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Headshot of Melissa Gira Grant
Melissa Gira Grant

Melissa Gira Grant is a staff writer at The New Republic, the author of Playing the Whore: The Work of Sex Work (published by Verso), and the co-director of They Won’t Call It Murder (executive produced by Field of Vision). She was a senior reporter at The Appeal, and a contributing writer at The Village Voice and Pacific Standard.


All Articles
August 20, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Stories Kamala Harris Won’t Tell Anymore
In her historic DNC speech, the former prosecutor elided most of her resume to craft a different image of her record.
August 19, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
QAnon Is Using the Anti-Trafficking Movement’s Conspiracy Playbook
Both are swimming in the same false claims and exaggerated campaigns.
August 10, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Unfinished Business of Women’s Suffrage
The women who remain locked out of the right to vote are the fractured legacy of a fractured movement.
August 3, 2020
MagazineMelissa Gira Grant
The Occult, Terrorizing Politics of QAnon
Q's followers were promised a war. Now, as federal agents snatch people off the streets, they believe it's arrived.
July 30, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
All Police Can Be Secret Police
Local democratic officials denounce the feds when they act with impunity, but their own police departments use many of the same tactics.
July 14, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Dark Obsessions of QAnon Are Merging With Mainstream Conservatism
With Republican candidates and Trump embracing the strange, child trafficking–fixated movement, it can no longer be dismissed as merely a conspiracy theory.
July 14, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
A Window of Possibility on Self-Managed Abortion
Telehealth has grown increasingly common in the face of Covid-19. A federal judge has now extended that access to medication abortion.
July 10, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Law Was Never Meant for Ghislaine Maxwell
Sex trafficking prosecution has been framed as a universal pursuit people can unite around, but that’s a fantasy.
July 8, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
Reproductive Coercion Wins at the Supreme Court
Conservatives have prevailed in an effort to deny people bodily autonomy. That’s always been their fight.
June 25, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Justice Department’s Fake Fight Against Sex Trafficking
Newspapers love a good “Feds take down sex trafficking” story, even if there are no sex traffickers actually taken down.
June 18, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
A Worker Uprising at Planned Parenthood
Staff at the New York affiliate of the health care provider say their CEO is abusing her power and compromising their mission.
June 16, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
A Glimpse of a Trans Future
A historic Supreme Court ruling arrives in the middle of an uprising for Black trans lives.
June 9, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Rush to Redefine “Defund the Police”
An abolitionist demand rose to mainstream prominence. Now every politician and cable news talking head is suddenly an expert.
June 3, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant, Katie McDonough
Protest Medics on Being Targeted by the Police, in Their Own Words
“The cops at the protest that day wouldn’t make eye contact. They were laughing at one point. I think they think this is funny.”
May 29, 2020
Patricia, Melissa Gira Grant
I Gave Birth While Incarcerated During a Pandemic
“It got to the point where us pregnant females were denying our medical treatment. It was almost like a boycott.”
May 28, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Pandemic Is the Right Time to Defund the Police
The coronavirus has slowed much American police work, but the rate of police killings has remained relatively unchanged.
May 19, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
Ronan Farrow Is Not a “Resistance” Journalist
Ben Smith’s explosive column in The New York Times seizes on the reporter’s alleged lack of rigor, but mistakes his target for a movement.
May 13, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Coronavirus Is Making Us All Camgirls
For millions of newly remote workers, doing your job now involves looking the part, figuring out your angles, and performing for the camera.
May 12, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
Congress May Hand Bill Barr the Keys to Your Online Life
Against the backdrop of the coronavirus crisis, our unaccountable surveillance state is set to expand.
May 8, 2020
Melissa Gira Grant
The Pandemic Surveillance State
In the drive to “reopen” the economy, the means to radically expand tech-based surveillance and criminalize our everyday lives are there for the taking.

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