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Drivers are cast as anti-woke and cyclists as the opposite, when the reality is often quite different. But I would have enjoyed an apology from the driver who turned suddenly into my cycle path

Cryptocurrency exchange and its debtors seek refund of money donated by company’s founder Sam Bankman-FriedThe bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange firm founded by disgraced entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried is demanding refunds of donations made to politicians before its spectacular collapse last year.In “confidential messages” sent to numerous political figures and action groups, FTX and its debtors are backing up their demand for the return of money donated by Bankman-Fried prior to the company’s bankruptcy in November with the threat of legal action. Continue reading...

Quake hit early on Monday, leveling buildings while many slept and trapping people under rubble. Plus, the Chinese ‘spy balloon’ rowGood morning.At least 1,500 people have been killed as they slept in Turkey and Syria after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake hit in the early hours of Monday – one of the most powerful quakes in the region for at least a century.Turkey is one of the world’s most active earthquake zones. It stretches over the Anatolian fault line in the north of the country that has caused large and destructive events. An area close to Istanbul was rocked by a 7.4-magnitude earthquake in 1999, the worst to hit Turkey in decades. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Peltier, 78, convicted of murdering two FBI agents in 1975, tells Guardian of desire to return home to tribal landLeonard Peltier, the Indigenous rights activist held for almost five decades in maximum security for crimes he has always denied, has made a plea for clemency so that he can wander freely and hug his grandchildren for the first time.In an exclusive interview with the Guardian to mark the start of his 48th year in prison, Peltier spoke about the pain of being deprived of his liberty, and his yearning to be reunited with his homeland and community after so many years. Continue reading...

The former PM’s confidence in her ‘small state’ formula remains undented. And her flailing party is all-too ready to share in the delusion“This soul-searching has not been easy,” she writes. But though she looked everywhere, Liz Truss never found it. Instead, she found blame to scatter on everyone but herself for the havoc left by her 49 days: even ChatGPT would have written her 4,000-word non-apologia with more humanity and humility. Truss’s attempt at resurrection would be easily dismissed, except that her hallucinations are rampant across her party: ideas not cauterised by searing confrontation with reality.Though Truss was outlasted by a lettuce, let’s reprise how she did such damage in so short a time: her mini-budget was more of a mini H-bomb. Within hours the pound plummeted and borrowing costs soared. When her chancellor proclaimed more was to come, gilt markets plunged and the Bank of England rushed in with a monster £65bn bailout. That has left some highly exposed defined benefit pensions missing billions and people with mortgages paying the price. Continue reading...

‘We need to get that bill passed,’ Tyre Nichols’s mother said at his funeral – but what is it, and will Congress ever act?As RowVaughn Wells addressed the hundreds of mourners gathered to grieve the loss of her son, Tyre Nichols, she delivered an impassioned plea to Congress: pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act.“We need to get that bill passed,” Wells said at Nichols’s funeral on Wednesday. “Because if we don’t, the next child that dies – that blood is going to be on their hands.” Continue reading...

Nick Sirianni has an awesome array of defensive and offensive talent at his disposal. But his players say his critics have sold him shortA cheeky 24-year-old New York Giants safety named Julian Love stirred things up last week by saying pretty much anyone could coach the Philadelphia Eagles. The Eagles have amassed so much talent, Love said, that Nick Sirianni, Philadelphia’s actual head coach, had “a free ride” all the way to the Super Bowl.“You know what, man? People always got something to say when they’re at home,” Brandon Graham, the Eagles’ veteran linebacker, would respond just hours later. “They got time to think about it. So I ain’t going to touch too much on it.” Continue reading...

Experts remain concerned about virus as Biden administration says it will let the public health emergency expire in MayDavid Rosner, who studies public health and social history at Columbia University, spent 10 days in a hospital in November because he contracted respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), which worsened due to his asthma, and he developed pneumonia.“It’s all over now, but there were a few moments where it was kind of touchy, and I wish people were more aware generally that this can happen,” said Rosner, 76, who has not had Covid-19. Continue reading...

