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Mother Jones

We Don’t Need Black History Month Police Cruisers. We Need Police Reform.

We’re only three days into Black History Month, and people are already cutting up. Within the first two days of February, police departments in both Miami, Florida, and Columbus, Ohio, unveiled their own separate police cruisers commemorating the month, complete with Kente cloth patterns, raised “Black Power” fists, and Martin Luther King Jr. quotes. And, […]

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Shoot Down the Balloon, You Coward! (And Please Also Donate $35 to Republicans.)

President Joe Biden seems to be pretty unhappy about the suspected Chinese spy balloon flying over Montana. His administration signaled this by postponing Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s trip to Beijing—less than a day before Blinken was supposed to depart. Donald Trump apparently prefers a different response. “SHOOT DOWN THE BALLOON!” the former commander-in-chief Truthed […]

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The Future of American Environmental Protests May be Unfolding in a Forest Outside Atlanta

The past two weeks have marked a significant escalation in the years-long struggle over the proposed construction of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center (PSTC), a $90 million project that would be built on nearly 100 acres of city-owned land in an unincorporated section of DeKalb County—Georgia’s fourth largest county that encompasses a sliver of […]

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The Far-Right Bounty Hunter Behind the Explosive Popularity of “Died Suddenly”

Illustration by Shira Inbar On January 5th, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) tweeted about the unexpected passing of Quentin Williams, a Democratic member of the Connecticut House of Representatives. “Terrible news today of Q Williams sudden death,” he wrote. “I’m sending every good thought I have to his family and friends today.” Most of the replies […]

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Before a 6-Year-Old Shot His Teacher, the School District Failed on Threat Assessment

A decade ago, with school shootings on the rise across the country, Virginia passed a law requiring all K-12 districts to adopt a violence-prevention method called threat assessment. The method—which relies on trained teams of administrators, counselors, police officers, and others to evaluate and manage alarming behavior—is designed to help avert tragedies like the one […]

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The IRS Over-Audits Black People. Why Won’t the GOP Say Anything?

At first I figured the Republicans would be all over this. I guess I figured wrong. I’m referring to the bombshell working paper that made headlines earlier this week, in which a team of academic and Treasury Department economists found that the IRS audits Black taxpayers at roughly three to five times the rate of […]

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The Real Reason House Republicans Kicked Ilhan Omar off the Foreign Affairs Committee

House Republicans removed Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) from the Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday because she is a Black, Muslim woman. Officially, that’s not the reason. But the facts speak for themselves: The removal is the culmination of years of targeting Omar by Donald Trump, the rightwing media, and Republican lawmakers who attacked her religion, […]

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Columbia Journalism Review’s Big Fail: It Published 24,000 Words on Russiagate and Missed the Point

Misdirection, an essential tool for magicians, is not usually a component of media criticism. But in a lengthy critique of the coverage of the Trump-Russia scandal published this week by the Columbia Journalism Review, veteran investigative reporter Jeff Gerth deflects attention from the core components of Russiagate, mirroring Donald Trump’s own efforts of the past six years […]

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Mother Jones

Aim for the Stomach

This piece was published originally by Capital & Main. The writer Upton Sinclair once famously said, upon the reaction to his classic exposé of the slaughterhouse industry, The Jungle, “I aimed at the public’s heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach.” He thought he was writing a book exposing the horrendous conditions for workers, and instead ignited […]

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This Deal Could Save the Colorado River—if California Doesn’t Blow It Up

This story was originally published by Grist and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. After months of tense negotiation, a half-dozen states have reached an agreement to drastically cut their water usage and stabilize the drought-stricken Colorado River—as long as California doesn’t blow up the deal. The plan, which was developed without the input of […]

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“All I Want Is My Baby Brother Back”

Three weeks after his death at the hands of Memphis police, Tyre Nichols is finally being laid to rest. On Wednesday, friends and family gathered to celebrate Nichols’ life at the Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church in Memphis, Tennessee. Several lawmakers and civil rights advocates, including the Reverend Al Sharpton and Vice President Kamala Harris, attended […]

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Oklahoma Jailed Women Who Couldn’t Stop Their Abusers. Will a New Law Help?

In 2015, Kerry King was arrested in Tulsa, Oklahoma, because she failed to stop her abusive boyfriend from beating her and her young daughter. That’s a slight simplification (read more about her case here), but in essence, prosecutors chose to blame the victim. King, then 28, tried to fight her boyfriend off when she discovered […]

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The College Board Just Watered Down its New AP African American History Course

The College Board released the curriculum for its new AP African American Studies course Wednesday, revealing that the group had stripped the course of the topics that prompted Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to ban the course. It will no longer contain certain material that DeSantis, who seeks to erase LGBTQ and Black experiences from school […]

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George Santos Relative Says They Never Gave $5,800 Reported by the Campaign: “I’m Dumbfounded”

Last week, Mother Jones reported that more than a dozen top donors to Rep. George Santos’ first congressional campaign did not appear to exist. The donations from people whose names or addresses could not be confirmed totaled more than $30,000. This pattern of questionable contributions, Mother Jones has learned, extends to Santos’ successful campaign last year. […]

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Mother Jones

The Website That Wants You to Kill Yourself—and Won’t Die

Most websites aren’t known for having a “kill count.” Kiwi Farms is. Its victims reportedly include Julie Terryberry, who in 2016 took her life after being targeted by users of the site. Two years later, after years of harassment from Kiwi Farms trolls, Chloe Sagal lit herself on fire in a public park. In June […]

