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After weeks of deliberating over the right words and fine-tuning your creative nonfiction piece , you’re ready to begin submitting to literary nonfiction journals. The only problem is finding the right home for your creative nonfiction submission. What journals or literary nonfiction magazines should you prioritize submitting your work to?

Find your answer here: we’ve searched the net for great creative nonfiction journals, and any of the following 24 publications is a wonderful home for creative nonfiction—guaranteed.

If you’re looking to submit multiple genres of work, take a look at the best places to submit poetry and the best places to submit fiction , too!

24 Creative Nonfiction Magazines to Submit To

Just like our other guides on the best literary journals to submit to, we’ve divided this article into three different categories:

• Great journals to secure your first publications in
• Competitive journals for writers with previous publications
• High-tier creative nonfiction journals at the summit of publishing

Any publication in the following 24 journals is sure to jumpstart your literary career. So, let’s explore the best nonfiction magazines and journals!

Creative Nonfiction Magazines: Great First Publications

The following eight journals sponsor creative nonfiction from both emerging and established writers, making them great opportunities for writers in any stage of their journey.

1. Sundog Lit

Sundog Lit loves the weird and experimental, and it regularly seeks innovative nonfiction for its biannual journal. All submitted works should be well-researched and play with both form and content. Submit your hybrid content to this great creative nonfiction journal!

2. River Teeth Journal

River Teeth Journal specializes in narrative nonfiction. The journal operates with the motto “Good Writing Counts and Facts Matter,” which captures their preference for well-researched and thoughtfully composed CNF. Literary nonfiction submissions are open twice a year, typically between September and May.

3. Atticus Review

Atticus Review posts daily nonfiction, fiction, and poetry. They publish work that is unabashed and resilient, finding hope in even the toughest of situations. All published works after September 19th, 2020 receive a $10 award from this creative nonfiction journal!

4. Barren Magazine

Barren Magazine publishes nonfiction, fiction, poetry, and photography, preferring works with grit and muster. Each publication of this creative nonfiction magazine includes prompts: for their 17th issue, the prompts are “unorthodox, sensational, kinetic, quixotic, & transcendent.”

5. The Offing

The editors at The Offing look for work that’s innovative, genre-bending, and challenges conventions. The Offing is especially keen to support both new and established authors, making them a welcome home for your creative nonfiction submissions.

6. Crazy Horse

Crazy Horse sponsors emerging and diverse voices in its biannual publication. Submissions for this journal remain open between September and May, and they typically range between 2,500 and 5,000 words. This is a great literary journal to submit to for writers of all styles and narratives!

7. Dogwood: a Journal of Poetry and Prose

Dogwood is a journal of poetry and prose based out of Fairfield University. This annual publication only opens for submissions in the Fall, and each edition includes prizes for top pieces. Literary nonfiction from all walks of life are welcome here.

8. Montana Mouthful

Straight out of the Treasure State, Montana Mouthful seeks “just a mouthful” of fiction and nonfiction. Creative nonfiction submissions should not exceed 2,000 words but should still deliver a cogent, memorable story.

Creative Nonfiction Magazines: Reputable Literary Journals to Submit To

The following literary magazines and creative nonfiction journals can be tough competition, but with a few previous publications under your belt and a special story ready for print, the following journals could jumpstart your literary career. All of these journals have fantastic literary nonfiction examples!

9. Conjunctions

Conjunctions publishes daring works of poetry and prose, living by its motto to “Read Dangerously!” Submitted works should provoke, excite, and linger with the reader. Conjunctions publishes both a biannual magazine and a weekly online journal, both of which house fantastic literary journalism.

10. Black Warrior Review

Black Warrior Review is a biannual literary journal run by the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. This Whiting Awarded journal nurtures groundbreaking literary nonfiction, fiction, and poetry, with many of its authors going on to win Pushcarts and Best of the Net prizes!

11. Hippocampus

Hippocampus Magazine is one of the best creative nonfiction magazines out there, as it focuses solely on the publication of personal essays and nonfiction stories. Their strictly digital publication is highly literary and has many great creative nonfiction examples and pieces. Despite being a highly competitive journal, both new and emerging writers can find a home at Hippocampus .

12. American Literary Review

The American Literary Review , run out of the University of North Texas, publishes engaging and precise stories and poetry. The journal is currently on hiatus, but read some of its back issues and you’ll understand why it’s a great literary journal to submit to.

13. Fourth Genre

Fourth Genre is a biannual creative nonfiction journal published through Michigan State University. The journal amplifies diverse and powerful voices, seeking stories that are refreshing, earnest, and imaginative. Fourth Genre only publishes nonfiction, so read its back issues for some great creative nonfiction examples!

14. The Cincinnati Review

The Cincinnati Review is interested in literary nonfiction that can “knock your socks off.” Submissions for personal essays are open between September and January; writers can also submit flash nonfiction year-round to its miCRo series.

15. Creative Nonfiction

“True stories, well told” is the motto of Creative Nonfiction , the aptly-named journal of all things CNF. Creative Nonfiction celebrates a diverse range of voices and experiences, championing both new and established essayists. Between its literary publications and its creative nonfiction blog, writers can learn a lot from this journal. Send your creative nonfiction submissions to Creative Nonfiction !

16. Witness

Witness publishes prose and poetry that examines and analyzes the modern day. They seek stories about modern issues and events, often publishing bold and eclectic takes on serious issues. Witness is a more politically-oriented journal, making it a leader in contemporary literary journalism.

Creative Nonfiction Magazines: The Summit of Literary Nonfiction

The following journals are notoriously difficult to publish in, as writers often have to have a name built for themselves in the literary world. Nonetheless, the following publications exist at the summit of CNF, so keep these publications on your radar as top literary journals to submit to.

AGNI , a highly literary publication run at Boston University, publishes fiery, transformative prose and poetry. Creative nonfiction submissions should be polished, inventive, and highly original. Be sure to read their previous publications for an idea of what they look for!

18. The Atlantic

The Atlantic is well-respected for its literary journalism, making it a premier publisher of creative nonfiction. Though many of its published pieces are solicited, The Atlantic is always looking for fresh, bold stories and poetry, so it’s a premier place for nonfiction magazine submissions.

Salon does not present itself as a creative nonfiction journal, but many of its previous magazine issues are highly literary in nature, examining current issues with a sharp, educated lens. If you have nonfiction stories that are both personal and global in nature, Salon accepts queries for articles and editorials, so check them out!

20. The Antioch Review

The Antioch Review is a real page-turner, as their past publications can attest to. This highly literary journal publishes fantastic prose and poetry, and if you have a creative nonfiction piece that’s riveting and influential, The Antioch Review is looking for your creative nonfiction submissions.

21. The Colorado Review

The Colorado Review is a tri-annual publication steeped in history, with original issues featuring poetry and prose from Langston Hughes, E. E. Cummings, Henry Miller, etc. The journal is committed to contemporary literature, seeking voices that are transformative and capture today’s (or tomorrow’s) zeitgeist. The Colorado Review is a fantastic space for literary journalism and will certainly welcome your creative nonfiction.

22. The Virginia Quarterly

The Virginia Quarterly publishes a wide array of literary nonfiction, fiction, and poetry, promising both ample readership and ample pay. VQR seeks inventive and imaginative stories, and it accepts both personal essays and nonfiction pieces on literary and cultural criticism. Submissions are generally open in July, but keep tuned for any special announcements or brief reading periods!

23. New England Review

New England Review is a quarterly publication of all things literary. The journal is dedicated to publishing both emerging and established voices, though it remains a highly competitive journal for creative nonfiction. NER is a great literary journal to submit to for stories that are engaged, critical, and sparkling.

24. North American Review

The North American Review is the oldest literary magazine in the United States. Since its inception in 1815, it remains one of the best nonfiction magazines to submit to, publishing strong literary voices with imaginative story arcs and moving messages. Nonfiction magazine submissions at North American Review are always spectacular—go check them out!

Tips for Publishing Your Creative Nonfiction Submissions

“How do I get my nonfiction published with so many other voices in the room?” This is a question we hear often, and as writers in the modern day, we can’t help but notice how diverse the publishing world is, and how everything “has already been written.” How can you make sure your story gets published in the right creative nonfiction magazines?

Of course, no story is guaranteed publication, but if you’ve written an earnest, sparkling story with grit, character, and truth, then the right literary journals to submit to are in this list. Additionally, you can boost your chances of success with the following publishing tips:

Start With a Powerful Title

Your creative nonfiction submissions should draw the reader in right away, which means starting with an attention-grabbing title. Your title could be a singular and obscure word, or it could be a long description, or anything in-between—the goal is to stand out while representing your story faithfully.

Here are some great titles we saw from a brief glance at the literary nonfiction examples from Hippocampus :

• Bar Bathroom Graffiti in New Orleans: A One Year Catalog by Kirsten Reneau
• Necrokedeia for Children by Mark Hall
• Ford Motor Company Tells Me About Perseverance by Alexis Annunziata

These titles give you an idea about the story itself while also drawing you in with wit, humor, or obscurity. Literary editors have thousands of stories to read each year; give them something to notice so you can stand out among the rest!

Follow the Creative Nonfiction Journal’s Formatting Guidelines

A surefire way to receive rejections on your literary nonfiction is to ignore the formatting guidelines. Each journal has its own requirements, though they often align with MLA formatting requirements, but be sure you follow the journal’s instructions faithfully, or else they may discard your submission without even reading it.

Read the Creative Nonfiction Magazine’s Past Issues

The 24 publications mentioned in this article are some of the best nonfiction magazines in the world, in part because they adhere so strongly to their tastes and preferences. As such, no two journals are alike, and each publication has its own expectations for the nonfiction they read and publish. Before you submit your creative nonfiction, be sure to read some past publications and gauge whether your essay will fit in with the journal’s literary tastes.

Keep Track of Your Submissions

Many creative nonfiction journals allow simultaneous submissions, meaning you can submit the same piece to multiple journals. However, if one journal accepts your work, you need to notify the other journals that it has been accepted and is no longer available for consideration.

Keeping track of your creative nonfiction submissions in a spreadsheet or personal organizer is essential: if multiple journals publish your story, it could harm your chances of getting published in the future.

Aim High—But Not Too High

Your personal essay deserves to be read, but if you’re only submitting to journals like VQR or The Atlantic, it might never see the light of day. Part of the publishing process means building your publication history and portfolio.

Your literary journalism will one day get published in Salon or the New York Times, but until then, focus on getting recognized in smaller and medium sized journals—and don’t let rejections bring you down, because it’s only up from here!

Fine-Tune Your Creative Nonfiction Submissions with Writers.com

Looking for extra help on writing your personal essay, lyric essay, or hybrid nonfiction piece? The instructors at Writers.com are ready to assist you. Gain valuable insight and diverse perspectives on your nonfiction stories before submitting them to the 24 creative nonfiction magazines we’ve listed.

Good luck, and happy writing!

Sean Glatch

This is a very well written, informative and inclusive article, and I will follow up. The art piece is wonderful.

Here is another market that pays authors https://www.authormag.com/paying-market/

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Tropical Storm Beryl forms in the Atlantic, forecast to become a hurricane in Caribbean

• Updated: Jun. 28, 2024, 10:23 p.m. |
• Published: Jun. 28, 2024, 7:22 a.m.

A new tropical storm has formed in the Atlantic, and it's expected to become Hurricane Beryl in the next few days. It's headed for the Caribbean and could be a hurricane when it reaches the islands. It's too soon to say if it could affect the U.S. National Hurricane Center

• Leigh Morgan

The Atlantic Ocean may get its first hurricane of 2024 in the next day or two, and its name will be Beryl.

And it looks like it’s headed for the Caribbean.

The National Hurricane Center upgraded a tropical depression to Tropical Storm Beryl in the central Atlantic late Friday. Beryl is the second named storm in the Atlantic in 2024. It is forecast to become Hurricane Beryl by Sunday.

The hurricane center was also tracking two other disturbances on Friday, one headed for the southern Gulf and the second on the heels of the new tropical storm.

But it’s Beryl that was getting most of the attention on Friday. As of 10 p.m. CDT, it was located about 1,110 miles east-southeast of Barbados and was on a path to the west at 18 mph.

Beryl had sustained winds of 40 mph, the hurricane center said, making it a minimal tropical storm.

The hurricane center expects Beryl to be near the Caribbean’s Windward Islands by the end of the weekend and urged those in the islands to keep a close eye on the storm. Forecasters said hurricane and tropical storm watches will likely be required for portions of the area by early Saturday.

The official forecast track takes the storm near Jamaica -- still as a hurricane -- by Wednesday night, when the forecast period ends. It’s too soon to say if it could affect the United States.

Models generally agree on it moving into the Caribbean but then diverge, some taking the storm into Central America and others curving its path northward.

There has already been Tropical Storm Alberto in 2024, which made landfall on Mexico’s Gulf Coast on June 20 with 45 mph winds.

ELSEWHERE IN THE ATLANTIC

Tropical activity was picking up in the Atlantic Ocean on Friday. Of most interest is Tropical Storm Beryl, likely to become a hurricane in the next few days. It's forecast to head for the Caribbean, but it's too soon to say if it could affect the U.S. Forecasters were also tracking two other disturbances, including one headed for the southern Gulf. NHC

The hurricane center on Friday was also keeping an eye on a tropical disturbance in the western Caribbean that is expected to move into the southern Gulf of Mexico’s Bay of Campeche.

It had a 40 percent chance of becoming a tropical depression in the next two days, up from 30 percent earlier Friday.

The disturbance is expected to move into the Bay of Campeche by late Saturday or Sunday. When it gets there some development would be possible.

The final system being watched is the newest. As of Friday it was located in the eastern Atlantic several hundred miles southwest of the Cabo Verde Islands off Africa’s west coast.

It was disorganized in Friday but could slowly get its act together next week as it continues on a path westward. It had a 40 percent chance of becoming a tropical depression in the next seven days, and forecasters said on Friday night it could become a depression by midweek.

RELATED ARTICLES • al .com

Tropical storm may be on path for Caribbean this weekend Jun. 27, 2024, 7:34 a.m.

Tropical Storm Alberto moves ashore in Mexico but another Gulf storm possible Jun. 20, 2024, 7:10 a.m.

The Atlantic hurricane season began June 1 and ends Nov. 30. A very active season is anticipated, with 17 to 25 named storms and up to seven hurricanes possible, according to NOAA forecasters.

Activity tends to really pick up in August, and Sept. 10 is the climatological peak of the season.

The 2024 outlook for the Atlantic hurricane season includes the possibility of 17 to 25 named storms. NOAA

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Jersey Shore man found guilty of sexually assaulting a 5-year-old girl on Christmas Day

• Published: Jun. 27, 2024, 11:13 a.m.
• Eric Conklin | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

Jurors on Wednesday convicted a Jersey Shore man of sexually assaulting a 5-year-old girl on Christmas Day two years ago, the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office said.

A petit jury found Oscar Oberlino Gomez Miralda, 41, of Atlantic City, guilty of first-degree aggravated sexual assault and second-degree endangering the welfare of a child, according to a news release.

Miralda faces 25 years without parole to life in state prison when he is sentenced on Sept. 16. He also faces a five-year sentence for the second-degree offense.

The hearing, prosecutors said Thursday, may be delayed to allow an assessment to judge to determine whether or not Miralda poses a risk for being a repeated offender.

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Thank you for relying on us to provide the local news you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a subscription.

Eric Conklin may be reached at [email protected] .

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

Rethinking the NATO burden-sharing debate

By Valbona Zeneli and Philippe Dickinson

“The American well can run dry.” That was US President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s  message to European allies in 1953, just four years after NATO was founded. With commitments in East Asia stretching US resources, the time had come for Europe to bear its share of the burden of collective defense. 

In other words, the burden-sharing debate is nearly as old as NATO itself. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the US contribution to NATO’s total spending on defense was above  70 percent . Since then, most US administrations have urged European countries to do more for their security. In public and in private, US presidents and officials have pressed European governments not to neglect military spending—especially in the post–Cold War period, in which European governments scaled down defense budgets and instead prioritized social programs and tax cuts. In 2011, then US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates sounded the same alarm as Eisenhower, only changing the metaphor from water to wealth. Gates  warned  that  

if current trends in the decline of European defense capabilities are not halted and reversed, future US political leaders—those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me—may not consider the return on America’s investment in NATO worth the cost.

At the same time, over the last decade this ongoing debate about burden-sharing has narrowed, unhelpfully, to focus on a single number. The guideline that NATO allies should each spend at least 2 percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense, established in 2014 with the best of intentions, has since taken on an almost totemic quality as the main criterion of an ally’s worth. The search for a simple benchmark has distorted an important, wider debate in the Alliance. Instead, a fuller understanding of what each ally brings to collective defense is needed, and the upcoming Washington summit is where this process should begin.

Why ‘2 percent’ is reductive

Russia’s first invasion of Ukraine in 2014 began to change calculations. At that year’s  NATO Summit in Wales , leaders promised to reach a defense spending target of 2 percent of GDP by 2024. Progress has been made toward that target, but it has been uneven. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 provided yet another impetus for increased spending across European capitals. In German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s famous  Zeitenwende  speech , given just days after Russian forces began their all-out assault on Ukraine, he promised that Berlin would finally get serious about meeting the target and allocate an additional one hundred billion euros to a special defense fund.

Last year at the Alliance’s summit in Vilnius, NATO allies renewed their 2 percent pledge and went further,  endorsing  a Defense Production Action Plan to “accelerate joint procurement, boost interoperability, and generate investment and production capacity.” In 2023, defense spending across European NATO members increased by 19 percent, with around $78 billion dollars of new defense spending, according to  data  from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). This week, NATO  announced  that twenty-three of the Alliance’s thirty-two member states are expected to meet the 2 percent target in 2024. This year will also be the  first  in which European allies’ aggregate spending will surpass 2 percent of their collective GDP.

While Europe is clearly headed in the right direction, the United States remains by far the largest single contributor. According to SIPRI’s  database , total US defense spending reached $916 billion in 2023, or 3.36 percent of US GDP. In Europe, the three biggest defense spenders were the United Kingdom ($75 billion), Germany ($68 billion), and France ($61 billion) in 2023. Contrast this with China, which between 2000 and 2023 increased its military spending more than thirteen-fold (from $22 billion to $296 billion) and significantly upgraded its military capabilities. Russia has also increased its defense budget by twelve times ( from $9 to $109 billion ). Moreover, these estimates, based in part on educated guesswork, may undercount China’s and Russia’s actual defense and security spending.

The danger here is that focusing the burden-sharing debate around a mathematical equation is reductive. It fixes attention on inputs and not requirements. It does not translate into a full understanding of what the real military capabilities of allies are or how they are able to employ those capabilities to benefit NATO and enforce the international order.

What’s more, the 2 percent target is itself an inadequate metric. It is a goalpost that shifts depending on wider national economic fortunes. And it’s ill-defined. Allies have broad discretion to determine what is in the scope of the 2 percent target and to indulge in some creative accounting. For instance, generous pension payouts can inflate a country’s defense budget without contributing much to collective capabilities. Not all 2 percent commitments are the same. The 2014 NATO Summit that set the 2 percent target also included the target that by 2024, a minimum of 20 percent of national defense spending would go toward frontline capabilities, equipment, and research and development. All but two allies are above this mark, according to the most recent data , but these figures fluctuate each year.

How allies can move beyond ‘2 percent’

It is in the interest of individual European allies to demonstrate the tangible ways in which they are contributing to collective defense and deterrence. This includes strengthening conventional forces, including through contributions to multinational deployments on NATO’s eastern flank. It includes showing a proactive readiness to fill the gaps in strategic enablers that the United States currently supplies for Europe’s defense. This means building out airlift capabilities, air-to-air refueling, and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance aircraft and platforms. It also means allies need a coherent plan to make smarter use of existing resources across Europe and to develop a strategy for partnering with defense manufacturers to ensure the continuity of critical supplies.

Perhaps most critically now, allies need to get the messaging right. This could start by ditching the notion of collective defense as a “burden” and adopt the language of “ responsibility sharing ” instead. Reframing the debate would help signal to the public a calm, mature, and committed resolve.

With the NATO Summit taking place in Washington, DC, in July, during a US presidential election campaign, European allies cannot ignore the political context. At the NATO Summit and beyond, they will need to carefully calibrate their messaging to the US public in a way that appeals to both sides of the political aisle. That means, for instance, giving concrete signals that European allies can be relied on as valuable and constructive partners globally, particularly in the Indo-Pacific. 

Ultimately, considerations of messaging and politics bring the discussion back to the 2 percent target. It has assumed a particular symbolic potency. As NATO history demonstrates, this debate will remain in one form or another for a long time. Indeed, 2 percent is now spoken of as a “floor and not a ceiling,” with some allies, most vocally Poland, which  advocates  raising the target to 3 percent. Republican US Senator Roger Wicker recently  argued  that the United States should be spending as much as 5 percent of its GDP on defense.

As more and more allies cross the 2 percent threshold, and as spending accelerates, it’s time for the conversation to evolve. To consider not just how much is spent, but  how  it’s spent. To examine how that translates to each ally meaningfully and tangibly taking responsibility for collective defense. That’s a more nuanced message than a simple equation, but the time to start telling that story is now.

Valbona Zeneli is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center and at the Transatlantic Security Initiative of the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security.

Philippe Dickinson is the deputy director of the Transatlantic Security Initiative and a former career diplomat for the United Kingdom.

NATO’s seventy-fifth anniversary  is a milestone in a remarkable story of reinvention, adaptation, and unity. However, as the Alliance seeks to secure its future for the next seventy-five years, it faces the revanchism of old rivals, escalating strategic competition, and uncertainties over the future of the rules-based international order.

With partners and allies turning attention from celebrations to challenges, the Atlantic Council’s Transatlantic Security Initiative invited contributors to engage with the most pressing concerns ahead of the historic Washington summit and chart a path for the Alliance’s future. This series will feature seven essays focused on concrete issues that NATO must address at the Washington summit and five essays that examine longer-term challenges the Alliance must confront to ensure transatlantic security.

Further reading

Mon, Jun 10, 2024

Building the bridge: How to inject credibility into NATO’s promise of membership for Ukraine

New Atlanticist By Ian Brzezinski

Ukraine’s bridge to NATO membership must be built in ways that institutionalize its integration into the Alliance’s structures—starting now.

Mon, Jun 3, 2024

National resilience is a crucial part of defense. Here are the countries doing it right.

New Atlanticist By Elisabeth Braw

Learning from the allies that are already taking action will give other NATO members that decide to enhance their resilience a leg up.

Thu, Apr 4, 2024

NATO at 75: ‘The most powerful and successful alliance in history’

New Atlanticist By Christopher Skaluba , Philippe Dickinson , Dominykas Kaminskas

Maintaining NATO’s effectiveness requires recommitting to the Alliance’s transatlantic vision today, tomorrow, and into the years ahead.

Image: Soldiers of the NATO Response Force (NRF) stand next to military vehicles as they attend a Norwegian, Czech, and German combat exercise during a press day as part of the "Quadriga 2024" training in Gardelegen, Germany, April 8, 2024. REUTERS/Liesa Johannssen

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Yale Climate Connections

The U.S. is finally making serious efforts to adapt to climate change

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Like an approaching major hurricane whose outer spiral bands are only just beginning to hit, an approaching climate change storm has begun and will soon grow to ferocious severity. This immense tempest is already exposing the precarious foundations upon which civilization is built — an inadequate infrastructure designed for the gentler climate of the 20 th century.

For example, because of sea level rise and stronger storms, some coastal cities that used to flood in a hurricane expected once every 100 years can now flood in a 1-in-20-year storm. Levees and dams built to handle a worst-case flood can now be overwhelmed by rains from a new breed of superstorms . And bridges, roads, runways, and rails are cracking and buckling in heat they were not designed for.

Transformative change will inevitably occur to bring us into balance with the new climate. The big question is: To what degree will this change be planned and orderly rather than chaotic and unplanned, resulting in great suffering?

An urgent, well-organized, well-funded adaptation effort is essential to prepare us for what lies ahead. One recent estimate found that adapting to climate change in the U.S. will cost from tens to hundreds of billions of dollars per year by 2050. For comparison, federal, state, and local governments in the U.S. currently spend over $400 billion annually on public infrastructure.

In the 1980s, there was one billion-dollar event every four months, on average. Now, there's one every ~3 weeks. Why? Three reasons: increasing exposure, increasing vulnerability, and the big one, increasing severity and/or frequency of weather extremes fueled by a warming world. https://t.co/IyDP8gj08v — Prof. Katharine Hayhoe (@KHayhoe) January 10, 2022

This is Part 1 of a four-part series on U.S. climate change adaptation. In this part, I’ll document the steps the U.S. has already taken to adjust to our new reality, with suggestions on legislation that could further this effort. I’ll add links to the blurbs below as each post goes online.

• Part 2 looks at how U.S. climate change adaptation efforts are still fall short of what is needed to safeguard people and property.
• Part 3 is an essay offering my observations and speculations on how the planetary crisis may play out.
• Part 4 describes personal actions that you can take to prepare for what is coming, including a discussion of where the safest places to live might be.

What the U.S. is already doing to adapt to climate change

In the past few years, after largely ignoring climate adaptation planning and funding, the U.S. government has begun to acknowledge the need to take climate adaptation seriously.

• The 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law : This law provided about $50 billion in resilience funding. FEMA received nearly $7 billion to help communities proactively reduce their vulnerability to floods, hurricanes, drought, wildfires, extreme heat, and other climate-fueled hazards. The Army Corps got $7 billion for projects related to coastal storm risk management, hurricane and storm damage reduction, inland flood risk management, and aquatic ecosystem restoration. The Department of the Interior will spend $8.3 billion over a five-year period for water infrastructure projects, with much of the spending geared toward drought resilience.
• The 2023  Inflation Reduction Act : This is the most significant piece of U.S. climate legislation ever passed. Although the vast majority of the $400-billion law is earmarked for reducing climate pollution, several billion dollars were set aside for climate adaptation. For example, NOAA got $2.6 billion to improve resilience in coastal communities, the Department of the Interior got $4 billion for drought mitigation.
• Reform of the National Flood Insurance Program, or NFIP : NFIP insures residential properties for up to $250,000, but the program has been widely criticized because it encourages building in high-risk areas. To correct that, the NFIP Risk Rating 2.0 reforms were implemented in 2022. The new policy  has led  to an increase in flood insurance rates for about 77% of all policyholders. Unfortunately, NFIP rate hikes are causing homeownership to grow too expensive for some, particularly those with lower income (see Tweet below). Home insurance policies rose  11.3%  in 2023, according to S&P Global, and the Insurance Information Institute says that  12% of homeowners  had no insurance in 2022, up from 5% in 2019.

There has been a steady decline in the number of active NFIP policies in recent years. Texas leads the way. Since March 2020, the active policy count has declined by 100,000. With the ongoing population boom, that means an even smaller % of homes with policies. Not good. (2/3) pic.twitter.com/9M5xfnYeFN — Steve Bowen (@SteveBowenWx) April 22, 2024

• Enforcing the NFIP 50% rule: To stay in NFIP, communities must agree that if a storm causes damage worth at least 50% of a property’s value (“substantial damage”), then it must be torn down and rebuilt to the newest building codes. This policy theoretically prevents the federal government from repeatedly paying to rebuild structures in vulnerable places. Communities that fail to enforce this rule can have their NFIP discounts for good building practices — which can be up to 25% —rescinded. In practice, this rule is regularly flouted, but this may be changing. In the wake of Hurricane Ian’s devastating $117 billion blow in 2022 on Southwest Florida, Lee County, where Ian made landfall, was supposed to send FEMA information confirming that they were following this rule. This has not happened , and FEMA is now threatening to cancel Lee County’s NFIP discount.
• New HUD rules on rebuilding after disasters: The Department of Housing and Urban Development announced in April (see PDF ) that all homes built or repaired with HUD money will be required to be elevated at least two feet above base flood elevation (the 100-year flood recurrence level). The new rule also enlarges the flood zones where the new requirement applies. According to E&E News , the new rule will increase building costs by up to $7,800 for a single-family home.
• New Community Reinvestment Act rules: In 2023, the Federal Reserve, the FDIC, and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency  released rules under  the Community Reinvestment Act that  offer banks incentives  to help low-income communities prepare for the consequences of climate change. (Relocation is included, as long as it is not forced.) Thus, banks now have increased incentive to invest in their communities’ adaptation needs.
• Rebuilding resilient structures after a disaster: In 2024, FEMA announced plans to reimburse state and local governments that rebuild damaged public buildings to be more energy-resilient. For example: installing solar panels on schools, hospitals and other public buildings that are rebuilt after disasters.

Planning for the climate of the future

The Biden White House has also called upon climate adaptation experts to develop plans for managing the looming climate extremes.

For example, Chapter 9 of the March 2023 Economic Report of the President , “Opportunities for Better Managing Weather Risk in the Changing Climate,” by climate scientist Fran Moore of the University of California, Davis, presents some excellent ambitions. For example, it advocates “long-term, forward-looking planning that anticipates coming climate change,” citing a 2021 study finding that proactive adaptation efforts could reduce the costs of climate change to the U.S. road, rail, and coastal infrastructure by a factor three to six by 2090 compared with purely reactive adaptation.

The government’s March 2023 Ocean Climate Action Plan acknowledges that for many coastal communities, the best strategy for avoiding the growing risks of more severe storms and sea level rise is to gradually relocate to higher ground. The plan sets this goal: “Develop an approach for sharing government-wide resources and information to support community-driven relocation effectively.”

And in April 2023, the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology put out a report, Extreme Weather Risk in a Changing Climate: Enhancing prediction and protecting communities , which laid out goals for improving models for quantifying future extreme weather risks, better sharing extreme weather data and models, developing a national adaptation plan, and funding adaptation-related research.

Biden’s 2021  Executive Order 14030 on Climate-Related Financial Risk  directs the government to “identify the primary sources of Federal climate-related financial risk exposure and develop methodologies to quantify climate risk within the economic assumptions and long-term projections of the President’s Budget.” A December 2023 paper by the Council of Economic Advisors, A Progress Report on Climate-Energy-Macro Modeling , outlined more specific subsequent plans. For example, it recommends “quantify extreme event risk for the next 25 years at a high spatial resolution across the country.”

Three additional proposed legislative efforts

At least three bills before Congress could help improve U.S. adaptation efforts.

1) The bipartisan National Coordination on Adaptation and Resilience for Security Act of 2023 . This bill would require the federal government to produce a national climate adaptation and resilience strategy and an implementation plan with federal, state, local, private sector, and nonprofit partners. A chief resilience officer would be appointed by the president and would work in the White House to implement the plan, which would be updated every three years.

2) The FEMA Independence Act , which would move FEMA out of the Department of Homeland Security and make it a cabinet-level organization. According to disaster scientist Samantha Montano , author of “Disasterology” (see my review here ), “There is widespread support among [emergency management] practitioners that this is needed to make emergency management more effective and efficient.” However, such a move is controversial, and FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell has not expressed support or opposition to the change.

3) The 2023 bipartisan Natural Disaster Safety Board Act , which would establish a commission to study future wildfires, hurricanes, earthquakes, and other disasters, and advocate for policy changes that would correct bad development decisions, discriminatory policies, and lack of climate change planning.

Other potential legislation

The nation’s entire disaster preparedness and response system needs a significant overhaul, as argued by Samantha Montano in “Disasterology” and in a 2023 New York Times editorial . Three potential ways to do so:

• Reform FEMA’s Stafford Act of 1988 to stop rebuilding infrastructure in high-risk places like barrier islands after a disaster. The Coastal Flood Resilience Project has a set of legislative ideas on how to accomplish this.
• Increase funding to the  Emergency Management Performance Grant , which helps prop up local and state emergency management programs.
• Increase funding for FEMA. In 2023, the  Government Accountability Office reported  that FEMA had a staffing gap in 2022 of 35%, or 6,200 people. Although the pace of U.S. billion-dollar weather disasters has increased by more than a factor of five since the 1980s, even after adjusting for inflation, funding for FEMA has not kept up.

Bob Henson contributed to this post.

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How (Not) to Pitch

A guide for freelance writers.

This Slate piece giving advice to entry-level job applicants in journalism about how to get their cover letters noticed made me think I ought to share a similar advice piece for new freelancers I put together for a women in media list-serv I'm on, inspired by the frequent and unnecessarily life-complicating errors of form I'd seen come in over the transom over the years, and some frequently asked questions about what can be an opaque process to newbies. Here are some basic rules to live by for people on the outside looking in.

1. If you are going overseas or somewhere on location, contact an editor before you go, so that you can offer to pitch stories from the scene. Don't wait until you come back with a story that may or may not be right for an editor -- and until it's too late to do any additional reporting from the scene, or to switch focus entirely -- to pitch the only piece you reported.

2. That said, unless you are going on location somewhere, do not write to ask if you can pitch things. Either write with a pitch , or ask to be put in contact with the editor who oversees the topic you want to pitch on if you know your one contact at a publication is not him. These days a lot of institutions are in flux and there's nothing easier for someone then pressing forward on a message.

3. Don't pitch topics. Pitch stories. That can take anywhere from one sentence to three or four grafs, but it's rarely longer.

4. Do not send your pitch as an attachment. It will get read faster if you put it in the body of your email, because that way the editor you're pitching can read it on her iPhone/iPad/Samsung Galaxy S4 while in line for lunch or waiting for a meeting to start, instead of having to be at her computer in her office. Take advantage of your chance to grab someone's attention during an interstitial moment by making your work easy to absorb by people with cutting-edge media consumption patterns.

5. But beware of being too cutting edge: Do not text or direct-message story pitches, unless you know an editor really, really well and have a great rapport. Respect your idea enough to send more than 140 characters explaining it.

6. Editors who work with free-lancers tend to accept pre-written stories less frequently than stories they can talk to you about before you file. It's more fun for editors to be part of the thinking and shaping part of putting the story together -- this is called "front-editing" -- than to just come in after the fact and clean up. So as between sitting down and writing something to file unsolicited and sending a query first, send the query.

7. That said, if you're going to send a complete draft unsolicited -- and plenty of these do get published -- odds of publication go up markedly if it is already clean and well-composed copy when it arrives. Don't send rough drafts unsolicited; send your best work. Spell check. Have a friend copy-edit you if you need to. You've gone through all the trouble to write something you believe in -- take that extra step to polish it.

8. The same goes for fact checking: You need to have everything locked down before you send something you've already composed. Think about it: What if the editor wants to run it right away? You don't want to have to scramble on the fly to confirm things and/or tell the editor your facts aren't actually already airtight.

9. Always include your phone number in your pitch email , in case the story idea is intriguing but not quite right for whatever reason. That will allow the editor to reach out to you to tweak the concept, instead of having to chase you down. Your goal should be to minimize the number of email volleys an editor needs to have with you to put something in play.

10. If you don't hear back about a pitch within a couple of days, depending on the news value of the pitch , it's not unheard of to send a follow-up email. Sometimes people are busy and lack of response doesn't always mean you've been rejected.

11. If your pitch is time sensitive, say so in the pitch and say you'd love a response within a set period. Also, if you're pitching about an event that's been planned for months, don't wait until the day before to send a query.

12. Never send pieces to multiple outlets at the same time without telling all the editors you've pitched that you've done this. It's better not to send pitches to multiple places at the same time at all, but sometimes it has to happen for reasons of timeliness. But you never want to be in a situation where an editor has accepted your piece, and then you have to go and yank it from her sad, disappointed hands because some other outlet that you pitched first but was reading more slowly weighed in with an answer. If you need to move on because the first outlet you pitched hasn't responded, drop that first editor a note letting him know, as a courtesy.

13. If your idea is turned down, don't take it personally. It's just an idea, it's not you. Very frequently, if your pitch is good but "not quite right for us at this time," people will reject your initial pitch but then assign you something that they want instead, especially if you stay in touch.

14. If you've never worked with an editor before, it helps to let them know a little bit about who you are and who else you've written for in your initial pitch letter, so they don't have to Google you. This can take from one sentence to one graf.

15. If you want some really, really long thing, like a book excerpt, to be considered, send it along with the initial pitch , or at the very least have it handy to send immediately if the editor expresses interest in considering it. Don't make the editor have to chase you to even get the material to review.

16. Make sure your major story source will work with you before you pitch . You don't have to have everything locked down at the pitch stage, but if it's a profile, it helps to know the person you want to profile is gettable. Your worst case scenario is having your pitch accepted and then having to tell the editor you can't deliver because you can't get the interview your entire pitch was predicated on.

17. If your story idea has been accepted, get clarity before filing on what the policy is regarding cross-posting to a personal blog. Most people don't care if you repost something to your personal blog after it has been published, but it's considered extremely uncool to file something you've already published, even if just in part, on your personal blog and just hope no one will notice. It could also potentially turn you into the journalism scandal du jour.

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The Supreme Court Walks Back Clarence Thomas’ Guns Extremism

This is part of  Opinionpalooza , Slate’s coverage of the major decisions from the Supreme Court this June. Alongside  Amicus , we kicked things off this year by explaining  How Originalism Ate the Law . The best way to support our work is by joining  Slate Plus . (If you are already a member, consider a  donation  or  merch !)

The Supreme Court upheld a federal law disarming domestic abusers on Friday, significantly narrowing a radical 2022 precedent in the process. Its 8–1 ruling in U.S. v. Rahimi is a major victory for gun safety laws, a much-needed reprieve after two years of unceasing hostility from the federal judiciary. Chief Justice John Roberts’ majority opinion walked back maximalist rhetoric—recklessly injected into the law by Justice Clarence Thomas—that had imperiled virtually every modern regulation limiting access to firearms. Thomas was the lone dissenter, signifying the rest of the court’s mad dash away from his extremist position on the Second Amendment.

Rahimi involves a violent criminal, Zackey Rahimi, who beat his girlfriend, then fired shots at either her or a witness as she fled his abuse. His girlfriend subsequently obtained a restraining order from a state court that found that he posed “a credible threat” to her “physical safety.” Rahimi, however, continued harassing her, threatened a different woman with a firearm, and was identified as the suspect in at least five additional shootings. When the police searched his apartment, they found a pistol, a rifle, ammunition, and a copy of the restraining order.

Rahimi was indicted under a federal law that bars individuals from possessing firearms while subject to a restraining order for domestic violence. He argued that this statute violated his Second Amendment rights, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5 th Circuit agreed . The court rested its analysis on New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen , the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision establishing a constitutional right to carry firearms in public. Thomas’ opinion in Bruen , though, went much further than that specific holding, declaring that all restrictions on the right to bear arms are presumptively unconstitutional unless they have a sufficient set of “historical analogues” from the distant past. (He didn’t bother to clarify the precise era, but it seemed to be sometime between 1791 and 1868.)

That approach posed two fundamental problems, which the lower courts quickly encountered when trying to apply Bruen : First, judges are not historians and cannot parse the complex, often incomplete record in this area with any consistency or reliability; and second, modern problems require modern solutions , especially when past bigotry prevented lawmakers from perceiving those problems in the first place. Rahimi is Exhibit A: Men were generally permitted to abuse their wives in the 18 th and 19 th centuries, with courts hesitant to interfere with what they deemed a private “familial affair.” Countless other examples have arisen in the lower courts since Bruen , with judges creating new rights to scratch the serial number off guns and own firearms while using illegal substances .

Roberts attempted to put a stop to this chaos on Friday. His Rahimi opinion cut back Bruen at every turn. “Some courts,” the chief justice wrote, “have misunderstood the methodology of our recent Second Amendment cases. These precedents were not meant to suggest a law trapped in amber.” Rather than hunt for perfect historical analogs, courts should ask “whether the challenged regulation is consistent with the principles that underpin our regulatory tradition.” If old laws regulated guns to “address particular problems, that will be a strong indicator that contemporary laws imposing similar restrictions for similar reasons fall within a permissible category of regulations.” Today’s regulations should generally avoid imposing restrictions “beyond what was done at the founding,” but the modern law need not “precisely match its historical precursors.” Roberts’ test significantly broadens (or perhaps loosens) the constitutional inquiry beyond what Bruen allowed. It instructs courts to look at principles , at a fairly high level of generality, rather than demanding a near-perfect match from centuries past.

The difference between Rahimi and Bruen is perfectly captured by Roberts’ majority opinion and the lone dissent written by Bruen ’s own author, Thomas. The chief justice asserted, “The government offers ample evidence that the Second Amendment permits the disarmament of individuals who pose a credible threat to the physical safety of others.” He breezily walked through a smattering of history allowing for the seizure of arms to preserve “public order.” For proof, Roberts cited surety laws, legislation that required an individual “suspected of future misbehavior” to post a bond, which he would forfeit if he engaged in misconduct. Domestic abusers could, in theory, be subject to the surety system, as could individuals who misused firearms—and that was good enough for Roberts. To him, this evidence established a historical practice of “preventing individuals who threaten physical harm to others from misusing firearms.” And disarming abusers “fits comfortably within this tradition.”

To Thomas, by contrast, surety laws “are worlds—not degrees—apart” from the law in question, because they were civil (not criminal) measures that did not actually disarm people but merely threatened them with a fine. These laws “did not alter an individual’s right to keep and bear arms,” Thomas protested, and they therefore failed to establish a relevant “history and tradition.” Indeed, “the government does not identify even a single regulation with an analogous burden and justification,” he complained in dissent. In 1791 a man like Zackey Rahimi could be disarmed only after a conviction for a violent crime. And so, Thomas wrote, that must remain the rule today.

Bruen was a 6–3 decision. Yet every justice who joined Thomas’ opinion in Bruen in 2022 signed on to Roberts’ walk back of Bruen on Friday. What happened? Aside from Justice Samuel Alito, every remaining member of the court expressed their views by writing or joining separate concurrences in Rahimi . Justice Brett Kavanaugh tried to defend his beloved “history and tradition” test, as opposed to “a balancing test that churns out the judge’s own policy beliefs,” while creating more room for “precedent” (or “the accumulated wisdom of jurists”). Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote that Bruen “demands a wider lens” than the 5 th Circuit deployed, explaining that “historical regulations reveal a principle, not a mold,” and do not forever lock us into “late-18 th -century policy choices.” Justice Neil Gorsuch tried to split the difference, marshaling a defense of Bruen while subtly reworking it to limit sweeping legal attacks on gun regulations.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justice Elena Kagan, celebrated the majority’s focus on “principles” instead of perfect analogs. “History has a role to play in Second Amendment analysis,” she wrote, “but a rigid adherence to history, (particularly history predating the inclusion of women and people of color as full members of the polity), impoverishes constitutional interpretation and hamstrings our democracy.” Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who joined the court soon after Bruen came down, warned that Rahimi will not end the “increasingly erratic and unprincipled body of law” that Bruen inspired. “The blame” for the lower courts’ struggles “may lie with us,” she noted, “not with them.” All three liberals sound ready and willing to overturn Bruen altogether if they get the chance—but will, for now, settle for Rahimi ’s compromise.

What next? The Supreme Court will have to vacate a spate of lower court decisions that used Bruen to strike down seemingly sensible gun safety laws, ordering a do-over in light of Rahimi . Some courts will gladly accept the message. Others, like the lawless 5 th Circuit , will probably interpret Thomas’ dissent on Friday as the law and refuse to change their tune. Such defiance will test the majority’s commitment to a more workable and balanced Second Amendment jurisprudence—and likely fracture the court once more. By replacing Thomas’ hard-line views with a more malleable standard, SCOTUS has ended one battle over guns. But by remaining in this area, where it has no right to be in the first place, the court has invited a thousand more.