Lois Parshley

On a late-September evening a reporter named Chloe Pleznac prepared to cover a memorial honoring Charlie Kirk in the small coastal town of Homer, Alaska. Pleznac—who is twenty-five, circumspect and earnest, with sea-colored eyes—had grown up in Homer. After working at a radio station in Juneau, she was thrilled to land a position at the Homer News. It paid less than working the fry station at McDonald’s, but she considered getting the job a stroke of luck. She chronicled fishery openings, cat rescues, planning commission meetings, high school sports—basic civic mortar. Twenty-four hours after the Kirk piece was published, Pleznac’s phone lit up. A friend she hadn’t heard from in years texted out of the blue: “You need to look at this.” It was a link to a Facebook post from Republican state representative Sarah Vance, who had denounced Pleznac’s article on Alaska state letterhead. Carpenter Media Group, the publisher of the Homer News, reacted swiftly. Without consulting Pleznac or her editor, Carpenter removed the article from the website, altered it according to Vance’s objections, and republished the piece without a note to indicate the story had been changed. The article has since been removed from the website altogether. I spent the last several months reporting for @columbiajournalismreview on the rapid consolidation of American newspapers under Carpenter Media. Its acquisitions have come with widespread layoffs, staff treatment leading to repeated resignations, and other editorial interventions like this one. Read more about what happened to Pleznac, and a public discourse increasingly detached from the full geography of American power and responsibility, here. (clickable link in bio) /feature/carpenter-media-ominous-takeover-local-news-tuscaloosa-alabama-homer-alaska-pleznac-charlie-kirk.php This project was supported by a grant from @economichardship Reporting Project, which supports independent journalism.

A James Baldwin solstice this year. “One discovers the light in darkness, that is what darkness is for; but everything in our lives depends on how we bear the light.”

No-bid deals, undisclosed contracts, and billions on the line: This investigation that took me over a thousand miles details the wild story of the Alaska LNG pipeline. A pillar of the Trump administration’s “energy dominance” agenda, the President hails it as “truly spectacular.” So is its price tag. Independent analysts say costs could exceed $70 billion. The state has already spent $600+ million on planning and permitting, and Sec. Wright told me $30 billion in federal loan guarantees are “likely.” Yet the manager of the publicly-funded entity created to advance the project says, “There are no subsidies.” This isn’t just an Alaska story. The U.S. is now the world’s largest LNG exporter—an industry increasingly built on debt, not demand. Analysts warn the LNG sector may be approaching a bubble, with investors exposed to climate risks and weakening markets. Declining credit quality, one recent report warns, could lead to debt packaging “similar to the 2008 mortgage crisis.” As one source told me, “Every taxpayer should be furious that the federal government is chasing this project.” Read more @grist (clickable link in bio): /energy/alaskas-44-billion-bet-on-natural-gas/ Captions: 1. The Trans-Alaska pipeline carrying oil across the state is a cautionary tale, with costs ballooning tenfold. 2. Trump Cabinet members on a sales tour of Alaska pitching the LNG project. Sec. Wright told me federal loan guarantees were “very likely.” 3. Sarah Furman, co-executive director of Fairbanks Climate Action Coalition, says the project locks in 1.5 gigatons of emissions and ignores long-term climate hazards that could have disastrous impacts on the gasline. 4. An ad for an LNG pipeline from 1958. There’ve been more than 23 proposals for a gasline in the last half century, but the harsh conditions, extreme distances, and variable markets have made it a gamble no investor could justify. 5. Daniel Skarzynski, an Alaskan trapper and musher, told me “A lot of companies just treat the Alaskan government as kind of suckers.” 6. and 7. Ecological impacts would unfold along the route from the North Slope to Cook Inlet.

The Trump administration opened the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling last week. Officials said these new leases are proof “Alaska is open for business.” But so far, the only one buying is... Alaska. After drilling there drew little interest, the state’s own development agency has stepped in to buy leases and fund road projects to support private industry profits — authorizing $110 million of public funds. Read more @grist (clickable link in bio): /politics/trump-officials-say-alaska-is-open-for-business-so-far-no-ones-buying/ …and because I haven’t been very good at updates here, you can also find more of my Trump administration coverage from the last few months on my website, also linked in my bio. Highlights include precedent-setting changes to public land management, Doug Burgum’s potential conflicts of interest, and the Soviet-izing of American science.

