This 4th of July, let’s extinguish fireworks for good

Traumatic to pets, kids, people with PTSD and survivors, the time for bombs bursting in the air has come and gone

Salon

Undocumented People Seeking an Abortion After Roe Face Double the Legal Risk

In this op-ed, Brenda Rodriguez Lopez explores the double persecution undocumented immigrants face in accessing abortion.

Teen Vogue

U.S. West Coast port labor contract expires, raising stakes for talks

The union and employers negotiating a new labor contract for more than 22,000 U.S. West Coast port workers said high-stakes talks that are being closely watched by industry and the White House would continue after the agreement expired late on Friday.

Reuters

Commentary: As Roe vs. Wade is overturned, a grim 1962 sculpture gains tragic new relevance

In 1962, when Edward Kienholz made “The Illegal Operation,” the sculpture gave intense visual form to an experience many knew, but one that remained submerged deep in the culture’s shadows.

The Los Angeles Times

Biden moves on abortion haven’t quieted progressive anger

“You’d genuinely think this decision hadn’t even leaked because it seems very clear there has been no real planning from the White House,” said Max Burns, a progressive strategist working on down ballot races ahead of the midterms, referring to the leak earlier this summer of a draft of the decision overturning Roe v. Wade. “I don’t know how you get caught by surprise on a pre-announced decision!”

The Hill

A Vasectomy Historian on Why Male Sterilization Won’t Solve the Abortion Problem

In the wake of Roe being overturned, ‘sterilize men’ has become a resounding war-cry. But as Georgia Grainger explains, it‘s just about the furthest thing from a useful solution

Mel Magazine

Judges from Florida to Kentucky find privacy rights to abortion in state constitutions

The decision by a Florida judge to block the state’s ban on abortions after 15 weeks is the latest salvo in a series of legal battles underway across the country over whether states have their own constitutional rights to privacy that protect women’s access to abortion care.

Miami Herald

Trump wanted to “neutralize” presidential chain of succession at the Capitol on January 6: expert

“Violence was part of the plan. It has to be in a coup,” fascism expert Ruth Ben-Ghiat tells CNN

Salon

A Florida county is quarantining after discovery of invasive Giant African land snail

The snails pose a health risk to humans because they carry a parasite called rat lungworm, which can cause meningitis, Christina Chitty, a public information director at FDACS, told CNN.

CNN

The Religious Right: Abortion, Segregation, and the Origins of a Movement

White evangelicals didn’t always see abortion as a “moral issue.”

Teen Vogue

How the Roe reversal could impact domestic violence survivors

The Supreme Court’s reversal on Roe is setting off ripple effects as states implement abortion bans. Among them, rising concern for women abused by those close to them. Natalie Nanasi, a professor at SMU Law School, and Lori Gonzalez from Domestic Violence Intervention Services, a nonprofit in Tulsa, Oklahoma, joins Lisa Desjardins to discuss.

PBS News Hour

Texas Board of Education Strikes Down Call to Rebrand Slavery in Classrooms as ‘Involuntary Relocation’

A proposal to teach slavery to second graders in Texas as ‘involuntary relocation’ has been struck down in a unanimous decision by the State Board of Education.

Complex

The long, ongoing debate over ‘All men are created equal’

“Those words say to me, ‘Do better, America.’ And what I mean by that is we have never been a country where people were truly equal,” Jennings says. “It’s an aspiration to continue to work towards, and we’re not there yet.”

AP News

North Carolina Is a Warning

With its even partisan split, its history of racist policies, and its stark urban-rural divide, the state has proved to be a microcosm of national conflicts before.

The Atlantic

Pete Arredondo resigns from Uvalde city council after botched response to school shooting

Uvalde school district police chief Pedro “Pete” Arredondo has resigned his separate position on the Uvalde city council in the wake of the massacre at Robb Elementary School in May, according to a resignation letter he sent to the city.

CNN

School’s out forever: Arizona moves “to kill public education” with new universal voucher law

In his January State of the State address, Ducey called on Arizona lawmakers to send him bills that would “expand school choice any way we can,” and the Republican-dominated legislature obliged, delivering last Friday’s bill, which will open a preexisting program for Empowerment Scholarship Accounts (ESAs) up to the entire state. In practice, the law will now give parents who opt out of public schools a debit card for roughly $7,000 per child that can be used to pay for private school tuition, but also for much more: for religious schools, homeschool expenses, tutoring, online classes, education supplies and fees associated with “microschools,” in which small groups of parents pool resources to hire teachers. 

Salon

Wisconsin School Board Excludes Book About Japanese-American Internment For Being ‘Unbalanced’

The Muskego-Norway School Board, which serves the Waukesha County district in Wisconsin, has generated controversy after its educational services committee declined to approve a book about Japanese-American incarceration during World War II for a sophomore English literature class.

Comic Sands

New York governor signs bill to ban guns from Times Square, mass transit

The legislation includes making concealed carry in “sensitive locations” illegal. Sensitive locations include airports and public transportation, entertainment venues, bars and restaurants, houses of worship and Times Square, among others.

ABC News

The Star Garden Strip Club Strike Is Part of the History of Sex Worker Organizing

No Classis an op-ed column by writer and radical organizer Kim Kelly that connects worker struggles and the current state of the American labor movement with its storied — and sometimes bloodied — past.

