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Preparing for an inevitable AI emergency
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Nvidia and AMD’s China Chip Deal Sets Dangerous Precedent in U.S. Industrial Policy
Aug 11, 2025
This morning’s announcement that Nvidia and AMD will resume selling AI chips to China on the condition that they surrender 15% of their revenue from those sales to the U.S. government marks a jarring inflection point in American industrial policy.
This is not just a transaction workaround for a particular situation. This is a major philosophical government policy shift.
What was once a matter of national security has now somehow become a transactional arrangement that is essentially a pay-to-export policy that blurs the line between protective regulation and economic extortion.
The deal, reportedly brokered after Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang met with President Trump, allows the companies to sell their H20 and MI308 chips in China, a market that previously accounted for billions in revenue.
There were two immediate responses from two former officials and trade experts who voiced strong concerns. Christopher Padilla, former head of the Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration, called the deal “astonishing,” likening it to “a mix of bribery and blackmail” and warning it may be “possibly illegal” and Peter Harrell, a fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said the arrangement sets a “terrible precedent,” noting that national security export controls should not be relaxed in exchange for financial concessions
The unintended consequences of a government policy are unknown, and the potential cost of access is steep, not just financially, but philosophically. This arrangement contradicts the very principles Republicans have long championed: free enterprise, limited government interference, and a clear separation between national security and commercial interest.
History provides some lessons.
Consider the Jackson-Vanik Amendment of 1974, which tied trade relations with the Soviet Union to human rights benchmarks, particularly the freedom of emigration for Soviet Jews. It was a moral stand, using trade as leverage to promote democratic values. But it was also transparent, legislated, and principled—even if imperfect.
Today’s chip deal with China lacks that moral clarity. It’s not about human rights or democratic norms. It’s about money. The 15% levy isn’t a tariff, a sanction, or a strategic investment. It’s effectively just a tax on corporations. And unlike Jackson-Vanik, it wasn’t debated in Congress or anchored in law. It was brokered behind closed doors, with the executive branch acting as both regulator and beneficiary.
This blurring of roles recalls the worst instincts of economic policy, where governments extracted rents from private enterprise under the guise of national interest. It also evokes the “crony capitalism” of post-Soviet Russia, where access to markets was contingent on political favor and financial tribute.
This policy sets a dangerous precedent by monetizing export permissions, effectively transforming the federal government into a tax collector on global commerce. It’s a dangerous slope. If the U.S. can demand a revenue cut for chip sales to China, what stops it from doing the same for pharmaceuticals to Europe, or software to Latin America? The logic of national security becomes a flexible pretext for economic leverage, and the private sector is left navigating a landscape where policy is shaped not by principle, but by deal-making.
This isn't an industrial strategy, but essentially it's economic policy to the highest bidder. And it sends a troubling signal to allies and adversaries alike: that American innovation is for sale, and its gatekeeper is no longer Congress or the Constitution, but the highest bidder in the West Wing.
If Congress is serious about reshoring supply chains, protecting intellectual property, and countering China’s techno-authoritarianism, then it must reject this ad hoc monetization of policy. True industrial strategy requires coherence, transparency, and a commitment to long-term national interest, not short-term revenue schemes. This should be embraced by Democrats and Republicans alike. Otherwise, we risk becoming the very system we claim to oppose: one where power is transactional, markets are politicized, and innovation is hostage to the whims of the state.
David Nevins is co-publisher of The Fulcrum and co-founder and board chairman of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund.
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A pile of political buttons sitting on top of a table
Photo by Marek Studzinski on Unsplash
Once Again, Politicians Are Choosing Their Voters. It’s Time for Voters To Choose Back.
Aug 11, 2025
Once again, politicians are trying to choose their voters to guarantee their own victories before the first ballot is cast.
In the latest round of redistricting wars, Texas Republicans are attempting a rare mid-decade redistricting to boost their advantage ahead of the 2026 midterms, and Democratic governors in California and New York are signaling they’re ready to “fight fire with fire” with their own partisan gerrymanders.
