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Tennessee death row prisoner Tony Carruthers was issued a one-year stay of execution last Thursday after prison officials were unable to find a backup injection vein in a botched execution attempt that left Carruthers suffering and in pain for over an hour. Nashville reporter Steven Hale attended the execution and describes his and fellow witnesses' confusion as they heard the sounds of what Carruthers's attorneys are calling torture." Per Tennessee's lethal injection protocol, witnesses can only see inside the execution chamber once the injection process has begun. Carruthers, who has long struggled with mental health issues and represented himself in his trial, was convicted of triple homicide in 1996. He has always maintained his innocence, but courts have thus far blocked his requests for modern-day crime scene analysis that could lead to his exoneration. Tennessee resumed capital punishment last year, following a three-year moratorium put in place to review the state's lethal injection protocols. Since its resumption, three people have been executed by the state, all by lethal injection. Carruthers would have been the fourth.

I could hear screaming the whole time." Our guests Alex Colston and Haitham Arafat spent days in Israeli custody after being abducted from a humanitarian mission sailing to Gaza. They share accounts of violence, abuse and torture at the hands of Israeli soldiers. The process that they have there in the jail was designed to break you as a human," says Arafat, a Palestinian American activist born in Gaza who has taken part in multiple missions attempting to break Israel's long-standing siege. Over 100 members of his family have been killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023. While incarcerated, the activists were visited by Israel's minister of national security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who was recently banned from France after publicly ridiculing flotilla members. They call us provocateurs, or they say we're terrorists ... and yet, whenever Ben-Gvir shows up to these things, he's the one provoking us," says Colston, a journalist who was previously detained by Israel while sailing with the Global Sumud Flotilla last year.

We get an update on the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran from journalist Negar Mortazavi, following the Pentagon's so-called self-defense strikes on two Iranian ships in the Strait of Hormuz Monday despite an official ceasefire and ongoing peace negotiations. The chaotic" ceasefire has been violated from day one," says Mortazavi, who notes that Israel's continuous attacks on southern Lebanon are delaying attempts to end the war - and that this is exactly the intention of the Israeli government. Clearly, Netanyahu doesn't want this war with Iran to end," she says. Every step of escalation is definitely going to harm the final outcome and narrow the path to a final agreement." Mortazavi also comments on the new political reality for Iran's Gulf neighbors in the aftermath of Iranian strikes on U.S. military bases hosted in the region. The Iranian message is: If war comes to us, it will not stay inside our borders."

U.S. Attacks Southern Iran as Ceasefire Negotiations Continue, Israel Attacks Lebanon's Beqaa Valley, Killing 12 People, Israeli Strikes Kill at Least Five Palestinians at a Refugee Camp in Gaza, Police Officers in Spain Attack Activists from the Global Sumud Flotilla at Bilbao Airport, New Jersey Police Arrest 10 Activists Attempting to Stop Ammunition Shipment to Israel, 300 Detainees at Delaney ICE Jail Launch Hunger Strike to Protest Inhumane Conditions, Federal Judge Dismisses All Criminal Charges Against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, USCIS Says Most Green Card Seekers Must Apply from Home Countries, Bystander Is Wounded as Secret Service Service Kills Alleged Gunman Outside White House, Russia Warns Foreigners and Diplomats to Leave Kyiv After Deadly Weekend Assault, WHO Warns Ebola Is Spreading Faster Than Efforts to Contain It, Pope Leo Issues Encyclical Warning Artificial Intelligence Must Serve Humanity

A special broadcast: Highlights from Democracy Now!'s 30th anniversary celebration at the historic Riverside Church, featuring Angela Davis, Patti Smith, Mosab Abu Toha, Michael Stipe, Hurray for the Riff Raff, Amy Goodman, Juan Gonzalez, Nermeen Shaikh and a surprise appearance by Bruce Springsteen.

We speak with journalist Karen Hao, author of Empire of AI, about the Trump administration's alliance with tech billionaires, efforts to regulate artificial intelligence technology, and rising local opposition to data centers across the United States.In 2025, these data center protests successfully stalled over $100 billion worth of these facilities," says Hao. It really does cut across political lines."Hao recently launched The AI Resist List with a group of fellow journalists, researchers and technologists. It's a collaborative project to track and reshape how artificial intelligence is deployed around the world.

Late-night comedian Stephen Colbert has ended his 11-year run as host of The Late Show on CBS. His program's cancellation removes one of President Trump's most vocal critics from the airwaves and comes after the comedian criticized his own employer for agreeing to pay $16 million to settle a lawsuit brought by President Trump. The settlement came as CBS parent company Paramount was seeking the Trump administration's approval for a merger with Skydance, which the Trump administration approved just one week after CBS announced Colbert's ouster. Trump's FCC Chair Brendan Carr has openly gloated about the administration's attacks on critics in the media and the defunding of outlets like PBS and NPR, which no longer receive federal money. Meanwhile, Paramount Skydance is seeking another megamerger with Warner Bros. Discovery, which would further concentrate media control in the hands of the billionaire Ellison family that has a long history of supporting Trump.We see this over and over again, where the Trump administration is weaponizing its power over mergers to try to get what it wants in the media space," says David Sirota, editor-in-chief of The Lever and host of the Master Plan podcast.

