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Podcast: America's foreign policy challenges are evolving rapidly

Podcast: America's foreign policy challenges are evolving rapidly

The takeover of the Taliban in Afghanistan; a more aggressive China and Russia; and a newly-elected hardline president in Iran are all major challenges facing President Joe Biden and his administration. On this episode of Let's Find Common Ground, Ned Temko, who writes the weekly international affairs column "Patterns"for The Christian Science Monitor, and Scott Peterson, the Monitor's Middle East bureau chief, discuss the challenges and implications of America's foreign policy.

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From Colombia to Connecticut: The urgent need to end FGM in the Americas

Journalists gather in front of the Connecticut State Capitol Building during a press conference on SB259 and an anti-FGM art installation

Bryna Subherwal, Equality Now

From Colombia to Connecticut: The urgent need to end FGM in the Americas

Across the Americas, hundreds of thousands of women and girls are living with or have undergone female genital mutilation (FGM). These affected populations are citizens and residents of countries where protections are incomplete, entirely focused on criminalisation, inconsistently enforced, or entirely absent.

FGM is not a “foreign” issue. It is a human rights violation unfolding within national borders, one that all governments in the Americas have the legal and moral responsibility to address.

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Senate Committee advances bill banning AI companions for children

Sen. Josh Hawley addresses the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary during a debate over the AI chatbot regulation bill he introduced in October, known as the GUARD Act. April 30, 2026.

Wisdom Howell // Medill News Service.

Senate Committee advances bill banning AI companions for children

WASHINGTON—A bipartisan bill that would ban minors from using AI companions, require all chatbots to verify a user’s age, and allow AI companies to be prosecuted for harming children was unanimously advanced to the Senate floor Wednesday by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo. introduced “the Guidelines for User Age-verification and Responsible Dialogue Act,” (GUARD Act) in October as the Senate’s response to the rise in cases of children being groomed and driven to commit suicide by chatbots designed to replicate human interactions known as AI companions.

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House Democrats and Republicans Clash over Free Speech in Higher Education

Rep. Burgess Owens, R-Utah, addresses the chamber in front of a portrait of George Miller.

(Matthew Junkroski / MEDILL)

House Democrats and Republicans Clash over Free Speech in Higher Education

WASHINGTON — Witnesses and representatives sat in silence as Rep. Burgess Owens, R-Utah, spoke about how universities should strive for intellectual diversity and introduce controversial ideas. Rep. Alma S. Adams, D-N.C., agreed with his rhetoric, but went on to criticize her Republican colleagues for standing in the way of free expression.

“Unfortunately, what we often see, especially in hearings like this, is not a good faith effort to strike that balance, but a selective narrative,” Adams said. “My colleagues on the other side of the aisle frequently claim that there’s a free speech crisis on college campuses, arguing that universities lack viewpoint diversity and silence certain perspectives.”

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Republican Attacks on Citizen Ballot Measures Undermine Democracy

Election workers process ballots at the Orange County Registrar of Voters one week after Election Day on November 12, 2024 in Santa Ana, California.

Getty Images, Mario Tama

Republican Attacks on Citizen Ballot Measures Undermine Democracy

In October 2020, Utah’s Republican Senator Mike Lee delivered a startling but revealing civics lesson in the aftermath of that year’s vice-presidential debate between Kamala Harris and Mike Pence. He tweeted, The United States is “not a democracy.”

“The word ‘democracy,’’’ Lee wrote, “appears nowhere in the Constitution, perhaps because our form of government is not a democracy. It’s a constitutional republic….Democracy isn’t the objective….” The senator said that the object of the Constitution was to promote “liberty, peace, and prospefity (sic).”

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