USApp Managing Editor, Chris Gilson, looks at the week in U.S. state blogging. Click here for our weekly roundup of national blogs. 

Northeast

This week in New Hampshire, PoliticusUSA covers the ongoing campaign of former GOP Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown, who is vying for the Granite State’s Senate seat. They say that a new poll shows that Brown is now trailing the incumbent Democrat Jeanne Shaheen by ten points. They say that voters just aren’t buying Brown’s claim that New Hampshire is his home state. Staying in New Hampshire, miscellany: blue says that State House Representative Bob Elliot has recently ‘launched into a tirade’ against Spanish speaking and Islamic immigrants, saying that ‘Obama has opened a Pandora’s Box’, that will be the end of free enterprise and ‘Christian/Jewish society’.

Moving south to Rhode Island, on Monday, WPRI.com writes that the state came dead last out of 38 states in a survey of 12,000 small business owners, as the least business friendly state in the country.

Meanwhile, in the Empire State, Hit & Run looks at whether or not the new taxi smartphone app, Uber is undermining New York City’s taxi Medallion racket. They say that the company, Medallion Financial, owns a large number of New York City taxi medallions (city-issued permits that permit drivers to operate a yellow cab), but that the company’s tight control over the permits, is being undermined by the new service. Staying in New York State, State of Politics writes this week that while a new poll shows that New Yorkers support the current governing coalition of Democrats and Republicans in the state Senate, the state’s Democrats are spinning the results, to say that Democrats want the main and Independent Democratic conferences in the state to unite.

Moving over to New Jersey, Save Jersey writes on Tuesday that President Obama has diverted nearly $1 billion in Hurricane Sandy recovery funds away from New Jersey and New York to fund a nationwide climate-change resiliency competition. They say that State Senators have condemned the decision to take funds away from their constituents.

Continuing south to Pennsylvania, early in the week, PoliticsPA writes that the Keystone State’s Republicans represent an important voting bloc in Thursday’s House vote for the Majority whip, to replace Kevin McCarthy, who is moving up to take Eric Cantor’s old job as Majority Leader. They say that the Pennsylvania deflation appeared to be supporting moderates rather than extreme conservatives. 

South

On Thursday this week, National Journal looks at Anthony Brown, the current Democratic Lieutenant Governor of Maryland, who is likely to be elected as Governor in the coming fall. If he is successful, then he will be only the third elected African American Governor in U.S. history, and the first in Maryland’s.

Moving down to Virginia, The Daily Signal covers the state’s ongoing Medicaid row. They say that while the GOP led House and Senate have approved a budget that does not include funding to expand Medicaid, Democratic Governor Terry McAuliffe has said that he will ‘take the actions necessary’, to implement the Affordable Care Act in the state.

Meanwhile in Georgia, Peach Pundit writes that a new report has found that if minority voter registration could be increased in the state by 30 – 60 percent (meaning up to 290,000 new blakc voters) then state would turn Democratic.

In Mississippi this week, The Daily Signal says that the state is the most corrupt in the nation, according to a new study that measures public corruption by convictions and also looked at its effects on state spending.

Moving west to Louisiana, PoliticusUSA writes on Sunday that Republican Governor, Bobby Jindal has signed the latest blow on the ‘War on Women’, in the form of new abortion restrictions that would close clinics, and require abortion providers to have admitting privileges in local hospitals. To top this off, he signed the legislation in a church.

Burnt Orange Reportwrites on Monday that the Texas GOP’s new policy platform proposed that welfare recipients should be substance-abuse free in order to receive benefits. They sat that in order to prove this, they should have to submit to random drug testing. They say that an issue with the policy is that children are punished the most when parents lose assistance, and that it is discriminatory, in that other recipients of state assistance, such as students who receive federal grants, are not similarly tested. Staying in Texas, The Atlantic reports that Dallas County adopted a resolution this week that backed reparations for the victims of racism – but by accident. Apparently a resolution was submitted by the only black member of the Dallas County Commissioners Court which commemorated the ‘Juneteenth Resolution’ (a commemoration of the freeing of Texas’ slaves after the civil war in 1865), and was agreed by a unanimous voice vote, with the Commissioners only realizing later on what they had approved.

