George Floyd
The Political Scene Podcast
Everyone Knew Who Shot Ahmaud Arbery. Why Did the Killers Walk Free?
In February, a young Black man was shot by three white men while jogging. His killers were known. But it took seventy-four days for them to be arrested. What were prosecutors thinking?
Our Columnists
We Should Still Defund the Police
Cuts to public services that might mitigate poverty and promote social mobility have become a perpetual excuse for more policing.
Annals of Activism
Can Minneapolis Dismantle Its Police Department?
After George Floyd’s killing, the city council pledged to “end policing as we know it.” Its members were far less certain about how they would do it.
Cultural Comment
The Second Act of Social-Media Activism
Has the Internet become better at mediating change?
News Desk
The Coronavirus Pandemic Has Intensified Systemic Economic Racism Against Black Americans
Without bold government action, many African-Americans will have an especially hard time recovering from the recession.
Annals of Activism
The Perils of “People of Color”
Rejecting the term may be of little consequence, but rejecting the solidarity it implies can result in an inaccurate and unduly limiting world view.
Q. & A.
Trump’s Dangerous Attempt to Create a Federal Police
Carrie Cordero, a specialist in homeland-security law, on the shaky legal basis of the President’s deployment of the Department of Homeland Security against protesters.
The Political Scene Podcast
In Portland, Oregon, Trump Cracks Down on Protests
Why is the President dispatching federal officers to quell largely peaceful demonstrations?
Cultural Comment
The Comorbidities of the National Football League
The league is attempting to survive the protest movements and the coronavirus pandemic in the way it always has: by banking on the devaluation of Black life.
Our Columnists
America Is a Country Besieged by Its Own President
By sending in federal agents to snatch protesters from the streets, Donald Trump is stretching the powers of the Presidency to foment civil strife and distract attention from his pandemic failures.
Dispatch
Trump’s Fake Solution to the Fake Crisis in Portland
Federal agents dressed as soldiers have only energized demonstrations for Black lives.
Personal History
Breonna Taylor Can’t Tell Her Story of Police Abuse, but I’m Here to Tell Mine
I can’t remember exactly how many seconds passed before I saw the other police officer, crouched on the stairway, with an assault rifle pointed directly at my chest.
The New Yorker Interview
Chance the Rapper Is Still Figuring Things Out
The artist on the two-party system, Black liberation theology, and learning from his mistakes.
Daily Comment
The Essential and Enduring Strength of John Lewis
What the late civil-rights leader and congressman taught the nation.
Racial Injustice in America
How a Coalition of New York Activists Revealed Police-Department Secrets
The widespread protests over George Floyd’s death helped prompt legislators to repeal a law known as Section 50-A, which kept police disciplinary records from public view.
Daily Comment
Back to Church, but Not, Let’s Hope, Back to Normal
One way to think about this pause in our lives is as a rare—likely a once-in-a-lifetime—opportunity for a reset.
Double Take
Sunday Reading: The State of American Democracy
From the archive: stories about the U.S. political system and people who have tried to strengthen it.
Daily Comment
The Present Belongs to Crowds
Urgent questions of our public life involve crowds: their power, their perils, their inevitability. So do questions of what forms our society ought to take in the near future.
News Desk
The Confederate Flag Finally Falls in Mississippi
The story of the state flag provides a window into how false narratives about the American South are sustained.
The New Yorker Radio Hour
Hilton Als’s Homecoming and the March for Queer Liberation
The writer recalls two days of unrest in his neighborhood in 1967, and how they relate to today’s protests for racial justice. And, in spite of COVID-19, gay pride goes on in New York.