August 16, 2017

Baltimore Just Took Down All of Its Confederate Statues Overnight

“It’s done. They needed to come down,” Mayor Catherine Pugh said.

Jerry Jackson/AP

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The city council of Baltimore approved a plan Monday to remove Confederate statues from public spaces. By Wednesday morning, all four of the city’s memorials honoring Confederate leaders were taken down. 

“It’s done,” Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh said early Wednesday. “They needed to come down. My concern is for the safety and security of our people. We moved as quickly as we could.” 

Several journalists on the scene documented the monuments’ removals:

The swift action comes in the wake of the white supremacist protests in Charlottesville, Virginia, where organizers of the “Unite the Right” rally were objecting to the removal of a Confederate-era statue honoring Robert E. Lee. One woman was killed when a suspected white supremacist drove a car through a crowd of counter-protesters. 

On Tuesday, President Donald Trump again drew fierce condemnation over his now-repeated claim that multiple sides were behind the Charlottesville protests, not just neo-Nazis and white nationalists. He also attacked what he described as the “alt-left” for the violence.

Trump on Tuesday also appeared to criticize the renewed movement to remove Confederate statues, asking at what point would proponents be satisfied in their efforts. “Was George Washington a slave owner?” he asked in a chaotic press conference Tuesday. “Are we going to take down statues to George Washington? What about Thomas Jefferson?”

As the president equivocated over hate groups and where to place the blame for Charlottesville, cities across the country have ramped up the process to remove Confederate monuments and flags from its public spaces.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

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