$25,000, which she spent renovating her home. The money was exciting, she says. “I felt good that I could fix my house up.” But, she goes on, it is hardly full recompense for what people of her race have suffered in America over the centuries. “I looked at it like this isn’t 40 acres and a mule”—a promise made to freed slaves by William Sherman, a Union general, towards the end of the civil war. Since 1989 three different black representatives in Congress have introduced HR40, a bill to create a commission to explore a federal reparations programme. Five states and some cities have also launched their own commissions. Yet the scheme in Evanston, a multicultural and deeply liberal spot that is the home of Northwestern University, is the only one to have actually paid out money. Its proponents hope it will inspire something bigger. With Donald Trump attacking DEI and the Supreme Court gutting the Voting Rights Act, that seems decidedly quixotic. Since the programme started 127 people have received payments. In the early stages recipients were permitted to use the money only for home improvements. More recently money has been paid in cash. This summer another 44 people, selected by lottery from a pool of 465 applicants, will be next to benefit. In total $20m is earmarked to be given away. Most of the 11,000 black people in Evanston do not qualify. For legal reasons the scheme compensates only people hurt by redlining and other racist policies adopted by the City of Evanston in the first half of the 20th century. But Robin Rue Simmons, who developed the scheme, says the goals are bigger. This, she says, is about “the gravest crime against humanity, the institution of slavery and its legacies”. Half the money comes from a property transfer tax, the rest from a tax on cannabis sales. Ms Rue Simmons, who now runs a charity that campaigns for reparations more broadly, still believes that a nationwide scheme is possible and necessary for America to fulfil its promises of liberty and equality of opportunity. The Evanston scheme, however, is faltering. Cannabis-tax revenues have raised a fraction of what was hoped. At a meeting of the city council’s reparations committee in March Krissie Harris, the chairwoman, reported that a “rebellion” against the project is part of the reason cannabis buyers are shunning the city’s dispensaries. Judicial Watch, a right-wing
group, is challenging the scheme in court on behalf of white residents, arguing that on constitutional grounds a government cannot discriminate by race. Ms Simmons says that reparations are not only necessary on their own terms: they will also help protect black culture. Older residents, like Ms Burton, talk about discrimination in their youth, but also nostalgically about the strength of the community. Evanston, like the Chicago region in general, is becoming less black. Ms Burton worries this is weakening black political power. Mr Trump, she says, is “trying to take us back to Jim Crow”, and younger people do not appreciate the threat. Yet having done up her house, she is following the exodus. She is going to sell it and move closer to her son in Atlanta. ■ Stay on top of American politics with The US in brief, our daily newsletter with fast analysis of the most important political news, and Checks and Balance, a weekly note that examines the state of American democracy and the issues that matter to voters. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//united-states/2026/05/31/welcome-to-evanston-where-woke- never-died
The fading influence of America’s spy co- ordinator Bill Pulte’s appointment as director of national intelligence reflects the office’s declining stature June 4th 2026 BILL PULTE, a 38-year-old Floridian, has run America’s Federal Housing Finance Agency for little over a year, mostly in blessed obscurity. Now he is America’s top spy. This might sound like the plot of a screwball comedy. Unfortunately it is not. On June 2nd Donald Trump appointed Mr Pulte, whose previous experience includes stints in home construction and private equity, to serve as acting director of national intelligence (DNI). Mr Pulte will succeed Tulsi Gabbard, a former congresswoman who resigned on May 22nd, citing her husband’s ill-health. Ms Gabbard, a long-standing anti-war advocate, had been
sidelined from most important foreign-policy debates, including the decisions to attack Venezuela and Iran. Mr Pulte does not carry the same ideological baggage as Ms Gabbard, whose views on Syria, Russia and Iran had made her an outlier in the Republican Party. But he is nonetheless strikingly unqualified for the job. The position of DNI was created 21 years ago, after the 9/11 attacks, to co- ordinate the work of America’s sprawling intelligence bureaucracy, whose constituent agencies were once poor at sharing secrets with one another. The law that established the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) specified that anyone nominated to lead it “shall have extensive national security expertise”. Every prior DNI has been either a former intelligence official, military officer or elected official. Mr Pulte is none of these things. His main qualifications for the role make sense only in MAGA- land. The president has not said whether he intends to nominate Mr Pulte for the role on a permanent basis. That would require confirmation by the Senate, which could prove difficult. In 2019 Mr Trump chose John Ratcliffe, then a congressman, to be DNI. Mr Ratcliffe had sat on various national-security committees, including the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. Yet Mr Trump withdrew the nomination after questions arose about Mr Ratcliffe’s qualifications. (He later secured the job and is now director of the CIA.) By comparison with Mr Ratcliffe, Mr Pulte is an intelligence neophyte. His lack of qualifications would not be the only obstacle to Senate confirmation. Mr Pulte has appeared eager to use his access to privileged information to target figures who have drawn Mr Trump’s ire. Last year he accused Lisa Cook, a member of the Federal Reserve Board, Adam Schiff, a Democratic senator, and Letitia James, New York’s attorney-general, of mortgage fraud, referring their cases to the Justice Department. He also went after Jerome Powell, the Fed’s chairman, whom Mr Trump was then seeking to remove. Mr Pulte’s willingness to weaponise his office is not unusual in this administration. Nor, increasingly, is the politicisation of the ODNI. Ms
Gabbard caused an outcry earlier this year when she attended an FBI raid on a Georgia election centre which was the focus of Mr Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election had been stolen. She also implemented Mr Trump’s directive to create a “Weaponisation Working Group” to co-ordinate complaints against the nefarious Biden administration. The prospect of Mr Pulte overseeing America’s intelligence apparatus has alarmed some senators. Mark Warner, the Democratic vice-chairman of the Senate intelligence committee, accused Mr Trump of choosing “an official who has demonstrated not just willingness but eagerness to use the authorities of government to pursue political retribution”. Mr Pulte, he added, appeared to have been selected “because the White House believes he will provide the narrative it wants, not the intelligence we need”. Even some Republicans are uneasy. “We don’t need a weaponised DNI,” said John Thune, the usually compliant Senate majority leader. “We need professionals there.” They may not get much of a say in the matter. Mr Pulte can carry on as acting director for roughly seven months without being nominated or confirmed. Mr Trump could then nominate him, allowing him to remain in charge for months while the Senate considers his candidacy. In truth, Mr Pulte’s appointment reflects the long decline of the ODNI. The institution has shrunk in both size and importance in recent years. Ms Gabbard cut more than 30% of its staff, shedding hundreds of personnel. It has also been mired in turf wars with other agencies. The CIA, in particular, has reportedly withheld intelligence from the ODNI on topics including Iran. Many former intelligence officials have argued that the office needs reform. Mr Pulte is not what they had in mind. ■ Stay on top of American politics with The US in brief, our daily newsletter with fast analysis of the most important political news, and Checks and Balance, a weekly note that examines the state of American democracy and the issues that matter to voters. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//united-states/2026/06/02/the-fading-influence-of- americas-spy-co-ordinator
Meet the jailscraper With no room for prisons, New York City is building up June 4th 2026 CHARLES DICKENS was no stranger to grim prisons. When he was 12 his father was sent to a debtors’ jail. The writer would later visit London prisons for research. Yet in 1842, when he went inside a New York City jail, he was horrified. “Such indecent and disgusting dungeons”, Dickens wrote, “would bring disgrace upon the most despotic empire in the world!” Dark, cramped and prone to flooding, it acquired the nickname “The Tombs”. Successive jails on the site would inherit it. In January ground was broken on the next generation of The Tombs. But rather than resembling a dungeon, the 1,000- inmate jail will reach to the sky. It will be 335 feet (102m) high, taller than the Statue of Liberty.