We look at President Biden’s nomination of Kristen Clarke to become the first Black woman to lead the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division and the conservative smear campaign against the veteran civil rights lawyer. The far-right Fox News host Tucker Carlson has devoted at least five segments to attacking Clarke’s nomination, including baseless accusations of anti-Semitism.
We get the latest on the murder trial of Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer who killed George Floyd, with Minneapolis-based civil rights attorney Nekima Levy Armstrong. She says prosecutors in the case have successfully chipped away at the “blue wall of silence” by getting current police officials to testify against Chauvin. However, she says it’s likely that “the only reason that these officers have testified is because the world is watching.
Mike Lindell has a very unusual definition of “free speech.
In the news today: A new watchdog report finds that officials knew in advance that Congress itself was the “target” of Jan. 6 insurrectionists. The Republican Party continues to ponder retaliation against corporate critics. It’s a day that ends in “y”, and that means newly uncovered details about Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, drugs, and sex trafficking.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has a specific classification for what is known as a “rare pediatric disease.” Every condition that meets that designation is, by definition, horrible. These are the diseases that most families are blissfully unaware of, while for others the names of these diseases—Severe Combined Immunodeficiency Disease, CANDLE Syndrome, Pompe Disease—become a dark drumbeat that sounds behind each moment of their lives.
Republican Rep. Kevin Brady, who serves as top Republican on the influential House Ways and Means Committee, announced Wednesday that he would not seek a 14th term representing Texas’ 8th Congressional District. This seat, which includes the suburbs and exurbs north of Houston, backed Donald Trump 71-28 in 2020, and there’s little question that it will remain safely red turf after the GOP-dominated legislature completes redistricting.
President Joe Biden’s nominee for U.S. assistant attorney general began going through the very partisan vetting process of a Senate committee hearing Wednesday. Kristen Clarke will become the first woman of color to head the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division in its 46-year existence.
Kristen Clarke informed Sen. John Cornyn that the line in the op-ed he’d dug up was satirical.
Karina Silvotti, an essential worker in New Jersey, said she’s “worried night and day” about what would happen if she gets sick while on the job as a cashier at a grocery store. Karina lacks legal status, so she’s ineligible for federal relief despite paying into the system through her tax dollars. Those fears only escalated when her husband lost his construction work job during the pandemic.
Neil Cavuto was not prepared for what the Wyoming congresswoman had to say about the former president.
Relocation incentives get lots of buzz.
A super PAC is attacking Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, now a Senate candidate, over carrying a shotgun to detain a Black jogger in 2013.
The Biden administration remains adamant that sticking with the science will boost public confidence in the vaccine rollout.
She’s come for my coffee.
The Biden administration recommended pausing the use of millions of doses on Tuesday.
Even the Republicans who occasionally work with Democrats seem hostile to expanding ballot access.
This simple purchase has turned my life around.
A year ago, when the United States decided to go big on vaccines, it bet on nearly every horse, investing in a spectrum of technologies. The safest bets, in a way, repurposed the technology behind existing vaccines, such as protein-based ones for tetanus or hepatitis B. The medium bets were on vaccines made by Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca, which use adenovirus vectors, a technology that had been tested before but not deployed on a large scale.
I am one of the nearly 7 million Americans with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine percolating through my tissue at this very moment. It feels good. The sensation of rising immunity to COVID-19 would almost certainly still feel good if I were a woman between the ages of 18 and 48, like all six of the vaccine recipients who later suffered from blood clots. The clots, which might or might not be related to the vaccine, can kill you; one of the six patients died.
The For the People Act is the centerpiece of the Democratic Party’s effort to remake American democracy. The legislation has galvanized a large and well-funded coalition of left-wing activists, elected officials, and advocacy groups, many of whom still insist that victory is within reach. Indeed, in light of the controversy over Georgia’s new voter-access law, this coalition might soon expand to include some of the nation’s leading corporate executives.
Last night HBO aired its new documentary, Our Towns, which grew out of a long Atlantic series and later a book, as I described here yesterday. It has a number of upcoming screenings on HBO and is available for streaming on HBO Max.
The proposed overhaul erases restrictions on abortion providers that Democrats derided as a “gag rule.
A college consultant talks about a chaotic year in university admissions.
A scathing new report by the Capitol Police’s internal watchdog reveals officials knew Congress was the target of the deadly January 6 insurrection, yet officers were instructed to refrain from deploying more aggressive measures that could have helped “push back the rioters.” Meanwhile, The Washington Post reports domestic terrorism incidents surged to a record high in 2020, fueled by white supremacist, anti-Muslim and anti-government extremists on the far right.
The Biden administration has unveiled plans to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan by September 11, the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. The War in Afghanistan has killed more than 100,000 Afghan civilians and over 2,300 U.S. servicemembers and has cost the U.S. trillions of dollars. The announcement comes just a week before the scheduled start of a new round of peace talks in Istanbul between the Taliban and the U.S.
Illustration by Oliver Munday; Christine Schneider / Brigitte Sporrer / Getty
This article was published online on April 14, 2021.Embarrassment makes for rich literature, but few fictions I can think of capture humiliation with the brute efficiency of “Traumarama.” The series, which ran for a time in Seventeen magazine, offered true stories written by, and for, teenagers—three or so lines, poetic in their brevity, about unruly bodies and unforgiving worlds.
Parenting advice on guardianship, adult sibling drama, and first baby preparedness.
A year of trying everything to survive the pandemic.
Searching for a third way in the battle between aesthetics and affordability.
