Politics

November 20, 2018 - The lame-duck North Carolina legislature convenes Nov. 27 to write a new voter ID law after the version it passed in 2013 was struck down for targeting black voters "with almost surgical precision." The same week, the U.S. Senate could vote to confirm to a federal judgeship a lawyer who helped draft the discriminatory law. 

November 19, 2018 - The text of Georgia Democratic gubernatorial nominee Stacey Abrams' Nov. 16 non-concession speech in which she acknowledged that Republican former Secretary of State Brian Kemp would be the state's next governor and announced plans for a lawsuit over election misadministration and the launch of a group to fight for electoral integrity in Georgia.

November 16, 2018 - The federal government's 287(g) program has put some 15,000 undocumented immigrants in deportation proceedings in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. But following a grassroots campaign by the immigrant-rights group Comunidad Colectiva, county residents voted to unseat their pro-287(g) sheriff for one who's promised to end participation.

November 16, 2018 - Republican-drawn congressional maps dramatically undercut Democratic candidates' ability to win in Southern states in 2018.

November 15, 2018 - The 2018 midterms saw voter turnout records smashed nationwide, and states in the South where progressive Democrats ran high-profile campaigns targeting low-propensity voters were among those that saw the most dramatic gains over 2014.

November 15, 2018 - Voters in states across the South faced difficulties including long lines, closed polling places, malfunctioning machines, and voter intimidation. There were also registration issues that forced some voters to cast provisional ballots, which aren't necessarily counted.

November 13, 2018 - They ended racist Jim Crow-era policies in two states and raised the minimum wage in another. But elsewhere, Southern voters embraced racially discriminatory voter ID laws and took steps to restrict reproductive rights. The ballot measures that passed this year reflect a politically divided region.