Featured – This is what an antiracist America would look like. How do we get there? Ibram X. Kendi / The Guardian

Opposing racism is not the same as building an antiracist society. Our new series, Antiracism and America, looks at the structures that sustain a racist society – and how we dismantle them. We should not see our era of resurgent white nationalism as the racist end, but the antiracist beginning. Read more

Republicans are undermining democracy state by state. Russ Feingold / The Guardian

As Michigan and Wisconsin pass bills stripping newly elected Democrats of power, we need legislative solutions to show the country it’s not business as usual. This is not how democracy works, and these maneuvers in Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and North Carolina are not just power grabs. They are deliberate efforts to undermine democracy and our faith in it. And these efforts are getting more brazen and desperate every year. Read more

Mitch McConnell is personally denying Donald Trump a win that nearly everyone would celebrate. Sam Fulwood III / Thinkprogress

The Senate has the votes to pass a bipartisan criminal justice reform that advocates like and that the President wants. The Senate Majority leader won’t let it happen. Read more

He Served the Longest Sentence of Any Innocent U.S. Inmate. Cassandra Evaniskovia via Lonelyleap / The Atlantic

In 1975, Rickey Jackson was 18 years old when he was sentenced to death for a murder he didn’t commit. Before a witness recantation led to his immediate exoneration and release, Jackson spent four decades in prison. He is the longest-serving exoneree in U.S. history. Watch the video here  

The Murder Case Seemed Solid. Here’s Why Jurors Would Not Convict. Jan Ransom / NYT

The Queens district attorney’s office believed its case against Chanel Lewis was airtight. Prosecutors had a videotape of Mr. Lewis confessing to the murder of 30-year-old Karina Vetrano two years ago as she jogged through a Queens park. Police had also found his DNA on her body. But after a two-week trial last month, the unexpected happened: The jury remained hopelessly deadlocked after only two days of deliberations. The judge quickly declared a mistrial. Prosecutors did not object. Read more

Native American imagery is all around us, while the people are often forgotten. Mark Trahant / National Geographic

For indigenous people, everything from the word “America” to the insulting ways native symbols are used is a reminder of how those of European ancestry nearly killed a culture—and still misrepresent it. Read more

Native American Lives Are Tragic, But Probably Not in the Way You Think. Terese Mailhot / Mother Jones

No matter what we write, white people can turn our stories into weapons, an excuse to be paternalistic. If we depict ourselves as educated and self-­sufficient, they might advance the narrative that our tragedies are long past, that we should dust ourselves off and move on. If we are portrayed as poor or dysfunctional or prone to alcoholism, they can use that to take away services or argue that we game the system. No matter what we do, we’re still Indian, and often we don’t get to speak for ourselves. Read more

Smithsonian Adds Gallery Honoring Latino-American Culture. Peter Libbey / NYT

The Smithsonian Institution announced on Thursday that it will add a gallery dedicated to honoring Latino-American experiences to the National Museum of American History. “Latino history is American history, and we have a responsibility to reflect the stories and experiences of Latinas and Latinos in the U.S. today,” Eduardo Díaz, the director of the Smithsonian Latino Center, said in a statement. Read more

Large cities still segregated even as nation becoming more diverse. Tara Bahrampour / Wash Post

Even as the United States becomes increasingly diverse, neighborhood segregation patterns persist in large urban areas, including in the Washington metro region, according to five-year trend data from the Census Bureau. Segregation has remained most entrenched between black and white residents, while segregation between whites and Hispanics and whites and Asians is more fluid, according to an analysis of the bureau’s latest American Community Survey data. Read more

He Doesn’t Know the System. He’s Been out of Football for Too Long. Nick Greene / Slate

They’ve had two years. NFL coaches still haven’t come up with a good excuse for their teams not signing Colin Kaepernick. Read more

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