November 13, 2025
Progressives Win in Seattle, Changing Directions on Public Safety
Voters ousted a mayor who oversaw a surge in encampment sweeps, and a Republican prosecutor who pursued punitive policies toward homeless people and drug users.
October 1, 2025
Your Cheat Sheet to the 2025 General Elections
November 6, 2025
Five Ways Tuesday’s Results Will Affect Voting Rules and Democracy
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Learn about State Courts
Your State-by-State Guide to Every State Supreme Court
Bolts breaks down the structure, selection procedures, and functions of each state’s highest court.
Learn About Election Administration
Who Counts Our Elections?
Who are the local and state officials who are responsible for counting, canvassing, and certifying elections?
Voting in Michigan
The Michigan Jail that Candidates Keep Visiting
This county lockup in Flint goes far beyond most in promoting civic engagement. But the jail still cuts people off from the world in many other ways while they await trial, sometimes for years.
Arkansas’ New Prison
The Prison Next Door
How Arkansas’ secretive plan for a new state lockup angered people in a deep red corner of rural America—and changed how some see incarceration.
Policing in Chicago
Chicago Police Made Nearly 200,000 Secret Traffic Stops Last Year
Chicago police are required to document every time they pull someone over. But a new investigation reveals the department is releasing vastly incomplete data to oversight agencies, even as the superintendent pledges reforms.
In 2025, Politics Is Local
Bolts covers the nuts and bolts of power and political change, from the local up. We report on the places, people, and policies that shape public policy. We focus on criminal justice and voting rights, and delve further in our vertical What’s on the Ballot.
You Asked Bolts. We Answered.
October 27, 2025
Elections Mailbag: Your Questions on Next Week’s Races, Answered
October 2, 2025
What’s on the Ballot this Fall: Send Us Your Questions
Criminal justice and local politics
Supreme Courts
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About State Supreme Courts
Why these courts matter, how they work, and the levers for changing them: Bolts answers your questions on these powerful institutions.
Direct Democracy
“It Just Feels Like Death”: Barrage of New Rules Target Arkansas Ballot Initiatives
Faced with popular initiatives to protect abortion rights and other measures they dislike, state Republicans are passing new bills that local advocates say will hollow out direct democracy.
Voter Registration
Michigan Law Is First to Automatically Register People to Vote As They Leave Prison
The legislature passed a bill that will also expand automatic voter registration in other ways, including applying it at Medicaid offices, and likely add many new Michiganders to voter rolls.
Long ReadS
September 11, 2025
The Prison Next Door
How Arkansas’ secretive plan for a new state lockup angered people in a deep red corner of rural America—and changed how some see incarceration.
May 5, 2022
A Future for Susanville
Plans to shutter a California prison offer halting glimpses of a different world: an economy that doesn’t revolve around incarceration, a country where losing your job isn’t tantamount to ruin, and an opening for abolition.
August 28, 2024
On Native Land, a New Push to Expand Voting Meets the Long Tail of State Violence
Ongoing negotiations between tribal leaders and Colorado officials may chart a new path for automatically registering Native voters and growing voter rolls nationwide. But first the state is having to confront a legacy of mistrust.
