Tuesday, June 30, 2015
"The transaction is expected to close in the near future," GlobalFoundries wrote in a brief press release posted to its website.
The two companies announced last October that IBM would pay GlobalFoundries $1.5 billion to take its money-losing chip unit — including its Essex, Vt., plant — off its hands. Because GlobalFoundries is owned by the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, it first needed to obtain clearance from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, an inter-agency panel charged with protecting national security in major commercial transactions.
"With the conclusion of the CFIUS review, the companies have completed the regulatory process in the United States," GlobalFoundries said in Monday's statement. "All necessary regulatory approvals outside the United States were previously received."
Tags: GlobalFoundries , IBM , Vermont , Pat Moulton , Image , Web Only
Thursday, June 25, 2015
That's because the court's 6-3 vote preserves Vermont's option to abandon its troubled health insurance exchange, Vermont Health Connect, in favor of the federal exchange or a federal-state hybrid. For a year and a half, Scott has urged Gov. Peter Shumlin to make such a move, but the Democratic governor has warned that a different outcome in the King case could have jeopardized the federal subsidies that make other systems viable.
“For 18 months, officials have dismissed repeated calls to explore alternatives to our dysfunctional exchange, saying to do so would put Vermonters at risk of losing their subsidies," Scott said in a statement Thursday after the court released its decision. "Now that the fear of losing subsidies is no longer a valid argument, we must find the best path to affordable, accessible health insurance for every Vermonter.”
Like other states that operate their own exchanges, Vermont was never at risk of losing the federal subsidies that make its health plans more affordable for those with low and moderate incomes. But the three dozen states that use the federal exchange and the three that use a hybrid — Nevada, New Mexico and Oregon — were in such danger.
Scott and other Vermont lawmakers have urged Shumlin to consider a hybrid exchange, among other options.
Tags: King v. Burwell , Vermont Health Connect , Phil Scott , Shap Smith , Peter Shumlin , Lawrence Miller , Image , Web Only
Wednesday, June 24, 2015
"He's a favorite son," says Martha Allen, a Canaan librarian who heads the Vermont-National Education Association. "And he's just right on all the issues."
The Vermont-NEA, which represents some 12,000 current and retired teachers, became the first union in the country Wednesday to endorse Sanders. Earlier this month, the South Carolina AFL-CIO's executive board passed a resolution supporting his candidacy, but its broader membership has yet to issue a formal endorsement.
While Vermont teachers may not make or break a national election, Allen promises to turn the Vermont-NEA's support into action — particularly in neighboring New Hampshire.
"We'll see what they need, where they need boots on the ground and send [our members] that way," she says.
Tags: Senator , Bernie Sanders , Presidential Campaign , Vermont-NEA , Labor , Endorsement , Martha Allen , Image , Recommended Reading , Web Only
Monday, June 22, 2015
"The flag is a relic of our nation’s stained racial history," he said in a statement. "It should come down."
Sanders' comments follow last Wednesday's deadly shooting of nine parishioners at Charleston's Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Photos posted online of the alleged perpetrator, Dylan Roof, show him posing with the Confederate flag and other racially charged imagery. Since 2000, when it was removed from the Statehouse dome, the flag has flown above a nearby monument to Confederate soldiers.
“The tragedy in Charleston, as terrible as it is, has given the people of South Carolina an opportunity to finally turn a page on our past," said Sanders, who is running for the Democratic presidential nomination. "The flag belongs in a museum.”
Sanders was hardly the first to issue such a call. His campaign issued a statement on the matter Monday afternoon only after word leaked that two prominent South Carolina Republicans — Gov. Nikki Haley and Sen. Lindsey Graham, a fellow presidential candidate — would do the same later that day.
Tags: Senator , Bernie Sanders , Presidential Campaign , confederate flag , South Carolina , Charleston , Image , Web Only
Sunday, June 21, 2015
By Sunday night, however, Donovan had made his decision: “I’ll be running for attorney general,” he told Seven Days.
Donovan's decision was the first of many expected of Vermont office-seekers in the coming months as they react to Gov. Peter Shumlin's June 8 announcement that he won't seek reelection. The third-term county prosecutor had flirted with the idea of running for governor or Congress. But after spending Father's Day weekend at home with his family, the 41-year-old father of two young children said it had become clear that attorney general was a better fit for him.
This won't be Donovan's first run for the post. In 2012, he lost to incumbent Attorney General Bill Sorrell by just 714 votes after a hard-fought primary. Donovan said that many at Friday night's dinner had urged him to make another run for AG.