The deadly Ebola outbreak spreading across the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo has killed at least 177 people, with more than 750 suspected cases reported in the DRC and neighboring Uganda, according to the World Health Organization. Health officials believe the virus may have been spreading undetected for months before the outbreak was identified, raising concerns that the scale of transmission could be far greater than initially understood. The epidemic has spread hundreds of miles away to South Kivu province, now under the control of the Alliance Fleuve Congo, which includes the Rwanda-backed M23 rebels.Jimmy Munguriek, country director for the Democratic Republic of Congo at Resource Matters, tells Democracy Now! that poor road access, insufficient medical facilities and local stigma about the disease are making it hard to respond to the crisis. Ebola outbreak is really, really a very urgent issue in the Mongbwalu region," he says from Kinshasa.We also speak with Matthew Kavanagh, director of the Center for Global Health Policy and Politics at Georgetown University, who says U.S. international aid cuts and the Trump administration's withdrawal from the World Health Organization have hampered the response to Ebola. This is not just an outbreak of a virus. This really is a politically driven ... epidemic."

GOP Leaders Delay Vote on Iran War Powers Resolution Until June, I'll Be the One That Does It": Trump Says He's Ready to Attack Cuba, Syrian Child and Paramedics Are Victims of Latest Israeli Strikes on Lebanon, Deported Global Sumud Flotilla Activists Describe Torture and Abuse by Israeli Captors, Greenlanders Protest as U.S. Opens New Consulate in Nuuk, Senate Delays Vote on ICE Funding as GOP Revolts over Trump's Ballroom and $1.8B Slush Fund", Advocates Demand Release of Karla Toledo, Tucson Activist Jailed by ICE, Immigrants at For-Profit ICE Jail in California Launch Hunger Strike Against Inhumane Treatment, Charges Dropped Against Chicago Anti-ICE Protesters Over Gross Misconduct" by Prosecutors, Colorado Democrats Censure Gov. Jared Polis over Clemency for 2020 Election Denier, DNC Faces Backlash over Post-Election Autopsy That Makes No Mention of Gaza Genocide, Thousands Attend Funeral for Victims of Massacre at Islamic Center of San Diego, Death Row Prisoner Tony Carruthers Wins One-Year Reprieve After Tennessee Botches His Execution

As colleges hold graduation ceremonies across the country, many schools are attempting to silence pro-Palestine speech at the commemorations, including canceling speakers and eliminating live speeches by students altogether. There will be no live student speakers at the City University of New York's School of Law or at New York University's school-specific ceremonies after former students gave speeches that included expressing support for Palestine and criticism of Israel. Rutgers University canceled biotech CEO Rami Elghandour's commencement speech at its School of Engineering's convocation, citing complaints about his social media posts on Israel and Palestine. And the University of Michigan's president issued a public apology after professor Derek Peterson praised pro-Palestine students during his commencement address.Our students are being told that your families, your Palestinian families, are expected to suffer and die, and you should be OK with it," says Noura Erakat, a Palestinian human rights attorney and professor at Rutgers University. Erakat adds that Rutgers professors have been asked not to teach about the conditions in Gaza. We are asked to betray the empirical record, including the one on genocide and apartheid, and we refuse to do that."This will be the third graduation and commencement ceremony in a row where we do not have a student speaker, we do not have a faculty speaker and we do not have a live-stream commencement," says Shivani Desai, a member of CUNY Law Students for Justice in Palestine. They took all of that away from us, and they took that away specifically because of Palestine repression."

The decades-old U.S. humanitarian aid agency USAID was largely dismantled in the early days of President Trump's second term by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency. The authors of a new study in the journal Science conclude, The abrupt withdrawal of USAID led to a significant and sustained increase in conflict across Africa's most USAID-dependent regions."We are joined by Austin Wright, one of the study's authors and a professor of public policy at the University of Chicago. What we found is that that shutdown had these large effects," says Wright. These are often double-digit percentage increases in the incidence, severity and lethality of violence across Africa in the affected regions."

The Trump administration is advancing plans to resettle an additional 10,000 white South Africans in the United States as refugees. Under President Trump's proposal, which was submitted to Congress on Monday, the U.S. would lift its record-low refugee admissions figure from 7,500 to 17,500, with the additional openings reserved for Afrikaners. This comes as the administration continues to block the entry of refugees from other countries. The U.S. has resettled just over 6,000 refugees between October and April - all except three were from South Africa. Trump has said Afrikaners face racial persecution and genocide in South Africa, claims that have been rejected by the U.N. Human Rights Office, among others. Last year, he cut off aid to the country and boycotted the G20 summit in Johannesburg.Whiteness is being recast as endangered," says Lebohang Pheko, a professor of practice at the University of Johannesburg. There is a move towards the alt-right, the MAGA discourse, which is about replacement theory, and which is absolutely about displacing the idea that anything other than whiteness is normative." Pheko also suggests that Trump's actions toward South Africa are retribution for the genocide case it brought against Israel at the International Court of Justice.We are processing resettlement cases for white Afrikaners at a record pace," adds Sharif Aly, president of the International Refugee Assistance Project, which is currently litigating a class-action lawsuit challenging the Trump administration's dismantling of the United States refugee program. This program has never been a fast program, and it's being expedited for just this one population." While Afrikaners are being quickly resettled, thousands of other people who have went through years of vetting, who have went through years of persecution and violence," are being blocked from entering the U.S., says Aly.

Iran Announces Controlled Maritime Zone" in Strait of Hormuz, 20 Million in Sudan Face Acute Hunger as Rival Military Factions Continue Deadly Strikes, Cuba Promises Fierce Resistance" as USS Nimitz Arrives in Southern Caribbean, Israel Continues Attacks on Lebanon Even After Agreeing to Extend Ceasefire", Israeli Settlers Erect Illegal Outpost and Burn Palestinian Vehicles in Occupied West Bank, Israeli Drones and Bullets Kill Four Palestinians in Gaza, Video Shows Israeli Security Minister Ben-Gvir Taunting Handcuffed Gaza Flotilla Activists, Elon Musk's SpaceX and OpenAI Confirm Plans to Go Public, Meta Lays Off 10% of Workforce and Assigns Thousands to New AI Initiatives, Sen. Sanders and Rep. Lee Unveil New Bill to Abolish Super PACs, Colbert Signs Off Tonight on the Final Broadcast of The Late Show", Demonstrators in Bolivia Call for President Paz to Step Down

Amnesty International's 2025 report on the global use of the death penalty finds that executions have surged to their highest recorded number in over 40 years, driven largely by the expanded use of political executions in Iran to create a climate of fear and intimidation in the society and deter dissent." Amnesty recorded 2,707 executions in 2025. But the data excludes China, believed to be the world's top executioner, because its government does not release any public data on executions. While the majority of countries around the world have banned the use of the death penalty, Raha Bahreini, who contributed to the report, says the 17 countries that carried out executions last year keep insisting on the use of the death penalty as a tool of control and repression."

