Mérida, Yucatán In 2013, my friend Juan’s cousin disappeared while attempting to cross from Mexico into the United States to return to his job at a restaurant in Florida. The cousin had successfully crossed the border on several previous occasions, and this particular passage, Juan tells me, was reportedly arranged by the restaurant’s proprietor via […]

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The GOP Affordable Care Act replacement draft includes reforms promoted by Speaker of the House Paul Ryan since (and before) the passage of the ACA, including funding Medicaid with block grants to states and a per capita cap on Medicaid funding. The federal government pays a fixed share of states’ Medicaid costs. Under Ryancare, federal […]

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Here’s how Donald Trump’s new immigration policy looks at ground level. On the Monday afternoon before Valentine’s Day, Juan Manuel García was taking the office mail to the post office two blocks south of the Capitol in Austin, Texas, when he saw an unmarked black Dodge crew-cab pickup make a quick U-turn. An “anglo” man […]

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America prides itself on peaceful transitions from one president to the other. No coups. No backstabbing. No backward glances at what might have been. We witness this every four years or, at the most, every eight. No matter how bitter a presidential campaign or how antithetical an outgoing president’s policies and ideology may be from […]

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A friend writes, “For basically the past six months or so I’ve been trying to tell my lefty friends in so many words, ‘Hey, there are a bunch of people on the Internet who are waiting for someone to tell them it’s okay to start shooting at you.’” He became concerned when a thread at […]

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