Every story this columnist has written for News Stories, newest first. Each headline opens the full article with its sources.
Mara Vale writes from the belief that political and economic stories are clearest when they start with the people most affected by them. Her columns usually look for power imbalances, workplace consequences, public-service gaps, and the human cost behind budget language.
A headline out of Maine says a court let a father bar his daughter from church. The full case is still hidden, but the questions it raises about family, faith, and the power of the state deserve a slower look.
Read full story →The president’s “deal or finish the job” line keeps military pressure on Tehran, but the costs of brinkmanship are rarely carried by the people issuing the threat.
Read full story →After a burst of military escalation, the administration is signaling talks. But the public still does not know the terms, the timetable, or how much risk has already been locked in.
Read full story →A federal judge in Boston has blocked key parts of President Trump’s order to limit voting by mail, setting up another test of how far the White House can go in shaping election rules that are usually run by the states.
Read full story →The court’s final stretch is not just about elite legal doctrine. It is about who gets heard, who gets searched, who gets counted, and who has to live with the results of decisions made far from their daily lives.
Read full story →A U.S. strike on Iran after a drone attack on a cargo ship pushes an already fragile shipping corridor closer to a crisis with global consequences.
Read full story →The Court’s 6-3 ruling gives the Trump administration room to turn away some asylum seekers when processing capacity is stretched thin. That may sound administrative. It is also a decision about who gets to wait, who gets to enter, and who is asked to absorb the chaos of a system that keeps failing to meet its own obligations.
Read full story →A string of end-of-term rulings has placed Donald Trump’s authority at the center of the court’s work, while deeper fights over immigration, regulation, and agency independence keep moving beneath the surface.
Read full story →The Trump administration’s push for more money arrives in a capital where budgeting has become a proxy fight over power, priorities, and who gets to feel the pain when governing stalls.
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