Progress on issues previously featured in the Americans of Conscience Checklist
- In Texas, a federal court orders the repositioning of dangerous floating barriers in the Rio Grande intended to unlawfully deter people seeking refuge.
- Since 1997, people with felony convictions have had their voting rights restored in 26 states and the District of Columbia.
- The Gila River Indian Community will install solar panels to generate electricity for crop irrigation.
- The White House announces the Initiative on Women’s Health Research, an effort to close the gender gap in medical research.
- A newly FDA-approved medication for Alzheimer's disease will be covered by Medicare.
- CA will change all future ballot referendum language to choose “repeal the law” or “keep the law” over the contradictory “yes/no” option.
- MA becomes the the fifth state allowing incarcerated people to make phone calls for free.
- MS’s Supreme Court strikes down a portion of a law that would have undemocratically deprived Jackson residents of the right to vote for their circuit court judges.
- NY: Under the Clean Slate Act, returning citizens with criminal records will have their records automatically sealed, affording them better access to employment, housing, and education.
- TN Rep. Justin Jones sues the speaker of the state House for unconstitutionally expelling him from his elected position.
- Several Oklahoma school districts promoting accurate and complete social studies instruction by opting out of curriculum with an unaccredited nonprofit.
- A legal settlement determines that people detained in CoreCivic’s immigration detention facilities have the right to labor protections.
- Employees and some corporations explore retirement pensions instead of less stable retirement accounts.
- The nonprofit RIP Medical Debt cancels $33M in debt owed by nearly 16,000 Cleveland residents thanks to funds allocated through the American Rescue Plan Act.
- The startup CarbonBuilt works towards creating low- and zero-carbon concrete.
- Students with children find support through the Virginia State University’s student-parent apartments and child care center.
- Researchers and engineers improve safety by creating the first car crash test dummy modeled on a female body.
- In his will, the unassuming Geoffrey Holt leaves $3.8M to his town of Hinsdale, NH.
- A host of hundreds of thousands of Caribbean king crabs will help restore the ecosystem of FL’s coral reefs.
- A species of holly tree thought to be extinct for nearly 200 years is rediscovered in Brazil.
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COP28 president Sultan al-Jaber opened Wednesday's plenary meeting, and within a few minutes announced that agreement had been reached on the main document. "It is a plan that is led by the science,'' al-Jaber said. "It is an enhanced, balanced, but make no mistake, a historic package to accelerate climate action."
Sultan al-Jaber of the United Arab Emirates... celebrates the end of the COP28 climate meeting. The final deal included a modest reference to transitioning away from fossil fuels, which scientists say is crucial to avoid catastrophic warming.
"It's embarrassing that it took 28 years but now we're finally there. Now it finally seems like the world has acknowledged that we need to move away from fossil [fuels]," said Dan Jørgensen, Denmark's climate minister.
The agreement comes after more than two weeks of contentious negotiations among nearly every country in the world at the United Nations climate conference in Dubai, known as COP28.
The science on climate change is clear. To limit the worst effects of planetary warming – runaway sea level rise, mass extinction of plants and animals, and damaging and deadly wildfires, hurricanes, droughts, heatwaves and floods – the world needs to rapidly reduce its emissions of climate-warming fossil fuels.
In 2015, world leaders agreed to limit warming to below 2 degrees Celsius, and ideally below 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), compared to pre-industrial times. Scientists say that warming above 1.5 degrees Celsius would put global food systems at risk, spell the end of most of the world's coral reefs and potentially trigger climate tipping points like the melting of permafrost, which could accelerate warming regardless of other human actions.
The world has already warmed roughly 1.2 degrees Celsius, said Jim Skea, chair of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, in an interview at COP28.
Keeping 1.5 alive, the oft-quoted goal of these climate summits is "still possible – just," Skea said. But, he added, "We continue to emit. So it's becoming harder and harder to imagine that we're going to limit warming at 1.5 degrees and at some point, if we carry on as we are, we'll run out of rope."
One of the biggest breakthroughs of COP28 is that, for the first time, millions of dollars will be directed to developing countries that are already suffering damage from climate change.
For years, developing countries have argued they're paying for devastating impacts that richer nations are largely responsible for. Wealthier countries like the U.S. and those in Europe have historically contributed the biggest share of emissions from fossil fuel use that are causing the planet to heat up. As weather extremes get worse and sea levels rise, developing countries are shouldering the cost of what's known as "loss and damage."
At climate talks a year ago, nations agreed to establish a new loss and damage fund. Now, more than $700 million has been announced for it, most from European countries and $100 million coming from the United Arab Emirates.
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