AL Political Reporter: “Gov. Kay Ivey on Friday signed several criminal justice reform bills into law, some products of Ivey’s criminal justice study group, which was formed to draft legislation aimed at resolving Alabama’s longstanding and deadly prison crisis. While the study group’s recommendations, released in January 2020, did include suggestions on spending and ways to…

The Progressive Pulse: “The first case re-evaluating the role of racial bias in the death penalty began last week in Wake County, the result of a landmark 2020 state Supreme Court decision. Hasson Bacote was convicted of murdering Anthony Surles, an 18-year-old high schooler in Johnston County in 2007, WRAL reported. A jury sentenced Bacote to death…

Slate: “Earlier this year, UNC–Chapel Hill’s Hussman School of Journalism and Media announced that it had extended acclaimed journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones a position as its Knight chair in race and investigative journalism. Like other (though not all) Knight chairs at journalism schools around the country, this was to be a tenured position. On Wednesday, the website NC Policy…

MS Free Press: “It was around 1 a.m. when Ray Elk and his family returned home from Ramadan celebrations on May 5. The children had school in the morning, but there was no way around the late night—not with a 40-minute-long drive home to their home in DeSoto County from the sunset-centered ceremony. Elk spent…

AL.com: “Gov. Kay Ivey has signed into law a bill allowing Alabama public schools to offer instruction in yoga. The law ends a ban on yoga adopted by the State Board of Education in 1993 because of yoga’s connections to Hinduism. Rep. Jeremy Gray, D-Opelika, today thanked Ivey for signing the bill and clearing the way for…

The Daily Beast: “If Georgia officials thought they might finally be able to breathe a sigh of relief over half a year after the 2020 election, they have another think coming. Fringe conservative activists are trying to take Arizona’sabsurd and aimless election audit circus nationwideas part of a flailing effort to keep conspiracies about the re-election bid Donald…

NPR: “District Attorney Andrew Womble has declined to file charges against Pasquotank County, N.C., sheriff’s deputies in the fatal shooting of Andrew Brown Jr. last month in Elizabeth City. His decision followed an inquiry by the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation, which presented its findings to the prosecutor. At a press conference Tuesday morning,…

USA Today: “Louisiana state troopers can be seen on a dark roadside stunning, punching and dragging a Black man as he apologizes for leading them on a high-speed chase – body camera video of the moments leading up to the man’s death that The Associated Press obtained after authorities refused to release it for two years. “I’m…

WaPo: “The Supreme Court announced Monday that it will review a restrictive Mississippi law that provides a clear path to diminish Roe v. Wade’s guaranteeof a woman’s right to choose an abortion. Abortion opponents for months have urged the court’s conservatives to seize the chance to reexamine the 1973 precedent. Mississippi is among many Republican-led states that…

Political Wire: “Following several threats to run as an independent over a Virginia GOP nominating process for Governor she called “rigged,” state Sen. Amanda Chase (R) told Richmond’s Morning News with John Reid she will instead support nominee Glenn Youngkin (R).”