Daniel G. Newman has been one of the more important drivers of the money-in-politics reform debate in the 15 years since he created MapLight — a sprawling database that quantifies the connections between politicians, the businesses and industries that finance their campaigns, the policies they support, and the votes they cast. He remains in charge but branched out his summer by publishing a graphic novel that seeks to explain the full range of fix-the-system challenges: "Unrig: How to Fix Our Broken Democracy" (McMillan). It's his fourth book; the others were about speech recognition, the initial focus of his career. His answers have been edited for clarity and length.
What's the tweet-length description of your organization?
We expose money's influence on politics and fight online political deception.
Describe your very first civic engagement.
For years, Brown, the college I attended, had been raising funds from each graduating class to support financial aid for low-income students. In my senior year, some student "leaders" sought to direct those funds to other purposes that didn't support equity. I recruited allies and generated lots of campus press to counter this change — and the funds continued to go to financial aid.
What was your biggest professional triumph?
When I started MapLight in 2005, the corrosive influence of money in politics was not on most people's radar as one of the most critical issues facing our country. Now that our news stories and data have been seen, heard or read by millions, we've helped make money's influence on our democracy a top political issue nationally.
And your most disappointing setback?
I spent two years organizing to pass a 2004 ballot measure for public funding of elections in my home town of Berkeley, Calif. But the measure didn't pass. I was dejected, feeling like a failure for more than a year. I tormented myself. If only I'd reached out to more people. Or made one or two fewer mistakes.
I started MapLight to expose money's influence and help other reform activists be successful. Over the next decade, the Supreme Court ushered in even more money in politics, generating more energy than ever to change our broken system — including momentum for another local effort in Berkeley. My desire for change was just as strong, but I was held back by my past feelings of despair. What if I attempted another campaign and it lost? I realized I needed to separate my success as a person from the success of the campaign. That new humility, in the face of the uncertainty of politics, allowed me to try again. And in 2016, we won!
How does your identity influence the way you go about your work?
Early in my career I taught high school math and physics. I continue to see myself as an educator. I'm good at explaining complex concepts and ideas in understandable ways — which helps in my work of explaining our democracy's problems and engaging people in the reform movement. My new book does exactly this — in 250 pages of comics!
What's the best advice you've ever been given?
Hire only people who are outstanding across all aspects. The cost and pain of hiring the wrong person is so great, leave positions unfilled until you find someone excellent. I got this advice a few years after starting MapLight, and that's what propelled the organization to take off.
Create a new flavor for Ben & Jerry's.
"Collective Action" — the more people eating it, the better it tastes.
What is your favorite TV show or movie about politics?
"The Candidate," the 1972 dark comedy starring Robert Redford as he seeks a Senate seat in California.
What's the last thing you do on your phone at night?
I'm big on boundaries between work and home, and between online and offline, so I aim for "airplane mode" a few hours before bedtime.
What is your deepest, darkest secret?
This may come as a surprise, given my profession, but I don't love reading books about democracy. Too often they are dry and pessimistic. I wanted to write a book that I would be excited to read myself. "Unrig" is that book.
U.S. President Donald Trump boards Air Force One on August 14, 2026 at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland. Trump is traveling to Long Island to tour law enforcement facilities in Nassau County and rally support for local Republican candidates ahead of the upcoming midterm elections
Travel Far Enough, You Meet Yourself
Is it possible that our President has simply not traveled enough?
Born and raised in Queens and attending Fordham University in the Bronx, Donald Trump has no record of traveling outside New York until he was over 20, when he transferred to a college in the neighboring state of Pennsylvania. Were his formative years amiss, then, in his learning about other places and other people?
Is his view akin to the famous New Yorker cover by Saul Steinberg, an illustration of the United States with New York City as the epicenter of the country and the Hudson River the border of the known world? We can now at least add Washington, D.C., and Mar-a-Lago to the map of “the realm.”
Our President has now traveled some, but what we recommend is another kind of travel. Not a state-sponsored trip or a venture to scout locations for future Trump Towers. This would be a genuine travel experience, enriching and eye-opening, showcasing other cultures and ways of living.
It will extend far beyond viewing military parades, hobnobbing with such “understanding” world leaders as Kim Jong Un, or taking tea with the King.
WHERE, then, should the President go? As Elon Musk’s Starship spacecraft is not yet ready to take passengers to Mars, perhaps he could explore our own vast country?
Maybe he could travel to “flyover country,” the farming states, where his ying-yanging tariffs and trade restrictions have played havoc with rural economies. Or possibly to California, number one in homeless U. S. citizens, and while there, regale homeless veterans (approximately 32,500 nationwide) with tales of his brave exploits invading and bombing foreign countries.
Or he might tour the Great Lakes, and rename the other four?
WHEN should he go? This will be tough, as he is very busy building his ballroom and renaming bodies of water.
How about a trip in early November, around the midterm elections? Despite the long-discredited accusation of widespread voter fraud, it would be reassuring to know he might be so caught up divvying out ladles of soup in a soup kitchen somewhere that he wouldn’t remember to deploy the military for “election security.”
HOW will he travel? He should definitely not take his Qatari-donated, newly renovated 747, especially after last time, when he had to be smuggled off clandestinely in a catering truck. It’s unlikely any traveling companions, like the Secretary of State or of the Treasury, are going to fall for the ruse a second time. Besides, we may need those people. No more decoys!
Perhaps the President could fly commercially, although this likely would expose him to undue suffering. Without gold bathroom fixtures and maple wood floors, the trip will be no “Luxury Experience.” If only he still had his “Trump Shuttle,” bought with a massive loan he later defaulted on, saying then, “I’m smart. I got out at a good time.”
Considering the potential pitfalls, maybe it’s best the President travel incognito, disguised perhaps as an elderly woman wearing a lot of bronzer.
Wherever, whenever, however: our President needs a vacation.
Moreover, we need a vacation from him.
If the President refuses our travel suggestions, here’s another idea:
Let’s get him a pet! He has never owned a pet. As we know with our children, pets teach essential life lessons: compassion and empathy; they instill a sense of responsibility. There is a well-established connection between those who can care for a pet and those who can care for people.
So, which pet should we choose? A puppy? A kitten? A boa constrictor?
Imagine, the President may even decide he likes having a pet. After all, what is more obedient than a well-trained dog, besides possibly the Cabinet? And what is more docile than a sweet kitten, other than plausibly the Supreme Court?
The President may even become more mellow with a pet afoot and less likely to slap tariffs on our allies, or attempt to annex our neighbors, or bully our Congress. (Realizing, of course, a bully requires active participation from the bullied to maintain his status.)
Maybe we should do both: get the President a pet and devise a travel plan for him. (Do you think we could possibly convince him to leave his phone at home?)
Let’s go for it! After all:
Travel far enough, you meet yourself. (David Mitchell)
And for our President, that would likely be the most profound discovery of all.
Amy Lockard is an Iowa resident who regularly contributes to regional newspapers and periodicals. She is working on the second of a four-book fictional series based on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice."