Politics

July 5, 2019 - Some see what's happening to migrant children at the U.S. border as a human rights catastrophe. Some see it as a chance to turn a profit.

July 3, 2019 - Amid the current assaults on voting rights by Republican-led statehouses in the South, some Democratic presidential candidates have traveled to Southern states to release proposals for election reforms that would create new standards for combating discriminatory practices and expand voting access nationwide.

July 3, 2019 - The U.S. Department of Agriculture has been researching how the climate crisis will affect farming, but it's withheld the findings from the public. That's just one example of how the Trump administration is making it harder for farmers across the South — a region especially vulnerable to climate change — to prepare for a warming world.

July 3, 2019 - An unprecedented number of African-American sheriffs were elected across North Carolina last year after promising to end their county's partnership with ICE. Now the Republican-controlled legislature is challenging their authority — and similar policies have been adopted in other Southern states.

June 28, 2019 - Fearing a population undercount that could result in lost congressional seats and federal funding, many states have taken aggressive steps to encourage full participation in the 2020 census. But some Southern states are dragging their feet.

June 28, 2019 - Despite the U.S. Supreme Court's refusal to address partisan gerrymandering, North Carolina courts this summer could decide if the extreme partisan manipulation of legislative districts violates the state constitution. Files that belonged to a deceased redistricting guru could shed light on the process, but the parties to the lawsuit are arguing over access to them. 

June 21, 2019 - Most of the states still refusing to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act are in the South — and the advocates pressing for expansion there are not giving up.

June 21, 2019 - Emails from the Texas Department of Public Safety show that Gov. Greg Abbott requested a purge of more than 90,000 eligible citizens from the voting rolls. It fits with Abbott's pattern of embracing discriminatory voting policies.

June 21, 2019 - This month Michael Bloomberg announced the Beyond Carbon campaign, which aims to permanently shift the U.S. away from coal and natural gas and toward renewable energy. The initiative dovetails with efforts in Southern states to move toward more sustainable energy options and comes as the Trump administration rolls back rules on coal plant pollution. 

June 18, 2019 - The man who gunned down his three Muslim neighbors in Chapel Hill in 2015 has pleaded guilty to their murders, but he couldn't be charged under North Carolina's hate crime law because it doesn't cover felonies. That's just one of many weaknesses in those state laws, which advocates are trying to strengthen.