Join us for National Night Out on Tuesday, August 4, from 4:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at Lookout Point! The schedule is being planned and will be released soon!
This family-friendly event is a great opportunity to meet your local first responders, connect with neighbors, enjoy activities for all ages, and learn about the organizations that help make our community a great place to live.
Community organizations and businesses: There’s still time to get involved! Showcase your organization, connect with the community, and be part of this exciting event by registering today at the link below.
Lookout Point
Tuesday, August 4
4:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.
We can’t wait to see you there! Be sure to tag your friends and help us spread the word.
On July 24th, we celebrate the day the first company of Mormon pioneers entered the Salt Lake Valley in 1847. It’s tempting to file this alongside every other westward settlement story — wagons, hardship, a new home carved from the wilderness. But something set these pioneers apart. Unlike most who pushed west for land or gold, they were searching for one thing above all else: the freedom to live their faith without persecution.
Their departure date wasn’t their own choosing. With Missouri’s extermination order hanging over them and mob violence at their backs, the risks of staying outweighed the risks of leaving. My great-great-grandfather Charles led the first company out of Nauvoo, across the frozen Mississippi, into the Iowa wilderness in February 1846. His wife, Julia Ann, and their three-year-old daughter, Harriet, would not survive the westward crossing — both died on the plains of Illinois of malnutrition and cold. Their 14-year-old son, Andrew, would become the youngest pioneer in the Advance Company that reached the valley the following year. My children also have a second pioneer grandfather in that same company: Lorenzo Dow Young, whose father had fought under General Washington — family lore says he carried home a cannonball from that war as a memento. Two generations: one fought to found a nation built on liberty’s promise; the next crossed a frozen river to claim it.
They sang, as they walked, a hymn that has outlived them all: “We’ll find the place which God for us prepared, far away in the West, where none shall come to hurt or make afraid… All is well! All is well!” They sang it despite burying wives and daughters in frozen ground — not because they didn’t grieve, but because they refused to bury their conviction that the sacrifice was worth it. They paid a terrible price, not merely for the right to hold a private belief, but for the right to live it without apology.
The pioneers’ wilderness was physical — frozen prairie, hostile tribes, wolves, starvation, a thousand miles with no guarantee of surviving the winter. The wilderness their descendants face today is daunting in a different way. We must not mistake the difference in landscape for a difference in stakes. No one is stalked by wolves for a religious conviction today. We do not face cold or hunger, but the social and political cost of speaking one’s convictions out loud can be vicious in its own way.
Too often, religious liberty is reduced to a right to worship quietly on Sunday and otherwise keep one’s convictions to oneself — tolerated only as a private habit. But the free exercise of religion has never meant only the freedom to believe. It has always meant the freedom to act on that belief — in civic life, in public debate, at the ballot box. A conviction that can only be held in private can’t really be exercised at all.
This cultural understanding of religious freedom is in jeopardy. Many believe religious conviction in a policy debate is inherently oppressive, or something to be embarrassed about. A recent Facebook comment went further still, dismissing religious belief itself as a kind of mental illness to be scorned rather than engaged. This reflects a broader cultural drift in which sincere conviction is treated as a private eccentricity or a threat rather than the first freedom named in the Bill of Rights.
Here is what might dismay our pioneer ancestors: we have the freedom they died for, and we are too polite, or too afraid of offending someone, to exercise it. We’ve accepted a quiet rule: good citizens keep convictions out of politics — faith belongs in the pew, not the public square. But a freedom unexercised doesn’t stay dormant — it atrophies, then disappears. We lose what we do not use. Yes, we should be civil, but silence is not civility, nor is enforced complacency.
The values our forebears carried across that frozen river — that human life and conscience deserve protection, that moral truth is self-evident natural law, not majority opinion — are the same values declared in the Declaration of Independence, which we celebrate as well this July, and enshrined in the Constitution that followed.
