Today's Liberal News

Outbreak at San Quentin: COVID Is Skyrocketing in CA Prisons. Why Haven’t More People Been Released?

As coronavirus rapidly spreads through California’s overcrowded prisons, 400 people have tested positive for the virus at San Quentin State Prison. Advocates and incarcerated people warn conditions behind bars make it nearly impossible to stop the virus once it enters. We speak with Adnan Khan, executive director of Re:Store Justice, an organization that advocates for policy and alternative responses to violence and life sentences.

How Black Lives Matter Protests Are Shifting Racial Justice Dialogues in Professional Sports

The Black Lives Matter protests are dramatically shifting dialogues about racial justice in sports, says former NBA player, author and activist Etan Thomas. He describes how athletes are forcing a reckoning about systemic racism in professional sports, including in NASCAR, which has rallied around the sole Black driver competing in the Cup Series, Bubba Wallace, who led a push to ban Confederate flags from races. “It’s amazing what’s happening in NASCAR,” Thomas says.

Photos of the Week: Yoga Dome, Iron Lady, Speedo Mick

Mountaintop yoga in China, a sunrise over Glastonbury Tor, a solstice fire in Lithuania, a baby hippo in France, a sneaky gull in Denmark, a field of lavender in England, statues pulled down in the U.S., “Rays of Victory” in Russia, a concert for plants in Spain, a ski run in Australia, and much more.

‘You broke my ribs!’: Black man sobs in pain after Georgia cop takes him down for crime he didn’t do

A Black man is accusing a Georgia police department of using excessive force when he was shown on video being grabbed from behind and thrown to the ground by an officer in a takedown the man said broke his ribs. Antonio Smith, the injured man police identified, wasn’t even the suspect officers were looking for, police confirmed on social media Monday after an inquiry from Valdosta Daily Times.

Philadelphia hospital tries to deport undocumented patient as he recovers from a serious accident

This week, the family of an undocumented Guatemalan immigrant who sustained serious injuries in an accident was able to stop his deportation from a Pennsylvania hospital⁠—a deportation organized not by federal immigration authorities, but by the hospital itself.

On May 10, A.V. (initials of the patient used to protect his privacy) was seriously injured in Philadelphia when a man on a motorcycle crashed into him.

A State-by-State Coronavirus Tracker

Editor’s Note: The data used in our COVID-19 tracker are updated daily around 5 p.m. ET. How many people have the coronavirus in your state, and how many people are being tested for it? The COVID Tracking Project at The Atlantic is monitoring vital information about the pandemic in each U.S. state, as well as the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.All 50 states regularly report their new positive cases, as do Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico.

The Atlantic Daily: A Catastrophic Week in the U.S. Pandemic

Every weekday evening, our editors guide you through the biggest stories of the day, help you discover new ideas, and surprise you with moments of delight. Subscribe to get this delivered to your inbox.The AtlanticThe second surge is here. The U.S. logged more coronavirus cases in the past week than in any since the start of this outbreak.This latest phase is striking states that were relatively spared earlier, such as Texas and Arizona.

A Burst of Light Unlike Any Captured Before

Astronomers don’t usually jump out of bed when they receive alerts in the middle of the night that, somewhere far away, two black holes have smacked into each other and sent shock waves coursing through the universe. These days, the detection of colliding black holes verges on routine, and astronomers know what to do: Go back to sleep.

The Supreme Court Didn’t Have to Rely on Xenophobic Logic

A little more than a century ago, in what are known as the Chinese Exclusion Cases, the Supreme Court said that the political branches possess sweeping powers over noncitizens who are seeking to enter the United States. The Court’s reasoning for granting Congress and the president these expansive powers wasn’t just because of some special status of the border. Rather, the Chinese Exclusion Cases were rooted in racism and xenophobia.

Repair & Revive: Rev. William Barber on Fighting Racism, Poverty, Climate Change, War & Nationalism

The Poor People’s Campaign offered a counterpoint to President Trump’s sparsely attended Tulsa campaign rally with a mass digital gathering that unveiled a policy platform to spur “transformative action” on five key issues of systemic racism, systemic poverty, ecological devastation, the war economy and the threat of religious nationalism. “We have to repair and revive,” says Rev. Dr. William Barber, co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign.