Contributing Writers

We speak with Dr. Abdul El-Sayed after his victory in Michigan’s primary race for U.S. Senate sent shockwaves through the Democratic Party. El-Sayed, a former public health official, ran a progressive campaign focused on affordability, Medicare for All, getting money out of politics, and opposing Israel’s genocide in Gaza. He defeated Congressmember Haley Stevens, who was backed by tens of millions in outside spending including by AIPAC, the powerful pro-Israel lobby group.

Composer and playwright César Alvarez joins Democracy Now! to discuss their new musical, The Potluck. It tells the story of the 1979 Greensboro Massacre, when Klansmen and American Nazis opened fire on an antiracist demonstration in Greensboro, North Carolina, killing five members of the Communist Workers’ Party. In 2020, the Greensboro City Council passed a resolution apologizing for the attack and the police department’s complicity in the killings.

Kansas state Senator Cindy Holscher won Tuesday’s primary race to become the Democratic nominee in the state’s gubernatorial race, facing Republican Ty Masterson in November. Holscher clinched the nomination over fellow state lawmaker Ethan Corson, who was backed by the outgoing Democratic Kansas Governor Laura Kelly. Holscher’s victory is seen as another resounding defeat for establishment Democrats in Kansas and nationwide.

Reproductive rights activists are alarmed over a pledge by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to institute nationwide abortion restrictions. Blanche, whose confirmation for attorney general is currently before the Senate, made the remarks in a private call with anti-abortion activists that was later posted online.

In the wake of a third ICE death at the Delaney Hall ICE jail in Newark, New Jersey, we speak with Gabriela Soto, whose husband Martín was one of the leaders of the May hunger strike at the immigration jail. Martín was transferred to Elizabeth Detention Center, New Jersey’s other ICE facility, during the hunger strike at Delaney. Gabriela is calling for the closure of both facilities.

In Pakistan-administered Kashmir, a coalition of local politicians, activists and small-business leaders called the Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC) has been leading mass protests over the soaring cost of living and the limits placed on political autonomy. In response, the Pakistani government banned the group under counterterrorism laws and ordered a communications blackout.

Is AI superintelligence inevitable? AI safety researcher David Krueger says it doesn’t have to be. Krueger, an assistant professor at the University of Montreal and founder of the nonprofit Evitable, warns that “we need to mitigate the risk of extinction” with regulation and moratoriums to halt the development of AI’s computational power and complexity, which he says is progressing at a rate much faster than current levels of human supervision can manage.

The Pacific Northwest is facing its worst fire season in more than 30 years. Scientists say drought, extreme heat and climate change are making wildfire seasons longer, more frequent and more destructive across the western United States.
“The homes, the communities, they’re just not simply prepared for fire,” says Paul Hessburg, former senior research ecologist at the U.S. Forest Service and professor of fire and landscape ecology at the University of Washington.

We look at the life and legacy of Dominican American historian, activist and prison abolitionist Dr. Johanna Fernández, who died on July 30 after a long battle with cancer. She was 55 years old. As a professor of history at Baruch College and the CUNY Graduate Center, Fernández was a leading scholar of the Young Lords, the radical 1960s civil rights organization founded in Chicago and New York and modeled on the Black Panthers.

In the wake of a third ICE death at the Delaney Hall ICE jail in Newark, New Jersey, we speak with Gabriela Soto, whose husband Martín was one of the leaders of the May hunger strike at the immigration jail. Martín was transferred to Elizabeth Detention Center, New Jersey’s other ICE facility, during the hunger strike at Delaney. Gabriela is calling for the closure of both facilities.

Voters went to the polls in Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, Virginia and Washington state on Tuesday. We continue to look at the results of those primary elections, with The Nation’s John Nichols calling it “a very good night for insurgent candidacies and for outsiders,” especially for candidates that campaigned around the fight against AI data centers.

Progressive candidate Abdul El-Sayed has been declared the winner of Michigan’s closely watched Democratic Senate primary, narrowly beating out Congressmember Haley Stevens, according to the Associated Press and other news agencies. AIPAC and its affiliated groups spent as much as $46 million to help Stevens in what has become the most expensive Democratic Senate primary contest in U.S. history.

We speak to Dave Zirin, author and sports editor at The Nation, about his new book, The People’s Historian: The Outsized Life of Howard Zinn, chronicling the life and activism of the legendary historian Howard Zinn, author of A People’s History of the United States. For Zinn, says Zirin, “being an academic was always secondary to being in the streets and making history, not just studying history.

We look at the life and legacy of Dominican American historian, activist and prison abolitionist Dr. Johanna Fernández, who died on July 30 after a long battle with cancer. She was 55 years old. As a professor of history at Baruch College and the CUNY Graduate Center, Fernández was a leading scholar of the Young Lords, the radical 1960s civil rights organization founded in Chicago and New York and modeled on the Black Panthers.

More than 70 years after the kidnapping, torture and lynching of 14-year-old Emmett Till in Mississippi, a major new photography exhibit and companion book ask how the world would be different “If Emmett Till Lived.” The Black teenager’s brutal murder, as well as his open-casket funeral that displayed his mutilated body, shocked the United States in 1955 and became a galvanizing moment in the civil rights movement. If Till had lived, he would be just over 85 years old today.

