Politics

January 29, 2020 - The voter registration deadline for Florida's 2020 primary election is approaching. A federal judge ruled that the state cannot require people with felony convictions to pay court fines, if they cannot afford it, to have their voting rights restored. An appeals court is reviewing that decision.

January 29, 2020 - Longtime elections watchdog Bob Hall has filed a complaint with the state elections board claiming that the Sons of Confederate Veterans' North Carolina Heritage PAC was unlawfully formed and engaged in illegal financing activity. But so far the elected officials who received money from the PAC aren't rushing to return it.

January 28, 2020 - With Southern states' monopoly electric utilities clinging to a business model that's worsening the climate crisis, polluting the environment, and costing consumers dearly, there's growing interest in opening markets to competition. While a ballot initiative to end Florida's electricity monopoly was recently rejected by the state Supreme Court, there are efforts underway to end Virginia's monopoly system and to study the question in the Carolinas.

January 17, 2020 - It's been a decade since the Supreme Court ruling opened a new era of Big Money influence in politics, heightening concerns over corruption and creating new barriers for lower-income candidates and candidates of color. But democracy advocates and their allies have responded by building a movement that links anti-corruption measures with broader reforms.

January 17, 2020 - With the United States' forever wars in the Middle East threatening to expand to Iran, peace activists in North Carolina, near the world's largest U.S. military base, report a spike in interest from service members interested in learning how to get out.

January 16, 2020 - With a presidential election season underway, the Trump administration carried out a deadly drone strike in Iraq, killing key Iranian military leaders and stoking fears of another war. What does recent research say about war's impact on elections and voting?

January 16, 2020 - Since the U.S Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United 10 years ago, corporate campaign cash has poured into supreme court races across the South. With seats up for grabs this year in Arkansas, North Carolina, and West Virginia, that trend is likely to continue.