Program Note: Watch Randi’s report on “what women want” tonight on 360° 10p ET

Randi Kaye
360° Correspondent

Hillary Clinton is selling buttons on her website that say “I’m your Girl!”

Over the weekend she held a town hall meeting with working moms.

Do you think she’s going after the women’s vote? Of course she is. So is Barack Obama.

It’s estimate 9 million more women than men will enter a voting booth this election so women could really end up determining our next president.

Right now, Obama is ahead in the polls, CNN shows, among women nationwide though Clinton has the edge with white women.

I just spent some time with a group of women in Indiana to try and understand what women want in a candidate. We had a good mix. Sally Zweig is a 56-year-old lawyer and single mom. Dawn Yingling is also a single mom who’s son just had to drop out of college because she couldn’t pay the bills. Stephanie Spirer is a 26-year-old lawyer who knows all about student debt. Nicole Schoville is a pilates instructor who is married. And Keshauna Castro is 30-year-old single pharmacy technician. Nicole was the only undecided voter. The rest were split between Obama and Clinton.

Turns out, women really differ from men in the kinds of issues we look at. As one political expert put it, “our feet are all facing the same direction, but we move at a different pace than the boys.”

What do women want? Read the rest of this entry »

Randi Kaye
AC360° Correspondent

“I told ya so” — that’s what lots of folks in Arizona these days are saying.

In January, the state passed the toughest immigration law in the country.

It’s called the “Employer Sanctions Law” and it penalizes businesses that knowingly hire illegal immigrants. After two offenses, businesses could have their licenses yanked.

Two months ago I went to Arizona to check out how this might impact the state. A local economist predicted about 8 percent of Arizona’s population would disappear, and the state would lose tens of billions of dollars in economic output. The agriculture industry, tourism, hospitality, and construction would be hardest hit. Why? Because illegal workers, at that time, made up about 11 percent of Arizona’s workforce, more than twice the national percentage. Now thousands have left town in search of work.

Read the rest of this entry »

New Orleans residents affected by Katrina may have to pay back the money they were given in grants.

Every time I go to do a story in New Orleans I hold onto a little piece of hope that things are going to be better this time.

That the community is going to be more healed, that the town is going to look more alive, and that the programs put in place to help homeowners are actually doing so.

Well, I should have known better.

Imagine this: Louisiana residents – after all they’ve been through and all they’ve lost – are now being billed by the state for nearly $200 million!

Yes – you read that right, $200 million.

Why? Well – it turns out the contractor hired by the state to dole out federal dollars designed to help homeowners rebuild… uh… well… how do I say this… OVERESTIMATED!!

The contractor, ICF International, may have overpaid as many as 5000 residents. In other words, the state gave these people too much grant money after state inspectors estimated home damages.

In all, homeowners could be asked to pay up $175 million. Some families could be on the hook for $150,000 each!

Read the rest of this entry »

Randi Kaye
360° Correspondent

Today is not just Earth Day. By some not-so-cosmic coincidence, it’s also Equal Pay Day! And I couldn’t help but notice it falls on the day of the Pennsylvania Democratic Primary.

So here we are, deciding whether or not to vote for the first woman president, and it seems we still have a need for Equal Pay Day.

Equal Pay Day started in 1995 as a public awareness event to illustrate the gap between men’s and women’s wages. For those of you who are new to this “holiday,” and yes, I use that term loosely, it is observed on a Tuesday in April and it symbolizes how far into the year a woman must work, on average, to earn as much as a man earned the previous year.

In other words, it takes a woman, on average, one year and about 4 months to earn what it took a man to make in just one year in the same job.

Read the rest of this entry »

Pennsylvania attorney Maria Wing, 28, says it's becoming increasingly difficult to make it on one income.

Program note: See Randi’s report on the influence of unmarried women on the election on AC360° tonight at 10pm ET.

Randi Kaye
360° Correspondent

If only the candidates had the luxury of time.. to meet with unmarried women in Pennsylvania and hear their plea.

I had the chance to do that last week and it was such an eye-opener.

First of all, you should know, a quarter of all eligible voters in Pennsylvania are unmarried women. One in four voters!

Unmarried women are the ultimate economy voter. Their average income is about $30,000 a year. Twenty percent of them are single moms and they tend to vote Democratic, which makes them a virtual “gold mine” for Democratic candidates. When I suggested to the women I interviewed that they are a gold mine, they chuckled.

