Helen Santoro is is a reporter with the Lever based in Colorado.
Dark money groups extracted huge tax cuts from Colorado lawmakers by threatening to push ballot initiatives that would slash taxes even further. Referenda should promote democracy — yet billionaires are using them to blackmail the state.
Kamala Harris has signaled she supports closing the carried interest tax loophole, an enormous boon to rich investors looking to avoid higher taxes. But she’s also received $80 million this year from finance, insurance, and real-estate sectors.
An anti-immigration nonprofit with ties to hate groups is pushing GOP lawmakers to expand the use of a government website designed to screen workers’ immigration status.
On Friday, an update to a cybersecurity program took down Microsoft systems across the globe. Microsoft has resisted efforts to regulate a root cause of this chaos: the concentration of digital infrastructure in the hands of a few tech giants.
Just months before an assassin tried to kill Donald Trump, Pennsylvania Republicans blocked an attempt to ban the type of assault rifle used in the attack. It’s lunacy that these guns are on the streets — and that you can buy them at only 18.
Finance giants like Fidelity and Schwab are pushing “donor-advised funds” that enable the ultrawealthy to funnel cash to far-right extremist groups anonymously under the guise of charitable giving. Project 2025 has benefited enormously.
GOP vice presidential nominee J. D. Vance has pressured lawmakers to kill a rule that blocks police from accessing the medical records of people seeking abortions — an indication of the threat a Trump-Vance administration would pose to reproductive health.
Private equity firms are scoring huge payouts from manufacturers to take on the financial risks of people getting sick from asbestos poisoning — and using ruthless legal maneuvers to delay and deny compensation to victims.
Boeing is facing scrutiny from the Justice Department that could lead to criminal charges. But a department official involved in the case formerly consulted on behalf of the company — just one among many such officials with close corporate connections.
Since the 2023 East Palestine derailment disaster, the railroad industry has continued to lobby against federal safety regulations, even as new data suggests that recent increases in train length have made derailments more likely.
A historic congestion pricing plan for New York City was slated to go into effect this month. NY governor Kathy Hochul suddenly blocked it this week — and has taken tens of thousand of dollars in campaign funding from auto groups opposed to the plan.
Teaming up with Big Pharma and Wall Street, universities are profiting by fighting government efforts to curtail soaring drug prices. A case in point: UCLA has reaped more than a billion dollars from its development of Xtandi, a lifesaving cancer drug.
The generic drug industry is pushing back against a government effort to lower the cost of lifesaving medications, even though the plan is built around letting them make more generic drugs.
Big Oil and shipping interests have lobbied for years to keep a law on the books that caps their liability following deadly disasters. The company linked to the Baltimore Key Bridge collapse aims to use it to avoid paying damages and compensation.
As Maryland governor, current GOP senate candidate Larry Hogan flouted safety warnings and sought to attract massive cargo vessels to Baltimore’s port — vessels just like the one that crashed into the Key Bridge last week.
The company responsible for the Baltimore bridge collapse blocked its employees from reporting safety concerns to the US Coast Guard. It is now being sanctioned by federal regulators for violating a whistleblower protection law.
For the first time ever, Medicare is negotiating with pharmaceutical companies to reduce the cost of lifesaving medicines. Big Pharma’s favorite Democrats are working to curtail the negotiations and protect the industry’s tax loopholes.
Pharmacy benefit managers push expensive medications and slash drug reimbursement rates, pocketing the profits for themselves. Congress looked set to regulate these shadowy middlemen — but $50 million in industry lobbying later, the effort has stalled.
Saddled with legal burdens, Elon Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX, is relocating to Texas to seek refuge in the state’s new business court system — which is controlled by his longtime ally, Republican governor Greg Abbott.
Ultrarich private universities are fighting hard against government efforts to tax their multibillion-dollar endowments. That revenue could be used to help provide low-cost public higher education for all.