Recent polling reveals three startling trends shaping American families and their views on national pride and morality.
Why it matters: American identity is in a time of transition.With the July 4 holiday, Axios is diving deeper than everyday headlines to examine some of the broader social trends driving politics.
The U.S. ambassador to Russia met with detained Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in Moscow on Monday, the State Department said.
Driving the news: Lynne Tracy's second-only prison meeting with the journalist comes after U.S. officials repeatedly requested to visit Gershkovich, who is the first American journalist to be detained in an espionage case since the Cold War, per the Wall Street Journal. U.S. officials say Gershkovich is being "wrongfully detained."
The Supreme Court continued to lean conservative during its most recent term, according to preliminary data.
Why it matters: After overturning Roe v. Wade in 2022, the court continued to push American law toward the right — including in its historic decisions last week on affirmative action and gay rights.
Historic sites linked to essential moments in LGBTQ history are finally seeing preservation efforts after decades of being forgotten or dismissed.
Why it matters: Few databases exist mapping LGBTQ sites, and cities rarely do anything to mark places related to gay and lesbian history, putting these places at risk of being erased from memory.
Justice Samuel Alito narrowly overtook Justice Clarence Thomas as the Supreme Court's most conservative member this term, according to preliminary data that measures judicial ideology.
How to read the chart: An analysis by political scientists Andrew Martin and Kevin Quinn, known as the Martin-Quinn Score, places judges on an ideological spectrum. A lower score indicates a more liberal justice, whereas a higher score indicates a more conservative justice.
On the heels of the Supreme Court decision striking down affirmative action, civil rights groups are going after legacy and donation-based admissions at Harvard College.
Driving the news: Boston nonprofit Lawyers for Civil Rights filed a complaint Monday to the U.S. Department of Education alleging Harvard’s legacy and donor-based admissions process violates federal law by systematically helping white applicants at the expense of their nonwhite counterparts.
Thousands of hotel workers in Southern California walked off the job Sunday in what the Unite Here Local 11 union is calling the "largest" strike in the industry in U.S history.
Driving the news: Members of the union last month voted 96% in favor of strike action during the extended Fourth of July holiday weekend to demand higher pay and better benefits.
A mass shooting at a Baltimore block party early Sunday left two people dead and at least 28 others with gunshot wounds, police and city officials said.
The latest: The ages of those shot ranged from 13 to 32 years old and some 15 of the injured victims hurt were younger than 18, the Baltimore Police Department said.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was criticized Sunday by two rival Republican presidential candidates and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg for a video taking aim at former President Trump's previous support for the LGBTQ community.
Driving the news: The DeSantis War Room Twitter account released a video marking the end of Pride Month Friday featuring footage of Trump at the 2016 Republican National Convention pledging to protect LGBTQ citizens in the wake of the mass shooting at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida.
The pivotal political battlegroundof Pennsylvania is demonstrating that there's still a critical mass of Trump-supporting swing voters that will back the right type of Democrat under certain circumstances.
Why it matters: The party that wins over the Pennsylvania voter that backed President Obama in 2012, President Trump in 2016 and Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) in 2022 will have the inside track toward winning the presidency in 2024.
The Supreme Court is falling off the pedestal it built for itself, down into the muck of normal politics.
Why it matters: That's increasingly how the public sees it. That's how the rest of the political system treats it. And it's getting harder and harder to believe the justices aren't interested in wielding that power.
