Investigative Journalism in the Public Interest
Mass. Governor Proposes Eliminating Statute of Limitations for Rape When DNA Evidence Exists
The post Mass. Governor Proposes Eliminating Statute of Limitations for Rape When DNA Evidence Exists appeared first on ProPublica.
Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey wants to eliminate the 15-year deadline to prosecute rape in cases where there’s a DNA match. Current Massachusetts law bars rape prosecutions in older cases, even when DNA testing has identified a suspect. An investigation last year by WBUR and ProPublica found that nearly all other states allow more time to charge rapes or similar assaults of adults than Massachusetts. Many of those 47 states extended their deadlines in recent decades as DNA technology helped solve old cases and as evidence mounted that police had failed to fully investigate rapes. The WBUR-ProPublica investigation followed the story of Louise, a woman who had been raped and stabbed after accepting a ride in 2005 from a man who said he recognized her from college, a police report said. Although DNA testing would later connect a man accused of multiple assaults to her case, prosecutors had to drop charges in her attack under Massachusetts’ statute. (WBUR does not identify victims of sexual assault without their permission. We agreed to identify Louise by her middle name.) Healey’s proposal would eliminate the statute of limitations for rape cases when DNA evidence exists. “With technological advances, new evidence is being collected and tested every day, and we need to make sure our judicial system keeps pace,” Healey said in a written statement on Saturday. “I hope this proposal will help survivors who have had to wait far too long for justice, while also improving our ability to hold offenders accountable.” The new language is part of Healey’s budget proposal for the 2027 fiscal year. The provision must pass both chambers of the Legislature. It would take effect for cases in which the statute of limitations has not yet expired and future sexual assaults, but it would not affect older cases. Legislators have tried to pass similar proposals every session since 2011, WBUR found, but those efforts have failed in part because defense attorneys have opposed changes, saying a longer deadline risks violating the rights of the accused. State Rep. Adam Scanlon, who has introduced legislation to create a DNA exception since 2021, said media attention helped push the issue forward again this year. He said Healey’s “bill is really a testament to victims to ensure that folks that are in the same situation never have to go through the process of seeing somebody being able to walk away from an alleged rape when they know — when we know as a society — that DNA evidence connects them to that crime.” That Healey, the state’s former attorney general, is backing the changes gives new hope for victims, said Louise, the woman featured by WBUR as part of its investigation. She was raped and repeatedly stabbed, a police report said. But DNA evidence did not match her assault to a suspect for 17 years. “ There are several of us that have missed out on having justice. We won’t get to have that day when we know that our perpetrators are not going to get us,” Louise said. Prosecutors alleged in 2022 that Louise’s attacker was a serial rapist. DNA from Ivan Cheung, a Boston-area man who worked in the financial services industry at the time of his arrest, also matched a 2006 stabbing and rape, court records show. But that attack was also beyond the state’s statute of limitations by the time the match was made. Cheung has repeatedly maintained his innocence. His attorney did not reply to WBUR’s requests for comment. Louise decided to advocate for survivors like her after Cheung’s prosecution failed. In June, she testified publicly before a state legislative committee in support of Scanlon’s bill. She said she’s glad that the governor heard the voices of her and other survivors. “I have beautiful family members, young women,” Louise said. “I care about all the youth in the community. I want them all safer.” The post Mass. Governor Proposes Eliminating Statute of Limitations for Rape When DNA Evidence Exists appeared first on ProPublica.
FAA Warns Airlines About Safety Risks From Rocket Launches, Urges “Extreme Caution”
The post FAA Warns Airlines About Safety Risks From Rocket Launches, Urges “Extreme Caution” appeared first on ProPublica.
The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a sharp warning that rocket launches could “significantly reduce safety” for airplanes, urging pilots to prepare for the possibility that “catastrophic failures” could create dangerous debris fields. The official notice, known as a safety alert for operators, was dated Jan. 8, the same day that ProPublica published an investigation showing how pilots scrambled to avoid debris after two SpaceX Starship megarockets exploded over busy airspace last year. The alert was an acknowledgment that travelers were at risk on those days, when the FAA hastily activated no-fly zones to help air traffic controllers steer planes away from falling rocket parts. In the last two decades, the agency has issued about 245 such safety alerts to the aviation community about issues ranging from runway threats to mechanical problems, but last month’s warning is the first to address the danger to airplanes when rockets launch or reenter Earth’s atmosphere, according to the FAA’s website. SpaceX and other companies have ramped up launches in recent years. Starship, a version of which is supposed to one day land on the moon, has followed a flight path that soars over well-trafficked commercial airways in the Caribbean. The FAA previously told ProPublica that it “limits the number of aircraft exposed to the hazards, making the likelihood of a catastrophic event extremely improbable.” It also said it takes steps to keep pilots informed and planes safe during launches, such as creating the emergency no-fly zones, known as debris response areas. The January alert also pointed to those procedures. “Past events have shown that when a mishap does occur, debris has fallen within or near the DRA, and pilots should exercise extreme caution near these areas,” the notice said. But it warned that debris can fall in places where the FAA doesn’t enact no-fly zones, such as international airspace over oceans without radar coverage, saying pilots need to have “additional situational awareness” to avoid debris fields there. Neither SpaceX nor the FAA has released data showing where debris fell after the Starship explosions last year. SpaceX did not respond to a request for comment. Previously, the company has said that it learns from its mistakes and that each test improves Starship’s reliability. “SpaceX is committed to responsibly using airspace during launches and reentries, prioritizing public safety to protect people on the ground, at sea, and in the air,” it said on X in December. Last year, the FAA granted SpaceX permission to launch Starship as many as 25 times a year from its base in Texas. But, after repeated setbacks, only five of the giant space vehicles lifted off in 2025. In its warning, the FAA urged aircraft operators to “evaluate the impact of space launch and reentry operations on their planned flight routes and take appropriate precautionary measures.” Those should include ensuring they have enough fuel in case air traffic controllers put them in a holding pattern, the agency said. In its investigation, ProPublica found several airplanes began running low on fuel after the January 2025 Starship incident, with at least one declaring an emergency and crossing the no-fly zone to reach an airport. The world’s largest pilots union told the FAA in October that such events call into question whether “a suitable process” is in place to respond to unexpected rocket mishaps. “There is high potential for debris striking an aircraft resulting in devastating loss of the aircraft, flight crew, and passengers,” wrote Steve Jangelis, a pilot and the group’s aviation safety chair. The FAA adjusted its practices over the course of the failed launches last year but still allowed SpaceX to launch more Starship prototypes over the same airspace, adding stress to the already-taxed air traffic control system, ProPublica found. The Wall Street Journal reported in December that an air traffic controller needed to intervene to prevent a collision when at least two aircraft flew too close to each other after one of the explosions. The FAA did not respond to requests for comment for this story. Airlines for America, a trade association for the leading U.S. airlines, said it is “committed to ensuring the safety of all flights especially amid the growing number of space launches.” The association said in a statement that airlines coordinate with both the federal government and commercial space companies to make sure the airspace stays safe. Rep. Nellie Pou of New Jersey, a Democrat on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s aviation panel, applauded the FAA for issuing the warning, saying the Trump administration “must protect American travelers from all threats, including space launches and reentry operations.” “Perfect safety demands scrupulous and forward-looking attention to detail from our federal agencies and close coordination with operators,” Pou said. “I am heartened FAA is showing both here.” ProPublica’s Jan. 8 story showed how airplanes had to maneuver quickly to clear wide swaths of airspace after SpaceX Starships blew up over the Caribbean in January and March last year. Read More “We’re Too Close to the Debris” Our analysis of flight tracking data found that in each incident, multiple planes were in the projected debris zones at the time of the explosions and that others likely had to change course to steer clear of falling debris. Pilots reported seeing flaming streaks far above the horizon. Before the third Starship launch last year, in May, the agency settled on a more conservative approach, proactively closing more airspace ahead of time. That mission failed too, with the rocket’s booster exploding over the Gulf and its upper stage blowing up over the Indian Ocean. SpaceX is now seeking FAA approval to add new trajectories as Starship strives to reach orbit. Under the plan, the rocket would fly over land in Florida and Mexico, as well as the airspace of Cuba, Jamaica and the Cayman Islands, likely disrupting hundreds of flights. The company says it’s committed to public safety as it ramps up its launch cadence, saying in a post on X that it “will continue to ensure maximum public safety while also working to integrate Starship more efficiently into the airspace.” The post FAA Warns Airlines About Safety Risks From Rocket Launches, Urges “Extreme Caution” appeared first on ProPublica.
Two CBP Agents Identified in Alex Pretti Shooting
The post Two CBP Agents Identified in Alex Pretti Shooting appeared first on ProPublica.
The two federal immigration agents who fired on Minneapolis protester Alex Pretti are identified in government records as Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo Gutierrez. The records viewed by ProPublica list Ochoa, 43, and Gutierrez, 35, as the shooters during the deadly encounter last weekend that left Pretti dead and ignited massive protests and calls for criminal investigations. Both men were assigned to Operation Metro Surge, an immigration enforcement dragnet launched in December that sent scores of armed and masked agents across the city. CBP, which employs both men, has so far refused to release their names and has disclosed few other facts about the deadly incident, which came days after a different immigration agent shot and killed another Minneapolis protester, a 37-year-old mother of three named Renee Good. Pretti’s killing, and the subsequent secrecy surrounding the agents involved, comes as the country confronts the consequences of President Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration crackdown. The sweeps in cities across the country have been marked by scenes of violence, against immigrants and U.S. citizens, by agents allowed to hide their identities with masks — an almost unheard of practice in law enforcement. As a result, the public has been kept from one of the chief ways it has to hold officers involved in such altercations accountable: their identity. Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers have called for a transparent investigation into the killing of Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care unit nurse working at a Department of Veterans Affairs hospital. “We must have a transparent, independent investigation into the Minnesota shooting, and those responsible—no matter their title—must be held accountable,” Republican Sen. John Curtis of Utah wrote on X on Monday. The agency sent a notice to some members of Congress on Tuesday acknowledging that two agents fired Glock pistols during the altercation that left Pretti dead. That notice does not include the agents’ names. A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees CBP, said the agents had been placed on leave after the Jan. 24 shooting. And after a week of protests and calls from lawmakers for a review, the Justice Department said Friday that its Civil Rights Division is investigating the shooting. A DOJ spokesperson did not answer questions, including whether DHS has shared materials, such as body-camera footage, with its investigators. Ochoa is a Border Patrol agent who joined CBP in 2018. Gutierrez joined in 2014 and works for CBP’s Office of Field Operations. He is assigned to a special response team, which conducts high-risk operations like those of police SWAT units. Records show both men are from South Texas. In the aftermath of the shooting, Gregory Bovino, who has orchestrated high-intensity immigration sweeps and arrests in a string of Democratic-led cities since early 2025, was removed from his role as Border Patrol commander at large and reassigned to his former post in El Centro, California. A spokesperson for DHS declined to answer questions about the two agents and referred ProPublica to the FBI. The FBI declined to comment. ProPublica made several attempts to call Ochoa and Gutierrez but neither answered. Ochoa, who goes by Jesse, graduated from the University of Texas-Pan American with a degree in criminal justice, according to his ex-wife, Angelica Ochoa. A longtime resident of the Rio Grande Valley, Ochoa had for years dreamed of working for the Border Patrol and finally landed a job there, she said. By the time the couple split in 2021, he had become a gun enthusiast with about 25 rifles, pistols and shotguns, Angelica Ochoa said. DHS’ disclosure to Congress was drawn from an internal review of the agents’ body-camera footage, which has not been released to the public. State investigators, meanwhile, have accused their federal counterparts of blocking them from investigating the shooting. <img decoding="async" height="766" width="1149" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?w=1149" alt="An overhead perspective of a street and sidewalks lined with trees. FBI agents walk around and inside an area marked off with caution tape. The area is blocked off by trucks and cars." class="wp-image-65963" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=2048,1366 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95_1fabea.jpg?resize=2000,1334 2000w" sizes="(max-width: 1149px) 100vw, 1149px" /> FBI agents work at the scene of the Pretti shooting. Peter DiCampo/ProPublica “We don’t have any information on the shooters,” a Minneapolis city spokesperson said. A spokesperson for Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said Tuesday that his office also had “not been given the names, and we don’t have any new information on the investigation.” Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee, in a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi Monday, accused the Justice Department of covering up evidence in both Pretti’s and Good’s killings. “DOJ has also blocked prosecutors and agents from cooperating with state law enforcement officials and prevented state officials from accessing evidence,” the letter said. Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, told CNN on Sunday that immigration agents should not be masked. “They should not be anonymous. They should be identifiable. And they have to have rules of engagement that don’t allow them to terrorize and intimidate, harass and assault U.S. citizens and other people,” he said. The notice to Congress said that the shooting happened when Pretti resisted arrest after officers were unable to get him and a female protester out of the street. The CBP officer “attempted to move the woman and Pretti out of the roadway. The woman and Pretti did not move,” the report reads. “CBP personnel attempted to take Pretti into custody. Pretti resisted CBP personnel’s efforts and a struggle ensued.” According to the report, one agent then yelled “He’s got a gun!” multiple times, and two others “discharged” their Glock pistols. In videos widely shared online, Pretti can be seen holding up a phone, documenting the movements of federal agents and officers as they roamed the streets of a popular food and arts district. According to news reports, Pretti was concerned about the increasingly volatile siege of the city by federal agents. In the videos, a masked agent appears to knock a woman to the ground. Pretti comes to her aid, getting between them, at which point the officer deploys pepper spray at his face. Two agents then grab Pretti and pull him to the ground, while more federal personnel pile on. During the struggle, the agents unleash a series of shots — approximately 10 — as onlookers scream. Pretti was armed at the time of the encounter with a legally owned handgun, according to state and federal officials. Some analyses of bystander video appear to show a federal agent taking Pretti’s gun from his hip before the first shots were fired. The agents’ masks and the chaos of the altercation make it difficult to differentiate one from another. Those videos appear to contradict the claims by Bovino and other officials, including DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, that Pretti had come to attack agents. “The agents attempted to disarm the individual, but he violently resisted,” Bovino said in a Jan. 25 news conference. “Fearing for his life and the lives and safety of fellow officers, a Border Patrol agent fired defensive shots.” In the initial aftermath, Stephen Miller, a top Trump aide and a leading force behind the immigration enforcement operations, called Pretti “a would-be assassin.” But Miller changed tack later in the week when he said in a statement that CBP officers “may not have been following” protocol related to confronting bystanders. Additional video has surfaced showing Pretti in another altercation with federal agents 11 days before he was killed. The video shows Pretti yelling at the agents, who get in an SUV and start to drive away. Pretti then kicks out the taillight of the vehicle and the agents, who wore protective masks, jump out and tackle him to the ground. It is unclear if any of the same agents were involved in both incidents. Lauren Bonds, executive director of the National Police Accountability Project, said that many local and state police departments are “much more transparent” than CBP when officers shoot people. “More and more police departments are choosing to release bodycam footage or dashcam footage within a couple of days.” Gil Kerlikowske, a former CBP commissioner, told ProPublica that it’s difficult to draw conclusions from the chaos in bystander videos. Still, he said, the shooting might have been prevented. Pretti’s attempt to help the woman knocked to the ground could have been seen as interfering with federal law enforcement, he said. But the decision by the officers to immediately use pepper spray created a chaotic scene that likely contributed to Pretti’s death. “The other agent could have said ‘don’t interfere’ or ‘stand back,’” Kerlikowske said. “Rather than move immediately to pepper spray, you can arrest the person.” It’s part of a pattern, he said, of federal officers jumping straight to use of force in situations that could have been de-escalated but instead create danger for both agents and their targets. Pretti’s death, and the federal government’s characterization of the event, sparked immediate protests, spurring thousands of people to go out into frigid conditions in Minneapolis and other American cities. The shooting has also drawn intense criticism from political leaders, including Walz, who has promised his state’s law enforcement will conduct its own criminal investigation. <img decoding="async" height="502" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="People wearing winter clothing stand in a street. One woman, wearing an orange vest and goggles, is kneeling on the ground with her hands clasped toward her face. Another woman leans down to put her arm around the kneeling woman. She is holding a sign that says “Ice Out MSP.”" class="wp-image-65961" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,513 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1367 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,282 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,767 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-72_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1335 2000w" sizes="(max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> People gather at the location where Pretti was shot. Cengiz Yar/ProPublica The post Two CBP Agents Identified in Alex Pretti Shooting appeared first on ProPublica.
