• Europe’s Moment of Truth: A Democracy Shield for Today and Tomorrow

    Democracy in Europe is under growing pressure. Authoritarian regimes like Russia and the People’s Republic of China are conducting increasingly sophisticated foreign interference campaigns. Internally, illiberal actors – who are often the beneficiaries of this foreign interference — are eroding the rule of law and civic freedoms as democratic norms deteriorate in the EU’s immediate neighborhood. The EU’s European Democracy Shield, announced in 2024 and expected in 2025, aims to counter these threats to democracy.

  • Are We Ready for a ‘DeepSeek for Bioweapons’?

    Anthropic’s Claude 4 is a warning sign: AI that can help build bioweapons is coming, and could be widely available soon. Steven Adler writes that we need to be prepared for the consequences: “like a freely downloadable ‘DeepSeek for bioweapons,’ available across the internet, loadable to the computer of any amateur scientist who wishes to cause mass harm. With Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4 having finally triggered this level of safety risk, the clock is now ticking.”

  • How Trump’s ‘Gold Standard’ Politicizes Federal Science

    The language of Trump’s so-called “Restoring Gold Standard Science” executive order of 23 May 2025 may seem innocuous based on a casual reading, but it risks undermining unbiased science in all federal agencies, subject to political whims. A politicized process has the potential to punish federal employees and to ignore external peer reviewers who have the temerity to advance evidence-based findings contrary to White House ideology.

  • Autocrats Don’t Act Like Hitler or Stalin Anymore − Instead of Governing with Violence, They Use Manipulation

    Modern autocrats don’t always resemble their 20th-century predecessors. Instead, they project a polished image, avoid overt violence and speak the language of democracy. They wear suits, hold elections and talk about the will of the people. Rather than terrorizing citizens, many use media control and messaging to shape public opinion and promote nationalist narratives. Many gain power not through military coups but at the ballot box.

  • 50+ Venezuelans Imprisoned in El Salvador Came to U.S. Legally, Never Violated Immigration Law

    Shortly after the U.S. government illegally and unconstitutionally transported about 240 Venezuelans to be imprisoned in El Salvador’s notorious “terrorism” prison, a CBS News investigation found that 75 percent of the men had no criminal record in the United States or abroad. Less attention has been paid to the fact that dozens of these men never violated immigration laws either.

  • Texas’ Mail-in Voting Rules Pushed Voters to Cast Ballots in Person — or Not Vote at All, Study Finds

    New research from the Brennan Center for Justice suggests that 2021 ID requirements in a recent overhaul of Texas election laws could explain some of the drop in mail voting.

  • The “Invasion” Invention: The Far Right’s Long Legal Battle to Make Immigrants the Enemy

    The Trump administration is using the claim that immigrants have “invaded” the country to justify possibly suspending habeas corpus, part of the constitutional right to due process. A faction of the far right has been building this case for years.

  • 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.”

  • Regulating X Isn’t Censorship. It’s Self-Defense

    The European Union’s landmark new content law, the Digital Services Act (DSA) reflects hard-earned European wisdom. It comes from historical memory of democracies undone by propaganda, foreign interference, and the normalization of lies. Vice President J. D. Vance and X owner Elon Musk harshly criticize DSA, framing their agenda as “free speech,” but in Europe, it increasingly looks like a coordinated push to weaken democratic institutions and empower their far-right allies.

  • Supreme Court allows Trump Administration to Terminate Venezuelan's Protected Status

    The protected status was granted to roughly 600,000 Venezuelans, with one group’s status ending in April of this year and another in March of next year. The court’s decision applies to roughly 300,000 Venezuelans released into the country by the Biden administration.

  • U.S. Supreme Court Blocks Deportations Under Alien Enemies Act

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday extended a previous ruling blocking the Trump administration from deporting alleged Venezuelan gang members detained in northern Texas. The Court pointedly criticized the administration’s grudging approach to due process: “Under these circumstances, notice roughly 24 hours before removal, devoid of information about how to exercise due process rights to contest that removal, surely does not pass muster.”

  • Busting ‘Manufacturing Jobs’ Myths

    A nostalgia-soaked return to the 1950s industrial workforce is neither preferable nor possible. Promises to use blanket tariffs to reengineer an industrial workforce of our parents’ distant memories are laughably out of touch.

  • What Is Birthright Citizenship and Could the Supreme Court End It?

    The Trump administration’s efforts to nullify birthright citizenship for millions of U.S.-born children could overturn a nearly 160-year legal precedent.

  • Governments Continue Losing Efforts to Gain Backdoor Access to Secure Communications

    The spotlight on encrypted apps such as Signal is a reminder of the complex debate pitting government interests against individual liberties.

  • Five Questions: RAND’s Jim Mitre on Artificial General Intelligence and National Security

    A recent RAND paper lays out five hard national security problems that will become very real the moment an artificial general intelligence comes online. The researchers made only one prediction: If we ever get to that point, the consequences will be so profound that the U.S. government needs to take steps now to be ready for them.