1/ Business lobbyist Virginia Lamp once said anti-immigration attitudes are “based on a type of selfish nationalism.”

Today she's better known as Ginni Thomas: wife of Clarence Thomas, and an "America-first" election denier.

What’s changed — for her and the US? 🧵 2/ For decades, the business community’s role in politics was to fend off threats to immigrant labor.

Sure, it probably wasn’t more complicated than economic self-interest. But business orgs were always *involved.*

In doing so, they moderated the nation’s immigration debate.

1/ THREAD: After a large solar farm was proposed, it seemed to many in Knox Co., Ohio that an anti-solar machine took over news & politics overnight.

They were right.

Here’s how fossil fuel interests shaped the conversation, and how a hometown paper’s new owners amplified it 👇 2/ @MountVernonNews had been owned by the same family since 1939, but by 2020, it was barely holding on.

The paper was sold to Metric Media, a news network described by media researchers as “pink slime” — named for filler in processed meat.

Microsoft has long downplayed its role in the 2020 "SolarWinds" attack -- one of the largest cyberattacks in US history -- but a new ProPublica investigation reveals that the tech giant ignored warnings that could have stemmed the damage... 🧵 2/ In 2016, while researching an attack on a major tech company, Microsoft engineer Andrew Harris said he discovered a flaw that left millions of users — including federal employees — exposed to hackers.
propublica.org/article/micros…

"Friends of the Court," ProPublica's investigation into Supreme Court justices' beneficial relationships with billionaire donors, has been awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service!

Here are the highlights from the reporting 🧵👇 2/ The series began with this story by @JustinElliott @js_kaplan & @Amierjeski that revealed how SCOTUS Justice Clarence Thomas had, for 20+ years, been treated to undisclosed luxury vacations by real estate titan and GOP megadonor Harlan Crow.
propublica.org/article/claren…

This year, ProPublica documentaries explored how university expansion led to Black land loss, retraced the steps of the Uvalde shooting response, documented the fallout of the Philips breathing machine recall and more... 🧵👇 2/ “Inside the Uvalde Response,” with @TexasTribune & @FRONTLINEPBS, reconstructs one of the most criticized mass shooting responses in history, providing real-time insight into officers’ thoughts & actions.

For more than a decade, the all-white judges of a Louisiana appellate court ignored thousands of petitions filed by prisoners, most of them Black, who claimed they had been wrongly convicted.

Efforts to expose the injustice went unheard. (THREAD)

propublica.org/article/louisi…
2/ In Louisiana, all such 'pro se' (that’s Latin for "for oneself") petitions must be reviewed by 3-judge panels.

“It got somewhat cumbersome to have to select 3-judge panels for every writ, because you’d get hundreds of them,” said a longtime law clerk to Judge Edward Dufresne.

How does a legislature block and slow roll lawsuits that accuse it of drawing discriminatory electoral maps?

Simple: By claiming privilege.
🧵👇👇
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2/ GOP lawmakers across the US have been shielding their redistricting work from scrutiny by claiming 2 types of privilege: attorney-client privilege & legislative privilege, which allows members of state legislatures to deliberate in private.
propub.li/3Q8FnRw

NEW: A ProPublica investigation has found that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas secretly participated in Koch network donor events – a breach of judicial norms that one federal judge said “takes my breath away.” 🧵👇 2/ In 2018, Thomas flew to Palm Springs on a private jet and attended a dinner for the network’s donors.

The justice was brought in, former network staffers said, in the hopes that such access would encourage donors to continue giving.

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito took a luxury fishing trip to Alaska with billionaire Paul Singer, whose hedge fund then had repeated business before SCOTUS over the years that followed.

Alito never disclosed the trip or recused himself from Singer's cases. (THREAD) 2/ Singer, a major GOP donor, wasn't just a fellow angler along for the trip with Alito. The investor flew the justice to Alaska in a private jet.

Had Alito chartered the plane himself, it could've cost him over $100K.

Three times a year, ProPublica compiles into a report all the real-world changes our journalism has sparked.

We are proud to share the remarkable impact of our investigations this spring, including 👇: A series of stories about the financial ties between Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and billionaire Harlan Crow ignited a national debate about the ethics of the court.

In May, lawmakers called for reforms of ethics rules for justices. propublica.org/article/claren…

Underride crashes — when a passenger vehicle collides with a semi truck & slides beneath it — kill hundreds of Americans a year.
A ProPublica/FRONTLINE investigation reveals how safety regulators repeatedly failed to collect accurate data or take action to protect passengers. 🧵 2/ Concerns about underride crashes are not new.

