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Supreme Court Ruling Threatens Gun Charges Filed in Trump’s Alleged Assassination Attempt
A Trace review of federal court cases found that several defendants have had similar charges tossed out since the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision dramatically expanded Second Amendment protections.
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New Method for Fingerprint Analysis Holds Great Promise
Overlapping and weak fingerprints pose challenges in criminal cases. A new study offers a solution and brings hope for using chemical residues in fingerprints for personal profiling.
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'Significant' Risks as Facial Recognition in Russia's Subways Goes Regional
In a move that human rights advocates warn carries potential risks for civil rights, Russia has begun expanding its facial-recognition payment system for subways to six cities outside of Moscow.
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The Second Assassination Attempt on Donald Trump in 64 Days Is a Troubling Turn of Events
In American politics, the expression “October surprise” describes “a game-changing event that can irreparably damage one candidate’s chances and boost the other’s,” upending a presidential election. It is no longer hyperbolic thinking to consider that an October surprise may involve another assassination attempt.
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Congressional Staff Learn to Fight Wildfires with Legislation
Stanford University’s Woods Institute for the Environment recently hosted a first-of-its-kind “boot camp” in which congressional staffers got a crash course from experts in climate, forestry, fire science, utilities, insurance, and other wildfire-related topics.
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Murder of Dallas Police Officer Latest in String of Violent Sovereign Citizen Encounters with Law Enforcement
The murder of a police officer in Dallas last month by a suspected adherent of the sovereign citizen movement became the latest in an alarming rise of violent incidents this year involving individuals who subscribe to the extreme right-wing, anti-government ideology and law enforcement officials.
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How to Manage Escalation with Nuclear Adversaries Like China
Chinese leaders fled Beijing in October 1969, as a nuclear attack from the Soviet Union seemed imminent. They were on the precipice of nuclear war owing to a remarkable series of missteps and miscommunications. The crisis of 1969 holds some important lessons for U.S. military planners as they think through how a future war with China could unfold. It needs a theory of victory that explains not just how it plans to win, but how it plans to win without triggering a nuclear war.
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Missile Test Helps Launch Mk21 Fuze into U.S. Nuclear Stockpile
The June test launch of a Minuteman III from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California was the last in a series of planned activities designed to demonstrate the operational effectiveness of the Mk21 Fuze, providing proof to the U.S. Air Force that it is ready to be accepted into the U.S. nuclear stockpile.
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Countering Deepfakes: We Need to Forecast AI Threats
We should consider more action to address new forms of criminality based on AI and other technology. As far as possible, we shouldn’t let these new forms surprise us. The government should organize a group of representatives from law-enforcement and national security agencies to identify potential or emerging criminal applications of new tech and begin working on responses before people are affected.
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South Korea and Nuclear Weapons
The constant threat of North Korean aggression and fears of abandonment by the United States of its security commitment to South Korea have been the primary reasons for Seoul’s nuclear ambitions. More recently, the deepening military alliance between North Korea and Russia has raised serious concerns in South Korea.
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Emergency Responders Struggle with Burnout, Budgets as Disasters Mount
Climate change has rewritten the script for disasters, leaving communities vulnerable to weather patterns that don’t abide by schedules or the rules of past behavior. As a result, hundreds of thousands of emergency responders are facing unprecedented challenges —from burnout to post-traumatic stress disorder to tighter budgets — as they battle hurricanes, windstorms, wildfires, floods and other natural disasters that are more frequent and intense than those in the past.
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Protecting Voters and Election Workers from Armed Intimidation
Although the United States is no stranger to political violence, our elections in the 21st century have been safe and secure. Rare events of violence closely covered by the media, but in reality, voter suppression by intimidation is much more likely to occur. While guns have rarely been used in elections to commit violent acts, they are increasingly being wielded as tools of intimidation.
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The Accelerationists’ App: How Telegram Became the “Center of Gravity” for a New Breed of Domestic Terrorists
From attempting to incite racially motivated violence to encouraging attacks on critical infrastructure, the alleged crimes planned and advertised by extremists on Telegram go far beyond the charges facing CEO Pavel Durov.
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The Country’s Biggest Ghost Gun Manufacturer Has Shuttered
As its products increasingly turned up at crime scenes, Polymer80 drew scrutiny from law enforcement and policymakers.
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Defense Department Should Secure Access to Advanced Semiconductor Technologies
A new, multipronged strategy is needed for the U.S. Department of Defense to secure access to advanced semiconductor technologies, one of the agency’s defining challenges, says a new report. DOD should invest in leap-ahead semiconductor technologies, work to reshore production capabilities, and strengthen industry and interagency engagement, says a new report.
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The long view
AI-Controlled Fighter Jets May Be Closer Than We Think — and Would Change the Face of Warfare
Could we be on the verge of an era where fighter jets take flight without pilots – and are controlled by artificial intelligence (AI)? US R Adm Michael Donnelly recently said that an upcoming combat jet could be the navy’s last one with a pilot in the cockpit.
What We’ve Learned from Survivors of the Atomic Bombs
Q&A with Dr. Preetha Rajaraman, New Vice Chair for the Radiation Effects Research Foundation in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan.
Need for National Information Clearinghouse for Cybercrime Data, Categorization of Cybercrimes: Report
There is an acute need for the U.S. to address its lack of overall governance and coordination of cybercrime statistics. A new report recommends that relevant federal agencies create or designate a national information clearinghouse to draw information from multiple sources of cybercrime data and establish connections to assist in criminal investigations.
Autonomous Weapon Systems: No Human-in-the-Loop Required, and Other Myths Dispelled
“The United States has a strong policy on autonomy in weapon systems that simultaneously enables their development and deployment and ensures they could be used in an effective manner, meaning the systems work as intended, with the same minimal risk of accidents or errors that all weapon systems have,” Michael Horowitz writes.
Twenty-One Things That Are True in Los Angeles
To understand the dangers inherent in deploying the California National Guard – over the strenuous objections of the California governor – and active-duty Marines to deal with anti-ICE protesters, we should remind ourselves of a few elementary truths, writes Benjamin Wittes. Among these truths: “Not all lawful exercises of authority are wise, prudent, or smart”; “Not all crimes require a federal response”; “Avoiding tragic and unnecessary confrontations is generally desirable”; and “It is thus unwise, imprudent, and stupid to take actions for performative reasons that one might reasonably anticipate would increase the risks of such confrontations.”
Luigi Mangione and the Making of a ‘Terrorist’
Discretion is crucial to the American tradition of criminal law, Jacob Ware and Ania Zolyniak write, noting that “lawmakers enact broader statutes to empower prosecutors to pursue justice while entrusting that they will stay within the confines of their authority and screen out the inevitable “absurd” cases that may arise.” Discretion is also vital to maintaining the legitimacy of the legal system. In the prosecution’s case against Luigi Mangione, they charge, “That discretion was abused.”