The South Burlington resident makes his decision without knowing whether Sorrell intends to run for reelection in 2016. The 68-year-old Sorrell, who’s served as attorney general since 1997, said Saturday he won’t make a decision until the conclusion of an independent investigation into allegations of campaign finance violations.
“I look forward to the truth coming out,” Sorrell said.
Tags: T.J. Donovan , Curtis Awards , Bill Sorrell , Peter Shumlin , Peter Welch , Sue Minter , Shap Smith , Image , Web Only
Thursday, June 18, 2015
In the early 1990s, he opposed the Brady Bill, which mandated criminal background checks for gun buyers, but he supported a federal ban on assault weapons.
After a gunman opened fire on a Colorado movie theater in July 2012, killing 12 and injuring 70, Sanders told the Addison County Independent that "decisions about gun control should be made as close to home as possible — at the state level." But after another gunman killed 20 children and six adults at Connecticut's Sandy Hook Elementary School five months later, he voted for sweeping federal legislation to mandate background checks and ban the sale of assault weapons.
In some respects, Sanders' evolving position on gun laws mirrors that of his Vermont constituents, who used to vociferously oppose gun control but now appear more open to it.
But among the Democratic voters he's courting in his run for president, many of Sanders' past positions seem to be out of the mainstream. In a national poll conducted by Quinnipiac University last July, 80 percent of Democratic voters surveyed said they supported "stricter gun control laws," while only 17 percent opposed them. Ninety-eight percent of Democrats favored the background checks he once opposed.
Tags: Senator , Bernie Sanders , Presidential Campaign , guns , gun control , Charleston , South Carolina , Image , Web Only
While the next election is more than 16 months away, early jockeying began in earnest last week when Democratic Gov. Peter Shumlin announced he won't seek a fourth term. That's prompted many to speculate that Republican Lt. Gov. Phil Scott is even more likely to leave his post to seek the state's top office.
Senate President Pro Tem John Campbell (D-Windsor), a close ally of Scott's, says such a vacancy may well lure him into his first statewide race.
"Depending on what [Scott] does, the lieutenant governor's office is one I certainly would be interested in," says the Quechee lawyer and Windsor County deputy state's attorney.
Tags: Vermont lieutenant governor , Phil Scott , John Campbell , Phil Baruth , Dick McCormack , Joe Benning , Sue Minter , Brandon Riker , Image , Web Only
Wednesday, June 17, 2015
Two polls out of New Hampshire this week have prompted the pundit class to acknowledge the excitement surrounding Sen. Bernie Sanders' (I-Vt.) quest for the Democratic nomination.
On Sunday, Morning Consult released the results of a phone and web survey showing Sanders trailing former secretary of state Hillary Clinton by just 12 percentage points — 44 percent to 32 percent. On Tuesday, a more reliable landline and cellphone poll of Granite State voters conducted by Suffolk University showed a marginally tighter spread of 41 percent for Clinton to 31 percent for Sanders.
That's a dramatic shift from the last round of New Hampshire polls conducted a month ago, which mostly showed Sanders in the low- to mid-double digits.
Tags: Senator , Bernie Sanders , Presidential Campaign , Hillary Clinton , Suffolk University , Morning Consult , Polls , Recommended Reading , Image , Web Only
According to TVNewser, Jones will serve as "deputy communications manager" for the campaign. She'll presumably work under Sanders' longtime flack, Michael Briggs, who has been splitting his time between the candidate's Senate and campaign offices.
Jones has worked for MSNBC since 2011, most recently as a producer for "The Ed Show," which is hosted by one of Sanders' biggest media cheerleaders: Ed Schultz. Based on her social media posts, it appears Jones accompanied Schultz to Burlington for Sanders' campaign kickoff last month.
The Sanders campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Tags: Senator , Bernie Sanders , Arianna Jones , Presidential Campaign , MSNBC , Ed Schultz , Image , Recommended Reading , Web Only
That didn't keep Trump from blasting the song as he took the stage at New York City's Trump Tower on Tuesday to announce he'd seek the Republican nomination for president.
Maybe this will: Hours later, Young's manager, Elliot Roberts, issued the following statement:
"Donald Trump was not authorized to use ‘Rockin' in the Free World’ in his presidential candidacy announcement. Neil Young, a Canadian citizen, is a supporter of Bernie Sanders for president of the United States of America."
Tags: Senator , Bernie Sanders , Neil Young , Presidential Campaign , Image , Recommended Reading , Web Only