Voters rejected election deniers in key states, but the path to extremism remains open.
By Jessica Goodheart, for Capital & Main
First the good news.
One of the biggest concerns heading into November’s midterm elections had been the possibility that election deniers would sweep statewide offices that oversee elections in key battleground states. Another was that they would refuse to concede once they lost.
An International Space Station instrument looks for dust, finds methane vent in the Permian Basin.
By Jerry Redfern for Capital & Main
A news release from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory about its new mineral mapping instrument on the International Space Station sent Oil Conservation Division (OCD) employees scrambling the last week in October.
Links between environmental exposures and maternal health outcomes remain underexplored, despite recent efforts to catch up.
By Dan Ross, for Capital & Main
This is the second article of the three-part series “Black Infant Mortality: The Deadly Divide”—republished at Daily Kos over the coming days. You can find part one here.
Deborah Bell-Holt lives near a decades-old drilling site in South L.A.
Democratic activists say they must flip statehouses to block rogue actors.
By Jessica Goodheart for Capitol & Main
The U.S. Supreme Court dropped a bomb in late June when it agreed to hear a North Carolina gerrymandering case that legal scholars and advocates say could have dire consequences for America’s already imperiled election system.
The case in question, Moore v.
With the health giant again under scrutiny by California regulators for alleged denial of care, many therapists are leaving for private practice.
By Jack Ross and Kristy Hutchings, for Capital and Main
When Susan Whitney was a therapist at Kaiser Permanente, her colleagues missed working in prison. Whitney’s coworkers first practiced mental health care in the region’s penitentiaries before joining the state’s largest health care provider.
With knowledge of personal details, ICE imposters have coaxed thousands of dollars from fearful relatives of detainees.
By Gabriel Thompson for Capital & Main
On April 5, Mariana was at her usual spot on a Miami sidewalk selling hot dogs and grilled corn when her phone rang.
She did not recognize the 1-800 number, and the caller said he was an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) official named Marcos Cruz.
The planes reconfigure from “ultra-luxurious” aircraft for athletes to mass deportation machines for migrants.
By Angelika Albaladejo, for Capital & Main
The top private airlines hired by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to deport immigrants also shuttle collegiate and professional sports teams, at times on the same jets tied to incidents of alleged abuse, a University of Washington Center for Human Rights report has found.
By Minerva Canto by Capital & Main
For many people of color, Roe v. Wade was always in jeopardy.
Fresno resident Amalia Moreno wasn’t surprised when she heard that the Supreme Court had prepared a ruling that would overturn the landmark court case guaranteeing abortion rights.
By Mark Kreidler for Capital & Main
A state secret comes into the open: how inflation targets the poor.
When I met Amparo Ramirez in March of 2020, our conversation was very much of the moment. The pandemic was in its early days and the fear factor was high, but Ramirez, who works in food service at the Los Angeles International Airport, was explaining that even if she felt ill, she would most likely report for her shift—and so would her colleagues.
Despite campaign promises, Biden hasn’t slowed down Trump’s “main engine of deportation.”
By Angelika Albaladejo, for Capital and Main
When Joe Biden ran against President Donald Trump in 2020, he promised to fight back against anti-immigrant policies, including those that punished “sanctuary cities” and gave more local authorities power to act as an extra arm of federal immigration enforcement.
What are Gov. Newsom’s plans for protecting workers who have suffered disproportionately?
By Minerva Canto, for Capital and Main
Until Feb. 16, most people could walk into almost any eatery or supermarket in Southern California and find most workers wearing masks as protection against COVID-19. Now, employees are mainly on their own.
Not just in those industries, of course, though these public spaces are among the most visible workplaces.
Coast to coast, the green rush is failing Black growers and entrepreneurs.
By Donnell Alexander, for Capital & Main
This story is the first in a four-part series about cannabis equity in America.
Full Disclosure: I am so thoroughly in the tank for cannabis that I believe negative “stoner behavior” can be chalked up to dosing issues. In my experience, cannabis is medicine, and too much of anything is bad for you.
Pressure from corporate donors, public relations firms, and anti-union consultants has chilled research by labor studies academics.
By Jo Constantz, for Capital & Main
Throttled by both strong-arm tactics from anti-union interests and a chronic lack of support from universities, the field of labor studies has dwindled in the U.S. in recent years.
An estimated 60% of large employers use workplace monitoring tools, some of which can be used to chill organizing.
By Jo Constantz for Capital and Main
Last January, at the height of the pandemic, an elderly housekeeper at a former hotel in Long Beach, California, that was being used to quarantine people with COVID-19 tested positive for the virus and died.
After a long slump, more drivers are winning the right to collective bargaining. Now the threat of privatization looms.
By Mike Elk for Capital & Main
“We have been here through the coronavirus, through the major snowstorms, we were here on Aug. 11 and Aug. 12, we were on the road,” says Charlottesville bus driver Matt Ray, who was driving his routes while the white supremacist riots engulfed the city on those dark days in 2017.
Here are the biggest problems the next governor will face.
By Tim Redmond, for Capital and Main
There are 46 people who think they should replace Gavin Newsom as governor of California.
Most of them have no idea what they would be getting into.
Sure, a couple of candidates—like former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer—actually have some experience in government.
‘Why would I put my kids in a place where there is no future?’
By Jessica Goodheart, for Capital and Main
Kathleen DeSisto has a good job, a house, four kids and, as she affectionately puts it, “a man-child” at home—a husband who is also gainfully employed as a manager at a club in downtown Boston. But she’s uneasy.
After the water stopped flowing, a grassroots effort in Jackson is organizing the Black community for future climate and political crises.
By Frances Madeson, for Capital and Main
After two weeks of taking sponge baths, Kalif Wilkes lingered in a long, hot shower with plenty of steam in his Jackson, Mississippi, home. The water had just come back on for this capital city of 160,000.
“The first shower I took, I stayed in there for 45 minutes.
The Trump administration’s failure to respond to the health crisis has led to job losses that could take decades to rebuild.
By Mark Kreidler for Capital and Main
As anyone who drove past a darkened restaurant, empty hotel, or shuttered stadium over the summer knows, the pandemic has been calamitous for the food service industry.
Pre-exposure prophylaxis can save lives, but patients seeking the medications face numerous obstacles.
By Larry Buhl, for Capital and Main
In 2012, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Truvada to prevent HIV in a regimen called pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, a potential life-saving game changer for people at risk of contracting the virus.
Social and bureaucratic hurdles have caused unnecessary delays in obtaining what can be a lifesaving antiretroviral medication.
By Larry Buhl, for Capital and Main
Back in March, Quadeer Jones, a 23-year-old actor in Los Angeles, decided to get preexposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, to protect himself from HIV when having sex. He made an appointment at the Los Angeles LGBT Center to get PrEP medication, the antiretroviral Truvada, traveling more than 30 miles.
An East L.A. family leans on community during the pandemic as government lets down low-income immigrants.
By Angelika Albaladejo, for Capitol and Main
Jenny’s family lives paycheck-to-paycheck on Los Angeles’ Eastside. Usually, they can piece together enough income from her mom’s taco cart and her brother’s rideshare driving to cover rent and food. But the coronavirus pandemic is disrupting their daily grind.