Todd Blanche’s nomination for attorney general cleared a major hurdle this week after two Republican senators who had raised concerns agreed to back him. Blanche gave written assurances that a $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization fund” designed to pay Trump allies would not be resurrected, and that a settlement between Trump and the Internal Revenue Service only gave the president retroactive immunity from audits rather than perpetual protection.

During Thursday’s segment about the risks of artificial intelligence, we shared a quote from author Naomi Klein that we later discovered was AI-generated. Klein has written about the proliferation of the fake quote on her Substack and joins Democracy Now! to discuss the growing difficulty of verifying online information.
“These companies are creating digital doppelgangers of us, trying to monetize our identities,” says Klein.

We speak to Dave Zirin, author and sports editor at The Nation, about his new book, The People’s Historian: The Outsized Life of Howard Zinn, chronicling the life and activism of the legendary historian Howard Zinn, author of A People’s History of the United States. For Zinn, says Zirin, “being an academic was always secondary to being in the streets and making history, not just studying history.

One year ago, an Israeli settler shot and killed the Palestinian activist Awdah Hathaleen in the occupied West Bank. Hathaleen, an English teacher and father of three young children, played a key role in the production of the Oscar-winning documentary No Other Land, which follows Palestinians in the community of Masafer Yatta as they struggle to stay on their land amid violent attacks by Israeli settlers.

An estimated 60,000 people from Morocco crossed into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, on the African side of the Strait of Gibraltar, in an unprecedented mass movement last week. At least 72 people died during the attempt. The sudden influx of migrants overwhelmed the city’s residents, leading to a humanitarian crisis while border police deployed water cannons, tear gas and warning shots to deter people from crossing.

During Thursday’s segment about the risks of artificial intelligence, we shared a quote from author Naomi Klein that we later discovered was AI-generated. Klein has written about the proliferation of the fake quote on her Substack and joins Democracy Now! to discuss the growing difficulty of verifying online information.
“These companies are creating digital doppelgangers of us, trying to monetize our identities,” says Klein.

U.S. boat strikes across the Caribbean and eastern Pacific have killed at least 221 people since September, while the Trump administration has provided no evidence linking the vessels or their passengers to drug trafficking. Ecuadorian prosecutor Alexandra Bravo was fatally shot on June 14 by a hitman in the city of Manta. Bravo had been investigating U.S. strikes on three Ecuadorian boats in which 36 passengers survived, many of them recounting alleged torture by American gunmen in U.S.

Democrats are calling for an ethics investigation into Republican Congressmember Max Miller of Ohio, who is facing allegations of domestic abuse as he runs for reelection. Miller’s ex-wife Emily Moreno, daughter of Ohio Republican Senator Bernie Moreno, claims that Miller burned her by throwing hot water at her, held a gun to her head and fractured their 2-year-old daughter’s collarbone.

President Trump said Thursday he may temporarily withdraw his nomination of Todd Blanche for attorney general after two Republican senators, John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, said they would not vote to advance Blanche’s nomination until they received written assurances that he would limit some of the terms in the controversial deal reached between the Department of Justice and President Trump to settle his personal lawsuit against the IRS.

During Thursday’s segment about the risks of artificial intelligence, we shared a quote from author Naomi Klein that we later discovered was AI-generated. Klein has written about the proliferation of the fake quote on her Substack and joins Democracy Now! to discuss the growing difficulty of verifying online information.
“These companies are creating digital doppelgangers of us, trying to monetize our identities,” says Klein.

U.S. boat strikes across the Caribbean and eastern Pacific have killed at least 221 people since September, while the Trump administration has provided no evidence linking the vessels or their passengers to drug trafficking. Ecuadorian prosecutor Alexandra Bravo was fatally shot on June 14 by a hitman in the city of Manta. Bravo had been investigating U.S. strikes on three Ecuadorian boats in which 36 passengers survived, many of them recounting alleged torture by American gunmen in U.S.

Democrats are calling for an ethics investigation into Republican Congressmember Max Miller of Ohio, who is facing allegations of domestic abuse as he runs for reelection. Miller’s ex-wife Emily Moreno, daughter of Ohio Republican Senator Bernie Moreno, claims that Miller burned her by throwing hot water at her, held a gun to her head and fractured their 2-year-old daughter’s collarbone.

President Trump said Thursday he may temporarily withdraw his nomination of Todd Blanche for attorney general after two Republican senators, John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, said they would not vote to advance Blanche’s nomination until they received written assurances that he would limit some of the terms in the controversial deal reached between the Department of Justice and President Trump to settle his personal lawsuit against the IRS.

During Thursday’s segment about the risks of artificial intelligence, we shared a quote from author Naomi Klein that we later discovered was AI-generated. Klein has written about the proliferation of the fake quote on her Substack and joins Democracy Now! to discuss the growing difficulty of verifying online information.
“These companies are creating digital doppelgangers of us, trying to monetize our identities,” says Klein.