Today's Liberal News

Texas Editor: Police in Uvalde Are Actively Obstructing Us from Doing Our Jobs

Police and bikers in Uvalde, Texas, are restricting a growing number of journalists from reporting on the aftermath of the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School that left 19 fourth graders and two teachers dead. “None of us can ever recall being treated in such a manner and our job impeded in such a manner,” says Nora Lopez, executive editor of San Antonio Express-News and president of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.

We Can’t Get Answers: Texas Lawmaker Decries Police Refusal to Address Response to School Massacre

We speak with Texas Democratic state Senator Roland Gutierrez about how the police botched the response to the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, a small town that is part of Gutierrez’s congressional district. The shooting left 19 fourth graders and two teachers dead after the police waited over an hour before anyone confronted the gunman.

U.K. PM Boris Johnson Survives No-Confidence Vote But Faces Uphill Battle to Stay in Power

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson survived a vote of no confidence held by members of his own Conservative Party on Monday. The 211-148 vote came just days after Johnson was booed by conservative royalists when he arrived at a service to honor the queen’s 70-year reign. We speak with Priya Gopal, English professor at the University of Cambridge, who says the vote signals a division within the country’s Conservatives and an opening for progressives.

Biden OKs $5.8B in Debt Relief for Corinthian Students; Pressure Grows to Abolish All Student Debt

The Biden administration this week canceled almost $6 billion in student loan debt for borrowers who attended the now-defunct network of for-profit schools known as Corinthian Colleges, which defrauded thousands of students before being shut down in 2015. We speak to two activists from the Debt Collective, a group working to end the student loan crisis, about the ongoing fight for full federal student debt cancellation.

Many Republicans think mass shootings are ‘something we have to accept as part of a free society’

A horrific trend of mass shootings continues across the country, with more shootings reported every day. According to Axios, this weekend alone at least seven occurred, resulting in 11 deaths and injuries to at least 54 others. The gun control debate has now been pushed to center stage in the U.S., but despite the increasing concerns about gun violence, some lawmakers continue to claim guns are not to blame.

Along with inflation and supply chain issues, parents and schools now need to worry about lunches

Here in the United States, we have a truly unwieldy number of issues to tackle at any given time, especially if you’re not a white, cisgender, heterosexual, able-bodied person. Those people face real issues and barriers, too, of course, but marginalized folks face all of those and then some. Extra sadly but not surprisingly, low-income youth in the nation also face barriers, including access to school lunch.

Ukraine update: 70% of Severodonetsk is back under the control of Ukraine, heavy fighting continues

At some points in the war, it’s been not only possible, but sensible, to doubt reports from either side, especially when they have sounded too rosy. Russia has repeatedly made claims or even shown videos that were absolutely at odds with the reports of those on the ground—that includes happy-happy-joy-joy videos showing smiling people in the areas occupied by Russia going about their day in cities unscarred by weeks of pounding artillery.

These North Carolina organizations are mobilizing frontline communities to vote in 2022 and beyond

Since moving from North Carolina to Massachusetts five years ago, I’ve heard over and over again that I must be so relieved to live somewhere more progressive and accepting—somewhere that isn’t as “backward” as the South.

These statements don’t surprise me anymore, but they do make me sad. There’s no doubt that many Southern states are the home of some of the most extreme anti-abortion, anti-trans, and anti-voter laws in the country.

Boris Johnson Has Only Delayed the Inevitable

Boris Johnson lives to fight another day. Britain, meanwhile, lives to endure another day in his shadow, a bit part in the soap opera of his life, watching on as the drama is set on an endless doom loop from comic farce to tragedy.

Publishing Photos of Dead Children Could Backfire

What can the press do to help stop mass shootings? This question haunts many journalists who struggle through the ritualistic cycle of news coverage that has become all too familiar after a massacre. Publishing photographs showing the grisly sight of slaughtered children is the latest answer from those seeking to move the public and politicians to act.

Meta Doesn’t Mean What You Think It Does

Don’t want to miss a single column? Sign up to get Caleb’s writing in your inbox.Perhaps no morpheme has been more crucial to understanding the current cultural moment than meta. I first remember hearing it in high school, an echo across the East River from Brooklyn during the Obama-era hipster boom. On a basic level, meta meant recursive or self-referential—like a warning sign warning you about warning signs or a coffee-table book about coffee tables.

California’s First-in-Nation Reparations Report Urges Action on Wealth, Education, Criminal Justice

We speak with the chair of the California Reparations Task Force, which is the first in the United States and has just released a landmark report calling for “comprehensive reparations” for Black people harmed by a historical system of state-sanctioned oppression. While the state report is unprecedented, reparations are “first and foremost a federal responsibility,” says attorney Kamilah Moore.