The case creating the 1976 Supreme Court decision declaring that spending limits, imposed on candidates and outside groups five years before, were unconstitutional limits on free speech.
Read more about Buckley v. Valeo.
David Meyers is the Executive Editor of The Fulcrum. Before launching The Fulcrum, David spent more than two decades at CQ Roll Call, a leading publisher of political news and information. During his time there, David served as managing editor of Roll Call (“the newspaper of Capitol Hill”) and as managing editor of member information and research, which included co-editing the definitive biographical directory of Congress, “Politics in America.” David went on to lead all of CQ Roll Call’s congressional research teams as vice president of research and content development before shifting to a revenue and strategy role as vice president of business operations for Roll Call, working with the advertising and editorial teams to develop new revenue models and expand the company’s events business. David lives in Fairfax, Va., with his wife, two daughters and rottweiler. A graduate of Tufts University, David is a past president of the Tufts University Alumni Association. He is also a past president of the Washington Press Club Foundation, which works to celebrate and advance the role of women and minorities in the media. David currently serves on the board of directors for Temple B’nai Shalom in Fairfax Station.
The case creating the 1976 Supreme Court decision declaring that spending limits, imposed on candidates and outside groups five years before, were unconstitutional limits on free speech.
Read more about Buckley v. Valeo.

Martha Molina has worked at the Flowing Wells Family Resource Center for 27 years. As its coordinator, she says the center serves about 50 families a month and gives our 160 food boxes. The center is open 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday - Friday. / Martha Molina ha trabajado en el Centro de Recursos Familiares de Flowing Wells durante 27 años. Como coordinadora, dice que el centro atiende a unas 50 familias al mes y entrega 160 cajas de alimentos. El centro está abierto de lunes a viernes, de 8 a.m. a 3 p.m.
More than 400,000 Arizonans have lost their SNAP benefits since July — the largest decline in the nation by a wide margin — as an underfunded state agency administered changes called for in President Donald Trump’s so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
The drop represents nearly 47% of the state’s participants in the program better known as food stamps and includes about 180,000 children, according to the Arizona Department of Economic Security, which administers the program.
On Wednesday, the nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities released data through February showing that the reduction in Arizona has far outstripped other states. After Arizona, the largest loss of participants was in Florida, where less than 16% of recipients lost benefits since July, according to the center’s analysis.
Arizona officials attribute the plunging caseload to swift implementation of policy changes forced by the bill, including new work requirements.
But interviews suggest that Arizona’s efforts to comply, combined with cuts to the agency that runs the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, have contributed to the decline — making it more difficult to apply and causing people who are eligible to be denied. The state’s drop has exceeded previous projections.
“Arizona is just the alarm bell,” said Joseph Palomino, executive director of the Arizona Center for Economic Progress, a nonpartisan advocacy organization. “This is likely going to happen in every state.”
The bill, which places a larger share of the program’s costs onto states, expanded work requirements for some recipients and eliminated work exemptions for others, such as people who are homeless or aging out of foster care.
In addition, the bill mandates that states reduce their payment error rates — which measure the accuracy of eligibility and payment determinations — or face millions in penalties. Although some changes don’t fully take effect until the fall, experts say Arizona’s experience suggests people are already going hungry as a result of the legislation’s changes.
Charisma Garcia, a 25-year-old mother of two, has tried for months to obtain an interview to complete a SNAP application. After weeks calling the agency only to get a recorded message, she woke before sunrise recently to wait in line at an Arizona Department of Economic Security office in south Phoenix.
A security guard told her the agency wasn’t doing in-person interviews, so she headed to a food bank instead. She needed to feed her children, ages 3 and 6.
“I need to do the thing that gets me the food,” she said.
