Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has filed hundreds of state-mandated “transparency” reports intended to disclose millions of dollars donated to third parties at her behest, but at least 23 filings reviewed by The Center Square show her requesting money from "Anonymous." Read the full story: thecentersquare.com/californ…

Three years ago, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass promised to stop lobbyists from donating to two nonprofits closely associated with her office, but an investigation by The Center Square found the corporations and organizations paying those lobbyists have still given millions of dollars at her request. Read more: thecentersquare.com/californ…

Michigan's Senate race should be an easy win for Democrats this year. Experts say it isn't, and the primary may be why. Here's what's going on.

Democratic hopes of taking the Senate might hinge on a liberal Muslim in Michigan. TV attack ads against Abdul El-Sayed most often point to his affiliation with online streamer Hasan Piker, who has been derided for statements that included: "America deserved 9/11, dude." El-Sayed also apologized in August for his own response to a March synagogue attack, when a man rammed the building with a vehicle and opened fire before killing himself. Several of the man's relatives had reportedly been killed by an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon. "Hurt people hurt people," El-Sayed said shortly after the attack. A Pew Research Center survey this year found that about 42% of U.S. adults think American Muslims are having a negative impact on the country, and about half say Islam encourages violence more than other religions, @jstrong712 of @thecentersquare reports. thecentersquare.com/michigan…

More from The Center Square on Georgia's child welfare agency: The Department of Family and Children Services spent $7.3 million on software to support service authorizations, and an audit shows the software was a factor in a $71.1 million increase in costs, @jarrett_ki80724 of @thecentersquare reports. Audit finds the cost of service authorizations was $63.3 million in FY2022. It was $134.4 million in FY2025 – up 112.3%. The department's use of the Salesforce-based system known as ARGO to facilitate placement options for foster children had "unintended consequences," according to auditors. "Central office staff stated case managers were more likely to obtain service approvals 'just in case' the service was needed or for many months even when the expectation should have been a decrease in usage over time," the audit said. thecentersquare.com/georgia/…

Team Obama rejected more FOIA requests than anyone in history, spied on James Rosen, secretly seized AP phone records and booted several news outlets off of his plane. And not a peep from the people screaming about Trump doing the same now.

That is pretty much exactly what he did, and he’s never really faced any criticism for it because the media will not ever write negative stories about Barack Obama

Obama did ban Fox, and waged almost constant war against press freedom. You should so this one out, President @BarackObama .

Obama used the Espionage Act against a Fox News reporter

Oh that’s rich. This guy started a movement in government “media affairs” that has choked off information from all levels of the Fourth Estate. When it comes to ratfking the media, Obama was the John the Baptist to Trump’s Jesus. Think I’m lying? Read below what the Society of Professional Journalists was complaining to Obama about in 2015 and tell me if this isn’t standard operating procedure now at all levels of government. A fawning press failed to call this out when Obama did it. And his fawning fandom in state and local governments took up his tactics too. Even Republicans were impressed enough to copy them. Now they burn taxpayer dollars with impunity. Every time I reach out to a government decision-maker, and instead I get an unsigned email from some taxpayer-funded “spokesperson” who wants questions in writing and ultimately tells me nothing, I think of Barack Obama. Every time I request records and instead go through months of hide-and-seek games that lead nowhere, I think of Obama and how he conned a nation. spj.org/more-than-50-journal…

The lives that could’ve been saved if anyone would’ve just listened to this motherfucker.

CAIR, the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights group, which rails against “Islamophobia,” booted a @thecentersquare reporter who was trying to cover their Washington conference. The decision to ban media coverage seems to contradict CAIR's mission statement, which says it seeks to “enhance understanding of Islam, protect civil rights, promote justice, and empower American Muslims,” @MarkStricherz of The Center Square reports. @AmyMek: “Groups that preach ‘civil rights’ in public and hide their record in private do not want independent journalists in the room … They want friendly outlets. They want control of the narrative.” thecentersquare.com/national…

CAIR blocked a reporter from The Center Square from covering its event.

TAXPAYER PHILANTHROPY: Three years ago, North Carolina passed a stringent ban against transgender medical interventions on children, outlawing surgical or chemical treatments on anyone under 18. That same year, the fortunes of the nonprofit Charlotte Transgender Healthcare Group began to soar. Since 2023, federal dollars have poured in totaling $2.6 million. And Trump's executive orders against federal funding for gender ideology and trans medical treatments on minors have done nothing to stop it. New reporting from @thecentersquare investigative team: thecentersquare.com/north_ca…

Upon the start of his second term, Trump signed executive orders aiming to end federal funding of gender ideology and cut off federal support for gender medical treatments on children. $2.6 million in federal funds has nevertheless flowed to a NC nonprofit called Charlotte Trans Health that openly promotes hormone therapies for minors, showing the limits of Trump's ability to stop it, @thecentersquare reports. thecentersquare.com/north_ca…

TAXPAYER PHILANTHROPY: Despite posting multi-million-dollar losses in several recent years, a federally funded nonprofit that develops vaccines against deadly viruses overseas has continued to raise its executives' pay, @MarkStricherz of @thecentersquare reports. The Albert B. Sabin Vaccine Institute of Washington, D.C., a 501(c)(3) organization, reported a net loss of nearly $4M in 2024 and $2M the year before, according to federal records. Despite the decreases, CEO Amy Finan saw her compensation rise to $517,124 from $503,726 in 2023. Then-President Anuradha Gupta received the biggest raise. Her compensation soared to $418,131 in 2024 from $237,447 the previous year. thecentersquare.com/national…

For 25 years, the 9/11 memorial ceremony has followed the same script: six moments of silence marking the exact minutes the towers were hit and fell, and the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pennsylvania, crashes happened. This year, organizers added a seventh, for the first time ever. At 12:20 p.m. Friday, the ceremony paused again, this time for everyone who has died since from 9/11-related illness or injury. Family members also read the names of all 2,983 people killed in the attacks, including six lives lost in a related 1993 bombing at the same site. The youngest was two and a half years old. The oldest was 85. They came from 90 countries. Read more about Friday's 25th anniversary ceremony: thecentersquare.com/national…