Virtual Fences, a Rancher’s New Best Friend?

New research demonstrates the potential benefits of virtual fencing for cows, pollinators and grasslands

How Democrats Can Win By Organizing from the County Up

In her new role as a party leader, Jane Kleeb is organizing Democrats to go on the offensive
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In Red States, Rural Voters Are Leading the Resistance to School Vouchers

Convincing rural voters to walk away from public schools could be a greater obstacle than expected for the GOP

Farmers in Trump Country Were Counting on Clean Energy Grants. Then the Government Changed the Rules.

Thousands of farmers and small rural businesses now in limbo as USDA demands grant rewrites that favor fossil fuels over renewables
Ames Alexander & Mario Alejandro Ariza, Floodlight; Joe Engleman, Barn Raiser

Science & Environment

Bird Flu Spreads as Musk’s DOGE Cuts Public Health Funding

“It’s not enough for us to sit by on the sidelines,” says Dr. Michael Osterholm

‘Cruelty Is the Point’: The Toxic Trickle-Down of Musk’s Government Purge

Kyla Bennett, former EPA whistleblower, says Musk’s DOGE “coup” has major ramifications for rural America
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Politics & Policy

As GOP Moves to Cut Taxes for the Rich, Bernie Sanders Rallies Iowans to Fight Oligarchy

“Trumpism will not be defeated by politicians in the D.C. Beltway,” says Sanders

‘They’d Rather We Be Dead’: New York’s Home Health Care Gambit

The state’s plan for corporate control of home health care is chaotic, dangerous and a scandal in the making
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Native Life

Tapping Into the Sweetness of Spring

“Waziya (Old Man Winter) is finally heading north”

In a North Dakota Courtroom, the Battle for Standing Rock Continues

Greenpeace and the owner of the Dakota Access Pipeline square off in court

Indigenous Artists Give Minnesota a Map Makeover

A roundtable conversation with three women who are reviving land-based wisdom and history from a Dakota perspective
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Food & Agriculture

Undoing the Power of Big Ag

A conversation with author Sonja Trom Eayrs and Farm Action co-founder Joe Maxwell

USDA ‘Cut Off at the Knees’ by Musk’s Mass Firings

Interviews with 15 recently fired employees reveal an agency thrown into turmoil
Sky Chadde, Investigate Midwest
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Barn Raisers

Barn Raiser’s 2024 Year in Review

Wendell Berry takes on “White Rural Rage,” farmers and environmentalists team up, and rural organizers contend with the opportunities, and aftermath, of an election year
Photo of Wendell Berry

Wendell Berry: What New York Times Columnist Paul Krugman Gets Wrong About Rural America

‘Those of us who speak for the country (“rural America”) must never give up’
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Letters to the editor

Readers Respond to Wendell Berry

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Religion

Donald Trump, MAGA and the Logic of the Gun

Trump’s image as a vigilante “peacemaker” reflects the religiously-tinged violence of the American frontier
Rachel Wagner, Religion Dispatches

Pete Hegseth’s War on Religious Freedom and the Constitution

What Pete Hegseth’s record says about where he would lead the Department of Defense

How Christian Nationalists Use Transphobia to Get Votes

A rural Wisconsin pastor explains why God’s compassion has no room for hate
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Arts & Culture

Going Off the Grid in the Midwest

What walking an arbitrary line through Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa reveals

The Arts Organization Helping Transform Appalachia’s Craft Economy

Creative entrepreneurs are getting needed support to grow and sustain their businesses after Hurricane Helene

The Best Country Album of 2024 You’ve Never Heard Of

In Blackgrass, an old Dogg shows he has plenty of new tricks
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History

How Rural Post Offices Sustain Community

Reflections on the post offices of Benzie County, Michigan, as a living map
Mary Welcome, essay & photography

Land of Liberty

Myth-making in the early American republic

Jim Hightower Confronts the 1980s Farm Crisis

"It's the same old story—Reagan helps the rich, and Lord help the rest of us."
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