The post What We Saw in Minneapolis appeared first on ProPublica.
Over the past month, the Trump administration has deployed thousands of federal immigration agents to the Minneapolis area. On Saturday, Jan. 24, federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care nurse for the Department of Veterans Affairs. Pretti was the third person shot by federal agents in the area in January. The Department of Homeland Security initially said an agent fired “defensive shots” after Pretti approached officers with a weapon, but video of the incident appears to contradict that claim. DHS said this week that two officers involved were placed on leave. In a press conference on Thursday, border czar Tom Homan said the administration is working on making the operation “safer, more efficient, by the book.” He said that agents will focus on “targeted, strategic enforcement operations” with a “prioritization on public safety threats.” Our photojournalists Cengiz Yar and Peter DiCampo were on the ground in Minneapolis, covering what they saw in the days before and after Pretti’s death. Read their accounts below. Cengiz Yar I arrived in Minneapolis last week to report on the crackdown and how local residents were reacting. I had packed my medical kit, full face respirator, helmet and a couple tourniquets, essentials for my reporting bag when I make trips to dangerous and potentially violent areas. I also brought layers upon layers of warm clothing, as temperatures were expected to drop to 20 below in the coming days. I knew the ICE raids and the community’s response had been intense across the region, but I wasn’t fully prepared for what I’d end up seeing playing out in the streets. In my few days in Minnesota, I’ve been witness to countless scenes that remind me of moments I’ve seen during previous trips covering conflicts around the world. I watched heavily armored federal units roll through quiet neighborhoods. In a grocery store parking lot, angry residents screamed at agents, demanding they leave the city. Masked and armed government agents pointed weapons toward me and some protesters during an encounter in the middle of the afternoon. Curious guests in a hotel elevator wondered why I was carrying around a medical pack and gas mask. Local residents thanked me for being there to witness the situation. A drunk man at a hotel bar cursed at me, saying the media was at fault. The wars we’ve carried out as a nation abroad have come home. On my first day out reporting, I came upon an incident that had been unfolding for over an hour. Late in the afternoon on Thursday, Jan. 22, three construction workers clung to a roof, bracing themselves against the slanted plywood of an unfinished two-story house on the far south side of Minneapolis. Federal agents had massed in the house and in cars on the street, conducting a raid on the construction site. The agents called for the workers to come down. They refused. They stayed on the roof, exposed to the elements in negative 4 degree weather. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="1708" width="2560" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=2560" alt="Men in tactical vests and ski masks walk out of the plywood shell of a house. A worker in a high-visibility vest leans against the peak of a roof as others on the ground watch the agents go." class="wp-image-65760" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,513 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1367 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,282 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,767 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-13_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1335 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px" /> Federal agents leave a construction site after trying to apprehend three individuals on the roof. Cengiz Yar/ProPublica I stood outside the house looking up at the men on the roof, wondering how they were surviving in only high-visibility vests and work clothing. Onlookers begged the agents to let them bring the men blankets. They were told to stay out of the building. Other construction workers milled about the snow-covered site as their co-workers hung on above. Some cursed at the officers. One worker told the men to come down before they freeze to death. “You can at least go to a warm cell,” he shouted. One young, white worker stuck his middle finger in the face of agents idling in their car. “Fuck you,” he screamed as he stomped around the site. A half dozen onlookers had assembled as well, shouting encouragement to the men above and asking the agents for compassion. The three men remained on the roof as the young, white construction worker argued angrily with the agents for almost an hour. Finally, as the time approached 5 p.m., the agents left. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="767" width="1149" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=1149" alt="A blurry scene of two construction workers rushing through a partially built house, wearing bright high-visibility jackets." class="wp-image-65761" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,513 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1367 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,282 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,767 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-14_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1335 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1149px) 100vw, 1149px" /> Workers rush up stairs to bring blankets to their co-workers after federal agents abandoned their attempted apprehension. Cengiz Yar/ProPublica Onlookers rushed into the building and brought the men down to wrap them in blankets. “You’re OK now,” they reassured the men. “You did great.” On Friday, I arrived in South Minneapolis as protesters gathered, shouting, filming and blowing whistles at armored agents in a pickup. After a few minutes, the agents threw tear gas into the small crowd of onlookers and sped away. Gas drifted through the snowy streets, passing cute two-story houses and short, leafless trees. My throat burning, I crouched to the ground, coughing up the irritants behind a snowbank. I couldn’t have known that less than a day later, in a similar situation, Customs and Border Protection agents would kill a man by shooting him multiple times in the back as they pinned him to the ground. Pretti died while filming agents and trying to help a woman as he was pepper sprayed. In the unfolding chaos in the hours after the shooting, I watched as agents unloaded tear gas on a couple hundred furious protesters who had assembled at the site of the shooting. Heavily armored law enforcement faced off against a crowd of unarmed protesters carrying signs and screaming for justice and retribution. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="502" width="752" data-id="65762" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="Men in camo wearing helmets and masks open the doors of a four-door pickup truck while holding weapons and a gas canister. Outside the truck, a few people in street clothes are gathered in a snowy suburban roundabout. One is filming on his phone. " class="wp-image-65762" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,513 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1367 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,282 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,767 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-30_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1335 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="502" width="752" data-id="65763" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="Two people scatter as a column of gas rises from a spot in the middle of a snowy residential sidewalk." class="wp-image-65763" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,513 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1367 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,282 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,767 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-31_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1335 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Federal agents threw tear gas into a crowd of protesters in a South Minneapolis neighborhood. Cengiz Yar/ProPublica Peter DiCampo It was 9:07 a.m. on Saturday morning when I learned that someone had been shot outside Glam Doll Donuts on Nicollet Avenue. It would be hours before I heard the name Alex Pretti and watched the grisly videos of CBP agents shooting him to death. But knowing that Minneapolis was on edge following the death of Renee Good, also killed by federal agents, I grabbed my camera and the warmest clothing I could find. I rushed out of my house. By 9:29 a.m., I was in my car texting a group of fellow photographers “omw.” Yellow police tape and federal agents lined the scene of the shooting, keeping everyone about a block away in every direction. A small crowd gathered. The first person I recognized wasn’t another journalist, it was my neighbor. “Peter!” she cried, and told me she wasn’t sure what was happening, just that she had also heard about the shooting and wanted to get down there. She sobbed into my arms for a minute, then we parted ways. More agents gathered. Many wore gas masks. More residents and others ready to protest another killing arrived. A young man stood at the edge of the yellow tape and yelled; an older woman hugged him to try to calm him down. The anger of the crowd was palpable. “ICE agents: Get out of Minneapolis,” they screamed. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="766" width="1149" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=1149" alt="A woman in a coat with a furry trim on the hood holds someone in a hat and dark jacket. Behind them are clusters of men in tactical vests, some with helmets, many with masks on." class="wp-image-65881" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1366 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-001_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1334 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1149px) 100vw, 1149px" /> Kristin Heiberg hugs a young man who had been screaming at federal agents. Peter DiCampo/ProPublica <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="1708" width="2560" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=2560" alt="Several men in tactical vests and helmets have their backs to the camera, facing a row of people in street clothes. Members of the crowd are shouting and their breath is visible. A strand of yellow police tape cuts across the scene." class="wp-image-65882" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1366 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-005_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1334 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px" /> Protesters in a standoff with federal agents a block south of where Alex Pretti was killed Peter DiCampo/ProPublica I do not have the words to articulate how it feels to watch this unfold in Minneapolis, a city that I have grown to know and love after moving here a few years ago. The journalists who flocked here over the past few weeks are people I have run into while on assignment in hot spots all over the world. Now they were in my home city. As crowds grew, agents fired tear gas to keep them back. Crowds would then briefly disperse, but some agents would grab and detain people regardless. The crowds reformed quickly, and the cycle of tear gas, detentions and regrouping continued. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="1708" width="2560" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=2560" alt="Several men in vests, helmets and gas masks walk through a haze of gas on an urban street. Two of them have a person in street clothes between them; the person is bent over double and their arms are being held. " class="wp-image-65884" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1366 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-010_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1334 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px" /> Federal agents detain a protester after tear gassing the crowd Peter DiCampo/ProPublica After one bout of tear gas, I stumbled away, doubled over and coughing. “Come inside!” I heard someone yell. I looked up and saw a woman opening the door to an apartment building. She wasn’t yelling to me but to two photographers I know. I stumbled toward them, and the three of them saw me, and all extended the invitation: “Come inside!” I was grateful to be out of the tear gas, and I was grateful to be warm. That day’s high temperature was well below zero; at one point, I looked down and realized frozen condensation had iced my camera dials and buttons in place. The other two photographers and I made our way to the rooftop and spent the next hour-plus photographing from above. We overlooked the scene of the shooting and could see the FBI examining it and the line of protesters and agents going back and forth in three different directions. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="766" width="1149" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=1149" alt="An overhead view of a mass of people in tactical vests standing behind a line of police tape and facing an urban street. Several clouds of gas are puffing up from the pavement as people in street clothes move away from the agents. Two dumpsters and multiple trash bins have been overturned in the roadway." class="wp-image-65885" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1366 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-012_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1334 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1149px) 100vw, 1149px" /> For more than two hours, protesters pushed north on Nicollet Avenue toward the site of the Pretti shooting, dispersing when federal agents fired tear gas on them only to then regroup. Peter DiCampo/ProPublica We watched as the federal presence finished at the shooting scene and packed up. They slowly backed out, firing tear gas at protesters who ran at them as they drove away. We went back down to the street. Protesters gathered at the next block, and a similar scene played out there, this time with city and state police. “Why aren’t you protecting us?” one person yelled at them. Another protestor tried to calm the crowd down, but people were fed up: “Fuck your pacifism,” I heard someone yell. Tear gas was fired, people dispersed and the police slowly backed out. Eventually, without federal agents and police around, the mood shifted from chaos to something more somber. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="502" width="752" data-id="65886" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="A man holds a Mexican flag and a protest sign in a cloud of tear gas. A street light is just visible behind him, but otherwise the cloud of gas is so thick and tall that the rest of the street is obscured." class="wp-image-65886" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1366 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-030_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1334 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> A lone protester stands amid tear gas in front of Cheapo Records on Nicollet Avenue in Minneapolis, a few doors down from where Alex Pretti was killed. Peter DiCampo/ProPublica <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="502" width="752" data-id="65764" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="A large crowd of protesters in heavy winter clothing scream into the air at an urban intersection. Their breath steams around them." class="wp-image-65764" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,513 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1367 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,282 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,767 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/202601-YAR-ICEMN-77_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1335 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Protesters rally near where Pretti was killed shortly after law enforcement withdrew from the scene. Cengiz Yar/ProPublica As I took a moment to breathe, I realized that the final standoff had taken place right in front of Cheapo Records, where I went record shopping on my birthday a couple years back. And the events of the entire day — the shooting, the protests, the tear gassing — all unfolded on a stretch of Nicollet Avenue called Eat Street, known for having many of the best restaurants in town, with cuisines from all over the world that showcase the city’s diversity. I knew then that walking these streets would never feel the same. People made their way to the site of Alex Pretti’s death. There was still yellow tape around it, now tied haphazardly around trash cans. A small bloodstain was visible on the pavement. Quietly, they began to build a memorial. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="766" width="1149" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=1149" alt="Flowers and candles piled in a semicircle on a ridge of snow. A spray-painted sign says “Alex Pretti,” and a crowd has gathered. One person holds a drum in one hand as they crouch and reach toward a candle with the other hand." class="wp-image-65887" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1366 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20260124-DiCampo-ICEMN-034_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1334 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1149px) 100vw, 1149px" /> Mourners gather and add to a memorial for Alex Pretti. Peter DiCampo/ProPublica The post What We Saw in Minneapolis appeared first on ProPublica.