In the latest escalation of the decadeslong U.S. pressure campaign against Cuba's communist government, the Trump administration is expected to unseal an indictment against Raul Castro, the 94-year-old former president of Cuba, later today. The charges stem from the 1996 shootdown of four pilots with Brothers to the Rescue, the U.S.-based anti-Castro organization formed by Cuban exiles and dissidents. Peter Kornbluh, a Cuba specialist at the National Security Archive, says that the indictment will send a clear warning" to Cuban leaders and provide justification for a possible future attempt to capture or assassinate Castro. Military options are on the table and coming soon," says Kornbluh. It is absolutely clear that the U.S. military is preparing contingency operations in case Trump's impatience runs out because Cuba has not met his imperial demands fast enough."

In Havana, we speak to journalist Ed Augustin, who calls the Trump administration's strict fuel blockade of Cuba, in place since the beginning of 2026, the collective punishment of a population, particularly targeting poor communities, pregnant women, children and the elderly." Augustin shares stories of hardship faced by everyday Cubans who are increasingly forced to go without electricity, drinking water and medical care.

In a shocking and unprecedented move, the Justice Department issued a memo Tuesday saying the IRS is forever barred" from investigating past tax returns of President Trump, his family, company and related companies." It came just a day after the department announced the creation of a $1.776 billion anti-weaponization" fund to compensate" people prosecuted for supposedly political reasons by the Biden and Obama administrations - a move expected to benefit January 6 insurrectionists, other Trump allies and even Trump himself. It's all part of an agreement between the Department of Justice and President Trump's personal attorneys in exchange for Trump dropping a $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS over leaked tax returns. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche - President Trump's former personal attorney - will appoint the commission overseeing the Justice Department's new fund. This is dictatorship in action," says reporter David Cay Johnston. He calls the anti-weaponization" fund a slush fund to pay a criminal enforcement arm, a violent arm of Trump supporters to intimidate people" and says the order to not investigate the Trump family's dealings screams that Donald Trump is, in fact, a criminal-level tax cheat."

Iran Threatens War Will Spread Beyond Middle East If Trump Resumes Attacks, Lebanon's Health Ministry Says at Least 22 People Killed in Israeli Attacks Despite Ceasefire, Israeli Forces Intercept Last Remaining Boats with Gaza Sumud Flotilla, Abducting Over 400 Activists, Israel's Far-Right Finance Minister Smotrich Says ICC Seeks Arrest Warrant Against Him, Victims of Islamic Center Shooting in San Diego Identified, DOJ Forever" Bars IRS from Probing Trump, His Sons and Their Family Business, Democratic Senators Grill Transportation Secretary Duffy About Reality TV Road Trip Project, WHO: 600 Cases of Ebola and 139 Suspected Deaths in Congo and Uganda, Nigeria's Military Confirms Joint Strikes with U.S. Against Islamic State, Killing 175 People, Trump Admin Plans to Resettle 10,000 Additional White South Africans in the U.S., Federal Jury Rejects Elon Musk's $150B Lawsuit Against OpenAI and Sam Altman, GOP Congressmember Massie Loses Primary to Trump-Backed Challenger Gallrein, Biotech CEO Rami Elghandour Speaks at The People's Convocation for Palestine" at Rutgers University

State prosecutors in Minnesota have filed criminal charges against an ICE officer who allegedly shot a Venezuelan immigrant in north Minneapolis in January, then lied about what happened. Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty announced Monday that federal agent Christian Castro will face four counts of second-degree assault and one count of falsely reporting a crime when he allegedly shot Julio Sosa-Celis through a door. Federal authorities have refused to cooperate with the investigation, as well as separate probes into the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.Emilia Gonzalez Avalos, executive director of the Minnesota-based social justice organization Unidos MN, welcomes the charges as a victory for civil society and the rule of law. That is what democracy looks like. It looks like separation of powers and getting material consequences [for] wrongdoing," she says.

President Donald Trump is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to toss two verdicts against him resulting from civil litigation brought by writer E. Jean Carroll. In 2019, the famous advice columnist published a memoir describing an encounter in the 1990s when she says Trump sexually assaulted her in a department store. When Trump denied the account, Carroll sued him and won $5 million in damages, with a unanimous New York jury finding Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation. After Trump made disparaging remarks about Carroll, she sued him again and won a second defamation judgment for $83.3 million. Federal courts have upheld both verdicts, but now Trump's attorneys are asking the Supreme Court to overturn them, asserting he has absolute immunity" as president.Carroll's life and her legal fight against Trump are the focus of a new documentary, Ask E. Jean, by award-winning filmmaker Ivy Meeropol. This is an incredible opportunity for audiences to see what really goes on when a woman brings a case like this, especially against a powerful man," Meeropol says.

