Politics
May 22, 2019 -
The Democrat-controlled N.C. Board of Elections has appointed a new executive director on a party-line vote. She'll be responsible for running two special congressional elections this year and implementing the state's new voter ID law, which is facing a lawsuit filed by voters who could be disenfranchised.
May 10, 2019 -
Earlier this year Texas officials threatened to remove from the state's voter rolls tens of thousands of people they alleged were not citizens. Warning that the state was using bad data, voting rights advocates sued and won — and now Texas must pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in attorneys' fees. It's not the only state to jeopardize citizens' voting rights over bogus claims of non-citizens voting.
May 9, 2019 -
The nation's largest investor-owned utility was recently named the worst for the environment. But changes recently proposed for the utility regulatory commission by the governor in the company's home state of North Carolina could push Duke in a more environmentally sustainable direction.
May 3, 2019 -
This week Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee led an anti-union meeting at Chattanooga's Volkswagen plant, where last month workers petitioned for an election to join the United Auto Workers. The public and journalists were shut out of the event, which showed how government officials and corporations in the South work together to bust unions.
May 3, 2019 -
After voters approved a constitutional amendment restoring the franchise to people with felony convictions, Florida lawmakers are trying to make it harder for citizens to put amendments on the ballot. Legislators in Arkansas, the only other Southern state that allows citizen-initiated amendments, did likewise after voters passed a minimum-wage hike.
April 26, 2019 -
In a year of harsh anti-abortion bills, one introduced in Texas went furthest of all by allowing women who end a pregnancy to be put to death. The bill's sponsor — a quadruple divorcee whose first wife sought a restraining order against him — is a major recipient of contributions from a fracking services billionaire and religious sect leader who's become a leading funder of radical anti-abortion groups and candidates.
April 26, 2019 -
Voting rights advocates offered solutions for combating discriminatory election practices and increasing voting access in the state and around the country.