Julia Ann and Harriet didn’t cross an icebound river in February so their descendants could worship privately on the Sabbath and disavow their sincerely held principles the rest of the week. They crossed it so we could stand in the public square and declare the truth as we understand it — unapologetically. Their frontier demanded courage; so does ours. All is well, indeed — but only if we will collectively pay the price to keep it so. This Pioneer Day, let’s live the freedom so many sacrificed so much to secure.
Julianne Young is a Bingham County Mom who loves faith, family, and freedom; a former state representative; founder of the nonprofit Idaho Family Strong; regional coordinator for Idaho Chooses Life; and 2nd Vice Chair of the Idaho State GOP.
Today, President Donald J. Trump heralded a historic expansion of the Ratepayer Protection Pledge, bringing more than 200 additional utilities, data center developers, cooperatives, and states into this growing national commitment. The goal is clear: ensure the growth of data centers powering America’s AI dominance will not raise electricity bills for American households and businesses.
Under the Pledge, large data center operators — not ratepayers — fund the electricity generation and infrastructure their projects require. Building on pioneering commitments from the nation’s leading tech companies and hyperscalers earlier this year, the Ratepayer Protection Pledge now covers 80% of all power delivered to U.S. homes and businesses and protects 263 million Americans when a data center is built nearby.
The Ratepayer Protection Pledge is already delivering real relief:
In Michigan, DTE Energy’s agreements with Google and Oracle are projected to produce billions in customer savings, with the tech companies covering their full energy and capacity costs.
In Indiana, NiSource’s arrangements with Amazon and Alphabet are set to return at least $1.4 billion to customers over 15 years.
In Georgia, Southern Company is freezing base rates through 2029 and delivering more than $1.7 billion in savings — saving the typical residential customer over $100 per year.
In Mississippi, Entergy’s agreement with Amazon is generating roughly $2 billion in total customer benefits, including full coverage of new transmission and related costs.
In Wisconsin, Alliant Energy’s partnerships with data center developers, including QTS, ensures the companies cover 100% of the energy and infrastructure costs needed to operate their facilities while supporting a five-year rate freeze.
In Louisiana, Entergy’s agreement with Meta ensures Meta pays 100% of the costs to connect its Richland Parish data center.
In Texas, Crusoe is powering its new 900-megawatt Abilene campus entirely with its own on-site natural gas generation and battery storage.
The Ratepayer Protection Pledge is the latest powerful example of President Trump leveraging private sector partnerships to deliver meaningful price relief to Americans. It shows that America can lead the world in AI and advanced computing without forcing working families to subsidize it.
(Idaho State Police Press Release, July 23 2026; Cover image credit: ISP)
Idaho State Police Forensic Services (ISPFS) has once again been recognized as one of the world’s most efficient crime laboratory systems, underscoring its longstanding commitment to scientific excellence, operational performance, and public service.
ISPFS received the prestigious Foresight Maximus recognition through Project FORESIGHT, an international benchmarking initiative that evaluates efficiency, quality, productivity, and performance across forensic science laboratories worldwide.
This year, ISPFS ranked fourth globally among participating forensic laboratory systems. More than 220 laboratories submitted data during the previous reporting cycle, placing ISPFS among the world’s leading forensic science organizations.
“Being recognized among the world’s leading forensic laboratory systems reflects the extraordinary expertise and commitment of our entire team,” ISP Forensic Services Laboratory System Director Matthew Gamette said. “Efficiency in forensic science is not about taking shortcuts. It is about using our staff, technology, and resources effectively while maintaining the scientific quality and integrity every case demands. This recognition demonstrates that Idaho has built a forensic science system capable of delivering exceptional service to law enforcement, the courts, victims, and communities across our state.”
The achievement reflects the collective work of forensic scientists, evidence technicians, technical leaders, supervisors, managers, and professional staff throughout the ISPFS system. Their commitment to accuracy, integrity, and continuous improvement supports criminal investigations, judicial proceedings, victim advocacy, and public safety across Idaho.
Modern forensic laboratories operate in an increasingly demanding environment shaped by advancing technology, rigorous accreditation standards, complex casework, and growing service expectations. Sustaining this level of performance while maintaining scientific rigor requires coordination, accountability, innovation, and technical expertise across every discipline within the laboratory system.