Nike Says Its Factory Workers Make Nearly Double the Minimum Wage. In Indonesia, Workers Say, “It’s Not True.”
The post Nike Says Its Factory Workers Make Nearly Double the Minimum Wage. In Indonesia, Workers Say, “It’s Not True.” appeared first on ProPublica.
Through boom times and, more recently, slumping sales, Nike Inc. has stuck by a key claim about its overseas suppliers: They pay the average factory worker about twice the local minimum wage. It’s a claim company co-founder Phil Knight first made in the 1990s, when the company faced accusations of sweatshop conditions in the overseas factories hired to make Nike’s apparel. And it’s one the sneaker giant has reasserted since 2021. But the experiences of workers in Indonesia, Nike’s second-largest production hub, illustrate how misleading the claim can be for vast portions of its supply chain. When a reporter for The Oregonian/OregonLive visited the country and interviewed roughly 100 workers from more than 10 factories that supply Nike, none said they made anywhere near twice the minimum wage. “Bullshit,” a union official said, in English, while sitting on a makeshift couch on the porch of his office near Jakarta, the Indonesian capital. (Like most workers currently employed by Nike suppliers, the official did not wish to be named because of fears of retaliation, including fines and termination.) One worker from a factory in West Java asked a reporter where on the company’s website Nike makes the wage claim. “No, no, no,” he said, through a translator. “It’s not true.” “Nike is not paying double the minimum wage,” said a union official in Central Java, a lower-wage area where Nike’s contract factories have been expanding. “The fact is the opposite. Nike is seeking cheaper workers.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="703" width="527" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=527" alt="A covered alleyway with a peeling floor, green walls and a sagging ceiling. Clothing hangs from horizontal poles, flip-flops are scattered on the ground and parked motorbikes sit against the walls." class="wp-image-65657" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 2250w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=225,300 225w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,1024 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1152,1536 1152w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,2048 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,1151 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,563 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,736 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,744 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,703 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,1003 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,1532 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Worker-apartments-3-SG-tone-2-redaction_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1200,1600 1200w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 527px) 100vw, 527px" /> Worker housing near an Indonesian factory that makes Nike products Matthew Kish/The Oregonian/OregonLive. License plates redacted by ProPublica. Last year, a ProPublica reporter visited Cambodia and found that only 1% of the 3,720 workers at a former Nike supplier earned at least 1.9 times the minimum wage, based on a factory payroll ledger. Interviews and paystubs for other workers corroborated that earnings are typically closer to the minimum wage than double that amount. A reporter for The Oregonian/OregonLive subsequently spent seven days in Indonesia, where Nike’s contractors, including its materials suppliers, employ about 280,000 people. All the workers interviewed said they made around minimum wage, which is as little as $150 a month in some parts of the country. Sandra Cho, who oversees human rights for Nike, didn’t dispute that some factory workers — including in Indonesia and Cambodia — make less than 1.9 times the minimum wage, describing the figure as a “global average.” “Some countries will be less than 1.9, some countries will be higher,” she said. In Vietnam, Nike’s biggest production center, two workers told The Oregonian/OregonLive they made minimum wage — about $204 a month — but two said they made twice as much. That’s in keeping with reports from Nike’s competitor, Puma, which says its biggest factories in Vietnam pay around double the minimum wage. Nike pushed back when asked whether it’s misleading for its disclosures to highlight the figure of 1.9 times the minimum wage. “A company trying to mislead would not voluntarily publish wage data, openly acknowledge its journey toward improvement, or subject itself to third-party scrutiny,” Nike said in a written statement. But the transparency that Nike provides is limited. The company’s global pay figure is based on data for 700,000 of its roughly 1.2 million workers in its nearly 700 contract factories. In other words, nearly half a million workers are omitted from the math. Nike doesn’t disclose which factories, or which workers, are left out. It’s said that the data covers its biggest partners, which account for an outsize share of production. (A Nike spokesperson said the wages of the roughly 500,000 workers not included in the calculation are audited to ensure they make at least the minimum wage.) Nike competitors Adidas and Puma similarly produce wage estimates for only a subset of their suppliers, but they have published data down to the country level in recent years. Adidas reports wage variations within countries. Advocates say the data helps workers determine whether they’re paid fairly and push for pay increases if they are not. Nike said focusing solely on pay relative to the minimum wage is a mistake. The company’s main focus with wages is whether they’re high enough to cover basic expenses and a little more, Cho said, a concept known as a living wage. Some countries have minimum wages that meet that threshold, some don’t. Nike has said 66% of workers at its suppliers, at least those for whom it has data, earn a living wage. That’s up from 53% in 2021. But living-wage calculations can vary widely, and they don’t always match the perceptions of people on the ground. Workers interviewed near Jakarta, where the local minimum pay rate is ostensibly more than a living wage, said it’s not enough to live on. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="738" width="527" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=527" alt="A woman wearing a yellow headscarf and black dress faces away from the camera toward the corner of a room filled with nail polish and other makeup. The walls are green and polka-dotted." class="wp-image-65659" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 1776w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=214,300 214w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,1075 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=732,1024 732w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1097,1536 1097w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1463,2048 1463w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,1208 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,591 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,773 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,781 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,738 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,1053 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,1608 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Factory-worker-with-her-cosmetics-2-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1143,1600 1143w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 527px) 100vw, 527px" /> A Nike contract worker near Jakarta sells cosmetics as a second job. Matthew Kish/The Oregonian/OregonLive One said she wakes up seven days a week, before the sun rises, to set up a small shop in front of her home. She sells groceries, gas canisters for cooking, water, cigarettes and snacks, mostly to housewives buying daily necessities. She opens the store around 6 a.m. A half hour later, on weekdays, she leaves for her job at the factory. Over the next eight hours, while her husband minds the shop, she works standing up, often in sweltering conditions, cutting fabric for 1,600 pairs of Nike sneakers — one every 18 seconds. She returns to her small apartment around 6:30 p.m., eats a quick dinner of instant noodles, then goes back to the shop until 10 p.m. She earns around $300 a month from making sneakers, just about minimum wage. The store brings in another $60. “I always come home late, sometimes in the heat and rain,” she said through a translator, “but I still endure it to meet me and my child’s needs.” A History of Dueling Numbers Nike’s beginnings were rooted in the low labor costs that overseas manufacturing could offer. In 1962, while working toward a master’s degree in business administration at Stanford University, Knight wrote an academic paper that became the company’s basic business plan. A core pillar: the disruptive power of cheap labor. “Low Japanese labor costs make it possible for an exciting new firm to offer these shoes at the low low price of $6.95,” Knight wrote in 1964 in his first ad, according to his 2016 memoir, “Shoe Dog.” In his book, he also wrote about the crushing poverty he saw on an around-the-world trip as a 24-year-old. Knight, who did not respond to detailed questions for this article, wrote in the book that hiring low-wage workers in developing countries would spur economic development. The first decades of Nike’s history backed up his belief. As the economy bloomed in Japan and wages rose, Nike shifted production from Japan to Korea and Taiwan and, later, Indonesia and Vietnam. “Thirty years ago, Nike shared that responsible participation in global manufacturing could accelerate economic development in emerging economies,” Nike said in its statement. “History has largely validated that.” When Nike arrived in Indonesia in 1988, the country offered an enticing economic carrot to companies hunting for overseas factories: a minimum wage around $1 a day in Jakarta, compared with $8 in South Korea, $14 in Taiwan and $33 in Tokyo, according to a 1988 U.S. State Department report. But Indonesia also presented new problems. The country was a target of activists because of its history of human rights abuses. As companies ramped up production there, anti-sweatshop protests and negative press accounts multiplied, with some noting the country’s minimum wage was so low that many factory workers were malnourished. Numerous stories took aim at Nike, whose soaring success, coupled with its popular athletic endorsers and corporate aloofness, made it a rich target. The early coverage included a memorable 1992 story in Harper’s Magazine that showed the paycheck of an Indonesian factory worker who made $1.03 a day at the time and concluded she’d need to work more than 44,000 years to match Nike endorser Michael Jordan’s annual Nike income. Knight and Nike pushed back on the criticism. Where Knight once sang the praises of low wages, he and the company now boasted the company’s suppliers paid generously. In 1996, Nike distributed a fact sheet that said the median wage in its Indonesian factories was $108.65 a month, or more than double the minimum wage. In June of that year, Knight wrote a letter to the editor of The New York Times saying Nike “has paid, on average, double the minimum wage” to factory workers. A month later, he told CNN Nike paid “over two times” the minimum wage in Indonesia. He told shareholders in 1996 that pay was “double the minimum wage throughout Indonesia.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="506" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="A bearded man wearing a black suit and white shirt smiles at the camera. He is standing in a room filled with various art about shoes. A replica of the Niké of Samothrace statue is visible between him and a pair of white shoes." class="wp-image-65662" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,202 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,517 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,689 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1034 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1378 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,581 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,284 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,371 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,376 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,355 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,506 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,773 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/GettyImages-534959948_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1346 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Nike co-founder Phil Knight in March 1995. In the 1960s, Knight wrote about how low-wage labor could help Nike disrupt the shoe industry. Three decades later, he boasted that the company’s Indonesian factories paid double the minimum wage. Najlah Feanny/Corbis via Getty Images The Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine and the editorial board of The Oregonian, the biggest newspaper in Nike’s home state, all repeated the claim. But The Oregonian/OregonLive and ProPublica could find no contemporaneous data that supported Nike’s assertion. Neither could Nike. “Those statements were made nearly 30 years ago, based on the data and understanding available at the time, and reflected a broader belief that responsible participation in global trade could raise incomes and expand opportunity in emerging economies,” Nike said in its 2026 statement. “Like most companies, we do not retain granular factory-level payroll data from partners in the mid-1990s.” The Oregonian/OregonLive and ProPublica found plenty to challenge the claim, including statements by the company itself. In fact, between 1994 and 2001, four reports issued directly by Nike, done at the company’s request or compiled by the U.S. government never put the average wage in Indonesia higher than 37% above the minimum. When asked to address the contradictory numbers from the 1990s, Nike said via email: “What’s relevant today is how Nike operates now, including the rigor of our current disclosures, the progress we’ve made, and the work still ahead to advance wages and opportunity across our supply chain.” The accuracy of Nike’s past wage claims didn’t go unchallenged. In 1998, California labor activist Marc Kasky sued Nike, alleging several claims about its overseas factories were “deceitful” and false advertising. He submitted a pile of Nike statements as evidence, including Knight’s letter to the editor of The New York Times. Nike said in a court filing, without admitting any of its statements were inaccurate, that those statements were not subject to a court’s opinion about their veracity. The company’s words were protected by the First Amendment, Nike wrote, because they were intended not to sell Nike products but to answer Nike’s critics concerning “issues of public interest.” Nike settled the lawsuit in 2003, for $1.5 million, without admitting fault. The money was earmarked for factory monitoring and programs for workers, including economic ones. Taking on Second Jobs <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="766" width="1149" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=1149" alt="A crowd of motorcycles on a potholed street. The road is flanked by stands under large beach umbrellas. Palm trees and other vegetation can be seen in the distance." class="wp-image-65661" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1024 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1365 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,575 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,351 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,501 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Rush-hour-commute-to-the-sneaker-factory-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1333 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1149px) 100vw, 1149px" /> Motorcycles fill Indonesia’s roads during a rush-hour commute to sneaker factories. Adi Renaldi for The Oregonian/OregonLive Since the Kasky settlement, Nike has published nearly 2,000 pages of reports on its work to become a better corporate citizen. The closest it came to shedding new light on wages was in 2021, when the company reported on new efforts to understand what factory workers earn. The 184-page report said that workers had “average gross pay of 1.9 times the minimum wage” — almost identical to the assertion the company made back in the ’90s. The company said it based the claim on information from 103 “strategic suppliers” in 13 countries that employed over 700,000 workers. The report did not identify the suppliers or disclose the wages paid to workers. Nike reiterates the claim in a disclosure currently posted on its website, which has been updated with 2022 data. It’s now based on data from 111 factories. Workers in Indonesia reported wide deviations from the company’s stated average pay for the supply chain as a whole. The workers’ accounts of earning minimum wage or a little bit more are consistent with 63 paystubs from three Indonesian factories, which The Oregonian/OregonLive and ProPublica obtained from a labor group. At two factories, workers averaged 1.1 times the minimum wage. At the other factory, workers averaged 1.4 times the minimum. Those numbers align with disclosures of Adidas and Puma, which have released more information about factory wages than Nike. In its 2024 annual report, Adidas said nearly 100,000 of its factory workers in Indonesia made between 1.1 and 1.4 times the minimum wage. Data from Puma’s 2024 sustainability report indicated that workers at four Indonesian suppliers averaged $208 in monthly wages, 17% above the average minimum wage where the factories were located. Presented with detailed questions about pay practices, Nike said looking at pay relative to the minimum in isolation “misses the broader picture of real wage growth and economic development” in countries where Nike sources its goods. In Vietnam, Nike’s contract factories account for 2.5% of the country’s gross domestic product, according to a 2019 diplomatic cable obtained by The Oregonian/OregonLive. “We’re proud of the role Nike and our industry have played in building employment, skills, and opportunity in many countries, including Vietnam today, where the industry contributes meaningfully to national GDP,” the company said, adding that it remained “committed to pushing for continued improvement.” Nike’s Cho said the company’s work to lift wages includes a program that’s helped female workers advance into higher-paid positions. Roughly 80% of factory employees are women, Cho said, but men are 2.5 times more likely to get promoted off the manufacturing line. She said 21% of participants in the program got a promotion within three months. The company said what matters more than what people are paid relative to the minimum wage is whether they make enough to cover basic expenses. Some regions of Indonesia, including Jakarta, have minimum wages higher than local living wage estimates by the WageIndicator Foundation, an independent Dutch nonprofit. The living wage “is where we focus our energy and work,” said Nike’s Cho. But an income that meets the living wage benchmark on paper doesn’t always match what workers say they need, at least in Indonesia. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="501" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="A narrow green room with a tile floor, fans, snacks, two mirrors, a television and a Mickey Mouse clock." class="wp-image-65660" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1024 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1365 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,575 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,351 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,501 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Inside-an-apartment-SG-tone-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1333 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Inside a Nike factory worker’s home. Workers in Indonesia say they earn far less than what Nike says is the average among suppliers for which it has sufficient data. Adi Renaldi for The Oregonian/OregonLive Standing in an overgrown lot outside Jakarta, 30 workers broke into laughter when asked if they got paid enough to cover their basic expenses. One said factory wages weren’t enough to pay for new uniforms, books and shoes for school-aged children. Another worker estimated as much as 70% of her coworkers had second jobs, a comment that drew approving nods. That work includes operating motorbike taxis, fish farming, collecting scrap metal and cleaning fruit, workers said. Some workers sell goods inside the factory, including coffee, snacks and cosmetics, which they said comes with the risk of disciplinary action, including termination. Knight once told documentary filmmaker Michael Moore that factory jobs were such a road to upward mobility that someone working in an Indonesian factory making Nike goods might someday be Moore’s landlord. Two workers who invited a reporter into their homes in a neighborhood near Jakarta last summer were not landlords. Read More She Was a Key Voice of the 1990s Labor Movement in Nike’s Indonesia Factories. Today She Relies on Donations From Abroad. They lived in 150-square-foot barracks-style apartments with almost no furniture except for thin mattresses, which had been propped against the wall to create living space. Small electric fans cooled the apartments, which cost around $30 a month to rent. Workers largely agreed Nike contract factories are preferable to local alternatives. Nike factories are clean and pay on time, they said. Many have exhaust fans that can provide some relief from the tropical heat. Forced overtime is no longer a problem. Government regulations tend to be followed. But the workers said wages remain chronically low, describing the typical pay as only enough to support one person. “It’s as if the company wants us to stay single forever,” a worker near Jakarta said. Another worker said she started stitching Nike sneakers 25 years ago, about the time Knight spoke to Moore about workers becoming landlords. She said after all those years, she makes $300 a month — roughly the local minimum wage. The post Nike Says Its Factory Workers Make Nearly Double the Minimum Wage. In Indonesia, Workers Say, “It’s Not True.” appeared first on ProPublica.
She Was a Key Voice of the 1990s Labor Movement in Nike’s Indonesia Factories. Today She Relies on Donations From Abroad.
The post She Was a Key Voice of the 1990s Labor Movement in Nike’s Indonesia Factories. Today She Relies on Donations From Abroad. appeared first on ProPublica.
Once a month, American labor activist Jim Keady logs into Remitly, an app for transferring money abroad, at his New Jersey home and sends $100 to a former Nike factory worker in Indonesia. Cicih Sukaesih helped bring the world’s attention to the lives of the young women in poor countries who made sneakers in the 1990s, first by organizing a strike and later by marching onto Nike’s bucolic corporate campus in Oregon to demand a meeting with co-founder Phil Knight. Her story — at a time of police and military harassment of labor organizers abroad — caught the attention of The New York Times and other news organizations. It also helped inform a generation of workers about their rights. “She helped to birth, I would argue, the Indonesian trade union movement within Nike’s supplier factories,” Keady said. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="602" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?w=752" alt="A faded and creased photograph showing a smiling, young Cicih standing between two smiling taller people wearing shirts with the Nike logo crossed out and the words “Don’t Do It.” Behind them is a march with people walking and holding banners and signs." class="wp-image-65403" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=300,240 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=768,614 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=1024,819 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=1536,1229 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=2048,1638 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=863,690 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=422,338 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=552,442 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=558,446 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=527,422 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=752,602 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=1149,919 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-049_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000_f167d8.jpg?resize=2000,1600 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Cicih during a visit to the United States to campaign for improvements in the labor practices of Nike suppliers. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica But media attention and accolades don’t pay the bills. Cicih had trouble finding work following her 1990s activism. (Cicih prefers to go by one name. It’s pronounced “Chee Chee.”) Decades after her crusade faded from the headlines, Keady and other labor organizers began sending Cicih money to keep her afloat. “She took a stand and she was a revolutionary,” Keady said. “And she has nothing to show for it.” Read More Nike Says Its Factory Workers Make Nearly Double the Minimum Wage. In Indonesia, Workers Say, “It’s Not True.” Now 62, Cicih welcomed a reporter for The Oregonian/OregonLive into her home last year, part of a reporting trip that included interviews with about 100 workers who make Nike sneakers, mostly in Indonesia, which was ground zero for the decade of sweatshop criticism that stained Nike’s reputation in the 1990s. Cicih said she’s proud of the example she set by standing up to Nike. She said workers “became aware of their rights and aware of the law.” “Many things changed,” she said. The advocacy led to improvements, she said, including cracking down on child labor, installing better safety equipment and providing menstrual leave. “Many of my friends,” Cicih said, “became brave enough to speak up.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="3000" height="2400" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg" alt="Cicih leans out of a doorway toward an orange-and-white cat, an orange tabby and a calico eating from a dish placed outside. Clothing hangs behind her and sandals rest on the ground in front of her." class="wp-image-65399" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=300,240 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=768,614 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=1024,819 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=1536,1229 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=2048,1638 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=863,690 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=422,338 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=552,442 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=558,446 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=527,422 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=752,602 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=1149,919 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-019.jpg?resize=2000,1600 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 3000px) 100vw, 3000px" /> Cicih feeds her three cats at home. Now 62, she struggles to get by. She lives with her sister at a home they inherited from their parents. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica But she described her work as incomplete because problems linger, including chronically low wages. Nike did not address specific questions about Cicih’s experience or about the Nike supplier that employed her in the 1990s, nor did Knight provide comment. Instead, Nike issued a broad statement saying, in part, “We’re appreciative of the efforts that individuals and organizations, including Cicih, have made in helping push the industry forward.” Nike said the company has been “deeply committed to advancing a responsible and resilient supply chain for more than 30 years” and that while progress hasn’t been perfect, it has sought “systemic improvements across the industry.” Nike’s goal, the statement said, is that “all people involved in the manufacturing of Nike’s products are respected, valued, and treated fairly.” Cicih keeps tokens of her activism in her home, including a framed poster that depicts a factory worker and reads, “Who made your shoes?” Jeff Ballinger, a labor organizer who was prominent in the 1990s’ anti-sweatshop movement, gave it to her. In an interview, Ballinger said he still considers Cicih a “hero” — albeit unsung, even in Tangerang, the industrial hub where the Indonesian factory movement took off. “Like in wartime, some people just step up,” Ballinger said. “In a perfect world, there’d be a statue of her in Tangerang.” $1.26 a Day Cicih sat for an interview in a backyard filled by a chicken coop and a small garden that included pumpkins, bananas and edible bamboo. The small house she and one of her sisters inherited from their parents in Menes, her childhood village about a 90-mile drive west of Jakarta, is now home. After putting out snacks that included a traditional Indonesian dessert made from rice and grated coconut in banana leaves, Cicih often flashed a wide grin as she reflected on a life intertwined with Nike’s emergence in her country. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="940" width="752" data-id="65418" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?w=752" alt="Cicih, wearing a beige head wrap and orange long-sleeve shirt, holds a large curved knife in her right hand and a coconut in her left hand." class="wp-image-65418" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg 2400w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=240,300 240w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=768,960 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=819,1024 819w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1229,1536 1229w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1638,2048 1638w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=863,1079 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=422,528 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=552,690 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=558,698 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=527,659 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=752,940 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1149,1436 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-039_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1280,1600 1280w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="940" width="752" data-id="65417" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?w=752" alt="Broad green banana leaves against the sky. Toward the back, a long bunch of green bananas is growing." class="wp-image-65417" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg 2400w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=240,300 240w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=768,960 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=819,1024 819w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1229,1536 1229w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1638,2048 1638w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=863,1079 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=422,528 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=552,690 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=558,698 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=527,659 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=752,940 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1149,1436 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-042_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1280,1600 1280w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="940" width="752" data-id="65416" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?w=752" alt="A red chicken sits behind a wire grid." class="wp-image-65416" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg 2400w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=240,300 240w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=768,960 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=819,1024 819w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1229,1536 1229w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1638,2048 1638w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=863,1079 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=422,528 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=552,690 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=558,698 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=527,659 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=752,940 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1149,1436 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-041_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1280,1600 1280w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Cicih grows coconuts, bananas, tomatoes, pumpkins and bamboo in her family’s garden, in addition to raising chickens. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica Nike, then known as Blue Ribbon Sports, bought its first sneakers from Japanese factories in the 1960s. But as Japan’s wages rose, it shifted manufacturing to lower-cost Asian countries, including Taiwan and South Korea. In 1988, it started making sneakers in Indonesia. The country had a terrible human rights record, but it was eager to attract foreign investors. Factories in Jakarta paid wages as low as $1 a day, compared with $8 in South Korea, $14 in Taiwan and $33 in Tokyo, according to a 1988 State Department report. In 1989, five years after she graduated from high school, Cicih joined one of her sisters making Nike sneakers at the Sung Hwa Dunia factory 40 miles west of Jakarta, Indonesia’s biggest city. She started work each day at 7 a.m. At first, she said, she cleaned glue and chemicals off sneakers with her bare hands. Then she moved to a glue line, attaching soles to shoes. The factory was poorly ventilated. Co-workers coughed from the fumes. Cicih recalled seeing one person faint and then return to the assembly line because factory managers didn’t give her permission to go home. (The factory is still open, but it has changed owners and now has a different name. The current owner did not respond to emails. The previous owner could not be reached.) <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="602" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?w=752" alt="" class="wp-image-65784" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=300,240 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=768,614 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=1024,819 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=1536,1229 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=2048,1638 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=863,690 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=422,338 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=552,442 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=558,446 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=527,422 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=752,602 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=1149,919 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-056_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000-1.jpg?resize=2000,1600 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> The factory formerly called Sung Hwa Dunia in Indonesia has changed hands since Cicih worked there. It is currently listed for sale. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica Worker safety was “very, very bad,” Cicih said through an independent journalist The Oregonian/OregonLive hired to translate the conversation. “There were many, many labor laws that the company did not follow,” she added. Like today, the vast majority of factory workers were young women. Most of the managers were older men, which Cicih said led to a natural power imbalance and problems with sexual harassment. “I have watched and seen a lot of women being sexually abused, or touched inappropriately,” she said. There was constant pressure to meet daily production quotas. Cicih made $1.26 a day, around minimum wage. A 1989 study found the minimum wage was so low that many factory workers were malnourished. “It was not enough for me to get by on a daily basis,” she said. “However, I had to make it on the amount I received.” Cicih often worked overtime until 9 p.m. Sometimes she worked on Saturday and Sunday, which she considered forced labor. The amount of overtime, she said, motivated her to “rebel.