March 31, 2026 ❧ Texas town runs out of water, Cuba gets a fuel delivery, IOC bans trans women athletes, and new branch of life discovered!

Plus: Israeli settler increases in West Bank, Mathematicians boycotting their most important conference, and Meta and YouTube lost in court, but there's a catch. 

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Now, the news.

❧ The News ❧

❧ TEXAS TOWN AND OIL HUB ABOUT TO RUN OUT OF WATER. Corpus Christi may be the first city on the Gulf Coast to hope for a hurricane. Reservoirs are running dry in the Texas town, which is home to one of the country’s biggest oil ports, and if 20 to 30 inches of rain don’t arrive in a very short period of time, Corpus Christi will run out of water in a matter of months. The problem lies not with residents’ long hot showers and water sprinklers, but with the area's substantial petrochemical industry, which accounts for a majority of water usage. City Manager Peter Zanoni called this a “supply and demand issue,” which is one way to obscure the truth. What’s really happening—according to local resident and retired chemical plant manager Encarnacion Serna, who was interviewed by Inside Climate News—is that local leaders and businessmen oversold their water supply to the petrochemical industry, then started scrambling as the city began to run dry. “I’ve been trying since 2020 to let them know how catastrophic this is going to be,” he told the outlet. The city promised, and then spectacularly failed, to build desalination plants that could bolster municipal water sources. Now it's too late. Residents have already started letting their gardens die and washing clothes less frequently. If the city does run out of water, leaders will have to enact emergency curtailment measures to avoid catastrophe, limiting water use for all—except for the oil industry. Local refineries have secured exemptions from some curtailment measures so they can keep using water to cool their plants and supply fuel to Texas airports.

Art by Josh Lynch from Current Affairs Magazine Vol. 5, Issue 4

❧ UNDER THE COVER OF THE WAR IN IRAN, SETTLER VIOLENCE REACHES NEW HIGHS IN THE WEST BANK. While on its northern border, Israel is enacting the “Gaza model” in Lebanon, displacing over a million people, to its west, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Israeli settler violence is increasing, too. Between January 1 and March 16, Israeli settlers or armed forces killed 26 people in the West Bank, and settlers have injured 260 Palestinians in more than 1,000 attacks. At the same time, Israel has dramatically stepped up its efforts to annex the West Bank. “The world has turned a blind eye—we were left alone long before the [Iran] war, these attacks especially here in Jaloud and Qaryoot were vicious and continuous, the settlers do whatever they want because they are supported. We have been left alone,” Palestinian taxi driver Fadi Issa told Drop Site News.

Art from Current Affairs Magazine Vol. 7, Issue 1

❧ PROTEST WORKS. A RUSSIAN FUEL SHIP WILL BE ALLOWED INTO CUBA. The Trump administration has decided to allow a single ship, an oil tanker from Russia, to deliver 730,000 barrels of oil to Cuba. The fuel could last the population of 11 million for up to a month. Our president appears to have had a brief flicker of realization that the blockade is plainly horrible. “We don’t mind having somebody get a boatload, because they need — they have to survive,” Trump told the New York Times while aboard Air Force One. “I told them, if a country wants to send some oil into Cuba right now, I have no problem with that. Whether it’s Russia or not.” Maybe Trump had less of an appetite for a naval confrontation with Russia, maybe he snapped back to reality when Cuba refused to let the U.S. import generators solely to power its own embassy on the island. And maybe the attention drawn to the humanitarian crisis in Cuba by the Nuestra América Convoy, of which Current Affairs was a part, worked. The fuel is arriving despite the right-wing slander of the convoy—which Current Affairs Editor-in-Chief Nathan J. Robinson and Associate Editor Alex Skopic have thoroughly debunked—and despite the detention of several convoy participants at Miami International Airport. At the end of the day, this is a public relations presidency. If they think PR is bad, they will change course and try to make it look like it was their idea all along.

CURRENT-EST AFFAIRS

What’s new in the magazine this week?

The Case for Ska

Fresh from the latest print edition, Miles Kampf-Lassin, a Senior Editor at In These Times, mounts a defense of Ska. People like to dunk on ska for silly lyrics and silly outfits, but sometimes silly isn’t as silly as it seems:

“Far from a brief and lamentable fad, ska is a decades-long movement whose existence far preceded its breakthrough into ’90s pop culture. It has traveled from the slums of Kingston, Jamaica to the industrial hamlets of the United Kingdom, to stages across America and the globe, spreading a message of working-class solidarity against power-hungry elites—and of unity in the face of racial oppression.”

Free your mind, read Kampf-Lassin’s article here. 

And while we’re on the topic, have you subscribed yet to the print edition of Current Affairs? Well, don’t wait! Join up.

