News Releases

  • Billionaires vs. Zohran Mamdani

    “A social-media screed by hedge-fund manager Bill Ackman (net worth: upward of $9 billion) was damn near apoplectic that activists and voters had so terribly transgressed. Ackman described himself as ‘a supporter of President Trump’ while expressing a fervent desire ‘to save the Democratic Party from itself.’ Mamdani’s policies, Ackman wrote late Wednesday night, ‘would be disastrous for NYC. Socialism has no place in the economic capital of our country.’”


  • As Israel Kills Aid-Seekers, Fasters at UN Hold News Conference

    The “Veterans & Allies Fast for Gaza” began May 22 “when six members of Veterans For Peace and allies traveled to New York City to stand at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. It has grown to over 800 people across the country and includes small groups in South Africa, Canada, Italy, Germany, Ireland, Hong Kong and Australia. Friends of Sabeel, NA has added critical behind-the-scenes support.” Fasters at the U.N. have limited themselves to “250 calories per day, considered medically to be a starvation diet and the amount reported early this year as the average available” to Palestinians…


  • Trump is “Far from a ‘Peace President’”

    In a news conference on Thursday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called the White House’s latest strikes on Iranian nuclear sites “highly successful.” But longtime anti-war activists see the strikes as a horrific decision by the Trump administration to attack a country that had not attacked the United States.


  • Nationwide Impacts of Science Funding Cuts

    The Science and Community Impacts Mapping Project (SCIMaP) has created an interactive map that reveals the projected nationwide impacts of the Trump administration’s cuts to NIH funding for crucial health research, including on cancer, diabetes, dementia and more. The White House has proposed budget cuts to NIH research of $18 billion compared to FY 2024. Those cuts are projected to cause more than $46 billion in lost economic activity, given that every dollar of NIH support translates to 2.5 dollars of economic activity. 


  • Does Mamdani’s Win Mean Voters Will “Embrace Truly Progressive Change”?

    In a statement, RootsAction said “we announced our support on the day his campaign launched in October because we knew that his platform — with such planks as freezing rent, creating free bus service, and no-cost childcare — was tailored to help working people in New York City, not the landlord lobby.”


  • War with Iran: * Media Coverage * Corruption at IAEA

    “The New York Times‘ echo of the standard Israeli and U.S. propaganda line offers an opportunity to critically examine this most recent justification for aggressive war. The premise here was that Iran is working to build a nuclear weapon, something that forms the backbone of the Israeli propaganda campaign justifying their actions. The only problem is that there is no evidence whatsoever for this position. Not only is there no evidence that Iran is building a nuclear weapon, there is no reason to think that if they did, they would be anything other than defensive weapons.”


  • Why Did the U.S. Bomb Iran Now?

    “Israel seeks to be the regional hegemon and for a long time Iran stood in its way. The real threat Iran has historically posed to Israel, rhetoric aside, has never been existential but rather strategic and ideological.“


  • Trump “Has Usurped” Congressional War Powers, “Summit of Impeachable Offenses”

    “President Trump has usurped the war power of Congress in making the United States a belligerent against Iran by systematic provision of intelligence, weapons, advisors, and military personnel in support of Israel’s criminal war of aggression. Mr. Trump tacitly acknowledged American belligerency in boasting, ‘we now have complete and total control of the skies over Iran’ and bugling for Iran’s ‘unconditional surrender.’”


  • Israel’s Gaza Killing Spree, Netanyahu’s Manipulation of Americans

    “Israel murdered this baby along with two of his siblings yesterday in Jabalia. … the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, BBC, and others! … You justified his killing with your coverage, even before he was born. Even after his murder, you did not run a story on him. You dehumanized him and his family. You dehumanized all Palestinians, most of whom were born under occupation and siege.”


