Via Anna Claire Vollers: Universities have faced pressure from lawmakers from laws that passed to scale back academic freedom for faculty that critics say are politically motivated. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/26/repub/public-universities-face-escalating-involvement-from-state-lawmakers/

Via Jennifer Shutt: Congressional Republicans' efforts to pass a budget bill with more money for immigration enforcement have been stymied by the President's voting bill. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/26/repub/gop-dreams-of-another-big-budget-bill-dashed-by-trump-demands-for-save-america-act/

Via Ariana Figueroa: The U.S. Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to strip temporary legal status from 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/26/repub/us-supreme-court-rules-trump-administration-can-end-legal-protections-for-350000-haitians/

Via Kelcie Moseley-Morris: Four years after the Dobbs decision, some clinics expanded the possibility to have abortions later in the term because of medical issues. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/26/repub/4-years-after-dobbs-advocates-clash-over-how-far-to-take-fight-for-later-abortion-access/

Via Anna Barrett: Alabama lawmakers said they have a “colossal task” ahead of them to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) to protect children. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/26/regulating-artificial-intelligence-will-be-colossal-task-for-alabama-lawmakers/

Via Andrea Tinker: The June 16 primary runoff saw a decrease in the number of Republican votes cast while the number of Democratic ballots increased. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/26/republican-ballot-numbers-drop-democrat-ballot-numbers-increase-as-voter-turnout-declines/

Via Jonathan Shorman: A federal appeals court ruled the Department of Justice isn’t entitled to access the sensitive personal data of Michigan voters. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/25/repub/judges-block-trump-push-for-michigan-voter-info-setting-up-possible-supreme-court-fight/

Via Jonathan Shorman: The U.S. Postal Service won’t mail ballots in states that do not turn over lists of voters under a proposed rule, the agency’s chief said. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/25/repub/states-that-wont-obey-trump-order-will-have-their-mail-ballots-halted-postmaster-says/

Via States Newsroom: U.S. Senate Republicans walked into a lunch with the president on Wednesday looking for ways to unify, but left fractured as ever about policy goals. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/25/repub/lunch-with-mad-as-a-murder-hornet-trump-and-us-senate-gop-fails-to-heal-divisions/

Via @nhassanein.bsky.social: Seventeen Republican attorneys general have sued California over a state law that requires plastic packaging producers to move away from single-use plastics. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/25/repub/17-gop-ags-sue-california-over-single-use-plastics-law/

Via Andrea Tinker: Gov. Kay Ivey announced that Alabama will have 64 new First Class Pre-K classrooms this fall supported by the Alabama Department of Early Education to increase access. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/25/alabama-to-expand-first-class-pre-k-program-to-64-classrooms-this-fall/

Via Anna Barrett: The Alabama Department of Public Health (ADPH) last week approved a set of rules for public comment for nursing homes and assisted living facilities. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/25/adph-proposes-new-rules-for-nursing-homes-assisted-living-facilities/

Via Jacob Fischler and @jennifershutt.bsky.social: President Donald Trump derailed a popular housing bill until Congress passes an election security measure. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/24/repub/trump-administration-in-court-win-allowed-to-conduct-nationwide-fast-track-deportations/

Via Ashley Murray: The Republican-led U.S. Senate served up a rare public check on President Donald Trump when it approved a House-passed War Powers Resolution to end hostilities in Iran. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/24/repub/us-senate-joins-house-in-rebuke-of-trump-over-his-war-in-iran/

Via Ariana Figueroa: An appeals court Tuesday cleared the way for the Trump administration to use fast-track deportations within the interior of the country. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/24/repub/trump-administration-in-court-win-allowed-to-conduct-nationwide-fast-track-deportations/

People who came to the U.S. through the the Temporary Protected Status program face uncertain future as U.S. Supreme Court weighs in on the program. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/24/repub/legal-protections-for-nearly-350000-haitians-at-risk-as-us-supreme-court-nears-ruling/