I want the language I use to describe myself to celebrate all the things my neurological difference has given me• Nick Ransom is a journalist and founder of the Neurodiverse Media CommunityI don’t see being autistic as “having” a disorder. Instead, I look at it as a very positive thing. From a young age, it has helped me direct a laser-like focus on achieving my goals. My obsessive mindset and lack of real motivation to socialise accelerated my career in a way that would not have been possible if I had other interests. Achieving my ambitions would have been so much harder if I had not been autistic.But there is an increasing tendency to use language that demonises this neurological difference. Phrases such as “Nick has autism” or “Nick’s autism” make me cringe as they suggest an ailment that controls and burdens, which feeds into a narrative of struggle, disability and a lack of agency.Nick Ransom is a journalist and founder of the Neurodiverse Media CommunityDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

A recent book about the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic details a ‘collective forgetting’ of the period. Our lack of Covid reckoning suggests history is repeating itselfMy best friend has been ill and it’s taken both of us back to March 2020. For her, it’s reawakening the real trauma of getting very poorly and waiting, struggling to breathe, for an ambulance that never came. I was far luckier, but it’s revived memories of trying to keep in touch with her, waking each morning terrified she wouldn’t answer my messages, as our robustly fit and healthy neighbour died in hospital, his partner unable to visit.Covid was so bad for so many – why aren’t we talking about it more? My friend, who suffers badly from long Covid, struggles to understand the refusal of many people to think or talk about the pandemic; their reluctance to understand what it has taken from her and from so many others. She’s baffled by the apparent desire to pretend it never happened, or that it wasn’t a big deal. Continue reading...

Despite the history of breast cancer in my family, I chose to be blithely ignorant. Now I have the disease, I realise that knowledge is powerThe results of the genetic test didn’t really come as a surprise. My mum died of breast cancer in her mid-30s, and I’d recently had it confirmed that my great-grandma on her side had it on her death certificate too.Yet when I was diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer last year – the most likely to be linked to a gene mutation – I hoped against hope that it wasn’t inherited. In part because of what it means for my relatives, in part because of what it means for my children and their children, and in part because I didn’t like to think that what I was going through now had been pretty much inevitable from the minute I’d been conceived, and I’d made no effort to find out about it. Continue reading...

The president’s domestic successes offer a rebuke to disciples of Reagan: the ‘free market’ has never existedHow can inflation be dropping at the same time job creation is soaring?It has taken one of the oldest presidents in American history, who has been in politics for over half a century, to return the nation to an economic paradigm that dominated public life between 1933 and 1980, and is far superior to the one that has dominated it since.Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His new book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com Continue reading...

In an unusual moment for the US economy, analysts look for hidden signals of consumers’ worriesReversecowgirl69 has been dancing for six years in clubs from Texas to New York. The graduate student and stripper tracks her income carefully, and in May 2022 she noticed it dropping: “I was noticing that there were just fewer higher-earning people coming into the club, and when that happens, you know something bad is going to happen.” She tweeted a warning: “The strip club is sadly a leading indicator and i can promise y’all we r in a recession lmao.”The tweet went viral, and at least within her club, it seemed to be correct. Over the next few months, her earnings continued to plunge, and the other workers at the club said the same. By December – usually an excellent month for strip clubs – business “was abysmal”, and, she says, her income that month was down by half compared with the same time last year. “It was bad for everybody. I know girls who dance in Vegas and even they weren’t making money. They’re like the oracles we consult, and if Vegas girls aren’t making money, no one’s making money.” Continue reading...

Follow along as we update our collection of the best looks at this year’s Grammy awards, both on the red carpet and on stage

Pete Buttigieg says president ‘considered safety of American people’ but Marco Rubio criticizes eight-day waitThe US transportation secretary, Pete Buttigieg, rejected Republican criticism of Joe Biden over the eight-day wait to shoot down a suspected Chinese spy balloon which flew over military sites.“The president gave instructions to have it shot down in a way that was safe,” Buttigieg told CNN’s State of the Union, of the operation off the Carolina coast on Saturday.Associated Press contributed to this report Continue reading...

Closed-door session could provide insight into the sensitivity of the documents Trump retained and possibility of indictmentsUS officials have offered to provide a closed-door briefing to congressional leaders about their review of about 300 classified-marked documents retrieved from Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort last year, sources familiar with the matter said.The precise nature of the briefing remains unclear. The offer from the justice department and the Office of the Director for National Intelligence (ODNI) was described as unofficial on Sunday and no date had yet been set, though the briefing could come as soon as this week. Continue reading...

