In the foothills of the Sierra Madre mountains, the carcasses of starving cattle rotted in a bone-dry reservoir.
Down on the valley floor, farmworker Rafael Parra bent to the work of feeding the world — and unintentionally warming it. wapo.st/3mmTaWk
Parra plunged one end of an old, plastic tube into an irrigation canal, generating the suction that sent water gurgling into the drought-parched earth.
“That’s all there is to it.”
He was not fully aware of the invisible consequences of his work. wapo.st/3mmTaWk
Scientists who have studied this valley for decades know that it’s at these precise conditions — when water mixes with nitrogen fertilizer, with no crops in the ground to absorb it — that huge surges of nitrous oxide gas are released into the atmosphere. wapo.st/3mmTaWk
The world’s climate conferences and pledges have done nothing to change a basic and dangerous fact: Concentrations of major greenhouse gases in the atmosphere continue to rise. wapo.st/3mmTaWk
What happens each fall in this valley underscores how difficult it is to even track these emissions accurately, let alone stop them. wapo.st/3mmTaWk
Emerging scientific evidence suggests that Mexico’s emissions of nitrous oxide are significantly underestimated — emissions may be double or even quadruple what the country reports.
It’s a problem that the Mexican government acknowledged to The Post. wapo.st/3mmTaWk
Without regulation, the fight against nitrous oxide pollution is left to people such as Iván Ortiz-Monasterio, a 63-year-old agronomist from Cuernavaca who has spent his career trying to convince farmers to use nitrogen more efficiently. wapo.st/3mmTaWk
In the fourth installment of our series, Invisible, The Washington Post examines how over-fertilization in Mexico results in a surge of nitrous gas that scientists and the government are grappling to understand. wapo.st/3mmTaWk
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Exclusive: A Washington Post investigation has found that over the past two decades, hundreds of law enforcement officers in the United States have sexually abused children while officials at every level of the criminal justice system have failed to protect kids, punish abusers and prevent additional crimes. wapo.st/3XiNgZC
The Post conducted an exclusive analysis of the nation’s most comprehensive database of police crimes.
From 2005 through 2022, reporters identified at least 1,800 state and local law enforcement officers who were charged with crimes involving child sexual abuse. wapo.st/3XiNgZC
Police and court documents show that abusive officers frequently spent months befriending and grooming kids.
Many used the threat of arrest or physical harm to make their victims comply. wapo.st/3XiNgZC
Exclusive: For decades, Catholic priests raped or molested Native American children who were taken from their homes by the U.S. government and forced to live at remote boarding schools, a Post investigation found. wapo.st/3yB2VZT
At least 122 priests, sisters and brothers assigned to 22 boarding schools since the 1890s were later accused of sexually abusing Native American children under their care, The Post found. wapo.st/3yB2VZT
Most of the documented abuse occurred in the 1950s and 1960s and involved more than 1,000 children.
Experts say the The Post’s findings are a window into the widespread sexual abuse at Indian boarding schools. wapo.st/3yB2VZT
Exclusive: A group of billionaires and business titans working to shape U.S. public opinion of the war in Gaza privately pressed New York City’s Mayor Eric Adams (D) last month to send police to disperse pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University. wapo.st/4apUvBO
Business executives including Kind snack company founder Daniel Lubetzky, hedge fund manager Daniel Loeb, billionaire Len Blavatnik and real estate investor Joseph Sitt held a Zoom video call with Mayor Eric Adams (D) a log of chat messages shows. wapo.st/4apUvBO
During the call, some attendees discussed making political donations to Adams, as well as how the chat group’s members could pressure Columbia’s president and trustees to permit the mayor to send police to the campus to handle protesters. wapo.st/4apUvBO
Emily Franciose’s love of the backcountry drew her to boarding school in the Swiss Alps.
Then a mountain fell apart beneath her skis — and left her parents seeking answers. wapo.st/3UqR3SH
Emily had been on skis since she was 2, had attended avalanche safety courses and traveled with a first-aid kit.
She arrived at Ecole d’Humanité — which had a backcountry program with ski tours at least once a week in the Swiss Alps — in August 2022, one day after turning 18. wapo.st/3UqR3SH
The school’s last backcountry outing of the season took place on March 21, 2023.
Spring break was a few days away. Emily and her roommate had tickets to Paris.
But first, a trek to the top of the Wellhorn: wapo.st/3UqR3SH
As Donald Trump faces dwindling options to pay off a massive fine imposed as a result of losing a fraud case in New York, financial experts say filing for bankruptcy would provide one clear way out of his financial jam.
But Trump is not considering that approach, partially out of concern that it could damage his campaign to recapture the White House, according to four people close to the former president. wapo.st/3TLvfAX
Even though bankruptcy could alleviate Trump’s immediate cash crunch, it also carries risks for a candidate who has marketed himself as a winning businessman — and whose greatest appeal to voters, some advisers say, is his financial success. wapo.st/3TLvfAX
A bankruptcy filing by Trump personally or by one of his companies could delay for months or years the requirement that he pay the judgment of nearly half a billion dollars, which with interest is growing by more than $100,000 a day. wapo.st/3TLvfAX
Four major nonprofits that rose to prominence during the coronavirus pandemic by capitalizing on the spread of medical misinformation collectively gained more than $118 million between 2020 and 2022, a Post analysis shows. wapo.st/49CX18x
The money enabled the organizations to deepen their influence in statehouses, courtrooms and communities across the country.
Children’s Health Defense, an anti-vaccine group founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., received $23.5 million in contributions, grants and other revenue in 2022 alone, allowing it to expand its state-based lobbying operations to cover half the country. wapo.st/49CX18x
Another influential anti-vaccine group, Informed Consent Action Network, nearly quadrupled its revenue during that time to about $13.4 million in 2022, giving it the resources to finance lawsuits seeking to roll back vaccine requirements. wapo.st/49CX18x