Via Ralph Chapoco: Members of the data working group will continue to define recidivism after they received feedback from other members of the Reentry Task Force at its meeting Tuesday.https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/24/alabama-reentry-task-force-to-continue-working-on-defining-recidivism/

Via Andrea Tinker: District level reading data shows a statewide decrease in second and third grade reading scores while counties in the Black Belt made gains. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/24/district-level-data-shows-black-belt-elementary-schoolers-made-gains-in-reading/

Via Sofia Resnick: Reproductive rights advocates argued that exceptions to abortion bans are too ill defined to give doctors and hospitals enough confidence to provide timely care. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/23/repub/miscarriage-management-remains-muddled-4-years-after-dobbs/

Via Robbie Sequeira: States enacted laws that rolled back child labor protection laws that included a lower minimum wage and and an increase in the number of work hours allowed for teens. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/23/repub/states-ease-child-labor-laws-ahead-of-summer-hiring-season/

Via @jonshorman.bsky.social: A judge ruled that the Trump administration illegally overhauled a U.S. Department of Homeland Security computer program. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/23/repub/trump-trampled-voter-privacy-by-feeding-info-into-homeland-security-system-judge-says/

Via Ralph Chapoco: A Limestone County Court agreed to the terms that residents and a mining company negotiated over a dispute regarding the environmental impacts over a quarry. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/23/residents-and-mining-company-agree-to-terms-that-ends-18-months-of-litigation/

Via Anna Barrett: Weapons were the leading cause of “non-medical, unexpected or unexplained” deaths in 2024 for children under 18 in Alabama, according to a report released Thursday, most of which were caused by firearms. https://ow.ly/59JK50ZerJA

Via Robbie Sequeira: States and cities loosened building code requirements in an effort to lower construction costs and boost affordable housing. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/22/repub/states-are-changing-fire-codes-to-make-housing-cheaper-some-safety-experts-are-worried/

Via @jonshorman.bsky.social: Civil rights groups are worried that fewer teens getting their driver's licenses means fewer of them will vote. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/22/repub/when-teens-drive-less-they-dont-register-to-vote-heres-how-civic-groups-are-adapting/

Via Anna Barrett: Alabama Republican gubernatorial nominee and U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville Monday afternoon filed a motion to dismiss a Montgomery County lawsuit over his campaign.https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/22/tuberville-files-motion-to-dismiss-montgomery-county-residency-lawsuit/

Via Shauneen Miranda: The U.S. Department of Education said it will temporarily reduce interest rates for federal student loan borrowers enrolled in auto pay starting July 1. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/22/repub/us-education-department-offers-two-year-trim-on-student-loan-interest-rates/

My column today. A new statehouse won’t change the profound problems with democracy in Alabama.

Editor Brian Lyman writes that Alabama's new Statehouse will correct the physical failings of the old one, but not the deeper issues that plague Alabama government. https://alabamareflector.com/2026/06/22/a-prayer-for-the-alabama-statehouse/

Via @fischler.bsky.social and @jonshorman.bsky.social: Democrats are growing hopeful they can recapture the U.S. Senate amid President Donald Trump’s plummeting approval. But they still need nearly everything to break their way against a disadvantageous map. (Fixed broken link.)

Via Ralph Chapoco: Experts say federal court rulings earlier this month that stopped Alabama from executing Jeffery Lee by nitrogen gas could complicate other states' plans to use the execution method and discourage others from establishing it. https://ow.ly/xe6Q50ZetJ8

Via Ariana Figueroa: A recent report from the Department of Homeland Security’s internal watchdog found a detention center in Louisiana failed to ensure sanitary conditions, properly store perishable food, report use-of-force incidents and maintain medical records. https://ow.ly/99Mu50ZesYw

My column from Monday. On having a Constitution that bans cruel and unusual punishments, and a judiciary that for nearly 150 years has refused to acknowledge evidence of cruelty in executions.

