As Highways Expand, Black Communities Are Threatened With Flooding and Land Loss

Timothy Williams’ family has lived in the same community for over 150 years, but he is afraid that they are one big storm away from losing it all. Eight years ago, the Alabama Department of Transportation widened the highway that runs just a few yards from Williams’ home in Shiloh. Since then, every time it rains, water has flowed down the highway, flooding his land with enough force to…
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Black Farmers Warn Pollution Is Changing The Food on Our Plates

If you’re lucky, your family is still using great‑grandma’s red beans and rice, black‑eyed peas, and potato salad recipes. And if you’re extremely fortunate, those meals might still taste like home, even without her hands. But climate pollution has quietly made sure that the food on your plates is not the same food she was eating. Rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is stripping nutrients…
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In Memphis, Investors Benefit From AI Boom While the Public Bears Its Cos

In Memphis, Tennessee, questions about AI data centers are rising nearly as quickly as their price tags. Recent reporting shows that Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI now has properties in Memphis appraised at roughly $3.4 billion, a staggering valuation that will shape how much the company contributes in property taxes and how local officials frame its economic impact.
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Black “Cancer Alley” Residents Win Key Ruling in Environmental Racism Case

In a pocket of Louisiana known as “Cancer Alley,” Black residents bear the generational toll of “plantation country” becoming “pollution country.” Seven times as many people are expected to be diagnosed with cancer than the national average in these disproportionately Black communities. Now, a federal district court has given those residents something they almost never get: a chance to…
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Amid the Winter Storm, a Rural SC County Quietly Approved a $2.4B Data Center

As a rare winter storm bore down on South Carolina, bringing conditions that historically paralyze the state for days, local officials in a rural county quietly pushed through a massive $2.4 billion data center without most residents knowing it was even on the table. “There was a public meeting, which most were unaware of,” Jessie Chandler, a resident of rural Marion County, told Capital B…
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Venezuelan Oil Brought to US Would Be Refined in Black Gulf Coast Communities

On Saturday morning, John Beard woke up to news that he’d been dreading, but preparing for: A global oil crisis could hit closer to home in Texas. The southeastern part of the state is home to more than a dozen oil refineries, and he’d spent decades working at one of them. But after attending more funerals than he could count for loved ones that died from cancer, he began to feel differently…
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