• On Nonexistent Crime “Emergencies”: Trump’s Politicization of the National Guard

    What Trump is doing now has nothing to do with “crime control” because the DC murder and crime rate is the lowest it’s been in literally decades. These out-of-state National Guard call-ups from Red states are designed to intimidate elected Democrats in major metropolitan areas under the guise of “fighting crime” and alleged immigration enforcement. Trump’s use of Title 32 authority to do this is a misuse of the statute, designed to get around the Posse Comitatus Act so he can use military personnel under the control of Trump loyalist governors for what can only be truthfully characterized as de facto political repression ops. 

  • What Would a More Effective Policing Strategy Look Like in D.C.?

    We spoke with crime prevention expert David Kennedy about the Trump administration’s takeover of law enforcement in the nation’s capital, and the tactics that might prove more effective.

  • The Data Doesn’t Support Trump’s Justification for Deploying the National Guard

    The president has taken over policing in Washington, D.C., and threatened to do the same in other Democratic-led cities. An analysis by The Trace shows that his claims of runaway violence are false.

  • Venezuela’s Attempts to Interfere in the September Guyana Election

    Venezuela has long disputed Guyana’s claim to the sparsely populated Essequibo region, recognized by the international community as being part of Guinea. Venezuela has now extended its interference in Guyanese domestic affairs by seemingly supporting the candidacy of the colorful, and controversial, candidate Azruddin Mohamed, who is under U.S. sanctions for gold smuggling and corruption.

  • Backgrounder: Guyana’s Forthcoming Election

    Guyana is a small country –population of only 831,000 –but rich in recently discovered oil reserves, reserves estimated to hold the equivalent of 11 billion barrels. On 1 September the country will hold a national and regional election.

  • Turnover Among Election Officials Reaches New High: Report

    Election officials turned over at the highest rate in at least a quarter century during the last presidential election. Nearly 40 percent of election officials administering the 2024 election weren’t around in 2020.

  • President Trump’s War on “Woke AI” Is a Civil Liberties Nightmare

    The White House’s recently-unveiled “AI Action Plan” wages war on so-called “woke AI”—including large language models (LLMs) that provide information inconsistent with the administration’s views on climate change, gender, and other issues. The plan would force developers to roll back efforts to reduce biases—making the models much less accurate, and far more likely to cause harm, especially in the hands of the government.

  • Dems Oppose Trump's Bid to End Mail-in Ballots, Voting Machines

    More than 99 million Americans voted by mail in the 2024 General Election, according to the United States Postal Service. There is no evidence that either mail-in ballots or direct-recording electronic (DRE) machines –where voters cast ballots completely electronically –have enabled widespread voter fraud.

  • Trump Wants States to Feed Voter Info into Powerful Citizenship Data ProgramElection

    Republicans are laser-focused on purging noncitizens from voter rolls. Critics of the effort fear President Donald Trump wants to build a federal database of voters to target political opponents or cherry-pick the vanishingly rare examples of noncitizen voters to fuel a sense of crisis.

  • The CDC Shooting Was a Matter of Time, Health Experts Say

    “A lot of the current political rhetoric is not a good-faith discussion or debate, but outright labeling of other humans as somehow evil and not worthy of walking the earth,” says Dr. Megan Ranney, dean of the Yale School of Public Health. In a conversation with The Trace, she notes that “It is almost inevitable that when you combine evil rhetoric with isolation, lack of support for physical and mental health, and lack of ability to temporarily remove a firearm from someone who has the intent to kill, that we’re gonna end up with tragedies.”

  • One in Five ICE Arrests Are Latinos on the Streets with No Criminal Past or Removal Order

    Illegal profiling accounts for a substantial portion of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrests in 2025. Mass deportation is a socially and economically damaging goal regardless, but it’s certainly not a goal for which we should sacrifice a sliver of our liberty or the Constitution. Only time will tell whether ICE and Border Patrol can continue to get away with these tactics.

  • Justice Department Demand for State Voter Lists Underscores Their Importance

    DOJ is demanding that states turn over their voter registration lists and other election information, citing unspecified concerns with voter list maintenance. Power over voter registration lists is the power to shape the electorate.

  • Denying Quorum Has Been a Texas Political Strategy Since 1870

    While the Democrats could technically derail the GOP’s redistricting map, such efforts have been largely symbolic and had limited success blocking past legislation, experts say.

  • How Special Interests Keep Bad Laws on the Books: The Case of the Jones Act

    The 1920 Jones Act restricts intra-U.S. water transport to vessels that are U.S.-flagged, U.S.-owned, and built in U.S. shipyards The law serves as a tribute to how entrenched interests can hijack public policy and make the repeal of failed, costly laws among the heaviest of political lifts.

  • Partisan Hostility, Not Just Policy, Drives U.S. Protests

    Partisan animosity is a powerful driver of protest participation—sometimes nearly matching or even exceeding concern about the actual issues.