Brett Bezio, a spokesperson for DES, said the agency is focusing on reducing the state’s error rate to ensure “the program remains a stable resource for vulnerable Arizonans.” Although Arizona’s rate of 8.8% is below the national average, the new federal regulations require that it be brought down to 6%. If officials don’t reduce the rate, Arizona could face penalties of $195.4 million in two years, which is more than double the amount it pays to operate the program. The department said it expects participation to stabilize in the months ahead.
The choices Arizona is making are “a reality that every state is facing,” said Katie Bergh, a senior policy analyst with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Congress created a “terrible incentive” by requiring states to reduce their error rate and shoulder more of the program’s costs, she said.
Nationwide, SNAP enrollment plummeted 8% from December 2024 to December 2025, according to estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which runs SNAP. Trump has touted it as a success.
“We lifted 3.3 million Americans off of food stamps,” he said, referencing figures since he took office. “That’s a record.”
Asked about the sharp decline in SNAP participants, Gov. Katie Hobbs’ press secretary, Liliana Soto, blamed Trump administration policies, which have “increased bureaucracy and red tape on states across the country, and forced DES to take difficult but necessary steps to reduce the state’s payment error rate.” Hobbs’ administration is taking these steps “to avoid staggering fines of hundreds of millions of dollars that would further endanger food assistance for vulnerable Arizonans,” Soto said in a statement.
But other factors have aggravated Arizona’s situation. In 2021, the state Legislature and then-Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican, passed a flat 2.5% income tax largely benefiting the wealthy, which has forced more than $1 billion in spending cuts and fund swaps to balance the state budget in subsequent years. (Ducey has defended the flat tax as necessary to ensure the state continues to be competitive and “a jobs magnet and generator of opportunity.”)
Last summer, DES also laid off about 500 employees in response to the elimination of federal grants and in anticipation of additional federal cuts. Officials said that about 160 eligibility specialists lost their jobs, a 40% decline since July 2024.
In December, Hobbs, a Democrat, allocated $7.5 million to DES, most of which was used to hire more than 100 workers and increase overtime to handle SNAP cases. A spokesperson said applications are also slowed by “1980s technology” it uses to administer benefits.
Hobbs asked for an additional $48.4 million in her 2027 budget proposal to help the department administer SNAP. The most recent federal data, from 2023, shows that the state spends $70 million to operate the $2 billion program.
Meanwhile, some seeking SNAP assistance told ProPublica that their applications remain in limbo, sometimes for months.
Garcia, the mother of two, said she will keep trying to obtain the benefits. She’s looking for work as a cook after being laid off from a car wash in January. Her family is living with her grandparents, where groceries are shared among six people.
Sometimes, her 3-year-old pats his belly when he’s hungry for his favorite fruits like strawberries. At times, she hasn’t received fruit in the boxes she receives from the food bank.
“I’m in a pinch,” she said. “I’m struggling.
“The Alarm Bell”: Arizona’s Drop in SNAP Participation Signals Potential Nationwide Impact of Trump Legislation was originally published by ProPublica, shared by Arizona Luminaria, and is republished with permission.

“Hello, I would like to talk with someone at your company about the large increase in my electric bill.”
So started my surreal conversation with a Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) representative. I had noticed that the amount I was paying monthly for electricity had suddenly jumped up, once again, after PG&E launched a new method of “billing.”
I’ve gotten grimly used to prices rising like a slow helium balloon, whether at the gas pump, grocery stores, or restaurants. The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ latest report says annualized inflation had climbed to 3.8% in April, the highest since May 2023, even as President Donald Trump recently said: “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation…not even a little bit.”
Since I can’t call President Trump or any other elected official, I believe it is responsible for inflation, I settled on my local utility company.
“Hello, I noticed my electric bill has gone up yet again, the third time in a year. It looks like now you are charging a new service fee of $24 per month? Can I please speak to someone who can explain to me your new billing?”
PG&E provides natural gas and electricity to 16 million people in northern and central California, from Bakersfield in the south to the Oregon and Nevada state lines. I’m sure it’s a tough job; that’s a lot of people over a giant service area that needs energy for their homes and businesses.
And unfortunately, if I don’t like PG&E’s prices or service, I can’t shop for another company. PG&E, a privately-owned utility, has been granted a monopoly over our 70,000 square mile area by the government. In return, the company is required to ask the California Public Utilities Commission if it can increase its rates. Even before Trump’s ill-advised war in Iran and its impact on oil prices, PG&E’s rates were up 41% over the past three years and 101% over the last decade, many times higher than the rate of inflation.
But apparently that wasn’t enough for PG&E. So their lobbyists went to California Governor Gavin Newsom and asked if it could implement a “new billing structure.”
Shifting the blame
Previously, all billing was based strictly on usage – the number of kilowatt-hours used multiplied by the rate per kilowatt-hour, which in California has been around 38 to 40 cents per kilowatt hour -- the second highest rate in the country, after Hawaii. For the new billing format, PG&E instead asked that all customers pay a mandatory Basic Services Charge of about $24 per month, regardless of how many kilowatt hours used, which – I was told – is “designed to cover infrastructure costs.”
And in return, PG&E would lower the price per kilowatt-hour to about 32.6 cents. PG&E swore that this would mean customers would either pay the same on their monthly bill or pay a little bit less.
But that’s not how it worked out. My wife and I have had two monthly bills now with the new billing method. In the first month, we paid 43% more for electricity than we would have under the old billing system. In the second month, we paid about 16% higher with the new billing system. WTH!
When PG&E and other utilities proposed this, utility watchdog groups were skeptical, saying it would turn into a “back door” rate increase. Nevertheless, Governor Gavin Newsom and legislative leaders sneakily pushed through the authorizing legislation for this billing change using a legislative trick -- they attached the bill as a “trailer” to an existing bill, which is usually reserved for inconsequential additions. So there were no committee hearings, no debates or no standalone floor votes in the Assembly or Senate. Even many of the legislators later complained that they didn’t know or read the bill.
Many people are now fuming. So I called PG&E to hear its explanation. Who knows, maybe there’s something that I don’t understand?
Blame game
The PG&E rep on the phone at first sounded syrupy and nice in that scripted "customer service voice." He claimed the state of California was “requiring” the company to shift its billing procedure. But I politely pointed out that there had been news articles reporting that this was the brainchild of the utility companies. So then he shifted to saying company costs have increased dramatically, just like everyone else’s costs, and the company needs more money to invest in renewable energy production and to build out the power grid for electric cars.
OK, fair enough. But I pointed out that PG&E had enjoyed record profits in 2024, and profits rose in 2025 by $118 million to $2.59 billion, with its CEO receiving $19.8 million in compensation, a 25% increase. The CPUC granted it six rate increases in 2024 and two more in 2025. “You’re ranked 175th on the Fortune 500 list, for heaven’s sake,” I said. “You’re not exactly hurting for cash.”
The PG&E rep now grew a bit huffy and tried a new tack -- talking down to me, shifting from his syrupy voice to sarcasm.
“Well you know, this really wasn’t a change,” he said. “The monthly service charge is not really a new fee, it’s just a reallocation of how we display our infrastructure and service costs that were previously embedded within the per kilowatt-hour rate. Now we show them separately on your bill, that’s all."
What a non-answer. Who cares about that? All people are concerned about is how much they pay. And I am now being charged on average 30 percent more for my electricity usage than with the old billing method.
We went round and round. Company PR flacks are steeped in their own reality distortion field. But here’s what he finally admitted, which is bizarre.
Those households that use less electricity and power are the ones that are seeing their monthly bills increase. While energy hog households that use greater amounts of electricity and power are seeing their monthly bills decrease. So, if you bought energy efficient appliances, invested in solar panels, avoid using the dishwasher during peak hours, and turn off lights to keep your usage low, your PG&E bill has gone up. Yet energy vampires who live in McMansions and use lots of power are seeing their bills decrease.
How wacky is that? The Utility Tax (as some are calling the monthly fee) is increasing electricity bills on four million households that use less energy. The average household will see a bump in what they pay annually of roughly $400. This goes against all previous conservation efforts which tried to incentivize reducing use of electricity and heat.
The disaster-prone company
The high prices and soaring profits might be acceptable if PG&E provided good service. But the company has long had a troubling safety record. Its service has resulted in a number of deadly disasters in recent years. In 2019, it was forced to declare bankruptcy to shelter the company against over $30 billion in liability lawsuits – nearly six times its market capitalization -- from catastrophic California wildfires caused by its negligence and equipment failures. That includes the 2018 Camp Fire, which killed 87 people and wiped off the map the town of – ready for this – Paradise, which was reduced to black burned rubble and standalone chimneys. More like Paradise Lost.
I still remember the deadly pipeline explosion in the Crestmoor neighborhood of San Bruno, just south of where I lived in San Francisco. Eight people were killed and their homes blown up due to PG&E’s failure to inspect gas lines. The initial blast shot a fireball more than 1,000 feet in the air. In 2023, a smaller version happened in nearby Daly City.
Just last year, multiple blackouts before Christmas and New Year’s Day left tens of thousands of San Francisco residents without electricity for several days. PG&E has pled guilty to numerous felonies related to safety violations, manslaughter and injuries to firefighters stemming from numerous California wildfires. In 2022, PG&E ended five years of federal probation after being convicted in the San Bruno explosions, with the judge noting that, even during its probation, the PG&E equipment sparked 31 wildfires which the judge referred to as a "crime spree" as he called the company a “continuing menace.”
How many companies tied to fatal disasters can still secure rate hikes from government regulators? The utility’s reputation is about as popular as a wildfire. And yet Governor Newsom and his CPUC keep approving one rate increase after another, as well as ballooning salaries for their executives, for a utility repeatedly found guilty by judges in some of the state’s deadliest disasters.
The anger and frustration of Californians toward PG&E is matched only by a rising sense that their political leaders have become nonresponsive and incapable of reining in such flagrantly egregious corporate behavior.
Steven Hill was policy director for the Center for Humane Technology, co-founder of FairVote, and political reform director at New America. See more of his writing at his Substack newsletter DemocracySOS.
The Unity Forum, a cross-partisan webinar and podcast series presented in partnership with the Bridge Alliance and produced by Alumni for Freedom and Democracy, is dedicated to fostering reasoned discourse and strengthening the foundations of an open society. Each program brings forward respected experts who challenge assumptions about current events, elevate civil dialogue, and deepen public understanding of today’s most pressing social, economic, and legal issues. In addition to attending Unity Forum events, readers are invited to join post-event discussions, volunteer as community dialogue facilitators, or help promote open society initiatives within their networks. Opportunities to stay engaged and make a difference are available for anyone who wants to support the mission of meaningful civil engagement.
On May 27, the Unity Forum welcomes former U.S. Representative Carlos Curbelo, who represented Florida’s 26th Congressional District from 2015 to 2019. During his time in Congress, Curbelo earned a national reputation as a principled, bipartisan voice, particularly on climate and energy policy, immigration reform, and efforts to restore constructive, bipartisan governance. His co‑founding of the House Climate Solutions Caucus remains a defining example of coalition‑building on one of the nation’s most polarized issues.
Congressman Curbelo is especially well-suited to lead a nonpartisan discussion on today’s most divisive topics.
In the next Unity Forum webinar, Curbelo will share his perspective on the ongoing redistricting debates happening across the country. He will talk about how changing district lines are affecting political incentives, especially in Florida, and what these changes mean for democracy and voter trust. He will also discuss the role of state courts and constitutions in ensuring fair maps, using examples from Florida’s legal and political experience.
Immigration is still one of America’s most complicated and misunderstood topics. As the son of Cuban immigrants, Curbelo offers both personal experience and policy knowledge. He will explain what a practical, bipartisan immigration plan could include, such as border security, asylum processing, legal immigration options, work permits, protections for Dreamers, E-Verify, and more. With so many misunderstandings about asylum rights right now, his views on bringing order and fairness are especially important.
Even though climate change may not be a major topic in national politics, it remains a major concern for young Americans. Recent data shows a big generational change: a 2025 AP–NORC/EPIC poll found that 42% of Republicans under 45 now think climate change is mostly or entirely caused by humans, up from 26% in 2017. Almost 9 out of 10 young people who have faced severe weather believe climate change played a part, and about half say it was a major reason.
For young people, climate change is not just a future problem. It is something they experience now, and it shapes how they see the world.
Curbelo will talk about how state leaders can turn climate risks into practical, bipartisan policies. This is especially important in Florida, where rising sea levels, stronger storms, and higher insurance costs make the issue urgent.
To find out more, sign up for the free Unity Forum live webinar on Wednesday, May 27, 2026, at 1:00 PM ET. The session will be interactive, with a live Q&A, so you can ask questions directly to Congressman Curbelo and the moderator.
The event will cover redistricting, immigration, and climate risk, with Congressman Carlos Curbelo talking to Chris Malone, host of The Unity Forum and co-founder of Alumni for Freedom & Democracy.
Register to attend or to get a link to the recording.
The Unity Forum Discussion w/ Carlos Curbelo. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar.us06web.zoom.us
Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: The Unity Forum Discussion w/ Carlos Curbelo. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar.
David Nevins is the publisher of The Fulcrum and co-founder and board chairman of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund.

Stephen Colbert attends the 51st Chaplin Award Gala honoring George Clooney at Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center on April 27, 2026 in New York City.
Stephen Colbert hosted The Late Show for the last time last week.
Tributes have been pouring in for Colbert’s nightly monologue and comedic genius. And rightly so. He has a unique and deeply humane way of making the unbearable bearable, giving us a little light and lift on our darkest days.
There’s even an unfolding argument that The Late Show’s premature cancellation signifies the end of late-night shows more broadly. David Letterman captured the sentiment brilliantly last week, “What will become of the Jimmys? Are they going to be all right?”
To most, Stephen Colbert offered nightly entertainment and commentary.
To me, he was my north star for having meaningful conversations that help everyone feel more human.
I’ve spent 25 years designing and facilitating conversations professionally — in boardrooms, in crises, in strategy sessions where the ability to hear each other was the whole point. I co-authored a bestselling book on what makes conversations transformational rather than transactional. I trained for years to support “Interpersonal Dynamics” at Stanford Business School — known to generations of students as “Touchy Feely” — built on a radical premise: through unscripted dialogue, you learn more about yourself as others share their experience of you. The more you reveal, the more the other person reveals. Trust builds as surface area grows.
We are living through a collapse of conversational infrastructure. The forums, institutions, and shared spaces where Americans once worked things out together are cratering. Public trust is at a historic low, polarization at an all-time high. My take on what’s missing is simple: visible examples of what it looks like when conversation fosters learning, strengthens trust, and helps people leave more human than when they arrived.
For eleven years, Stephen Colbert has been that example — demonstrating every night what it looks like when conversation fosters learning, strengthens trust, and helps people leave more human than when they arrived.
The more human the conversation, the more human the response.
Stephen Colbert knows how to ask a great question — but it’s how he responds to the answers that often feels magical. Watch him receive an unexpected answer: you can see him absorb it, recalibrate, and go somewhere he hadn’t planned with ease and grace. Improvisers call this practice “accepting the offer” — building on what’s unfolded rather than sticking to a rigid script. It looks effortless because he’s been practicing it for decades.
His curiosity spans the depth and breadth of his own reservoir of interests and talents. He can pull from literature, theater, the Bible, history, music, food, culture, and even more cult-like topics like Tolkien and Dungeons and Dragons. I heard him bust out conversational Latin the other day as if he was asking someone to pass the salt. That range allows him to ask questions that range from “is a hot dog a sandwich?” to someone’s deep origin story in a single segment.