ISPFS’s continued success reflects a culture grounded in professionalism, collaboration, and service to Idaho’s criminal justice partners. The recognition also highlights Idaho’s continued investment in forensic science and the professionals who provide accurate, timely, and reliable scientific services in support of public safety and the criminal justice system.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) today announced new efforts to support President Donald J. Trump’s Genesis Mission, aligning expertise and capabilities across the Department to harness artificial intelligence in support of biomedical research and accelerate discoveries that improve the health of the American people. These efforts advance a key priority of Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. to address the nation’s chronic disease epidemic, a prime focus of the MAHA Strategy unveiled by the Trump Administration in September 2025.
“America will lead the next generation of medical discovery by harnessing the power of artificial intelligence,” said Secretary Kennedy. “We are mobilizing the nation’s best researchers to uncover the root causes of chronic disease, accelerate lifesaving breakthroughs, and help Make America Healthy Again.”
Working in partnership with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), HHS will launch a series of National Science and Technology Challenges that invite America’s scientific community to apply next-generation artificial intelligence to some of the nation’s most urgent health challenges. The flagship challenge will focus on identifying the root causes of chronic disease; additional challenges will accelerate research on pediatric cancer and transform drug discovery and development.
Launched by President Trump in November 2025, theGenesis Mission will usher in a new era of American scientific discovery by harnessing artificial intelligence, advanced computing, and the Nation’s unparalleled research enterprise to solve some of humanity’s greatest challenges. As the Genesis Mission platform is developed, HHS will help shape its biomedical capabilities by contributing diverse scientific datasets and rallying researchers to explore how AI can accelerate breakthroughs that improve the health of the American people.
The centerpiece of HHS’ participation in the Genesis Mission is a government-wide effort — the NIH-led Bio Genesis Mission — which will use artificial intelligence, advanced computing, and cross-sector partnerships to modernize the biomedical research ecosystem and cut in half the time it takes for scientific discoveries to reach patients. By applying advanced AI tools to large and complex datasets with appropriate security and privacy protection spanning multiple scientific disciplines, researchers will be challenged to uncover previously unseen patterns, generate new hypotheses, and identify promising pathways for prevention and treatment.
“Patients living with cancer, chronic disease, and rare conditions cannot afford to wait decades for scientific discoveries to reach them,” said NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya. “Through the Bio Genesis Mission, we are harnessing artificial intelligence and advanced computing to help researchers uncover the root causes of disease, accelerate the development of new treatments, and build a biomedical research ecosystem that delivers lifesaving innovations to patients faster, while upholding the rigorous scientific standards and responsible stewardship that earn the public’s trust.”
HHS agencies, including NIH, FDA, and ARPA-H, will contribute a broad range of scientific resources to support these efforts, including biomedical research, genomics, public health, and safety data. These rich datasets, combined with the Genesis Mission’s advanced computing capabilities, will help researchers analyze information at a scale and speed that has never before been possible.
In addition to the chronic disease challenge, HHS will launch research challenges focused on:
Accelerating breakthroughs in pediatric cancer research by identifying new biological insights and therapeutic opportunities.
Transforming drug discovery and development by using AI to shorten development timelines, identify promising therapeutic targets, and bring safe, effective treatments to patients faster.
Together, these efforts will help demonstrate how artificial intelligence can strengthen America’s biomedical research enterprise by enabling scientists to generate hypotheses more rapidly, analyze enormous volumes of data, and accelerate discoveries that otherwise could take years using traditional approaches.
By combining America’s world-class researchers with cutting-edge AI and computing infrastructure, the Department aims to unlock discoveries that improve health, reduce the burden of chronic disease, and position the United States as the global leader in AI-driven biomedical innovation.
Dorothy Moon, Chairwoman of the Idaho Republican Party
This November, Idahoans have a choice to make: keep the Gem State a sanctuary for all life, including preborn babies, or adopt a radical abortion regime even darker than the days of Roe v. Wade. With less than two months until absentee ballots arrive in mailboxes, we have no time to lose when it comes to educating Idahoans about how radical this initiative really is.
