♪ I have been.

>> Her dog in this I think we're going to have a vote on.

I think I'm actually going to succeed.

>> A Kentucky congressman says he has the support he needs to move toward releasing the abstain Viles.

>> We had one judge at one point that said I wish the state would come and take all of the state inmates because the medical is so expensive.

It is about to break me.

>> More taxpayer money is going to jail cost county officials wish they could spend more of that money elsewhere.

>> The policy is basically preempted by federal law that bars undocumented immigrants from college benefits unless the same benefits are offered to every U.S.

citizen.

>> What we're learning about a lawsuit in Kentucky concerning reduced college tuition for non U.S.

citizens.

>> We're we're very similar in in our thoroughbred racing, but also just a general appreciation for the worst in our culture and our pop culture in our history.

>> And we go to an exhibit all about horse kalter across the Pacific.

>> Production of Kentucky Edition is made possible in part by the KET Millennium Fund.

♪ ♪ >> Good Evening and welcome to Kentucky EDITION for this Wednesday, September, the 24th, I'm Renee Shaw and we thank you for winding down your Wednesday with us.

>> U.S.

Senator Rand Paul and 4th district Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky hit the road today making several campaign stops for Massey as he runs for reelection in 2026.

And Kentucky's 4th district.

The duo is hosting community forms at each location and giving updates on what's happening in Washington.

They stopped today the Maze Bills, part Cafe Paul in Masse heard from people about the importance of the towing industry in the river city.

They discuss the impact of trade tariffs and more Massey.

All to also talked about his work to release the so-called Epstein files files about Jeffrey Epstein and his trafficking of young women and girls.

The congressman is trying to get a discharge petition that would allow members of the House to vote directly on whether to release the files in their entirety.

The petition needs 218 signatures for a vote to take place.

A majority of the House membership right now.

The petition has 217 names, but Massey believes he secured the last vote necessary to move forward.

>> Last night there was an election in Arizona to fill an empty seat in Congress and both the Republican and the Democrat promised to sign the Epstein discharge petition that I can and so it didn't matter who won.

And now I have 218 votes to force this vote on the floor is something that I think we can all agree on.

The billionaires and politically connected.

People should get a pass when they commit some of the worst crimes on the books.

And when we all know that the DOJ has been turning a blind eye to this in.

So I have been bird dog in this, and I but I think we're going to have a vote on.

I think I'm actually going to succeed.

The vote could happen as soon as mid October.

And at that point, the speaker has a choice and speaker of the House.

And so far he's been trying to KET a windfall from supporting my discharge petition.

But now that it's a vote, he has a choice between releasing the conference to vote their conscience and the will of their constituents, which would be for transparency and justice.

>> Or he can try to hold them all captive.

All the Republicans in the House and make them walk the plank, do the wrong thing politically.

But also to do the wrong thing for the victims lived by.

I hope now that the vote is going to happen and that he'll realize he'll see the light and he will not try to KET people from voting for the U.S.. >> Senator Paul and Congressman Massie discussed many other topics, including the likelihood of a government shutdown.

And if Massey might consider joining the race for the United States Senate, we'll have much more on their community forum tomorrow night on Kentucky edition.

The Jefferson County Sheriff John Aubrey, has died after 27 years in office.

Arbery was 86 years old, who yes in Louisville says he was planning to retire at the end of his current term.

He was also a former Louisville chief of police and a U.S.

Army colonel.

He spent 55 years in public service.

Sheriff Arbery is seen here with U.S.

Senator Mitch McConnell earlier this year, Senator McConnell put out this statement saying, quote, John was a dedicated public servant who made an indelible impact on our community and for 27 years as sheriff, he worked tirelessly to KET our neighborhoods safe.

His recognition as the 2025 Sheriff of the year was a testament to his unwavering commitment to law enforcement and the respect he earned from all who KET him, unquote.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear said this on social media, quote, Sheriff John Arbery was a true public servant dedicating his career to protecting Kentuckians, unquote.

County officials went to Frankfort yesterday to ask once again for help finding their local jails.

It's a perennial problem that's growing more costly and immediate due to inflation as our June last year.

Reports and our legislative update.

Some state lawmakers say it's time to make a change.

>> And county jails are saddled with the responsibility of housing, alleged and convicted offenders all while having almost no say in the number of inmates that come in or the price to KET them alive and well, 4 years ago.

>> We had a gentleman try to burn his mother in inside her house.

And he actually paid someone to do it.

But he was on a dialysis.

And so we were paying $28,000 a week to Baptist Hospital to take him to get dialysis.

And I don't take too long to $28,000 a week before we start.

Getting in some financial trouble.

>> Across the board medical expenses are on the rise says the Kentucky Association of Counties or Keiko, this has become one of the most talked about expenses in the jail.

Ram.

