So much excitement for 2026's first News You Can Use. Trump finally has an "Osama bin Laden moment" to top Obama's (and distract from Epstein stuff)  although Mar-a-Lago doesn't really have a Situation Room We bet he's building one there now as we speak. States, we see below, are trying to find work-arounds for all the Affordable Care Act premium subsidies now last year's news; many  states (like Maryland) are about to begin legislative sessions and find out how many other things they/we really have to worry about.

But News You Can Use has made it to 2026 and promises to keep you up on outrages and attafolkses at the global/federal, state and local level.

Broad coalition celebrates historic leadership moment while calling for action on redistricting to protect democracy 

Annapolis, Maryland –   Marylanders gathered Tuesday morning at Lawyer’s Mall for a high-energy pep rally hosted by the Meet the Moment Maryland Coalition, a broad alliance of more than 25 labor and community organizations. The rally uplifted a historic moment in Maryland politics, ahead of the first Afro Latina speaker of the house Del. Peña-Melnyk’s, while calling on state leaders to redistrict now to protect democracy, strengthen fair representation, and advance policies that support working families.

The rally comes as redistricting battles intensify nationwide, with Republican-led states aggressively redrawing congressional maps in ways that threaten to silence Black and working-class voters. Advocates warned that Maryland cannot afford to stand still while political power is reshaped around it.

“We’re proud to come together to celebrate Delegate Peña-Melnyk and the significance of this moment for Maryland,” said Larry Stafford Jr., Executive Director of Progressive Maryland. “Her leadership and commitment to redistricting matters, and this rally is about showing that our communities are paying attention, engaged, and ready to work with leaders who are committed to fairness, inclusion, and meeting this moment head-on. As maps are being redrawn across the country and communities are at risk of being silenced, Maryland needs leaders who are willing to meet the moment, protect fair representation, and stand with  working-class families.”

Speakers at the rally represented a wide cross-section of Maryland, including progressive and labor leaders, immigrant rights and healthcare advocates, Chair of the state Democratic party Steuart Pittman, local and state elected officials. Together, they emphasized that fair maps are not an abstract political issue, but one that directly impacts funding for schools, access to healthcare, transportation investments, and protections for vulnerable communities.

Advocates closed the rally with a clear message: Maryland must act decisively to protect fair maps, defend democracy, and ensure that working families and communities of color are not left behind as national political lines are redrawn.

The livestream of the rally can be found here

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>>>>>>>>>>>>Note: no News You Can Use blog until January so practice your info-scavenging skills...<<<<<<<<<<<<<

It'll be money week in several respects. The General Assembly will have a special session to elect Del. Joseline Peña-Melnyk (D-Prince George’s) as new House Speaker -- but it will also be a flurry of veto overrides. Gov. Moore, who has promised no new taxes to overcome a $1.5BN budget deficit, is juking around with minor budget items to take some of the sting out of what will be pretty rugged overrides. Meanwhile, many states are thumbing their noses at Trump's EO forbidding existing or future state laws that restrict AI, largely on the grounds that the feds have done zilch on this pressing subject. The Maryland Assembly won't have a regular session until January but they are almost guaranteed to have a better 2025 than Congress, which is about to slink home without having done anything about skyrocketing health care premiums for the Affordable Care Act (see Megan E's holiday post below).

It's News You Can Use. See you in 2026, and the best of the holiday season.

Across the country, maps are being challenged, overturned, and redrawn, and those changes will shape who controls Congress in 2026 and beyond. But while other states are recalibrating their political power, Maryland is standing still. In a moment this consequential, standing still is the same as falling behind.

Recent news notes that Democrats could gain seats nationally because courts in some states have struck down Republican gerrymanders. That’s a step in the right direction, but it’s not a strategy. In a narrowly divided House, a single seat could determine whether reproductive rights are protected or stripped away, whether voting protections expand or collapse, and whether working families nationwide get relief or get left behind.

Last time the Maryland General Assembly struggled to sort out ambitions and peacefully replace a House Speaker after the death of the beloved Mike Busch, House factions and geography boiled over and there was talk of recruiting GOP members to tip the balance in a supermajority Democratic body. Remembering that, early aspirants to replace departing House speaker Adrienne Jones tripped over each other stepping aside to clear the way for Prince George's/Anne Arundel Del. Joseline Peña-Melnyk to take the vacant leadership seat.

Civility triumphs. What a contrast to the hopeless mess that is the GOP-majority Congress, where battles over the nitty-gritty (and the most trivial opinion roadblocks to a solution) puts the health care of millions of Americans still further at risk. As our People's Action specialist on D.C. doings Megan E outlines below, "the Trump administration's war on poor people" is relentless and the GOP majority in both houses of Congress is kneeling to the increasingly addled Prez. The latest GOP apostate, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, has illuminated the two-faced nature of the GOP members as they mock Trump in private but fearfully knuckle under in public.

Trump's latest pro-billionaire trick, just today, is to try to pre-empt the efforts of many states to protect their residents from the dangers of corporate artificial intelligence while leaving room for its advantages. While the feds have dawdled in the four years since Chat-GPT began informing/bamboozling its users, states have stepped in. The billionaires of Silicon Valley and their hedge-fund allies are balking, and Trump is listening. He calls them "brilliant" and it's likely they are. But brilliant at what, and at whose expense? It's News You Can Use, so read on below...

With the Holidays here, there a "case of the slows" * in the action around states. Maryland will begin its 90-day legislative session in early January (opening day is January 14)so don't put down your phones quite yet. The Maryland.gov site is "under construction" today, at least as far as legislation filed so far, but the hardworking Department of Legislative Services is beavering away on prep for the 2026 session and has interesting studies and audits to offer -- you can while away your time on that. Don't forget your county delegations to the Assembly will be meeting to discuss upcoming proposals so keep an eye open for that. Note below that as other states slowly assemble law providing for family leave policies, Maryland keeps dragging its legislative feet. 

Meanwhile about 20-ish states' attorneys general are suing the Trump gangsters for their constant flurry of budget cuts (seldom coordinated with Congress, supposedly the budget-and-appropriation branch of government). Our AG Anthony Brown is one of that coalition and as we read below, the serious harm done in Maryland and other states stemming from reckless cuts to housing subsidies would have drastic effects on keeping people securely sheltered during the coldest part of the year.

People's Action DC watcher Megan E also has her assessment of how things are going in DC. The worst news, we all know, had nothing to do with a helpless Congress or disobeyed judges, but with the tragic shootings of National Guard members who were posted to the nation's capital -- quite unnecessarily -- by Trump. His motive was to show off how a president can order people around (including those in uniform) at his whim. The result was the tragic death of a member of the West Virginia guard and life-threatening injuries to another. A suspect is in custody and we may find out his motive. But the suspect had nothing to do with the casual, show-off deployment of guard members in potential harm's way.

It's all News You Can Use. 

*attributed to President Lincoln, speaking of one of his generals