Two teenage gunmen in California fatally shot three people on Monday at the Islamic Center of San Diego, the largest mosque in the city. Among the dead was a security guard - Amin Abdullah, a father of eight - whom police credit with preventing more casualties. The 17- and 18-year-old suspects were found dead from apparent self-inflicted gunshot wounds in a car near the scene. Police are investigating the attack as a hate crime. The Council on American-Islamic Relations noted the attack comes as anti-Muslim bias complaints reached their highest level since they began tracking them in 1996, with 8,683 complaints filed nationwide.This is a mosque that has opened its doors to the community," says Palestinian American activist Linda Sarsour, co-founder of the Muslim rights and advocacy group MPower Change. This is the epitome of a mosque that shows our true values as Muslims, in community and in solidarity. So, it's just devastating, and no house of worship should have to ever experience this."

Trump Says He Called Off A Very Major Attack Tomorrow" to Give Iran Negotiations More Time, U.S. Imposes Entry Ban on Travelers from DRC, Uganda and South Sudan as Ebola Deaths Top 130, World Leaders Condemn Israel's Abduction of Activists from Gaza-Bound Aid Flotilla, Teenage Attackers Kill 3 at San Diego Islamic Center in Suspected Hate Crime, Charges Filed Against ICE Officer Who Shot a Venezuelan Immigrant in Minneapolis, Report: 100,000+ Children in U.S. Have Had a Parent Detained in Immigration Crackdown, DOJ Announces $1.776B Fund to Compensate Trump Allies, EPA Proposes to Kill Drinking Water Limits for Four Forever Chemicals, Long Island Rail Road Strike Ends After MTA and Unions Reach Tentative Agreement, NYC Mayor Mamdani Announces City's First Municipally Owned Grocery Store in the Bronx

Donald Trump on Monday dropped his $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over a leak of his personal and business tax records, a bizarre case of a sitting president suing his own government and essentially acting as both plaintiff and defendant. This comes amid reports that Trump's Department of Justice was considering settling the case in exchange for the creation of a $1.7 billion fund to compensate victims of so-called weaponization of the DOJ under the Biden and Obama administrations. Trump allies who participated in the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol could file claims and be compensated.They want a $1.7 billion slush fund, which comes to a million dollars a head in terms of Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, the insurrectionists, with $100 million left over of taxpayer money to spread around in different ways," says Congressmember Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, who spoke with Democracy Now! shortly before news broke of Trump dropping the IRS lawsuit.Raskin last week introduced the Protecting Our Democracy Act, which is geared toward curbing the president's profiteering from public office. Corruption is the whole purpose of the Trump administration," says Raskin. It's not like some eccentric peripheral thing; it's a vast money-making operation."

Thousands of people gathered on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., on Sunday for Rededicate 250," a taxpayer-funded Christian evangelical service backed by President Trump. The eight-hour lineup featured songs, prayers and remarks by top government officials including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, House Speaker Mike Johnson and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. The event included religious leaders like evangelist Franklin Graham and Cardinal Timothy Dolan.Nothing was Christian about what we saw yesterday," says Bishop William J. Barber II. This is idolatry. This is heresy. This is a form of religious nationalism. This is Trump worship. This is trying to make someone a messiah figure." Barber, the president of Repairers of the Breach and founding director of the Yale Center for Public Theology and Public Policy, took part in a counter-event on Sunday called Redirect 250.This is really a battle for the soul of America," says Sarah Posner, author of Unholy: How White Christian Nationalists Powered the Trump Presidency, and the Devastating Legacy They Left Behind. The Supreme Court has eroded the separation of church and state in recent decades, particularly under President Trump, adds Posner. She also notes that evangelicals, for decades, have been marinating in Christian Zionist theology and ideology, which holds that, in their view, America has a biblical duty to defend Israel, and in particular defend Israel from aggression, both nuclear and otherwise, from Iran."

The World Health Organization declared a global health emergency on Saturday due to the rapid spread of Ebola virus in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda. Ebola causes severe hemorrhagic fever and is often fatal. There's no approved vaccine for the strain of Ebola responsible for the current outbreak, known as the Bundibugyo variant. The WHO said in a statement that the outbreak is potentially much larger than what is currently being detected and reported."Public health professor and emergency room physician Dr. Craig Spencer, who is an Ebola survivor, says this Ebola outbreak could be the fourth largest in history. This is going to be a really difficult outbreak to manage and respond to," says Spencer. The ability of healthcare workers to address the outbreak in eastern Congo, given the violence and conflict, is anything but ideal."Spencer adds that cuts to USAID and the U.S. withdrawal from the World Health Organization have increased the likelihood for viruses to spread nationally and internationally, citing outbreaks of measles in the U.S. and Ebola and hantavirus abroad. This is not all just a coincidence," says Spencer. This is a consequence of us cutting back our support."

Trump Escalates Threats Against Iran as Ceasefire Negotiations Remain Deadlocked, Israel Kills at Least Six People in Southern Lebanon, Including Three Paramedics, Israel Assassinates Izz al-Din al-Haddad, the Head of Hamas's Military Wing, Israeli Cabinet Approves Plans to Build Military Compound at Former UNRWA Site, Israeli Forces Begin Intercepting Ships with the Global Sumud Flotilla, World Health Organization Declares Ebola Outbreak a Global Health Emergency, GOP Senator Cassidy Loses Primary After Trump Backs His Opponent, New Financial Disclosures Show Trump Made Between $220M and $750M in Securities Trades in 2026, U.S. Government Officials Participate in Taxpayer-Funded Christian Gathering on National Mall, U.S. Supreme Court Ends Redistricting Bid by Virginia Democrats, Thousands Rally in Alabama to Protest Lost Voting Rights, Long Island Rail Road Workers Strike After Wages Fail to Keep Pace with Inflation