Dangerously cold temperatures and wind chills dropped as low as -45 to -50F across the rest of the regionArctic air in the US north-east on Saturday brought dangerously cold temperatures and wind chills including a record-setting -108F (-78C) on the summit of Mount Washington in New Hampshire.Authorities in Massachusetts took the unusual step of keeping the South Station transit hub open so homeless people had a place to sleep. High winds brought down a tree branch on a car in western Massachusetts, killing an infant. Continue reading...

Texas senator says he ‘never said I’m going to unilaterally comply’ with his own proposed restrictionTed Cruz has introduced a bill to limit US senators to two terms in office, thereby removing from Washington what he calls “permanently entrenched politicians … totally unaccountable to the American people”.On Sunday, however, he said he saw no problem with running for a third term himself. Continue reading...

Death collection | State school success | Ballooning problem | Rose-tinted Brexit | Passport to the polls“It’s not who we are,” says British Gas in response to criticism of its bullying tactics (‘It’s not who we are,’ wails British Gas. Sorry but when you’re using bailiffs to install meters, that’s exactly who you are, 3 February). Oh, yes it is. This is a company with a “bereavement team” that is, in fact, a debt collection agency. Nothing could surprise me now about British Gas.

Poll shows 60% of Democrats want someone else as 2024 nominee and nearly 50% of Republicans want someone other than TrumpNearly 60% of Democrats and nearly 50% of Republicans want someone other than Joe Biden or Donald Trump to be their party’s nominee for president in 2024, a new poll showed on Sunday.A key member of Biden’s cabinet, however, insisted Biden’s record in office was more important than any “generational argument” for change. Continue reading...

It’s easy to get people riled up and panicked about kids, about a changing culture and about lost innocence. That’s exactly what the right is doingYou could be forgiven for losing track of all the lurid and inventive ways that Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor with presidential ambitions, has attacked education in his state. Last year he signed the Don’t Say Gay bill, a nasty little law that bans classroom discussion of sexuality or gender identity issues – effectively forcing children and teachers alike to stay silent about their families and lives, under the threat of lawsuits. The bill caused confusion and controversy, frightening gay students and teachers, leading to preemptive compliance in some sectors and defiant disobedience in others – and, not coincidentally, drawing quite a bit of culture-war attention to DeSantis himself.Since then, the Florida governor has repeated the playbook in increasingly ambitious fashion. Last April, DeSantis signed the exhaustingly titled “Stop Woke Act,” which restricts lessons on racial inequality in public schools. The bill prohibits the teaching of material that could cause a student to “feel guilt, anguish, or other forms of psychological distress,” due to US racial history – the implication being that these are not appropriate responses to an encounter with this history, or that protection from such emotions is more important than a confrontation with the facts.Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist Continue reading...

The US Coast Guard shared footage of a rescue involving a rescue swimmer saving a man from a 35ft yacht that was rolled over by a huge wave. The rescue swimmer was lowered into the water from a helicopter and swam towards the vessel, before the man was thrown into the water in the mouth of the Columbia River. Officers identified the man as Jericho Labonte, who authorities had been looking for after video had revealed Labonte involved in a bizzare incident where he left dead fish at a home featured in 1985 film, The Goonies. Labonte is also wanted in the British Columbia on criminal harassment, mischief and failure to comply cases

It is 126 years since the magnificent bronzes were stolen. When will they finally be returned to where they belong?This month marks 126 years since the British punitive expedition resulted in the theft of more than 10,000 objects from the Benin kingdom. They came to be known as the Benin bronzes, and have been at the centre of repatriation debates ever since.Though the original victims are long gone, their descendants have eagerly awaited the return of the bronzes, and still do. As one such descendant, the issue of repatriation isn’t just diplomatic, it’s personal. My great-great-grandfather, HRH Ogbidi Okojie King of Uromi, fought alongside his relative Oba Ovonramwen Nogbaisi, the ruler of the Benin kingdom. What began as a family matter more than a century ago is now an international diplomatic issue.Noah Anthony Enahoro is a freelance journalist and writer based in London Continue reading...

Derek Myers alleges he was put to work as a volunteer before controversial Republican touched him and asked him overThe embattled New York Republican congressman George Santos has been accused of sexual harassment by a former aide.Santos already faces local, state, federal and international investigations over professional and personal behaviour, campaign finance filings and a campaign résumé shown to be largely made-up. Continue reading...

President’s second address on Tuesday comes at a critical moment, as House Republicans are eager to damage his 2024 election prospectsJoe Biden’s second annual State of the Union address on Tuesday comes at a critical juncture for the president, as he contemplates a second term. ​He faces a newly empowered House Republican majority eager to damage ​his political prospects with investigations into him, his administration and his family while a special counsel investigation into his handling of classified documents brings a degree of legal uncertainty.​ Continue reading...

Footage shows a suspected Chinese spy balloon being shot down over the Carolina coast. Two US fighter jets circled the balloon before launching an air missile to destroy it. Beijing claimed it was a weather observation airship that had been blown off course, but the Pentagon claimed it had been able to manoeuvre and make deliberate turns. The US said it reached Montana, home to some of the US arsenal of nuclear ballistic missiles. Some Republicans called for the balloon to be shot down over land, despite the risk of deaths and property damage below. The Biden administration took the decision to disable it once it reached Carolina's coastline

From self-help books to Oscar campaigns, lots of people are telling us that self-promotion is good. Resist the boasters!By nature, I am not a modest man. Maybe you find that easy to believe. If so, I apologise. If not, I’m ashamed to say I think that’s good. And I’m rightly ashamed to say it because saying things that are good about yourself, I was brought up to believe, is a shameful thing to do. Not very shameful, but slightly shameful. Like a crafty piss behind a wheelie bin. Rude.I may be outwardly shy and non-confrontational but sometimes, inside, I well up with a megalomaniacal self-belief that I want to scream from the rooftops. Sometimes, as is characteristic of many professional performers, my confidence collapses and I’m inclined to tedious, consolation-seeking self-pity. But then I think up some adequate joke and my brain is immediately telling me: “There you go, Mr Amazing, you did it again!” When something I’ve done has gone well, I want everyone to know. I itch to get the knowledge of it into all of their heads. Fortunately for anyone who meets me, I understand that it is not permitted for me simply to tell them. Continue reading...

Republican Florida governor unveils plans for overhaul of state university system as he prepares for expected presidential bidAlex Obraud, a 21-year-old anthropology student in his third year at New College in Florida, did not expect to be on the frontlines of America’s culture wars simply by attending university in the state.But Florida’s rightwing Republican governor, Ron DeSantis – and likely would-be presidential candidate for 2024 – has launched a relentless campaign of attack on higher education in the state, seeking to appeal to his party’s Trumpist base by positing that the state’s colleges and universities are a bastion of liberal extremism that needs to be reformed. Continue reading...

Party’s criticism of Omar’s Israel position has greased the path for Republicans to oust her from the foreign affairs committeeThe resolution that set in motion the removal of the only African immigrant, Muslim and former resident of a refugee camp on the congressional committee overseeing US foreign policy paid scant attention to Ilhan Omar’s views on anything but a single issue: Israel.“Omar has attempted to undermine the relationship between the United States and Israel,” said the author of the resolution, Republican congressman Max Miller. “She has disqualified herself from serving on the foreign affairs committee.” Continue reading...

The director of disturbing documentary Leaving Neverland, which featured two of the singer’s young victims, says the forthcoming film about the star sends out an unacceptable messageIt has been four years since the first public screening of Leaving Neverland to a shocked, tearful American audience in a packed 266-seat venue at the 2019 Sundance film festival. The four-hour documentary, co-produced by Channel 4 and HBO, is a brutally frank and explicit account of two abusive relationships that the King of Pop, Michael Jackson, had with children: one with Wade Robson describes how the boy was just seven when the entertainer first raped him, and an earlier one with James Safechuck, who was all of 10 years old when it began. The film’s spine consists of searingly candid interviews with Robson and Safechuck and their mothers. The Guardian reported: “After the film ended, an ashen-faced crowd rose to their feet to applaud Wade and James, who arrived on stage, both visibly moved by the response.”What had motivated me – and Robson and Safechuck even more so – to embark on making Leaving Neverland was not just the opportunity to expose Jackson by having his victims speak on camera for the first time. Here was an opportunity to bring to the widest possible audience an insight into how children fall victim to any sexual abuser, the psychology of the predator and, above all, the grooming process. Maybe we could help prevent young children from falling prey to this most scarring, crippling of crimes. Of course the fact that the child molester in this case was one of the world’s most famous men meant that a lot of people would watch. Setting fire to Jackson’s reputation, already charred around the edges by multiple allegations and payments of hush money, was not the primary goal of the documentary. But it seemed like a necessary collateral impact: if you know that your idol has abused children, should that not make celebrating his personality a little more problematic, to say the least? Continue reading...

President Erdoğan’s increasingly hostile stance towards Nato and democratic principles can no longer go unpunishedThat Turkey is a “vital strategic ally” of the west is the sort of truism on which people such as Joe Biden and Jens Stoltenberg, Nato’s secretary general, are raised. Yet what if the old saw no longer holds true? What if Turkey’s leader, exploiting this notion, betrays western interests in a pretence of partnership? Should not that leader be treated as a liability, a threat – even ostracised as an enemy?Geography doesn’t change. Turkey wields significant influence at the crossroads of Europe, Asia and the Middle East. Yet the increasingly aggressive, authoritarian and schismatic policies pursued at home and abroad over two decades by its choleric sultan-president have upended long-cherished assumptions. Turkey’s reliability and usefulness as a trusted western ally is almost at an end.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 250 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at observer.letters@observer.co.uk Continue reading...

Appeals court submission exposes racial toxicity in case of Black man John Balentine, sentenced to death for 1999 triple murderIn April 1999, John Balentine, a Black man on trial for murder in Amarillo, Texas, sat before an all-white jury as they deliberated whether he should live or die.Should he be given a life sentence, in which case he would likely end his days behind prison bars? Or should they send him to death row to await execution? Continue reading...

David Balogun, who loves science and computer programming, receives diploma after taking remote classesA nine-year-old boy from Pennsylvania who loves science and computer programming has become one of the youngest ever high school graduates, and he has already started accumulating some credits toward his college degree.David Balogun recently received a diploma from Reach cyber charter school – based in his state’s capital of Harrisburg – after taking classes remotely from his family home in the Philadelphia suburb of Bensalem, the local television station WGAL reported Saturday. Continue reading...

Chinese foreign ministry accuses US of ‘overreacting’ and ‘violating international practice’ after balloon was downedA US warplane has shot down a Chinese high-altitude balloon over the Atlantic Ocean after it had crossed the entire US and caused a diplomatic rift between the two countries.The balloon, which China said is for meteorological purposes but the US insists has been spying, could be seen on television collapsing and falling from the sky. Continue reading...

Extremist Republican who makes $174,000 annually according to public records says ‘I’ve lost money since I’ve gotten here’The far-right US congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene is facing backlash after complaining that her elected position’s salary is “too low”.Earlier this week, the Republican representative from Georgia appeared on journalist Glenn Greenwald’s podcast and expressed concern about her congressional salary, which according to public records is $174,000 annually. Continue reading...

Huge spree on Fernández, Mudryk, Nkunku and Madueke raises more questions about the coherence of Boehly’s plansAmortisation over a long-term deal. Heavily incentivised contracts. A couple of relatively quiet windows before Roman Abramovich was forced to sell the club. There’s been a lot written over the past few months about how Chelsea can afford a spree that will hit £620m when the Christopher Nkunku deal happens next June. But perhaps the bigger question is why? What on earth are they doing?Structure the deals as cleverly as you like, that money still has to be paid at some point. Chelsea’s spending has been of the sort you would expect from a megalomaniac billionaire taking over a club, when the point is to have fun or make a splash, when long-term planning means less than “Get me Robinho, now!” In that regard, the careful squad-building of the Saudi Public Investment Fund at Newcastle has been a huge disappointment. Continue reading...

Biden administration considers plan to bring balloon down safely over Atlantic where remnants could be recoveredThe Biden administration was on Saturday considering a plan to shoot down a large Chinese balloon suspected of conducting surveillance on the American military, according to four US officials.The aim would be to bring it down once it is above the Atlantic Ocean, where the remnants could be recovered. Continue reading...

