Missouri House of Representatives

Missouri state Rep. Elizabeth Fuchs, a St. Louis Democrat, went public last week about having her drink spiked during last year's legislative session. House Speaker Jon Patterson has pledged support for her bill increasing penalties for those substances.

Rep. Melanie Stinnett, a Springfield Republican, sponsored the bipartisan bill that could give voting rights back to more than 53,000 Missourians. It passed the Missouri House 107-36, and is now waiting for action in the Senate.

Lawmakers are leaving Jefferson City for a week having sent a total of four bills to Gov. Mike Kehoe's desk, one more than last year at this point.

A similar version of this bill was thrown out by the Missouri Supreme Court in January because of an unrelated item. Before it was struck down, that new process was put to the test over a proposed constitutional amendment to ban most abortions.

Under a Missouri House bill, if a person is convicted of domestic violence and has been convicted at least once before, they would have to register as a persistent offender.

John Diehl served in the Missouri House from 2009 through 2015. He resigned in 2015 after being caught sending sexually explicit texts to an intern.

Anti-capital punishment advocates say the death penalty is costlier to taxpayers than life in prison because many defendants appeal their sentences, and the appeals process can force victims’ families to relive their trauma.

The state House has approved legislation that would allow more than 53,000 people supervised by the state to vote.

The Missouri secretary of state may be given additional subpoena power to investigate complaints of election fraud under a bill that now heads to the state Senate.

The Republican bills would separate public restrooms and changing rooms by sex as assigned at birth, rather than gender identity. Transgender Missourians testified that the measures would put them at greater risk of assault.

Missouri is one of two states where, if a jury is deadlocked on whether to sentence someone to death, the judge can issue the death penalty. The bill also establishes an automatic record-clearing process for most nonviolent offenses.

A Missouri House bill would establish a "Bitcoin Strategic Reserve Fund" that would buy, trade, and sell Bitcoin. But over the last 14 years, the cryptocurrency has lost more than 60% of its value six different times.