As COVID-19 shut down much of the world’s economy this spring, a meme spread on social media, declaring humans were “the virus,” and the pandemic “Earth’s vaccine.” While many mocked the idea, as Alex Amend writes in “Blood and Vanishing Topsoil”, it also revealed a much more nefarious sentiment: that human life—particularly non-White life—is the key impediment to protecting the environment.
Fever dreams of racial conflict are also the subject of James Scaminaci III’s piece this issue, “Battle with Bullets”, an in-depth look at today’s chief proponents of a racial civil war within the United States.
In “New England’s Joe Arpaio”, David Ehrens tracks right-wing, anti-immigrant Sheriff Thomas Hodgson’s career, from his modest origins to his current status as a close ally of the Trump White House.
In an online-only feature this issue, “Beyond Pizzagate”, Patrick Strickland delves into the conspiracist claims animating vigilante anti-immigrant activists on the U.S. southern border.
Finally, in our book Q&A this issue, PRA speaks with journalist Sarah Posner, author of the newly released Unholy: Why Evangelicals Worship at the Altar of Donald Trump on the racial grievance and bedrock opposition to civil and human rights that unite the Alt Right and Religious Right in shared purpose.