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="940" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?w=752" alt="A young Cicih stands holding a pipe attached to factory equipment and leaning back. She has shoulder-length hair, a black skirt, sandals and white shirt. There is red and white damage on the right side of the photograph." class="wp-image-65401" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg 2400w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=240,300 240w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=768,960 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=819,1024 819w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=1229,1536 1229w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=1638,2048 1638w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=863,1079 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=422,528 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=552,690 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=558,698 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=527,659 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=752,940 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=1149,1436 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-044_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=1280,1600 1280w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Cicih worked at a Nike supplier in Serang, Indonesia. She says the factory broke “many, many labor laws.” Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica “A Wage Increase Was the Top Priority” The turning point for Cicih came when one of the company’s buses, which workers rode to the factory and were always overcrowded, flipped and killed a co-worker. “How can we protest this issue to the company?” she asked another co-worker. Unbeknownst to Cicih, this co-worker had joined an organization that taught workers about labor rights. Cicih faked a doctor’s letter, got a sick day and took a class. Through the organization, she met Ballinger, who had moved to Indonesia to organize factory workers. In 1992, Ballinger wrote a story for Harper’s Magazine that compared the wages of Sadisah, one of Cicih’s co-workers, to the earnings of Nike endorser Michael Jordan. Sadisah earned 14 cents an hour. It would have taken her more than 44,000 years to make what Jordan earned from Nike in a single year. Cicih started skipping lunch and prayer breaks to organize her co-workers. On Sept. 28, 1992, Cicih and workers from her factory went on strike. The New York Times reported 600 walked out, but Cicih and other activists have put the number of strikers in the thousands. They demanded better treatment of women, better union representation, better food, better transportation and, most importantly, better pay. “A wage increase was the top priority,” she said, holding up the original document that listed protesters’ demands. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="602" width="752" data-id="65410" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?w=752" alt="A faded photo with white damage on the edges shows a standing group of people wearing name tags and smiling. They are standing outside, in front of white walls, with plant fronds in the background." class="wp-image-65410" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=300,240 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=768,614 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1024,819 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1536,1229 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=2048,1638 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=863,690 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=422,338 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=552,442 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=558,446 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=527,422 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=752,602 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1149,919 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-045_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=2000,1600 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Cicih and her friends gathered before a labor rights training course. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="602" width="752" data-id="65397" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?w=752" alt="People sit in a circle outside on a lawn in the shade with trees in the background." class="wp-image-65397" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=300,240 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=768,614 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=1024,819 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=1536,1229 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=2048,1638 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=863,690 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=422,338 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=552,442 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=558,446 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=527,422 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=752,602 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=1149,919 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-048_maxHeight_3000_maxWidth_3000.jpg?resize=2000,1600 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> In 1992, Cicih photographed her fellow workers meeting about going on strike. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica Her activism came with great risks. Around that time, Marsinah, a factory worker who was recognized last year as the country’s first National Hero from the labor movement, was kidnapped, tortured and murdered. “Military and police were everywhere,” Cicih said, but she said her desire to help her co-workers “eclipsed all the fear.” The strike lasted two days. It ended after the factory agreed to increase wages for many employees, Cicih said, but she added that her seniority made her eligible for just a small raise. The company accepted other demands, including allowing menstrual leave. Cicih said she was the first worker to take it. That same year that Cicih led the strike, Nike released a code of conduct, becoming one of the first brands to do so. Codes of conduct have since become the default method companies like Nike use to police overseas factories. The basic system: The company writes rules and contract factories agree to follow them. Auditors monitor compliance. A few months after the strike, Cicih and roughly two dozen of her co-workers got laid off. Leslie Milano, a prominent American labor organizer in the early 2000s, said unemployment at the time was high in Indonesia. “That’s why a lot of people didn’t want to do what Cicih did,” Milano said. “They didn’t want to lose their jobs.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="602" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?w=752" alt="Cicih holds part of a wooden fence. She is surrounded by plants." class="wp-image-65427" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=300,240 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=768,614 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1024,819 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1536,1229 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=2048,1638 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=863,690 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=422,338 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=552,442 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=558,446 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=527,422 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=752,602 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1149,919 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-038_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=2000,1600 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Thirty-plus years after she began her organizing work, Cicih struggles to make ends meet. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica Cicih said that not long after being laid off, she was hauled into a police station and spent two days being pressured to confess to destruction of property and causing a disturbance. She was not allowed to go to the bathroom, she said. Cicih said the police made her watch them beat a suspect. Then they made her sit in his blood, she said, before releasing her. The Indonesian embassy in Washington, D.C., did not respond to questions about military repression of worker rights in the 1990s. (The country undertook democratic reform after the dictator Suharto stepped down in 1998, although problems remain.) After her release, encouraged by Ballinger and others, she joined co-workers in filing a lawsuit against the factory alleging wrongful termination. The lawsuit went all the way to Indonesia’s Supreme Court. In 1996, Cicih and her co-workers prevailed. She got about $200 in back wages. She still has the check in a binder with other documents from her organizing days. For two years of lost wages, Ballinger figures Cicih should have gotten more than $2,000. That would have been enough to set up a small business. “It would have been a hell of a lot of money back then,” he said. The movement’s failure to deliver greater restitution to Cicih and others “is something that I’ll never get over.” Cicih Comes to Oregon Around the time the lawsuit concluded, in July 1996, Cicih walked onto Nike’s suburban campus near Beaverton, Oregon, and demanded a meeting with the company’s co-founder. “I’m here to meet with Phil Knight,” she said, according to The Oregonian’s coverage of her visit. “I want to ask him to consider the plight of Indonesian workers.” Cicih had stayed in touch with Ballinger. He helped bring her to the United States to put pressure on Nike, one of four such visits she made to the country. Knight refused to see her. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="609" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?w=752" alt="A woman wraps her arm around Cicih’s shoulder in front of a building with a “Nike Town” sign. A crowd of people stand behind the pair holding protest signs, and in front of them are reporters holding out video cameras and microphones. One sign says: “Nike is a loser.” Another reads: “Don’t just do it! Do the right thing: Allow independent monitoring.”" class="wp-image-65405" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg 3980w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=300,243 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=768,622 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=1024,829 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=1536,1244 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=2048,1658 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=863,699 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=422,342 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=552,447 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=558,452 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=527,427 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=752,609 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=1149,930 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cicih-in-Oregon-1996.jpg?resize=1976,1600 1976w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Cicih tried to meet with Nike’s Phil Knight when she visited Oregon in 1996. As part of the trip, she also held a press conference in front of the company’s downtown Portland store. Kathryn Scott/The Oregonian/OregonLive A week before Cicih arrived in Beaverton, Knight wrote a letter to her trip’s organizers, saying he was “sympathetic” to her case but preferred to meet with people “interested in constructive, proactive solutions, not those who announce their intentions through news conferences and mean-spirited media campaigns.” He defended Nike’s response to problems at Cicih’s factory, saying Nike had worked to correct them. “The factory where Ms. Sukaesih worked has been under new Indonesian management for two years, the grievances have been addressed and the minimum wage is in force,” Knight wrote. “In our view, this is an example of the benefit Nike brings in upgrading labor practices in emerging market societies.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="659" width="527" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?w=527" alt="A teal binder with a sticker that says “Boycott Nike, Justice Do It!” with a crossed-out Nike swoosh logo." class="wp-image-65414" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg 2400w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=240,300 240w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=768,960 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=819,1024 819w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1229,1536 1229w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1638,2048 1638w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=863,1079 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=422,528 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=552,690 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=558,698 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=527,659 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=752,940 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1149,1436 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-014_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1280,1600 1280w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 527px) 100vw, 527px" /> Cicih keeps many of the documents from her labor organizing days in a three-ring binder. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica After she made her request to meet with Knight, a “trio of beefy Nike security guards” escorted Cicih off Nike’s campus and local sheriff’s deputies asked her to leave the premises, according to The Oregonian’s coverage. Roughly a week later, Knight sat across the table from President Bill Clinton at the White House to talk about labor reforms, according to records obtained from the Clinton Presidential Library. Knight then stood in the Rose Garden behind Clinton as the president announced a sweeping effort to address sweatshop conditions in overseas factories. “While I think that we have been good citizens within our industry, I think there’s clearly a lot more that we can do, that we can indeed be better,” Knight said in his brief remarks. The meeting with Clinton led to the creation of the Fair Labor Association, one of several groups that monitor factory working conditions. Knight publicly committed to specific sweatshop reforms in a 1998 speech at the National Press Club. Knight announced six changes, including heightened indoor air quality standards, increased factory monitoring and raising the minimum age in footwear factories to 18. He didn’t say anything about raising wages. “You Have to Fight” These days, Nike factory workers in Indonesia told The Oregonian/OregonLive, the kind of forced overtime that sparked Cicih’s desire to “rebel” is nonexistent. They also said Nike lived up to Knight’s commitment to get underage workers out of Indonesian factories. But they said problems remain. In interviews, they criticized the auditing process, the linchpin of the factory monitoring system that Nike helped pioneer. Workers said factories know in advance when auditors will arrive. At one factory, workers said safety equipment had been distributed on the eve of an audit. “The best time to work at a Nike factory is when it’s being audited,” a worker said. Workers said more rigorous and consistent auditing would catch problems with safety and sexual harassment, which they said remain persistent. Asked about the workers’ description of factories prepping for planned audits, Nike said that it conducts unannounced audits in addition to those that are scheduled in advance, and that these are supplemented by “worker engagement and well-being surveys,” among other efforts. “When issues are brought to our attention, through any mechanism, we work with suppliers to validate, identify root causes and implement comprehensive remediation processes,” Nike said. Nike’s most recent disclosures say 87% of the 623 suppliers it audited in fiscal year 2024 at least met the company’s basic code of conduct requirements. The company also disclosed a factory injury rate significantly below its peers. Less than 1% of code of conduct violations related to harassment and abuse, according to the disclosure. Workers and union leaders also say their No. 1 concern — low wages — has not been addressed. Many said they work second jobs to make ends meet. “One job isn’t enough,” Keady said. “They’re not getting a second job because they want to send their kid to a really good private school or they want to buy a home in a great neighborhood. They’re getting a second job because they can’t afford three meals a day for their family.” Cicih also has struggled. After her lawsuit against the factory that once employed her, she had the option to return, but she declined. She thought the environment would be uncomfortable because of her history as an organizer. She did some volunteer work as a labor organizer. Some other organizers encouraged her to set up a small business. Those efforts never panned out. She moved back to her hometown of Menes in 2018. A sister on whom Cicih depended financially died during the pandemic. Cicih opened a roadside food stall and sold vegetable salad and gado gado, a type of Indonesian dish, but it didn’t go well. She gets by on donations from American do-gooders, including Keady. She grows some of her own food. She doesn’t have a pension or savings. “Nothing,” she said. But she’s resolute. “You have to do this,” she said, reflecting on her years as an activist. “You have to fight.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="1920" width="2560" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?w=2560" alt="Cicih stands in a forest clearing wearing a light gray hijab and dark gray pants and shirt. Bamboo and other tropical plants grow behind her." class="wp-image-65430" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=300,225 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=768,576 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1024,768 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1536,1152 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=2048,1536 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=863,647 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=422,317 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=552,414 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=558,419 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=527,395 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=752,564 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=1149,862 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251213-Fadli-Nike-Indonesia-Advocate-028_preview_ppi_300_quality_100_embedMetadata_true_contentETag_1.jpg?resize=2000,1500 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px" /> Cicih at home. Despite the struggles she faced in her labor activism, she still believes in fighting for workers’ rights. Muhammad Fadli for ProPublica The post She Was a Key Voice of the 1990s Labor Movement in Nike’s Indonesia Factories. Today She Relies on Donations From Abroad. appeared first on ProPublica.
