Leaked audio revealed elected officials, including City Council President Nury Martinez, making xenophobic, homophobic, and racist statements about their colleagues and constituents. The city has united in fury.

Pro-pot Californians said legalizing marijuana would end the state’s black market for reefer. Instead, says LA Times investigative reporter Paige St. John, the illegal market is bigger than ever.

Chinese President Xi Jinping is a product of Mao Zedong’s revolution. On Sunday, he'll become the most powerful Chinese leader since the Communist Party’s founder — and maybe the most powerful person in the world.

The Endangered Species Act was transformative in protecting animals from extinction. Vox’s Benji Jones says its proposed successor, the Recovering America’s Wildlife Act, would be the most significant conservation law in decades.

The 22-year-old Iranian died in police custody after being arrested for wearing her hijab improperly. Her death has sparked a protest movement calling for the end of a regime that has for decades ruled Iran with an iron fist.

They’ve got a few legislative ideas and a LOT of investigative ones. Vox’s Rachel Cohen and Ben Jacobs explain.

John Fetterman, the 6-foot-8, hoodie and cargo shorts-wearing Democratic candidate for Senate in Pennsylvania, may be the model for how progressives can win elections. He just needs to beat Dr. Oz.

Vladimir Putin keeps threatening to use smaller nuclear weapons to win his war. Author J. Peter Scoblic says “there’s no such thing as small nukes.”

President Biden’s plan to forgive billions of dollars in student debt is both historic and controversial. Now some red states are suing to block it. NPR’s Cory Turner explains.

Days after Ian, most Floridians now have their power back. Weeks after Fiona, more than 100,000 Puerto Rican households and businesses are still coping with blackouts and an outdated grid. The Washington Post’s Arelis Hernández explains.

According to Vox’s Ian Millhiser (and no, he hasn’t forgotten they just overturned Roe).

An extraordinary case of fraud is unfolding in Mississippi, where a chummy cadre of nonprofit leaders, elected officials, and professional athletes redirected tens of millions in welfare funds toward their own pet projects. Mississippi Today’s Anna Wolfe explains.

Elvedin Pasic lived through the Bosnian genocide in the early 1990s. So why is one of Bosnia’s leaders saying it never happened? And what happens if that leader, Milorad Dodik, wins a national election this weekend?

Pipelines are leaking, winter is coming, and concerns over an energy crisis in Europe are growing. Vox’s Jen Kirby heads to Oktoberfest to find out more.

Republicans have firmly held the Texas governorship since 1995. Beto O’Rourke’s campaign is both a long shot and Democrats’ best challenge in decades.

The Russian president is calling on reservists and holding fake referenda to legitimize his war. Washington Post reporter Mary Ilyushina explains.

I wish I was a baller. I wish there was a doc who’d break my legs, I would call her.

Thousands of people say Johnson and Johnson’s baby powder gave them cancer. They’re suing — but the consumer giant is using a bankruptcy strategy called the “Texas two-step” to limit its liability.

After catastrophic flooding, Pakistani people are demanding better disaster management from their government. Their government wants reparations from wealthy countries.

The billionaire founder of Patagonia is giving away his company to fight climate change. He’s also getting a giant tax break.

The war in Ukraine has demonstrated just how dysfunctional the United Nations is. Uri Friedman, managing editor at the Atlantic Council, explains how to fix it.

The historical epic The Woman King, in theaters today, is set in the Kingdom of Dahomey in the 19th century. The kingdom’s elite all-female fighting force was evidence of its enlightened attitude toward women, but its participation in the transatlantic slave trade is a stain on its history. Director Gina Prince-Bythewood and economist Leonard Wantchekon, a descendent of the women fighters, explain.

As the coronavirus pandemic disrupted business in the US, the government sent billions of dollars to people and businesses that were affected. That led to an epidemic of financial scams.

A recent Ukrainian counteroffensive seems to have caught Russia on its back foot. That could have consequences for Putin in the war — and at home. The Washington Post’s Mary Ilyushina explains.

A quartet of 2020 election deniers are running for secretary of state this year in key swing states, raising questions about whether they could fairly administer the 2024 presidential election.