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Trump’s Second Assassination Attempt Is Shocking, but Attempts on Presidents’ Lives Are Not Rare in U.S. History
There have been 45 men elected president since the country’s founding. And 40% of them have experienced known attempts on their lives. Four presidents – Abraham Lincoln, James A. Garfield, William McKinley and John F. Kennedy – have been assassinated.
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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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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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Blocking the Nippon Steel Acquisition: Politics Versus Policy
A decision by President Biden to block Nippon Steel’s purchase of U.S. Steel would not be good policy or good politics.
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ICE Incapable of Monitoring Unaccompanied Minors Released into U.S.: IG
The Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued a management alert to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to make it aware of an urgent issue: ICE is incapable of monitoring hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied children (UACs) released into the country.
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U.S. Adversaries Step Up Efforts to Influence Results of Next Election
Russia, Iran and China are ramping up efforts to impact the outcome of the U.S. presidential election and down-ballot races, targeting American voters with an expanding array of sophisticated influence operations.
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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 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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No, Local Election Officials Can’t Block Certification of Results – There Are Plenty of Legal Safeguards
Some local election officials have refused to certify election results in the past few years, and worries abound that election officials might subvert the results of the 2024 presidential election by refusing to certify the results. But there isn’t one weird trick to steal a presidential election. And there are ample safeguards to ensure ballots are tabulated accurately and election results are certified in a timely manner.
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Free Legal Helpline Has Gained Pro Bono Support from 40+ Law Firms, 250+ Individual Practitioners Since Launching in November 2023
The Campus Antisemitism Legal Line (CALL) has received more than 650 requests for assistance from university students across the country who experienced antisemitic harassment, violence or discrimination in the first nine months of the program.
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Swing States Prepare for a Showdown Over Certifying Votes in November
There is widespread concern in Michigan and Wisconsin over interference in finalizing election results. Despite the checks and balances built into the voting system, members of state and county boards tasked with certifying elections will be driven by conspiracy theories and refuse to fulfill their roles if former President Donald Trump loses again.
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How the 14th Amendment Prevents State Legislatures from Subverting Popular Presidential Elections
In November 2020, as it became clear that Trump had lost the popular vote and would lose the Electoral College, Trump and his supporters mounted a pressure campaign to convince legislatures in several states whose citizens voted for Joe Biden to appoint electors who would support Trump’s reelection in the Electoral College votes. Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election not only failed, but some of them also rested on a misreading of the U.S. Constitution. There was a safeguard already in place – and it remains today, defending against this approach being used to subvert the 2024 presidential election.
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Officials Voted Down a Controversial Georgia Election Rule, Saying It Violated the Law. Then a Similar Version Passed.
The rule, which was pushed by nationally prominent election deniers, only changed in minor ways between being voted down in May and approved in August. Those adjustments made it even less compliant with existing law, experts say.
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Election Experts Cautious as Abbott Touts Voter Roll Purge
Federal and state law already required voter roll maintenance. Experts warn the governor’s framing of this routine process could be used to undermine trust in elections.
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The Hacking of the Trump Campaign Is 2016 All Over Again
Hackers affiliated with the intelligence service of a foreign county hack the campaign of a candidate for the U.S. presidency, scoop damaging material, and disseminate it to reporters. This describes both the 2016 hacking of the Clinton campaign by Russian hackers, and the 2024 hacking of the Trump campaign by Iranian hackers. But there are differences: In 2016, “The press seized on the hacked emails,” Quinta Jurecic writes, “and the Trump campaign capitalized exuberantly on Russia’s involvement in the election.” Trump called on Russia to do even more. Now, the press has behaved more responsibly, and “Kamala Harris has not yet weighed in on the campaign trail with any winking suggestions that Iran might want to continue rummaging around in the Trump campaign’s systems.”
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The long view
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.”
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.”