Two School Districts Sue, Claiming Alaska Is Failing Its Constitutional Obligation to Fund Public Education
The post Two School Districts Sue, Claiming Alaska Is Failing Its Constitutional Obligation to Fund Public Education appeared first on ProPublica.
Two Alaska school districts filed a lawsuit on Jan. 20 in Anchorage Superior Court against the state, its governor and its education commissioner over what they say is a long-running failure to adequately fund public education. In the complaint, the Kuspuk School District and the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District argue “the state is failing to meet its constitutional obligation” to provide Alaska students “a sound basic education and meaningful opportunity for proficiency” in vital subjects, and to fund schools and school districts sufficiently to do that. The plaintiffs are seeking to force the state to fulfill its constitutional obligation and requesting a court-ordered study to determine what it costs to educate students. “Alaska, we don’t believe, has ever done an adequacy study to really understand what it would take to allow Alaska students a fair opportunity to learn the skills they need to participate and contribute to society,” said Matt Singer, a trial attorney representing the plaintiffs. “If you don’t know what something is going to cost, then you can’t have a conversation with the Legislature about how to fund it.” The lawsuit points to the effects of chronic underfunding: low proficiency test scores; reductions in teaching staff; and the elimination of fine arts as well as career technical and vocational education programs. It also cites dangerous conditions inside school buildings. Over the last year, KYUK, NPR and ProPublica have spotlighted poor health and safety conditions inside many rural school buildings across Alaska. The reporting showed how the state has largely ignored hundreds of requests from rural school districts to fix deteriorating buildings and that some of the worst conditions exist at state-owned schools. Kuspuk Superintendent Madeline Aguillard said that since Gov. Mike Dunleavy took office in 2018, he had put little money toward education. “That’s almost a decade of just starting at nothing, and when you have to claw your way to even less than minimal funding, that takes a toll,” said Aguillard. A spokesperson with the governor’s office referred questions about the lawsuit to the state Department of Law. “The responsible path is legislation — not litigation,” Department of Law spokesperson Sam Curtis wrote in an email. The education clause in Alaska’s constitution does not specify a dollar amount for education. Instead, wrote Curtis, the constitution “vests the power of the purse squarely in the Legislature and the Governor. The legislative session began today. That is where education policy and funding decisions are meant to be debated and resolved.” It’s not a coincidence the suit was filed on the same day legislators convened in Juneau for this year’s legislative session, said Fairbanks Superintendent Luke Meinert. “I think it sends the message that the work on education funding is not done,” said Meinert. Education Commissioner Deena Bishop did not respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for her department also referred questions to Alaska’s Department of Law. Prior to her appointment as commissioner, Bishop was superintendent of the Anchorage School District, the state’s largest. In that position, Bishop consistently advocated for increased state funding for public schools through a change to Alaska’s education funding formula. As commissioner, Bishop has said her department is not responsible for allocating funds for education. “The levers that I can pull aren’t levers for funding,” Bishop said in a 2024 interview. “I don’t create the money. The Legislature creates that, but we can certainly support policy that would help support schools as their needs come up.” Caroline Storm, executive director of the Coalition for Education Equity, an Alaska-based nonprofit organization representing school districts and their leadership that is helping finance the lawsuit, said years of advocacy from her organization and others simply “hasn’t moved the needle enough” in the state to pay for wide-ranging needs from curriculum to building maintenance. She said the lack of financial support for public education should be central to this year’s election cycle. Alaska’s public schools receive funding from two state budgets. Capital funds pay for building maintenance, upgrades and construction. Money for operations, often referred to as the Base Student Allocation, buys things like textbooks and pays for teachers’ salaries. According to the complaint, Alaska allocated $5,800 per student in 2015. Over a decade, the number had risen to $5,960, significantly less than the rate of inflation. In all regards, Singer said, the state is failing. “In order to provide a basic sound education, you need a lot of different things,” he said. “One of the things is a safe school building with a roof and heater. Another thing you need is a competent teacher standing in front of a classroom educating young people.” After years of relatively flat state funding for schools amid rising operational costs, Alaska lawmakers during the 2025 legislative session passed a $700 increase to the BSA, then gained enough support to override Dunleavy’s veto of the bipartisan education bill — and later overrode his veto of $50 million in education funding from the budget. In recent years, lawmakers have been at odds with Dunleavy, who has blamed declining enrollment on school closures and who has also called for a statewide open enrollment system and for policy changes to benefit charter schools. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="791" width="527" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=527" alt="A portrait of a woman standing on an outdoor staircase wearing a jacket with gold accents made out of fabric decorated with a moose and snow motif." class="wp-image-65647" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 2000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=200,300 200w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,1152 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=683,1024 683w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,1536 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1365,2048 1365w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,1295 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,633 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,828 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,837 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,791 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,1128 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,1724 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20250822-Salgado-AK-Crumbling-Schools-04325_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1067,1600 1067w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 527px) 100vw, 527px" /> Kuspuk Superintendent Madeline Aguillard said chronic underfunding is having an outsized impact on districts like hers, where the student population is predominantly Indigenous. Gabby Hiestand Salgado/KYUK While advocates celebrated the funding increase, many education leaders have said it still falls short of what school districts need to effectively operate, and the plaintiffs in the lawsuit said the increase was “woefully insufficient to keep pace with inflation, which had eroded purchasing power by 37% in the preceding decade.” There are more than 50 school districts in Alaska, and most are located within cities or organized boroughs, which have access to local tax revenue to help fund education. But 19 are almost entirely reliant on the state for funds because they serve rural, unincorporated communities where money from local taxes is not available. Dozens of those rural school buildings are owned by the state education department, including in the Kuspuk district, which covers an area in Western Alaska that’s roughly the size of Maryland. State assessment data on student performance within the Kuspuk district is “dire,” according to the legal complaint. The numbers show that 90% of the district’s 330 students during the 2024-25 school year were not proficient in English language arts, math or science. Aguillard, the superintendent, said chronic underfunding from the state is having an outsized impact on districts like hers, where the student population is predominantly Indigenous. She said those students also suffer because her district has had to pull funds from its operational budget to keep buildings open. That money has gone to fix failing plumbing and fire suppression systems and to help repair problems with building foundations and leaky roofs. Earlier this month, Aguillard got word from an architect that most of the joists that hold up the roof of the school gym in Aniak are broken. “We are closing the high school immediately and beginning plans to demolish before it collapses,” she wrote in a text message. In the last three years, experts have said at least three buildings in her district should not be occupied. This winter, a prolonged and extreme cold snap meant that eight of the Kuspuk district’s nine buildings could not open in time for students to return from the holiday break because there was no running water, heat or electricity. The majority of the buildings in the district are owned by Alaska’s education department. “It’s unsettling,” Aguillard said. “Our buildings should not be shutting down so easily. It’s really just evidence of the decline of the capacity of those buildings.” Dozens of studies cited by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on its website highlight the negative effects of poor maintenance and conditions inside schools on student performance. The investigation found black mold inside several Alaska schools. Exposure can increase the risk of asthma and is linked to higher rates of absenteeism. According to the agency, leaking roofs and problems with heating and ventilation can also impact academic performance. Read More A Rural Alaska School Asked the State to Fund a Repair. Nearly Two Decades Later, the Building Is About to Collapse. The situation isn’t unique to rural school districts, however. In an interview, Meinert, the Fairbanks superintendent, described the tangible impact a $5 million budget deficit has had in his district, one of the three largest in the state. In the last five years, seven schools in his district have closed due to a budget shortfall. Since 2019, Meinert said, his district has terminated more than 300 teaching positions, which means class sizes have swelled to more than double what the National Center for Education Statistics reported for the state five years ago, sometimes topping 40 students in a classroom. Meinert contends that a lack of state financial support within his district is also disproportionately impacting the minority student population. State assessments show that more than 76% of Indigenous and economically disadvantaged students in the district are not proficient in English language arts. The post Two School Districts Sue, Claiming Alaska Is Failing Its Constitutional Obligation to Fund Public Education appeared first on ProPublica.
Six Senators Accuse Deputy Attorney General of “Glaring” Crypto Conflict, Cite ProPublica Investigation
The post Six Senators Accuse Deputy Attorney General of “Glaring” Crypto Conflict, Cite ProPublica Investigation appeared first on ProPublica.
