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<p>Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe has vetoed legislation he said would legalize discrimination against LGBT people.</p> <p>The Democratic governor signed his veto of Senate Bill 41 Wednesday morning while on WTOP.</p> <p>"We're not going to tolerate discrimination. Virginia will be open and welcoming," he said.</p>

Virginia Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe restoring voting rights for roughly 200,000 convicted felons is part of a lauded, national effort to reverse sentencing laws that most affect African Americans. But Republicans are suggesting McAuliffe, a long-time Clinton supporter, went too far by including violent criminals and that his move is a “transparent effort to win votes.” The governor’s executive order allows Virginia felons, includes convicted murders and rapists, who by Friday had completed their sentence and finished supervised release, parole or probation requirements to vote in the swing state in the November presidential elections.

A bill that would force condemned inmates to die by the electric chair if the state can't find lethal injection drugs is one step closer to final approval in Virginia. [...] The bill sailed through the GOP-dominated House last month. A spokesman for Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a Democrat, has declined to say whether he would support the bill. ...

The Virginia House of Delegates passed a measure Tuesday that would prohibit the state from taking action against businesses that refuse services to same-sex couples or people who engage in extra-marital sex. The House passed the controversial bill in a 56-41 vote, with supporters saying the legislation would protect religious rights of business owners from state-led lawsuits or the loss of state grants and contracts for simply refusing service to gay couples. ...

The decision by Virginia’s Attorney General Mark Herring to sever reciprocity in carry permits with 25 other states has one state senator seeing red. Bob Carrico considers the issue “absurd,” but plans to do more than fume about it. If the Terry McAuliffe administration worries this much about firearms, Carrico wants to take action to keep them as far away from the governor as possible, according to the Bristol Herald-Courier: "I absolutely think it's absurd," Carrico, a Republican from Galax, said Tuesday. "I think it's a threat to the people of Virginia that have concealed carry handgun permit reciprocity from...

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe has vetoed legislation he said would legalize discrimination of the LGBT community. The Democratic governor made the announcement Wednesday during a radio appearance on WTOP. The measure would prohibit the state from punishing religious groups that refuse services related to gay marriages. Republican supporters said it would protect people from expressing their religious beliefs. …

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a Democrat, will sign an order Friday restoring the voting rights of more than 200,000 felons in the state. The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported that the unprecedented move will also allow felons living in Virginia to sit on a jury, serve in elected office, or become a notary. The order will effectively restore the civil rights of both nonviolent and violent felons who have served their time in prison and completed parole. According to the McAuliffe administration, the move will affect roughly 206,000 felons currently living in Virginia who have finished their prison sentences but not applied...

Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s (D) unexpected decision to give a blanket, automatic restoration of voting rights to ex-felons – the order covers those convicted of all crimes, non-violent to the most heinous – has upended the 2017 contests for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general. The state’s pundits have been calling McAuliffe’s surprise decision — he never hinted at this while campaigning — a politically motivated effort to help longtime friend Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president. This is based on their belief that African Americans will benefit the most, and skin color determines voting choices today. This belittles...

Gov. Terry McAuliffe this morning will sign an order that effectively restores the civil rights, including the right to vote, of more than 200,000 felons in Virginia. The unprecedented move, expected to be announced at an 11 a.m. news conference on Capitol Square, marks a dramatic expansion of policy in restoring the right to vote, to sit on a jury, to serve in elected office or become a notary. Today's order applies to nonviolent and violent felons - a significant departure from a policy embraced in recent years by Democrat and Republican governors to remove the societal obstacles felons face...

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) on Sunday slammed Republicans who have complained about an executive order he signed extending the right to vote in his state to convicted felons who have served their sentences. "Well, I would tell the Republicans, 'Quit complaining and go out and earn these folks' right to vote for you. Go out and talk to them,' " he said in response to a question about people saying his order was an election-year ploy to help Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton.

