US

September 10, 2020 – Hundreds of thousands of immigrants might be prevented from voting in the 2020 election—even though they are just one step away from becoming new Americans. Years of fiscal mismanagement at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS)—coupled with a series of policy changes under the Trump administration—have led to an enormous backlog of citizenship applications at […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. Sept. 10, 2020 -Today, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee, gave the following statement at a full Committee hearing entitled “The Need for Financial Aid to America’s States and Territories During the Pandemic: Supporting First Responders, Assisting Schools in Their Efforts to Safely Educate, and Preventing Mass Layoffs.” […]

Bronx, NY, Sept. 10, 2020—Representative Eliot L. Engel, Chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, today made the following statement on the Treasury Department’s sanctioning of Andreii Derkach for election interference: “Andreii Derkach, the man whom this administration’s Treasury Department has now singled out for interfering in our election, has also been supporting the […]

September 10, 2020 – The United States may have experienced more than 6.4 million cases of COVID-19 by April 18, 2020, according to a probability analysis conducted by UC Berkeley School of Public Health researchers and published in Nature Communications. That is nine time more than the number of confirmed cases in the same period, which […]

Washington, DC, Sept. 9, 2020 – Today, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), the Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, announced that, as part of its ongoing investigation into the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A), the Committee received a whistleblower reprisal complaint alleging serious wrongdoing by officials at the […]

Washington, DC September 9, 2020 – Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), member of the Senate Aging and Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committees, and Senator Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Ranking Member of the Senate Aging Committee and HELP Committee member released new findings from their investigation into USPS’s delayed delivery of mail-order medications following operational changes […]

WASHINGTON, D.C. Sept. 8, 2020 – This afternoon, the Senate released its deficient, limited plan for additional COVID-19 relief. The so-called “skinny bill” focuses on providing widespread corporate immunity to employers whose workers and staff get sick on shift and extends Trump’s flawed, fraud-ridden Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). Meanwhile, the legislation fails to provide adequate support […]

September 8, 2020 – The United States’ post-9/11 wars have displaced at least 37 million people, according to a new report released today by Costs of War. This study, “Creating Refugees: Displacement Caused by the U.S. Post-9/11 Wars,” is the first to calculate the displacement toll of these wars. The estimate was derived by counting refugees, […]

RALEIGH, NC, Sept. 7, 2020 – Attorney General Josh Stein, along with a coalition of 24 other attorneys general, today released a statement highlighting the importance of election integrity. “It’s against the law to vote twice in the election,” said Attorney General Josh Stein. “That is true everywhere in the United States. Anyone who intentionally […]

SAN DIEGO, Calif. September 8, 2020 – Asylum seekers who have been turned back by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) from ports of entry along the U.S.-Mexico border asked a federal court to permanently stop the Trump administration’s turnback policy and declare it unlawful. Under the policy, CBP agents have rejected asylum seekers using […]

September 7, 2020 – A new report by the Economic Policy Institute discusses the importance of unions and workers’ collective action in establishing an equitable economy, particularly during the coronavirus pandemic. The authors find that unionized workers earn on average 11.2% more in wages than nonunionized peers (workers in the same industry and occupation with similar education […]

Earlier today, the Washington Post published a story alleging that US Postmaster Louis DeJoy had previously reimbursed private-sector employees for making political contributions. DeJoy is a longtime Republican megadonor and fundraiser, and led efforts to raise money for the 2020 Republican National Convention. Reimbursing employees for political contributions is illegal under both federal and North Carolina law. The federal Department of Justice has previously prosecuted actions similar to the allegations described by […]

WASHINGTON D.C. Sept. 4, 2020 –– Today, the U.S. District Court for the District Columbia issued a preliminary injunction to stop the Trump administration from denying immigrant visas to 2020 diversity visa winners. In its ruling, the court ordered the administration to process all 2020 diversity visa applications as quickly as possible before September 30. […]

September 3, 2020 –  A first-of-its-kind study from the Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) finds 27.8% of U.S. adults had depression symptoms as of mid-April, compared to 8.5% before the COVID-19 pandemic. Published in the journal JAMA Network Open, the study also found that income and savings are the most dramatic predictors of depression symptoms […]

New Rochelle, NY, September 2, 2020—The COVID-19 pandemic has illuminated three main pathologies of American voting rights, according to Richard Hasen. The pandemic has revealed the lack of systematic and uniform protection of voting rights in the United States, as described in the peer-reviewed Election Law Journal. Click here to read the article now. Richard Hasen, Chancellor’s Professor […]

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. Sept. 2, 2020 –  With just over two months before the 2020 election, three professors at the Indiana University Kelley School of Business offer a comprehensive review of how other nations are seeking to protect their democratic institutions and presents how a multifaceted, targeted approach is needed to achieve that goal in the U.S., where […]

Greenbelt, MD, Sept 1, 2020 – Civil rights groups asked a federal court on Monday to prevent the Trump administration from ending the 2020 Census count more than a month early. Attorneys with MALDEF (Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund), and Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC (Advancing Justice | AAJC), and WilmerHale seek […]

Washington, D.C. September 1, 2020—Today, the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis released a preliminary staff report on the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) showing that billions of dollars in PPP loans may have been diverted to fraud, waste, and abuse.  Based on this report, Rep. James E. Clyburn, Chairman of the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis, sent […]

HELENA, MT, September 1, 2020 – Following the Interior’s Office of the Inspector General report that concluded that Interior officials misled Congress, Western Values Project Director Jayson O’Neill issued the following response:    “As this investigation rightfully concludes, the relocation of America’s largest public lands management bureau was based on false pretenses in order to achieve […]

> ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox. September 1, 2020 – Dr. Sara Cody, health officer of Santa Clara County, California, was tired of seeing the same thing over and over again. Her contact tracers were telling people […]