Contributing Writers

As part of our Memorial Day special, we continue our interview with Ohio death row inmate Keith LaMar live from the Ohio State Penitentiary, after the release of The Injustice of Justice, a short film about his story that just won the grand prize for best animated short film at the Golden State Film Festival.

As part of our Memorial Day special, we speak with death row inmate Keith LaMar live from the Ohio State Penitentiary, after the release of The Injustice of Justice, a short film about his case that just won the grand prize for best animated short film at the Golden State Film Festival. “I had to find out the hard way that in order for my life to be mine, that I had to stand up and claim it,” says LaMar, who has always maintained his innocence.

We begin our Memorial Day special with acclaimed director Ryan Coogler about his latest film Sinners, which is set to be one of the biggest box office hits of the year. Starring Michael B.

Historian Jeanne Theoharis’s new book, King of the North: Martin Luther King Jr.’s Life of Struggle Outside the South, is a major reexamination of the civil rights leader that offers a different picture of both King’s own experiences of police brutality and his sustained critique of police brutality and the criminal legal system in the North as well as the South.
“We’ve southernized Dr. King.

This Sunday marks five years since George Floyd was murdered by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. In a video that shocked the world and spurred a global movement for racial justice, Chauvin pinned Floyd to the ground with a knee to his neck for eight minutes while Floyd gasped for air. Floyd repeatedly said, “I can’t breathe.

Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil testified at his asylum hearing on Thursday, telling an immigration judge in Jena, Louisiana, that his deportation from the United States could lead to his “assassination, kidnapping, torture.” Hours before the hearing, Khalil was allowed to meet and hold his 1-month-old son Deen for the first time.

Trump’s sweeping budget legislation has been described as the biggest Medicaid cut in U.S. history. House Republicans passed the bill early Thursday morning in a 215-214 vote. The legislation would trigger massive cuts to Medicare and Medicaid over the next 10 years, denying coverage to an estimated 7.6 million Americans, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Historian Jeanne Theoharis’s new book, King of the North: Martin Luther King Jr.’s Life of Struggle Outside the South, is a major reexamination of the civil rights leader that offers a different picture of both King’s own experiences of police brutality and his sustained critique of police brutality and the criminal legal system in the North as well as the South.
“We’ve southernized Dr. King.

This Sunday marks five years since George Floyd was murdered by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. In a video that shocked the world and spurred a global movement for racial justice, Chauvin pinned Floyd to the ground with a knee to his neck for eight minutes while Floyd gasped for air. Floyd repeatedly said, “I can’t breathe.

Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil testified at his asylum hearing on Thursday, telling an immigration judge in Jena, Louisiana, that his deportation from the United States could lead to his “assassination, kidnapping, torture.” Hours before the hearing, Khalil was allowed to meet and hold his 1-month-old son Deen for the first time.

Trump’s sweeping budget legislation has been described as the biggest Medicaid cut in U.S. history. House Republicans passed the bill early Thursday morning in a 215-214 vote. The legislation would trigger massive cuts to Medicare and Medicaid over the next 10 years, denying coverage to an estimated 7.6 million Americans, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Historian Jeanne Theoharis’s new book, King of the North: Martin Luther King Jr.’s Life of Struggle Outside the South, is a major reexamination of the civil rights leader that offers a different picture of both King’s own experiences of police brutality and his sustained critique of police brutality and the criminal legal system in the North as well as the South.
“We’ve southernized Dr. King.

This Sunday marks five years since George Floyd was murdered by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. In a video that shocked the world and spurred a global movement for racial justice, Chauvin pinned Floyd to the ground with a knee to his neck for eight minutes while Floyd gasped for air. Floyd repeatedly said, “I can’t breathe.

Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil testified at his asylum hearing on Thursday, telling an immigration judge in Jena, Louisiana, that his deportation from the United States could lead to his “assassination, kidnapping, torture.” Hours before the hearing, Khalil was allowed to meet and hold his 1-month-old son Deen for the first time.

Trump’s sweeping budget legislation has been described as the biggest Medicaid cut in U.S. history. House Republicans passed the bill early Thursday morning in a 215-214 vote. The legislation would trigger massive cuts to Medicare and Medicaid over the next 10 years, denying coverage to an estimated 7.6 million Americans, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

President Donald Trump staged an extraordinary confrontation in the Oval Office on Wednesday, repeating his false claims about a “white genocide” taking place in South Africa during a meeting with the country’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa. At one point, Trump had the lights dimmed and ordered video clips played showing people calling for violence against white farmers in South Africa.

International criticism of Israel continues to grow as the country’s military expands its assault on Gaza, killing scores of Palestinians on a daily basis while blocking food, fuel, medicine and other supplies from reaching the starving population. The U.K. Labour government announced this week it is suspending free trade talks with Israel and imposing sanctions on some Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank. The European Union says it will also review its trade ties with Israel.

We speak with Dr. Victoria Rose, a British plastic and reconstructive surgeon who has been on three medical missions to Gaza since the start of Israel’s war on the territory. She joins us from Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, where she’s been treating patients for over a week, and describes horrific injuries amid Israel’s ongoing bombardment, limited medical supplies and widespread malnutrition making it harder for people to heal. “Children are particularly taking the brunt of this,” she says.

We speak with Israeli journalist Gideon Levy after a young Israeli couple was shot dead in Washington, D.C. Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim both worked at the Israeli Embassy and were killed by a gunman after leaving the Capital Jewish Museum Wednesday night. The couple were dating and about to get engaged, the embassy said. Police identified Elias Rodriguez of Chicago as the suspect in custody.

Cuts by the Trump administration are beginning to “chase” U.S.-based scientists at federal agencies and research institutions out of the country. “We’re draining our scientific talent,” says environmental journalist Robert Hunziker, who explains how China and European countries are offering positions for scientists laid off, fired or pushed out by Trump and DOGE’s mass culling of federal workers and funding. The massive U.S.

As President Trump pushes House Republicans to support a sweeping budget bill that gives massive tax breaks to the rich while slashing spending for Medicaid, food stamps and subsidies for clean energy, we look at a new series for The Lever’s podcast Lever Time, which covers the history of the Republican anti-tax movement and how their anti-government influence is impacting Trump’s attempts to build power.

Over two dozen disability rights activists were arrested on Capitol Hill last week when they protested the Trump-backed Republican budget bill and its cuts to Medicaid, affordable housing and more. “We’re putting our bodies on the line [because] our bodies are on the line,” says Julie Farrar, an activist with ADAPT, which organized the protest.