Tyler Gibgot sees the world through a constant haze of light, “like living in an impressionist painting.” He was born with a rare eye condition called aniridia, meaning without irises. I talked to the determined 21-year-old magician this fall about learning to perform magic tricks when he couldn’t see, a journey that reveals a lot about our susceptibility to misdirection. As I kept asking questions, I stumbled on records of a forgotten CIA experiment, the heuristics behind people’s “almost infinite capacity to self-rationalize,” why everyone’s into astrology now, and a magic contest with life lessons far, far off-stage. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by this week’s news, check out this Lever Time podcast with @pancake_sellers : /trump-magic-and-misdirection/

What’s the deal with Greenland? My reporting found Donald Trump’s top donors have financial interests — and sometimes even personnel — involved in mining there. Read more @levernews : /trumps-tech-donors-have-big-plans-for_greenland/

As Hurricane Milton barreled toward Florida last week, Billy Cox eyed the sky, talked to his neighbors, and decided to stay put. His daughter Savannah texted him late into the night, trying to convince him to “get the hell out of there,” he says. Savannah was worried not only for her family’s safety, but the consequences of yet another major hurricane hitting the state. She researches the role of financial systems in climate governance at the University of Sheffield in England, and warns that even as it gets easier to quantify exactly how much worse our new normal might be, the global financial system hasn’t caught up. As the insurance industry collapses, these individual liabilities have been collecting upstream, accumulating quietly in mortgage portfolios and downgrades of credit and bond ratings. Like the 2008 subprime crisis, these overlooked risks could set the stage for the next financial disaster. To learn more about how climate change’s economic impacts will likely impact you, even if you live far from hurricanes, read this @levernews investigation: /the-coming-financial-hurricane/

You’ve probably eaten Alaskan-caught pollock, even if you didn’t know it. It’s the fish that’s in Filet-O-Fish sandwiches, school-lunch fish sticks, and fish-oil supplements. It’s often held up as a prime example of sustainably-sourced seafood — but the reality is far murkier. It’s caught by trawlers in a process critics say is destabilizing other species and disrupting the Bering Sea’s ecosystem. Federal regulators monitoring the industry have close ties to — and in some cases simultaneously work for — the commercial fleets they manage. The trawl industry has aggressively pushed back against criticism, reportedly intimidating fishermen and journalists from speaking out for fear of losing jobs or limiting access to markets. You can read more @levernews (clickable link in bio): /deadly-harvest-the-hidden-costs/

I wrote about birds and trees and living in a world where everything can’t be saved for @vqreview , in collaboration with @grist . “So much of the fear or perception of loss relates to our own expectations,” a boreal researcher told me. Just like landscapes, stories aren’t static. Passed down, they shift through time and circumstance, just as their tellers will spend their own lifetimes changing—a fragile, precious flash. I hope you’ll read it here or in the Spring print issue (clickable link in bio): /spring-2024/reporting/unnatural-selection

After years of sharp declines, a new approach aims to restore Chinook levels in the Yukon River. Tribal leaders feel it unfairly targets subsistence fishing, while failing to tackle huge losses to industrial fishing in the ocean. “I understand the intent of the agreement was to protect salmon, but this is not the solution,” said Brooke Woods, former executive chair for the Yukon River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, who grew up fishing Chinook on the Yukon with her grandparents. For most of Woods’s children’s lives, the Yukon has been closed to them. This new plan ensures they will be young adults before it reopens, she said, fighting back tears. Read more @guardian : /us-news/2024/apr/28/alaska-salmon-conservation-native-indigenous

A new online tool allows anyone to search for air pollution by home address. It offers predictions of how the skies might change over the next three decades—raising important questions about people’s ability to respond to climate risks. Read more at @grist : /health/climate-change-is-undoing-decades-of-progress-on-air-quality/

This spring, Alaska Fish and Game employees culled 94 brown bears — including 11 new cubs. They hoped to help the dwindling Mulchatna caribou herd by reducing predators. But the program set off a political and scientific storm. Multiple employees for Fish and Game told me that the agency was ignoring basic scientific principles, and that political appointees to the Board of Game were not equipped to judge the effectiveness of such actions. As the climate crisis intensifies, agencies across the country are now facing similar questions, and strategies need to shift, says Christi Heun, a former research biologist at Alaska Fish and Game. “All we can do is just kind of cross our fingers and mitigate the best we can.” Read more in this @grist investigation: /science/alaska-predator-control-caribou-wolves-bear-hunt/ #climatechange