New York Times opinion page editor James Bennet has been widely criticized for a series of hires, including columnist Bret Stephens, a longtime climate science denier. On Tuesday, Columbia Journalism Review wrote about “a crisis in confidence within the newsroom” as a result of Bennet’s miscues. The decision by Bennet and the Times to hire Stephens […]
A school district in Nevada is considering using debt collectors to retrieve money from parents for unpaid school meals. The Washoe County School District Chief Operations Officer Pete Etchart said debt collections are “the only thing that anyone could come up with,” the Reno Gazette Journal reported. According to the publication, the district is facing almost […]
The NRA often gets a lot of attention in the news — and there’s been a particular focus on the organization over the past several weeks, in the aftermath of a mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, that left 17 people dead. But many Americans still have some basic questions about the gun advocacy group. Here’s […]
After over 16 years of war with the Taliban, the Afghan government on Wednesday offered to recognize the armed group as a legitimate political party, hoping that, along with other concessions, the recognition will cease the end to hostilities. “We are making this offer without preconditions in order to lead to a peace agreement,” said […]
Title I schools with a high percentage of schoolchildren from low-income homes face achievement gaps due to issues like delinquency, poverty, and illiteracy. In a new University of California at Los Angeles report, researchers are finding that immigration enforcement operations under the Trump administration could exacerbate those gaps at schools with large populations of children who […]
A new study, published on Tuesday in the journal Agronomy, contains a dire warning for anyone in the United States who eats: By the end of the century, climate change could wreak havoc on California’s major crops, prompting a sharp downturn in the state’s ability to produce things like almonds, wheat, and corn. “The detailed literature […]
During an intense and emotional CNN town hall between Florida lawmakers and the survivors of a mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) issued a promise: he would support any legislation that would prevent teens from purchasing deadly assault rifles. “I absolutely believe that in this country, […]
Ten days ago, University of Wisconsin junior Marsha Howard found herself the target of an elected official, when Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) directed his constituents to “exprress outrage” at the women’s basketball player for not standing during the national anthem during Wisconsin’s road game against Iowa. According to Grassley, her decision meant she wasn’t “patriotic […]
Breaking with conventional wisdom, renewable energy resources were as important as natural gas in driving down carbon dioxide emissions in the United States over a seven-year period beginning in 2007, according to a new peer-reviewed study. U.S. energy-related carbon dioxide emissions dropped roughly 10 percent between 2007 and 2013. Renewables contributed between a fourth and […]
When it comes to guns, I won’t sugarcoat it: I am part of the problem that I know exists in America. Even though the statistics show owning a gun increases your odds of being a victim of gun violence, I am still drawn to them like a moth to flame. My gun safe is stocked […]
West Virginia teachers union leaders reached a deal with the governor on Tuesday evening. Teachers will return to work on Thursday after four days on strike. Wednesday is a “cooling off” day for teachers. Gov. Jim Justice (R) announced that teachers would be getting a 5 percent raise this year and a 3 percent raise […]
More than two dozen companies have cut ties with the National Rifle Association (NRA) in recent days, having come under scrutiny for doing business with the gun lobby following the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, which left 17 people dead earlier this month. But FedEx has refused to cut ties with the association, and a […]
Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and policy advisor on a range of issues, finally lost his top-level security clearance on Friday on the orders of White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, according to a report in Politico. The decision to strip away Kushner’s access to highly sensitive information is the culmination of months of […]
A federal judge, whom President Donald Trump previously lambasted as biased and “a hater” because of his Hispanic ethnicity, on Tuesday ruled in favor of the Department of Homeland Security, allowing the federal government to bypass environmental regulations to construct a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel of the U.S. District […]
On Tuesday, the House voted 388-25 in favor of a bill that advocates say conflates sex trafficking and sex work, and would result in more dangerous conditions for sex workers. Eleven Democrats and 14 Republicans voted no, with 18 abstentions. The House bill, introduced by Rep. Ann Wagner (R-MO), is called the Allow States and Victims to […]
Last month, more than 250 women who accuse former USA Gymnastics and Michigan State University doctor Larry Nassar of sexual predation faced their abuser in open court during two sentencing hearings. One after another, they delivered powerful victim impact statements that made front-page headlines all around the country. The judges in Ingham and Eaton counties […]
A bipartisan group of eight senators unveiled legislation Tuesday that addresses an opioid epidemic that killed nearly 64,000 people in 2016 alone and shortened life expectancy by about three months. CARA 2.0 — advertised as a sequel to the last major bill to address the opioid epidemic, the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act of late […]
After watching a gunman shoot more than a dozen peers at his school, Parkland shooting survivor David Hogg has spent a good portion of the last fortnight defending himself from the absurd far-right conspiracy theory that he is fact a “crisis actor,” paid by agents of the left to make the mass shooting at Marjory […]
Randy Bryce has a plan to take down House Speaker Paul Ryan. It all boils down to this: be everything Ryan isn’t and promote everything he refuses to promote. “I’m the kind of person that we need to get rid of him… I’m the opposite of what he is,” Bryce, a Democrat who’s challenging Ryan […]
For at least the fourth year in a row, 2017 saw a rise in the percentage of federal gun background checks that the Federal Bureau of Investigation didn’t finish in three business days — allowing hundreds of thousands of potential gun sales without a completed background check. According to previously unpublished data obtained by ThinkProgress, […]
White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders admitted on Tuesday that the Trump administration has no contingency plan in place for recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program after March 5, the deadline Donald Trump gave Congress to come up with a permanent fix. “[President Trump] is encouraging them to get something done,” Sanders said […]