Mother Jones: Posts

Mother Jones

Twitter Is Regressing Into a Cesspool of Climate Misinformation

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Twitter has proved a cherished forum for climate scientists to share research, as well as for activists seeking to rally action to halt oil pipelines or decry politicians’ failure to cut pollution. But many are now fleeing Twitter due to a surge […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Walker, Warnock, and the Epic Battle for Georgia’s Soul

So. Much. Prayer. Kicking off debates, woven into speeches, and emanating from pulpits serving as campaign pit stops, God is everywhere in the Senate runoff between Democratic incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock and his Trump-backed challenger Herschel Walker. I grew up in the Southern Bible Belt, and even I’m blown away by the sheer amount of […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Joe Biden Called Out Antisemitism. Why Can’t Some Republicans?

On Friday, President Joe Biden dropped a tweet that in one fell swoop urged political leaders to condemn antisemitism, white supremacy, and Holocaust denialism. The simple statements, which neatly fit into Twitter’s 280-character limit, came one day after Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, appeared on Alex Jones’ Infowars to openly praise Adolf Hitler […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

“Mr. Trump Explicitly Sanctioning Tax Fraud! That’s What This Document Shows!”

Manhattan prosecutors on Friday flatly accused Donald Trump of helping executives at his companies commit tax fraud. The allegations came during closing arguments of a trial in which the ex-president’s businesses are charged with allowing key employees to reduce their taxable salaries while simultaneously providing them with off-the-record benefits—like company cars and apartments. For much of the trial, […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Bats Are Nature’s Death Metal Singers. Who Knew?

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. It has long been known Ozzy Osbourne has a taste for bats. But now it seems the mammals are also fans of his. Bats greet each other with death metal growls, scientists have discovered, and possess a vocal range which […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Donald Trump’s Lawyers Might Have Made a Huge Mistake

During closing arguments on Thursday in the criminal tax fraud case against Donald Trump’s companies, Trump’s attorneys did their best to blame everyone but Trump himself. They told the jury that the alleged fraud was the fault of rogue employees, some of whom had been employed by the Trump family for decades. But after laboring for […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

To Save Whales, Should We Stop Eating Lobster?

The North Atlantic right whale isn’t doing well. There are fewer than 350 of these stocky baleen whales believed to be left in the wild—and the numbers are shrinking. In the last six years, vessel strikes, entanglements in fishing gear, or other unknown causes have killed or injured at least 92 whales, prompting scientists to […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

It Took Ye Praising Hitler Before the House Judiciary GOP Took Down Its Infamous Tweet

On October 3, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West (now Ye) attended Paris fashion week wearing a shirt that said “White Lives Matter.” Three days later, the Twitter account associated with the Republican members of the House Judiciary Committee (ranking member: Jim Jordan) tweeted, “Kanye. Elon. Trump.” When Ye tweeted on October 8 that […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Madison Cawthorn: Young Men Should Be “Punched in the Face” for Doing Stupid Things

On Wednesday, outgoing North Carolina Rep. Madison Cawthorn made a bizarre final speech on the House Floor, jamming at least eight alpha male podcasts worth of toxic masculinity into a minute and twenty-two seconds. “It used to be a rite of passage in this country for young men to be punched in the face when […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Herschel Walker Said He Got Into Law School. That Seems Highly Unlikely.

In 2014, Herschel Walker delivered a speech to a group of National Guard members in Wichita, Kansas about overcoming hardship to build resiliency and achieve success. Walker, now the Republican nominee for US Senate in Georgia, explained how he sought treatment for Dissociative Identity Disorder, formerly called Multiple Personality Disorder, after wanting to kill a […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

This MAGA PAC Raised Nearly $2 Million Off the Trucker Protests. Where Did All the Money Go?

Alex Phillips was standing one block from the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, when he warned an interviewer that members of Congress who went along with certifying the results of the presidential election would suffer the consequences in the midterms. As President Donald Trump’s speech at the Ellipse echoed from the loudspeakers, he told […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Forced Labor, Child Miners, Payment in Drugs—Clean Energy Supply Chain Has Issues

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. The Australian clean energy industry has warned of growing evidence linking renewable energy supply chains to modern slavery and urged companies and governments to act to eliminate it. A report by the Clean Energy Council, representing renewable energy companies and solar […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Are Police Helicopter Fleets Worth the Money?

This piece was published originally by Capital & Main. Los Angeles’ police and sheriff’s departments have amassed among the largest helicopter units of any local law enforcement agencies in the world, costing city and county residents tens of millions of dollars each year for patrols that disproportionately hover over low income communities of color, according to government records. […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Trump’s Dinner Fiasco Was a Win for Fascists Playing the Long Game

The 24-year-old white nationalist Nick Fuentes dined with Donald Trump and Kanye West (who now goes by Ye) at Mar-A-Lago last week. For the last six years, Fuentes has built up a following on Twitter, Twitch, and other social media platforms while touting his support for antisemitism, fascism, and the creation of a white ethnostate. In […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Herschel Walker Once Said He Was the Target of Racism. Now He Claims It Doesn’t Exist.

