By Nancy Lavin | Senior reporter
It’s Saturday. Between World Cup games, a dizzying array of simultaneous summer events, and a chance of light rain, there’s not much time for yardwork today. Not that I need an excuse.
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The Rhode Island Democratic Party holds its 2026 state convention at 9:30 a.m. at the General Teamsters Local 251 in East Providence. State committee members will meet to consider and vote on endorsements for state and federal offices.
Rhode Island’s annual Pridefest celebration happens in downtown Providence today and into tonight. The daylong festival of vendors, performances and celebratory hoopla kicks off at 11 a.m. with an illuminated night parade setting off from the intersections of Empire and Washington streets around 7:30 p.m.
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High tide in Providence is at 12:46 a.m. and 1:19 p.m. Low tide is at 6:13 a.m. and 6:38 p.m.
The summer solstice begins on Sunday, June 21, at 4:24 a.m.
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Here’s what you might have missed from this week:
Gov. Dan McKee, with the Port of Providence in the background, touted his role in fighting the Trump administration on offshore wind in a new TV commercial that debuted on Wednesday, June 16, 2026. (Screenshot/Friends of Dan McKee)
By Nancy Lavin
Cumberland Democrats rebuffed their own in endorsing Helena Foulkes over Gov. Dan McKee in the gubernatorial race on Monday. Meanwhile, the embattled incumbent governor launched a new TV ad on Tuesday, his 75th birthday, touting his track record fighting the Trump administration on offshore wind.
The exterior of U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island in downtown Providence. (Photo by Alexander Castro/Rhode Island Current)
By Christopher Shea
A federal prosecutor who didn’t tell a Rhode Island federal judge that a man she was about to release from immigration detention had a homicide warrant active in his native Dominican Republic will not face any disciplinary action.
An advocate for healthcare affordability holds a sign during Gov. Dan McKee's budget signing event at Children's Friend in Providence on Friday, June 12, 2026. (Photo by Nancy Lavin/Rhode Island Current)
By Nancy Lavin
One year after commercial health insurers sought the steepest annual premium hikes in over a decade, the companies that insure one third of Rhode Islanders have barely tempered their requested increases under new filings released by the Rhode Island Health Insurance Commissioner.
Marchers make their way on High Street in Bristol during the town's Fourth of July parade in 2025. (Photo by Alexander Castro/Rhode Island Current)
By Christopher Shea
Add Rhode Island to the list of states that will not participate in President Donald Trump’s Great American State Fair when it kicks off in Washington D.C. June 25.
Richard Charest is shown at a Rhode Island House Committee on Finance hearing on Feb. 3, 2026, related to the sale of Roger Williams Medical Center and Our Lady of Fatima Hospital to the Centurion Foundation. (Photo by Michael Salerno/Rhode Island Current)
By Nancy Lavin
Rhode Island Health and Human Services Secretary Richard Charest isn’t retiring after all. At least, not on July 3, as Gov. Dan McKee’s office previously announced.
Patrons sit at the Spring House Seafood Grill at Rhode Island T.F. Green International Airport in Warwick on June 2, 2026. (Photo by Janine L. Weisman/Rhode Island Current)
By Christopher Shea
Seventy-two food and beverage workers at Rhode Island T.F. Green International Airport are preparing to walk off the job ahead of the England-Ghana World Cup match in nearby Massachusetts unless they’re given a new contract.
ICYMI
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