Mother Jones
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Mother JonesOn Thursday, a Texas house panel voted to recommend impeachment proceedings for Republican attorney general Ken Paxton. Investigators for the committee concluded that the state’s top law enforcement official broke a number of laws—including felony statutes—by using his office to help a friend and political donor named Nate Paul. (You can read more about the […]
Mother JonesThe movement to counter the Supreme Court’s rightward lurch has come a long way since 2018, when a small but dogged group of progressive advocates began pushing to expand the nine-member court. In Democratic circles, the idea has gained traction, particularly in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision overturning the right to abortion, and […]
Mother JonesWhen Disney announced that the singer and actress Halle Bailey was chosen to play Ariel in the upcoming live-action adaptation of The Little Mermaid, I was uncharacteristically ecstatic. With her angelic voice and magnetic onscreen presence, even I, as a vocal Disney live-action hater, had to admit that Bailey as Ariel was a match made […]
Mother JonesWhen Disney announced that the singer and actress Halle Bailey was chosen to play Ariel in the upcoming live-action adaptation of The Little Mermaid, I was uncharacteristically ecstatic. With her angelic voice and magnetic onscreen presence, even I, as a vocal Disney live-action hater, had to admit that Bailey as Ariel was a match made […]
Mother JonesWhen Disney announced that the singer and actress Halle Bailey was chosen to play Ariel in the upcoming live-action adaptation of The Little Mermaid, I was uncharacteristically ecstatic. With her angelic voice and magnetic onscreen presence, even I, as a vocal Disney live-action hater, had to admit that Bailey as Ariel was a match made […]
Mother JonesOnce a month, Adam Ulbricht hosts a lively podcast called The Bison Insider. Ulbricht, who’s also executive director of the Minnesota Bison Association, discusses weaning calves, the pros and cons of small ranches, and field harvesting. A favorite topic: the rebound of the bison market after a brief Covid slump. Between 2021 to 2022, bison […]
Mother JonesIs the federal government helping companies sell surveillance technology to repressive governments? Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) wants to know, but a federal subagency has been cagey about the information. In a letter sent on Saturday, Wyden asked the International Trade Administration (ITA), a subagency of the Department of Commerce, for details about its role in […]
Mother JonesThis story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. The scope of a landmark law to protect America’s waterways has been shrunk by the US Supreme Court, which has sided with an Idaho couple who have waged a long-running legal battle to build a house on wetlands near one of the […]
Mother JonesZooey Zephyr was tired of watching Montana’s Republican-controlled legislature pass laws targeting trans residents, so last year, the 35-year-old Missoula native decided to join the chamber herself. She ran for an open seat and was elected with 79 percent of the vote. “If you wanna make a difference, get in that room,’” Zephyr recalled a […]
Mother JonesZooey Zephyr was tired of watching Montana’s Republican-controlled legislature pass laws targeting trans residents, so last year, the 35-year-old Missoula native decided to join the chamber herself. She ran for an open seat and was elected with 79 percent of the vote. “If you wanna make a difference, get in that room,’” Zephyr recalled a […]
Mother JonesEarlier this week, seemingly out of the blue, Texas attorney general Ken Paxton issued a statement calling one of the most powerful politicians in the state a drunk. Citing a video that was circulating of Dade Phelan, the speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, stumbling over his words while presiding over the chamber, Paxton […]
Mother JonesThe leader of the far-right Oath Keepers, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy last year, received an 18-year prison sentence Thursday following a hearing in which he defended his role in the January 6 attack. “I’m a political prisoner,” Stewart Rhodes said at his sentencing. “And like President Trump, my only crime is opposing those […]
Mother JonesLast night, in a Twitter Spaces marred by glitches, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced that he was running for president. Within hours, former President Trump took to Instagram with a seemingly AI-generated video so absurd that I had to double-check that it was in fact posted by @realdonaldtrump. The video, laced with homophobic and anti-Semitic […]
Mother JonesOn Thursday, the Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion that provides liberals, conservatives, and libertarians a rare chance to celebrate the same thing. The court’s decision in Tyler v. Hennepin County will block about a dozen states and the District of Columbia from keeping surplus funds from the homes they sell after residents fail to […]
Mother JonesJohn Durham’s final report blasts the FBI for using the so-called Steele dossier, a compilation of unconfirmed claims about Donald Trump and Russia, without sufficiently considering Steele’s findings could have contained deliberate Russian falsehoods. But Durham himself relies substantially on a sketchy intelligence product that may be Russian disinformation to push a partisan political narrative. […]
