States are doing what they generally do during a federal government shutdown: continuing to operate programs serving some of the neediest people.

That means schools are still serving federally subsidized meals and states are distributing funding for the federal food stamp program. For now.

LINCOLN — Two Nebraska lawmakers on the Legislature’s budget-setting committee requested that their panel schedule a public briefing to better understand the planned conversion of a McCook-based state prison into an ICE detention hub.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has seized on the government shutdown as an opportunity to reshape the federal workforce and punish detractors, meeting with budget director Russ Vought on Thursday to talk through “temporary or permanent” spending cuts that could set up a lose-lose dynamic for Democratic lawmakers.

When filmmaker Nick Beaulieu set out to make his first documentary, he wanted to understand an apparent contradiction in his hometown — “a tale of two Omahans.”

How, he wondered, could the city bill itself as one of the top middle-class cities in America while Black Omahans continued to face disproportionately bad outcomes?