election that will narrow the GOP's already slim House majority.
Texas cannot use a new congressional map drawn by Republicans in hopes of securing the party additional U.S. House seats, a panel of three federal judges ruled Tuesday.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- The Kansas House's top Republican on Tuesday dropped efforts to force a redraw of U.S. House districts that would have thrust the state into a widening national battle for partisan advantage in the 2026 elections.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Kansas' Republican House leader on Tuesday dropped efforts to force a redraw of U.S. House districts that would have thrust the state into a widening national battle for partisan advantage in the 2026 elections.
The CEO of the nonprofit managing the Alamo resigned after a powerful Republican state official criticized her publicly, suggesting that her views aren't compatible with the history of the Texas shrine.
A panel of federal judges began considering Wednesday whether Texas can use a redrawn congressional map that boosts Republicans and launched an expanding redistricting battle ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
A panel of federal judges will begin Wednesday to consider whether Texas can use a redrawn congressional map that boosts Republicans and has launched a widening redistricting battle ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
A Democratic lawmaker is staying in the Texas Capitol rather than accept an around-the-clock police escort that Republicans imposed to keep she and her colleagues from leaving the state again and further delaying the GOP's redrawing of congressional districts as President Donald Trump wants.
Republicans can move ahead with redrawing Texas' congressional districts now that Democratic lawmakers have returned to the state. Efforts to thwart President Donald Trump's push to tilt the political map for next year's midterm elections in his favor shifted to California.
A walkout by Democratic legislators in Texas has ended and Republicans arranged to push a plan for redrawing the state's congressional districts through the GOP-controlled Legislature and give President Donald Trump a better political landscape.
Republicans can move ahead with redrawing Texas' congressional districts now that Democratic lawmakers have returned to the state. Efforts to thwart President Donald Trump's push to tilt the political map for next year's midterm elections in his favor shifted to California.
In a story published May. 23, 2025, The Associated Press reported about Planned Parenthood closing clinics in Iowa and Minnesota. The story should have made clear that despite the closures, the organization will still offer medication abortions in Des Moines and medication and medical abortion services in Iowa City.
Four of the six Planned Parenthood clinics in Iowa and four in Minnesota will shut down in a year, the Midwestern affiliate operating them said Friday, blaming a freeze in federal funds, budget cuts proposed in Congress and state restrictions on abortion.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- A group that successfully defeated an anti-abortion ballot measure in Kansas has filed a federal lawsuit against a new state law aimed at curbing foreign influence in elections, saying it violates free speech rights and would keep the group from waging future campaigns.
Missouri's governor said Friday that he will call the Legislature into a special session to consider incentives aimed at keeping the Kansas City Chiefs and Royals from moving to Kansas after lawmakers failed to pass a plan during their regular, annual session.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Campgrounds, boat ramps and other facilities in at least 30 locations at federal lakes and reservoirs in six states will be closed or have their hours curtailed as of mid-May as the Trump administration tries to rapidly shrink the U.S. government.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- The leader of a small group of self-described satanists and three other people were arrested Friday following a scuffle inside the Kansas Statehouse arising from an effort by the group's leader to start a Black Mass in the rotunda.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- The leader of a small group of self-described satanists and at least one other person were arrested Friday following a scuffle inside the Kansas Statehouse arising from an effort by the group's leader to start a "Black Mass" in the rotunda.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Republican legislators in Kansas on Tuesday shrunk what already was among the nation's shortest windows for voting by mail, arguing that problems with the U.S. Postal Service's handling of ballots required the move. Critics called it voter suppression.
A key adviser warned President John F. Kennedy after the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961 that the agency behind it, the CIA, had grown too powerful. He proposed giving the State Department control of "all clandestine activities" and breaking up the CIA.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Republican state attorneys general are declaring their continued support for a landmark federal law protecting disabled people's rights, after parents expressed fears of losing services for their disabled children because of a GOP lawsuit opposing transgender rights.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Kansas became the latest state to ban gender-affirming care for minors Tuesday after the Republican-controlled Legislature overrode the Democratic governor's veto of the measure.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Is Presidents Day the most confusing holiday in the U.S.?