And regardless of the guest, he honored whoever sat next to him with his full presence and energy. He brought the same visceral quality of attention to Barack Obama on the weight of the presidency as he did to Paul Simon on creativity and mortality, or deep reverence and respect for Barbra Streisand, who almost never gives interviews, or to a beloved colleague like Jon Stewart who appreciated taking the guest seat. The content differed, but the quality of presence and respect never did.
His conversation with Anderson Cooper about grief remains one of the most extraordinary pieces of public dialogue I’ve witnessed — two people, on television, talking deeply and frankly about loss with shared compassion, vulnerability, and care.
Many years ago, I got to see a live taping of The Late Show. Watching Colbert work in person was nothing short of magic. He came out before the show to connect with the audience, earnestly answering our questions with attention. You could feel his chemistry building in real time with the hundreds of audience members lucky enough to be present at the glorious Ed Sullivan Theater. We were in on the jokes and banter, as if we had a stake in the experience.
Good conversations are designed.
In a media climate optimized for performative extremes, creating the conditions for authenticity is both rare and radical. It happens before a single question is asked — in the introduction of the guest, the welcome to the stage, the opening greeting, and the signals you send about what may unfold. Colbert did this so consistently that it looked natural and emergent, but it was built on careful choices, made every night, to prioritize genuine exchange over performative spectacle.
Sometimes the conversations centered on a shared experience, like mixing a drink, evoking nostalgia with a picture or prop, or even changing the environment for the interview, as when he would lie down on a picnic blanket with guests and ask big questions while looking up at the “stars.” When Kamala Harris sat down for one of her first post-election interviews, Colbert handed her a Miller High Life. It was unpretentious, a little surprising, and quietly radical: a way of saying, we’re just two people talking. His choices created the conditions for something more vulnerable and connected than a standard interview.
A couple of weeks ago, he sat down with a roomful of elementary school kids to brainstorm a new talk show format. His group facilitation prowess was on full display. He greeted every child by name, as if they’d been friends forever. His questions built on each other in a deliberate arc of engagement. He noticed who hadn’t spoken and made space for them. And when enthusiasm spilled into dancing, he joined right in. When the session ended, he didn’t just summarize where they landed — he built the prototype of what they created together. That’s the difference between facilitation that documents and facilitation that transforms.
What We Can Take Forward
How We Future is built on the belief that the future isn’t something that just happens to us — it’s shaped by the quality of our conversations, our capacity to imagine together, and our willingness to stay genuinely curious about each other.
Stephen Colbert, night after night, reminded us that this is a choice we can make.
He was modeling something we desperately need more of: the belief that real dialogue — across difference, across discomfort, across the unexpected — can actually build trust, understanding, and a shared sense of what’s possible. In a time when so many of our public conversations have collapsed into performance, he kept showing us what it looks like to actually be in one.
For 1,810 episodes, Colbert was doing for conversation what TED did for public speaking — making excellence visible, repeatable, and worth studying. We’ve never had a public model for what great dialogue looks like, the way we have for great presentations. We had one, five nights a week.
After The Late Show ends, no one will fill that seat. But there can be recognition of what was actually happening on that stage and what we can continue to learn from it.
Colbert has made me a better facilitator — more present, more willing to follow an unexpected answer, and more committed to building rather than just capturing. Sure, I’ll try to channel his humor and grace. But what I’m really taking into every room is his commitment to the craft and to building the conditions where people leave more human than when they arrived.
Thank you, Stephen. You showed us how.
Lisa Kay Solomon is a faculty member at Stanford University's design school, host of the podcast and Substack “How We Future," and a creator of civic futures programs like Vote by Design, The Futures Happening, and The Team.
Some MAGA loyalists have turned on Trump. Why the rest haven’t