We speak to two prominent Israeli thinkers, historian Omer Bartov and journalist Gideon Levy, about the founding beliefs of Zionism. Bartov, a professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Brown University, is the author of the new book Israel: What Went Wrong? Bartov says the early Zionist movement had liberatory intentions, aiming to emancipate the persecuted Jewish minority in Europe and modeling itself after other contemporary ethnonationalist movements. He then argues that while Israel had the opportunity to become a normal state" and issue a constitution that would provide equality to all its citizens, would define its borders and create a legal framework" that could also acknowledge and redress the Nakba, it chose another path. Instead of remedying its foundational violence, he says, the modern Israeli state has become increasingly militaristic, centralized, expansionist, racist and, as we've seen since October 2023, genocidal." Though Bartov does not identify as an anti-Zionist, he says Israel must discard Zionism, it must put it on the garbage heap of history, and it must redefine itself, going all the way back to 1948."Levy, on the other hand, says Zionism has never been reformable, because the movement, from its very beginning, started wrong, without the belief or the conviction that we can live together." He contests Bartov's assertion that early Zionist intentions became warped over the 20th century, and says instead that the violent dispossession of Palestinians is embedded into the premise of the movement. This very same attitude, this very same policy never stopped ever since '48," Levy contends. His latest piece in Haaretz is titled Zionism Didn't Go Wrong, It Was Always Built This Way."Both Bartov and Levy also respond to the Israeli government's threat to file a defamation lawsuit against The New York Times for publishing a column by longtime opinion writer Nicholas Kristof about systemic sexual abuse against Palestinian detainees in Israeli prisons. That has become the policy of the country - to abuse, to humiliate, to rape systematically," says Bartov. Levy explains Israel's reaction is to attack the messenger."

Palestinians around the world are marking Nakba Day, 78 years after their forced mass displacement led to the establishment of the Jewish-majority state of Israel. Decades later, Palestinians still face widespread oppression and violence from the Israeli state as it continues its expansionary project. Israel tried, since 1948 until today, to destroy us as a people, as a group, and they failed at it. Our people are still there, resilient," says Palestinian writer Muhammad Shehada, who was born in Gaza and now lives in Denmark. Shehada discusses the ongoing process of the Nakba, including its latest intensification after October 7, 2023. Now this veneer of civility has fallen off. The mask was taken off. And now it's a matter of national pride in Israel to brag about annihilating Palestinians."Shehada also describes current conditions in Gaza - still under Israeli blockade and occupation - and what he calls the disarmament trap" of unfairly weighted negotiations designed to strip Palestinians of political autonomy. The 'realistic' proposal that Israel is putting on the table is surrender, capitulate, become fully defenseless, weaponless, and entrust the very army that carried out a genocide against you to be merciful towards you once you are an easier target than you ever were before."Finally, he responds to the Israeli government's recent threat to file a defamation lawsuit against The New York Times, after the paper published a column by longtime opinion writer Nicholas Kristof about systemic sexual abuse against Palestinian detainees in Israeli prisons. It's the newspaper of record. It'll be spread and disseminated widely to an American audience," says Shehada about the allegations levied in Kristof's piece. So we see, basically, an Israeli panic attack in return."

House Narrowly Rejects Latest War Powers Resolution to End Trump's Attacks on Iran, CENTCOM Commander Denies U.S. Killed Civilians in Iran: No Way That We Can Corroborate That", Iran's Foreign Minister Asks BRICS Nations to Unite Against U.S. Bullying", Trump Departs China Without Agreements on Taiwan, Iran or Strait of Hormuz, CIA Chief Travels to Havana as Cuba's Oil Reserves Run Dry Amid U.S. Fuel Blockade, UNICEF Says Israeli Attacks Have Killed or Wounded 59 Children in a Week, Despite Ceasefire Deal, Israeli Nationalists March Through Jerusalem's Old City, Chanting Death to Arabs", 24 Killed as Russian Missile Slams into Kyiv Apartment Building, Border Patrol Chief Michael Banks, Who Oversaw Mass Deportation Campaign, Abruptly Resigns, Court Orders Trump Administration to Return Colombian Woman Deported to Congo, Supreme Court Preserves Broad Access to Abortion Medication Mifepristone, ABC: Trump Set to Unveil $1.7 Billion IRS Compensation Fund" to Benefit MAGA Allies, Boeing to Pay Family of Samya Stumo Nearly $50M over Fatal Crash of 737 MAX Jet, Bolivian Unions Lead Nationwide Strikes Demanding Ouster of President Paz, Richard Glossip Freed on Bond After Nearly 30 Years on Oklahoma's Death Row

We speak with the acclaimed artist and author Molly Crabapple about her new book, Here Where We Live Is Our Country: The Story of the Jewish Bund. Although largely forgotten today, the Jewish Labor Bund was once a powerful secular, socialist revolutionary party that fought for freedom and dignity for Jews in Europe. The movement formed in the waning days of the Russian Empire in an atmosphere of intense antisemitism, but it rejected, from the very start, calls to create a Jewish ethnostate in Palestine," Crabapple says. They felt that Zionism was a capitulation to the same bigots that wanted to kick Jews out of Europe."Bund members - known as Bundists - navigated profound historical changes from the founding of the movement in 1897 until its ultimate destruction in the Holocaust. But Crabapple, who learned Yiddish for the book, says the Bund is not just Jewish history.This is a history that belongs to all rebels. It belongs to everyone who believes in the necessity of human solidarity," she says.

U.S. President Donald Trump is in Beijing for a highly anticipated summit with his Chinese counterpart President Xi Jinping. It is the first U.S. state visit to China since 2017, during Trump's first administration. Trade, the Iran war, artificial intelligence and the fate of Taiwan are some of the issues being discussed, although it's not clear if any new agreements are likely. Trump traveled to China with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, along with a delegation of top U.S. executives including Apple CEO Tim Cook, Elon Musk of Tesla and Jensen Huang of Nvidia.The summit comes after years of rising hostility between the two superpowers, but leaders recognize the importance of improving the bilateral relationship, says Zhao Hai, director of international political studies at the Institute of World Economics and Politics in Beijing. This is a very critical historical moment [at] a crossroad, and both sides now are working together to establish a stable relationship that will have a global ramification," he says.We also speak with Jake Werner, a historian of modern China and director of the East Asia Program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. He says the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran and the resulting economic chaos have strengthened China's position.China has ties to all the countries in the region. It has acted in the past to help broker the normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran," says Werner. So it has some experience in this realm, sort of acting as a broker towards peace."