Six senators accused Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche this week of having a conflict of interest when he shut down investigations into crypto companies, dealers and exchanges and eliminated an enforcement team dedicated to looking for crypto-related fraud and money-laundering schemes. A letter written by Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Dick Durbin and Mazie Hirono and signed by Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse, Christopher Coons and Richard Blumenthal cited a ProPublica investigation that revealed Blanche owned at least $159,000 worth of crypto-related assets when he ordered an end to the work. Durbin, Hirono, Whitehouse, Coons and Blumenthal serve on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which oversees the Justice Department. The same senators previously sent a letter to Blanche raising concerns that his actions would help President Donald Trump’s financial interests in cryptocurrency. In their letter sent on Wednesday, they said Blanche’s actions appeared to violate the federal conflict of interest law. “Last year, we asked for the rationale behind your puzzling decision to scale back the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) cryptocurrency enforcement efforts and urged you to reconsider. We write now in light of recent reporting that you held substantial amounts of cryptocurrency at the time you made this decision,” the senators wrote. “At the very least, you had a glaring conflict of interest and should have recused yourself.” Blanche, the second-highest-ranking official at the Justice Department, signed an ethics agreement in February promising to dump his cryptocurrency within 90 days of his confirmation and not to participate in any matter that could have a “direct and predictable effect on my financial interests in the virtual currency” until his bitcoin and other crypto-related products were sold. But on April 7, before he divested, he issued a memo titled “Ending Regulation by Prosecution” that halted investigations launched under President Joe Biden. In the memo, Blanche condemned the Biden Justice Department’s tough approach toward crypto as “a reckless strategy of regulation by prosecution, which was ill conceived and poorly executed.” The memo disbanded the agency’s National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team, which had won several high-profile crypto-related convictions. Blanche said the agency would instead target only the terrorists and drug traffickers who illicitly used crypto, not the platforms that hosted them. Days later, the six senators urged Blanche to reconsider, contending that his decision would otherwise help support sanctions evasion, drug trafficking, scams and child exploitation. In their latest letter, they said their concerns had been realized. They cited an independent report that found there was a surge in illicit cryptocurrency activities in 2025, including crimes tied to money laundering and human trafficking. They also questioned Blanche’s reasons for the policy shift. “Certainly, President Trump’s financial interests seem to have motivated some of his pardons of criminals convicted of cryptocurrency-related crimes,” their letter stated. “But the fact that you held substantial amounts of cryptocurrency at the time you made this decision calls into question your own motivations.” A Justice Department spokesperson told ProPublica last week that Blanche’s crypto orders were “appropriately flagged, addressed and cleared in advance.” She did not elaborate or respond to questions asking who cleared his actions. The department did not respond this week to requests for comment about the senators’ criticism. In this week’s letter, the six Democratic senators issued a series of questions demanding details about how and when Blanche’s actions were cleared and by whom. They also asked Blanche to, no later than Feb. 11, provide any written determination he received about the legality of his crypto enforcement action; all his communications with ethics and Justice Department officials about the issue; and any communications he had with the crypto industry prior to issuing his April memo. Their demands come approximately a week after the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan government watchdog group, asked the Justice Department’s inspector general to investigate Blanche. Kedric Payne, the group’s general counsel and senior director of ethics, alleged that Blanche’s orders violated the law because they benefited the industry broadly, including his own investments. Payne estimated that the value of Blanche’s bitcoin holdings alone rose by 34%, to $105,881.53, between when he issued the memo and when he divested. At the time he issued the memo, Blanche also held investments in several other cryptocurrencies, including Solana and Ethereum, and stock holdings in Coinbase. Read More Top DOJ Official Shut Down Enforcement Against Crypto Companies While Holding More Than $150,000 in Crypto Investments Under the federal conflicts-of-interest statute, government officials are forbidden from taking part in a “particular matter” that can financially benefit them or their immediate family unless they have a special waiver from the government. The penalties range from up to one year in jail or a civil fine of up to $50,000 all the way to as much as five years in prison if someone willfully violates the law. “The public has a right to know that decisions are being made in the public’s best interest and not to benefit a government employee’s financial interests,” Payne wrote in his complaint to the inspector general. Blanche, a former federal prosecutor for the Southern District of New York, was Trump’s lead attorney in the Manhattan trial that resulted in his being convicted of 34 felonies stemming from a hush-money payment to a porn actress, Stormy Daniels. Blanche also defended Trump against criminal charges accusing him of conspiring to subvert the 2020 election and retaining highly classified documents. (Those two cases were dropped after Trump was reelected president.) Payne’s group expanded its investigation request on Wednesday, asking the Office of Government Ethics and the Justice Department’s ethics officer to look into whether Blanche violated his ethics agreement, the federal conflicts-of-interest statute and the federal law prohibiting false statements on compliance forms. The post Six Senators Accuse Deputy Attorney General of “Glaring” Crypto Conflict, Cite ProPublica Investigation appeared first on ProPublica.
Smoke and Mirrors: How Intoxicating Hemp Seeped Into the First Recreational Marijuana Market in the Country
The post Smoke and Mirrors: How Intoxicating Hemp Seeped Into the First Recreational Marijuana Market in the Country appeared first on ProPublica.
The owner of a marijuana testing lab called a top regulator in Colorado on his cellphone in April 2024 with an urgent situation. “We’ve got something that’s kind of a big deal,” he remembers saying. During a routine test of a manufacturer’s products, Bona Fides Laboratory in Denver had found a toxic chemical in a popular brand of marijuana vapes sold at dispensaries in Colorado. The chemical, methylene chloride, is prohibited by Colorado’s marijuana regulators and for most uses by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency because it can cause liver and lung cancer and damage the nervous, immune and reproductive systems. The owner felt he had a duty to call immediately rather than just submit a report through the state’s online system. As state regulators investigated, they discovered a second problem: The product wasn’t derived from marijuana at all. It came from hemp, a close cousin of marijuana that is much cheaper to produce and that Colorado had banned companies from using to make intoxicating products for sale in the state. Congress had legalized hemp in 2018 for other uses, such as clothing and rope, and because people believe its high levels of the nonintoxicating compound CBD can help them with seizures, pain and sleep. Hemp has extremely low levels of THC, the psychoactive compound found in marijuana that gets people high. And federal lawmakers thought allowing it would support farmers and rural jobs without the risks posed by marijuana. But hemp manufacturers quickly figured out how to convert CBD into THC through a process that involves toxic solvents, creating products that sometimes contain harmful chemicals and that can be more potent than products made from marijuana. Colorado was one of the first states to ban intoxicating hemp products made by chemical processing, initially with regulatory advisories and then with legislation in 2023. In doing so, lawmakers and Gov. Jared Polis boasted that Colorado — which had created the first regulated recreational marijuana market in the nation — was once again a model for how to smartly regulate cannabis, generating billions of dollars in tax revenue while keeping consumers safe. But despite the ban, the legislature and regulators failed to adopt many critical regulations that other states have employed to keep hemp products off the shelves. Unlike some other states, Colorado’s lab testing system operates largely on an honor code, with marijuana manufacturers free to choose the samples they send for analysis. Colorado won’t require labs to test those products for the toxic chemicals used to convert hemp to THC until this summer. The state is also now scrambling to set up its own testing program to randomly purchase products from dispensaries to verify safety. The 2023 law also had an exception that allowed registered hemp companies to continue manufacturing intoxicating hemp products, but only for sale outside the state. Thuy Vu, a compliance consultant who once spearheaded the city of Denver’s marijuana manufacturing inspection regimen, warned lawmakers at the time that the carve-out “was an open invitation for bad actors” that would result in “misbranded products” proliferating in Colorado. The cumulative effect of these gaps means hemp-derived vapes, gummies and other edibles, which may be more dangerous than traditional marijuana products, are making their way to consumers in Colorado, according to regulatory filings, independent testing and lab results filed in litigation against companies and the state. Comparing Marijuana and Hemp <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="2460" width="1149" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?w=1149" alt="A flowchart comparing the origins, regulations, THC makeup, extraction processes and dangers of marijuana and hemp." class="wp-image-65686" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png 2300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=140,300 140w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=768,1645 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=478,1024 478w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=717,1536 717w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=956,2048 956w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=863,1848 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=422,904 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=552,1182 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=558,1195 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=527,1128 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=752,1610 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=1149,2460 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/weed-hemp-comparison-fallback_f66633.png?resize=747,1600 747w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1149px) 100vw, 1149px" /> Note: Some states that allow the sale of hemp products have restrictions on their potency. Source: Baker Institute’s Drug Policy Program, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, University of North Texas. Chris Alcantara/ProPublica Officials with the state Marijuana Enforcement Division declined requests for an interview. Agency spokesperson Heather Draper said in a statement that the agency updates its testing program on “a nearly annual basis” and “intends to pursue additional regulatory updates to the testing program this year.” She said the division continues to investigate allegations of companies using hemp-derived THC in marijuana products but noted that the inquiries take time because “they can be highly complex and require significant resources to complete.” After the passage of the 2018 federal farm bill, many states were caught off guard as people could buy hemp-derived vapes and gummies similar to marijuana products online or at gas stations across the nation, sometimes without age restrictions. That sparked safety concerns as calls to poison control centers and emergency room visits related to known hemp products surged. “When you have a market that is unregulated, difficult to assess and evolves very quickly, that is a calling card for nefarious agents to step in and make money,” said Michelle Peace, a toxicologist at Virginia Commonwealth University. “So, if they can make something that might have a little bit better of a kick, why not?” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="501" width="752" data-id="65462" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="A person wearing a hairnet, a mask, a white lab coat and purple gloves holds a tray of red circular gummies above a metal table." class="wp-image-65462" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1024 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1365 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,575 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,351 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,501 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1333 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="501" width="752" data-id="65464" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="Red gummies tumble down a silver metal machine with workers in white lab coats and hairnets looking on from below." class="wp-image-65464" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1024 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1365 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,575 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,351 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,501 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Ripple-7_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1333 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Operations at the Denver-based cannabis company Ripple. Its CEO, Justin Singer, said illegal hemp is endangering consumers and undercutting Colorado marijuana businesses. Stephen Swofford/The Denver Gazette With concerns mounting and states creating a hodgepodge of rules governing intoxicating hemp, Congress passed a law in November banning nearly all hemp-derived products starting in the fall of 2026. But how the government will implement that is an open question. In December, President Donald Trump issued an executive order to increase medical marijuana and CBD research, tasking his aides to develop regulations with Congress that would allow some hemp products while barring those that pose serious health risks. For now, it remains up to the states to regulate hemp. And Colorado’s experience underscores how difficult that task is. The hemp derivatives have jeopardized a key promise made to the state’s voters: that marijuana legalization would drive out the black market and create a safer environment through regulation. With hemp, the opposite has happened, marijuana industry representatives say. Following the lab owner’s warning in April 2024, it took state regulators about two months to issue a public health advisory about the toxic vapes. The once-prolific vape manufacturer surrendered its marijuana license in January 2025. Last year, state regulators suspended two more marijuana operators after finding they used hemp-derived THC in products. Read More We Tested Vapes in Colorado for Signs of Hemp. This Is What We Found. The Denver Gazette and ProPublica conducted their own testing on products purchased at legal cannabis dispensaries in August and September. Three of the 14 vape products tested contained compounds and chemical residues that several experts said were indicative of hemp. A fourth vape had a solvent often used to process hemp into THC. The cases of manufacturers swapping marijuana for hemp have threatened Colorado’s marijuna industry so much that many companies are calling for tougher regulation. One even sued the state, asking a judge to force the Marijuana Enforcement Division to overhaul its testing regimen. In court filings, the agency argued that changing testing protocols was unnecessary and impracticable. “The honor system is not working in Colorado,” Justin Trouard, owner of Mammoth Farms, the largest marijuana cultivator in the state, said in the lawsuit. “The strong economic incentives for hemp inversion have made it common practice in Colorado.