In what is likely an unconstitutional state action seemingly calculated to ensure that the purple state of Virginia goes blue in the November election, Governor Terry McAuliffe (D.) signed an order on Friday restoring the voting rights of 206,000 ex-felons in Virginia, including those convicted of murder, armed robbery, rape, sexual assault, and other violent crimes. The order also restores their right to sit on a jury, become a notary, and even serve in elected office. McAuliffe believes that ex-felons can be trusted to make decisions in the ballot booth and the jury box but apparently not to own a...

Lindsey Graham will host a fundraiser for Ted Cruz next Monday. While Graham has not formally endorsed Cruz, the fundraiser is a sign that Graham at least prefers Cruz over Donald Trump and John Kasich, something Graham confirmed in a comment to the Washington Examiner. "He's the best alternative to Donald Trump," he said.

MIAMI — Former Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina endorsed Sen. Ted Cruz on Wednesday in a surprise appearance in Miami. "I checked the box for Ted Cruz,” Fiorina said.

Fresh off back-to-back victories in the Republican presidential race, Donald Trump is moving to expand his tight-knit campaign by building a political kitchen cabinet that includes former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. Giuliani, who has not made an endorsement in the 2016 contest, said in an interview Sunday that he has conferred at length with Trump at least three times in the past month, both in person and by phone, and has counseled the real estate mogul "as a close personal friend" about campaign issues. "We've been talking. Donald and me, Donald and a few other friends who know...

PORTSMOUTH, New Hampshire "And you can tell them to go f**k themselves," Donald Trump told a crowd at a Portsmouth Rally on Thursday night, uttering the expletive at the climax of the riff on his tax proposal. He was referring to companies that have relocated overseas for more favorable tax rates. (Trump: I'd be a "much different person" as president) Trump often relies on expletives and crude language to spice up his stump speech, though Thursday evening's event was a little more profane than usual...

"During the 2008 campaign cycle, Retired U.S. Army General Wesley Clark appeared on CBS’s Face the Nation as a surrogate for Barack Obama. Clark did use the word “hero” to describe McCain’s POW experience, stating, ”I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in the armed forces, as a prisoner of war.” But Clark also made a statement about how the Arizona senator ended up a prisoner of war. “Well, I don’t think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is...

On Monday, 28 Russian military planes including TU-95 and TU-22 strategic bombers were intercepted over the Baltic Sea near Latvia's border. On Tuesday, a Russian plane violated Estonia's airspace. Poland's defense minister later accused Putin of launching "unprecedented activity" around the Baltic Sea. Gen. Philip Breedlove, NATO's Supreme Allied Commander Europe, said the recent Russian flights were "of a different nature than we've seen in a while." The warplanes were intercepted by NATO in international airspace. "For the past 19 years, we have been trying to treat Russia as a partner, trying to bring the nations of Europe back together...

Putin has become shockingly effective at influencing European politics through a host of far-right parties. The following chart from the Center for Eurasian Strategic Intelligence (CESI) shows Russia's growing influence within six different European Union countries. The parties, located in the UK, France, Germany, Greece, Bulgaria, and Hungary, are increasingly popular—and staunchly against giving more power to the EU. Each of the parties has also fostered a closer relationship with Russia, and has protested against sanctions on Moscow following its annexation of Ukraine.

Staunton, December 13 – Four Russian analysts suggest that the six causes they identify as being behind the collapse of the USSR are again to varying degrees present in Russia today, but what is perhaps more interesting than the causes they do identify is the one that they don’t: the ways in which the six they do helped power a seventh: nationalism Russian and non-Russian. In a 4400-word article in “Russky Reporter” this week, Vladimir Bazhanov, Andrey Veselov, Dmitry Karpets and Aleksandr Pototsky consider to what extent the six causes they say led to the demise of the USSR are...

VIENNA (AP) — A Russian loan to France's National Front. Invitations to Moscow for leaders of Austria's Freedom Party. Praise for Vladimir Putin from the head of Britain's anti-European Union party. As the diplomatic chill over Ukraine deepens, the Kremlin seems keener than ever to enlist Europe's far-right parties in its campaign for influence in the West, seeking new relationships based largely on shared concern over the growing clout of the EU. Russia fears that the EU and NATO could spread to countries it considers part of its sphere of influence. And it has repeatedly served notice that it will...