Not too long ago, Herschel Walker said that he had experienced racism, having been stopped and harassed by the police because he was a Black man. And he expressed his fear that police will abuse his son because he’s Black. Yet during his campaign for Senate in Georgia, Walker, the Republican now in a December […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

“Something Needs to Change or Else We Will All Quit”

It is not news that public schools in the United States are now conflict zones. Across the country, K-12 teachers, school administrators, and counselors have become targets of a right-wing crusade against Critical Race Theory, gender identity, and social-emotional learning. Books are being banned from libraries as conservative extremists have taken over school boards. In a […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

The Tragedy of the Oxford High School Mass Shooting Deepens

In the year since a mass shooting at Oxford High School in Michigan left four students dead and many others injured and traumatized, questions have loomed about whether the carnage could have been prevented. The most intense media focus has been on the role of the shooter’s parents. They bought a semiautomatic pistol for their […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

These Scientists Are Looking for “Glacier Blood”

This story was originally published by High Country News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Jim Elser scanned the snowfields clinging to the lower slopes of Clements Mountain in Montana’s Glacier National Park. While nearby tourists snapped pictures of soaring rock faces and searched for wildlife, Elser, an ecologist at the University of Montana and the director […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Oath Keepers Founder Convicted of Sedition in Capitol Attack

A jury has convicted Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the far-right Oath Keepers militia group, of seditious conspiracy and other crimes, a milestone in the Justice Department’s sprawling investigation into the January 6 attack on Congress. Jurors also convicted Kelly Meggs, the leader of the group’s Florida chapter, of seditious conspiracy. But the same jury […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Joe Biden Is Moving to Stop a Rail Strike. Workers Are Upset.

Joe Biden, the Amtrak-obsessed president who has prided himself on being “pro-labor,” is urging Congress to step in and halt a looming railroad strike. This move is a massive change of course for a president known to some as “Union Joe.” In 1992, Biden was one of just six Senators to vote against halting a […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

An Investigation: Who Is Mitch McConnell Condemning?

One week after Donald Trump entertained an unrepentant antisemite and white nationalist at his Mar-a-Lago residence, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has offered an uncharacteristically harsh assessment of the former president’s hopes for reelection. Or at least that was the implication. “First, let me just say that there is no room in the Republican Party […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Blake Masters to Explain Things to the RNC

After dismal predictions for Democrats around the country, the red wave never arrived. Instead, Stop the Steal performed miserably on the ballot. A murderer’s row of extremist candidates preferred by Donald Trump lost. And despite polling noting concerns about inflation and crime, Democrats outperformed expectations. Now, Republicans are attempting to figure out exactly what happened. In […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

You Can’t Keep the World Out of the World Cup

The political subtext of the 2022 men’s World Cup in Qatar has never been particularly well hidden, because the politics is sort of the point. During every match of the tournament on Fox, ads paid for by the government of Qatar boast of the country’s relationships with American universities and the US armed forces—flexing its […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

It turns Out Western Voters Care a Lot About Public Lands

This story was originally published by High Country News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Ammon Bundy only got 17 percent of the votes in the Idaho governor’s race. Phew, I thought. What a relief. Then: Wait, 100,000 people voted for Ammon Bundy? Yikes! That sorta sums up the 2022 midterm elections: Western voters generally chose pragmatism over ideology, moderation […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Buffalo Shooter Pleads Guilty to Hate Crime and Murder Charges

The 19-year-old white man who killed 10 Black people at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, has pleaded guilty to murder, attempted murder, and domestic terrorism motivated by hate, which carry a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole. In May, Payton Gendron, then 18, live-streamed his attack on a supermarket in a predominantly […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Mounting Scientific Evidence Rekindles Fracking Health Concerns

This story was originally published by Yale E360 and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Almost 20 years after the adoption of hydraulic fracturing began to supercharge US production of oil and gas, there’s growing evidence of a correlation between the industry’s activities and an array of health problems ranging from childhood cancer and the […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

How Did a State Known for Its War on Immigrants Approve In-State Tuition for Undocumented Students?

Jose Patiño remembers how his mother cried when the acceptance letter from Arizona State University arrived in the mail in late 2006. There it was, the ultimate reward for her son’s hard work and the reason why they had sacrificed so much by leaving Mexico when he was six years old. He had not just […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Potential Trump 2024 Challengers Weigh in on His Dinner Meeting With Avowed Anti-Semite

On the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, former president Donald Trump hosted the rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, and avowed anti-Semite Nick Fuentes for dinner. It’s unclear what the main course was, but the dessert was heaps of condemnation—from both Republicans and Democrats who are considering challenging Trump in 2024. Fuentes has denied the Holocaust […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

Congress Won’t Be Able to Ban Assault Weapons Anytime Soon. Sen. Chris Murphy Has Another Idea.

A shooter used an assault-style rifle and handgun to kill five people and injure 25 more at an LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado Springs on November 19. Three days later, a different shooter used a handgun and multiple magazines to kill six people and injure at least six more at a Chesapeake, Virginia, Walmart. Those are […]

Continue Reading…

Mother Jones

As RSV Cases Surge, Experts Warn of America’s Worsening ‘Tripledemic’

Respiratory illnesses are sweeping the nation, overwhelming hospitals, causing kids to miss school, and keeping adults home from work. The culprit? Covid. And respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). And the flu. “We’re facing an onslaught of three viruses—Covid, RSV and influenza. All simultaneously,” Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University, recently told NPR. […]

Continue Reading…