Skip to content
Project 2025
Search

Latest Stories

Follow Us:
Top Stories
Full frame shot of pins that say “vote” with red, white, and blue American flag theme.

Spirit of 1776 – Rejected by Project 2025, Embraced by NPVIC

Eisenhower’s D‑Day Leadership Shows What America Has Lost

Eisenhower’s D‑Day Leadership Shows What America Has Lost

Rioters breach Capitol security Jan. 6

Trump’s 1776 Slush Fund Shows a New Level of Executive Abuse

Young group of people standing in circle using mobile phones outside. Unrecognizable teen friends watching social media content on smartphone app. Technology lifestyle concept.

Teens Are Confiding in AI. Instead, They Should Help Shape It.

14 new languages coming to California's polling places next fall

Voting stickers

California currently provides voting aid in 16 languages. A state appeals court gas ruled the roster must be expanded by 14 Asian languages.

David Paul Morris/Getty Images
The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumNov 05, 2019
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
See More Writings by author

Elections across a large swath of California a year from now must be conducted in 14 additional languages in order to stop disenfranchising at least 800,000 Asian-American voters, a state appeals court has ruled.

Acting on a lawsuit brought by several civil rights groups, a three-judge panel in San Francisco unanimously ordered the changes Monday after deciding the state's top election official, Democratic Secretary of State Alex Padilla, was setting an improperly high threshold for deciding when to offer voting assistance in some languages other than English.

The ruling by the 1st District Court of Appeals could have a measurable impact on 2020 turnout in the nation's largest and most linguistically diverse state. While its 55 electoral votes will be a virtual lock for the Democratic nominee, at least half a dozen congressional races and dozens of state and local contests look to be competitive.

California law requires that, in any place where at least 3 percent of the voting age population is from a language minority and lacks skills to vote without linguistic help, the state must provide translated facsimile ballots and other materials to help voters in using election equipment that has instructions and the names of contested offices in English. That standard is higher than the federal thresholds, which Padilla applied for the 2018 congressional midterms.

About 1,300 precincts will be affected because at least 57,000 of their voters speak one of the covered languages at home. Translated voting materials will now be prepared for the first time in Bengali, Burmese, Gujarati, Hindi, Indonesian, Japanese, Lao, Mien, Mongolian, Nepali, Tamil, Thai, Telugu, and Urdu. In addition, the ruling expands access to materials in Hmong and Punjabi.

The court declined, however, to do what the lawsuit asked for and expand voting in many other languages. The judges said they were limited to considering Asian languages under the law's definition of "language minority." California currently offers aid in at least part of the state in 16 languages.

Padilla's office said it had not yet decided whether to appeal.

The decision "will make it possible for many thousands of Californians to participate fully and equally in our democratic process," said William Freeman, a senior counsel with the ACLU Foundation of Northern California, one of the plaintiffs. "California must continue to be in the forefront of encouraging robust voter participation by our state's diverse communities."


Latest news

Full length of man unloading cardboard box from van
Economy

America Has Stopped Moving

Read More

The Future of DEI in Higher Education: Unpacking Recent Federal Restrictions
A group of people standing in a circle with their hands together
Photo by Shelby Murphy Figueroa on Unsplash

The Future of DEI in Higher Education: Unpacking Recent Federal Restrictions

This nonpartisan policy brief, written by an ACE fellow, is republished by The Fulcrum as part of our partnership with the Alliance for Civic Engagement and our NextGen initiative — elevating student voices, strengthening civic education, and helping readers better understand democracy and public policy.

Key Takeaways

  • Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs serve diverse student populations at colleges and universities across the nation. DEI programs in higher education have traditionally supported first-generation college students, students with disabilities, veterans, low-income students, and racial and ethnic minorities through offices, scholarships, cultural centers, and accessibility services.
  • Federal initiatives, such as TRIO or the Full-Service Community Schools program, are facing cuts to funding due to DEI-related federal policy, affecting students across the nation.

Defining DEI

From debates surrounding race-conscious admission policies to questions about the role and funding of identity-based student centers, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) has become a widely debated topic in higher education policy. DEI refers to institutional policies and programs–such as mentorship opportunities, cultural centers, and support programs–which improve campus climate and student access for underrepresented groups. Though many colleges and universities across the United States have developed DEI initiatives aimed at shaping student access and institutional priorities, recent legal and policy developments have raised questions about how these efforts align with federal law.

Keep ReadingShow less
Rear view of teenage boy walking with arm around friends

Why many young men feel politically and socially adrift, how changing gender roles affect masculinity, self-esteem, relationships, and the future of society.

Maskot / Getty Images

Lost Boys - What Is the Role of a Man in Today's Society?

A recent New York Times article stated that young males who provided an important swing vote for Trump in 2024 are discouraged by what Trump has done and not done while in office. But they are nevertheless not particularly inclined to vote Democratic because they don't see the Party as welcoming their view of masculinity and they don't know where they fit in this society.

These young men assume that because the Party supports equality for women in the workplace and because many young women no longer have marriage and having children at the top of their agenda, the Party would not be a welcoming home for them. They see themselves as striving for the masculinity of their fathers' or grandfathers' day, where the man was the breadwinner in the family and had respect and authority. Not the weaker half in relationships with women.

Keep ReadingShow less
Showing Up and Staying: Disaster Relief in an Age of Distrust

NECHAMA volunteers in Western North Carolina after Hurricane Helene.

Showing Up and Staying: Disaster Relief in an Age of Distrust

As the Atlantic hurricane season officially began on June 1, disaster response organizations across the country are preparing for the next storm. That preparation includes coordinating logistics, purchasing supplies, training volunteers, and strengthening partnerships. It now also requires planning for an environment shaped by misinformation, distrust, and competing narratives.

A recent 60 Minutes segment examining extremist groups in disaster zones highlighted how quickly public perceptions can form after a disaster. Recovery efforts are now followed by outside groups and online networks attempting to influence how events are understood while communities are still in crisis.

Keep ReadingShow less
How State Courts Can Help Deflect the Supreme Court’s Latest Blow to Multiracial Democracy

Black and white illustration of voters

State Court Report

How State Courts Can Help Deflect the Supreme Court’s Latest Blow to Multiracial Democracy

With its April ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, the Supreme Court delivered yet another blow to the Voting Rights Act, specifically Section 2, which governs race in redistricting. The decision was sad and utterly predictable, but still nothing short of astonishing. Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the Court’s conservative supermajority, stealthily setting aside 40 years of legal precedent under Section 2 largely on the belief that racism is a thing of the past and extreme partisan gerrymandering is, in effect, a fundamental right of state lawmakers. Callais had a tortured path to the Court, a feature of the case that has undoubtedly been eclipsed by the lawless nature of the ruling itself, all of which reveals that the Supreme Court represents the gravest threat to multiracial democracy in the United States. (I argued as much in a law review article, predicting the outcome and analyzing the ways a Court gone rogue might get to that ruling.)

What’s more? In recent years, the Court has played fast and loose with a “principle” purportedly meant to limit chaos around elections, known as Purcell. But instead of limiting chaos, the Court’s Purcell jurisprudence will hasten and aggrandize the already-problematic impact of the Callais ruling. As the nation’s redistricting wars inevitably continue — in this election season, the 2028 presidential campaign, and even the next decade — state courts can help stave off democratic erosion by resisting the urge to invoke Purcell.

Keep ReadingShow less
© Copyright 2026