4:10 p.m.

Native American tribes in Montana and South Dakota say the Trump administration approved the Keystone XL oil pipeline without fully considering its potential damage to burial grounds and other cultural sites.

Attorneys for the Fort Belknap and Rosebud Sioux tribes sued the U.S. State Department on Monday, asking a court to rescind the line’s permit.

The tribes argue that President Donald Trump ignored the rights of tribes when he reversed a prior decision by President Barack Obama and approved the project last year.

State Department spokeswoman Julia Mason says the agency is not commenting on the lawsuit.

The $8 billion TransCanada Corp. pipeline would carry up to 830,000 barrels of crude daily from Canada to Nebraska. It would pass through the ancestral homelands of the Rosebud Sioux in central South Dakota and the Fort Belknap tribes in Montana.

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11:30 a.m.

Native American tribes in Montana and South Dakota say the Trump administration unlawfully approved the Keystone XL oil pipeline without fully considering its potential damage to cultural sites.

Attorneys for the Fort Belknap and Rosebud Sioux tribes sued the U.S. State Department Monday, asking a court to rescind the line’s permit.

The tribes argue President Donald Trump ignored the rights of tribes when he reversed a prior decision by President Barack Obama and approved the project last year.

The $8 billion TransCanada Corporation pipeline would carry up to 830,000 barrels of crude daily from Canada to Nebraska. It would pass through the ancestral homelands of the Rosebud Sioux in central South Dakota and the Fort Belknap tribes in Montana.

State Department representatives did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Nebraska Sen. Ben Sasse said Sunday that neither his Republican Party nor the Democrats stand for “very much more than being anti” and that’s why he often thinks about becoming an independent.

“The main thing that the Democrats are for is being anti-Republican and anti-Trump, and the main thing Republicans are for is being anti-Democrat and anti-CNN. And neither of these things are really worth getting out of bed in the morning for,” he told CNN’s “State of the Union.”

The first-term senator, a vocal critic of President Donald Trump, said he considers himself “an independent conservative who happens to caucus with the Republicans.”

He said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he was nonetheless “committed to the party of Lincoln and Reagan as long as we can try to reform it and get it back to being a party that’s about the universal dignity of all Americans and the First Amendment as the beating heart of American life. But right now, that’s not what the party talks about very much.”

Sasse said he would like both major parties “to be healthier and be competing to be better than the other one amongst a bunch of good ideas, instead of trying to be less bad than the other one.”

Neither party, he said, has “a long-term vision” for the future of the nation or is “very much more than being anti. And anti, or anti-anti or anti-anti-anti. It’s pretty boring stuff.

Asked when he last considered bolting the GOP and becoming an independent, Sasse said: “I probably think about it every morning when I wake up and I figure out, why am I flying away from Nebraska to go to D.C. this week? Are we going to get real stuff done?”

The commission’s Todd Nordeen says staffers at check stations will be asking hunters to allow removal of lymph nodes from elk carcasses to test for the disease.

The tests have about a two-week turn-around, and staffers will notify hunters if their animals tested positive. All test results will be posted to links at the bottom of the commission’s website page on the disease.

Nordeen says lymph nodes from deer will be collected during the firearm deer season.

The deadly disease attacks the brains of deer, elk and moose. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends avoiding consumption of meat from animals that look sick or test positive for the disease.

More than 50 scientists and students from four universities will participate during the 2019 and 2020 storm seasons. The project has received a $2.5 million in support from the National Science Foundation and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

University officials say the study is the largest of its kind, based on the geographical area covered and the number of drones and other assets deployed.

The University of Colorado Boulder, Texas Tech University, the University of Oklahoma and the National Severe Storms Laboratory are also participating.

The research is intended to improve the conceptual model of supercell thunderstorms.