CONCORD, N.H. — Two decades before launching her bid to succeed Gov. Kelly Ayotte, Cinde Warmington was a paid lobbyist for Purdue Pharma, working to defeat New Hampshire legislation that would have restricted access to OxyContin years before the drugmaker admitted to a scheme that fueled the deadliest drug epidemic in U.S. history.

Warmington, a former Executive Councilor who filed her candidacy on June 4 and is the all-but-certain Democratic nominee against Ayotte, was hired by Purdue in late 2001 and 2002 to fight House Bill 1218, a measure that would have required patients to try three alternative therapies before being prescribed OxyContin or its generics.

At an April 9, 2002, hearing before the state Senate Committee on Executive Departments and Administration, Warmington testified that OxyContin “is a miracle drug” for many patients and had “very few side effects,” according to official hearing minutes. She argued the bill would restrict access to medically necessary medications without clinical support. Pressed by a state senator on the drug’s abuse potential, Warmington acknowledged OxyContin “is a drug of abuse as are all narcotics” and said it was “an issue that is of great concern to Purdue Pharmaceuticals.”

The state Senate voted 23-0 in favor of the restriction anyway, and HB 1218 became law later that year.

Purdue would go on to plead guilty to federal crimes twice — first in 2007, when the company and three executives admitted to falsely marketing OxyContin as less addictive and less subject to abuse than competing painkillers, paying $634.5 million, and again in 2020, when it admitted to defrauding the DEA and paying kickbacks to doctors as part of an $8.3 billion resolution. A $7.4 billion settlement between Purdue, the Sackler family and state governments was approved by a federal bankruptcy judge in November, with New Hampshire set to receive nearly $29.6 million over 10 years.

Purdue “is widely blamed for the opioid crisis that killed an estimated 645,000 nationwide,” the New Hampshire Bulletin reported. Most of the settlement funds are earmarked for governments fighting a crisis linked to 900,000 deaths since 1999, according to the Associated Press.

Warmington has acknowledged the Purdue work. A spokesman for her 2023 campaign said that she did lobbying work for Purdue in 2001 and 2002 but no other pharmaceutical company, adding that “we were all unaware of Purdue Pharma’s fraud” at the time.

But Warmington later did legal work as attorney for PainCare, a New Hampshire pain-management clinic network.

PainCare was owned by Dr. Michael O’Connell, who in 2012 agreed to surrender his medical license amid allegations that he had inappropriate romantic relationships with patients, under a settlement in which he admitted no wrongdoing. Warmington represented O’Connell in that disciplinary proceeding and helped negotiate the resolution. Two years later, in 2014, O’Connell was indicted on two felony counts of witness tampering, accused of pressuring his accusers to retract their complaints to the state medical board; prosecutors dropped the charges before trial, and O’Connell was represented in that criminal matter by Warmington’s husband, attorney Bill Christie. Warmington separately represented Dr. Anton Heins, another PainCare physician.

It was during this same period, in 2013 and 2014, that PainCare physician assistant Christopher Clough, one of the most prolific prescribers of opioids to New Hampshire Medicaid patients, was taking kickbacks from opioid manufacturer Insys Therapeutics in exchange for prescribing its fentanyl spray, Subsys. Federal prosecutors said Clough received more than $49,000 from Insys and wrote more than 750 prescriptions, including over 215 for Medicare patients, while being paid roughly $1,000 per speaking event for the company. He was convicted in December 2018 and sentenced to 48 months in prison. Warmington was PainCare’s lawyer at the time of that conduct, though prosecutors did not implicate her in it, and her documented involvement in the matter was limited to representing Clough’s supervising physician, not Clough himself.

In 2015, separately, Warmington lobbied against a bill that would have barred doctors with revoked or suspended medical licenses from owning a health care practice; the bill failed. She also met with New Hampshire Public Radio at the time to defend PainCare’s public image.

In 2023 Warmington claimed to have cut ties with the embattled opioid pushers in 2020. But an unearthed document showed that she was the registered business agent for Pinewood Professionals, a PainCare affiliate at the same address tied to PMC Medical Group in 2022.

PMC operated facilities including Granite State Pain Associates. Critics have labeled GSPA a “pill mill” for the volume of opioid painkillers it prescribed in the early 2000s.

O’Connell and PMC Medical Group went on to become significant donors to Warmington’s political career. She received a combined $49,000 in campaign contributions from O’Connell and PMC Medical Group across her two Executive Council campaigns and her current run for governor, according to campaign finance records. Warmington’s 2024 primary opponent, former Manchester Mayor Joyce Craig, put the figure at close to $70,000 from “these bad actors” during a debate that August.

The New Hampshire general election is Nov. 3.

NORTHFIELD, N.J. — Atlantic County is lowering its property tax rate for the fifth consecutive year, trimming the general rate 2 cents under its 2026 budget while keeping health and library rates flat.

