Emanuel A. M. E. Church Shootings

In his book Mother Emanuel: Two Centuries of Race, Resistance, and Forgiveness in One Charleston Church (2025, Crown) Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Kevin Sack explores the inspiring history that brought the church to that moment, and the depth of the desecration committed in its fellowship hall.In this expanded episode of Walter Edgar's Journal, Sack joins us to explore the story of Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston.

In his book Mother Emanuel: Two Centuries of Race, Resistance, and Forgiveness in One Charleston Church (2025, Crown) Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Kevin Sack explores the inspiring history that brought the church to that moment, and the depth of the desecration committed in its fellowship hall.In this expanded episode of Walter Edgar's Journal, Sack joins us to explore the story of Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston.

On this episode of the South Carolina Lede for May 27, 2025: lawmakers return to Columbia to take up the $14.7 billion state budget for the coming fiscal year; state Democrats have a big week with their convention and major events featuring two prominent voices in the party; we bring you one of the Voices Collected for our Mother Emanuel remembrance initiative; and more!

Parkland. Uvalde. Columbine. Sandy Hook. A supermarket in Buffalo. A church in South Carolina. A synagogue in Pittsburgh. When violence comes to a public place, as it does all too often in our era, a delicate question lingers afterward: What should be done with the buildings where blood was shed?

Charleston County religious leaders met with officials from the Department of Homeland Security earlier this month as the feds warn of an increased risk of attacks on houses of worship.

Two survivors of a 2015 racist massacre that killed nine of their friends at a Charleston church say South Carolina's lack of a hate crimes law is an insult to what they suffered through at their Bible study. Polly Sheppard and Felicia Sanders told a group of state senators Tuesday it sends a message that the state isn't serious about stopping the kind of wickedness that led to the massacre at Emanuel AME. South Carolina and Wyoming are the only U.S. states without a law giving stiffer penalties for crimes motivated by someone's race, sexual orientation, religion or disability. The House and a Senate subcommittee have approved the bill, which died on the Senate floor last year.

A bill that would make South Carolina the 49th state with a hate crime law is making its way through the House. A subcommittee Thursday unanimously advanced Rep. Wendell Gilliard's proposal. The pursuit of enhanced state penalties for hate crimes got renewed attention after an avowed white supremacist murdered members of the oldest African Methodist Episcopal church in the U.S. South in 2015. But no such proposal has become law in the years since. The bill allows harsher punishments for perpetrators of violent crimes motivated by their perception of someone's race, color, religion, sex, gender, national origin, sexual orientation, or physical or mental disability.

After mass shootings, the loss felt by marginalized groups already facing discrimination is compounded. Some public health experts say the risk for mental health issues is greater for the groups — communities of color and the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community among them. The trauma is especially acute when the shootings happen at schools, churches, clubs or other places that previously served as pillars of those communities. Some have rebuilt their spaces, some are still working to rebuild, and some never will reopen.

The Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from Dylann Roof, who challenged his death sentence and conviction in the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation. Roof had asked the court to decide how to handle disputes over mental illness-related evidence between capital defendants and their attorneys. The justices did not comment Tuesday in turning away the appeal. Roof fired his attorneys and represented himself during the sentencing phase of his capital trial, part of his effort to block evidence potentially portraying him as mentally ill. Roof shot participants at a Bible study session at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

Attorneys for the U.S. Justice Department say the nation's highest court shouldn't review the case of convicted church shooter Dylann Roof. Federal prosecutors made that argument in an expected filing with the U.S. Supreme Court. Roof was sentenced to death after his conviction in the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation. His lawyers have appealed his case to the high court, asking justices to decide how to handle disputes over mental illness-related evidence between capital defendants and their attorneys. Government attorneys say Roof wasn't entitled to "control his counsel's strategy" for winning his case "by dictating the mitigation evidence that they could introduce."