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="501" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="A man wearing a long-sleeve red shirt and gray pants leans against a metal table with green and yellow substances in bags. Metal shelves with equipment and glass containers sit against the wall behind him." class="wp-image-65465" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1024 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1365 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,575 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,351 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,501 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/0xx25Trouard-2_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1333 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Justin Trouard, a Colorado marijana cultivator, at his factory. Trouard alleges widespread infiltration of hemp-derived THC products into the regulated marijana market in the state. Stephen Swofford/The Denver Gazette “The Marijuana ‘Goods’ Have Changed” Colorado seemed well-prepared to take on hemp after the world’s first stores licensed to sell marijuana opened there in 2014. The state developed a “seed-to-sale” system to track marijuana from the initial planting to the purchase of pot, vapes and other products in dispensaries, which was meant to calm fears that marijuana grown in Colorado would be diverted to states where it remained illegal. Colorado also set up licensed private labs to test marijuana products for contaminants and potency. The tracking and testing became foundational elements that other states looked to when they set up their own legalization programs. The first wake-up call for Colorado marijuana regulators about intoxicating hemp came in 2021. A Broomfield man, whose business used marijuana to make the honey-colored syrup known as distillate that goes into vapes and gummies, reported that another company, Mile High Distributing, was making distillate from hemp and selling it as a marijuana product. Mile High’s owner, Jeffry Knight, who ran a string of Florida nightclubs and restaurants, had teamed up with retired pharmaceutical industry chemist Harold Meckler to come up with a way to convert hemp CBD into highly potent and profitable THC distillate for a fraction of what it cost to use marijuana, according to patents, a state investigation and interviews with Knight and Meckler. After investigating the complaint, Colorado’s Marijuana Enforcement Division sought to bar Mile High from participating in the state’s marijuana industry, arguing the company had used solvents and a chemical conversion process that weren’t allowed to make a new hemp-derived concentrate for products sold in marijuana dispensaries. At the suspension hearing, Meckler testified that Mile High’s hemp distillate was “probably safer” than what you get from “Mother Nature,” stressing that distillation should remove any chemicals used in the process. But Heather Krug, then Colorado’s state cannabis sciences program manager, worried that did not occur and testified at the hearing about the dangers posed if chemical residue remained in the final product. “When you inhale something,” she said, “it tends to go directly into your lungs and into your bloodstream and goes right to your brain.” <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="502" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="A man with white hair and a white mustache and goatee wearing a baseball hat and white sweater sits at a bar under indigo light." class="wp-image-65466" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1025 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1366 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,576 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,352 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,502 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/20251024-Weiner-CO-Hemp-05_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1334 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Jeffry Knight, who owned Mile High Distributing, says his competitors stole his company’s patented techniques and are doing what he was suspended for. Chip Weiner for ProPublica Denver Fire Department officials expressed concern that if the chemicals inside Mile High caught fire or exploded, a plume of toxic gas would have reached 1 to 2 miles over Denver neighborhoods, according to a simulation run by the department’s hazmat team. “A new breed of marijuana concentrate has entered Colorado’s cannabis market,” state hearing officer Milla Lishchuk said in her suspension order, warning that the state had failed to keep up with the changing industry. “Essentially, the marijuana ‘goods’ have changed in the cannabis market, but the laws — at least in Colorado — have not.” She suspended Mile High’s marijuana manufacturing license for three years, and the company went out of business. In an interview, Knight said that after his suspension, he had tests conducted on about a dozen products from Colorado dispensaries and found that two-thirds of them were hemp derivatives. He said his competitors simply stole his company’s patented techniques and were doing what he was suspended for. “There’s a bunch of guys in Colorado that are making it illegally,” Knight said in the interview. (Knight is facing criminal charges in Florida after a fatal boat crash last year. He has pleaded not guilty.) Knight and Meckler contend that they didn’t endanger anyone with Mile High products but that the chemical conversion process could be dangerous in the wrong hands. “There’s a lot of people that don’t know what they’re doing,” Meckler said. Mile High’s case prompted Colorado regulators to issue warning bulletins about hemp-derived THC in 2021, but it took state lawmakers nearly two years before they passed legislation that confirmed regulators could ban the sale of intoxicating hemp products in Colorado. By then, the hemp industry was already entrenched in Colorado. It had invested over $300 million in the state and generated $800 million in annual revenues, according to one industry estimate given to lawmakers. It’s unclear how much of that is intoxicating products. But an industry expert told a legislative task force that Colorado had become “the biggest provider of hemp-finished products in North America.” Intoxicating hemp products were also spreading widely across the country. Several states took action. Oklahoma, for example, launched a secret-shopper program to ensure accurate labeling for its sanctioned medical marijuana products, including tests to detect banned solvents. Other states that had followed Colorado’s lead in full marijuana legalization have since adopted more robust measures that Colorado did not. Of the 43 regulated recreational and medical marijuana markets in states and the District of Columbia, 24 require testing for methylene chloride. Federal health officials also began to sound the alarm. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted a public warning about the risks of hemp-derived THC in 2021 after a spike in hospitalizations, including children who had consumed hemp gummies. The following year, the Food and Drug Administration warned that hemp that had been chemically converted into THC “may have potentially harmful by-products (contaminants) due to the chemicals used in the process.” And studies found THC products derived from hemp caused more harm than marijuana. A review of FDA data from 2018 to 2021 found triple the number of adverse events tied to delta-8 THC, a compound common in products chemically derived from hemp, as that in delta-9 THC, the version found in marijuana. Like other states, Colorado requires marijuana manufacturers to have labs test their products to ensure safety. Twenty-six states and the District of Columbia require lab personnel to collect samples for testing to ensure that manufacturers don’t cherry-pick products for testing and hold back contaminated products. But Colorado lets manufacturers select samples for testing. The state found two dozen cases in which companies had manipulated testing in 2024 alone, according to a review of Marijuana Enforcement Division reports. The violations ranged from substituting samples that were different from what companies sold in stores to the use of unauthorized chemical treatments on submitted samples. In an April court filing in the lawsuit brought by Mammoth Farms, the division said it saw no reason to require testing for methylene chloride since it’s already banned and that doing so would be “unreasonably impracticable.” The agency’s attorneys said state employees couldn’t collect samples for testing because they are barred from possessing controlled substances, but the filing didn’t say why private labs couldn’t gather them. Marijuana industry officials say this resistance by regulators has made it easier for manufacturers to cheat by using hemp-derived distillates. They also say the lack of regulation makes it hard to detect whether the distillate they buy is derived from hemp. “It has never been cheaper to get the results that I want and more expensive to get an accurate understanding of what is in my inventory,” Justin Singer, CEO of Denver-based cannabis company Ripple, said at a recent policy forum. “If you actually want an accurate number, you cannot get one today if you care about accuracy. If you just care about passing the test, you can get that for 120 bucks.” Test Results Raise Suspicions The gaps in Colorado’s marijuana laws have allowed hemp to keep showing up throughout the market. Time and again, Colorado has issued late warnings to the public or delayed enforcement action, even when officials were aware of the violations. The biggest discovery of illegal hemp products occurred with the tainted vapes that Bona Fides Laboratory called about in April 2024. But it wasn’t the first time Colorado regulators had heard concerns about the company, Ware Hause. In October 2023, a whistleblower warned the Marijuana Enforcement Division that Ware Hause was chemically converting hemp to make intoxicating vapes and selling them as marijuana. The state opened an investigation after the 2023 report, but regulators didn’t warn the public until June 2024, a couple of months after the lab reported the positive tests for methylene chloride. The Marijuana Enforcement Division told consumers to destroy or return Ware Hause vapes bought as many as five months earlier. The agency determined that samples Ware Hause had submitted for testing were not representative of what it put out to market. Ware Hause’s owner, Thanh Hau, declined requests for an interview and did not respond to detailed questions. The problem was more widespread than Ware Hause, according to Mammoth Farms, which grows marijuana and has a lot to lose if hemp infiltrates the market. The company sued Ware Hause and three other manufacturers last year, claiming that independent testing showed their vapes contained distillate derived from hemp. Mammoth Farms argued that the low-cost hemp put consumers at risk and also put it and other companies at a competitive disadvantage. The companies have denied the allegations, and Ware Hause countersued, contending that Mammoth Farms was the one using hemp derivatives to make distillate, an allegation Mammoth Farms denied. For now, Colorado doesn’t have a testing regimen to detect hemp to help sort out such conflicts. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" height="501" width="752" src="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?w=752" alt="Test tubes full of green liquid sit in a circular pattern on a machine." class="wp-image-65463" srcset="https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg 3000w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=768,512 768w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1024,683 1024w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1536,1024 1536w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2048,1365 2048w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=863,575 863w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=422,281 422w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=552,368 552w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=558,372 558w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=527,351 527w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=752,501 752w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=1149,766 1149w, https://www.propublica.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Cannabis-Testing-6_preview_maxWidth_3000_maxHeight_3000_ppi_72_embedColorProfile_true_quality_95.jpg?resize=2000,1333 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 752px) 100vw, 752px" /> Cannabis samples sit in agitation equipment at Kaycha Labs in Denver. The facility provides comprehensive testing for potency, contamination and compliance with state and federal regulations, including the presence of illegal synthetic cannabinoids. Stephen Swofford/The Denver Gazette In March, Mammoth Farms filed another lawsuit against the Marijuana Enforcement Division, arguing that the testing system and seed-to-sale tracking program were failing to catch impostor products derived from hemp. During a court hearing in that case last spring, an official for Purplebee’s, once the largest marijuana distillate manufacturer in Colorado, said hemp distillate was making it hard to turn a profit. James Parco, former president of manufacturing, said the price of distillate had cratered to $2 a gram. That was down 85% from what testimony in another case estimated it had been four years earlier, and he said the decline forced his company out of the distillate business. The judge dismissed the lawsuit against the enforcement division in May on procedural grounds, stating that Mammoth Farms should have petitioned regulators for rule changes before filing the suit. Regulators have since found other hemp cases. The Commission Cartel, a marijuana manufacturer, surrendered its license in July after the Marijuana Enforcement Division found vials of hemp-derived compounds in a refrigerator at the factory it was using. One of the company’s owners, Joshua Littlejohn, denied in an interview that the company used hemp in its edibles and said it had instead used hemp to manufacture body creams for another company, which state regulators said still wasn’t allowed because the hemp had intoxicating levels. He said he surrendered his license because fighting regulators would cost too much. Colorado regulators have started taking steps to adopt regulations that other states have, with a trial of an off-the-shelf testing program to buy products from dispensaries and double-check the work of labs. They also agreed to require testing for methylene chloride before any products can go to dispensaries. Still, the state delayed implementation until July to give labs time to adjust their practices. “It’s not enough,” said Singer, the owner of Ripple. “It is a start. But like, again, they’re four years late at least.” The post Smoke and Mirrors: How Intoxicating Hemp Seeped Into the First Recreational Marijuana Market in the Country appeared first on ProPublica.
We Tested Vapes in Colorado for Signs of Hemp. This Is What We Found.
The post We Tested Vapes in Colorado for Signs of Hemp. This Is What We Found. appeared first on ProPublica.
Leaders in the Colorado marijuana industry have complained in recent years that intoxicating products derived from hemp are endangering consumers and creating unfair competition, threatening to upend the first regulated recreational marijuana market in the United States. While labs have developed the technology to distinguish between hemp and marijuana, the state has been slow to implement a random testing program to check the quality of products on dispensary shelves. In the absence of official testing, The Denver Gazette and ProPublica set out to test whether the claims of widespread hemp substitution were accurate, purchasing 14 vapes at dispensaries across the Denver area. Read More Smoke and Mirrors: How Intoxicating Hemp Seeped Into the First Recreational Marijuana Market in the Country Hemp naturally has high levels of the nonintoxicating compound CBD but only trace amounts of THC, the chemical in marijuana that gets people high. But some manufacturers have been caught by Colorado’s Marijuana Enforcement Division converting CBD from hemp into THC using solvents — a process banned in the state. Labs can detect indicators of this process by looking for versions of THC known as delta-8 and delta-10, which often emerge when CBD from hemp is chemically converted to THC. They can also identify residues of solvents that are typically used in that process but not in marijuana production. Three of the news organizations’ samples had levels of delta-8 or delta-10 THC between 1.1% and 3.3%, which experts said was significant because they rarely show up at those levels naturally. “Anything beyond trace amounts is suspicious,” said Monica Pittiglio, the analytical director for Colorado Chromatography Labs, which has done research into hemp-derived THC. “Anything over 1% is insane,” she noted after reviewing the news outlets’ test results. Experts consulted by the news organizations, however, weren’t unanimous that the results amounted to conclusive evidence of hemp-derived THC. Some noted that compounds extracted from plant material can degrade into those rarer compounds with age or imprecise processing. The samples included products from: Dutch Botanicals, an Aurora marijuana manufacturer whose license the state suspended in May, pending a final determination. Regulators accused the company of producing intoxicating hemp-derived THC. Two of its vape products tested by the news outlets were positive for delta-8 THC. Owner Jenny Tran acknowledged the state’s allegations but denied using hemp and said she is fighting the state’s efforts to revoke her license. Rockin Extracts, a marijuana processor in Pueblo County. A vape showed anomalous levels of delta-10 THC. It also contained residues of volatile solvents that were different from those listed on the package. The company’s attorney denied it used hemp additives and blamed the anomalous compound on natural degradation, though the product was tested eight months before the sell-by date. The oil used to make the vapes, the attorney said, was purchased from another company. C2CC, a Denver marijuana manufacturer that does business as Bonanza. The company’s Flyin’ Hawaiian vape contained toluene, a dangerous solvent that was not listed on the packaging. Independent chemists said it should not be found in marijuana products and is indicative of hemp-derived THC, as it can be used in the conversion process. Conlan Keller, co-founder of C2CC, said the distillate was purchased from a supplier and that his company requires certificates of analysis for any product it buys to ensure compliance and quality. Experts said findings like these could warrant further investigations into the processes used to make the products. They also said the ambiguity around determining conclusively whether a product was derived or partially derived from hemp highlights a need for more effective regulations. The Marijuana Enforcement Division declined to comment on The Gazette and ProPublica’s test results. Last fall, Colorado launched a pilot off-the-shelf testing program to buy products from dispensaries and double-check the work of labs. State regulators planned to collect up to 150 samples from October to December, a small fraction of the more than $1 billion in marijuana products sold in the state annually. But the new program has already run into delays. Heather Draper, the division’s spokesperson, said the off-the-shelf testing program remains in “initial steps.” Permanently establishing it, she said, will require “increased resources with appropriate funding.” The post We Tested Vapes in Colorado for Signs of Hemp. This Is What We Found. appeared first on ProPublica.