The Trump administration’s commemorations of the 250th anniversary of the country’s founding have drawn criticism for their overt partisanship and conflicts of interest for the Trump family. Surveys show widespread ambivalence and lack of enthusiasm for the semiquincentennial. StoryCorps founder Dave Isay has set out to capture the national mood with Connect250, an oral history project matching strangers across the United States to interview each other about their lives, families and formative experiences. The series is produced in partnership with NPR’s Morning Edition, with the conversations to be preserved in the Library of Congress. “It’s actually a very hopeful project,” says Isay. “We have to hold on to hope.”

“I do not love America, and never have, especially now.” Those are the opening words of America, U.S.A.: How Race Shadows the Nation’s Anniversaries, a new book from Princeton historian Eddie Glaude. Released ahead of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, the book is a critical look back at how the United States has celebrated previous milestone birthdays, including what narratives were left out of the official commemorations. This comes as President Donald Trump has made himself the center of many events and celebrations for the 250th anniversary, while promoting a “storybook version” of U.S. history that elides the injustice that was baked into the very founding of the country, Glaude tells […]

Nearly 50,000 Remain Missing in Venezuela as Earthquake Rescue Efforts Pivot to Recovery, Iran Denies U.S. Claims of Upcoming Talks Following Weekend Clashes, Israel Renews Attacks on Southern Lebanon After Signing U.S.-Brokered Deal, Children Among the Dead as Israel Continues to Bombard Gaza, Despite Ceasefire Deal, Gaza Humanitarian Convoy Activists Released from Libyan Prison, France’s Death Toll Tops 1,000 as Europe Bakes Under Unprecedented Heat Wave, Appeals Court Blocks Trump’s Rollback of Pollution Limits from Coal-Fired Plants, Kenyan Activists Arrested at Anti-Government Protests Say They Were Tortured by Police, Trump Taps Former Oklahoma State Trooper Lance Schroyer as Next ICE Director, Mexican Immigrant Dies at […]

The Supreme Court ruled 7-2 to restrict thousands of lawsuits claiming Bayer, the parent company of Monsanto, had a duty to warn consumers about potential cancer risks from its popular weed killer Roundup. The case before the Supreme Court began in St. Louis, Missouri, where a resident named John Durnell, who had used Roundup for decades and was later diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, sued Monsanto under Missouri state law for not putting a warning label on its product. But because the federal Environmental Protection Agency found no cancer risk in its assessment of Roundup, the court has ruled against Durnell. “The ruling essentially says that only the EPA can make a determination that something is harmful to us and has to carry a […]

Thousands of Haitians and Syrians living in the United States are newly at risk of deportation after the Supreme Court ruled to allow the Trump administration to strip them of “temporary protected status,” or TPS. The program, designed for foreign citizens of countries the U.S. government believes are too unstable or dangerous to be returned to, often due to natural disasters or war, has been a major target of attack by the Trump administration and its anti-immigrant agenda. “We are looking at the catastrophic deficit in the workforce in the United States if we allow this deportation machine and cruelty to take effect,” our guest, Haitian Bridge Alliance’s Guerline Jozef, says. “This is just part of the Trump administration’s […]