Caden Atkinson was granted a wish on Thursday that will send him and his family to Alaska.

The Make-A-Wish Foundation of Nebraska revealed Caden’s “celebrity wish” to him at Stone Hearth Estates in Gothenburg on Thursday afternoon.

In 2017, Cade was diagnosed with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. According to mda.org, Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is a genetic disorder characterized by progressive muscle degeneration and weakness. It is one of nine types of muscular dystrophy.

Cade’s mom, Lynette, started a blog shortly after Cade was diagnosed and has told the story of their journey.

Cade is a fan of the popular TV show, “Alaska: The Last Frontier.” Not only is Make-A-Wish sending Cade and his family to Alaska, but they will also get to meet the cast of the show, which is shooting now for Discovery Channel.

Cade’s Wish Grantors, Amy Williamson and Kristi Gargan, were greeted with huge hugs when the broke the news to Cade.

Gargan said Cade made his wish in November but said that Celebrity Wishes are different because they never know when the wish will be granted.  She said they don’t know whether it will take three months or three years.

In addition to the blog, Lynette also made “Cade’s Journey” t-shirts and sold them.  Gargan said Lynette told Cade he could do anything with the proceeds that he wanted, and Cade chose to give the money, $1,000, to the Make-A-Wish foundation.  He presented the organization with a check.

The Post was at the reveal and captured the amazing moment.  Check out the Facebook Live video below, as well as a link to Lynette’s blog and some other useful information.

Cade’s Journey Blog: https://cadesjourney.com/2017/10/19/welcome/

Make-A-Wish Nebraska: https://nebraska.wish.org/

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska Supreme Court set an execution date Thursday for the state’s longest-serving inmate, a crucial step needed to carry out Nebraska’s first execution in 21 years.

The court issued a death warrant for Carey Dean Moore, who has spent nearly four decades on death row for the 1979 shootings deaths of two Omaha cab drivers. Justices set the execution date for Aug. 14 at midnight, a few weeks before the state’s supply of a key lethal injection drug is set to expire.

“The Department of Correctional Services is prepared to carry out the court’s order,” Suzanne Gage, a spokeswoman for Nebraska Attorney General Doug Peterson, said in a statement.

After years of delays, the 60-year-old Moore has stopped fighting state officials’ efforts to execute him, and he recently accused them of being too “lazy or incompetent” to carry out the sentence. He filed a motion in May to dismiss his court-appointed lawyer, but the state Supreme Court denied his request. Moore also ordered his attorney to stop fighting the state’s attempts to execute him.

“At this point, I do not intend to file anything” to try to stop the execution, said Moore’s lawyer, Jeff Pickens.

Nebraska has struggled for decades to carry out executions, despite its deep conservative leanings. The state’s last execution took place in 1997, using the electric chair.

The state has since adopted a lethal injection protocol but has struggled to carry out executions because of legal challenges and difficulties in obtaining the necessary drugs. Gov. Pete Ricketts’ administration faced criticism in 2015 after the state corrections department sent $54,000 to an India-based broker for lethal injection drugs it never received.

State lawmakers abolished capital punishment in 2015, overriding Ricketts’ veto, but voters reinstated the following year through a petition drive partially financed by the Republican governor.

Nebraska has 11 men on death row.

In court filings, corrections Director Scott Frakes said the state’s supply of potassium chloride —a key drug in Nebraska’s protocol — will expire on Aug. 31. State officials haven’t disclosed where they obtained the drug.

Executions for Moore have been scheduled before, but were thwarted by legal issues. An execution date was set in 2007, but was called off after the Nebraska Supreme Court declared the electric chair unconstitutional. The court scheduled him again to die 2011, but that ruling was halted amid questions over the legality of the state’s purchase of lethal injection drugs.

State officials are trying to forge ahead with an execution despite a judge’s order last month to release public records that would identify the supplier of its lethal injection drugs. Nebraska officials have appealed the ruling in lawsuits filed by the state’s largest newspapers and a civil liberties group.

“We are deeply disappointed that the court would issue a death warrant when multiple cases relevant to the death penalty are currently pending in the courts,” said Amy Miller, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Nebraska.

Miller said it was “incredibly troubling” that the court would allow an execution to go forward even though the governor, attorney general and Department of Correctional Services have not honored Nebraska’s open records laws.

By GRANT SCHULTE, Associated Press

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A group that’s seeking to expand Medicaid in Nebraska has collected more than enough signatures to place the issue on the November general election ballot, organizers said Thursday.

Insure the Good Life announced it has gathered more than 133,000 signatures, well above the required minimum of 85,000.

The petitions were due to Secretary of State John Gale’s office by Thursday afternoon. The signatures still need to be verified, a process that will take weeks, but campaign officials said they’re confident voters will get to decide the issue.

“Our state is strongest when all Nebraskans have the chance to be healthy, and it’s hard to stay healthy without health insurance,” said state Sen. Adam Morfeld of

Lincoln, a leading proponent. “Expanding Medicaid is a long overdue solution that would allow our hardworking families, friends and neighbors to get the health care everyone needs and deserves.”

Nebraska’s Republican-dominated Legislature has rejected six previous attempts to expand Medicaid under former President Barack Obama’s signature health care law, the Affordable Care Act.

GOP Gov. Pete Ricketts and former Gov. Dave Heineman opposed the expansion, arguing it would divert state money away from other priorities. Ricketts’

Democratic challenger, state Sen. Bob Krist, said he supports the ballot initiative.

Conservative organizations vowed to fight the ballot measure.

“This proposal will make a bad problem worse by further straining a broken Medicaid program that already struggles to provide quality health care services for Nebraska’s most vulnerable citizens,” said Jessica Shelburn, state director of the group Americans for Prosperity-Nebraska.

Despite the state’s conservative leanings, petition organizers said they’re hopeful voters will pass the measure. They pointed to Maine, the first and only state so far to expand Medicaid coverage through a ballot measure. It still hasn’t been implemented there, as Republican Gov. Paul LePage has fought it.

Former state Sen. Kathy Campbell of Lincoln, who fought for years to expand Medicaid in the Legislature, said the measure would help rural hospitals that have struggled financially because of patients who can’t pay their bills.

“A ‘yes’ vote for this initiative underscores our Nebraska heritage of supporting and caring for each other,” Campbell said. “We need to work very hard until November.”

Andy Hale, a lobbyist for the Nebraska Hospital Association, said allowing voters to decide the issue could remove some of the partisan pressures that have built around it.

“Changes in Medicaid should be motivated by the needs of the patients and the people, and not by politics,” Hale said.

The measure would provide health care coverage to an estimated 90,000 people, ages 19 to 64, who earn too much to qualify for regular Medicaid but too little to be eligible for financial assistance available under the Affordable Care Act. Many residents who fall into the so-called coverage gap work in service jobs with no benefits, such as hotel, fast-food and construction workers.

The ballot initiative was heavily financed by the Fairness Project, a Washington-based group formed by labor unions to push for minimum wage ballot measures that has since branched out to promote what it calls “economic fairness” issues.

The Fairness Project played a pivotal role in the 2017 vote to expand Medicaid in Maine. In addition to the Nebraska campaign, the group is working this year on Medicaid expansion ballot measures in Idaho, Montana and Utah.

Roughly 11 million people nationally have gotten coverage through the expansion of Medicaid.

The Nebraska measure would require state officials to submit a coverage plan to the federal government to insure certain residents who make less than 138 percent of the federal poverty level — about $16,750 a year. The federal government would then have to approve the plan.

It also would prevent state officials from placing “additional burdens or restrictions” on residents who qualify. Some Republican-led states have sought to impose work and other requirements on able-bodied adult recipients as part of their proposals. Critics argued that Medicaid isn’t a jobs program.

In addition to getting 85,000 signatures, organizers also had to demonstrate statewide support by gathering signatures from at least 5 percent of the registered voters in 38 of Nebraska’s 93 counties. Petition circulators were able to meet that threshold in at least 45 counties, said campaign manager Meg Mandy.
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LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A record $600 million in road and bridge projects are slated for construction in Nebraska next year.

State officials including Gov. Pete Ricketts announced the total on Thursday as they released the Department of Transportation’s plans for projects over the next five years.

Nebraska DOT Director Kyle Schneweis says it’s an exciting time for Nebraska given the historic level of investment in road and bridges.

The DOT is responsible for nearly 10,000 miles of Nebraska roads and 3,500 bridges. In the coming fiscal year 2019, the agency will focus on maintaining existing infrastructure within the state’s transportation system.

The upcoming projects are scattered throughout the state.

A Florida man has been arrested following a road rage incident on Interstate 80 near Kimball Wednesday evening.

At approximately 9:30 p.m. MT Wednesday, July 4, the Nebraska State Patrol (NSP) received a report of a man shooting from one vehicle into another on I-80 near mile marker 20.

The victims, driving westbound in a 2005 Chrysler minivan, reported that they had come upon the suspect vehicle, a 2000 Kia Rio, traveling at 45 miles per hour through a one-lane construction zone. The driver of the minivan honked and flashed its lights in an attempt to urge the suspect vehicle to drive faster.

When the construction zone ended and both lanes were open, the suspect vehicle stayed in the passing lane, traveling slowly. The minivan was attempting to pass in the right lane, when the passenger of the Kia Rio fired a single shot from a handgun into the minivan. The bullet went through the driver’s window and lodged in the dash. The driver of the minivan suffered minor injuries after being struck by bullet fragments and broken glass.

The victims stopped their vehicle, while the suspect vehicle continued driving westbound into Wyoming. NSP coordinated with the Wyoming Highway Patrol, which was able to locate the vehicle and take the suspect into custody.

Kevin Austin, 47, of Cocoa, Florida, will be returned to Nebraska on an arrest warrant for 2^nd degree assault and use of a weapon to commit a felony.