Sweeping tariffs took effect Thursday, and while President Donald Trump has said the tariffs would lead to factories and jobs moving back to the United States, for Black Americans and small-business owners, it is not that simple. Prices are expected to dramatically rise for clothing and shoes; electronics like cellphones and computers; cars and auto […]
Adam Mahoney
Adam Mahoney is the climate and environment reporter at Capital B. He can be reached by email at adam.mahoney@capitalbnews.org, on Bluesky, and on X at @AdamLMahoney.
Posted inClimate Change, Environmental Justice, Extreme Weather, Housing, Mental Health
20 Years After Katrina, Louisiana Residents Are Most Vulnerable to ‘Die of Despair’
This is the fourth story in our series chronicling the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Trigger warning: This article contains descriptions of suicide, gun violence, and child deaths that may be distressing to some readers. As the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina approached in 2015, Michelle McCullum, a 25-year-old mother of two, drove her children, […]
Posted inAir Pollution, Climate Change, Environmental Justice, Extreme Weather, Unsafe Water
Black Neighborhoods at Risk as U.S. Pushes to Cancel Important Climate Protection
As nearly two-thirds of the U.S. population sweltered under extreme heat advisories on Tuesday, news echoed through Black neighborhoods already scorched by the effects of climate change: the Trump administration was moving to tear the heart out of America’s climate protections. In a decision that environmental activists say is one of the most severe blows […]
Posted inEnvironmental Justice, Housing, Land Pollution
Black Women Fight for Life in Houston’s Most Toxic — and Gentrifying — Neighborhood
When Carolyn Rivera moved to Settegast, a majority-Black neighborhood in northeast Houston, 45 years ago, horses roamed the streets and nearly every homestead had a backyard farm where chickens and speckled feather guinea hens darted between rows of corn and greens. Rivera, who turns 83 next month, remembers those early days with a kind of […]
Posted inEnvironmental Justice, Extreme Weather
A Flood Crisis Is Escalating. Southern Black Communities Face Double The Risk.
One month before the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, Black residents across southern Louisiana braced for their first tropical disturbance of hurricane season. The storm threatened to bring flash flooding across the coast from Mississippi to the center of Louisiana. Thousands of residents stocked up with drinking water and sandbags in preparation for imminent power […]
Posted inClimate Change, Extreme Weather, Housing
After LA Fires, Black Altadena Faces Foreclosure and Displacement
Six months after California’s Eaton Fire, Black residents of Altadena find themselves at the epicenter of a mounting national crisis as state and federal foreclosure moratoriums expire. A Capital B analysis of public records found that roughly three dozen fire-ravaged properties have been added to pre-foreclosure lists — a public record of homes where owners […]
Posted inBlack Businesses, Money
In New Orleans, Essence Fest Is a Celebration — but Not Always for Black Locals
This is the second story in our series chronicling the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. On the first night of Essence Fest, Paper Machine, an artist space in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward, came alive with creativity and community. Inside a sunlit room, Lauryn Hinton gathered neighbors around long tables scattered with scissors, glossy magazines, […]
Posted inClimate Change, Culture, Social Welfare, Sports
Black Kids Are 2x More Likely To Drown. This Organization is Offering Free Swim Lessons.
Across the country, Black children and youth are twice as likely as the general population to die by drowning, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And this crisis is compounded by the fact that their parents are 20% more likely to be non-swimmers, creating a cycle that perpetuates the problem across generations, […]
Posted inEnvironmental Justice, Extreme Weather, Mental Health, Partner Content
Extreme Heat Is Causing a Black Suicide Crisis in Phoenix. Urban Farms Offer a Lifeline
LIKE THOUSANDS OF OTHER BLACK AMERICANS, Tiffany Hawkins’ grandparents, Earnest and Mattie Lee Johnson, left the Jim Crow South in the 1950s to pick cotton in Arizona’s desert. Many sought opportunities in cities like Chicago and Detroit, but the Johnsons chose Arizona, where their lives and those of their children — including Hawkins’ mother, Arlene […]
Posted inHousing
From Watts to D.C.: How 500 Black Neighborhoods Vanished in 45 Years
Ignited by a single arrest and fueled by decades of poverty and police brutality, the Watts Uprising of 1965 turned the Los Angeles neighborhood into a national symbol of Black struggle and resilience. Thousands of Black residents like Ted Watkins Sr. rose up in anger and desperation. They were fighting for resources to maintain their […]