As I order signs and palm cards, post information on our website and social media, and schedule campaign training events throughout the state, it’s worth stopping to ask why. Why are we fighting this initiative so hard? Why are Republicans so opposed to abortion?
Proponents of Proposition 1 will say it’s all about women’s health and bodily autonomy. Social media trolls comment on our posts, asking why we want to control other people’s bodies.
“Other people’s bodies.” Strange how those who support abortion don’t consider unborn babies to be “people.”
I’m reminded of a dark time in our nation’s history, when men and women were bought and sold because those doing the buying and selling did not consider them fully human simply because of the color of their skin. The Republican Party was founded nearly two centuries ago to fight the evil and inhuman scourge of slavery, so it’s entirely appropriate that today we fight the evil and inhuman scourge of abortion.
The truth is that the unborn are just as human as you and me. We often call them “preborn” babies because birth is the natural consequence of pregnancy, not a disease that needs to be cured.
Just five weeks after conception, a preborn baby’s heart is beating—just as your heart and mine beat today.
At eight weeks, a baby’s brain is beginning to function.
At twelve weeks, babies have their own unique fingerprints, different from those of any other human being who has ever existed.
At fifteen weeks, a preborn baby can feel pain—no different from you or me.
Doctors can now save babies born at just twenty-one weeks, barely halfway through a normal pregnancy, and that threshold continues to move earlier as neonatal medical science advances.
Fathers and mothers have obligations to the children they create, obligations that don’t disappear simply because a preborn baby lives inside his or her mother for nine months. Nor do those obligations end when a baby is born. Both natural law and our statutes recognize the sacred responsibility of parents to care for their children until they are grown and ready to care for themselves. Abortion is no more moral—and should be no more legal—than a parent causing harm to his or her child, whether through neglect or deliberate action.
We are Republicans because we believe that every human being bears the image of God, our Creator, and that each one of us—born or yet unborn—has a God-given right to life. Let’s keep Idaho a place where life is sacred by voting no on Proposition 1.
The Catholic Diocese of Boise has officially come out against Prop 1, the Idaho abortion initiative.
Several weeks ago, we noted that two of Idaho’s largest religious bodies, the Catholic Church and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS/Mormon church), could have a major impact on the outcome of Prop 1. Together, these churches can mobilize hundreds of thousands of Idahoans if they choose to engage.
With the Diocese of Boise publicly opposing the initiative, this marks a significant victory for those working to protect life in Idaho. The statement was released in a video posted on the Diocese’s official Facebook page.
Boise, Idaho – Governor Brad Little commented today on the news that Idaho’s average hourly wage increased 4.7% in 2025, placing Idaho third nationally for percentage increase in mean wage.
“One of the strongest indicators of a healthy economy is when Idahoans see bigger paychecks and greater take-home pay. Rising wages mean more opportunities for families, more confidence for workers, and more prosperity in communities across our state. Idaho’s continued wage growth reflects the strength of our economy and our commitment to creating an environment where businesses can thrive and workers can earn more,” Governor Little said.
News release from the Idaho Department of Labor:
Idaho’s average hourly wage increases 4.7% in 2025
Idaho’s average wage for all occupations in 2025 was $29.41 per hour, according to recently released data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Occupational Employment and Wages Statistics (OEWS) program. This amounts to an increase of 4.7%, or $1.31 per hour, from 2024.
Idaho ranked third in the country behind Kentucky and Montana in terms of percentage increase in average wage.
The median wage, representing the midpoint between lowest and highest earners, also rose from $22.34 per hour in 2024 to $23.06 per hour in 2025 — a 3.2% increase over the year.
All seven Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) in Idaho had average and median wage increases in 2025. The Coeur d’Alene MSA experienced the largest increase in average wage, rising $1.68, while the Pocatello MSA had the greatest increase in median wage at $0.95.