Via Anna Claire Vollers: Without explicitly tying their efforts to a replacement of Pride Month, GOP governors in Alabama and other states have labeled June with conservative-friendly monikers that celebrate one type of family unit: a man and woman married with children. https://ow.ly/AhIe50ZesVG

Commentary via The Conversation: Juneteenth made clear that freedom was not just confined to someone’s physical enslavement, but mental enslavement as well, bound in the laws that barred enslaved people from receiving an education in Southern states.

Via SC Daily Gazette: A school that opened 100 years ago for Black children in South Carolina could become part of a proposed, multi-state national historical park that connects the remaining structures where tens of thousands of students were educated in the Jim Crow South.

Via Andrea Tinker: Emily Jones, chair of the Madison County chapter of Moms For Liberty, won a GOP runoff for State Board of Education District 8 on Tuesday. She will face Democratic nominee Shatika Armstrong in the fall. https://ow.ly/991L50ZesLR

Via Kelcie Moseley-Morris: Two reproductive health care organizations filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Health and Human Services agency on Thursday alleging that it is politicizing the Title X grant funding program and violating the intent of the law. https://ow.ly/x1Oc50ZesU4

Via Sofia Resnick: New HHS guidelines will shift the focus of Title X from access to contraception to "family formation and assist(ing) clients in achieving healthy pregnancies," aligning the program with the Trump administration’s efforts to increase the U.S. birth rate. https://ow.ly/5kOA50Zef9Q

Via Ashley Murray: Negotiations between the United States and Iran officially began Thursday, Vice President JD Vance said, starting a 60-day countdown for Iran to safely open the Strait of Hormuz, the U.S. to lift a blockade on Iranian oil, and for the two nations to hammer out a nuclear deal.

Via Ralph Chapoco: Gov. Kay Ivey Thursday scheduled an August execution for a death row inmate convicted of the rape and murder of a five-year-old girl in Russell County.

Via Sam Gauntt: The FTC’s complaint against the World Professional Association of Transgender Health is the latest in a series of legal actions from the Trump administration against groups that provide gender-affirming treatment or work on transgender healthcare issues. https://ow.ly/imQM50ZefzJ

Via Stateline: Families are facing rising grocery prices at the same time that many of the most vulnerable are losing access to the nation’s largest food assistance program, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. https://ow.ly/72QZ50Ze1yF

Via Andrea Tinker: Two Alabama House incumbents managed to hold off challengers in Tuesday’s primary runoffs as voters around the state chose federal and state nominees for office. https://ow.ly/KhJn50ZcZJx

ICYMI via Anna Barrett: A lawsuit filed in Montgomery Wednesday seeks to put Alabama Republican gubernatorial nominee Tommy Tuberville in front of a jury to answer questions about his residency.

Via Ralph Chapoco: The Southern Poverty Law Center announced on Tuesday that it had hired Ryan P. Haygood, currently the CEO of the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice, as the organization’s next president and CEO. https://ow.ly/ctgW50Ze1ez

Via Ashley Murray: The White House on Wednesday read to reporters a 14-point memorandum of understanding with Iran to stop the ongoing war and allow for further negotiations, but did not release the exact text.

Via Anna Barrett: A lawsuit filed in Montgomery County Circuit Court on Wednesday seeks to put Republican gubernatorial nominee Tommy Tuberville on trial over allegations that he does not meet residency requirements for the governor’s office.

Via Sam Gauntt: The Atlantic Ocean is predicted to have a tamer-than-usual hurricane season this year, but experts say it’s necessary to remain vigilant as it can take only one serious storm to cause significant damage. https://ow.ly/vESa50ZcMGl

Via Amelia Twyman: U.S. House and Senate Democrats are demanding transparency from the Interior Department after reports revealed the Trump administration redirected roughly $90 million in national parks fees to help fund renovations and upcoming celebratory displays in Washington, D.C.