Xi Jinping Warns U.S. of Potential Conflict" over Taiwan After Beijing Summit with Trump, Senate Narrowly Rejects Iran War Powers Resolution for Seventh Time, Children Among the Dead as Israel Continues Bombing Lebanon Despite Ceasefire, Israeli Police Kill Palestinian Attempting to Scale West Bank Wall to Find Work, Study Finds Israel Increased Attacks on Gaza After Halting Strikes on Iran, Judge Temporarily Blocks U.S. Sanctions Against U.N. Expert on Occupied Palestinian Territories, Israeli Prime Minister Claims He Made Secret" Visit to the UAE in March, U.S. Senate Votes to Confirm Kevin Warsh as Federal Reserve Chair, Trump Admin Withholds $1.3 Billion in Medicaid Reimbursement Payments from California, Former Private Prison Official to Be Named Acting Director of ICE, Louisiana Police to Pay More Than $4.8 Million to Settle Wrongful Death of Ronald Greene, U.N. Warns Drones Cause More Than 80% of Civilian Deaths in Sudan, Mexican President Denies Reports CIA Officers Assassinated Cartel Members, Israel Qualifies for the Eurovision Song Contest Final Amid Protests and Calls for Boycott

Salah Sarsour, a prominent Palestinian immigrant, green card holder and president of Wisconsin's largest mosque, the Islamic Society of Milwaukee, has been locked up in an ICE jail since late March. Despite his lawful permanent resident status, the government says he could be subject to deportation for failing to disclose a conviction by Israeli military authorities when he was a teenager in the occupied West Bank. Sarsour says he never understood the charges presented against him in Hebrew and that he was tortured in Israeli custody. Supporters view the case as an escalation of the Trump administration's crackdown on Pro-Palestinian speech. Munjed Ahmad, a member of Salah Sarsour's legal team, says, Salah's case will be a litmus test. Will we allow the administration to gut those rights and to strip people from their free speech?"Ahmad is joined by Sarsour's son Kareem, who calls Trump's federal immigration agents kidnappers" and says his family initially had no idea what had happened to his father. While incarcerated, Salah Sarsour missed the birth of his ninth grandchild. He's a community pillar," says Kareem Sarsour. The entire thing shook us as a family."

As the supercharged" construction of new data centers to power artificial intelligence blankets the country, a growing resistance movement to these massive corporate projects amid a lack of public oversight is not far behind. As organizer Astra Taylor explains, local fights across the country are leveraging this industry chokepoint" to force important questions, from the distribution of land, water and energy resources to democratic governance over an industry currently driven by a billionaire Big Tech agenda." While AI boosters frame the technology as inevitable, Taylor says, I think that many people are more skeptical than that. ... That's part of what it means to have democratic governance over AI, to say, 'No, we don't need this technology to take over every facet of our existence.'"

Trump's commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Martin Makary, has resigned. During Makary's 13-month tenure, he attempted to split the difference between Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Make America Healthy Again agenda and a more traditional approach to regulation, ultimately angering both camps. Nobody was happy with what he did," says Dr. Aaron Kesselheim, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.Shortly before his resignation, Makary had drawn the ire of President Trump for attempting to block the approval of fruit-flavored vapes, and anti-abortion groups for not placing harsher restrictions on the abortion pill mifepristone. But even before Makary took the helm, mass layoffs and the loss of scientific expertise had already thrown the FDA, which has oversight powers extending to more than a fifth of the U.S. economy, in turmoil.The FDA's deputy commissioner for food, Kyle Diamantis, will now assume Makary's position in an acting capacity. Diamantas, a personal friend of Donald Trump Jr., does not have a background in medicine. The abrupt leadership shakeup is worrisome for the future of health and medicine in the United States, says Dr. Robert Steinbrook, the health research director at watchdog organization Public Citizen. We need a strong public health agency," he explains. [But] when you pick them apart for particular theories and the idiosyncrasies of the Health and Human Services secretary, you destroy things which take years, if not decades, to rebuild."

Pentagon Comptroller Says Cost of Iran War Has Risen to $29 Billion, U.S. Inflation Rate Rose to 3.8% in April, WSJ Receives Subpoenas for Records of Journalists Reporting on Internal Discussions of Iran War, Peace Activists Disrupt Politico Defense Summit, Confronting Iranian Opposition Leader Reza Pahlavi, Israeli Attacks Kill 8 in Lebanon in Latest Breaches of U.S.-Brokered Ceasefire, Senators Grill FBI Director Kash Patel over Reports of Excessive Drinking, U.S. Negotiates with Denmark to Open New Military Bases in Greenland, CNN: CIA Officers in Mexico Are Directly Involved in Targeted Assassinations" of Cartel Members, Immigration Lawsuits Surge Under Trump's Mass Deportation Campaign, House Field Hearing in Palm Beach Brings Epstein Survivors to The Scene of the Crime"

We were hearing, every day, the screams of other Palestinians who were being tortured inside this investigation center."Spanish citizen Saif Abukeshek, an activist of Palestinian origin, speaks with Democracy Now! about spending 10 days in Israeli detention after he was abducted in international waters. He was among 175 international activists sailing to Gaza as part of the Global Sumud Flotilla, which has for years tried to breach Israel's maritime blockade of Gaza and deliver humanitarian aid to Palestinians.Abukeshek and Brazilian activist Thiago Avila were the only flotilla members detained for questioning" inside Israel, where they say they faced severe physical abuse in detention. Abukeshek, speaking from Turkey, says being dual nationals provided them some protection because of international attention. Imagine how Palestinians are being treated. Imagine the violations that people from Palestine are receiving," he says.

We speak with Kristen Clarke, general counsel of the NAACP, about growing threats to democracy in the United States following the Supreme Court's gutting of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965. Republican lawmakers across the South are responding to the ruling by racing to redraw their congressional maps, which is expected to lead to a historic drop in the number of Black representatives in Congress.The Supreme Court's devastating decision in the Louisiana v. Callais case has really turned our country upside down," says Clarke, who previously served as assistant attorney general for civil rights at the Justice Department in the Biden administration. She says that given the history of racial discrimination in the United States, particularly in the Deep South, it is unsurprising" to see lawmakers race at lightning speed to eradicate the gains that have been made over the decades."Clarke also discusses President Trump's efforts to take federal control of elections in at least eight states, which Clarke says is part of his administration's goal to lock out certain voters" and commit mass disenfranchisement."

Trump Warns Iran Ceasefire Is On Life Support", Saudi Aramco Warns Of Catastrophic Consequences" Unless Strait of Hormuz Reopens, Israeli Military Issues New Evacuation Orders for Residents of Southern Lebanon, Israeli Forces Continue Deadly Violations of U.S.-Brokered Ceasefire, Palestinian Family Says Israeli Settlers Forced Them to Exhume West Bank Gravesite, EU to Impose Sanctions on Israeli Settlers in the Occupied West Bank, Protests Erupt at Real Estate Expo Advertising Properties for Sale in the Occupied West Bank, SCOTUS Allows Alabama to Adopt Congressional Map Eliminating a Black-Majority District, Trump Set to Arrive in China with Entourage of Billionaires, Senate Democrats Blast GOP Plan to Spend $1 Billion in Taxpayer Funds on Trump's Ballroom, Haiti's Prime Minister Says Country Is Too Unstable to Hold Presidential Elections, Philippines Senator Flees Federal Agents Serving ICC Arrest Warrant

Two weeks before Rami Elghandour was expected to address newly minted engineering graduates at his alma mater Rutgers University, the CEO of biotech firm Arcellx received a shocking call from school administrators. Citing vague" complaints about his social media posts on Israel and Palestine, the school abruptly withdrew its convocation invitation. We speak to Rami Elghandour about the decision, which he tells Democracy Now! he finds not only heartbreaking," but also illogical. Having a different point of view is not harming these students in any way to lead to this sort of outcome," he says. Elghandour, an executive producer of the Oscar-nominated film The Voice of Hind Rajab, adds that the silencing of pro-Palestine speech stems from a false equivalency" between pro-Israel and pro-Palestine voices. There are two sides, but they couldn't be more historically different."

Outraged by the civilian casualties from the war on Iran, protester Guido Reichstadter scaled the 168-foot Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge in Washington, D.C., earlier this month. He remained on the bridge for over five days. Upon descending, he was arrested and charged by law enforcement for trespassing. Reichstadter says he undertook his protest as a form of nonviolent opposition against both the Trump administration's war on Iran and the unchecked acceleration of artificial intelligence systems - some of which have been used by the United States military to select targets for deadly missile strikes. We the people, in whose name these murders are being committed, we've got the power and the responsibility to nonviolently withdraw our support, our cooperation, from the system, from the regime," he explains. Reichstadter is a former U.S. Marine who left the service after refusing to deploy to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. He is now an outspoken social justice activist and the founder of the grassroots coalition Stop AI.

This year's local election results from the United Kingdom are in. The far-right, anti-immigrant Reform UK party made substantial gains, while the ruling Labour Party suffered heavy losses, signaling what London-based journalist Daniel Trilling calls a wider fragmenting of politics" and a generational shift away from the two-party political system. We get an overview of major developments to the U.K. political scene from Trilling, including how Donald Trump's transformation of the U.S. right-wing movement has inspired Nigel Farage's Reform UK party, and how the Labour Party's crackdown on pro-Palestine activism led to rising support for the left-wing Green Party. Trilling also discusses how populist sentiment continues to influence other countries in Europe after Hungary's extremist leader Viktor Orban suffered a major election defeat last month.

Trump Blasts Iran's Response to U.S. Ceasefire Proposal as Totally Unacceptable", Iranian Political Prisoner Narges Mohammadi Hospitalized After Collapsing in Prison, Israeli Strikes on Lebanon Kill Dozens, Including Infant and Medics, Despite Ceasefire Deal, Israeli Forces Kill Three Palestinians in Latest Violations of Gaza Ceasefire, Israel Deports Two Activists It Abducted from Gaza-Bound Humanitarian Aid Flotilla, Palestine International Marathon Includes Amputees Who Lost Limbs to Israeli Attacks, Gaza Documentary Censored by BBC Wins BAFTA Award, Party of Far-Right U.K. Populist Nigel Farage Makes Historic Gains in Local Elections, Virginia High Court Strikes Down Voter-Approved Congressional Map in Major Win for GOP, Justice Department Rushes to Deport Palestinian Activist Mahmoud Khalil, Couple Jailed by ICE Reunites with Terminally Ill Son One Day Before He Dies of Cancer, Pentagon Says Latest Boat Strike Killed Two, Leaving One Survivor, U.S. Military Surges Surveillance Flights Off Cuba's Coast, Ukraine and Russia Exchange Fire as U.S.-Brokered Ceasefire Fails to Hold, Hungary's Peter Magyar Sworn In as Prime Minister, Ending 16 Years of Rule by Viktor Orban

