Category: Uncategorized

As the Trump administration moves to weaken America’s air pollution rules, it is deploying new legal interpretations that are intended to tie the hands of future administrations for years to come.

In practice, the changes limit the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority under the Clean Air Act. The result allows EPA officials to ignore science, data and the adverse effects their decisions will have on public health and the environment.

But the new interpretations are also designed to apply not just to the rule in which they are first set forth but into the future.

If affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court in inevitable legal challenges, these interpretations could make it harder for future administrations to restore the public health protections that the Trump administration eliminates. They could also make it difficult to update rules to respond to new information about health risks.

Typically, moves to weaken pollution regulations through novel legal interpretations would have a good chance of being overturned in court. But the EPA’s new interpretations are strategically designed to appeal to the current U.S. Supreme Court’s view of federal agencies’ authority, especially in light of the court’s 2024 ruling in Loper Bright v. Raimondo. In that case, the court overturned what’s known as the Chevron doctrine. A 1984 Supreme Court ruling had established that courts should defer to executive agencies’ legal interpretations of their governing statutes when the text of the law was ambiguous or left gaps. That deference no longer applies.

As a former EPA appointee who helped write and review dozens of regulations under the Clean Air Act during the Obama and Biden administrations, I find these efforts to prevent the EPA from doing its job of protecting public health and the environment to be alarming. Here are two examples of how the new interpretations are playing out.

Blocking future climate regulations

In February 2026, the EPA rescinded its 2009 endangerment finding, a determination under the Clean Air Act that carbon dioxide and five other greenhouse gases “may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare” because they contribute to climate change.

The endangerment finding was the scientific and legal basis for EPA rules requiring automakers, power plants and oil and gas operations to cut their greenhouse gas emissions. Erasing it would make it easier for the Trump administration to eliminate greenhouse gas regulations.

Rather than try to challenge the science of climate change, which would be difficult given the growing mountain of evidence, the Trump EPA relied on legal arguments that were intended to dispense forever with the EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas pollutants under the Clean Air Act.

Among the administration’s numerous arguments, two stand out:

First, the Trump EPA says the Clean Air Act should be read to limit the EPA’s authority to regulate air pollution only if its harm to the public is “through local or regional exposure.”

That would mean contributions from U.S. sources to global air pollution, no matter how demonstrable or how much they endanger Americans, are not covered by the Clean Air Act.

Second, the Trump EPA says that reducing greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles and engines would be “futile.” It points to global climate modeling that suggest these reductions would not meaningfully reduce the harm to public health and welfare.

What that argument fails to mention is that actions by people around the world to reduce emissions across different sectors add up. Motor vehicle emissions are the No. 1 contributor of U.S. emissions. If this sector is too small to regulate, then nothing is big enough.

Each of these interpretations is contrary to positions that the EPA took in the original endangerment finding, which the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld in 2012.

Allowing more toxic air pollutants

A second example involves the EPA’s proposal on March 17, 2026, to weaken pollution restrictions on businesses that sterilize medical equipment using ethylene oxide, a known carcinogen.

In that proposal, the EPA is also changing a legal interpretation in a way that would constrain the agency’s ability to protect human health into the future, this time from emissions of toxic air pollutants.

The Clean Air Act, under Section 112, establishes a methodical program for the EPA to regulate industries that emit significant quantities of air pollutants that can cause cancer, birth defects, genetic mutations or neurological harm, or harm reproductive health.

The EPA reviews how facilities control their emissions and sets standards that require all facilities to meet what the best-controlled sources are doing. But Section 112 has an important provision called “residual risk” review: Eight years after the EPA sets the first technology-based standards, it must determine whether the public health risk posed by emissions from the facilities after controls are added is acceptable.

In 2024, the EPA updated its hazardous air pollution rule for facilities that use ethylene oxide to sterilize medical equipment sensitive to steam heat, such as devices containing plastic, rubber or electronic components. Because recent research showed that ethylene oxide posed a much higher risk of cancer than previously thought, the EPA also updated its 2006 residual risk finding and required additional safeguards.

The Trump EPA is now arguing that the agency can assess residual risk only once, even if more recent information shows that the health risk is unacceptably high.

By constraining its own authority, the EPA is withholding standards that would protect thousands of people from a higher risk of cancer. It is also creating a legal precedent that will justify weakening other standards. Those include standards for chemical manufacturing facilities that the Biden EPA updated in 2024 through residual risk review.

That precedent would also prohibit the EPA in the future from taking into account new information about the health effects of any regulated hazardous air pollutant from any type of industry the EPA regulates under Section 112 of the Clean Air Act, including petroleum refineries, chemical manufacturing and paper mills.

Arguing the law

These rules are just two examples of the administration’s “if you don’t have the facts, argue the law” approach.

If the administration’s strategy works, the American public may be living, and dying, with the consequences of these industry-friendly regulations for years to come.

Janet McCabe is a volunteer with the Environmental Protection Network and has held several appointed positions at the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Consistent with the Indiana University Statement of Policy on Institutional Neutrality, the comments contained in this communication are solely my views and are not intended to be construed, and shall not be construed, as the views of Indiana University or comments made on behalf of or by Indiana University.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

If someone you know is detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, it can be incredibly challenging to find and communicate with them.

For example, it can take several days just to confirm where they are. Even after locating a loved one, it is possible to lose track of them again, as ICE regularly moves people between facilities without notice.

I’m a law professor at Temple University in Philadelphia, where I work with immigrant rights organizations on issues of ICE arrest and detention.

Here’s what we know about how and where ICE is holding people as of May 2026.

A confusing web of detention facilities

When a person is arrested by ICE, the lack of a centralized immigration detention system makes it hard to figure out where they are.

For ICE detention, the federal government can contract with counties for county jail space or to execute service agreements with private prison companies. ICE also contracts with the Federal Bureau of Prisons to hold immigrants in their facilities.

Pennsylvania is no exception to this patchwork system. Four county jails – in Pike, Clinton, Cambria and Franklin counties – have contracts with the federal government to detain immigrants for ICE. Pike County, for example, received US$16 million from ICE in 2024 and 2025 for use of its jail.

Further, ICE contracts with Centre County so the county can serve as a pass-through for payment to the private prison company, the Geo Group, which runs the Moshannon Valley Processing Center. Moshannon is the largest detention center in the Northeast with 1,876 beds. This pass-through system allows the federal government to avoid the burdensome Federal Acquisition System for contractors. That purchasing system is governed by uniform policies that apply to all federal agencies that enter into contracts for services to ensure that business is conducted with integrity, fairness and transparency.

ICE pays millions of dollars each month to operate the Moshannon Valley facility.

Most recently, ICE set up contracts with two Bureau of Prison facilities in Pennsylvania to hold immigrants: the federal detention center in Philadelphia and the federal prison FCI Lewisburg.

Over 2,000 immigrants in detention in PA

After a person has been arrested by ICE, major federal policy changes that are intended to keep people locked up or have them deported make it difficult to get that person released.

For example, ICE has issued new guidance that expands who is subject to mandatory detention without access to a bond hearing to include anyone who entered the U.S. without a visa. This policy is currently being legally challenged by the ACLU along with other groups.

Additionally, ICE releases many fewer people. Under federal law, ICE has the discretion to release most people, unless they fall into a specialized category of “criminal aliens.” Previously, people were released on parole or on their own recognizance, sometimes with an order of supervision or bond.

As a result, immigration detention has reached unprecedented levels.
Over 70,000 people were held in immigration detention in January 2026. As of April 2, 2026, over 2,000 people were held in immigration detention in Pennsylvania.

Isolated from family and legal advice

Once arrested, ICE detainees have a hard time contacting the outside world.

Upon arrival at a facility, they are stripped of their belongings, including their cellphone. They must pay for telephone calls to their family or get others to pay by putting money in their commissary account.

Further, ICE detention facilities are often outside of major urban areas and far from legal services and community support. Moshannon, for example, is over 100 miles from any nonprofit immigration attorneys who provide representation to people in immigration removal proceedings.

Previously, the federal government funded a Legal Orientation Program where nongovernmental legal services offered information, referrals and representation to those in detention. In 2025, the Department of Justice ended the program, justifying its termination based on the executive order entitled “Protecting the American People Against Invasion.” Section 19 of that executive order relates to reviewing, pausing or terminating contracts, grants or other agreements with nongovernmental organizations that support or provide services “to removable or illegal aliens.”

Out-of-state transfers are common

ICE’s movement of people without notice across different facilities is a long-standing practice. However, a recent UCLA study found that out-of-state transfers of noncriminal Latino detainees jumped from 18% to 55% after President Donald Trump’s reelection in 2024.

Transfers are mostly about ICE’s own efficiency in maximizing the filling of bed space. Some advocacy organizations have alleged that transfers are conducted for retaliatory reasons against people who make requests or complain. Transfers are not only disorienting for the person involved but also impede communication with family and access to counsel.

How to find someone in ICE detention

Several online guides provide information about how to locate someone after an ICE arrest and how to prepare one’s family in case of future arrest.

Here are some key tips.

1. Use the ICE online detainee locator.

The locator requires either a person’s country of birth and alien registration number – called an “A number” – or their full name and date of birth. A person might have an A number if they have a past or present case with the government, including having applied for a green card or asylum. It can take 48 hours for ICE to enter information about the person into its database so it can be picked up by the online locator. The name must be an exact match with what was entered into the system.

2. Contact the ICE field office.

The Philadelphia field office covers Delaware, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. If you are a noncitizen, you might want a U.S. citizen to do this for you out of an abundance of caution, because ICE records information about the person calling. Call 215-656-7164 or email Philadelphia.Outreach@ice.dhs.gov.

3. Contact the consulate.

In many instances, ICE is supposed to notify the consulate of the arrested person’s home country within 72 hours.

4. Reach out to community groups, attorneys and elected officials.

In Philadelphia, community groups such as Asian Americans United, Juntos and New Sanctuary Movement, or the statewide Pennsylvania Immigration Coalition, might be able to help you. An attorney might also be able to help you. Here is a list of nonprofit legal service providers in Pennsylvania.

Further, you can ask for help from your federal elected officials, such as your congressional representative or Sens. John Fetterman or Dave McCormick. If you have a more direct relationship with a local elected official, such as your city council member, it cannot hurt to see whether they can also help you.

How to prepare in advance

If you know someone who is at risk of arrest by ICE, you can help them prepare in advance. Tell them to:

1. Keep copies of their documents in a secure space.

This includes their A number as well as immigration documents, passport, birth certificate, marriage certificate, tax returns and any employment and medical records. If they have children, make sure to include their passports, birth certificates and medical records.

2. Memorize important phone numbers.

They should know the numbers of family members and their attorney in case their cellphone is taken from them.

3. Have an emergency plan.

A family preparedness plan includes designating a caregiver for children in case a parent or guardian is arrested. They should also consider filling out documents that may help a family member or friend to care for their children if they are unavailable because of detention or deportation. These include forms that provide temporary guardianship or custody of minor children, consent for medical care of minor children and information for the Philadelphia School District.

Philadelphia Legal Assistance provides free downloadable packets in English and in Spanish to build a family preparedness plan.

Read more of our stories about Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, or sign up for our Philadelphia newsletter on Substack.

Jennifer J. Lee does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

On April 30, 2026, Texas executed James Broadnax, a Black man who was sentenced to death for the robbery and murder of two men in 2008.

Before the jury was seated, the prosecutor moved to dismiss each of the seven Black people from the jury pool. Citing court documents, CNN noted that he “(utilized) a spreadsheet during jury selection that bolded only the names of every Black juror” and none of the white or Latino people. After defense objections, the judge reseated one Black juror, citing the otherwise all-white jury.

The trial proceeded with 11 white jurors and one Black juror.

A jury with that racial composition is likely to deliberate in a different way than one that is more racially diverse. According to Duke University law professor James Coleman, “Juries with two or more members of color deliberate longer, discuss a wider range of evidence, and collectively are more accurate in their statements about cases, regardless of the race of the defendant.”

A 2012 Duke University study of two Florida counties found that juries “formed from all-white jury pools convicted Black defendants 16% more often than white defendants, a gap that was nearly eliminated when at least one member of the jury pool was Black.”

Broadnax was executed on the 40th anniversary of Batson v. Kentucky, in which the Supreme Court ruled that prosecutors cannot exclude jurors solely on account of their race.

But Broadnax’s case is not an outlier. Similar efforts to “whiten” juries in capital cases regularly occur in states that authorize the death penalty. A 2025 analysis of Alabama’s death row by the Equal Justice Initiative found that across 122 capital cases – involving Black and white defendants in roughly equal numbers – more than one-third were decided by juries with no Black jurors or, like Broadnax’s case, only one.

As a death penalty scholar who has tracked the role of race in the death penalty system, I believed Batson was a step forward in the effort to address a long history of excluding Black people from jury service. But 40 years have shown that Batson merely scratched the surface of the problem.

A long history

The exclusion of Black people from jury service is as old as the republic itself.

Before the Civil War, one way this was done was by limiting eligibility for such service to those who could vote. Some states went further, saying only whites could serve on juries. A Tennessee law dating from 1858 is a good example: “Every white male citizen who is a freeholder, or householder, and twenty-one years of age, is legally qualified to act as a grand or petit juror.”

It was only after the Civil War and the passage of the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments to the Constitution that Black people were entitled to serve on juries nationwide – at least in theory.

Some states resisted. For example, West Virginia law specified that “all white male persons who are twenty-one years of age and who are citizens of this State shall be liable to serve as jurors.”

In 1880, 12 years after the ratification of the 14th Amendment – which guarantees equal protection of the law – the Supreme Court struck down that West Virginia law. It did so in the case of a former slave who was convicted in a capital case by an all-white jury and given a death sentence – a preview, I believe, of the kind of thing that happened to Broadnax.

The court held that the West Virginia law that “denies to colored citizens the right and privilege of participating in the administration of the law as jurors because of their color … is, practically, a brand upon them, and a discrimination against them which is forbidden by the [14th] amendment.”

Despite the court’s unequivocal ruling, the door to jury service remained closed to Black people. As legal scholar Sarah Claxton argued in 2022, “States across the country enacted vague and subjective standards for juror eligibility – requiring good moral character, honest and intelligent men, persons having educational qualifications – whose discriminatory application excluded Black citizens from juries.”

The modern story

The story of racial discrimination in jury selection is not simply a story of a now discredited past.

In 1965, the Supreme Court refused to remedy the exclusion of Black people from juries that its 1880 decision was supposed to have ended. It held, in Swain v. Alabama, that “a defendant in a criminal case is not constitutionally entitled to a proportionate number of his race on the trial jury or the jury panel.”

Two decades passed before the court again took up the glaring problem of racial discrimination by prosecutors seeking to keep Black people off juries.

In Batson v. Kentucky, the court considered a case in which the prosecuting attorney “used his peremptory challenges to strike all four black persons” in the jury pool and managed to seat an all-white jury. And on April 30, 1986, it reaffirmed that “a State denies a Black defendant equal protection when it puts him on trial before a jury from which members of his race have been purposefully excluded.”

The court then created a process for challenging jury selection. First, the defendant must point to evidence – based on how the prosecutor used their strikes – that suggests racial discrimination. If they can, the prosecutor must then come forward with “a neutral explanation for challenging Black jurors.” Finally, the trial judge weighs all the evidence to decide whether the prosecutor’s stated reason is genuine or a cover for bias. In practice, this means a Batson challenge will fail as long as the prosecutor can offer any nonracial reason for excluding Black jurors, however thin.

When Batson v. Kentucky was decided, Justice Thurgood Marshall, drawing on his years of experience as an NAACP Legal Defense Fund lawyer, warned that the decision would not end racial discrimination in jury selection. “Merely allowing defendants the opportunity to challenge the racially discriminatory use of peremptory challenges in individual cases will not end the illegitimate use of the peremptory challenge,” he explained.

He predicted that “any prosecutor can easily assert facially neutral reasons for striking a juror, and trial courts are ill-equipped to second-guess those reasons.”

40 years of Batson

History has proved Marshall right.

In the Broadnax case, prosecutors claimed that their efforts to remove Black jurors had nothing to do with their race. They suggested that they were dismissed because they could not be impartial or they had reservations about the death penalty, disqualifying them from service on a jury in a capital murder trial.

The Batson test has not been much of an obstacle for prosecutors in other capital cases either. In fact, in 2025 the Death Penalty Information Center reported that in the years after Batson, “prosecutors soon learned how to successfully defend race-based challenges, and courts generally accepted even the flimsiest excuses.” That’s why defendants rarely win Batson challenges “despite powerful evidence of racial bias.”

In the 40 years since Batson was decided, the Death Penalty Information Center has identified only 68 cases across 16 states in which a capital defendant succeeded in getting a conviction or death sentence reversed because of racial discrimination in jury selection.

The picture is similar in California, where more comprehensive data exists. According to a 2020 Berkeley Law report, the California Supreme Court reviewed 142 cases involving Batson claims over 30 years and found a violation in only three. At the time the report was published, it had been more than three decades since that court found a Batson violation involving the strike of a Black prospective juror.

Looking at what has happened since Batson v. Kentucky, Elisabeth Semel, a UC Berkeley law professor and co-director of the school’s Death Penalty Clinic, said in an interview with the Death Penalty Information Center that she would give Batson a grade of “F.” As she explained, “It certainly has failed to achieve its promise.”

Austin Sarat does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

The number of family caregivers has grown from 53 million Americans in 2020 to 63 million as of 2025. This number is expected to increase as the baby boomer generation ages and faces the limitations of our current health and social services systems.

A family caregiver is an unpaid individual who provides assistance to a family member who needs support due to illness, disability or aging.

The population of metro Pittsburgh is one of the oldest in the country, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. This means an increasing proportion of the local population will require care from family caregivers as they age. In Allegheny County, the number of residents age 65 and older is projected to grow by 50,000 by 2050.

Despite their critical role in supporting the aging population, however, family caregivers are not often provided with medical training or help with navigating the health and social services systems. This puts them at significant risk of experiencing physical and mental strain that can lead to burnout and leaving the workforce before retirement age. Caregivers and those they support can also develop health complications based on these factors.

This is particularly true for women, who provide a disproportionate amount of care in the U.S.

I study ways to improve the quality of life for aging adults and their care partners. My work centers on how family caregiving can improve mental health for families. I also examine the toll that caregiving takes on families navigating serious illness and decline.

Sandwich generation caregivers

The “sandwich generation” refers to adults – typically in their 40s and 50s – who are simultaneously caring for their aging parents while raising their own children. They are “sandwiched” between two generations of dependents and often face significant financial and emotional pressures as a result.

These caregivers often find themselves caught between work and unpredictable caregiving demands. Without formal protections like paid leave, they may feel forced to reduce hours, turn down promotions or leave the workforce altogether. These decisions can add to the financial strain they’re already under.

Where the law falls short

Several national and state programs exist to support older adults.

The federal Older Americans Act funds services like meal delivery, transportation and caregiver support, and Medicaid Home and Community-Based Services helps older adults receive care at home rather than in a facility. But systemic barriers – from eligibility gaps to access issues – limit their reach.

Federal initiatives like the RAISE Family Caregivers Act offer some hope for family caregivers. It outlines specific actions the government can take to help caregivers, including making it easier for them to balance caregiving with their jobs.

In addition, several states have implemented paid family leave policies. California, for example, offers up to eight weeks of paid family caregiving leave – replacing up to 90% of wages for lower earners. Washington and Massachusetts both provide up to 12 weeks, with wage replacement rates of 90% and 80%, respectively, and include job protection so caregivers don’t have to choose between their loved one and their livelihood.

Pennsylvania may be next. Legislators are currently debating the Family Care Act, paid leave legislation proposed by state Rep. Jennifer O’Mara. The bill, approved by the Pennsylvania House in March 2026, would allow employees to take up to 12 paid weeks off after the birth of a child or to care for a family member during a serious illness. Spotlight PA reports that the House-approved bill proposes employers cover the cost, with grants available for small businesses.

The state Senate’s version of the Family Care Act, pending in the Labor & Industry Committee as of May 2026, would fund benefits through employee payroll deductions of up to 1% of their income. This addresses a critical gap in existing federal law, which guarantees only unpaid leave.

Even if passed and signed into law, the proposal may fall short for sandwich generation caregivers, who face simultaneous, overlapping demands on both ends of the age spectrum. Many of these caregivers have already reduced hours or left the workforce entirely. A benefit tied to employment may never reach the people who need it most.

Pittsburgh’s generational tug-of-war

Pittsburgh-based sandwich generation caregivers face competing demands: securing reliable, affordable childcare – a growing problem in Allegheny County driven by staffing shortages and limited spots – while simultaneously managing eldercare responsibilities. Without a state or federal paid leave mandate, many Pittsburgh workers, like those in lower-wage or part-time roles, have no guaranteed access to the time off they might need to meet either obligation.

Paid leave policies vary by employer, and without a universal federal mandate, coverage is uneven – often weakest for lower-wage workers, part-time employees and people at small businesses.

Research has shown that sandwich generation caregivers already use most of their paid time off for caregiving tasks. This means they have limited time to take care of their own health. The proposed Family Care Act caps paid leave at 12 weeks per year. While this is an improvement from having no mandatory paid leave, it’s designed to supplement – not replace – standard sick days. The Family Care Act would cover intermittent leave for singular events, like childbirth or surgery. But sandwich generation caregiving is chronic, overlapping and resource-intensive in ways the bill isn’t designed to address.

In addition, the act proposes a partial wage replacement – 90% of wages for a weekly benefit cap ranging from $573 to $995 per week, depending on the individual’s earnings.

Caregivers who step back from work to care for a child or an aging parent are disproportionately lower- and middle-income workers. A 90% wage replacement rate at a lower-wage tier means those workers don’t have to choose between a paycheck and showing up for their family.

Yet this coverage is still likely insufficient for caregivers who often face significant financial strain related to caregiving, such as out-of-pocket expenses for care.

While the Family Care Act – whether it is funded through employee and employer payroll contributions – is a step forward, it still falls short for sandwich generation caregivers. What this population needs is the ability to take flexible time off as needs arise, not just in one block. However, intermittent leave presents administrative challenges for employers, like scheduling disruptions and paperwork burdens that could make it harder to put into practice.

Kate Perepezko does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

Ted Turner, who died on April 6, 2026, was bright, shrewd and, most of all, lucky. The cable TV visionary proved to be in the right place, at the right time, to change television and video news forever.

Most of his big gambles, on things such as the MGM studio and library, which led to the creation of the Turner Classic Movies channel, paid off handsomely.

But Turner will be remembered mostly for the creation and development of the Cable News Network – CNN – which launched in 1980 and made our knowledge of distant events instantaneous and our world more comprehensible. In this sense, Turner’s legacy extends beyond television. He changed our conception not only of journalism but also of our world.

Turner’s obituaries note his record-setting philanthropy, his impressive conservation efforts and his campaign to make the world safer by securing post-Soviet Union era nuclear weaponry. Over the course of his 87 years, Turner proved an outstanding yachtsman, an active and involved sports team owner and a quotable maverick in the business world.

Yet as a scholar of broadcast history – and a former CNN employee – I think Turner’s ultimate legacy is a bit more atmospheric than measurable.

He changed the media ecology in profound and lasting ways. CNN’s arrival disrupted an established media environment, in which broadcast journalism routines and audience viewing habits had become standardized by the ABC, CBS and NBC TV networks.

The ramshackle early CNN, with its farcical “world headquarters” housed in a former Atlanta-area country club, was derided as the “Chicken Noodle Network” by veteran network journalists. But by the mid-1980s it had established profitability, and by 1991, with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Gulf War, it assumed a singular position in America’s – and the world’s – information environment.

CNN had matured to respectability, and Turner was recognized as a visionary by Time magazine, which named him 1991’s Man of the Year. His idea had blossomed into a new arena for global information sharing, and his cable network fully competed with the established broadcast channels on big stories throughout the 1990s.

Right place, right time, right team

Turner’s cable TV news revolution required significant collaboration. The fulfillment of his vision needed luck, inherited money, innovative new technologies, supportive partners and even federal regulatory intervention.

For example, had Newton Minow’s Federal Communications Commission not pushed Congress to pass the All-Channel Receiver Act of 1962, American TV manufacturers would likely never have placed the UHF dial on their sets. That UHF dial made additional local TV competition possible by allowing more stations to broadcast.

In 1970, Turner purchased UHF Channel 17 in Atlanta, which he named WTGC for “Turner Communications Group,” and UHF Channel 36 in Charlotte, North Carolina, which he named WRET for “Robert Edward Turner,” and began building his broadcasting empire.

By the mid-1970s, the cost of satellite distribution to cable system operators had decreased to such an extent that Turner realized – and seized – an opportunity to nationally distribute his local station. He worked with satellite and cable system operators, building early relationships that would prove beneficial to everyone in the cable industry as it developed over the 1980s and ’90s.

In 1979 and 1980, he used these relationships to build the first 24-hour TV network, but it was his internal hires that made the original channel function. To launch CNN, Turner hired veterans of the TV news business, including Robert Wussler, who had previously been president of CBS Sports and the CBS Television Network. And he hired Reese Schonfeld, who had previously founded the Independent Television News Association, a national syndicator of pooled local TV programming.

It was Turner’s vision, investments and established partnerships that made CNN possible. But the creation of the network proved a team effort requiring managerial competence and veteran television production experience.

CNN’s success was never assured. The channel continually lost money in its initial years. But the idea of 24-hour TV news being delivered to paying subscribers, through their cable system operators, proved so valuable that as early as 1981, two CBS executives secretly jetted to Atlanta to meet with Turner and Wussler about purchasing the network.

“I’ll sell you CNN,” he told them. But the deal floundered when the CBS executives would not accept anything less than 51% ownership – and control – of the channel. “You want control? You don’t buy control of Ted Turner’s companies,” he explained. “Forty-nine percent or less.”

Only four years later, Turner would turn the tables and attempt to take over CBS.

Turner came very close to living long enough to see CBS and CNN under a single ownership. CBS’ parent company, Paramount Skydance, is closing in on the purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery, the corporation that owns CNN.

Yet today, these two once hugely profitable news operations have been subsumed within massive multinational corporations, with their legacy brand equity providing as much value to their ownership as their journalism. Turner had long bemoaned the managerial fate of his cable news channel, which he sold to Warner Bros. in 1996.

Success invites criticism, establishes a legacy

Turner is one of the few figures in American media history who left a clearly identifiable legacy. There was a media world that existed before CNN and the one that came after. CNN’s success gave rise to competitors such as MSNBC, Fox News and others.

These channels simultaneously differentiated themselves from CNN while constantly measuring themselves against their older rival. But Turner’s original vision was distinct from the panel programs and punditry that’s now replaced original reporting from around the world.

Turner wanted to own and operate a global news organization where the news would always be the star, and where, like the classic wire services, professional reporting would be instant and accurate. And he wanted to make a fortune while doing it.

When he finally succeeded, critics began to complain about what journalist and academic Tom Rosenstiel called “The Myth of CNN” in a cover story in The New Republic in 1994. Scholars bemoaned CNN for its privileging good visuals over context and depth. They argued that its foreign coverage failed to maintain sufficient independence from the U.S. government.

Dictators and terrorists around the world learned to exploit CNN to get their messages across to the American public. In this sense, CNN’s neutrality, once a source of respect and credibility, could also undermine it by making the channel easily exploitable.

Billions of people around the world now take for granted the profusion of news access to anywhere on earth, at any time of day or night. That world was unimaginable before Turner’s work to make CNN conceivable and then real.

His legacy is not simply a series of cable channels but an entirely new way of thinking about information retrieval and access. Think about that the next time you scroll past video clips from London, Tokyo, Beirut or Mexico City, or check out breaking news videos from Ukraine or Tehran. And thank Ted for making such a world possible.

Michael J. Socolow does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

Hate communities often flourish online for years, raising the question of how they persist. My research team has found that powerful stories keep members of a hate group galvanized, either by repeating the story over and over or by constantly adding fresh accusations and interpretations to it.

I’m a computational social scientist who studies social and political networks. My colleagues and I uncovered these trends by examining 10 years of posts, reactions and participation patterns in Facebook groups that shared antisemitic and Islamophobic content. Our findings have been accepted at the 2026 International Conference on Web and Social Media.

First, we measured who was posting and how that related to engagement on a site. Groups in which a small number of people produced most of the content tended to attract more reactions and responses. Then we looked at subjects the group members discussed – religion, immigration, geopolitics – and the kinds of stories members told about those topics, such as describing an entire group of people as criminals or warning that certain types of people are secretly taking over a country’s way of life.

When we put these pieces together, we discovered some clear patterns. Messages posted by a few very active people were strongly associated with higher site engagement in the form of likes and shares in the near term. And repetition – espousing the same ideas again and again – was an effective tactic. We also found that when many users kept adding fresh accusations, conspiracy theories and explanations, a group tended to persist. Very uniform content that used the same framing led to less engagement over time.

Different communities seemed to be drawn to different messaging patterns. In Islamophobic groups, the most prolific posters tended to repeat a narrow, consistent set of messages. Often these were religiously framed posts that portrayed Muslims as morally condemned. In antisemitic groups, the most engaged members were more likely to impart a mix of narratives, from tales of victimization to conspiracy theories about public figures.

Why it matters

Our findings suggest that hate communities can sustain themselves in various ways, so efforts to moderate them should consider these variations. If a few voices drive the conversation, removing them could quiet the noise. If new stories constantly appear from many contributors, harmful ideas may survive even if a few key online accounts are taken down. Hate networks can persist even after social media platforms ban specific groups or accounts.

It is also important to understand how stories can make prejudice feel justified and emotionally compelling. Extremist stories may claim that a group is under attack, that outsiders are dangerous or subhuman, or that violence is the only way to stay safe. Groups seen as outsiders – such as immigrants – are common targets, and they may be described as an “invasion” that threatens the nation.

What other research is being done

Researchers are finding that extremist ideas are now spreading through looser networks where many voices contribute and messaging can vary widely. That could affect whether engagement in the future still depends on consistent repetition or novelty. Some investigators are also scrutinizing how harmful language, conspiracy theories and propaganda evolve over time.

What’s next

Another important direction is tracking how hate narratives are spread by public figures and influencers, how the narratives move between online platforms, and how they surface in offline groups and efforts to organize supporters, all of which can normalize harmful ideas. My group is starting to study how this amplification works: who shares which narratives and why, which kinds of people become bridges across different online platforms, and how those roles shape which messages spread.

The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

Yu-Ru Lin’s research has received federal funding, including National Science Foundation and the Department of Defense (DARPA, AFOSR, Minerva, and ONR). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material do not necessarily reflect the views of the funding sources.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

If you follow the Trump administration’s social media posts, you might spot its new mascot: a cartoon lump of coal with big eyes and babylike features. “Coalie” sparked a backlash almost as soon as Interior Secretary Doug Burgum debuted it for the Office of Surface Mining and Reclamation Enforcement in early 2026.

Coalie’s design draws on a type of Japanese anime called Kawaii, a word meaning “cute” or “adorable.” It’s the latest in the White House’s efforts to pass off coal as harmless, despite the well-established environmental and human health harms of mining and burning the fossil fuel.

As a scholar of American literature and culture, I write about media portrayals of coal, beginning in the 19th century with its rise to become the leading fuel in the United States. Coal use grew until the early 2000s, when other sources became cheaper and its health and environmental damage became unacceptable to more of the public.

While “Coalie” might be new, the logic behind it is not. For centuries, coal’s promoters have worked hard to show coal as harmless – as well as “clean” and “beautiful,” to use President Donald Trump’s words.

‘An agreeable heat’

Humans living with the effects of burning coal have disliked it for as long as they have burned it.

In 1578, Queen Elizabeth complained that she was “greatly grieved and annoyed with [its] taste and smoke” in the air. In 1661, John Evelyne’s treatise Fumifugium outlined negative health effects of breathing coal smoke.

English settlers were drawn to North America in part because of the continent’s abundant supply of timber, a substitute for coal that deforestation had made prohibitively expensive in England.

But by the 19th century, the price of timber had risen in America as well. When, in the 1820s, news spread of Pennsylvania’s rich veins of anthracite coal, urban consumers were eager for a cheaper source of fuel.

In addition to its lower price, anthracite coal grew desirable because of its high carbon, low-sulfur content, which produced less visible smoke when it was burned. An enthusiastic 1815 letter to the editor of the American Daily Advertiser captured increasingly common attitudes toward anthracite as “affor[ding] a very regular and agreeable heat.”

‘A healthful home’

The spread of anthracite also shored up tolerance for smokier but cheaper bituminous coal.

To help people, housekeeping manuals aimed at the fossil fuel’s mostly female users tried to invent workarounds for its smoke. In 1869, Harriet Beecher Stowe, best known as the author of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” and her sister Catharine Beecher wrote one of many 19th-century articles to acknowledge the “evils” of coal smoke, while outlining “modes of making a healthful home,” in the housekeeping manual American Woman’s Home.

Consumers provided temporary solutions for maintaining indoor air quality while burning coal by sending in suggestions that were published in housekeeping manuals, magazines and newspapers.

At the same time, as the century progressed, coal and coal-stove companies began to suggest that burning coal was healthy, that it could improve indoor air as well as domestic aesthetics. One 1892 newspaper advertisement claimed that stoves were “necessary to heat, cheer, and beautify the home and preserve its health.”

To keep the children clean and bright …

In the 20th century, marketers churned out more colorful claims about the benefits of coal: One magazine advertisement showed a mother and child pointing at the crackling stove aflame with the company’s coal, saying it “cannot be excelled in purity, cleanliness, and free-burning qualities.”

Similarly, the Lackawanna Railroad Company came up with the classy, often rhyming, character of Phoebe Snow. In one ad, she points to the importance of comfort, suggesting that not only could anthracite fuel faster travel, but it could also make your travel – and your life – more comfortable.

Coal marketing often used children to suggest safety and reach parents. Another iteration of the Phoebe Snow series promised that anthracite-powered railway travel could keep children “clean and bright.”

A 1930s advertisement went so far as to position a piece of anthracite coal next to a child in a bathtub, a visual proximity implying that coal was as good as soap.

In fact, soap made of “coal tar” – a liquid byproduct of producing coke, a fuel made from bituminous coal used in industrial blast furnaces – did (and does) exist. The British company Wright’s, also popular in the U.S., generated a slew of advertisements praising its soap as having antiseptic properties for children.

Each of these advertisements tried to capitalize on a mother’s desire for healthy children. And they pushed back against the image of the tyrannical “King Coal” that had come about amid strikes by miners protesting dangerous, degraded working and living conditions as well as the rise of black lung disease.

‘Clean coal’

By the mid-20th century, petroleum took coal’s place as America’s main energy source. The U.S. environmental movement continued to grow, and people got interested in natural gas as an alternative to coal.

In response, coal companies doubled down on the fantasy of “clean” coal.

A 1979 advertisement for American Electric Power, for example, flew in the face of Clean Air Act mandates that coal corporations employ “scrubbing” technology to remove sulfur dioxide from smoke – the ad depicted someone cleaning coal by hand.

The myth continues

Today, coal generates only 16.2% of America’s electricity, down from generating more than half of the U.S. power supply in the 1990s. But the country isn’t done with it. Even though coal production today is far below its peak, as companies try to shut down old uneconomic plants, Trump has promised to “reinvigorate” the coal industry.

In addition to ordering some coal plants to continue operating, the Trump administration has pulled out old coal promotion tactics from the past, including repeatedly referring to coal as “clean and beautiful.” One image inserts Coalie next to a coal-mining family that otherwise looks like an ad that could have appeared a century ago.

And, like its predecessors, this picture tries to present an innocent image of a product that harms human health and the environment.

A 2018 study found that black lung disease was on the rise in Appalachia, where about 40% of America’s coal is mined today. Living near a fossil-fuel power plant exposes residents to pollutants that contribute to premature deaths, asthma and lung cancer, including tiny particulate matter known at PM 2.5, sulfur dioxide and mercury. Even when it’s just sitting in piles waiting to be used at a power plant, coal can harm human health as the wind blows across it and carries coal dust into the air and people’s lungs.

The myth of coal as healthy and family friendly has been around for centuries – but coal has never been clean, or cute.

Annie Persons does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

On the eve of the American Revolution, Matthias Aspden made a decision that would change the trajectory of his life. A wealthy merchant from Philadelphia, Aspden carefully prepared to leave his home in March 1776 as rumors of revolution circulated. He drafted a will and appointed trusted friends to manage his property while he traveled to England.

As a loyalist, someone who wanted to remain loyal to the crown and the British empire, Aspden believed the war would be brief. Historians estimate that at the beginning of the war as many as one-third of all American colonists identified as loyalists. Aspden believed his departure would be temporary. Order, he assumed, would soon be restored, and he would permanently return within a few years.

But that wasn’t the case.

The American Revolution is often told as a triumphant story of democracy and freedom. But this narrative leaves out a significant group: the loyalist men and women who remained faithful to Britain and, as a result, lost their homes, property and sometimes their sense of belonging.

As a historian of the American Revolution who studies Philadelphia loyalists, I believe Aspden’s story offers a glimpse into an overlooked experience of the war.

A wealthy Philly merchant exiled in England

Born and raised in Philadelphia, Aspden was not a marginal figure. He was a Quaker merchant with extensive property holdings, including a home on Water Street, in what is now the Old City neighborhood, and land in Chester County outside Philadelphia.

When he left in 1776, he abandoned nearly everything he owned, believing he would return. As others celebrated independence that summer, Aspden quietly slipped away to London.

In England, reality set in. Exile was not just physical; it was deeply social and emotional. In Philadelphia, Aspden had been established. In London, he was one of tens of thousands of displaced loyalists trying to rebuild a life. He gravitated toward communities of fellow exiles. These networks offered some stability, but they could not replace what he had left behind.

Aspden’s letters to friends and family from this period reveal a man caught between hope and anxiety. He followed news from Philadelphia obsessively, requesting newspapers and updates from friends and business contacts. At one point, he described himself as “an idle man until I can return to America.” His words suggest both longing and uncertainty, as if his life were on pause.

By 1780, that uncertainty turned into fear.

A ‘traitor’ trying to come back home

Aspden began hearing about laws in Pennsylvania aimed at confiscating loyalist property. These laws required individuals accused of treason to appear in court and defend themselves. Aspden, still in England, could not do so. As a result, he was tried in absentia, declared a traitor and subjected to the state’s harshest penalties.

The consequences were devastating. In 1782, Aspden learned that all of his property had been confiscated and would be sold to aid the patriots in the American Revolution. An official commissioner of confiscation seized his Philadelphia home and wharf, which were worth thousands of pounds, along with his land in Chester County. Aspden, facing financial ruin, decided to return to Philadelphia to defend his name and his property.

In 1785, after nearly a decade abroad and with the war over, he crossed the Atlantic, hoping the new United States would restore his property under the terms of the peace treaty with Britain. Instead, he was met with rejection.

Pennsylvania officials informed him that individuals in his position were not protected. He had no legal claim to his property and, more shockingly, no rights as a citizen. While the peace treaty prevented further confiscation of loyalist property, his property was not restored.

The message was clear: Philadelphia was no longer his home.

One last trip to Philadelphia

Aspden left again, traveling through New Jersey and New York before securing passage back to England. Reflecting on his departure, he wrote of the pain of being forced from his “native country.” His brief return confirmed what he had feared. He had no home.

In the years that followed, Aspden sought compensation wherever he could. The American government offered nothing, so he turned to Britain. The Loyalist Claims Commission, established to reimburse those who had lost property during the war, eventually awarded him just over 1,100 pounds, a fraction of his estimated losses.

Aspden made one final visit to America in the early 1790s. By then, he had received a legal pardon and could travel without fear of arrest. But he still could not recover his property or successfully pursue compensation in American courts. Once again, he left – this time for good.

Heirs recover his fortune

Aspden died in England in 1824, having spent nearly 50 years in exile from the city he always considered home.

Decades after his death, his heirs pursued a legal claim in the United States against Pennsylvania, arguing that his estate had been unjustly seized. After years of litigation, the court ruled in their favor in 1848, awarding them over a half-million dollars – approximately US$20 million today. It was a remarkable reversal, but Aspden never saw justice.

His life raises difficult questions about loyalty, identity and belonging. Aspden did not see himself as disloyal to Philadelphia. To him, loyalty to the British Crown and loyalty to home were not opposites.

His story reminds us that the Revolution was not just a fight for independence. It was also a civil conflict that divided communities and reshaped lives. For every celebrated patriot, there were loyalists like Aspden and others who lost so much during the American Revolution.

Read more of our stories about Philadelphia, or sign up for our Philadelphia newsletter on Substack.

Kimberly Nath does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

The United States is experiencing one of the steepest declines in violent crime in modern history, including a murder rate at its lowest point in more than a century.

Homicides across 35 major American cities fell 21% in 2025, amounting to 922 fewer people killed. Robberies dropped 23%. Gun assaults declined 22%. Carjackings plummeted 43%.

Yet the Trump administration has yanked hundreds of millions of dollars from the programs that helped make those numbers possible.

As a scholar focused on how policy decisions and structural conditions shape crime in marginalized communities, I see a pattern forming that could put these historic gains at serious risk.

‘Wasteful grants’

In April 2025, the Department of Justice terminated 365 previously awarded grants. About US$500 million in promised funds evaporated, affecting more than 550 organizations across 48 states.

The cuts stretched across the public safety landscape: community violence intervention, victim services, law enforcement training, juvenile justice, offender reentry and criminal justice research.

Then-Attorney General Pam Bondi described the cancellations as eliminating “wasteful grants.” The White House argued that the grant programs had been “funding DEI and cultural Marxism” rather than helping to keep Americans safe.

The DOJ’s fiscal year 2026 budget proposal reduces the pool of funds for public safety and justice programs by an additional $850 million – about a 15% decrease from the prior year.

Bipartisan programs

On the ground, the effects of the cancellations were immediate.

Initiatives implementing a federal law to support ex-inmates with temporary housing, job training and healthcare lost $40 million in funding, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at New York Unversity.

Many of the terminated programs had deep bipartisan roots.

Project Safe Neighborhoods, a crime-reduction initiative launched in 2001 under President George W. Bush, lost its training funds, the Council on Criminal Justice found. Also axed was an anti-terrorism program that had trained more than 430,000 state and local law enforcement officers and other partners since 1996.

More modest programs were targeted as well.

In rural Oregon, a DOJ grant had allowed the Union County district attorney to hire an investigator who, after a few years of probing a 43-year-old cold case involving the killing of a 21-year-old woman, finally developed some leads. When the money was cut, the investigation stopped.

Funding cliffs

The funding cuts couldn’t have come at a worse time. States and local jurisdictions were already facing looming cuts, as billions of dollars provided by President Joe Biden’s COVID recovery plan run out on Dec. 31, 2026.

Many local governments had used that money to build violence prevention programs from the ground up: employing community-based mediators, launching youth employment initiatives and expanding behavioral health teams.

And now? A double funding cliff with the sudden cancellation of DOJ grants, paired with the expiration of COVID recovery money.

In Chicago, this cliff has already forced a 43% cut to the city’s domestic violence prevention budget for 2026 – even as its share of domestic-related homicides rose 13% over the previous year.

Larger and more targeted

Criminology research helps explain the particular risks of abrupt disinvestment. Emory sociology professor Robert Agnew’s General Strain Theory identifies a direct relationship between increased strain – economic pressure, blocked opportunities, the withdrawal of institutional support – and higher risks of criminal behavior.

Historical precedent reinforces the concern. In 2013, federal across-the-board spending cuts eliminated services for more than 955,000 crime victims in a single year. The capacity of the FBI and related agencies was slashed by the equivalent of more than 1,000 agents.

Between 2014 and 2016, the violent crime rate climbed 7%.

The 2025 cuts are substantially larger and more targeted, and have devastated some groups.

Equal Justice USA, a national organization working to end the death penalty and reduce violence through community-based interventions, shut down in August 2025 after losing more than $3 million in DOJ grants.

Local programs like Baltimore’s LifeBridge Health’s Center for Hope lost $1.2 million to provide therapy for gun violence survivors.

“What shocked me the most … was what feels like the utter cruelty of it,” said Adam Rosenberg, who runs the center, referring to the cancellation of the funds.

As of April 2026, the DOJ has not paid out $200 million in approved grants to assist victims of domestic violence, sexual assault and human trafficking.

This comes after the department last year allowed more than 100 grants for human trafficking survivors to expire, affecting more than 5,000 victims, despite Congress allocating $88 million for these services.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania warn that cuts to violence prevention programs are likely to lead to increases in gun crime.

What happens next

The initiatives now losing funding are the ones that helped drive crime down in many American cities.

Community members trained in conflict mediation help extinguish tensions before they turn lethal. Youth programs provide alternatives to street economies. Forensic labs process the evidence that solves cases. Reentry programs keep people from cycling back through the system. With each serving a distinct function, together they form the infrastructure of public safety.

As funding for crime prevention from two main sources runs out, whether progress continues depends on what happens next.

Andrea Hagan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

A 35-year-old Kentucky woman was arrested in late 2025, accused of taking abortion pills that she ordered online.

The gestational age and status of the pregnancy is unknown. But Kentucky, like the majority of Southern states that contain Appalachian counties, has a complete abortion ban.

Mifepristone is a medication approved by the Food and Drug Administration for self-administered abortion care through 10 weeks’ gestation, and research suggests it is safe and effective up to 16 weeks. Mifepristone can still be ordered into states with abortion bans after the Supreme Court weighed in on the matter on May 4, 2026.

