Pentagon officials today claimed President Obama and future presidents have the power to send troops anywhere in the world to fight groups linked to al-Qaeda, based in part on the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), passed by Congress days after the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001....

The Associated Press says the U.S. Department of Justice has secretly obtained a trove of journalists' phone records in what its chief executive called a "massive and unprecedented intrusion."

"It seems to be terrible intrusion on the freedom of the press," says Ramsey Clark, the U.S. attorney general from...

The American Civil Liberties Union has obtained documents revealing that the FBI and IRS may be reading emails and other electronic communications of U.S. citizens without obtaining a warrant. This comes just as reports have emerged that the Obama administration is considering approving an overhaul of government surveillance of the...

NBA basketball player Jason Collins swept sports headlines this week when he publicly revealed that he is gay, becoming the first professional male athlete to do so while still active in a major U.S. team sport. Collins noted that he was inspired by tennis legend Martina Navratilova, who became one...

Private First Class Kimberly Rivera -- a conscientious objector and pregnant mother of four -- has just been sentenced to military prison for refusing to serve in the Iraq War. Rivera was on a two-week leave in December 2006 when she decided she would not return to Iraq for a...

A group of Georgia high school students are making history by challenging the segregation of their high school prom. Thanks to their efforts and the support of groups like the NAACP, Wilcox County High will hold its first ever integrated prom this Saturday, nearly 60 years after Brown v. Board...

As the Senate holds its first-ever public hearing on drones and targeted killings, Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman sits down for an extended interview with investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill, author of the new book, "Dirty Wars: The World Is A Battlefield."

Scahill charts the expanding...

Six days after the U.S. bombed his village, Yemeni activist Farea al-Muslimi testified on Capitol Hill about the terror of the U.S. drone wars. Al-Muslimi spoke during the Senate's first-ever public hearing on the Obama administration's targeted killing program. His family's village was hit by a U.S. drone strike last...

In a Democracy Now! exclusive on Earth Day, climate change activist Tim DeChristopher joins Democracy Now! for his first interview since being released from federal custody on April 21 after serving 21 months in detention.

DeChristopher was convicted of interfering with a 2008 public auction when he...

In 1982, investigative journalist Allan Nairn interviewed a Guatemalan general nicknamed "Tito" on camera during the height of the indigenous massacres. It turns out the man was actually Otto Pérez Molina, the current president of Guatemala. Democracy Now! airs the original video interview footage and speak to Nairn...

Today is April 15th, Tax Day, when millions of Americans scramble to file their income taxes on time. It's also a day when people across the country are planning to protest the use of tax dollars to fund war.

In dozens of communities across the country, demonstrations are...

So-called "ag-gag" bills that criminalize undercover filming on farms and at slaughterhouses to document criminal animal abuse are sweeping the country. Five states, including Missouri, Utah and Iowa, already have such laws in place. North Carolina has just become the latest state to consider such a law, joining a list...

City council members in Nelson, Georgia, voted unanimously to require heads of households to own guns and ammunition on Monday. The so-called Family Protection Ordinance requires a gun in every home in order to "provide for the emergency management of the city" and "protect the safety, security and general welfare...

Paralyzed in a 2004 attack in Sadr City, Iraq War veteran Tomas Young recently announced that he will stop his medicine and nourishment, which comes in the form of liquid through a feeding tube -- a decision which will hasten his death.

In a Democracy Now! live...

Ten years ago today, the United States invaded Iraq under the pretext that Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction. Six weeks later, President Bush stood under a banner reading "Mission Accomplished" and declared an end to major military combat operations. But Operation Iraqi Freedom would lead to an...

The White House called Republican activist Derek Khanna just hours after his appearance on Democracy Now! to say they are reversing its position on the ban against cell phone unlocking, which can subject users to up to five years in prison. Khanna talks to Amy Goodman minutes after...

Students and alumni at Yale University are organizing against a proposed campus center to train Special Operations Forces in interview techniques. The center would be funded by a $1.8 million grant from the Pentagon and could open as early as April. Dubbed an "interrogation center" by critics, the facility would...

Ten years ago this week, a defining moment occurred in the Bush administration's push to invade Iraq. On Feb. 5, 2003, then-Secretary of State General Colin Powell addressed the United Nations Security Council. His message was clear: Iraq possessed extremely dangerous weapons of mass destruction and Saddam Hussein was systematically...

Born on Feb. 4, 1913, today would have been Rosa Parks' 100th birthday. On Dec. 1, 1955, Parks refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a city bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Her act of resistance led to a 13-month boycott of the Montgomery bus system that...

The new documentary "Running From Crazy" chronicles the life of actress Mariel Hemingway, the granddaughter of the great novelist Ernest Hemingway. The film focuses on Mariel's family history of mental illness, drug addiction, and the suicides of seven relatives, including her grandfather and her sister, Margaux. The film is directed...