I know we had one judge at one point that said I wish the state would come and take all of the state inmates because the medical is so expensive.

It is about to break me jail expenses as a whole have gone up and that means local governments are spending more of their tax dollars to KET the jail's reading.

That leads to tough choices.

We have to look at.

>> Cutting services battle services to serve other constituents that really deserve this money and to that or raise taxes and which is very unpopular.

>> County governments are responsible for misdemeanor offenders and pre-trial felony detainees on their dime.

The county jails, also house state inmates, those with certain felony convictions.

The state reimburses the jail.

35 $1 a day for each state inmate.

But this lawmaker says the state can do more.

>> proposed a few years ago would have done this.

So if you are a county and you have inmates, you're responsible for the U.S.

when somebody is is convicted of a felony by then become the state's responsibility.

What my bill would have done a few years ago would have said that if you are convicted of a felony in the state will pick up the tab for the prefilled any conviction time which would have been a major transfer of funding to those county jails for what is truly a state responsibility, which is the housing of those felony.

In months, the Kentucky General Assembly increase the inmate per diem 3 years ago by $4.

>> The report from the Kentucky Association of counties says the rate would need to be $12 higher to KET up with inflation for Kentucky edition.

I'm Jim Leffler.

Thank you, Jim.

>> Kentucky.

Attorney General Russel Coleman is leading.

25 other attorneys general urging the repeal of several pro environmental regulations.

Their letter to EPA administrator lays elden calls for an end to the EPA is electric vehicle mandates.

The Clean power plan and programs often referred to as the Green New Deal.

In a statement, Coleman says the Obama administration wrongly decided in 20 0, 9, that carbon dioxide contributed to climate change and lead to policies that high prices and kill jobs, including jobs here in Kentucky.

The letter from the 26 attorneys general claims the policies were based on theories that were scientifically unproven.

The Kentucky Lantern reports the American Lung Association and other health organizations say People's health would suffer if lifesaving pollution controls are repealed.

Over the last 3 years, 74% of school districts in Kentucky have seen an increase and English language learning students, according to the Kentucky Department of Education this week, Warren County Public Schools, which has more than 5,000 multi-lingual students presented to the commission on race and Access and Opportunity and Frankfort about ways the state could better accommodate those students.

Our McKenzie spank has more on their proposals and the commission's reaction.

>> Warren County Public Schools is the 4th largest school district in the state and 31% of its students speak more than one language.

>> Representatives from Wcpss spoke to the commission on race and Access to opportunity to ask for changes in the accountability system that would better support their English learning or E L students.

So when we get a student, they get one year of exemption.

>> For the state assessment and then after that, they are expected to perform at the same level if students who then hear multiple years speak English.

>> One of the request is to lengthen the exemption from state assessments.

For else students past one year in order to give them a greater chance at success, how much time can be given before we have to tell a student?

>> That you know, they're novice when they have no shot, right?

Just imagine being another cut.

Country parachute into Burma tomorrow and take their standardized test and see how well you perform.

>> A student who only attend school for one day and then drops out can negatively impact a school's graduation rate?

Dr Johnson and Superintendent Clayton say El students who only attend school very briefly are disproportionately affecting certain schools.

Success rates.

You may decide that.

>> I'm 17 years old around 18 years old and the chance of me getting enough credits to graduate is overwhelming.

And so it's best to find work and to support my family.

It's very difficult.

>> When you have one school where they're going to it, the majority of the students that only come perhaps for day or 2.

And it questions there graduation rate.

What we would like to see is that when we have these situations, how about that accountability moved to the district.

>> The commission was receptive to wcpss presentation.

Republican Senator Lindsey teacher expressed sympathy for real students since she had to learn another language while living overseas as an adult.

The challenge of.

>> But considering you have one year, does that mean that there's just no way a student can come?

And I think the emphasis as opposed to focusing on that graduation rate that shouldn't matter and should be do they know how to read the English language?

Hopefully we can find some solutions to help the students get to that proficient level of English.

>> In the 2025 Session Commission co-chair Representative Kevin Jackson proposed a bill that would increase supports for students and extend the deadline for grade level proficiency to 3 years.

The bill did not advanced past committee for Kentucky edition.

I'm McKenzie Spank.

>> Thank you.

McKenzie.

Since 2017, the amount of E all students in the state has grown 89%.

The Kentucky Department of Education says they're the largest growing student population in the state.

It's official Kentucky students will switch from CTE to the SAT test.

Details in tonight's Education Matters.

Report.

>> The Department of Education's as it awarded a contract to the College Board, which means Kentucky High School juniors will take the SAT during the school day.

>> During a six-week window that opens March.

The second, it's a four-year sat contract.

Kentucky's contract with a CT ended June 30th.

The state says Kentucky will save $350,000 annually over what it paid for the A C t.

