For more than two decades, I researched the life of Inez Burns, one of America’s most successful abortion providers. Burns lived in California and terminated more than 50,000 pregnancies when abortion was illegal across the U.S. While the Supreme Court weighs whether to overturn Roe v. Wade, Burns’ cautionary story underscores a basic, ...Read more

The Supreme Court’s recent decision to block the Biden administration’s vaccination-or-test requirement for large private businesses will threaten the safety of hundreds of thousands of workers. But the damage it could do goes well beyond the pandemic.

The court’s 6-3 majority acknowledged that the order would save more than 6,500 lives ...Read more

WASHINGTON — A year into his presidency and with his central greenhouse gas-cutting legislation stalled in Congress, President Joe Biden finds his climate agenda moving in fits and starts as the U.S. is on track to miss the carbon reduction goals his administration set.

Biden said last week he may have to break off pieces of that bill, a ...Read more

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced Tuesday she will run for another term, ending months of speculation about whether the 81-year-old would retire.

“Our democracy is at risk,” the California Democrat said in a video message, citing last January’s Capitol insurrection and Republican attempts to limit access to voting. “We don’t...Read more

ATLANTA — A Republican state senator has filed legislation to fight a decision by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration allowing those with a prescription to obtain the abortion pill through the mail.

Senate Bill 351, filed Monday by state Sen. Bruce Thompson, R-White, would require pregnant women to see a doctor in person before being able ...Read more

WASHINGTON — About one in eight congressional staffers are not making a living wage, according to a new analysis of payroll data.

The problem is particularly acute for staff assistants, who are often the most junior staffers in congressional offices. According to Issue One, a “crosspartisan” group that advocates for transparency in ...Read more

CHICAGO — Nearly 10,000 women traveled from out of state to have an abortion in Illinois in 2020, a roughly 29% increase compared with the previous year, according to the most recent Illinois Department of Public Health data available.

State health statistics show 9,686 out-of-state women terminated a pregnancy in Illinois in 2020, comprising...Read more

When he was running for president in 1999, George W. Bush, then governor of Texas, famously fended off the strong anti-abortion wing of his party by suggesting the country ought not consider banning abortion until public opinion shifted further in that direction. “Laws are changed as minds are persuaded,” he said.

Bush was no moderate on ...Read more

CHICAGO — Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has been spending campaign money faster than she has been raising it, leaving her with less political cash than she had shortly after winning office 2 1/2 years ago.

The mayor’s two campaign funds have bled $213,000 during that time, as Lightfoot raised $2.67 million but spent $2.88 million, a Chicago ...Read more

In an era in which everyone’s a media critic, Nina Totenberg has been getting some exceptionally rough reviews lately. NPR’s veteran Supreme Court watcher last week reported that conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch refuses to wear a mask while sitting next to liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who is diabetic, thus causing Sotomayor to ...Read more

At a time when Republican leadership has come to tolerate, or even embrace, Donald Trump’s “big lie,” 19 states have acted to subvert previously established voting rights by passing 34 new laws that restrict voting access.

In response to these machinations and to several egregious Supreme Court decisions, Senate Democrats opened debate on...Read more

Ballotpedia tracks what it calls a “personal gain index” showing how much each member of Congress’ personal wealth has changed while in office. For the top 20, the average increase in net worth has been 422% per year. Data like that helps explain why regular Americans hold Congress in such low esteem, as they watch their supposed public ...Read more

As 9/11 was unfolding, a relatively new president, down in the polls shortly after getting into office, George W. Bush, skyrocketed in the polls because of his clever use of branding and marketing. He became the icon for confronting the “all evil” that was behind the first attack on U.S. soil since the attack at Pearl Harbor.

What makes a ...Read more

MIAMI — The new Doral real estate venture launched by former president Donald Trump includes the traditional trappings of his promotional playbook: luxury amenities, access to high-end golf and a swaggering statement from Trump himself touting it as “perhaps the most exciting development in the Country.”

But as described in an application...Read more

WASHINGTON — The House Ethics Committee on Monday released details of Office of Congressional Ethics reports on two members, Reps. Marie Newman, D-Ill., and Doug Lamborn, R-Colo., and said that the committee would continue to review the referrals.

Newman’s situation concerns whether she offered a job to someone in exchange for that person ...Read more

President Joe Biden called Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy a “stupid son of a bitch” after Doocy shouted a question the president found ridiculous.

“Do you think inflation is a political liability ahead of the midterms?” Doocey asked Monday at the end of a news conference.

The president, seemingly not noticing he was ...Read more

ATLANTA — The judges on Fulton County’s Superior Court bench on Monday cleared the way for a special grand jury to be used for District Attorney Fani Willis’ investigation of former President Donald Trump and his efforts to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results.

Chief Judge Christopher S. Brasher wrote that a majority of the judges ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court agreed Monday to hear a major challenge to race-based affirmative action in the nation’s colleges and universities, setting the stage for another long-sought win for conservatives.

The justices voted to hear a pair of appeals contending that Harvard University, the nation’s oldest private university, and the...Read more