North America
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How the Supreme Court’s decision on Skrmetti may impact Bostock and the overall future of trans rights in America.
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In June 2025, the Supreme Court quietly let a dangerous precedent take hold. By allowing Tennessee to enforce Senate Bill 1 (SB1), later referred to as Skrmetti, a law banning doctors from providing puberty blockers and hormone replacement therapy to transgender minors, the court did more than greenlight discrimination. It…
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The Second City: Why Chicago Should Implement America’s Next Congestion Pricing
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After a lengthy, contentious, and still ongoing political process, New York City became the first American city to implement congestion pricing in January of this year. Despite fierce opposition, the move has been a smashing success and is winning over the public. If Chicago wants to keep pace as one…
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From Resistance to Reshaping: The Right’s Transformation of Federal Bureaucracy
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When historians examine pivotal transitions in American governance, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal stands as perhaps the most consequential transformation of the federal government’s role in American life. Yet nearly a century later, the American right has undergone its own transition—from a movement defined primarily by opposition to expansive government…
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Inside Trump’s Ukraine Gambit
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In the last few months, President Trump has gone from labeling Ukrainian President Zelensky a “dictator,” to shouting at him in front of an open forum in the Oval Office, to pausing all U.S. military assistance to Ukraine, to granting Golden Visas to Russian Oligarchs. Commentators have offered convoluted theories…
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The Democratic Party Has a Working Class Problem
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The Democratic Party brand is in crisis. A recent NBC poll reports the party’s favorability rating at a record low of 27 percent, marking a nadir that dates back to 1990. This polling follows the Democratic coalition fraying in November’s election as many working-class nonwhite voters defected from their ranks…
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Yes, it’s political: Dance & Disparities during a Trump term
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The first sentence of the 2024 Republican Party Platform is its dedication: “To the forgotten men and women of America.” This powerful message can and should be expanded upon as the toll of inequality continues to rip through America. From attacks on LGBTQ+ rights to stark racial disparities in mortality…
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The Case for Chicago’s Public Health Vending Machines
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On November 2, 2023, the Chicago Department of Public Health launched its first Public Health Vending Machine at Harold Washington Library as part of a one-year pilot program aimed at providing harm reduction and opioid overdose prevention supplies. This pilot program deploys a total of five Public Health Vending Machines…
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Do Arts Industries Lead to Gentrification?
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Urban revitalization projects that use arts-based industries have had mixed results and are often accused of causing gentrification and displacement. Gentrification occurs when an area “improves” its look and feel, leading a wave of higher-income groups to enter an area and to increase the cost of living there. As a…