Forget November 3. It’s January 3 when Donald Trump and his MAGA Republicans might bury our democracy once and for all. Here’s how.

In one week, the US Press Freedom Tracker documented 30 assaults by officers on journalists near the facility

As we celebrate America’s 250th anniversary, join trusted and fan-favorite MS NOW hosts for a news-packed evening in Philadelphia.

If you feel conflicted about America’s 250th anniversary celebrations, when Black Americans are being gerrymandered out of power, and immigrants are getting locked up indefinitely in detention centers, you’re not alone. In his new book “America, U.S.A.: How Race Shadows the Nation’s Anniversaries,” Eddie Glaude Jr. calls this a “double consciousness” that’s inherent in all Americans: the feeling that “America imagines itself as a beacon of freedom and as a white republic.” 

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Shira Scheindlin is one of a group of 35 former federal judges who filed to reopen President Trump’s settlement with the IRS, accusing him of using the judicial system “for an improper purpose.” Scheindlin questions why taxpayer money should go to Trump’s $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund to compensate convicted Jan. 6 insurrectionists. "The president was on both sides of the case. That's called collusion."

Tech giants are rushing to build artificial intelligence that is smarter than any human with almost no regulation. One former AI insider walked away from the race and is now sounding the alarm. Activist Michaël Trazzi insists building something "smarter than human beings should be a red line," because it's far from clear we could control it.

Pope Leo XIV has issued a landmark encyclical warning that artificial intelligence threatens human dignity and truth itself. Meanwhile, across America, a massive bipartisan revolt is erupting against the spread of data centers powering the AI boom. It may be the most united Americans have been on anything in years, and their leaders aren't listening.

Amid an affordability crisis and unpopular Iran war, a new Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll has found President Donald Trump’s disapproval ratings have never been higher across his terms in office....

Donald Trump has been making some wild promises to bring down the price of pharmaceutical drugs. At one point, he said he would slash it by as much as 1,000%. It’s the kind of exaggerated, attention-g...

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones explains why the Supreme Court's gutting of the Voting Rights Act is not just a blow to Black representation. It’s a blow to democracy itself. "Th...

Congress just passed a 45-day extension of one of the most sweeping warrantless surveillance provisions in U.S. law, delaying a high-stakes fight over FISA reform. But with artificial intelligence now able to analyze massive amounts of data, the risks are growing fast, and the fight for reforms is far from over.

When Karoline Leavitt says that the writings of the man who tried to shoot up the Correspondents’ Dinner are “indistinguishable” from what reporters say every day — what, exactly, is she claiming? That asking whether the president of the United States meets the constitutional bar for office is the same as picking up a rifle? That noting, accurately, that the president was found liable for sexual abuse, convicted on 34 felony counts in New York, and found by multiple federal courts to have engaged in self-dealing through his business empire — that saying these things out loud is the moral equivalent of an attempted assassination? This is the trick, and it needs to be named: the administration is trying to launder Trump’s documented record into a kind of unspeakable fact. The argument is not that the press has gotten its reporting wrong. The argument is that the press should stop reporting it, because the reporting is what is dangerous.

New medication abortion restrictions will reach across the country - including states where abortion is still legal, after a federal appeals court ruling in a case from Louisiana. The state sued the FDA to block tele-med access to the abortion drug mifepristone, arguing that its availability by mail undermined Louisiana’s abortion ban. An appeals court panel agreed - blocking mail-order access across the country. Drugmakers have already asked the Supreme Court to reverse the ruling. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is waging a quiet war on birth control, rewriting guidelines for a crucial family planning program. “There's become a kind of new coalition politics of opposing contraception,” says UC Davis Law Professor Mary Ziegler, “and the President is looking for a way to reach those social conservative voters who are angry with him about other things.”

Donald Trump has been making some wild promises to bring down the price of pharmaceutical drugs. At one point, he said he would slash it by as much as 1,000%. It’s the kind of exaggerated, attention-grabbing publicity ploy that he has engaged with for much of his life. The only problem is that his promises are mathematically impossible.

Two months into the war with Iran, the price of oil and gas is high, and MS NOW Business Analyst Ron Insana explains that "the price here is not coming down" any time soon. From transportation to plastics, crude oil is essential to the global economy, so the current oil crisis "extends well beyond gasoline" to become "a global problem." The complicated, intertwined nature of oil markets and the global economy means that "this is going to be a protracted problem," Insana explains.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones explains why the Supreme Court's gutting of the Voting Rights Act is not just a blow to Black representation. It’s a blow to democracy itself. "The Black rights struggle has been a struggle to democratize America for everyone," she says, “and the loss of this impacts democracy for everyone."

The Supreme Court this week effectively gutted the Voting Rights Act, by restricting a key provision of the landmark law against voter discrimination. Critics warn this is a deliberate attempt to disenfranchise Black representation in Congress. There is precedent for this in history, when 22 Black congressmen during the Reconstruction-era were reduced to zero representation within a single generation.

Gun violence isn’t a distant threat in America—it’s a daily reality shaping how people live, learn, and lead. While those in power move to protect themselves, millions of American children remain exposed to a crisis that continues to go unchecked. Sandy Hook Promise CEO, Nicole Hockley argues “our culture is so focused on reaction, not on prevention. We the People need to change that narrative.” Gun activist and Author, Fred Guttenberg believes the Trump administration is sending a message to the American people, “they want to undo all of gun violence prevention.” Adding, “we the people are pissed, and we the people can do something about that.”

“Sold” by Patricia McCormick tells the fictional story of Lakshmi, a 13-year-old girl sold into sexual slavery to help pay off her stepfather’s debts. Her story is told in a series of vignettes, deliberately fractured to mirror her life itself. “Sold” was a National Book Award finalist, but now it has a new distinction. It’s America’s most banned book. 

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Republican-held Senate seats in Ohio and North Carolina are looking more vulnerable due to Trump’s declining popularity. Democratic pollster Cornell Belcher says this weakens Republicans across the country. “What that means, from a campaign perspective, is that Republicans now have to think about defending more seats now than they certainly were thinking about a year or so ago.”

Hennepin County has brought the first-ever state charges against an ICE officer tied to on-duty actions during the Trump-era immigration crackdown. Prosecutors have issued a nationwide warrant alleging the agent pointed a firearm at civilians from an unmarked vehicle. While the President has claimed federal agents have “absolute immunity” this case could set a major precedent for holding federal law enforcement accountable. Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty weighs in, "even if it was removed to federal court...it is still a state court prosecution in federal court, state law applies, and the president cannot pardon anybody who has a state court conviction."

Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s overwhelming loss in Hungary’s parliamentary elections marked a major rejection of Orban’s Illiberal Democracy, a form of government which has elections, but rights and freedoms are not guaranteed. It’s a form of government many fear America is turning into under Donald Trump. But as Anne Applebaum argues, Orban’s loss shows illiberalism isn’t inevitable.

Under Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s long-rule, Hungary morphed into an illiberal Democracy, and saw a significant backsliding of democracy and democratic institutions. But with Orban’s loss in Hungary’s parliamentary elections, there is hope not just for the future of Hungary, but for democracies around the world.

I was honored that the Reverend Bishop William J.

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After attending a pro-Palestinian campus protest, one student journalist reportedly became the target of a federal investigation—and his data was quietly handed over by Google. New reporting by The Intercept uncovers the depth of personal data requested by ICE officials and how immigration authorities are using powerful tools to access deeply personal information. Brennan Center for Justice’s Faiza Patel, weighs in: They can identify whether you go to a gun shop, whether you go to a mosque, whether you go to an abortion clinic, all these really intimate details about us are revealed by this kind of information which is available to the government via subpoena." Technology journalist, Jacob Ward adds, "the Fourth Amendment doesn't protect a third-party data relationship, and we're in a world now where when an outlet like ICE or anybody else wants this data, they don't need a subpoena."

Former White House correspondent Jim Acosta warns of rising threats to the free press under President Trump. Persistent attacks on journalists, as well as Trump-friendly media mergers, make the situation more dire. "You can't speak truth to power if those in power can crush the truth."