As Iran and the United States maintain rival blockades on the Strait of Hormuz and surrounding waters, we look at the more than 20,000 seafarers stranded on commercial ships since the outbreak of the war and unable to move out of the region. These maritime workers are often working-class men from developing countries across the Global South who form the crews on about 1,500 oil tankers, cargo ships and other vessels currently stuck on the water. Unpaid for several weeks, they lack the visas to disembark in any of the Gulf countries near the ships.There is lack of food, there is lack of provisions, there is lack of water," says Mohamed Arrachedi of the International Transport Workers' Federation, joining us from Bilbao, Spain. The seafarers are just exposed and absolutely vulnerable."We also speak with Manoj Yadav, general secretary of Forward Seamen's Union of India, who says the mental health of the workers is rapidly deteriorating as many have also lost connection to their families.They are trained for serving on board merchant vessels. They are not trained for the war," Yadav says.

Construction crews in Arizona who are building President Trump's expanded border wall have razed a portion of a Native American archeological site in the Sonoran Desert estimated to be at least 1,000 years old. Aerial photos reveal that bulldozers caused extensive damage to a 280-by-50-foot etching in the desert sand known as an intaglio, which holds special significance for the Hia-Ced O'odham people.Lorraine Marquez Eiler, co-founder of the International Sonoran Desert Alliance and an elder of the Hia-Ced O'odham, says locals informed both the work crews and Border Patrol officials about the significance of the intaglio.On Thursday, late afternoon, they were still talking about how to protect the area and went home feeling that they were still working together. On Friday, for whatever reason, the contractors bulldozed the area," says Marquez Eiler.This wall cuts through sovereign ancestral lands that existed long before the U.S.-Mexico border," adds Congressmember Adelita Grijalva, whose district includes the area. The federal government is prioritizing this rapid construction of an unnecessary wall without any meaningful tribal consultation."

As the Trump administration continues to expand the ICE detention system, concerns are growing over abuses inside immigration jails, including use of physical violence, pepper spray and electric shocks against detainees. Earlier this year, more than 70,000 people were being detained by ICE in jails across the country.Congressmember Adelita Grijalva from Arizona, who visited two ICE jails recently, says detainees who spoke to her described dire conditions, medical neglect and more. People are losing weight. Water is undrinkable," she says. There are a lot of really significant abuses happening. There's no rhyme or reason as to what's going on."

A new investigation by Reuters details how the Trump administration is seeking to gain federal control over elections in at least eight states, employing investigations, raids and demands for access to balloting systems and voter ID records for the campaign.What we're seeing is the Trump administration, in some ways, is seeking to relitigate the 2020 election, and they're also seeking to impose federal authority over the administration of elections," says investigative journalist Ned Parker.Parker also discusses the Trump administration's campaign of retribution against the president's perceived enemies, for which he and his colleagues at Reuters just won a Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. What we found in our count of 470 targets was that it really cut across all aspects of American society," he says.

Trump Downplays Renewed U.S. Strikes on Iran as Just a Love Tap" and Claims Ceasefire Is Holding, UAE Expels Pakistani Workers as Strait of Hormuz Crisis Leaves 20,000 Sailors Stranded, Israeli Attacks Kill 12 in Lebanon, Including Paramedic and Two Children, U.S. Imposes More Sanctions on Cuba as Brazil's President Says Trump Ruled Out Military Action, Dozens Killed as al-Qaeda-Linked Insurgents Attack Villages in Mali, Tennessee Republicans Approve New Congressional Map Diluting Power of Black Voters, New York to Ban ICE Agents from Wearing Masks and Raiding Schools, Hospitals or Churches, Chicago Teen with Terminal Cancer Pleads to Reunite with Parents Who Were Jailed by ICE, U.S. and Israel Worked with Disgraced Ex-President of Honduras to Destabilize Leftist Governments, El Salvador's President Freezes Assets of Staffers at Newspaper That Reported on Corruption, U.K. Identifies Another Suspected Case of Hantavirus from Stricken Cruise Ship, Trump Economic Adviser Celebrates Soaring Credit Card Debt as Iran War Drives Rapid Inflation

The country's most important civil rights law no longer effectively exists, and that's going to have ramifications on American democracy for a very long time." Mother Jones correspondent Ari Berman reacts to the Supreme Court's recent 6-3 decision rejecting key principles of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Since the court issued its ruling last week, Republican-controlled states have begun to redraw their voting maps in a gerrymandering arms race" that could lead to the largest drop in Black representation since the Jim Crow era," explains Berman. We're returning to the days of literacy tests and poll taxes - not through those devices, but through specifically trying to eliminate Black office holders. And Southern legislators are very clear they are going to do this. They feel unshackled by the Supreme Court ruling. They are being pressured by President Trump to do it, and they feel like all the guardrails are off right now."

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won big in state-level elections this week, with the Hindu nationalist BJP now controlling over 70% of the country. Leading opposition politician and Chief Minister of West Bengal Mamata Banerjee has refused to recognize the results as legitimate, accusing the Modi government of mass disenfranchisement. Ahead of elections, 9 million names were deleted from the rolls under a process called Special Intensive Revision" (SIR). The process, conducted by India's Election Commission, vitiates and creates an electoral advantage by pitting Hindu voters against Muslim voters," says political scientist Gilles Verniers. Rather than the advertised purge of deceased and duplicate voters, SIR appears to have primarily affected Muslims and other minorities. Nearly 3 million voters in West Bengal, where more than a quarter of the population is Muslim, were unable to cast their vote.From New Delhi, journalist Arfa Khanum Sherwani says blatant election interference has destroyed Indians' faith in democratic elections. The general public does not think the elections are free and fair in India," she explains. So this is a sad day for democracy, for people who believe that not only today, but tomorrow's India should also be democratic."