They certainly don’t feel like one. They are struggling and they’re not sure if the candidates are noticing.

One of the women, Maria Wing, a lawyer in Philadelphia, told me about one third of her income goes to student loans and another third to house payments. She says, “after Uncle Sam gets paid, and Fannie Mae gets paid, and housing expenses get paid, mama only has a couple hundred dollars to go out. I’m still driving my beat up Sentra from law school.”

Read the rest of this entry »

Randi Kaye
360° Correspondent

From the moment I walked into the Pennsylvania home shared by Arnie Freedman and his companion of 12 years, Shelly Winston, I knew we were going to get some strong opinions.

This couple represents your typical “older” Pennsylvania voter. The voter that tends to favor Hillary Clinton but that Barack Obama is trying to win over. From the sounds of it, he’s going to have a tough go of it in this household.

Arnie is 62. Shelly is 61. They aren’t retiring anytime soon but they do worry about retiring comfortably. Some background: they were in high school when John F. Kennedy was in the White House. Arnie was in the Air Force when Obama was in diapers, so that should help you understand where he’s coming from.

Read the rest of this entry »

Check out Randi Kaye’s article on CNN.com:

NEW YORK (CNN) – The U.S. government paid more than $1.7 million in defense contracts over the last decade to companies owned by leaders of Warren Jeffs’ polygamous sect, with tens of thousands allegedly winding its way back to Jeffs and his church.

In fact, some of the deals were made after Jeffs was named to the FBI’s “Most-Wanted List” and remained in place while he was on the run.

CNN has learned that between 1998 and 2007, the United States Air Force and Defense Logistics Agency purchased more than $1.7 million worth of airplane parts from three companies owned by members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which practices polygamy.

FULL STORY

I hope you have some extra cash lying around because Warren Jeffs and his polygamist sect may be dipping into your wallet.

I’ve been following the money for about two years now and I have some bad news for you: It seems you, the taxpayer, may be helping finance this polygamist sect and Jeffs’ FLDS church.

How, you ask?

Here’s what I know: Investigators and former followers tell me the sect is beating the welfare system in a couple of ways. Some members are applying for food stamps, then sending that food to Jeffs’ compounds around the country, including the recently-raided compound in Texas.

Read the rest of this entry »

When I interviewed Philadelphia’s Mayor Michael Nutter a couple of weeks ago he seemed a bit uncomfortable with all the questions about why he endorsed Hillary Clinton. After all, Nutter is African American and finds himself at the center of a debate about whether high profile African Americans should automatically be endorsing Barack Obama.
 
At the time, I asked Nutter if he felt any pressure because of his color to back Barack Obama? He told me, “This is not a campaign for high school class president—this is the campaign for the President of the U.S. I’m only hoping voters will take a lot more factors in when voting than just the issue of race…  I’m mostly under pressure from my constituents to make sure that potholes are getting filled, trash is getting picked up, and that the city is running well and proper. I understand those concerns but folks of Philadelphia, we just went through a mayor’s race, had three African-American candidates and two white candidates. I received the majority of votes of the African-American community and the white community—the first time any African-American has done that in a mayor’s race.”
 
Any chance he’ll change his mind? Nope. He told me, “People in the city know once I make a commitment to do something I’m going to follow through and do it. If I say I’m endorsing a candidate, I have a good reason for it and they know I’m not going to change my mind.”

Read the rest of this entry »

If you read the New York Times this morning that’s what you woke up to. The results a new poll that found Americans are more dissatisfied with the country’s direction than at any time since the Times/CBS News poll began asking nearly two decades ago.
 
Surprised?
 
The paper reports 81% of those questioned said they believe “things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track,” up from 69% a year ago and 35% in early 2002.
 
Only 4% of the 1,368 surveyed said the U.S. is better off than five years ago.
 
What’s everybody so unhappy about?
 
What are you unhappy about? Jobs? Iraq? Immigration? Global warming? Tax season?  I’d love to know.

And what do you think this attitude might mean for the election come November? Will the Democrats benefit?
 
President Bush has acknowledged economic troubles, but a recent article suggested he is in denial about the seriousness of what’s happening in the economy. (Remember, he “hadn’t heard that” gas was approaching $4 a gallon?)
 
And how will the state of the economy play for presumptive Republican nominee John McCain, who has said when it comes to the economy, he “doesn’t know much about it.” 
 

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