Skip to content
Project 2025
Search

Latest Stories

Follow Us:
Top Stories
Gynecologist doing ultrasound of pregnant woman in hospital.

No Doctor, No Delivery, No Future

A military ship out in the sea.

Reasons to Care about the Sailors Aboard the USS Lincoln

Woman putting savings in a white piggy bank.

Affordability Crisis: From The Great Compression to the Great Divide

People walking to voting booths.

The Democratic Socialists of America Is Not What It Seems

The Sleeping Giant Woke Up. Trump is Asleep.

The Sleeping Giant Woke Up. Trump is Asleep.

Voter machine companies working with DHS to combat hackers

Voter machine companies working with DHS to combat hackers
Joe Raedle/Getty Images
The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumSep 06, 2019
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
See More Writings by author

Makers of voting machines and other election equipment have given the government under-the-covers access to their products, hoping federal experts can find the potential vulnerabilities before hackers can exploit them next year.

Jeanette Manfra, a top Homeland Security Department cybersecurity official, made the revelation at an Intelligence and National Security Summit in suburban Washington on Thursday. Afterward, she told Bloomberg that the manufacturers are cooperating voluntarily, representing a breakthrough for the government.

Latest news

Silhouetted People with American Flag Neon Sign
Democracy

With Rights Come Responsibilities - That's the American Way

An Independent Just Broke Through in Alaska — As Republicans Try to Kill the System That Made It Possible
Elections

An Independent Just Broke Through in Alaska — As Republicans Try to Kill the System That Made It Possible

Montanans Urged To Defend Voter Integrity in November Elections
Electoral Reforms

Montanans Urged To Defend Voter Integrity in November Elections

Read More

GOP Claims of Voter Disenfranchisement Are a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

Repeated claims of voter fraud have eroded Republican trust in mail-in voting. Explore how GOP rhetoric surrounding mail ballots risks depressing conservative turnout ahead of the 2026 midterms.

ArtMarie/Getty Images

GOP Claims of Voter Disenfranchisement Are a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

Trump’s efforts to sow seeds of doubt in the election process have had an unintended yet predictable effect on the 2026 midterms: many Republican voters no longer trust mail-in voting.

When City Councilmember Nithya Raman surged from behind in the Los Angeles mayoral primary as late mail-in ballots were counted, some members of the GOP pointed to a broken election system. In reality, they were watching California elections function exactly as designed — slow, scrupulous, but secure.

Keep ReadingShow less
Person voting in a voting booth.

Why are so many American elections uncontested? Richard Neal’s long tenure in Congress highlights a broader problem involving money, ballot access, parties and candidate recruitment.

Hill Street Studios/Getty Images

America Has an Uncontested Elections Problem

Richard Neal, the congressman representing Massachusetts’ 1st district, is concluding his 19th congressional term this year. In many ways, Neal is a typical long-tenured congressperson. However, Congressman Neal is distinguished by having been elected to Congress uncontested more times than anyone in post-civil rights American history.

Neal owes his long tenure in part to the uncompetitive elections in western Massachusetts where so-called “silent elections” are common. Some would be challengers may be put off by the fact that he has won seven of his eight contested congressional races by more than 20 points. More often than not, Neal has been uncontested in the Democratic primary as well, however, this year he has competition in both the primary and general election.

Keep ReadingShow less
A Democracy Cannot Run on an AI Model

Clerk Matthew Sandbar, 34, demonstrates part of the ballot-sorting process to members of the media attending a walkthrough of the Philadelphia Ballot Processing Center used to process the ballots of the 2022 US midterm elections, in Philadelphia on October 27, 2022.

Photo by Ryan Collerd / AFP via Getty Images

A Democracy Cannot Run on an AI Model

Tallying the results of Washington, DC’s first ranked-choice election in June took about 10 days—longer than many voters are used to. In an age when artificial intelligence can generate an answer in seconds, waiting days for election results can feel old-fashioned, inefficient, even suspicious. And it is about to matter far more widely. This November, 17 states, cities, and counties will use ranked-choice voting, including Maine and Alaska statewide, in races that could help decide control of Congress. More voters than ever will watch results take days to resolve, and more will be asked to trust a count they cannot see.

But that slowness may be one of its most democratic features.

Keep ReadingShow less
People waiting in a line outside as the sun sets.

Voters wait in line outside the Metropolitan Multi-Service Center to cast their ballots in Houston, Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025. A recent state investigation confirmed that some registered voters flagged as potential noncitizens by a federal system had already provided proof of citizenship.

Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images

Texas Confirms Some Flagged As Potential Noncitizens on Voter Rolls Had Provided DPS Proof of Citizenship

Election officials across the state should immediately reinstate some voters who were incorrectly flagged as potential noncitizens through a federal program, the Texas Secretary of State’s Office told county officials Wednesday.

Christina Adkins, the state elections director, told county officials the state had reviewed Texas Department of Public Safety records confirming the citizenship of some of the 2,724 registered voters who were flagged as potential noncitizens, according to an audio recording of her comments obtained by Votebeat and The Texas Tribune, as well as election officials who heard them. The voters were flagged after the state checked its voter roll through a federal program called Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, used to verify the citizenship of people registered to vote.

Keep ReadingShow less
© Copyright 2026