Imagine Pleading Guilty Because You Can't Afford to Call Your Lawyer

Sunday, February 17, 2019 Help us keep civil rights violators in check: Support Truthout's bold, uncompromising journalism. [Donate Now →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [Imagine Pleading Guilty Because You Can't Afford to Call Your Lawyer]( Victoria Law, Truthout In 2013, the Federal Communications Commission set price caps on interstate calls from jails, prisons and detention facilities. In 2017, a federal court ruled it could not do the same for in-state calls, which make up 92 percent of prison and jail phone calls. This leaves some phone call rates sky-high and many incarcerated people less able to access legal resources that might mean the difference between prison and freedom. [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [North American Expats Contribute to Inequality in Latin America]( Matthew Hayes, Truthout Over the last decade, thousands of North Americans, mostly white retirees, have settled in Latin America and Mexico, citing lower costs of living and a desire for lifestyle change. In the process, they have brought gentrification and displacement to communities there, pushing local people off their land and into lives where they must work longer, often at lower pay, and unlike the lifestyle migrants, without hope of retirement. [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [Over 230 President's Day Protests Planned to Fight National Emergency]( Julia Conley, Common Dreams As of now, more than 230 demonstrations in cities and towns across the US are planned for Monday, February 18, with more than 10,000 Americans preparing to protest President Donald Trump's admittedly fake national emergency. After Trump's press conference Friday morning, progressive groups got to work organizing demonstrations against what CREDO co-director Heidi Hess called "an unconstitutional power grab that threatens our democracy and escalates Trump's attacks on immigrants, communities of color, Muslims and Black and Brown people." [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [After Superstorm Sandy's Rain, Cooperatives Sprang Up Like Mushrooms]( Laura Flanders, Truthout In the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, something unexpected rose up out of the devastation in the Rockaways neighborhood of New York City -- worker-owned businesses, initially created to meet the immediate needs of residents. Six years later, we get an update from Lorena Giron and Brendan Martin of The Working World, an organization focused on starting and sustaining cooperatives in low-income communities. [Watch the Video and Read the Interview →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [Teacher Strikes Are Rattling Washington]( Rachel M. Cohen, In These Times As Denver public school teachers are heading back to the classrooms, it's hard to dismiss the impact the nationwide teacher strikes have had on US politics. Further evidence of how the teacher protests have shaped the national conversation came this week as the House education committee convened for its first hearing on K-12 schools in the new Congress, and the topic of teacher pay was front and center. Republicans and Democrats both agreed that teacher salaries are simply too low. [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [A Green New Deal for American Labor?]( Saurav Sarkar, Labor Notes The Green New Deal would include a federal guarantee of living-wage employment and also include public investments in clean energy infrastructure. But significant forces in the labor movement are actively opposed to a Green New Deal, worried that members will lose their jobs in fossil fuel industries, which they say pay better than current jobs in the renewable energy sector. [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [Former EPA Official Launches Dark Money Group to Promote Trump's Energy Agenda]( Anna Massoglia, Center for Responsive Politics Environmental and energy policy is poised to be a hotly contested issue in the lead-up to the 2020 election. One new group that stands to play a key part in that conversation is Energy 45 Fund, a nonprofit organization founded by outgoing senior Trump administration adviser Mandy Gunasekara "to promote the Trump energy agenda" following her resignation from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [What It Really Takes to Secure Peace in Afghanistan]( Kathy Kelly, Voices for Creative Nonviolence In 2018, the U.S. dropped 7,632 bombs on Afghanistan, more than any other full calendar year since the U.S. Air Force began documenting its attacks in 2006. There was a 39 percent rise in the number of casualties from airstrikes last year. Continuing this cycle of violence and attacks has a devasting impact on Afghan citizens, but the nonprofit Afghan Peace Volunteers is working toward peace, even as its participants face daily anxieties in the chaos and upheaval that mark life in a war zone. [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- In Case You Missed It --------------------------------------------------------------- [Can Trump's Wall Survive His Fake Emergency?]( William Rivers Pitt, Truthout It took less than a day for Donald Trump and his emergency declaration to be sued, with more lawsuits likely to follow. When we look back on the crater left by this incredible failure of leadership, we will in all likelihood remember that his "big, beautiful" border wall died at its own Rose Garden party because the president tried and failed to outsmart a reporter. [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [Trump's Broken Promises to the Land of "American Carnage"]( Sean T. Posey, Truthout In late November, General Motors announced that it had no plans to allocate any new products to its Lordstown, Ohio, plant after it discontinues production on the Chevrolet Cruze this March. The move essentially ends the plant's last 1,600 jobs, and represents only the latest dispatch from the heartland of what President Trump has called "American carnage." [Read the Article →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- Like what you're reading? Support Truthout's independent news and analysis by making an automatic monthly donation. [Donate Now →]( Connect With Us [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [Instagram]( [Donate]( Truthout is a reader-supported, nonprofit organization; donations are tax-deductible. Truthout is a proud member of the Newspaper Guild/CWA, Local 36047. 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