The $283 million spending plan calls for about $198.5 million to be raised through taxes. The county applied $22.5 million in surplus to the budget, a little more than half of what was available, to hold down the burden on taxpayers.

The Board of County Commissioners held a public hearing on the budget March 31 at the county complex in Northfield.

A five-year run

The 2026 cut extends a streak that began in 2022:

• 2022: the county lowered the rate 1.5 cents.

• 2023: the rate fell another 2 cents, with $13.8 million in surplus applied.

• 2024: the county cut the rate roughly five cents as part of a $262.1 million budget.

• 2025: the county projected a further decrease of 1 to 1.8 cents, using about $19.3 million in surplus.

County budget documents say the rate has been lowered 18 times in the last 26 years.

The county has paired the rate cuts with steps aimed at containing costs:

• It has held top-tier credit ratings, which keep borrowing costs down, and has posted 26 straight perfect audits.

• It has pursued shared services and efficiency measures, including paperless online bidding, solar panels and LED lighting conversions at county facilities.

• It reached agreements with unions to move employees to a more affordable health plan.

• It secured $1 million in federal funding for an aviation maintenance training academy at Atlantic City International Airport.

CASCADE LOCKS, Ore. — In October 2023, the port of Cascade Locks’ board of commissioners met to hear about the search for a new tenant for a large industrial space after the original tenet had vacated the premises. Optimism at finding a new company was high - but so was the $6 million debt the company, whose owner sold it to a foreign firm, left the town.

Flex 6, a 43,376 square feet commercial building, was completed in 2021. The port built it for one tenant, The Renewal Workshop, which was co-founded by Nicole Bassett, now the Democratic nominee for Oregon Senate District 26.

The Renewal Workshop was in need of a new home and didn’t have the money to expand, but Cascade Locks was committed to keeping the business in town. So, in May 2020, Business Oregon approved a $6,608,500 Special Public Works Fund loan to the port to build Flex 6 for lease to the company. The fund lends only to public entities, so the port borrowed to fund construction. The company separately took a $257,000 Paycheck Protection Program loan, which was forgiven.

Port Manager Olga Kaganova sold the project to the community in early 2021. “It is exciting that a Cascade Locks-grown business is expanding,” she said. “They will be bringing 75-100 new jobs into the community.”

Bassett never managed to hit those numbers, and now says the company created no more than 45 local jobs.

On March 16, 2022, the logistics firm Bleckmann announced it had bought The Renewal Workshop. “We are thrilled to find a values aligned partner,” Bassett said in the announcement. “Bleckmann has the resources, expertise, and commitment to scale renewal and recommerce for the industry.” Co-founder Jeff Denby said Bleckmann’s global footprint would let it build on what the company started “in Europe and the US.”

Bleckmann is 75 percent owned by Netlog Logistics, an Istanbul-based company that bought Bleckmann in 2014. The Çak family, a Turkish business group, hold the majority share of Netlog. After the sale, control of the business Oregon helped finance sat with a foreign private logistics group.

The effect on Cascade Locks is a familiar story of small towns encountering large multi-national firms. Bassett announced that services provided in Cascade Locks were being set up in Ohio and offshored to European locations The Oregon facility closed, and port records say the buyer opted to leave the port location. Bassett stayed on with Bleckmann as its Circularity Lead, but the other jobs the building was meant to host left Oregon.

Bassett has since been upbeat about how it went. “When I tell people how easy and aligned the acquisition has gone, they say that’s not normal,” she said in a 2023 newsletter Q&A.

Cascade Locks was left with the loan, and the ensuing tax burden. In May 2023 its budget packet listed $5,703,086 still owed on Flex 6 and described the building as “Vacant right now.” The port was paying more than $53,000 a month on its loans and maintenance with no tenant. Port Commission President Brad Lorang said the empty building had cost the port “roughly $300,000 in accrued interest” on the $6 million loan.

The port, which “isn’t sure why the Renewal Workshop’s new owner isn’t responsible for the lease” had to look at other uses for the property. A data center proposal was considered and canceled, but now in the port’s 2025-26 budget Flex 6 is listed as leased.

Bassett is now on the ballot. Her voter-guide statement says she “co-founded a company in Cascade Locks that created local jobs by giving apparel a second life.” It doesn’t mention the closure or the port’s debt. She calls herself “not a career politician” and says she knows “how to build something, make payroll, and read a budget.”

Cascade Locks still budgets $435,500 in debt service on the building they built for Bassett, accounting for over 40% of Cascade Locks’ yearly debt service. The debt is equivalent to over 10% of its discretionary budget.

HAMILTON, NJ - Atlantic County Clerk Joe Giralo succeeded in an effort to count 24 mail ballot votes that missed the receipt deadline after the USPS held the ballots over an unrelated billing issue from 2020.

