Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Citing history of racial discrimination, judge blocks North Carolina voter ID law

Voter ID law on hold

A federal judge in North Carolina has put a hold on a law that would have required voters to show an ID at the polls.

Getty Images

A federal judge has blocked implementation of a new voter identification law set to go into effect in North Carolina, claiming Republican state legislators who authored the bill were intending racial discrimination.

U.S. District Judge Loretta Biggs noted in her ruling on Tuesday that North Carolina "has a sordid history of racial discrimination and voter suppression stretching back to the time of slavery, through the era of Jim Crow, and, crucially, continuing up to the present day."

Biggs blocked use of the voter ID requirement until there is a trial. That, in effect, means North Carolina voters won't have to present an ID when they vote in the state's March 3 primary elections.


North Carolina voters approved a ballot measure in November 2018 requiring voters to produce an ID when they cast their ballots. The GOP-controlled Legislature passed a bill the next month to implement the ballot measure. It was vetoed by the Democratic governor, Roy Cooper, but the Legislature overrode the veto.

The North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP and several local NAACP chapters immediately filed a federal lawsuit challenging the law and asking for an injunction to block its implementation.

Biggs ruled that the same GOP state legislators who were behind earlier voter ID legislation that a federal appeals court found was intended to discriminate against black voters were involved in the most recent voter ID law.

She concluded that there was enough evidence that the new law, "like its predecessor, was imbued with discriminatory intent."

Because North Carolina has a history of discrimination, parts of the state had been subject to restrictions under the federal Voting Rights Act. Any changes to voting systems were required to receive advance approval, called "preclearance," by a federal judge or the Justice Department.

But that preclearance requirement was struck down by the Supreme Court in a landmark 2013 ruling. The court found that the evidence used to justify the preclearance requirement was out of date.

Read More

The Sanctuary City Debate: Understanding Federal-Local Divide in Immigration Enforcement
Police car lights.
Getty Images / Oliver Helbig

The Sanctuary City Debate: Understanding Federal-Local Divide in Immigration Enforcement

Immigration is governed by a patchwork of federal laws. Within the patchwork, one notable thread of law lies in the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. The Act authorizes the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) programs, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to work in tandem with local agencies and law enforcement on deterrence and enforcement efforts. Like the now-discontinued Secure Communities program that encouraged information sharing between local police agencies and ICE, the law specifically authorizes ICE to work with local and federal partners to detain and deport removal-eligible immigrants from the country.

What are Sanctuary Policies?

Keep ReadingShow less
Trump Slams Washington Commanders and Cleveland Guardians Over Name Changes

President Donald Trump speaks to the media as he departs the White House in Washington, DC.

(Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Trump Slams Washington Commanders and Cleveland Guardians Over Name Changes

Washington, D.C. — President Donald Trump has reignited controversy surrounding the Washington Commanders football team, demanding the franchise revert to its former name, the “Redskins,” a term widely condemned as a racial slur against Native Americans.

In a series of posts on Truth Social this past weekend, Trump declared, “The Washington 'Whatever's' should IMMEDIATELY change their name back to the Washington Redskins Football Team.” He went further, threatening to block the team’s $3.7 billion stadium deal in Washington, D.C., unless the name change is reversed.

Keep ReadingShow less
Media criticism
News media's vital to democracy, Americans say; then a partisan divide yawns
Tero Vesalainen/Getty Images

Public Media Under Fire: Why Project 2025 Is Reshaping NPR and PBS

This past spring and summer, The Fulcrum published a 30-part, nonpartisan series examining Project 2025—a sweeping policy blueprint for a potential second Trump administration. Our analysis explored the proposed reforms and their far-reaching implications across government. Now, as the 2025 administration begins to take shape, it’s time to move from speculation to reality.

In this follow-up, we turn our focus to one of the most consequential—and quietly unfolding—chapters of that blueprint: Funding cuts from NPR and PBS.

Keep ReadingShow less
Person voting

New York City’s election has gotten a lot of attention over the last few weeks, and ranked choice voting is a big part of the reason why.

Hill Street Studios/Getty Images

New York City’s Ranked Choice Voting: Democracy That’s Accountable to Voters

New York City’s election has gotten a lot of attention over the last few weeks, and ranked choice voting is a big part of the reason why.

Heads turned when 33-year-old state legislator Zohran Mamdani knocked off Andrew Cuomo, a former governor from one of the Democratic Party’s most prominent families. The earliest polls for the mayoral primary this winter found Mamdani struggling to reach even 1 percent.

Keep ReadingShow less