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Kansas' top elections official launched a campaign for governor Wednesday after building his public profile by pushing back against unfounded election conspiracy theories and breaking with fellow Republicans on voting rights issues.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Republicans made claims about illegal voting by noncitizens a centerpiece of their 2024 campaign messaging and plan to push legislation in the new Congress requiring voters to provide proof of U.S. citizenship. Yet there's one place with a GOP supermajority where linking voting to citizenship appears to be a nonstarter: Kansas.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- A Kansas official who is an informal adviser to President-elect Donald Trump's transition team on immigration issues doesn't expect mass deportations to prompt arrests of migrants at sensitive locations such as schools and churches.
Voters in South Dakota have rejected a proposal to add protections for abortion rights to the state constitution, preserving a near-total ban there.
Voters in South Dakota have rejected a proposal to add protections for abortion rights to the state constitution, preserving a near-total ban there.
South Dakota will decide Tuesday whether to add protections for abortion rights to the state constitution and potentially overturn the state's abortion ban.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- A former Kansas attorney general's successful political comeback in Tuesday's election kept an open U.S. House seat in Republican hands while the only Democrat in the state's congressional delegation won reelection.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- A former Kansas attorney general's successful political comeback in Tuesday's election kept an open U.S. House seat in Republican hands while the only Democrat in the state's congressional delegation was trying to fend off a GOP challenger.
South Dakota will decide Tuesday whether to add protections for abortion rights to the state constitution and potentially overturn the state's abortion ban.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Republicans expected a former Kansas attorney general's political comeback in Tuesday's election to keep an open U.S. House seat in GOP hands while the party faced a tougher challenge in trying to oust the only Democrat in the state's congressional delegation.
A northern Minnesota woman accused of trying to submit a mail ballot for her recently deceased mother has been charged with three felonies, showing how routine election safeguards thwart rare instances of attempted voter fraud.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Conservatives could capture majorities on the Kansas and Nebraska state school boards in this year's elections, making it easier for them to shape what's taught in classrooms.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- The U.S. Postal Service has reopened all of its mail processing centers in areas of Florida and North Carolina hit by recent hurricanes, a top official said Wednesday in a briefing meant to reassure voters and election officials that the agency is ready to handle mail ballots.
Lawmakers said during a contentious congressional hearing Thursday they are uneasy about the U.S. Postal Service's readiness for a crush of mail ballots for the November election because some of them feel burned by other Postal Service actions.
An effort to prevent Donald Trump from losing a potentially crucial electoral vote from Nebraska appeared dead Tuesday after the state's Republican governor said he's not planning to push for the necessary change in state law ahead of the November presidential election.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- The head of the U.S. Postal Service expressed frustration Thursday with ongoing criticism by election officials of how it handles mail ballots while also seeking to reassure voters that it's ready to handle an expected crush of those ballots this fall.
Nebraska's Republican attorney general said Friday that supporters of two measures to legalize medical marijuana could have submitted at least "several thousand" invalid signatures to get them on the ballot, suggesting that the issue ultimately could keep the proposals from becoming law.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Gov. Laura Kelly and her allies have unseated a fellow Democrat who consistently voted against her in the Kansas Legislature, while GOP voters ousted a lawmaker many Republicans blamed for Kelly's narrow reelection two years ago.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- The last Democrat to represent an eastern Kansas district in Congress won the party's nomination for the now-open seat, keeping her bid for a political comeback alive.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Republicans in the Kansas City area nominated a doctor to challenge the only Democrat in the Kansas delegation in Congress.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- A former Kansas attorney general and failed candidate for governor has found at least initial success in his political comeback attempt, winning Tuesday's Republican primary for an open U.S. House seat.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- An open congressional seat in eastern Kansas inspired two political comeback attempts in the state's primary Tuesday, one from the last Democrat to hold it and the other from a former Republican attorney general who lost the 2022 governor's race.
DE SOTO, Kan. (AP) -- The sheriff in Kansas' most populous county faced no opposition to his reelection four years ago, extending a decades-long Republican lock on the office despite big gains locally by Democrats during the Trump era. Then he took on election fraud as a cause.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- Kansas is no longer enforcing a 3-year-old law making it a felony to impersonate election officials as it faces a legal challenge from critics who argue that the law has hindered efforts to register new voters.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- A federal judge in Kansas has refused to block the nationwide enforcement of a Biden administration rule requiring firearms dealers to do background checks of buyers at gun shows, leaving Texas as the only state so far where a legal challenge has succeeded.