Among the state’s labor market regions, southwestern Idaho had the highest average hourly wage for 2025 at $30.76 and was the only region to surpass $30 per hour. It also had the highest median wage at $23.53 per hour — closely followed by north central at $23.08 per hour. All labor market regions surpassed $22 per hour in median and average wages in 2025.
Employment is also still growing across the state. In 2025, Idaho’s reported employment number was 857,440 — an increase of over 12,000, or 1.5%, from 2024’s total of 844,910. All MSAs and labor market regions experienced employment growth, with the Lewiston MSA and north central region seeing the largest increases at 2.8% and 2.3%, respectively.
Idaho’s largest occupation by employment in 2025 was fast food and counter workers with over 25,000 employed, followed by general and operations managers at 24,880. On the national level, these occupations ranked third and fourth after home health and personal care aides and retail salespersons.
This release includes 2025 data on employment and wages by occupation for the state, including MSAs and rural county regions. Idaho also compiles and releases information on labor market regions which are not official Bureau of Labor Statistics areas but have great importance to Idaho.
Visit the department’s OEWS webpage for complete employment and wage data on the state as well as its MSAs, nonmetropolitan areas and labor market regions.
(Idaho Department of Parks and Recreation Press Release, July 22, 2026)
Boise, Idaho – Looking for a chance to squeeze in one more summer camping trip before the school season begins? For a limited time, the Idaho Department of Parks and Recreation is offering discounted rates at every state park and the Idaho City Yurts! July 20th, 2026, through August 31st, 2026, all of Idaho’s State Parks and the Idaho City Yurts are offering a 25% discount. Use the discount code A250Camping for camp sites or Yurt250 for the Idaho City Yurts at checkout. The codes must be given at time of checkout for the discount to apply. This is the ultimate opportunity to continue your America 250 celebration in some of the Gem State’s most beautiful areas. This discount is your opportunity to create lasting memories with your family and friends in Idaho’s great outdoors before the summer season ends. These discounts are available from July 20, 2026, through August 31, 2026. Don’t hesitate to book an end-of-season getaway in Idaho’s one-of-a-kind state parks while these deals last. Visit getoutside.idaho.gov or call 888-922-6743 to make your reservation today!
The Department of War is a dedicated partner in the Genesis Mission, a national effort to leverage artificial intelligence to accelerate scientific discovery. Led by the White House, the Department is committing substantial resources and technical expertise to its success. The Department is on track to commit over $200 million in funding across Fiscal Year (FY) 2026 and over $1.3 billion in FY 2027 to advance critical National Science & Technology Challenges.
The Department of War plans to leverage the Department of Energy’s (DOE) American Science and Security Platform, which will connect data, compute, scientific instrumentation and AI tools to accelerate scientific discovery and technological innovation. The Department is providing decades of validated aeronautic, hydrodynamic, acoustic and sensor data directly into the platform via the DOE’s Discovery Engine. This integration will ultimately enable automated design loops, decision superiority and scaled breakthroughs in national security research.
A cornerstone of the Department of War’s financial commitment is the Digital Biosecurity Forge (DB-FORGE) project, a high-performance computing environment developed in partnership with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. This represents a significant investment, starting with $30 million in FY 2026 and projected to scale to $150 million in FY 2027. In addition to this flagship project, the Department is aligning funding across its broader research and development portfolio, including efforts in biomanufacturing, human health and biosecurity policy. This ensures the Department’s contributions are robust, well-resourced and fully integrated with the Genesis Mission’s AI for science capabilities.
“President Trump has mandated that the United States be the dominant global leader in AI, and the Genesis Mission represents an unprecedented opportunity to unlock our nation’s scientific might,” said Under Secretary of War for Research and Engineering Emil Michael. “The Department of War is scaling investments across AI, quantum computing and biotechnology to turn our decades of data into a catalyst for scientific discovery to support the American warfighter.”
The Genesis Mission provides a collaborative opportunity for government and industry partners to advance the Department of War’s efforts to increase and accelerate technological advances to defend the Homeland, deter adversaries and supercharge the defense industrial base.