Midwest 

This week in the Prairie State, Progress Illinois looks at whether or not Chicago police are tracking people’s cellphones. This comes after a lawsuit was filed against the Chicago Police Department by a civil rights law firm to determine if the police are collecting data secretively from cellphones.

Wisconsin was in the news this week, mostly due to allegations against the Governor, Scott Walker. But first, Blue Cheddar reports on Saturday that the state has renewed its ban on same-sex marriage after a federal judge put an order that would prevent state officials from enforcing the ban on hold. Meanwhile, Blogging Blue takes Governor Walker to task for his election promise in 2010 to create 250,000 jobs in his first term. They say that his jobs agency, the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation has only created around 4,800 jobs in the last three years. On Thursday, National Journal reports that, according to newly released documents, Governor Walker is allegedly at the center of a criminal scheme to illegally coordinate fundraising with conservative groups in his 2011-2012 recall election campaign. They say that prosecutors allege that Walker and his campaign members tried to bypass state election laws by working with 12 national conservative groups to raise money. On Friday, Red State critiques what they say is the media’s ‘insanely inaccurate reporting’ of the issue. They say that most stories fail to report that Walker has been cleared of any wrongdoing, and that there is no ongoing investigation, as it had previously been shut down by a Federal Judge.

Moving to Minnesota, Daily Kos writes that the state has achieved what they say is near impossible: achieving a health insurance rate of 95 percent.

In North Dakota this week, SayAnythingBlog reports (with some surprise) that the second largest religion in the Peace Garden State is Islam. They qualify this by saying that it only the second largest if all Christian faiths are combined, which together make up more than 86 percent of the population.

Moving down to The Mount Rushmore State, South Dakota War College writes on Tuesday that say while the local GOP has an abundance of candidates to run for office, the Democrats have been forced to ‘scour the taverns’ for candidates. 

West and Pacific

This week Red State reports that the Governor of Colorado, John Hickenlooper has apologized to state sheriff for not meeting them prior to the passage of gun control bills that they were opposed to. They say that the issue must be making Hickenlooper’s internal polling ‘downright awful’. Staying in the Centennial State, ColoradoPols writes on Tuesday that the state’s man on same-sex marriage appears to be ‘headed for [the] dustbin of history’, after the state’s attorney general’s office argued at a hearing on the ban that the 15 state and federal judges have struck down similar ban ‘were wrong’.

Moving to Idaho, Crooks & Liars writes on Sunday that the state’s Republican Party convention was in disarray as it degenerated into ‘a fiasco’ after attempts to disqualify up to a third of delegates.

In the Grand Canyon State this week, Blog for Arizona reports that the GOP’s candidate forum for the position of Secretary of State was a ‘joke’. They say that the televised forum consisted of ‘softball setups’ from the moderators, who did not challenge candidates’ statements.

In California, Daily Kos writes that the city of San Jose has had great success in raising its minimum wage from $8 an hour to $10.15, which has had no discernable impact on unemployment, and given 70,000 people a raise. Staying in the Golden State, Fox & Hounds writes on Monday that the state legislature should focus on legislation that promotes energy diversity, rather than continuing to act in favor of solar power, which has received strong state and federal tax benefits in recent years. Finally, this week Capitol Alert reports that Governor Jerry Brown has signed California’s $156 billion state budget. They write that the budget represents a dramatic improvement for Brown, as four years ago, the state faces an $26 billion deficit, and now it is able to put away $1.6 billion into a ‘rainy-day account’.

Featured image: Scott Brown, Credit: WBUR (Creative Commons BY NC ND)

Please read our comments policy before commenting.

Note:  This article gives the views of the author, and not the position of USApp– American Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics.

Shortened URL for this post: http://bit.ly/1pozlrQ