A dire droughtlook and more news from the states

Good evening. As wildfires have claimed millions of acres in the West this year, the drought outlook remains grim, experts in Oregon said. Even with a sustained rainy weather pattern predicted, water sources are unlikely to see robust rebounds. 

In Pennsylvania, two people have died from measles, the first deaths in the country this year. State leaders encouraged vaccination. 

Few states will feel the pain of decreased health insurance enrollment as much as Mississippi, where hundreds of thousands of residents — many with chronic conditions — are now uncovered. And for a U.S. Army couple in Missouri, Starbucks offered better fertility treatment coverage than the military. 

As people around the world mourn the death of Dolly Parton, her philanthropy is remembered as transformative. 

Voters are at the polls today for runoff and special elections in Georgia, Oklahoma and South Carolina. We’ll have coverage at News From The States tonight, in Daybreak tomorrow morning and right here tomorrow evening.

The last weeks of summer find Oregon and much of the Northwest experiencing historic drought, exacerbating what has become one of the most active wildfire seasons in the state and region, Oregon Capital Chronicle reports. 

Overall, about 3.5 million acres have burned across the Northwest, including fires in and around Spokane that became some of the most destructive in Washington history.

Beyond fish and ecological impacts, drought across Oregon, Idaho and Washington is causing water supply shortages for public water and electric utilities, costing farmers tens of millions of dollars in lost crops and leaving vegetation and soils dry and susceptible to fires.

Even with a potential deluge of precipitation this winter from a very strong El Niño weather pattern, water reservoirs in the region are so depleted that there’s unlikely to be much carryover in water supplies into next year, experts warned. 

Related coverage: 

The Pennsylvania Department of Health confirmed two measles-related deaths, the first in the nation this year, Pennsylvania Capital-Star reports. 

Both people, who lived in Lancaster County, were unvaccinated. No other personal details were provided in order to protect their families’ privacy, officials said. 

The deaths come amid the country’s largest outbreak of measles in decades. The disease had been declared eliminated in 2000, due to the success of a widespread vaccination campaign. But the country’s measles-free status is now at risk, with 2,777 cases confirmed by the Centers for Disease Control this year so far. 

“Because measles was largely eliminated in the Commonwealth for more than three decades, people are not familiar with this disease and don’t fully understand the potential severity of the illness,” said Pennsylvania Health Secretary Dr. Debra Bogen. 

Bogen went on to say that the vaccine is “safe and provides the best protection we have against measles.”

A new court filing in the federal case against 15 anti-ICE protesters contained more than 200 pages of undercover agents’ notes and photos from the Department of Homeland Security’s widespread surveillance operation during Operation Metro Surge, Minnesota Reformer reports. 

The documents reveal new information about groups and events targeted by the agents — and contain dozens of photos of cars of people who trailed immigration agents in their cars.

The documents further underscore the feds’ use of intelligence tactics — including the use of undercover agents and electronic surveillance — as a frustrated Trump administration sought to tamp down the widespread resistance to the immigration crackdown, which wound up ensnaring many legal residents and led to the killings of two Americans. 

More immigration coverage: 

Louisiana: A state teacher is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear his constitutional challenge to a state law that requires the Ten Commandments to be posted in K-12 and college classrooms. 

Nebraska: The state’s top elections official will decide whether a ballot measure seeking to make it harder for legislators to amend voter-approved laws is too broad for the November ballot.

South Dakota: A nonprofit organization and a voter filed a federal lawsuit challenging the implementation of the state’s new proof-of-citizenship requirement for voter registration.

Michigan: The Board of State Canvassers deadlocked on a ballot measure that would enact strict voter ID laws, meaning the proposal was not certified for the November ballot. However, it is likely headed to the state Supreme Court. 

Kansas: Iowa Republican gubernatorial nominee Zach Lahn champions the private school he helped launch in Kansas as a model for reinventing schools, but his campaign doesn’t mention its precarious finances, which have been propped up by millions in personal loans.

Arkansas: The founders of a whites-only community have filed a lawsuit against several state and federal agencies claiming their constitutional rights are being violated by government investigations.

Alabama: A former Southern Poverty Law Center executive pleaded not guilty Tuesday to conspiracy charges of wire fraud and making false statements as part of the U.S. Department of Justice’s prosecution of the civil rights nonprofit.

North Dakota: Proposed federal rule changes would reduce the bond money required to drill wells and cut the time for public comment on some potential oil and gas developments to 10 days, drawing concerns..