Temperatures will be 10 to 30 degrees below average over parts of the north-east as millions under wind chill warningsAn Arctic blast has swept through numerous parts of the north-east, leaving millions of people under wind chill warnings and cities and states issuing emergency warnings.Record-breaking temperatures will be 10 to 30 degrees below average over parts of the north-east and into the coastal mid-Atlantic, the National Weather Service announced on Saturday, with wind gusts potentially reaching up to 40 to 55mph (64 to 88km/h). Continue reading...

Pablo Lyle, a telenovela star, was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in October after 2019 road rage incidentA Mexican telenovela star and Netflix series actor received a five-year prison sentence Friday after punching a man to death during a road rage confrontation in Miami in 2019.Pablo Lyle’s sentence came four years after he was charged with murder in the death of a man he struck during an encounter in traffic. A jury ultimately found Lyle guilty in October of involuntary manslaughter in the killing of 63-year-old Juan Ricardo Hernández. Continue reading...

China has called for calm amid a growing diplomatic row with the US over suspected spy balloons, adding that Beijing was 'verifying' the reports. It comes after the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, indefinitely postponed a planned visit to Beijing after a large balloon was spotted in US airspace. 'China is a responsible country that has always strictly abided by international laws, and it has no intention of violating the territory and airspace of any sovereign country,' the foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said.

Of all the places to find a heartening queer love story: the apocalypse. This TV series is a major cultural milestoneLove finds many expressions, but its sole certainty is that it always ends. This inescapable reality underpins much of human culture: what is most art, music, theatre, cinema and television other than an attempt to grapple with the emotional turmoil that results?A devastating new contribution to this artistic tradition finds an unlikely home in episode three of the new HBO series The Last of Us. Unlikely, because it is based on a popular video game, set in an apocalyptic alternative universe in which most of humanity has been reduced to zombie-like cannibals. What remains of our species is confined to totalitarian quarantine zones and desperate raiding parties. This is not conventionally fertile ground for romance.Owen Jones is a Guardian columnistIn the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

Dogs lead lives of loneliness. Grey parrots die years earlier than their natural lifespans. And it is hard to fathom the boredom of pet fishAt the end of last year, the state of New York banned pet stores from selling cats, dogs, or rabbits. The state wants to encourage pet stores to work with shelters, rather than puppy mills, to get animals adopted. With any luck, other states will follow suit.In her story The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, Ursula Le Guin described a society where the joy of its citizens depended upon the “abominable misery” of a single child immured in a dungeon. Le Guin asked the reader if even great happiness could justify suffering. Humanity’s relationship to animals is predicated on a similar utilitarian calculus. Like the town of Omelas, we have made a silent pact to dominate pets for our benefit, despite the cost to the pets themselves, to wild and farmed animals, and to our own morality.Troy Vettese is an environmental historian at the European University Institute and co-author of Half-Earth Socialism (Verso 2020) Continue reading...

Ideologues like Ron DeSantis aren’t angry at politics in education; they’re angry their politics don’t have a monopolyThe rightwing governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, and his administration recently blocked a proposed black studies course for advanced placement high school students, as well as announced policies that would inhibit state universities from teaching programming about racial diversity, equity and inclusion or so-called “critical race theory”. These moves follow on the heels of Florida’s “don’t say gay” legislation, last year, restricting teachers from discussing sexual orientation.DeSantis and other conservative politicians argue that they are saving America’s young from leftwing indoctrination, and that students should instead be exposed to “civic education” that extolls a patriotic vision of America. When DeSantis and his growing number of acolytes present themselves as champions of civic education, however, they are in fact undermining the whole point of civics: not to make children “patriotic” or just fill brains with facts (how many branches of government are there again?), but to enable individuals to be fearless, critical citizens.Jan-Werner Müller teaches at Princeton and is a Guardian US columnist. His most recent book is Democracy Rules Continue reading...

Immigrants express frustration as nine Republican-led states ask judge to end Obama-era program that gives temporary deportation reliefIt’s been almost 10 years since Areli Hernandez received her first US government work permit in her mailbox. Hernandez remembers staring at her own photograph and touching the scripted name on the card in disbelief, feeling that a long-sought dream had finally materialized.But earlier this week, the program that gives temporary deportation relief to Hernandez and hundreds of thousands of other immigrants known as Dreamers, allowing a chance to live and work legally in the US, came under threat once again in a federal court. Continue reading...