By Raymond Bonner/Special to ProPublica

In August of 2002, interrogators at a secret CIA-run prison in Thailand set out to break a Palestinian man they believed was one of al-Qaeda’s top leaders.
As the CIA’s video cameras rolled, security guards shackled Abu Zubaydah to a gurney and interrogators poured water over his mouth and nose until he began to suffocate. They slammed him against a wall, confined him for hours in a coffin-like box, and deprived him of sleep.
The 31-year-old Zubaydah begged for mercy, saying that he knew nothing about the terror group’s future plans. The CIA official in charge, known in agency lingo as the “chief of base,” mocked his complaints, accusing Zubaydah of faking symptoms of psychological breakdown. The torture continued.

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Posted on February 27, 2017

By Renee Dudley/Reuters

BOSTON – Last month, the governing body of the College Board – the not-for-profit that owns the SAT college entrance exam – met at the Ritz-Carlton resort in Fort Lauderdale for its annual retreat.
In 2016, the organization struggled with myriad problems: security lapses overseas, a major breach of questions from the new SAT in the United States, concerns that math questions on the redesigned exam were too long, and continuing setbacks in its years-long effort to digitize the test.
Whether the organization’s Board of Trustees discussed any of those issues at its Florida retreat is unclear. Trustees have declined to discuss the College Board’s problems. In a statement to Reuters, a spokeswoman cautioned that “outside experts” who comment on the College Board “have no knowledge of the Board of Trustees’ deliberations.”
A lack of disclosure by the board is precisely the issue, say some specialists in non-profit governance. Oversight of the College Board and its CEO, David Coleman, has been opaque, they say, as members of the Board of Trustees have proved unwilling to discuss how the organization is handling its problems.

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Posted on February 17, 2017

By Centro de Trabajadores Unidos: Immigrant Workers’ Project

CALUMET CITY – On Wednesday evening, community residents of Calumet City will host a nonpartisan candidates forum to ask candidates where they stand on local issues.
Given the current political climate around the recent executive orders targeting specific communities as well as the raids this past weekend in which 600 people were arrested by federal immigration agents, many immigrants like Guadalupe Baez are wondering where current and potential elected officials stand on strengthening protections for immigrants in Calumet City.

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Posted on February 14, 2017

By A.C. Thompson/ProPublica

The year was 2012. The place was Bowling Green, Ohio. A federal raid had uncovered what authorities feared were the makings of a massacre. There were 18 firearms, among them two AR201315 assault rifles, an AR201310 assault rifle and a Remington Model 700 sniper rifle. There was body armor, too, and the authorities counted some 40,000 rounds of ammunition. An extremist had been arrested, and prosecutors suspected that he had been aiming to carry out a wide assortment of killings.
“This defendant, quite simply, was a well-funded, well-armed and focused one-man army of racial and religious hate,” prosecutors said in a court filing.

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Posted on February 8, 2017

By Jon Marcus/The Hechinger Report

This article was originally published by The Hechinger Report in March 2016.
MELBOURNE, Australia – He admits it: José Lopez always dreamed of going to America and using his training in information technology to make his fortune.
But even if he hadn’t been put off by the rhetoric from across the border about building walls and banning people based on their religion, there were 52 times more applicants for visas to emigrate to the United States from his native Mexico in 2015 than were made available under a complex quota system. And even if a technology company agreed to sponsor him, that route, too, was closed off when the number of workers who applied for those kinds of visas in the first week was three times the annual cap.
Which is why Lopez has come to find himself in a classroom in Melbourne boning up on his English and preparing for a new life in Australia, a country that invites skilled, well-educated immigrants like him with comparatively open arms.

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Posted on February 7, 2017

By Tom Polansek and Mark Weinraub/Reuters

CHICAGO – U.S. food producers and shippers are trying to speed up exports to Mexico and line up alternative markets as concerns rise that this lucrative business could be at risk if clashes over trade and immigration between the Trump administration and Mexico City escalate.
Diplomatic relations have soured fast this month, as the new U.S. administration floated a 20 percent tax on Mexican imports and a meeting between the presidents of the two countries was canceled. U.S. President Donald Trump has also pledged to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement trade deal with Mexico and Canada.
Mexico is one of the top three markets for U.S. farm production.

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Posted on February 6, 2017

By Patrick Stokes/The Conversation

Hey, remember 2016? When all those beloved celebrities kept dying and we couldn’t wait for the year to be over? We’re now less than a month into 2017 and two weeks into Donald Trump’s presidency, and the Internet finds itself seriously conflicted over whether it’s ok to punch Nazis.
Nostalgic yet?

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Posted on February 3, 2017