4 Automakers Sided With California Over Air Pollution. Now Trump’s DOJ Is Investigating Them.
Marcos Assis/Getty This story was originally published by HuffPost and appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. The Justice Department has reportedly opened an antitrust investigation into four major automakers that struck a deal with California on vehicle-emissions standards in July, sidestepping opposition from the White House. The automakers―Ford Motor Co., BMW AG, Volkswagen…
California Just Passed New Limits on Police Use of Force. Not Everyone Is Happy With the Compromise.
California Gov. Gavin NewsomAssemblymember Shirley Weber/Facebook California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law one of the country’s most substantive police use-of-force bills on Monday. The legislation nominally attempts to narrow the parameters for when officers are allowed to use deadly force on the job—marking a significant turning point for the state, which is the country’s…
What If Courts Treated Young Sex Trafficking Victims Like Cyntoia Brown as People, Not Perpetrators?
Maia Boakye One morning in February, Brittney, a baby-faced 17-year-old with short black braids, stands in front of a juvenile court judge in Compton, California, talking about kittens. Brittney had been in and out of the justice system since she was 14, after the state removed her from her physically abusive mother. Diagnosed with post-traumatic…
Burn. Build. Repeat: Why Our Wildfire Policy Is So Deadly
A multiple-exposure image of developer Jeb Allen at a construction site in Redding’s Salt Creek Heights Justin Maxon Standing on Shingletown Ridge and gazing west toward the setting sun, Bruce Miller eyes a rainbow of colors. He sees pink: the dusky sky blanketing a postcard-perfect valley 3,000 feet below. He sees gray: distant snow-capped mountains. He…
Getting Out of Jail After Dark Can Be Dangerous—and Sometimes Deadly
The last bus of the day pulls away from the parking lot outside the Santa Rita Jail in Dublin, California, at 8:43 p.m. Twenty minutes later, a young woman pulls up the hood of her dark jacket, pushes open the jail lobby’s heavy door, and steps out into the night, looking for a cigarette. Leah,…
Tom Steyer Wants You to Want Him to Be President
Jacob Rosenberg Tom Steyer—hedge fund billionaire, Democratic megadonor, and newly self-proclaimed presidential candidate—is prepared for the question. He’s only 10 days into his campaign, but he knows to expect it. Often, it’s the first question; sometimes it’s a single word. Why? In January, Steyer said he wasn’t running, but now he is, and so are 20-plus other Democrats. There’s the…