In a social media post, the Atlantic County Republican said he “want[ed] to thank all involved in getting all the votes counted.”

The NJ Attorney General’s office, which is filled by a partisan appointment process by Democrat Governor Mikie Sherrill, had urged the Board of Elections to ignore the ballots, effectively disenfranchising the two dozen voters. New Jersey is facing an unrelated enfranchisement scandal after it was revealed this week that 6,600 noncitizens had been registered to vote, with many casting ballots over the last three years.

Municipal elections in New Jersey, which has over 500 municipalities, are frequently decided by razor-thin margins as small as one vote.

The votes, which did not change the results of any primary election on either the Republican or Democrat side, were held by the USPS over a past-due bill of $66,000. As the New Jersey Globe reports, that decision is contrary to standard USPS practices to “not impede the mailing and return of ballots, even if there is an outstanding balance due.”

The delinquent bill occurred under Democrat Ed McGettigan in 2020. Giralo flipped the clerk’s office after McGettigan declined to run in 2021 after he spoiled a county commissioner race, forcing a do-over.

RICHMOND — Gov. Abigail Spanberger signed two executive orders on June 30, 2026, laying out how her administration will review state agency regulations and which executive branch officials must file financial disclosure statements, actions required of Virginia governors by law within their first six months in office.

Executive Order 17 establishes the process the administration will use to develop and review regulations proposed by state agencies during Spanberger’s term. Executive Order 18 designates which executive branch officers and employees must file annual financial disclosure statements, a transparency requirement aimed at flagging potential conflicts of interest among senior state officials.

Both orders remain in effect until June 30, 2030, unless amended or rescinded by a future executive order.

The orders followed a series of earlier actions from Spanberger’s first six months in office focused on immigration enforcement and law enforcement oversight, including a directive terminating the state’s agreements allowing federal immigration authorities to deputize state law enforcement officers, and an executive order establishing standards for state police conduct.

Spanberger’s office said the regulatory review order is intended to ensure agency rulemaking reflects the priorities she outlined in her Day One executive orders, which directed state agencies to identify ways to lower costs for Virginia families in housing, health care and energy. The financial disclosure order is separate from, but complements, existing state ethics laws that require lawmakers and certain other public officials to disclose outside income and business interests.

AUGUSTA — A new Maine law requiring larger employers to disclose salary ranges in job postings is set to take effect in late July, about 90 days after the Legislature’s adjournment, following a party-line vote earlier this year.

Gov. Janet Mills signed LD 54 in April, requiring businesses with more than 10 employees to include a prospective pay range when posting job openings and to disclose pay ranges to current employees upon request. Employers must also maintain pay history records for the duration of an employee’s tenure plus three years.

Rep. Amy Roeder, D-Bangor, the bill’s sponsor, said the measure gives job applicants information they need before committing to a lengthy application process and helps address pay disparities among current employees performing similar work.

The Legislature appropriated just over $81,000 from the state’s general fund for the 2026-27 fiscal year to cover enforcement costs. Democrats on the Legislature’s Labor Committee and in floor votes supported the bill unanimously, while Republicans opposed it in both chambers.

The Maine Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank, argued the law could inadvertently harm job seekers and place an outsized compliance burden on small businesses already navigating a tight labor market.

The pay transparency law joins a wave of similar measures adopted in other states in recent years, as Maine becomes one of a growing number of states requiring salary disclosure in job listings.

The lawsuit, filed by Right to Life of Michigan and the Pregnancy Resource Center in Grand Rapids against Attorney General Dana Nessel and the Michigan Department of Civil Rights, argued that recent changes to the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act violated the groups’ First Amendment rights by forcing them to employ staff whose views conflict with their mission.

U.S. District Judge Robert J. Jonker, a George W. Bush appointee, sided with the plaintiffs, writing that the law’s recent statutory changes “do, however, at least arguably cover” the organizations’ constitutionally protected conduct. Jonker also denied the state’s motion to dismiss the case.

The injunction bars the state from enforcing provisions that would otherwise prevent the groups from declining to hire people who have had an abortion, advocate for abortion rights or hold pro-choice views for open positions, and from disclosing those hiring preferences publicly. It also allows the Pregnancy Resource Center to decline volunteers who do not share its positions, and permits both groups to offer employee insurance that excludes elective abortion coverage.

A spokesperson for Nessel’s office said it has “significant concerns” with the ruling and will raise them in further proceedings. It is the second lawsuit Right to Life of Michigan has pursued against the state this year; a federal appeals court in May upheld the dismissal of a separate challenge to Michigan’s constitutional right to abortion access.

U.S. District Court Judge Benjamin Settle, a George W. Bush appointee, granted two preliminary injunctions requiring the GEO Group to allow Washington State Department of Health inspectors into the Northwest ICE Processing Center, excluding areas under direct federal control.

