The Daily Beast: “This week, Senate Republicans voted against the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act that would have restored voting rights protections created by the 1965 legislation but removed by John Roberts’ Supreme Court in 2013, on the bizarre premise that racial disparities were no longer a problem. With those protections gone, conservative politicians…

Political Wire: “Rich Lowry: “After Trump’s presidency, the party is more populist, focused on the culture war, resistant to media narratives and skeptical of business — and it would remain so if Trump retired tomorrow and promised never to utter another word about politics.” “Although in many ways an orthodox conservative, DeSantis covers all these…

Business Insider: “The University of Alabama football coach Nick Saban signed a letter to Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia — his longtime friend — pushing him to support voting-rights legislation. The letter to Manchin, dated January 13 and signed by Saban, a West Virginia native, urged Congress “to exercise its Constitutional responsibility to enact…

AL Political Reporter: “Beginning Jan. 31, Birmingham single mothers can apply for guaranteed income provided by an initiative implemented by Mayor Randall Woodfin. Embrace Mothers is a city of Birmingham research pilot in partnership with Mayors for a Guaranteed Income, a network of mayors advocating to give Americans an income floor. Through the program, 110…

NC Policy Watch: “Be sure to check out a new report that the good folks at Carolina Forward have published this morning about the minimum wage. As it notes, the fact that Virginia raised its wage substantially and that North Carolina has not, provides a handy experiment to see which of two very similar neighboring…

The Hill: “House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) said in an interview that he is worried about losing the House in 2022 and “losing this democracy,” saying that is the reason why he is pushing so much for Democrats’ voting rights legislation. “I’m worried about losing the House. I’m worried about losing this democracy. That’s why I’m fighting…

NY Times: “For months, former President Donald J. Trump has been grumbling quietly to friends and visitors to his Palm Beach mansion about a rival Republican power center in another Florida mansion, some 400 miles to the north. Gov. Ron DeSantis, a man Mr. Trump believes he put on the map, has been acting far less…

WUNC: “Howard Dudley spent nearly 24 years in prison after being wrongfully convicted of sexually assaulting his 9-year-old daughter, Amy Moore. A few days before Christmas, 30 years after the initial verdict, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper pardoned Dudley. In a recent conversation with WUNC’s Tested Podcast, Dudley reflects on what he’s been through over the…

NY Times: “Ever since Zara, a transgender girl, was 8, she has been certain she wanted to grow up to be a woman. After conversations with her parents and sessions with a therapist, she began transitioning socially: changing her name to Zara and pronouns to she/her. When she turned 9, she began treatment with puberty…

AL Political Reporter: “The Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act, a newly combined bill comprised of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and the Freedom to Vote Act, passed the U.S. House of Representatives Thursday, moving now to the U.S. Senate where the looming threat of yet another Republican filibuster, which stymied previous attempts to pass the…