Politics

January 10, 2017 - Last week the Obama administration denied all pending permits to conduct seismic testing for oil and gas reserves in the Atlantic Ocean, but pro-drilling politicians who don't represent directly affected coastal communities say they'll work to reverse the decision under Trump.

January 6, 2017 - This week North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper (D) announced he would take action to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, just months after his Louisiana counterpart did the same. But now congressional Republicans are vowing to repeal the law altogether.

January 6, 2017 - Passed last March, North Carolina's discriminatory HB2 "bathroom bill" has inflicted major economic damage on the state, costing it more than half a billion dollars as businesses, athletics organizations, film companies and conferences have canceled expansions and events in protest. Here's the latest tally of that lost revenue.

January 5, 2017 - As U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama prepares for his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee next week, civil rights groups are working to block his nomination, citing his poor record on civil rights and role in targeting African-American voting rights activists.

January 4, 2017 - Republican Rep. Bob Goodlatte led an unsuccessful effort this week to roll back the powers of the Office of Congressional Ethics. The move came as the nation is about to have a GOP president with numerous potential conflicts of interest, but Goodlatte was also recently accused of his own financial conflicts regarding a natural gas pipeline planned for his state.

December 23, 2016 - In a year when it was hard to keep up with the onslaught of political news, Facing South helped to make sense of important developments and to share insights about the region. Catch up on our best reporting of 2016 with a roundup of our top stories of the year.  

December 22, 2016 - The recent move by North Carolina's GOP-controlled legislature to strip powers from Democratic Gov.-elect Roy Cooper is an example of basic democratic norms being undermined in a radical way, authoritarianism expert Yascha Mounk of Harvard University told an NPR talk show this week.