The order stems from a 2023 state law, House Bill 1470, that set health and safety standards for private detention facilities and authorized unannounced state inspections. GEO had sued to block enforcement of the law, and Settle initially sided with the company in 2023, but the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals vacated that ruling last year and sent the case back for reconsideration.

Gov. Bob Ferguson and Attorney General Nick Brown sought the injunction in April after the facility’s operator repeatedly refused to admit health inspectors despite more than 3,500 complaints from detainees about food, medical care and sanitation.

Settle rejected GEO’s argument that federal immigration authorities, not the company, should have been named in the case, writing that a federal contractor “does not” enjoy the same immunity from state law as the government itself.

The order takes effect in 14 days, giving GEO Group time to appeal. The company has not said whether it will do so.

OAKLAND — Gov. Gavin Newsom on July 8, 2026, signed the Fair Share from Big Corporations Act, a measure aimed at requiring the state’s largest employers to cover more of the cost of their workers’ health benefits rather than shifting those costs to Medi-Cal and state taxpayers.

Senate Bill 177 requires large companies to contribute toward employee health coverage or face new state assessments tied to the cost of care their workers receive through the public program.

Members of SEIU and Health Access joined Newsom for the signing. Sen. John Laird, D-Santa Cruz, said the law “strengthens Medi-Cal, protects taxpayers, and helps ensure that large employers contribute fairly toward the health care costs of their workforce.”

Assemblymember Mia Bonta, D-Oakland, said federal cuts to health coverage are compounding the problem, arguing some employers have used public benefits as a “business strategy” for their workforce while shifting costs onto taxpayers.

The bill follows a broader pattern from Sacramento this year of legislation aimed at corporate cost-shifting, arriving the same week Newsom signed a separate measure extending the California Competes Tax Credit to encourage business investment in the state.

State finance officials have not yet released a formal estimate of how much revenue the new corporate assessments are expected to generate for Medi-Cal, though the administration has said the goal is to offset a portion of the state’s rising costs for the program as federal Medicaid matching funds face new restrictions under last year’s federal budget law.

JUNEAU — Alaska has received final federal approval for the King Cove Road, Gov. Mike Dunleavy announced July 10, 2026, marking a milestone in a decades-long effort to connect the communities of King Cove and Cold Bay.

The approval clears the way for year-round road access between the two remote Aleutian communities, a project state officials have pursued through multiple federal administrations.

U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan, a Republican seeking reelection this year in a closely watched race, said the permit put Alaska “closer than ever before to delivering a lifesaving, 11-mile, single-lane gravel road to the all-weather airport in Cold Bay.” Sullivan said the decades-long dispute had come to symbolize “an uncaring, out-of-touch, faraway federal government that prioritizes the lives of birds over people.”

The announcement came the same week Dunleavy set a state record for the most vetoes issued during a single two-year Legislature, rejecting 29 of the 115 bills passed by the 34th Alaska Legislature, or more than one in four.

The previous record of 25 vetoes was held by Gov. Tony Knowles in the mid-1990s. Legislative leaders declined to discuss the veto tally at length, citing ongoing negotiations with the governor over a separate, closely watched tax-break bill for the developer of the proposed trans-Alaska natural gas pipeline.

Earlier in the month, Dunleavy vetoed a bill that would have reimposed limits on individual campaign contributions, saying the matter should be left to voters. An identical measure is already slated for the August ballot after the Alaska Legislature failed twice before to reinstate the limits, which a federal appeals court struck down in 2021.

Dunleavy, who will leave office in December, has vetoed 44 bills in total during his tenure, short of the career record of 74 held by former Gov. Jay Hammond. Lawmakers are not expected to attempt an override of the campaign finance veto, since the bill fell short of the 40 votes needed in the House.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Monday against the Republican National Committee in Watson v. Republican National Committee, holding 5-4 that states can count mail ballots that are cast by Election Day but arrive afterward, rejecting the GOP’s challenge to a Mississippi law permitting late-arriving ballots.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett authored the majority opinion, joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and the three liberal justices.

At issue was a Mississippi law allowing ballots received up to five days after the election to be counted, provided they were postmarked by Election Day. The RNC argued the practice conflicted with a federal statute dating to 1845 that designated Election Day as the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November, contending ballots must not just be cast but received by that date.

Mississippi is one of a few states, including D.C., that allows such a grace period. The ruling preserves those laws heading into the 2026 midterms.

The Trump administration had backed the RNC’s challenge, arguing Election Day is the day the ballot box closes and the deadline by which officials must have all ballots in hand.

After the ruling, RNC Chairman Joe Gruters called on Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, saying that “Democrats are inviting chaos at the ballot box by allowing elections to drag on for days and weeks after voters cast their ballots.”

The Court could have ruled narrowly on Mississippi’s specific statute or broadly in a way that impacts all states with a grace period.