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Just the Facts: Canadian Tariffs

Just the Facts: Canadian Tariffs

Project 2025: Implementing Changes to the Department of Defense

Project 2025: Implementing Changes to the Department of Defense

Redistricting

Redistricting

A fictional, fanciful sign depicts the results of voter suppression through the unfair, partisan manipulation of district lines (gerrymandering).

The worst congressional gerrymanders of the 2020s

Just the Facts: Trade Deficits

Just the Facts: Trade Deficits

The Fulcrum Digest: Voting Access Proposals Are Sweeping the Nation

David Meyers
By David MeyersMay 06, 2019
David Meyers

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.

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There has been a surge in legislation to ease access to the polls during the early days of state legislative sessions across the country.

The New York University School of Law's Brennan Center counts at least 230 bills that have been filed or pre-filed at state capitals since the midterm election – with bipartisan efforts to place automatic voter registration, vote-by-mail, same-day registration or the restoration of voting rights for convicted felons on the legislative agendas in 31 states.

Hawaii Moves Toward Always Voting by Mail

Legislators in Hawaii this week began debating a range of election measures including a proposal to make the archipelago the fourth state in the nation that conducts all voting by mail.

Mail ballots are now an option and have outnumbered those cast at traditional polling places since 2014. A bill starting to move in the legislature would shift Hawaii to an exclusively mail-in system in 2022. Previous have been passed by the state Senate but ignored in the state House. However, Democratic majority leaders in both chambers say they are supportive of the reform this session, Honolulu Civic Beat reports.

Ranked-Choice Voting Gets Next Test in D.C. Suburbs

One of the hottest concepts in the world of election modernization is "ranked-choice voting" – where rather than selecting one candidate per contest, voters list candidates for each office in order of preference. Whenever no one secures majority support in the first round, an automated runoff among top finishers kicks in.

It's hailed by supporters as a means of giving more power to voters, enhancing the prospects of outsider candidates, boosting civility in campaigns and producing more consensus-minded lawmakers. Detractors see the system as confusing and in someway disenfranchising.

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The White Lotus Politics: Is Hollywood Storytelling Shifting Right?
Pop Culture

The White Lotus Politics: Is Hollywood Storytelling Shifting Right?

USA China trade war and American tariffs as opposing cargo freight containers in conflict as an economic and diplomatic dispute over import and exports concept as a 3D illustration.
Business & Democracy

Just the Facts: United States Vs. China Tariff War

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This is Trumpism

WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 31: U.S. President Donald Trump gestures while speaking during an executive order signing event in the Oval Office of the White House.

(Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

This is Trumpism

It's high time commentators stopped trying to shoehorn the American polity into a paradigm that doesn't fit. Donald Trump's brand of government is as new and unique as it is volatile and disturbing. Sometimes, history neither repeats nor rhymes. Sometimes, a whole new species bursts onto the scene.

What we're seeing today with Trump isn't dictatorship. Dictators control their countries. They don't rely on the opposition party to pass budgets; they dictate where money is spent. They don't get bludgeoned every hour in the press; they dominate the media. And they don't have their key initiatives stymied in the courts; they control the judiciary.

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Where Civic Hope and Political Reality Meet: Constitutions
Can the Constitution stop the government from lying to the public?
Can the Constitution stop the government from lying to the public?

Where Civic Hope and Political Reality Meet: Constitutions

Constitutions everywhere represent the nexus of civic hope and political reality. Nearly 300 professors, lawyers, and judges from 64 countries gathered in Austin, Texas, last month to compare notes during the thirdGlobal Summit on Constitutionalism. But a high school student, an atypical but welcome attendee, best captured the event's purpose.

I attended the Summit to offer 12 minutes about U.S.amendment cycles in a concurrent session, but I gained so much more as an attendee for all three event days. Some highlights:

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Selling Out? The Rightward March of Black Elected Politicians

Two elected officials shaking hands.

Getty Images, shironosov

Selling Out? The Rightward March of Black Elected Politicians

Are Black American politicians fighting the fascism they fear or aiding its rise?

The second Donald Trump administration is doing pretty much everything it set out to do from Project 2025 without much resistance from the oppositional Democratic party—most notably Black elected officials.

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USAID flag outside a building
A USAID flag outside a building.
J. David Ake/Getty Images

A Profound Distortion of Humanity’s Purpose on Earth

In the comments section of his New York Times column titled “Musk Said No One Has Died Since Aid Was Cut. That Isn’t True,” Nick Kristof wrote: “I think that President Trump and Elon Musk thought the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) would be an easy target and could be a practice run for raiding something harder, like Medicaid. In reporting this story, I tried to put human faces on the aid cuts and appeal to readers' consciences, but I wonder whether it's more effective to appeal to the public's sense of self interest? Which arguments do you think are most effective in reaching people and changing minds?”

As a citizen advocate who has spent more than 40 years working to improve USAID, waves of grief keep coming over me due to the reckless and shameful dismemberment of the agency. Attempts by Musk and Trump to shut down USAID amount to vandalizing America’s soul.

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