Contributing Writers

The conservative talk radio host Larry Elder is now the Republican front-runner challenging Democratic California Governor Gavin Newsom in a special election that could also shape national politics. California voters cast ballots on September 14 on whether to recall Newsom, after a right-wing campaign to unseat the governor garnered enough signatures to trigger the vote.

As thousands of people in Afghanistan attempt to flee the country before the United States’ withdrawal on August 31, we look at how the Trump administration made it much harder for Afghans who worked with the U.S. to apply and receive what is known as a special immigrant visa, or SIV.

We speak with Haroun Rahimi, assistant professor of law at the American University of Afghanistan, about the Islamic State affiliate that claimed responsibility for this week’s devastating suicide bombings at Kabul airport, which killed more than 110 people, including 13 U.S. troops. Islamic State Khorasan, or ISIS-K, is a puritanical group that is “critical of all other sects of Islam,” says Rahimi.

We go to Kabul, Afghanistan, for an update as the death toll from twin suicide bomb attack outside the airport has topped 110 people, including 13 U.S. troops. The suicide bombers struck near the crowded gates of the airport where thousands of Afghans had gathered in an attempt to flee the country before the withdrawal of U.S. troops on August 31.

We speak with Stéphane Vincent, a Haitian citizen journalist who is helping the BBC to cover the aftermath of the devastating August 14 earthquake for the BBC and says the destruction in Les Cayes is reminiscent of the 2010 earthquake that struck the country. “To relive that again was very heart-wrenching,” he says. “The people have been feeling left out and abandoned by government.

We get reaction to the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan from British member of Parliament and former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, one of the leading critics of the Afghan War in Britain. He says critics who warned against invading Afghanistan, and later Iraq, have been vindicated, and calls for an official inquiry into the war.

As the U.S. proceeds with evacuating people from Afghanistan following the Taliban takeover of the country, we speak with author and former NPR reporter Sarah Chayes, who covered the fall of the Taliban in 2001, then lived in Kandahar until 2009, where she ran a soap factory, and went on to become a special adviser to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Mike Mullen in Kabul. She says it was apparent shortly after the U.S.

As the United States has begun the final phase of evacuations of U.S. citizens and Afghan allies from the Kabul airport, we speak with Obaidullah Baheer, an Afghan academic who has decided to stay in Kabul despite the risks. Baheer’s grandfather, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, is a former mujahideen fighter once nicknamed the “Butcher of Kabul,” now among the senior political figures in the country attempting to shape a post-U.S. government with the Taliban.

We speak with Stéphane Vincent, a Haitian citizen journalist who is helping the BBC to cover the aftermath of the devastating August 14 earthquake for the BBC and says the destruction in Les Cayes is reminiscent of the 2010 earthquake that struck the country. “To relive that again was very heart-wrenching,” he says. “The people have been feeling left out and abandoned by government.

We go to Les Cayes, Haiti, to speak with a doctor about the conditions near the epicenter of the massive August 14 earthquake, as the death toll passes 2,200, with thousands of survivors growing increasingly desperate. Over 12,000 people were injured and an estimated 53,000 homes were destroyed by the 7.2 magnitude quake.

We look at the situation in Afghanistan, and pressure on Biden to stay longer, with CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin, who for years has called for an end to the longest war in U.S. history. “We didn’t want it to end like this, and there should have been better planning in terms of getting people out of the country, but we were very clear we never wanted the U.S. to go in to begin with,” says Benjamin.

The United States has helped evacuate over 75,000 people since the end of July from the Kabul airport, but the Taliban is now allowing passage only to people with foreign passports or an invitation from the U.S. or one of its allies. President Joe Biden says U.S. troops are on pace to leave the country by the August 31 deadline, despite pressure from U.S. allies in the G7 to stay longer to help more people flee the country.

Civil rights and voting rights icon Rev. Jesse Jackson and his wife have been hospitalized with COVID-19 in Chicago. Jackson is fully vaccinated and has Parkinson’s disease.

With the Democratic-led House of Representatives expected to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, pressure is growing on the Biden administration and Senate Democrats to abolish the filibuster, without which new voting rights legislation and other Democratic priorities have no hope of passing the Senate. We speak with Ben Jealous, president of People for the American Way and former president of the NAACP, as voting rights groups protest in front of the White House.