♪ >> I'm Lauren Rogers with Lisa on tree, a news anchor and reporter for WKU Public Radio.

Lisa, want to ask you about a few stories that you've covered recently, including the U.S.

Department of Justice reaching this tentative settlement with the Kentucky Council on post-secondary education.

Now, this concerns tuition policy where they were offering undocumented immigrants in-state tuition.

So tell us more about what concerned the federal government about this policy and to what this could mean for the cpe moving forward.

>> Yes, sure.

The DOJ filed a lawsuit in June against originally Governor Andy Beshear was named Kentucky Department of Education Commissioner Robbie Fletcher was named and of course, the Kentucky Council on post-secondary education.

Governor Beshear and Commissioner Fletcher were later dismissed from the lawsuit.

But basically the lawsuit argues that the C P e's regulation that provides reduce costs in-state tuition to students without permanent legal status.

That discriminates against U.S.

citizens.

The cpe policy counts in Peabody who graduates from a Kentucky high school.

As an in-state resident, including undocumented immigrants.

And so the DOJ lawsuit said it's an equal treatment of Americans and it violates federal law because those who live outside of Kentucky don't get the same tuition relief.

And so the policy is basically preempted by federal law that bars undocumented immigrants from college benefits unless the same benefits are offered to every U.S.

citizen.

The DOJ filed similar lawsuits in Texas and Oklahoma as well as one other state.

The Texas lawsuit has already been settled.

Texas agreed to terminate its policy.

There has been a tentative settlement agreement reached in Kentucky.

The motion to settle has been filed according to court documents.

But the judge has yet to sign off on that.

I know that there is a Latino civil rights group that recently filed a motion to intervene on behalf of students.

But that motion hasn't been heard yet.

And so I think that's the hang-up right now.

But the motion to settle the suit has been filed and basically the motion says the CBE agrees to terminate the policy immediately and develop new policy.

>> We did hear from State Attorney General Russel comment about this as well with his own bowling a couple of months ago when the lawsuit was originally filed.

>> Encouraging the cpe to drop the regulation and he seemed like he was siding with the federal government on this.

He was he he urged the Cpe in a letter in July not to litigate what he called would be a losing fight.

>> He said he's now we know this was clearly on the side of the federal government.

>> And let's also live now to Governor Andy Beshear, who has project in reserve warning of this potential budget shortfall, revenue shortfall for the next fiscal year for Kentucky in he citing a couple of different reasons for this.

Tell us more about what we're hearing from the governor.

>> Yeah.

So about a month ago during his weekly team, Kentucky update, the governor said I fully expect there to be a budget shortfall in the current fiscal year and he attribute that to a couple of factors.

The federal tariffs he says that has basically impacted spending and overall economic activity everywhere across the country.

And then he also blamed the reduction in the state income tax, which will take effect in January.

An issue we know a few years ago, the Republican led General Assembly cut the income tax rate from 5 to 4 and a half percent and set up this process to where it's gradually reduced to half a percentage point until it's eliminated.

And the next cut is scheduled to take effect in January.

And so the governor said that coupled with less economic activity due to federal tariffs that has impacted Kentucky's budget.

A panel of economists known as the consensus forecasting group.

They met September 16 last week and revise Kentucky's budget outlook.

They said the fiscal year is expected to fall short just over 300 million dollars.

But it's nothing that should cause alarm because we should not have major spending cuts due to the state's rainy day fund.

It's very robust at this point.

It's expected to have about 3 and a half billion dollars in it by the end of this fiscal year and that Governor Beshear said, you know, stay tuned in the coming weeks.

He'll talk about how we're going to address the deficit.

But without compromising services to Kentuckyian he is warning the next budget is going to be more lean as the state as our state in every state faces more pressure by picking up costs from the federal government, including SNAP benefits.

Kentucky will have to come up with an additional I think 66 million dollars in additional costs to administer snap the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

That's funding that the federal government is no longer taking care of.

Yes, all of that coming about in President Trump's recent budget bill.

The one big beautiful Bill.

>> We thank you for your reporting, Lisa.

Audrey WKU, Public Radio, appreciate you're too.

>> She ate it.

Thanks.

♪ >> A car and booster seats are the best way to protect children during a crash, which is the leading cause of death for kids under the age of 13.

But according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, almost half of all car seats are not being used properly during child passenger safety week.

Kentucky State Police is holding free events around the state to help caregivers make sure children are safe in their seats.

>> During collisions are children are the most susceptible to being injured.

So it's our job here today to make sure that our kids are as safe as possible in their car seats and all times inside of the vehicle.

>> So this week than national child passenger safety wake, you know, we're wanting to make sure that these kids are properly restrained and in the vehicle because a lot of times that is the difference between life and death in the event of a car crash.

