Today's Liberal News

The Former Proud Boys Leader Finds Out

Say this for the Proud Boys: They abide by their own creed. “Fuck around, find out!” members of the group, with Joseph Biggs in front, chanted as they marched down the National Mall, in Washington, D.C., on January 6, 2021.Over the past week, they’ve found out. Enrique Tarrio, the group’s former chairman, was sentenced today to 22 years in prison on charges of seditious conspiracy.

How Jimmy Buffett Created an Empire

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.Jimmy Buffett, the chiller laureate of Key West, died on Friday at 76. His legacy goes well beyond music: He also parlayed the power of his loyal community into a business empire.

A DeSantis Speech Too Dangerous to Teach in Florida

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis does not often find himself attempting to deliver a unifying message, but in the aftermath of the killing of three Black Floridians by an alleged white supremacist in Jacksonville last week, he tried.“What he did is totally unacceptable in the state of Florida,” DeSantis said during a speech at a vigil for the three victims, A.J. Laguerre, Angela Michelle Carr, and Jerrald Gallion, last Sunday.

“Doing Harm”: Roy Eidelson on the American Psychological Association’s Embrace of U.S. Torture Program

A military judge at Guantánamo has thrown out the confessions of Saudi man Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri because he had been tortured and waterboarded at secret CIA black sites in Afghanistan, Thailand, Poland, Romania and Morocco before being sent to Guantánamo. Psychologists James Mitchell and John Bruce Jessen, who were paid at least $81 million by the CIA to develop and then implement the CIA’s post-9/11 torture program, had waterboarded al-Nashiri at a CIA black site.

Racist Shootings “Don’t Happen in a Vacuum”: Bishop Barber on DeSantis, Trump & Those Who Spread Hate

As federal law enforcement opens an investigation into the Jacksonville, Florida, shooting where a white gunman killed three Black people at a Dollar General as a possible hate crime and act of domestic violent extremism, we speak with civil rights leader Bishop William Barber about the increasing number of racist attacks in America fueled by racism.

Leopards ate the face of this conservative Idaho community

West Bonner County, Idaho, like most of the state, is Trump country. The four-time indicted former president won 73% of the vote in the county in 2020. And, following their MAGA instincts, county voters swept in a radical right-wing school board in the November 2021 elections. 

After seeing those two board members work diligently to destroy their schools, county voters overwhelmingly recalled them last Tuesday.

Green New Deal Architect Rhiana Gunn-Wright Warns the Green Transition May Leave Black People Behind

As the cost of the climate crisis continues to rise and climate justice groups demand more government action to halt the heating of the planet, we speak with policy expert Rhiana Gunn-Wright, one of the architects of the Green New Deal. She says the Inflation Reduction Act championed by President Biden, which is the largest climate bill in U.S. history, has many provisions that “structurally leave out Black people.

Enbridge Is the Guilty Party, Not Me: Meet the Pipeline Protester Facing 5 Years for Peaceful Action

We speak with climate activist and water protector Mylene Vialard, whose trial for peacefully protesting the Enbridge Line 3 pipeline began this week in Minnesota. Vialard faces up to five years in prison for her 2021 protest, when she attached herself to a 25-foot bamboo tower erected to block a pumping station in Aitkin County. Vialard, who lives in Colorado, had come to Minnesota to take part in a wave of Indigenous-led acts of civil disobedience to stop the pipeline.

Abortion anecdote from DeSantis at GOP debate is more complex than he made it sound

When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was asked during last week’s GOP presidential debate whether he would support nationwide abortion restrictions, he instead offered a startling anecdote.

“I know a lady in Florida named Penny,” he said. “She survived multiple abortion attempts. She was left discarded in a pan. Fortunately, her grandmother saved her and brought her to a different hospital.

Civil rights advocates defend a North Carolina court justice suing over a probe for speaking out

Civil rights advocates and Democratic state legislators defended and praised Wednesday a state Supreme Court justice for suing this week to block a state ethics panel from investigating her public comments that she says are protected by the First Amendment.

Leaders of the North Carolina Black Alliance, Emancipate NC and a minister spoke at a Legislative Building news conference in support of Anita Earls, who is the only Black woman on the seven-member court.

Great Reads From Our Editors

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.Today, spend time with a collection of stories selected by our writers and editors.Many of the below stories have narrated versions, if you prefer to listen to them; just click the link and scroll to the audio player below the headline.

A Politician Who Loved Being Courted

Every so often, someone asks me who my favorite politicians to write about over the years have been. I always place Bill Richardson, the longtime congressman and former governor of New Mexico, near the top of my list. I once mentioned this to Richardson himself.“How high on the list?” he immediately wanted to know. “Top 10? Top three? I get competitive, you know.”Richardson died in his sleep on Friday, at age 75.