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Mother Jones

“Polluting Elite” Belch Out Far More Than Their Fair Share of Emissions

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. The difference between the carbon emissions of the rich and the poor within a country is now greater than the differences in emissions between countries, data shows. The finding is further evidence of the growing divide between the “polluting elite” of […]

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Mother Jones

This Experiment Could Help Restore Eroding Coastlines

This story was originally published by High Country News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. David Cottrell stood on what used to be a 14-foot-high cliff at the crumbled end of Blue Pacific Drive. Just a few years ago, this was the fastest-eroding shoreline on the US Pacific Coast; locals here in North Cove, […]

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The Under-the-Radar Legal Battle Protecting Health Care for Trans People

Shauntae Anderson lived for the weekends. Growing up Black and transgender in a small West Virginia city in the 1990s, she spent a lot of time alone, hiding her self-knowledge from her mom and coping with ridicule from classmates. Yet on Friday and Saturday nights, she could lock herself in her room, put on Whitney […]

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The Word That Makes Brutal Budgets Sound “Truly Evil”

The cuts have come even for the word itself. “Austerity” is a cornerstone of conservatism—a catch-all term for limiting government spending to promote capitalist growth—and yet the expression seems to have disappeared from deficit hawks’ speeches. “I call it balancing the budget,” said German Chancellor Angela Merkel in 2013. “Everyone else is using this term […]

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Trump’s Latest Legal Nightmare: A Grand Jury Is Reportedly Investigating the Stormy Daniels Payoff

Fresh off securing convictions against the Trump Organization in a tax fraud case, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is reportedly once again investigating Donald Trump over an alleged hush money payment made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 campaign. The New York Times reported on Monday that Bragg’s prosecutors are preparing to present […]

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Tyre Nichols’ Parents Set to Attend Biden’s State of the Union Address

The parents of Tyre Nichols, the Black man who was fatally beaten by Memphis police officers, have accepted an invitation from the Congressional Black Caucus to attend President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address on February 7. The invitation came days after the Memphis Police Department released bodycam footage that, as warned, showed an abuse […]

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Tyre Nichols’ Family Attorney Calls on Congress to Pass George Floyd Justice in Policing Act

On Sunday, Ben Crump, an attorney representing the family of Tyre Nichols, called on Congress to pass police reform legislation in the wake of Nichols’ death at the hands of Memphis police earlier this month. “Shame on us if we don’t use his tragic death to finally get the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act […]

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Minnesota Becomes First State to Pass Bill Enshrining Abortion Rights Post-Dobbs

After more than 14 hours of debate, the Minnesota Senate passed a bill on Saturday that would establish a “fundamental right” to abortion in the state. Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, has said he will sign the Protect Reproductive Options Act, known as the PRO Act, into law. The move makes Minnesota the first state to […]

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Memphis Police Department Disbands Unit Whose Members Brutally Killed Tyre Nichols

The Memphis Police Department has disbanded the so-called Scorpion Unit whose members abused and fatally beat Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man, earlier this month. Those five officers have now been fired and charged with murder. Community leaders and Nichols’ family had called on Police Chief Cerelyn “CJ” Davis to eliminate the unit, which worked […]

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Mother Jones

Why Starbucks Is Inviting Social Workers Into Its Stores

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. On a chilly recent morning, customers inside a Starbucks in New York City’s midtown were doing what you’d expect: buying coffee, warming up, chatting. But one person was moving through the store with a different purpose: she first approached a woman standing […]

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Utah Just Became the First State of 2023 to Ban Gender-Affirming Care

On Saturday, Utah Republican Gov. Spencer Cox signed legislation banning gender-affirming surgeries for transgender youth and placing an indefinite moratorium on hormone treatment for minors who haven’t yet been diagnosed with gender dysphoria. While Utah is the first state of 2023 to limit gender-affirming care, it is not likely the last: A barrage of state bills […]

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At Least Three Killed, Four Injured in Another California Shooting

At least three people have been killed and four injured after a shooting early Saturday morning in the upscale Los Angeles neighborhood of Benedict Canyon. Two of those wounded are in critical condition, reports the Los Angeles Times. No suspect has been publicly identified. The shooting took place outside a “gathering” at a short-term rental […]

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Memphis Police’ First Press Release About Tyre Nichols Was Full of Glaring Omissions

On January 8, the Memphis Police Department released a statement about a “confrontation” between police officers and a 29-year-old Black man, Tyre Nichols, that had taken place the previous evening. Body-cam footage released on Friday night shows glaring differences between the police’s version of events and reality: Five officers brutally beat Nichols to his death. The […]

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Fossil-Fuel Power Plants May Be on Their Last Legs

This story was originally published by Inside Climate News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. The global energy transition has reached a pivot point, in which fossil fuels have likely peaked in their use for producing electricity and are about to enter a period of decline. This is the idea at the heart of a […]

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Mother Jones

What to Know About the Risks of Gas Stoves and Appliances

This story was originally published by ProPublica. As a climate reporter, I was well aware of the growing concern about the gas stoves in people’s homes leaking dangerous pollutants, like methane, a potent greenhouse gas and explosive hazard; nitrogen dioxide, which worsens asthma; and benzene, which causes cancer. But I was a renter who had no […]

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