It’s a tempting strategy. But gerrymanders for a good short-term cause are still unfair to voters, and this tit-for-tat constitutional hardball is just another stop on the longer road to democratic collapse.
If party leaders insist on running from competition, then it’s time for voters to run toward it. And in many states, the best tool available to do that is the citizen-led ballot initiative—a way for ordinary people to demand fair representation when legislators won’t deliver it.
Ballot initiatives allow voters to bypass gridlocked and unresponsive legislatures and change the rules of the game directly. In states that allow them, citizens have enacted reforms that legislators refused to touch: Michigan’s citizen-led independent redistricting commission cleaned up partisan gerrymandering; Maine’s switch to ranked-choice voting elevated and protected moderates like Rep. Jared Golden and Sen. Susan Collins; Arizona’s public campaign financing system increased competitiveness. These reforms didn’t come from the top down; they were bottom-up demands for a democracy that works.
Initiatives work. They help realign public policy with the public interest where the gaps are largest and make elected officials more accountable. And when they’re used to fix the deeper structural problems—like single-member district, winner-takes-all elections—they can even make themselves less necessary over time.
That’s why we need them now. So we won’t need them as much in the future.
Unfortunately, not everyone has access to statewide ballot initiatives. Only about half of the U.S. states allow citizens to place new laws on the ballot. The rest—including Texas—leave voters in a Catch-22: They need structural reform to make government responsive, but can’t get reform because government isn’t responsive.
Right now, voters in states that have a statewide initiative process but haven’t yet adopted independent redistricting commissions should start organizing for that—or, even better, for multi-member state legislative districts elected via proportional representation, which would make gerrymandering obsolete. Voters in places like Nevada, Missouri, and Florida don’t need to wait for their state legislatures, the courts, or Congress to upgrade their systems.
By contrast, Texas’s roughly 19 million registered voters currently have no pathway to change that that doesn’t begin inside the statehouse. And polling suggests Texans aren’t thrilled with the status quo. A recent survey found that 63 percent of Texas voters view the redistricting push as unnecessary. Another Texas poll from 2010 found 68 percent support for adopting a statewide initiative process. Several bills to create one in Texas have been introduced in recent years. For now, though, the people’s hands are tied.
Creating a new ballot initiative process is no easy task. It bumps into the Catch-22 as before. In every state without ballot initiatives, creating a process for them requires a constitutional amendment, which, absent a constitutional convention, must be initiated by the legislature. However, there’s a difference between political reform groups asking lawmakers to vote to create an independent commission and a large, broad-based coalition asking them to give the public a new way to propose ideas in the future. That second ask—about democratic process, not specific policy outcomes—might be harder to reject without political consequences.
We’ve been here before. Between 1898 and 1920, amid corruption, inequality, and political capture, 21 states enshrined initiative systems into their constitutions. Many lawmakers supported the change not out of principle, but because they saw the writing on the wall.
Ballot initiatives aren’t perfect. They can be expensive, distorted by special interests, or weaponized to harm vulnerable communities. But in moments of democratic backsliding, they’re one of the only tools voters have to rebalance the system and reclaim their power.
Let’s use and expand their use now—strategically and responsibly—so we can build a democracy that no longer needs them.
Maresa Strano is the deputy director of the Political Reform program at New America.
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Since President Donald Trump took office for his second presidential term in January 2025, detentions of immigrants without criminal records increased more than 10-fold
Getty Images, fudfoto
Arrests of Immigrants With No Criminal Record up More Than 1,000%, While Criminal Arrests Rise 55%: The Change at ICE Under Trump Administration
Aug 11, 2025
Since President Donald Trump took office for his second presidential term in January 2025, detentions of immigrants without criminal records increased more than 10-fold: from 1,048 detainees to 11,972 (an increase of 1,042%), according to public data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the agency in charge of immigration enforcement within the United States
In the same period (January 1 to June 28, 2025), the number of detainees with criminal records rose by 55%, from 9,741 to 15,141.
