Justice
March 7, 2022 -
As trans youth face a crisis of harassment, violence, and trauma, Republican politicians up for reelection in Texas and other states are launching misleading attacks on them and their families in a blatant attempt to stir up the party's base and win votes. Legal and human rights advocates and the Biden administration are taking steps to protect the lives of these vulnerable young Americans as others press for boycotts.
March 3, 2022 -
While reporting on the human rights crisis in Alabama's prisons, journalist Beth Shelburne began corresponding with incarcerated men in the state about their fight to read. She recounts their ongoing battles against censorship inside an irrational system where books and magazines are treated like dangerous contraband.
February 25, 2022 -
Inspired by her own experience with postpartum depression, Louisiana nurse practitioner and doula Nikki Greenaway launched an innovative practice to care for vulnerable new mothers. She talks with Facing South about how her model of community care can help address the maternal mortality crisis, which is especially dire among young Black women living in Louisiana and other Southern states.
February 17, 2022 -
The House Natural Resources Committee held a hearing this week on the Environmental Justice for All Act, which would strengthen protections for vulnerable communities from environmental health threats. We share the official testimony of Amy Laura Cahn, director of the Environmental Justice Clinic at the Vermont Law School, who discussed waste dumping in Alabama and pipeline construction in Virginia in making a case for the bill's transformative power.
February 11, 2022 -
Public support for labor unions in the U.S. is at an all-time high, but the latest federal data on union membership shows the share of workers belonging to unions declined in 2021. The downturn, which was especially dramatic in the South, appears to be driven by several factors.
February 11, 2022 -
In December, the Food and Drug Administration permanently allowed the drugs for medication abortions to be delivered to patients by mail — but most Southern states require such abortions be done in the presence of a doctor. And now Republican state lawmakers in Georgia and South Carolina are considering bills that target that safe form of abortion care and would give patients disinformation about it.
February 4, 2022 -
The expanded child tax credit lifted millions of children out of poverty but expired because the closely divided U.S. Senate failed to renew it as part of the Build Back Better Act, which was opposed by Republicans and Democrat Joe Manchin of West Virginia. As talks continue, Manchin has signaled he might be open to renewing the expanded credit with more limited eligibility and a work requirement, but anti-poverty advocates oppose those conditions.