Reporting: Arizona immigration law has echoes across U.S.

July 29, 2010

 
Arizona officers on Thursday began enforcing the state’s new immigration law — what’s left of it, anyway. In the small town of Fremont, Neb., they’re not even bothering.

 

Arizona and Fremont are at the forefront of the movement by state and local governments to get tough with illegal immigrants, rather than rely on the federal government’s efforts to address the problem. But they are learning that simply passing a law is far from enough.

 

Full story (Alex Johnson/msnbc.com)

 

Reporting: Utah close to determining whether state resources used in immigrant list

July 15, 2010

 

Utah officials said Thursday they had uncovered evidence that someone used a state employment database to help anti-immigration activists compile a list purporting to identify 1,300 illegal immigrants.

 

Full story (Alex Johnson/msnbc.com with KSL-TV)

 

Reporting: He did the right thing; now he faces deportation

May 26, 2010

 
It’s called Section 287(g), and it means local police can enforce federal immigration laws. That’s why an illegal immigrant from Mexico faces deportation after he did the right thing and called 911 to report a dirty cop.

 

Full story (Alex Johnson/msnbc.com)

 

Reporting: U.S. split over Arizona immigration law

May 14, 2010

Arizona’s tough new immigration law has brought calls for boycotts of the state, but similar measures are in the works in at least 12 other states.

Full story (Alex Johnson/msnbc.com)

Interactive: Reaction around the world

Why I'm leaving Facebook

May 3, 2010

Goodbye, Facebook. I’ll miss the updates from my friends, but I won’t miss you or your always-changing, let’s-see-if-we-can-trick-users-into-divulging-all-their-info privacy shenanigans.

Full post

Reporting: In adult films, condom question twists plot

April 30, 2010

 

California's efforts to mandate the use of condoms in adult videos shot in the state has divided the pornography industry and made allies of seemingly strange bedfellows — a leading AIDS organization that says it doesn't care about the morality of porn and a former adult actress who has made it her mission to shut down the industry.


Full story (Alex Johnson/msnbc.com)

 

Reporting: New ways of counting leave U.S. Census behind

April 9, 2010

 

India's massive census, the biggest under way in the world, could mark a turning point away from door-to-door surveys toward real-time database-driven counting. That could leave the United States far behind. 

 

Full story (Alex Johnson/msnbc.com and Shereen Bhan/CNBC-India)

 

Reporting: Schools in ‘category 5’ budget crisis

March 18, 2010

 

While the recession has put a squeeze on all types of government programs, none has felt its impact more than education — the largest item in most states’ budgets.

 

Full story (Alex Johnson/msnbc.com)

 

Reporting: Already under fire, crime labs cut to the bone

February 23, 2010

 

There are serious questions about the credibility of nearly every kind of crime lab analysis, the conclusions of which often rest on unproven science filtered through the subjective judgment of technicians whose training and certification vary wildly from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.

 

And with crime labs struggling under backlogs that already reach back years in many cities and states, budget cuts driven by the recession are threatening to make credible crime scene analysis a lost art, law enforcement officials and forensic specialists say.

 

Full story (Alex Johnson/msnbc.com)