By Erin Bamer | Reporter
“This is an important achievement that has been years in the making … We are very excited to be moving forward on bringing high-paying jobs for our Nebraska graduates.” - Jim Ristow, Bellevue city administrator.
The planned “REACH” facility, represented here in the front row to the left, reached a milestone when an anchor tenant signed a letter of intent agreement with the Prairie Hill Farm Area Development Authority, a nonprofit that includes City of Bellevue officials and will own and manage the broader campus northeast of Highways 75 and 34 in the state’s third most populous city just south of Omaha. It is to house research and development of defense and cybersecurity technologies that will boost the missions at the Bellevue-based U.S. Strategic Command (StratCom). The REACH building is still under design. (Courtesy of the City of Bellevue and Prairie Hill Farm Area Development Authority)
LABOR & GROWTH
By Cindy Gonzalez
BELLEVUE — Now that its main tenant has been “nailed down” and an agreement signed, a campus focusing on national defense technology in this military-heavy Nebraska town should start to take shape.
State Sen. Terrell McKinney, left, Omaha Mayor John Ewing Jr., right and Omaha Inland Port Authority Executive DIrector Garry Clark unveil what could be the first newly constructed building on the planned “innovation district” southeast of 30th Street and Ames Avenue. The port authority held an event Tuesday to show the public where the innovation district will rise. (Cindy Gonzalez/Nebraska Examiner)
LABOR & GROWTH
By Cindy Gonzalez
OMAHA — Roughly 100 people who turned out Tuesday to see the site of a future “innovation district” in North Omaha also got a peek at what could be the first major building to rise on the grounds southeast of 30th Street and Ames Avenue.
Nebraska Labor Commissioner Katie Thurber speaks at a press conference at Metro Community College, as Nebraska launches the federally-funded Workforce Pell Grant program. (Cindy Gonzalez/Nebraska Examiner)
GOVERNMENT & POLITICS
By Cindy Gonzalez
OMAHA — Nebraska officials raved Tuesday about a new federally-funded Workforce Pell Grant program they expect will boost the state’s labor force and more quickly connect trainees with high-demand jobs.
A resident sits on a bench at Make the Road New York, a community center in Corona, Queens, in New York City. An appeals court ruling against mandatory detention applies to states where many New York immigrants are transferred after arrest. (Photo by Tim Henderson/Stateline)
GOVERNMENT & POLITICS
By Tim Henderson
A new appeals court ruling is another blow to the Trump administration’s mandatory detention policy that threatens millions of immigrants with unlimited incarceration without bond if they ever crossed a border illegally.
Independent U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont on Tuesday, July 7, 2026, said he told U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner of Maine he should “step aside.” In this photo, Sanders, right, rallies with Platner in Portland on May 25, 2026. (Photo by Emma Davis/ Maine Morning Star)
D.C. BUREAU
By Jacob Fischler
A host of high-profile Democrats called for Graham Platner, the party’s nominee to take on Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine in November’s election, to drop out of the race as they tried to save the party’s chances to retake the Senate majority.
An Iowa nurse recently agreed to surrender her Iowa nurse’s license after federal grand jury indictment charging her with eight counts of tampering with consumer products and three counts of acquiring controlled substances by subterfuge or fraud. (Photo by Darwin Brandis/iStock Getty Images Plus)
HEALTH
By Clark Kauffman
Almost two years after the State of Nebraska revoked a nurse’s ability to practice there for posing a “significant risk to public safety,” Iowa’s Board of Nursing has agreed to accept the nurse’s surrender of her license to practice in Iowa.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Ballot initiative for total abortion ban fails to submit signatures | Juan Salinas II
Nonpartisan NE-03 candidate enters race as write-in | Juan Salinas II
COMMENTARY
OPINION: The Supreme Court headline is not what you think | George Ayoub
EDITOR'S CHOICE
$9.6 million in lottery proceeds goes to Nebraska entities | Cindy Gonzalez
Nebraska Secretary of State calls RNC lawsuit ‘a little baffling’ | Juan Salinas II
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