Contributing Writers

We look at the historic settlement reached this week in Dominion Voting Systems’s lawsuit against Fox News for promoting lies about voting machines being rigged against Trump in the 2020 election.

In Yemen, at least 79 people were killed and over 300 injured in a stampede on Wednesday in the capital city of Sana’a. The crowd crush began after armed Houthis fired into the air to control the crowd, striking electrical equipment and causing it to explode. The tragic deaths come as Yemen continues to face one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises following years of fighting between U.S.-backed Saudi forces and the Houthi rebels.

We get an update from South Texas, where Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket blew up four minutes after launch Friday and residents reported particulates or ash rained down on their neighborhoods near the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge. We speak with Bekah Hinojosa of Another Gulf Is Possible, who has been targeted for participating in protests against SpaceX. She says, “We’re clearly being exploited by a billionaire and his pet project.

We discuss the U.S. gun violence epidemic with historian Andrew McKevitt, who says, “We ought to conceive of our gun problem as a problem of gun capitalism.” He covers the history of the proliferation of individual gun ownership since World War II in his forthcoming book, Gun Country: Gun Capitalism, Culture & Control in Cold War America.

As pressure grows on Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to resign over his decades-long relationship with a billionaire benefactor, we speak with legal journalist Adam Cohen, who says there is a precedent that should guide lawmakers in how to address the growing scandal. In 1969, Justice Abe Fortas was forced to resign after his financial relationship came to light with businessman Louis Wolfson, who paid Fortas to consult for his foundation.

We look at the historic settlement reached this week in Dominion Voting Systems’s lawsuit against Fox News for promoting lies about voting machines being rigged against Trump in the 2020 election.

As the Supreme Court weighs whether to keep mifepristone available nationwide, we speak with Julie Burkhart, who is on the frontlines of the fight for reproductive justice. Burkhart is president of Wellspring Health Access, the only full-service abortion clinic in Wyoming, that was firebombed by an anti-abortion activist last year, as well as co-owner of Hope Clinic in Granite City, Illinois. Burkhart previously worked for eight years with Dr. George Tiller before his assassination in 2009.

As the abortion pill mifepristone remains available for at least another two days after a delayed U.S. Supreme Court ruling, we discuss the case with law professor Michele Goodwin. She notes the push to force more people to give birth is taking place against a backdrop of poor maternal health outcomes.