  • “Impunity is Fueling Israel’s Spiraling Aggression”

    The New Statesman writes in “Impunity is fueling Israel’s spiraling aggression” that “Israel attacked Iran not out of fear but out of hubris. … This is the overwhelming lesson Israel has drawn from the past 20 months amid its intensifying onslaught on Gaza: there is no limit to what the world will let it get away with. Now, as it bombs its sixth neighbouring state or occupied territory in less than two years, there should be no doubt that impunity is the lifeblood of Israel’s far-right government, and the fuel driving its spiraling aggression. Until it runs up against firm…


  • The Environment: Behind the Rhetoric

    PATTI GOLDMAN A managing attorney with Earthjustice Defense Fund, Goldman said today: “Differences between Bush and Gore include the Arctic Wildlife Refuge, which came up in the debates. There are also differences in the priority and strategies for recovering Pacific salmon…. Gore favors having labor and environmental protection in trade agreements while Bush has not…

  • Bush and Gore Agree Death Penalty Deters; But What Are the Facts?

    Last night, presidential candidates George W. Bush and Al Gore agreed that the death penalty is an effective deterrent. “I think the reason to support the death penalty is because it saves other people’s lives,” Bush said during the debate. Gore agreed, saying: “I support the death penalty…. I think it is a deterrence. I…

  • Big Oil Gets Bigger: Chevron and Texaco

    Chevron has just agreed to acquire Texaco for $36 billion. This follows the BP-Amoco and Exxon-Mobil mergers. The following analysts are available for comments: WENONAH HAUTER Director of Public Citizen’s Critical Mass Energy Project, Hauter said today: “This trend towards more consolidation in the oil industry is bad for consumers in the long run and…

  • Perspectives on Mideast Crisis

    MARC ELLIS Director of the Center for American and Jewish Studies at Baylor University in Texas and author of Oh Jerusalem: The Contested Future of the Jewish Covenant, Ellis said today: “The escalation of the Israeli helicopter gunships firing into civilian areas is just appalling…. Justice would mean a shared real sovereignty of all of…

  • Interviews Available on Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

    ALLEGRA PACHECO An Israeli Jewish human rights lawyer who represents Palestinians in the West Bank, Pacheco is now a fellow at the Bunting Institute at Radcliffe. She wrote in The New York Times last week: “Since 1994, Palestinians have seen the influx of 50,000 new Jewish settlers into the West Bank and Gaza, the paving…

  • Revolution in Yugoslavia?

    ROBERT HAYDEN Director of the Center for Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pittsburgh and author of Blueprints for a House Divided: The Constitutional Logic of the Yugoslav Conflict, Hayden said today: “The army has broken with the regime. The state media has been taken over by the opposition. It’s a real…

  • Beyond Debate for Bush and Gore

    STEFFIE WOOLHANDLER Co-director of the Center for National Health Program Studies at Harvard University, Woolhandler said today: “On Medicare, Gore supports what is happening now — seniors slowly being forced into HMOs — while Bush supports accelerating the process. Bush cloaks his privatization of Medicare as ‘choice,’ but it means choosing between restrictive HMO ‘A’…

  • Debate Commission Says Gore-Bush Only: Responses Available

    The Commission on Presidential Debates has formally announced that it intends to exclude all third party candidates from the presidential debates. Phil Donahue (who is a member of the Committee to Elect Ralph Nader President) wrote in the Sunday Los Angeles Times: “If Ralph Nader is excluded from the presidential debates, many issues important to…

  • Key Economic Issues: Oil, IMF, Euro

    WENONAH HAUTER Director of Public Citizen’s Critical Mass Energy Project, Hauter said today: “Oil interests have used their enormous political power — which has increased with Exxon-Mobil and other mergers — to stop public policies that advance energy efficiency and conservation. Lehman Brothers reported recently that profits from the four largest oil companies are expected…

  • Analysts Available on National Association of Broadcasters

    The National Association of Broadcasters, which lobbies for the commercial broadcast industry, is holding its annual radio convention in San Francisco through September 23. Nonviolent protests are planned. These analysts are available for interviews: ROBERT McCHESNEY Professor at the Institute of Communications Research at the University of Illinois and author of Rich Media, Poor Democracy:…

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