Contributing Writers

In a landmark climate case, a judge in Montana has ruled in favor of a group of young people who had sued the state for violating their constitutional rights as it pushed policies that encouraged the use of fossil fuels. In her decision, Montana Judge Kathy Seeley wrote, “Plaintiffs have a fundamental constitutional right to a clean and healthful environment, which includes climate.

The Kansas Bureau of Investigations has launched a probe into the shocking police raid on the newsroom of the Marion County Record and the home of its publisher and co-owner, Eric Meyer. Last week, police seized computers, hard drives, servers and phones. Eric Meyer lived with his 98-year-old mother, Joan Meyer, who was co-publisher of the family-owned newspaper. She died one day after the raids.

In the wake of ProPublica’s bombshell report detailing even more lavish gifts from right-wing billionaires to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, five House Democrats are calling on the Justice Department to investigate Thomas under the Ethics in Government Act for accepting the series of gifts from wealthy benefactors without following disclosure laws. Federal judges are required to disclose gifts worth more than $1,000 — including travel.

Ecuador is reeling from the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio, who was shot dead Wednesday after a campaign rally in the capital Quito less than two weeks before the August 20 general election. Villavicencio was running on a platform opposing corruption and organized crime. Authorities have arrested six Colombian nationals and say they are members of a drug trafficking group, but many questions remain about who was behind the murder.

Ralph Nader, the longtime consumer advocate, corporate critic and former presidential candidate, discusses “serial law violator” Donald Trump’s criminal indictments, particularly the second federal case brought by special prosecutor Jack Smith that accuses Trump of conspiracy to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and of inciting the January 6 attack on Capitol Hill.

We’re joined in Atlanta by LaTosha Brown, co-founder of the Black Voters Matter Fund, to discuss Donald Trump’s latest criminal indictment. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is charging Trump and more than a dozen of his allies with plotting to steal Electoral College votes during the 2020 presidential election.

Former President Donald Trump now faces a fourth criminal indictment regarding his actions during his 2020 reelection campaign, after a Georgia grand jury indicted him and 18 of his allies for attempting to overturn the state’s 2020 presidential election results.

We speak to a fire scientist about how the climate emergency fueled this week’s historic wildfires on the Hawaiian island of Maui. “This is something that is absolutely unprecedented,” says Clay Trauernicht, a professor in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management, University of Hawaii at Mānoa, where he focuses on wildland fire management in Hawaii and the Pacific.

Ecuador is reeling from the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio, who was shot dead Wednesday after a campaign rally in the capital Quito less than two weeks before the August 20 general election. Villavicencio was running on a platform opposing corruption and organized crime. Authorities have arrested six Colombian nationals and say they are members of a drug trafficking group, but many questions remain about who was behind the murder.

We speak with leading climate scientist Michael Mann about the devastating Maui wildfires and how the climate crisis makes such disasters more frequent and more intense. “This is the climate crisis. It’s here and now,” says Mann, director of the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media at the University of Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, pressure is mounting for President Biden to declare an official climate emergency.

The death toll from the Maui wildfires is now about 100 and is expected to continue to climb in what is now the deadliest U.S. wildfire in a century and the worst natural disaster in Hawaii’s history. As recovery efforts continue, many residents are asking why Hawaii’s early warning system, with about 80 alarms on the island of Maui alone, did not get activated to alert residents about the approaching flames.

We speak to a fire scientist about how the climate emergency fueled this week’s historic wildfires on the Hawaiian island of Maui. “This is something that is absolutely unprecedented,” says Clay Trauernicht, a professor in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management, University of Hawaii at Mānoa, where he focuses on wildland fire management in Hawaii and the Pacific.

In Lahaina, the area in west Maui that is of historical importance to Indigenous people, entire neighborhoods were wiped out by this week’s historic wildfires, including the Na ‘Aikane o Maui Cultural Center, which had a massive archive that was lost to the flames. We are joined by Noelani Ahia, a Kanaka Maoli activist, who describes the community’s reaction to the destruction of Indigenous cultural documents, art and artifacts.

We speak with Kaniela Ing, national director of the Green New Deal Network and seventh-generation Kanaka Maoli, Native Hawaiian, about the impact of this week’s devastating wildfires and their relationship to climate change. The catastrophic fires have destroyed nearly all buildings in the historic section of Lahaina, which once served as the capital of the Hawaiian Kingdom.

From Maui, we hear from a survivor of Hawaii’s historic wildfires, which have taken at least 55 lives to date. Vixay Phonxaylinkham, a resident of California, was on vacation with his wife and five children when they had to jump into the ocean to escape the raging fires and floated on a piece of wood for hours. “We stuck together. We held on. We’re not going to die this way. We’re here. We’re alive,” said Phonxaylinkham.