ICE data also show that fewer arrests are happening at border crossings and more are occurring throughout the rest of the country.
The increase in arrests of people without a criminal record, according to experts consulted by Factchequeado, is due to changes in immigration policies and measures taken by the Republican administration.
Puedes leer esta nota en español haciendo clic aquí.
Lauren DesRosiers, professor and director of the Immigration Law Clinic at the P. Swyer Justice Center at Albany Law School, told Factchequeadothat the arrests increased because the Trump administration rescinded immigration enforcement priorities implemented under President Joe Biden, a democrat. The Biden administration had prioritized arrests of individuals with “certain serious convictions,” DesRosiers said.
Another factor, according to DeRosiers and Florence Otaigbe-Nkwocha, an immigration attorney and member of the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA), is the daily arrest “quotas” imposed on ICE agents. As reported by media outlets such as AlJazeera or Reuters, at the end of May 2025, the Trump administration increased the daily arrest quota from 1,000 per day to 3,000 immigrants. California Democratic Congressman Mark Takano also said on June 25, 2025, that the quota “does not force them to focus on felons and violent criminals" during a speech on the House floor in a special session titled "Holding Power Accountable."
Otaigbe-Nkwocha also cited other contributing factors, such as the rescinding of an October 2021 memo that prohibited immigration enforcement actions near or inside protected areas, like schools, hospitals, or religious sites, and the suspension of an April 27, 2021 memo that prohibited immigration enforcement near courthouses.
"Enforcement has increased due to ICE having more access to areas where they can arrest people," Otaigbe-Nkwocha told Factchequeado. "With how easy it is today to arrest in almost any location now, it could be said that this directly correlates to the increase," he added.
What the data say: fewer arrests at border crossings, more in the rest of the country
Since the beginning of Trump's second term, ICE arrests have become less common at border crossings and more frequent in the rest of the country. For example, looking at Customs and Border Protection (CBP) apprehensions data, there were 460 arrests per day in the last quarter of 2024 (October, November and December). That figure dropped to an average of 170 arrests per day (14,264 per month) beginning in January 2025.
In contrast, data on immigrants detained by ICE in the rest of the country (non-border areas) show that the average daily number of arrests rose from 262 people in the last quarter of 2024 to 666 detainees per day as of January 2025, with a peak of 1,011 detainees per day in June (a total of 30,328 were detained in that month, according to data collected by Factchequeado through June 28).
ICE also classifies both ICE and CBP arrests into three categories based on the detainees’ criminal history.
These are the official ICE definitions:
- Convicted criminal: people who have violated immigration laws and who already had a criminal conviction when they were detained by ICE.
- Pending criminal charges: people who have violated immigration laws and had unresolved criminal charges at the time they were detained by ICE.
- Other immigration violator: people who have violated immigration laws, but had no criminal convictions or pending criminal charges at the time they were detained by ICE.
Among all immigrants detained by ICE, those classified as "other immigration violators," i.e., those with no criminal history, rose from 7% (1,048) in January 2025 to 29% (11,972) in June 2025. Meanwhile, those arrested under the "pending criminal charges" category accounted for 31% (4,747) in January and rose to 33% (13,560) by June 2025.
In contrast, the percentage of detainees classified as "convicted of a crime" dropped from 63% (9,741) to 37% (15,141) of the total number of arrestees over the same period.
John Sandweg, former acting director of ICE during Barack Obama's presidency, told ABC News, " for the last probably 15 years at least, the majority of ICE arrests, people booked into ICE custody or ICE apprehensions, were individuals apprehended at the border."
"The problem is that you are now engaged in operations that are, frankly, more likely to find non-criminals than criminals," Sandweg added in the ABC article, which also found in ICE data that the current administration is increasingly arresting immigrants without criminal records.
An analysis by the Cato Institute, a nonpartisan, independent public policy research organization that "promotes libertarian ideas", of non-public ICE data found that 65% of those detained between October 1, 2024, and June 14, 2025, had no criminal record, and more than 93% have never been convicted of violent crimes.
84% of ICE detainees are considered "non-threat level" individuals
The data also shows the criminal history of immigrants held in ICE detention centers.
The agency classifies detainees into four categories::
- ICE Threat Level 1: Includes aggravated felonies, violence, major drugs, terrorism or threats to national security. These individuals are ICE's highest priority.
- ICE Threat Level 2: Includes crimes not as serious as Level 1, but still significant (fraud, weapons, multiple misdemeanors). They are a medium-high priority.
- ICE Threat Level 3: Includes individuals with one or two non-violent misdemeanors. Low priority for ICE, although may be subject to action.
- No ICE Threat Level: Individuals with no criminal convictions. Generally undocumented migrants with no criminal history. Low priority under current policy, but still subject to deportation depending on political or legal context.
According to data collected as of June 23, 84% (39,722 individuals) of immigrants held in detention centers were classified under the "No ICE Threat Level" category. Threat Level 1 accounted for 7% (3,371 people); Level 2 for 4% (1,801); and Level 3 for 5% (2,338). The majority of detainees in all categories are held in detention centers in Texas, Louisiana, Arizona, California, and Georgia.
The percentages of each group has remained relatively the same since fiscal year (FY) 2022. However, between 2019 and 2021 (during part of the previous Trump administration) immigrants with no criminal history accounted for about 62%, while those at ICE Threat Level 1 made up 17%.
Jacqueline Watson, an immigration attorney and second national vice president of AILA, told Factchequeado that the data show that most immigrants in ICE detention centers have no criminal history "because immigrants commit fewer crimes than the native-born population," contrary to what is repeated on social media. In this Factchequeadoarticle, we explained that there is no data showing a "crime wave" caused by immigrants, and in this article, we explained that immigrants have lower incarceration rates than U.S.-born individuals.
Graphic: Ignacio Ferreiro.
Data also shows that FY 2025 has already surpassed the number of detainees in detention centers in FY 2019 (46,304). As of June 23, 2025, there were 47,232 individuals in detention centers and there are still three months left in the fiscal year (which runs from October 1, 2024, to September 30, 2025).
Data on immigrants in detention centers do not include certain facilities classified as:
- HOLD, which are temporary detention centers;
- HOSPITAL;
- HOTEL;
- ORR, an acronym for the Office of Refugee Resettlement which oversees unaccompanied minors;
- MIRP, an acronym for the Mexican Interior Repatriation Program.
Arrests of Immigrants With No Criminal Record up More Than 1,000%, While Criminal Arrests Rise 55%: The Change at ICE Under Trump Administration was originally published by Factchequeado and is republished with permission.
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Akarapong Chairean/Getty Images
Generative AI Can Save Lives: Two Diverging Paths In Medicine
Aug 10, 2025
Generative AI is advancing at breakneck speed. Already, it’s outperforming doctors on national medical exams and in making difficult diagnoses. Microsoft recently reported that its latest AI system correctly diagnosed complex medical cases 85.5% of the time, compared to just 20% for physicians. OpenAI’s newly released GPT-5 model goes further still, delivering its most accurate and responsive performance yet on health-related queries.
As GenAI tools double in power annually, two distinct approaches are emerging for how they might help patients.
One path involves FDA-approved tools built by startups and established technology companies. The other empowers patients to safely use existing tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude.
Each path has advantages and tradeoffs. Both are likely to shape healthcare’s future.
To better understand what’s at stake, it’s first helpful to examine how generative AI differs from the FDA-approved technologies used in medicine today.
Narrow AI
Medicine has relied on “narrow AI” applications for more than two decades, using models trained to complete specific tasks with structured clinical data.
These tools are programmed to compare two data sets, identify subtle differences, and assign a precise probability factor to each. In radiology, for example, narrow AI models have been trained on thousands of mammograms to distinguish between those demonstrating early-stage breast cancer and those with benign conditions like fibrocystic disease. These tools can detect differences too subtle for the human eye, resulting in up to 20% greater diagnostic accuracy than doctors working alone.
Because narrow AI systems produce consistent, repeatable results, they fit neatly within the FDA’s current regulatory framework. Approval requires measurable data quality, algorithmic transparency, and reproducibility of outcomes.
Generative AI: A new kind of medical expertise
Generative AI models are built differently. Rather than being trained on structured datasets for specific tasks, they learn from the near-totality of internet-accessible content, including thousands of medical textbooks, academic journals, and real-world clinical data.
This breadth allows GenAI tools to answer virtually any medical question. But the large language model responses vary based on how users frame questions, prompt the model, and follow up for clarification. That variability makes it impossible for the FDA to evaluate the accuracy and quality of the tools.
Two distinct pathways are emerging to bring generative AI into clinical practice. Maximizing their impact will require the government to change how it evaluates and supports technological innovation.
1. The traditional path: FDA-approved, venture-backed
As medical costs rise and patient outcomes stagnate, private technology companies are racing to develop FDA-approved generative AI tools that can help with diagnosis, treatment, and disease management.
This approach mirrors the narrow AI model: high-priced tools that are highly regulated and largely dependent on insurance coverage for American families to afford them.
With venture funding, companies can fine-tune open-source foundation models (like DeepSeek or Meta’s LLaMA) using a process called “distillation.” This involves extracting domain-specific knowledge and retraining the model with real-world clinical experiences, such as tens of thousands of X-rays (including radiologists’ readings) or anonymized transcripts of patient-provider conversations.
Consider how this approach might impact diabetes management. Today, fewer than half of patients achieve adequate disease control. The consequences include hundreds of thousands of preventable heart attacks, kidney failures, and limb amputations each year. A generative AI tool trained specifically for diabetes could replicate the approach of a skilled chronic disease nurse: asking the right questions, interpreting patient data, and offering personalized guidance to help users better manage their blood sugar levels.
This path already appears to have federal backing. The Trump administration recently launched its Medicare-funded Health Tech Ecosystem initiative, partnering with more than 60 tech and healthcare firms to pilot AI-enabled tools for chronic disease management, including diabetes and obesity.
Although distillation is faster and cheaper than building an AI model from scratch, the timeline to FDA approval could still span several years and cost tens of millions of dollars. And any adverse outcome could expose companies to legal liability.
2. The alternate path: Empowering patients with GenAI expertise
This second model flips the innovation equation. Instead of relying on expensive, FDA-approved tools developed by private tech companies, it empowers patients to use low-cost, publicly available generative AI to manage their own health better. This can be accomplished through digital walkthroughs, printed guides, YouTube videos, or brief in-person sessions.
For example, a patient might input their blood pressure, glucose readings, or new symptoms and receive reliable, evidence-based advice from ChatGPT or Claude: whether a medication change is needed, when to alert their doctor, or if emergency care is warranted. Similarly, patients working with their physicians could use these LLMs to detect early signs of post-operative infection, worsening heart failure, or neurological decline.
With 40% of doctors already engaged in “gig work,” an ample supply of clinicians from every specialty would be available to contribute their expertise to develop these training tools.
This model would bypass the need for costly product development or FDA approval. And because it offers education, not direct medical care. It would create minimal legal liability.
Government support for both models
These approaches are not mutually exclusive. Both have the potential to improve care, reduce costs, and extend access. And both will benefit from targeted government support.
The traditional path will require companies to evaluate the reliability of their tools by testing the accuracy of their recommendations against clinicians. When these tools are equivalent, the FDA would give its approval.
The alternate path of educating patients to use existing large language models will benefit from educational grants and added expertise from agencies like the CDC and NIH, partnering with medical societies to develop, test, and distribute training materials. These public-private efforts would equip patients with the knowledge to use GenAI safely and effectively without waiting years for new products or approvals.
Together, these models offer a safer and more affordable future for American healthcare.
Robert Pearl, the author of “ChatGPT, MD,” teaches at both the Stanford University School of Medicine and the Stanford Graduate School of Business. He is a former CEO of The Permanente Medical Group.
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