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Webinar rewind: Preparing for potential election crises

A pandemic. Battles over millions of mailed-in ballots. The Supreme Court deciding an Electoral College dispute. The accelerated undoing of democratic norms. Dozens of legal battles over election administration and voting rights. Each would be enough to create unprecedented challenges to an election. But all are present this year, positioning Election Day 2020 and the days after to face challenges rarely as intense before. As Nov. 3 approaches, voters, government officials, candidates and the media may become overwhelmed by the many storylines, the shifting landscape and the potential outcomes. Preparation needs to start now.

The Fulcrum convened an expert panel to discuss these issues and more on June 9. Editor-in-Chief David Hawkings moderated the webinar, which also included:


  • Bryan Monroe, associate professor of practice at Temple University's Klein College of Media and Communication. Before joining Temple, Bryan was editor of CNNPolitics and Washington opinion editor for CNN; president of the National Association of Black Journalists; and editor-in-chief of Ebony & Jet magazines.
  • Trevor Potter, president of the Campaign Legal Center. Trevor is a past chairman of the Federal Election Commission and was general counsel to John McCain's 2000 and 2008 presidential campaigns.

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A close up of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement badge.

The Supreme Court’s stay in Vasquez Perdomo v. Noem restores ICE authority in Los Angeles, igniting national debate over racial profiling, constitutional rights, and immigration enforcement.

Getty Images, Tennessee Witney

Public Safety or Profiling? Implications of Vasquez Perdomo v. Noem for Immigration Enforcement in the U.S.

Introduction

The Supreme Court’s recent decision in September 2025 to stay a lower court’s order in Vasquez Perdomo v. Noem marks a significant development in the ongoing debate over the balance between immigration enforcement and constitutional protections. The decision temporarily lifted a district court’s restrictions on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations in the Los Angeles area, allowing agents to resume certain enforcement practices while litigation continues. Although the decision does not resolve the underlying constitutional issues, it does have significant implications for immigration policy, law enforcement authority, and civil liberties.

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For the Sake of Our Humanity: Humane Theology and America’s Crisis of Civility

Praying outdoors

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For the Sake of Our Humanity: Humane Theology and America’s Crisis of Civility

The American experiment has been sustained not by flawless execution of its founding ideals but by the moral imagination of people who refused to surrender hope. From abolitionists to suffragists to the foot soldiers of the civil-rights movement, generations have insisted that the Republic live up to its creed. Yet today that hope feels imperiled. Coarsened public discourse, the normalization of cruelty in policy, and the corrosion of democratic trust signal more than political dysfunction—they expose a crisis of meaning.

Naming that crisis is not enough. What we need, I argue, is a recovered ethic of humaneness—a civic imagination rooted in empathy, dignity, and shared responsibility. Eric Liu, through Citizens University and his "Civic Saturday" fellows and gatherings, proposes that democracy requires a "civic religion," a shared set of stories and rituals that remind us who we are and what we owe one another. I find deep resonance between that vision and what I call humane theology. That is, a belief and moral framework that insists public life cannot flourish when empathy is starved.

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