Art by Greg Houston from Current Affairs Vol. 11, Issue 2

❧ In More News ❧

❧ PROTEST KEEPS WORKING. THIRD NO KINGS DRAWS EIGHT MILLION AMERICANS TO THE STREETS. Trump got more bad PR this weekend at the nationwide No Kings protests, which saw Pikachus and a luxury retirement community joining together to create what organizers described as the largest protest in U.S. history. Republicans downplay protests like these because they don’t want you to know they work. It's the same reason Fox News talking heads get on the air and fearmonger about the left being “organized,” citing it as evidence of danger and depravity—because organized is exactly what the left needs to be in order to effectively fight back. (The right is incredibly organized.) The Conservative Political Action Conference, better known as CPAC, took place the same weekend in Grapevine, Texas. According to Mother Jones, it was a total flop, with fewer participants and less star power than ever.

Art from Current Affairs Magazine Vol. 5, Issue 4

❧ THE OLYMPICS BANS TRANS ATHLETES FROM WOMAN’S SPORTS, REQUIRES INVASIVE GENETIC TESTING. The science shows that trans women do not have significant athletic advantages over cis women—which is perhaps part of the reason why only one trans woman has ever made it to the Olympics, weightlifter Laurel Hubbard. But this decision is not about science. Rather, it puts Olympic National Committee policy in line with the Trump administration's executive order banning trans women from sports ahead of the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles. If it was about the science, the International Olympic Committee would have remembered that it has tried sex testing before, during the last century, and it didn’t go well. Way back in 2000, a Yale physician called the IOC’s sex testing “discriminatory against women with disorders of sexual development, and may have shattering consequences for athletes who 'fail' a test.” This new round of sex testing will use the presence of the SRY gene as a proxy for male sex development in utero. However, the person who discovered the SRY gene, said “the science does not support this overly simplistic assertion,” and called its use in for sex testing “misguided.” “[This policy] does not smell of science. It smells of stigma,” said Olympic runner Caster Semenya, aa cis woman whose naturally high levels of testosterone became the subject of investigation. “It was not born from care for athletes. It was born from political pressure.”

In related news, today, the Supreme Court ruled against a Colorado law banning conversion therapy, 8-1, claiming that the law infringed on the freedom of speech of a Christian counselor who wanted to deliver faith-based therapy. 

Art from Current Affairs Magazine Vol. 5, Issue 4

❧ INTERNATIONAL MATHEMATICIANS PROTEST TO MOVE MATH’S BIGGEST CONFERENCE OUTSIDE OF THE U.S. The numbers aren’t adding up for some of the world’s preeminent mathematicians. The U.S. has built a paramilitary force to brutally harass and expel non-Americans from within the country's borders … and meanwhile, the International Congress of Mathematicians wants its global members to convene in Philadelphia? Mathematicians Tarik Aougab and Ila Varma have spearheaded a petition calling for the boycott of the conference unless it is moved to a less openly fascist country. The ICM, which takes place every four years, is math’s most consequential event. It awards the Fields Medal, tantamount to a Nobel Prize in Math, and has hosted speeches that changed the discipline. Still, over 1900 people who signed the petition—among them a previous Fields Medal recipient and the head of the mathematical society—attendance isn’t worth the risk of being thrown in a jail cell. The petition asserts that travel to the U.S. would subject all international travelers to the Trump administration's ludicrous border and immigration policies. Indeed, last year, a mathematician was denied entry to the U.S. after officials found messages criticizing Trump on her phone. “There is simply no sound argument one could make that claims international participants are more safe at this iteration of the ICM than they would have been in Russia in 2022,” the petition states, referring to the time the conference was relocated after Russia invaded Ukraine. “The current American government has demonstrated in no uncertain terms its unbridled hatred of immigrants.”

❧ Crooks vs. Sickos ❧

Or, what our politicians and oligarchs are up to

❧ TRUMP GETS HIS IRAN UPDATES IN TWO-MINUTE VIDEOS. The only number too big to count is the number of times Trump has declared the U.S. has “won” its needless war in Iran. Still, he is now threatening to “conclude our lovely ‘stay’ in Iran by blowing up and completely obliterating all of their Electric Generating Plants, Oil Wells and Kharg Island (and possibly all desalinization plants!)” if the country’s leadership does not make a deal soon (these are war crimes). There’s an inherent contradiction in these statements, as one implies that the war is finished, and another implies that it is ongoing. Perhaps the president is confused because he literally does not know what is going on. NBC News reported that, each day, Trump’s staff prepare for him a two-minute video of bombs hitting targets in Iran, and that little montage, in addition to conversations with staff and some news reports, comprises his daily briefing on the war. (We’re not sure which program his staff uses to create the clips, since even TikTok allows videos up to 10 minutes long.) It’s a terribly apt image for this moment: a man with a short attention span prefers to consume short-form content, and now people are dying. 

❧ BIG TECH LOSES BIG IN COURT, BUT THE AMERICAN PEOPLE MAY NOT BE THE WINNERS. Taking inspiration from the legal arguments against tobacco, prosecutors secured rulings against both Meta and YouTube, successfully arguing that the platforms were addictive to users and harmful. In New Mexico, investigators used a To Catch a Predator style investigation called “Operation MetaPhile” to lure men with decoy accounts of underage girls. The resulting arrests helped convince a jury that Meta platforms are unsafe for children. In California, YouTube and Meta were both held responsible for the damaged mental health of a child who compulsively used social media. It is cathartic to see these tech oligarchs be forced into any modicum of accountability, and more cases may follow. However, in New Mexico, the victors are already talking about using their wins to justify age verification laws, which we know will likely lead to increased surveillance and the end of anonymity online.

Art from Current Affairs Magazine Vol. 5, Issue 4

❧ DEMOCRAT FLIPS A STATE LEGISLATURE IN MAR-A-LAGO’S DISTRICT. Shockwaves were sent through a reliably red corner of Florida when Democrat Emily Gregory—a first-time candidate with a background in public health, who now runs a fitness community for postpartum women—flipped a state house seat in Palm Beach County. She beat out Republican Jon Maples after the last Republican to hold the seat, John Caruso, resigned to take another local position. Caruso won in 2024 by 19 percentage points. Gregory won by 2.4. The sweetest irony: Trump voted in the election, even though his primary residence is in D.C. — and he voted by mail. Time and time again, Trump is exactly the kind of guy he fearmongers about. 

❧ ICE ASKING FOR SECOND FORMS OF ID. ICE is still in airports and may remain there even though Transportation and Security Administration employees, mercifully, have received pay as the Department of Homeland Security shutdown drags on. If you are traveling through airports, it is important to know that in at least one instance, ICE agents have asked a person of color for a second form of identification. Matthew Rodriguez documented for The Intercept his experience of an ICE agent making this demand in a TSA line, and not to the white people around him. “Later, it was impossible not to think about what my brief, eventually harmless encounter with the agent might portend,” writes Rodriguez, who said he was eventually allowed to pass after showing a drivers license in addition to his passport. “Shortly after Trump deployed ICE agents to airports, his former chief strategist Steve Bannon may have tipped the administration’s hand. Bannon speculated on his ‘War Room’ podcast that the immigration force’s presence at TSA security checkpoints was a ‘test run’ ahead of the November midterms.”

❧ The Brightside ❧

❧ Vermont has a lot of ice in the winter, sure, but ICE Tours VT is interested in the other kind. “Move over maple syrup, craft beer, and fall foliage — ICE is the new attraction in Vermont!” reads the excursion group’s ironic slogan. These tours load visitors onto a bus and drive them around to see Department of Homeland Security facilities, not snow covered mountain peaks, all while cheekily pretending to be regular tour guides. ICE Tours VT’s goal is to help locals better understand DHS’s insidious presence in the region as the Trump administration undertakes its violent mass deportation campaign. It’s a clever piece of performance art, and the experience of it has been well-captured by a local paper. 

❧ According to the Colorado Sun, Democrats in Colorado have introduced a package of bills “to rein in consumer prices by outlawing higher costs for so-called captive audiences” (think: people waiting hospitals and airports), banning “surveillance pricing,” (like when a retailer displays higher prices for baby items, because your recent Google searches reveal you’re pregnant) and “prohibiting manufacturers from selling their goods to small businesses for more than they charge big-box stores.” All things that feel like they should already be illegal. 

❧ Artist Emilie Louise Gossiaux, who is visually impaired, has a collection in the Whitney Biennial that is a touching tribute to their guide dog. The series of drawings and sculptures, which imagine heaven through a dog’s perspective, is on display at the Whitney Museum of American Art through August 23; but beware—according to one art critic: “I’ve been hard on this show, but I’m not made of stone: Gossiaux’s drawings made me tear up.”

ANIMAL FACT OF THE WEEK

New branch of aquatic life discovered!

While exploring the deep sea between Hawaii and Mexico, researchers have discovered a new branch of life 13,000 feet below the water’s surface, a superfamily of amphipods. These tiny, shrimpy organisms are related to sand fleas and have, for millions of years, evolved in total darkness. Researchers say this discovery underscores the need to research the deep sea before mining it for precious metals, as the Trump administration is currently pushing to do. Previous deep sea mining expeditions have reduced local biodiversity by a third. Tammy Horton, a researcher who helped identify the new superfamily, told Inside Climate News, “If you imagine that on planet Earth, we know about carnivorous mammals, we know that bears exist and we know that the families of cats exist, it would be like finding dogs.”

Writing and research by Emily Carmichael. Editing and additional material by Alex Skopic, Emily Topping and Nathan J. Robinson. Header graphic by Cali Traina Blume. This news briefing is a product of Current Affairs Magazine. Subscribe to our gorgeous and informative print edition here, and our delightful podcast here.

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