In 1967, Hollywood star Jayne Mansfield was killed when the Buick she was riding in collided into the rear of a semi truck, crushing the top portion of the car.
propublica.org/article/underr…

A Chicago cop got out of 44 tickets by saying over and over that his girlfriend stole his car.

And it worked.

All 44 times, his tickets were dismissed. 👇🧵 2/ At ticket hearings, Jeffrey Kriv often provided what he said were legitimate police incident reports as evidence of the car thefts.

He explained that he got the reports at police HQ.

Kriv did not let on that he, himself, was a Chicago cop.

propublica.org/article/how-ch…

A few weeks before our investigation into HomeVestors of America came out, the “We Buy Ugly Houses” company’s leadership called an online meeting for its 1,100+ franchisees.

The purpose of that meeting: Teach franchisees how to push back on our story. 🧵👇👇 2/ “Our goal is to bury it,” HomeVestors CEO David Hicks said about ProPublica's investigation:
propublica.org/article/homeve…

HomeVestors, the company behind those "We Buy Ugly Houses" billboards, has a stated goal: Help homeowners out of "Ugly Situations."

But our investigation found HomeVestors franchisees that used deception & targeted America's most vulnerable. 🏘️🧵👇 2/ These tactics targeted the elderly, infirm and those so close to poverty that they feared homelessness would be a consequence of selling.

propublica.org/article/ugly-t…

Lee Mazurek had been on medication to keep his chronic disease at bay for nine years when a @Cigna employee flagged his case for review.

The company estimated it could save $98,000+ if he switched parts of his treatment plan. Then came the denial. 🧵👇👇 2/ At first, no one @Cigna told him about these calculations.

The only reason Mazurek found out: He used a little-known but very powerful tool to get a peek behind the scenes at the insurance company.

He requested his claim file.
propublica.org/article/find-o…

In 2022, South Carolina's GOP-dominated legislature pushed through a redistricting plan that took a competitive district and made it solidly Republican.

They got a surprising boost from one of the country's biggest Democrats: Rep. James Clyburn. (THREAD) 2/ Clyburn, South Carolina’s most powerful Democrat, wanted a safe seat as state lawmakers began redrawing SC’s congressional districts:

His 6th district had suffered a big population drop.

More revelations on the financial ties between Clarence Thomas and billionaire pal Harlan Crow:

The GOP megadonor paid the private school tuition for a Thomas family member the Supreme Court justice raised "as a son."

And no, Thomas didn't disclose the payments. (THREAD) 2/ Thomas took legal custody of his grand-nephew Mark Martin when the boy was 6.

In 2008, when Martin was a teen, Thomas sent him to Hidden Lake Academy, a private boarding school in the foothills of Northern Georgia where tuition cost in excess of $6K/month.

In small towns across America, kids are crawling under parked train cars to get to school on time.

Trains are blocking roads to schools for hours or even days at a time.

And they could start moving at any moment.

(video by @PhotogScotty from our partners at @InvestigateTV) These photos and videos are from Hammond, Indiana.

Residents say trains block their streets multiple times a week.

(photos by Jamie Kelter Davis)

Meet Judy Eledge.

Anchorage’s mayor picked her to help run public libraries.

Alaska’s governor says she exemplifies “the heart of Alaska.”

She also has a well-documented history of inflammatory speech.

Listen for yourself: This is Eledge speaking in her top floor office at one of Alaska’s largest public libraries, where she ran day to day operations and remains on the job as deputy director.

In 2014, one of Texas billionaire Harlan Crow’s companies quietly bought several lots on a residential street in Savannah, GA.

The seller? Crow’s friend & travel companion Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. 🧵👇 2/ This transaction marks the first known instance of money flowing directly from Crow to Thomas.

Like the lavish trips Crow provided for the justice, Thomas failed to disclose the real estate deal as appears to be required by law.

propublica.org/article/claren…

For decades, Justice Clarence Thomas has secretly accepted luxury trips from a major Republican donor, newly obtained documents and interviews show.

The extent and frequency of these apparent gifts to Thomas has no known precedent in modern SCOTUS history... 🧵👇 2/ Thomas has publicly presented himself as an everyman with modest tastes.

In this documentary about the justice, he waxes nostalgic about his fondness for Walmart parking lots: