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Gregory J. Reiter Award
Each year, Gregory J. Reiter Award is given to an individual or group that demonstrates inspiring compassion and dedication to animals. Greg was a beloved member of the PETA family with his wife Alysoun for many years. Together, they gave refuge to 17 rescued animals including former race horses rescued by PETA. This year’s award recipient, Julia Novak, is a 10 year PETA veteran who has worked on PETA’s mobile clinics, participated in countless protests, delivered life changing dog houses with our Community Animal Project, and fostered PETA rescues, including Itchy who was adopted by Alysoun and Greg! Julia is shaping the next generation of animal activists as loving mother to her sweet son, West, who already advocates for everyone he meets to be vegan.
As COVID Infections Soar, Trump Attacks Dr. Fauci, CDC & Pushes Schools to Reopen at All Costs
As the world and the United States shatter the daily records of COVID-19 infections, President Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos continue to push for public schools to reopen in the fall without a plan to adhere to CDC guidelines. “We need to be doing this safely,” responds emergency physician Dr. Leana Wen. “We’ve already seen what happens when we use shortcuts.” Meanwhile, the White House continues to attack the nation’s top infectious disease specialist, Dr. Anthony Fauci, and Wen says, “I fear that at this point we are not even seeing the peak of this epidemic.”
We Are Not Your Mascots: Washington NFL Team Removes Racist Name After Years of Indigenous Protests
The Washington NFL team, whose name and mascot have been a slur against Native Americans for nearly 90 years, announced Monday it will change its racist name, facing mounting pressure from corporate sponsors. The decision is a hard-fought victory for Indigenous activists who for years have demanded the team remove the R-word from its name. It also comes as the Black Lives Matter movement has forced a reckoning about monuments and tributes to racism around the country. We get response from Amanda Blackhorse, a Navajo activist who has led the fight to change the name and logo of the Washington R-dsk-ns football team.
As COVID-19 Cases Spike, Epidemiologist Warns “The Road to an Uncertain Vaccine Is Paved in Death”
As the U.S. reports its highest one-day spike in infections and 11 states report record hospitalizations, the Trump administration is demanding states stop sending COVID patient data to the CDC, which then releases it to the public. We speak with Dr. Ali Khan, epidemiologist and the dean of the College of Public Health at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, about the Trump administration’s handling of the crisis and his hopes for a vaccine. “The road to an uncertain vaccine is paved in death,” notes Dr. Khan. He is the former director of the CDC’s Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response, where he oversaw the Strategic National Stockpile. We also ask him about the ongoing shortages of masks and tests.
The Left Remakes the World: Amna Akbar on Canceling Rent, Defunding Police & Where We Go from Here
We look at another looming crisis for the American public: mass evictions. More than four months into a pandemic that has left millions unemployed, eviction freezes across the country are ending, even as case numbers rise and states reimpose lockdown measures. As the Cancel the Rent movement inspires rent strikes and protests nationwide, a coalition of labor unions, workers and racial and social justice groups in 25 states plans to stage a mass walkout this Monday called the “Strike for Black Lives.” We speak with Amna Akbar, law professor at Ohio State University, who wrote about how to respond to all of this in her op-ed in Sunday’s New York Times headlined “The Left Is Remaking the World.”
Tucson Mayor Romero Slams Arizona Gov. Ducey for Downplaying COVID & Hasty Reopening as ICUs Fill
As COVID-19 cases soar in the U.S. South and Southwest, we go to the hot spot of Arizona, where 88% of ICU beds are full and the family of one man accuses Arizona Governor Ducey and President Trump of being directly responsible for his death, after they downplayed the threat of the virus and obstructed local officials from requiring masks even as Arizona’s case numbers were exploding. “We have been in a state of crisis since Governor Ducey decided to hastily reopen the state,” says Tucson Mayor Regina Romero, who has been standing up to Ducey and is the first Latina and the first woman to be elected mayor of Tucson, and the daughter of migrant farmworkers.
Disability Rights Activists Take on Twin Pandemics of Racist Police Brutality & COVID-19
Two months after the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis sparked an international uprising, we look at the underreported but devastating impact police violence has on people with disabilities, especially Black disabled people. According to at least one study, up to one-half of people killed by law enforcement in the U.S. have a disability. “People with disabilities have always been attacked by police. And people with disabilities and poor people have our own answers,” says Leroy Moore, a Black disabled activist and artist, POOR Magazine co-founder and founder of the Krip-Hop Nation. “Our own answer is to really get rid of police.” We also speak with POOR Magazine co-founder Lisa “Tiny” Gray-Garcia and discuss challenges they’ve faced during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Release Is Only Way to Save Lives”: Migrant Families Face Separation as COVID Spreads in ICE Jails
As the United States leads the world in coronavirus infections, we go behind the walls of immigrant jails, where infection rates are also soaring, and also look at how thousands more jailed migrant parents may be separated from their children starting Friday. “Release is the only way to save the lives of people in custody,” says reporter Jacob Soboroff, who went inside these ICE jails and first witnessed kids in cages in 2018, which he writes about in his new book, “Separated: Inside an American Tragedy.”
How to Stop the Next Pandemic: U.N. Report Links Outbreaks to Climate Crisis & Industrial Farming
As the unprecedented global health emergency continues to unfold, a new United Nations report says humans must lower stress on the natural environment to prevent the next pandemic. COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, has a zoonotic origin, meaning it jumped from animals to humans, and the U.N. report finds that such diseases are spreading with greater frequency due to human activity, including industrial farming and the climate crisis. “Rather than focusing on the symptoms, we were looking at the causes,” says Delia Grace, lead author of the report, veterinary epidemiologist at the International Livestock Research Institute in Kenya and professor of food safety at the U.K. Natural Resources Institute.
Viagra? Yes. Birth Control? No. SCOTUS Sides with Trump & Limits Free Contraception Under Obamacare
The Supreme Court dealt a major blow to reproductive rights when it sided with the Trump administration in letting employers deny people access to free birth control based on religious or moral grounds, hollowing out a mandate under the Affordable Care Act that requires most private health insurance plans to provide cost-free birth control. “It’s a really deeply disappointing ruling,” says Fatima Goss Graves, president and CEO of the National Women’s Law Center. “These individuals are effectively on their own to find and pay for their contraception.”
The Three SCOTUS Decisions in a nushell:
