News

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul and the Republican National Committee chairman are distancing themselves from conservatives who suggested in recent days that President Barack Obama could face impeachment for the developing scandal at the Internal Revenue Service.

RNC chairman Reince Priebus said, “There’s a few chapters before we get to the last one.” He says it’s up to Republicans to “connect the dots” before calling for impeachment.

Asked about impeachment, Paul says investigators must learn more “before we go anywhere else.”

The Republican leaders addressed reporters before a Monday GOP fundraiser in Concord, N.H.

Paul is touring early-voting states while considering whether to run for president in 2016.

A construction worker has died following an accident at the site of the Owensboro “Blue Bridge” painting project. Daviess County Coroner Jeff Jones says the man—whose identity has not been released—died Monday evening after being taken to the Owensboro Health Regional Hospital.

Co-workers found the 35-year-old unconscious in safety netting at the work site. He was cut from the netting and taken to the hospital with burns on his hands, indicating that he may have come into contact with energized electrical wires on the bridge.

The contractor and Kentucky Transportation Cabinet safety personnel will conduct an investigation into the incident.

The Glover H. Cary Bridge—also known locally as the “Blue Bridge”—is closed until November while it gets a fresh coat of paint. The bridge connects Owensboro with southern Indiana, and is used by an average of 8,500 vehicles a day.

Kentucky's agriculture commissioner says last week's setback shouldn't cause hemp supporters to give up hopes of getting the crop legalized. James Comer told WKU Public Radio he's not surprised language legalizing industrial hemp failed to get added to the first drafts of farm bills in the U.S. House and Senate.

Last week, a group of Kentucky U.S. Senators and House members tried--and failed--to get that language included in the legislation.

Comer says the federal farm bill has a long way to go before it gets passed, and a lot of things will be added and taken out in the next few months.

"And I learned during this last session in Kentucky, when I read in the papers that (House Speaker) Greg Stumbo would say my bill was dead, that it's not over until the very last day, so we're still holding out hope on it," said Comer, a farmer from Monroe County.

A judge will rule "as soon as possible" on a motion to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the legality of the Kentucky Health Benefits Exchange that Governor Steve Beshear created last year by executive order.

Beshear said the Health Benefits Exchange would help uninsured Kentuckians arrange insurance coverage under the federal Affordable Care Act.

Tea Party activist David Adams filed a lawsuit claiming that Beshear created the exchange without necessary legislative approval. Adams is asking Franklin County Circuit Judge Phillip J. Shepherd to order work on the exchange to cease. Shepherd held a hearing on the issue Monday morning in Frankfort.

Attorneys for Beshear asked Shepherd to dismiss the lawsuit, claiming that Adams and others who filed it lack legal standing to do so.

Kentucky House Speaker Greg Stumbo has offered a Senate redistricting plan in hopes of speeding up what's become a drawn out process.

Stumbo said Monday that delaying legislative redistricting makes it more likely that judges will step in to realign political boundaries in the state. Two federal lawsuits have been filed in recent weeks; one seeking to force lawmakers to take action and another asking for a panel of judges to redraw political lines.

House Republican leader Jeff Hoover said Kentuckians may be better off having federal judges draw a redistricting plan that would place people above politics. That, Hoover said, would also eliminate the need for Governor Steve Beshear to call lawmakers back into a special session that would cost $300,000 a week.