Contributing Writers

Nearly a year and a half after Russia invaded Ukraine, we speak with defense and international affairs expert Rajan Menon about the state of the war and prospects for peace. “The difficulty is that neither side, neither Ukraine nor Russia, feels that it is losing the war,” says Menon, director of the Grand Strategy program at Defense Priorities and a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies.

We unpack the explosive new criminal charges against Donald Trump for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, marking his third indictment in four months as he continues to campaign for reelection in 2024.

Former New York gynecologist Robert Hadden has been sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for sexually assaulting patients over more than two decades while working as an OB-GYN at the Columbia University Medical Center starting in the late 1980s. Hadden’s federal conviction relates to four survivors, and he has been accused of abusing at least 245 women under the guise of medical examinations.

In an in-depth interview, we look at the life and legacy of the groundbreaking musician Sinéad O’Connor, who converted to Islam and also started using the name Shuhada’ Sadaqat in 2018. O’Connor died last week at the age of 56 and was known for her music as much as for her outspoken activism.

Democracy Now! co-host Juan González remembers his longtime friend and comrade, Juan Ramos, a founder and leader of the Young Lords chapter in Philadelphia in the early 1970s who recently died after a long bout with Alzheimer’s. “It’s really not possible to overestimate the influence that Juan Ramos had on the social and political and liberation struggles of the Puerto Rican, Latino community, but also all communities, in Philadelphia,” shares González.

We look at the growing crisis in Niger, where the country’s democratically elected president, Mohamed Bazoum, was overthrown last week by his own presidential guard. One of the coup’s leaders, Brigadier General Moussa Salaou Barmou, was trained by the U.S., making the Nigerien coup the 11th in West Africa since 2008 to involve U.S.-trained military officers. The U.S.

On what would have been Emmett Till’s 82nd birthday, President Joe Biden designated a new national monument in Mississippi and Illinois honoring Emmett Till and his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley. Emmett Till was just 14 years old when a white mob abducted him from his great-uncle’s home in Money, Mississippi, in 1955 before torturing and lynching him.

As nearly half of Americans face heat advisories, President Biden announced new steps Thursday to provide relief, and Texas Congressmember Greg Casar held an eight-hour thirst strike Tuesday on the steps of the U.S. Capitol to highlight the need for a federal workplace heat standard, including mandatory water breaks for workers. This comes as Texas Governor Greg Abbott recently signed legislation overturning local rules for mandatory workplace water breaks. “It is a slap in the face.

Former New York gynecologist Robert Hadden has been sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for sexually assaulting patients over more than two decades while working as an OB-GYN at the Columbia University Medical Center starting in the late 1980s. Hadden’s federal conviction relates to four survivors, and he has been accused of abusing at least 245 women under the guise of medical examinations.

For the past 14 years, relatives of four men jailed on terrorism charges in Newburgh, New York, have accused the FBI of entrapment. On Thursday, a federal judge agreed and ordered the release of three of the men known as the Newburgh Four: David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen. The men had been sentenced in 2010 to 25 years in prison for a government-orchestrated bombing plot of a New York synagogue. In a stunning decision, the judge accused the FBI of inventing a conspiracy.

On what would have been Emmett Till’s 82nd birthday, President Joe Biden designated a new national monument in Mississippi and Illinois honoring Emmett Till and his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley. Emmett Till was just 14 years old when a white mob abducted him from his great-uncle’s home in Money, Mississippi, in 1955 before torturing and lynching him.

As nearly half of Americans face heat advisories, President Biden announced new steps Thursday to provide relief, and Texas Congressmember Greg Casar held an eight-hour thirst strike Tuesday on the steps of the U.S. Capitol to highlight the need for a federal workplace heat standard, including mandatory water breaks for workers. This comes as Texas Governor Greg Abbott recently signed legislation overturning local rules for mandatory workplace water breaks. “It is a slap in the face.

July is on pace to be the hottest month ever recorded, and the impact of the soaring temperatures is being felt across the globe in massive heat waves, wildfires, flooding and more. On Thursday, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said the world has entered the “era of global boiling,” and President Joe Biden gave a major speech to unveil new measures to combat the crisis but resisted calls to declare a climate emergency.

A shocking new investigation by Insider reveals patrol dogs in U.S. prisons have attacked at least 295 people since 2017, with Virginia setting dogs on prisoners more than any other state. These attacks can leave people with grievous physical and psychological scars, sometimes permanently disabling and disfiguring them. The report also finds ties between procedures in U.S. prisons and the abuses committed by U.S.