congress

May 25, 2023 - A new report from the Movement Advancement Project ranks the states on their risk for election denialism and finds that more than a few states in the South are vulnerable to attempts to overturn the will of the voters. It also highlights policies that can protect elections from deniers.

January 24, 2023 - The poverty rate for people with disabilities is more than double that of our nondisabled counterparts, and the disparity is being driven by state policy choices that force us into institutions unnecessarily and allow employers to pay us subminimum wages. Some Southern states have already embraced reforms, and others should act now.

January 11, 2023 - Over 100 corporations said they'd reconsider their political giving after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, but most continued donating to members of Congress who voted against certifying President Biden's 2020 election. Among them are Fortune 500 firms with headquarters in the South, including AT&T, Delta Air Lines, and Walmart.

November 18, 2022 - The Republican wave that many pundits predicted this year didn't happen, but the party captured control of the U.S. House of Representatives thanks to federal and state courts allowing extreme manipulation of voting maps.

August 11, 2022 - Thanks to policy changes championed by the Biden administration in response to the coronavirus pandemic, eviction filings have remained well below historic averages, even after the federal moratorium ended last year. But experts warn that current trends in the housing market indicate more trouble ahead.

May 24, 2022 - A U.S. House subcommittee recently held a hearing into ongoing efforts to limit discussion in public school classrooms on American history, race, and LGBTQ+ issues — and to punish teachers who broach those topics. Among those who testified was James Whitfield, a high school principal from North Texas who lost his job after sending students an email in response to killings of Black people by police and white vigilantes that acknowledged systemic racism and called education "a necessary conduit to get liberty and justice for all."

May 13, 2022 - A number of states, including several in the South, are bucking the federal policy that allows companies to pay workers with certain disabilities less than the basic minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. The Biden administration recently took an initial step to address that pay disparity for tens of thousands of disabled workers nationwide, while a bill to end the practice is stalled in Congress.