Mother JonesJohn Durham’s final report blasts the FBI for using the so-called Steele dossier, a compilation of unconfirmed claims about Donald Trump and Russia, without sufficiently considering the chance that Steele’s findings contained deliberate Russian falsehoods. But Durham himself relies substantially on a sketchy intelligence product that may be Russian disinformation to push a partisan political […]
Mother JonesHenry Kissinger is turning 100 this week, and his centennial is prompting assorted hosannas about perhaps the most influential American foreign policymaker of the 20th century. The Economist observed that “his ideas have been circling back into relevancy for the last quarter century.” The Times of London ran an appreciation: “Henry Kissinger at 100: What He Can […]
Mother JonesThree years ago today, George Floyd was murdered, and his death, alongside the killings of Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor, acted as a catalyst for many news organizations to address their lack of diversity. In 2020, media institutions created diversity and inclusion positions, hired more people of color, and launched programs aimed at reducing racial bias. […]
Mother Jones“Our government is a government of laws, not a government of men,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis declared last August, standing at a podium in Tampa with a phalanx of armed officers behind him. “That means that we govern ourselves based on a constitutional system.” The occasion was a triumphant press conference announcing his suspension of […]
Mother JonesThis story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. A new investigation into Chevron’s climate pledge has found the fossil-fuel company relies on “junk” carbon offsets and “unviable” technologies, which do little to offset its vast greenhouse gas emissions and in some cases may actually be causing communities harm. Chevron, […]
Mother JonesOn Wednesday, with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis expected to announce he’s entering the 2024 presidential race in the evening, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) released a damning report on the state of higher education in the potential candidate’s home state. “Academic freedom, tenure, and shared governance in Florida’s public colleges and universities,” the […]
Mother JonesThis story was originally published by Yale Environment 360 and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Off the coast of southeastern China, one particular fish species is booming: the oddly named Bombay duck, a long, slim fish with a distinctive, gaping jaw and a texture like jelly. When research ships trawl the seafloor off that […]
Mother JonesIt wasn’t long after Jessica Madison graduated in 2009 that she realized her student loans were a terrible mistake. She had borrowed $21,000 for a paralegal program at Everest College in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, in the hope of building a more secure life, but instead she spent the next three years looking for a full-time […]
Mother JonesDonald Trump was summoned to appear Tuesday before a Manhattan judge, who warned the former president that he could face additional legal trouble if he publicly rants about the evidence against him in his criminal fraud case—a recurring problem during the E. Jean Carroll sexual assault lawsuit earlier this month. Trump’s virtual appearance was brief, […]
Mother JonesAmid high-wire negotiations over the nation’s debt ceiling and the increasing likelihood of a US default, House Republicans on Tuesday took a moment to turn their attention to a used chapstick belonging to House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy. That chapstick—which, according to Politico, was a cherry-flavored souvenir from Florida Congressman Aaron Bean’s campaign—was to be auctioned […]
Mother JonesThe NAACP is the latest organization to warn Black people and members of marginalized communities against traveling to Florida amid the relentless right-wing bills signed into law by Gov. Ron DeSantis. The travel advisory, issued on Saturday, condemned Florida as “openly hostile towards African Americans, people of color, and LGBTQ+” people and urged people to […]
Mother JonesThis morning, Andrew Yang announced that Krist Novoselic of Nirvana joined Forward—his political party that is “not left,” “not right,” but “FORWARD” (and pretty hard to take seriously). Yang is famous for running unsuccessfully for president and for mayor of New York City. He has staked his claim on the technocratic, centrist dream that problems […]
Mother JonesThe Texas legislature passed a series of bills on Monday that amounted to a sweeping power grab giving Republicans more control over how elections are run and administered in the state’s most populous Democratic county, which includes the city of Houston and is home to nearly 5 million people. One bill would allow the secretary […]
Mother JonesOne year after a suicidal 18-year-old opened fire with an AR-15 rifle inside Robb Elementary School, most of the public discussion remains focused on how a swarm of law enforcement failed for more than an hour to put an end to the attack. By the time police finally went into the classroom and killed the […]