Abortion is illegal in Kentucky, however, and the police viewed the woman’s actions as criminal. A grand jury supported bringing charges, including fetal homicide, “abuse of a corpse” and tampering with physical evidence. Her distressed mugshot was plastered all over regional news sites.

As a social work researcher who studies access to reproductive healthcare in underserved Appalachian communities, I have worked with clients in similar circumstances. I have observed that many decisions to end pregnancies are motivated by intense barriers to accessing healthcare – not by criminal intent.

It can be extremely difficult for women in this region to get healthcare, and these access burdens affect quality of life in the region. For example, research suggests that Appalachian women are more likely to die at younger ages when compared to women living in other regions of the United States.

Here are six factors I consider when a case like this appears in the news.

1. Abortion bans do not stop abortion

Data clearly shows that outlawing abortion care does not stop abortions from happening.

According to data from the Society of Family Planning’s #WeCount project, U.S. abortion rates have actually increased since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, ending federal abortion protections.

What state abortion bans do is change how people try to get care.

2. Abortion bans isolate patients from doctors

For people living in most of rural Appalachia, brick-and-mortar abortion facilities are currently only available in another state, often a great distance away.

The only way many people can get care, then, is to order pills and self-manage their own abortion.

When someone orders abortion pills without medical consultation, however, there is more room for error in assessing relevant medical information, such as how far along their pregnancy is. When abortion care is legal and accessible, like other forms of healthcare, such estimates are made in consultation with a health provider.

Multiple clinics, community groups and pharmacies will send abortion pills to Kentucky for self-managing abortions up to about 13 weeks into pregnancy, according to the abortion access resource Plan C. These places may offer medical support, peer support or no additional support at all.

Patients who do involve a telehealth provider report satisfaction with that experience.

Yet patients in abortion-ban states may avoid using sites that are connected to support services because they fear being discovered and prosecuted. Abortion bans may therefore compel patients to make critical reproductive health decisions without consulting an expert.

This may have occurred in the Kentucky case, according to what the law enforcement officers reported to the Lexington Herald-Leader newspaper.

3. Ending Roe worsened healthcare deserts

Another factor to consider is how abortion bans contribute to existing healthcare deserts in rural Appalachian communities.

Even before the repeal of Roe, people living in Appalachian communities were not getting adequate healthcare. Communities in central and southern Appalachia face significant health disparities: These regions have higher illness and death rates and increased risk of cancer and diabetes compared to non-Appalachian areas of the United States.

In part, that has to do with inadequate healthcare infrastructure endemic in rural parts of the country. Geographic isolation, limited financial incentives and lack of infrastructure decrease the number of available health providers, meaning that only about 9% of U.S. physicians practice in rural areas.

Appalachia has lost regional obstetric services in recent years and seen numerous hospital closures, further discouraging providers from working there. One study found that of 53 rural hospitals that closed between 2005 and 2016, 66% of them were in Southern states, 21% in Appalachia.

This has reduced access to specialty care, including reproductive healthcare.

Abortion bans have compounded all these problems. They make it difficult, if not impossible, for providers to practice within established standards of care when treating conditions such as miscarriage, which can discourage ER physicians and OB-GYNs from remaining in red states.

The shortage of medical professionals makes it increasingly challenging to obtain reproductive healthcare in the region – except by mail.

4. Poverty influences reproductive decisions

Money is another important factor in people’s reproductive choices.

Research indicates that financial distress is a main reason that people seek abortions. Those who are denied abortion access are more likely to be in poverty four years after they give birth than those who were able to access it.

Appalachia’s history of resource extraction has left it impoverished. In Central Appalachia – in Kentucky – up to 21% of residents live in poverty.

The median household income in adjusted 2023 dollars in Wolfe County, Kentucky, where the woman was arrested, is just over US$29,000, compared to about $79,000 in the rest of the country. It costs approximately $232,000 to raise a child in Kentucky from birth to age 18, the mortgage broker LendingTree calculated in April 2026.

Facing the daunting cost of another mouth to feed, families confronting an unintended pregnancy may see abortion as a financial necessity. Appalachian residents in these circumstances are figuring out how to get the abortion care they need against steep odds.

5. In rural Appalachia, abortion can carry stigma

In rural Appalachian communities where most residents know each other, abortion and reproductive health stigma – some of which, research suggests, is rooted in religiosity – can present a significant barrier to care.

My own research has found that stigma may dissuade Appalachians from seeking healthcare and discussing sexual health topics with providers due to fear of judgment. Many Appalachians have reported to me their negative reproductive health visits with regional medical providers, including attempts to coerce patients into using or not using contraception.

Because abortion is stigmatized in Appalachian communities, healthcare workers may be inclined to inform police on their patients.

One news report indicates that in cases where abortions were reported to police, 39% of reports were made by health professionals and another 6% by social workers. In 412 cases of pregnancy criminalization analyzed by the advocacy group Pregnancy Justice, 264 involved information that had been disclosed in a medical setting.

That is what happened in the Kentucky case: People working in a clinic allegedly told the police that the woman had disclosed her abortion.

Abortion medication shipped directly to one’s home, by contrast, offers privacy.

The prosecutor eventually dismissed the homicide charge, because Kentucky law exempts pregnant people from being prosecuted for getting abortion care. But other charges were added, including concealing the birth of an infant. The woman may still be facing legal consequences.

6. Sex education is important – and lacking

One final factor I consider relevant in understanding this case is sex education – or rather, the lack of it in most Appalachian states.

Kentucky requires some sexual health education in public schools, but each county can dictate much of the content. Sex education in the state is not required to be comprehensive, and it must promote abstinence.

As NPR reported in 2023, there are parts of rural Appalachia without comprehensive sex education, where contraception is unaffordable and abortion is also banned. Those trying to provide better sex education have faced harassment and threats of violence.

When people do not receive the sexual health education needed to know their bodies and how they function, they are more vulnerable to negative health outcomes such as unintended pregnancy. And they may not know their bodies well enough to know how long they’ve been pregnant when they make reproductive health choices.

Bad policies, impossible situations

All of the factors listed above could potentially affect people in any community. But rural Appalachian communities are disproportionately affected by a confluence of these factors.

In my analysis, the Kentucky case elucidates how poor health infrastructure and bad health policies – such as abortion bans – place one barrier after another in front of people who are just trying to do the best they can to cope with an unintended pregnancy.

This story was produced in collaboration with Rewire News Group, an independent newsroom dedicated to covering reproductive health in the United States. Read their version here.

Gretchen E. Ely has previously received funding for her research from the Society of Family Planning.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation