OUR PICKSBeyond the Big Cities, ICE Is Rattling Small-Town and Exurban America | Swarms of AI Bots Can Sway People’s Beliefs – Threatening Democracy | Why Pete Hegseth’s Anti-Harvard Crusade Doesn’t Make Sense, and more

How Democrats Aim to Curb ICE without Losing Votes  (Economist)
Its brutal tactics are unpopular with Americans. But so is border insecurity.

Beyond the Big Cities, ICE Is Rattling Small-Town and Exurban America  (Anna Griffin and Chelsia Rose Marcius, New York Times)
Far from the national spotlight, towns like Cornelius, Ore., and Coon Rapids, Minn., are dealing with President Trump’s expanding mass deportation effort, and the effects can be acute.

Four Governance Approaches to Securing Advanced AI  (Ian Mitch et al., RAND)
Growing concerns about the societal risks posed by advanced artificial intelligence (AI) systems have prompted debate over whether and how the U.S. government should promote stronger security practices among private-sector developers. Although some companies have made voluntary commitments to protect their systems, competitive pressures and inconsistent approaches raise questions about the adequacy of self-regulation. At the same time, government intervention carries risks: Overly stringent security requirements could limit innovation, create barriers for small firms, and harm U.S. competitiveness.

Swarms of AI Bots Can Sway People’s Beliefs – Threatening Democracy  (Filippo Menczer, The Conversation)
In mid-2023, around the time Elon Musk rebranded Twitter as X but before he discontinued free academic access to the platform’s data, my colleagues and I looked for signs of social bot accounts posting content generated by artificial intelligence. Social bots are AI software that produce content and interact with people on social media. We uncovered a network of over a thousand bots involved in crypto scams. We dubbed this the “fox8” botnet after one of the fake news websites it was designed to amplify.
Such a level of coordination among inauthentic online agents was unprecedented – AI models had been weaponized to give rise to a new generation of social agents, much more sophisticated than earlier social bots. Machine-learning tools to detect social bots, like our own Botometer, were unable to discriminate between these AI agents and human accounts in the wild. Even AI models trained to detect AI-generated content failed.
There are measures which might mitigate the systemic risks of malicious AI swarms before they become entrenched in political and social systems worldwide, the current political landscape in the U.S. seems to be moving in the opposite direction. The Trump administration has aimed to reduce AI and social media regulation and is instead favoring rapid deployment of AI models over safety.
The threat of malicious AI swarms is no longer theoretical: Our evidence suggests these tactics are already being deployed. I believe that policymakers and technologists should increase the cost, risk and visibility of such manipulation.

Kennedy Allies Target States to Overturn Vaccine Mandates for Schoolchildren  (Christina Jewett, New York Times)
Proponents of vaccines warn that the efforts will further dismantle the immunization infrastructure and lead to more outbreaks of disease.

Conspiracy Theories Only Flourish with More Epstein Evidence  (Tiffany Hsu and Steven Lee Myers, New York Times)
The dump of millions of documents has fueled a new wave of speculation, A.I.-generated hoaxes and foreign disinformation.

Who Is Joining ICE? The Breakneck Operation to Recruit U.S. Agents  (Danny Fortson, The Times)
Trump’s immigration enforcers and border patrol are recruiting in conservative America with promises of $50,000 bonuses. I saw it in action at the bull ring.

Kristi Noem’s Audience of One  (Nick Miroff, Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, and Michael Scherer, The Atlantic)
The DHS secretary is suddenly talking about more than just mass deportations.

Social Security Workers Are Being Told to Hand Over Appointment Details to ICE  (Zoë Schiffer, Vittoria Elliott, and Leah Feiger, Wired)
The recent request goes against decades of precedent and puts noncitizens at further risk of immigration enforcement actions.

Why Pete Hegseth’s Anti-Harvard Crusade Doesn’t Make Sense  (Lawrence J. Korb and Stephen Cimbala, National Interest)
Harvard University’s graduate programs prepare rising leaders in the Department of Defense for policymaking and implementation.