Tagged: Kentucky General Assembly

A Lexington lawmaker says she will apologize for making a disparaging comment about another legislator that appeared on Facebook.

Democratic state Sen. Kathy Stein told the Lexington Herald-Leader that she made the comment on an old blog and thought it would be private, but the commenting system was powered by Facebook and so her post also appeared on her Facebook account.

The Republican state Senate has completed it's shake-up, after announcing new committee chairs today. 

With multiple chairmen retiring and others promoted into leadership, the caucus had many roles to fill, including that of chairmen for Education, Judiciary, Agriculture and Natural Resources. 

And in another move, the caucus named State Senator David Givens as c0-chair to the budget committee, with Senator Bob Leeper.

Incoming freshman Senator Whitney Westerfield is the new judiciary chairman. The full list of Republican chairs are below, with * by new chairs.

Gov. Steve Beshear is considering multiple options in the efforts to get the General Assembly to support expanded gambling legislation.

A constitutional amendment failed earlier this year in the state Senate -- and a major complaint from critics was that the amendment did too much to protect thoroughbred racing tracks over other businesses. The bill banned casinos from being within 60 miles of a race track, unless the casino was at the track.

The State Senate Republican Caucus has officially nominated Sen. Robert Stivers for Senate president.

Stivers’ new role won’t be official until it’s voted on by the full chamber in early January. But the GOP holds a 24-14 advantage, meaning Stivers is all but certain to succeed former Senate President David Williams. Williams left the Senate to take a position as a circuit judge.