Brianna and Elijah Campo admire their son, Wesley, on Friday, Aug. 21, at their home at Fort Leonard Wood, the Army base where Brianna is stationed. (Photo by Anna Spoerre/Missouri Independent)

The couple, now 23, were a few years into marriage when a doctor said their best chance at pregnancy was through in vitro fertilization. But TRICARE, the insurance plan for military members, doesn’t cover any of the medications or procedures for IVF for most members.

When they first learned how much it would cost them to have a baby, Brianna and Elijah considered putting their dreams of starting a family on hold. 

Instead, the couple made a series of career and financial sacrifices — which included Elijah putting his college studies on hold to work for Starbucks, which offers fertility coverage to employees — to fund the more than $10,000 they paid out-of-pocket for fertility treatment.

For the Campos family, the sacrifices were worth it, they agreed as they sat in their home in southern Missouri, combing through their son’s strawberry blonde hair with their fingers. But, both asked, did it have to be this hard?

For years, military members and their families have been asking lawmakers to expand insurance coverage to include at least some of the costs of IVF, which on average often range from $15,000 to $30,000 per cycle.

Read more from Missouri Independent.

After Congress allowed subsidized Affordable Care Act insurance plans to expire at the end of last year, the number of diabetic Mississippians without insurance, and thus regular care, is once again on the rise, Stateline reports. 

According to state data, enrollment in ACA plans has fallen by nearly two-thirds in just eight months. The medical and financial consequences could be dire — for individual patients and for the state.

Nationwide, participation in ACA plans, or Obamacare, has declined this year by nearly 3 million people, according to the Trump administration. 

But few if any states are feeling the absence of the subsidies as acutely as Mississippi.

By many measures, Mississippi is the poorest state. It is also one of the unhealthiest states. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has identified a “diabetes belt,” where people are most likely to have the chronic disease. It includes 644 counties across 15 states, primarily in the South; Mississippi is the only state where every county made the list.

Without insurance, many Mississippians are likely to put off routine care, which can stave off the worst consequences of diabetes and other chronic conditions. 

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday handed a procedural victory to President Donald Trump on an executive order to curb mail-in voting, but the administration is still fighting a separate ruling that limits a portion of the order and remains in effect — complicating the administration’s temporary win, States Newsroom’s D.C. Bureau reports. 

In light of the ruling in the nation’s highest court, the administration late Monday asked U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Massachusetts to vacate her decision from earlier in August that blocks the U.S. Postal Service from carrying out aspects of Trump’s executive order, while the voting rights groups that brought that challenge argued Tuesday the block should remain in place.

Monday’s decision from the Supreme Court also drew the ire of Democrats, who argued that Trump’s executive order ran afoul of the Constitution and threatens democracy. 

Under the Constitution, states are responsible for administering elections. Many Democrats have said Trump’s order seeks to unlawfully grab that power for the executive branch.

Dolly Parton, the personification of Tennessee music, died Tuesday at age 80 after decades of entertaining the world, Tennessee Lookout reports. 

Parton’s nephew, Bryan Seaver, delivered the news of her death in a video for the family, sparking mourning from her birthplace of Locust Ridge in the mountains of East Tennessee across the state to Nashville, where she found fame, and around the world where her name brought people happiness in her deeds and passion for life.

Parton opened doors for generations of singers and songwriters from all walks of life, giving people hope that “anything was possible,” Seaver said. “She never saw a door she couldn’t open, and the doors she opened made and changed history.”

The daughter of a sharecropper and farmer, Parton asked that she be buried in a field of cotton, he said, “because after a life wearing heavy rhinestones, she finally deserves to be comfortable and have some rest.”

Through her business network, Parton has an estimated net worth of $650 million and used her considerable wealth for philanthropic causes. 

The Dollywood Foundation created Dolly’s Imagination Library in 1995, which donates some 10 million books to children each year to bolster literacy.

She started The Buddy Program in the 1990s, offering $500 to Sevier County middle school students to stay in school and graduate in Tennessee, eventually lowering the dropout rate. The foundation also offers $15,000 scholarships annually to five Sevier County High School seniors “who have a dream they wish to pursue and who can successfully communicate their plan and commitment to realize their dreams.”

Parton raised $12.5 million to help the victims of a 2016 wildfire in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park that devastated cities such as Gatlinburg, and $1 million in response to Hurricane Helene in the East Tennessee mountains. She also gave $1 million to Vanderbilt University Medical Center during the COVID-19 pandemic to support development of the Moderna vaccine and filmed herself receiving a shot to encourage people to get vaccinated.

Parton received the Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy in 2022. Early this year, officials renamed the East Tennessee Children’s Hospital in her honor after she made a donation described as “generational and transformational.”