>> So, you know, and it's very important to make sure that these kids are installed correctly that other states are installed correctly, that the child is in the rocket booster sate Iran car say.

>> So the Kentucky state law is all kids.

Once I am Kim out of >> A child restraint and they have to remain in a booster seat up to 8 years of age or 57 inches tall to come out of that booster say that just because I am here at the age of 8 doesn't necessarily mean I have to come out of a booster say and a lot of those, your sage and up to 10210 pounds.

But we want to make sure that this email is fitting these kids properly.

And that's one of Mister Cink.

Does it faces him up so that bill fits in the way that it's supposed to?

A lot of times, we say that some children are in the car seats.

However, they're not installed properly.

>> Everybody, thanks that if a car seat is just put in a vehicle that is safe, but there are certain steps that patients take to make sure that it is following manufacturer guidelines and that it's not expired.

These car seats have expiration dates on them.

This make sure that your children are always.

In some type child restraint seat.

I know sometimes it's hard that we're just going to the store is easy.

It just put him in the vehicle.

But that small second could be a life or death for them.

So please just make sure that we use the right measures to make sure that our kids are safe at all times within our vehicles.

>> The biggest thing is, you know, just if you're unsure that your child that, you know, maybe your car say it is not installed correctly and make sure you find a location in your You know, Kentucky State Police, I have someone at all of their post that certified a lot of your health departments in the state has certified.

So if you're just unsure, stop by location, make sure that you are reaching out to someone that is certified as a car seat.

Take nation and have them to check your say.

>> If you're unable to make it to one of the checkup events, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration has some information on its website to help you find a technician in your area.

Go online to an HTA dot Gov.

The website has other information and resources for anyone who drives child passengers.

♪ >> In Kentucky Horse Park is a great place to engage with one of Kentucky's signature industries.

But the Park's International Museum of the Horse gives visitors a chance to see the world of horses through the eyes of other cultures.

Our McKenzie speak takes us to one of these exhibits for this week's Arts and Culture segment.

We called Tapestry.

>> Forces are an undeniable part of Kentucky culture.

How do forces fit into cultures and other countries?

>> The heart of the horse exhibit gives visitors a peek into the role of horses in Japanese history and modern pop culture.

The exhibit is named Monica Grow, which translates to heart essence spirit of the courts.

My curator of exhibits was very interested in thoroughbred horse racing, but especially in Japan.

>> And the last few years, the Japanese forces have done very well in all the major events around the world.

And so she asked if we could just do a little exhibit on the current Japanese thoroughbreds.

>> From there, the exhibit grew into an immersive experience diving into the military, spiritual and cultural Japanese history of the horse.

The symbolic significance of the horse in Japan goes back further than the history of the United States horses in Japan.

Kind of start out as a religious connection.

Their first horse races start at shrines as as religious but races.

>> And horses show up as Hama where they're integrated into these burial mounds and 5, 6, 100 ad.

>> The exhibit isn't just focused on the past.

There's also a focus on modern racing and a popular anime featuring characters based on well-known Japanese thoroughbreds.

>> I do love the Inland with pretty Derby section just because I think that is something that's unexpected.

But I think it is it's another cultural thing that brings people in who are maybe not course fans.

And now we have people who are into it because they like the video game.

They like the anime.

They just think the characters are cute.

>> Lauzon says fans have started supporting the real-life forces by attending races and even donating supplies to their retirement Barnes, the care and respect for horses is something she says connects Kentuckyian Japan's horse industries.

On top of the literal genetic connections.

>> There's a thoroughbred lines, the ones that are currently doing so well around the world come out of Kentucky horses and their been horses in the Kentucky Derby.

There have been Japanese forces in that came and and so there is that the connection and between the 2 countries where we're very similar in in our thoroughbred racing, but also just a general appreciation for the horse in our culture and our pop culture in our history.

>> Lauzon says the exhibit has had a positive reception and she hopes that visitors gain a more global appreciation of the horse and its history.

I would love visitors to just take away a better understanding of Japan of its people of its culture in the connection to horses.

I would love.

>> For people to, you know, take away the appreciation that all people around the world have of the course and understand that there's a very deep rich history that happens there.

>> The heart of the horse exhibit will be open through the end of 2025. for Kentucky edition.

I'm McKenzie Spank.

>> Thank you, McKenzie.

That is a must see tomorrow.

Will a familiar face tap into the 2026?

U.S.

Senate race here in Kentucky.

Well, we'll tell you about it tomorrow at 6.30, Eastern 5.30, central on Kentucky Edition, we inform connect and inspire.

You can connect with us all the ways you see on your screen, Facebook, X and Instagram to stay in the loop and send us a story idea by email to public affairs at KET DOT Org.

I'm Renee Shaw.

Thank you for watching.

Take really good care and I'll see you right back here again tomorrow night.

♪