Teen Vogue

Prominent trans celebrities you need to follow ASAP

If you’re curious to learn more, keep reading Queerty’s list of notable trans luminaries who have made their mark on history.

Queerty

‘We’re fools for not doing it’: Why some LGBT+ Americans are turning to guns amid a rising wave of hate

As threats and violence increase to a fever pitch, some LGBT+ people believe it’s time for their community to embrace the Second Amendment, writes Io Dodds

Independent

Onondaga Nation will regain 1,000 acres of New York forest in historic agreement

The Onondaga Nation is set to regain over 1,000 acres of ancestral land in central New York in what the Department of Interior calls “one of the largest returns of land to an Indigenous nation by a state.”

CNN

California passes first sweeping US law to reduce single-use plastic

Under the new law, which California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, signed on Thursday afternoon, the state will have to ensure a 25% drop in single-use plastic by 2032. It also requires that at least 30% of plastic items sold or bought in California are recyclable by 2028, and establishes a plastic pollution mitigation fund.

The Guardian

Thirty Years of Community — Without Cops and Corporations — at the Dyke March

Scenes from this weekend’s anniversary march in New York City.

The Cut

On Queer Fandom and the Radicalization of the Underdog

Fan Serviceis a column by pop culture and fandom writerStitchthat looks at the highs and lows of fandom, and unpacks how what we do online, and for fun, connects back to the way we think about the offline world.

Teen Vogue

Anti-LGBTQ+ Laws Take Effect in Five More States

Florida is getting all the attention with its heinous “don’t say gay” law taking effect, but several other states have major anti-LGBTQ+ laws that came into force Friday.

Advocate

Alabama cites Supreme Court abortion decision in transgender youth case

Echoing the high court’s language in striking down Roe, the Alabama appeal filed on Monday argued that the state has the authority to outlaw puberty-blocking hormones and other therapies for transgender minors in part because they are not “deeply rooted in our history or traditions.”

Reuters

Everything to Know About the WNBA Star in Russian Custody

As tensions between the U.S. and Russia continue to rise amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, an AmericanWNBA star has been detained in Russia formonths. Brittney Griner, the two-time Olympic gold medalist who plays for the Phoenix Mercury in the WNBA and for Russia’s UMMC Ekaterinburg during the off-season, was arrested on drug charges in February after Customs found vape cartridges in her luggage at the airport. U.S. officials met with Griner last month, and while a spokesperson from the U.S. Embassy in Moscow said she was in “good condition,” it remains unclear when she will be released.Her trial, which legal experts believe will end in conviction, began on July 1.

The Cut

The most moving images from the history of Pride marches around the world

Around the world, there will be multiple other Parades and celebrations; including London, which celebrates its first Pride parade since 2019 as more than one million people are expected to gather in the UK capital.

Indy 100

3 dead, 3 critically wounded in shooting at Denmark mall

A gunman opened fire inside a busy shopping mall in the Danish capital Sunday, killing three people and critically wounding three others, police said.

AP News

Single-sex toilets to be compulsory in new public buildings

Ministers will formally announce this week that it is acting to prevent non-residential buildings from being built solely with “universal” lavatories. The move will involve changes to building regulations and planning guidance.

The Guardian

West African leaders lift economic and financial sanctions on Mali

Leaders of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) on Sunday lifted economic and financial sanctions imposed on Mali, after its military rulers proposed a 24-month transition to democracy and published a new electoral law.

Reuters

Putin’s invasion has shattered dreams of progress, German chancellor says

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Sunday that the Russian invasion of Ukraine ruptured illusions that had been in place since the end of the Cold War, creating a different dynamic in Europe than existed a few months ago.

Politico

What Turkey got for letting Sweden, Finland join NATO

It was a nailbiter, NATO’s welcome of Sweden and Finland into the alliance with just a few hours to spare before the opening of the alliance’s Madrid summit.

American Military News

Inside Russia’s war camps: Ukrainian POWs detail torture, abuse

The Hill spoke to a half dozen former prisoners of war and their families this month about what life was like for those captured by Russian forces since Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine more than four months ago.

The Hill

Cuban general Lopez-Calleja dead of heart attack, state media says

General Luis Alberto Rodriguez Lopez-Calleja, one of Cuba’s most powerful men, died on Friday of a heart attack, state media reported, leaving a critical hole in the political and economic leadership of the communist-run island.

Reuters

Labour to aim to launch national care service inspired by creation of NHS

Labour will aim to bring in a national care service in England with just as much ambition as the 1945 government that brought in the NHS, the shadow health secretary has said, launching a review of how it would work.

The Guardian

Germany slams UK’s plan to dismantle post-Brexit agreement

Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock has written an opinion piece with her Irish counterpart in a British paper, saying the UK was “not engaging in good faith” with its plans to change the Northern Ireland protocol.

Deutsche Welle

Tunisian constitution panel head blasts president’s draft

The head of Tunisia’s constitution committee blasted a proposed constitution published by President Kais Saied, local media reported on Sunday, reinforcing opposition fears that Saied was seeking to impose a unilateral charter.

Reuters

Former Japanese prime minister urges Tokyo to talk more to China and stop trying to ‘encircle’ it alongside the US

Former Japanese prime minister Yukio Hatoyama has called for more political dialogue between China and Japan and accused the current Japanese government of playing up ideological differences to “encircle” Beijing together with the US.

South China Morning Post