Sen. Elizabeth Warren set to roll out student debt plan with Rep. James Clyburn

Among the myriad proposals that Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has offered up while on the 2020 campaign trail is a plan to confront the nation’s growing student loan crisis by cancelling a significant amount debt currently held by tens of millions of Americans. Now, with an assist from House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-SC), Warren will move the timetable on this proposal up, with an eye toward introducing legislation in a few weeks’ time.

As Roll Call’s Niels Les...

New York City to become first city ever to directly fund abortion

New York City will become the first city nationwide to directly fund abortion, thanks to a budget deal announced Friday.

Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) and City Council Speaker Corey Johnson (D) included $250,000 for the New York Abortion Access Fund (NYAAF) in a $92.8 billion budget agreement for the 2019-20 fiscal year, which begins July 1.

New York City already funds Planned Parenthood, but the organization’s affiliates don’t just help patients terminate a pregnancy....

The one man most likely to turn the United States into a theocracy

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) is having a moment.

Last month, Hawley tore into a Trump judicial nominee. The nominee’s sin? Michael Bogren had the audacity to represent a Michigan city that wanted to enforce a civil rights ordinance against Catholic business owners who believe they have a constitutional right to discriminate. Hawley’s interrogation of Bogren was widely condemned even by many conservative voices.

Ed Whelan, the legal activist best known for using the rea...

Please, AOC, don’t fall into Ted Cruz’s birth control trap

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), the lefty lion of the House freshman class, has a new frenemy — Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX).

I agree. Perhaps, in addition to the legislation we are already working on together to ban Members of Congress from becoming lobbyists, we can team up here as well. A simple, clean bill making birth control available over the counter. Interested? https://t.co/7kh3kqxN1w

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) June 12, 2019

M...

Secret Service repeatedly interferes with Rev. Barber’s protest in front of the White House

WASHINGTON, D.C. — More than 300 religious leaders and activists protested outside the White House on Wednesday to bring attention to administration policies they say are immoral. The U.S. Secret Service repeatedly interfered with the protest, first closing off Lafayette Square and then gating off access to the front of the White House an hour later.

The protest, called “Moral Witness Wednesday,” was led by Rev. Dr. William Barber II, a Protestant minister, social ...

The nation’s largest physician group is warming up to universal health care

The American Medical Association (AMA) — one of the nation’s most powerful health groups — is warming up to policy ideas that expand the role of government-run health care, thanks to activists trying to change minds from the inside.  

Every year, the country’s largest physician group hosts a meeting to discuss its priorities. The top-line from this year’s annual conference is that the organization will continue its support for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) while still op...

This progressive Muslim woman could make history in Virginia’s state Senate primary race

Democrat Richard Saslaw has represented Virginia’s 35th district in the state Senate for nearly 40 years, without ever facing a primary fight. For the past several months however, he’s been feeling the heat from progressive challenger Yasmine Taeb, who could deliver an upset victory in Tuesday’s primary election.

Taeb, a human rights attorney and the first Muslim woman to be elected to the Democratic National Committee, is one of many progressive Democrats across the cou...

How activists of color got Democrats to care about the Hyde Amendment

H.K. Gray had an abortion, but her insurance wouldn’t pay for it.

“When I was pregnant with my daughter, I used my Medicaid to cover almost all of her birth, almost all of her ultrasounds, and almost everything I needed for pre-natal care,” Gray told ThinkProgress, “So when it came time to when I needed my abortion for my third pregnancy, I just assumed it would work for that as well.”

That’s when Gray learned about the Hyde Amendment, whic...

In reversal, Biden says he no longer supports anti-abortion Hyde Amendment

Former Vice President Joe Biden announced late Thursday that he no longer supports the Hyde Amendment, one day after coming under fire from pro-choice groups and fellow Democrats for reaffirming through his campaign his support for the measure that bans using federal funds for abortions.

Biden told an audience in Georgia that he’d had a change of heart after decades supporting the amendment, motivated by a recent raft of “extreme laws” — including one passed ...

The two most important Supreme Court cases you’ve probably never heard of

It’s June, which means the Supreme Court is in the final stretch of its first term since Justice Anthony Kennedy gave his seat up for President Trump to fill. We will soon know what America looks like under a judiciary that’s been remade by a president that is actively lobbying the Supreme Court to permit racist voter suppression.

Indeed, the story of this term is likely to be a story about democracy — and the Supreme Court’s role in thwarting it. The court i...