By Lauren Rodriguez (PO’22) The U.S.-Mexico border is one of the hottest topics, yet perhaps one of the least understood, of today’s political discussion. Most Americans have heard by now that if the border is to be closed, we’re at risk of running out of avocados. But perhaps more pressingly, what are the constitutional implications of closing the border? And is it an example of illegal...
By Ethan Widlansky (PO’22) The Senate Small Business Committee, chaired by Marco Rubio, convened a hearing in late February to discuss its latest report “‘The Made in China 2025’ industrial plan.” Spurned by many free-market Republicans, the report considers “not whether states should organize their economies, but how they should organize them.” A self-avowed free-market apostle as a...
By Kimberly Tuttle (CMC’19) Starting in the 1960s, the American government began to implement policies to deinstitutionalize the mentally ill. The deinstitutionalization movement was spurred by public outcry as a result of the exposure of the shortcomings of state-run “insane asylums” at the time. In 1955, the number of institutionalized mentally ill patients peaked at 558,000, or 0.03...
By Rafael Santa Maria (PO ’20) On April 11, Spanish police detained an 18-year-old Italian man accused of sexually assaulting a 17-year-old British national on a Mediterranean cruise ship. However, the suspect was promptly released by a Spanish judge who claimed that Spain had no jurisdiction over the case. Specifically, the judge argued that Spain could not prosecute the suspect because...
By Savannah Green (CMC ’20) The topic of citizenship in the United Kingdom and throughout Europe has been consistently discussed since the beginning of Brexit talks. Though the UK’s exit from the European Union is still not finalized, many EU citizens living in the UK (and vice versa) are worried about their status post-Brexit. EU citizenship brings a multitude of perks, including seamless...
By Musa Kamara (PO’22) The rise of streamed music consumption—that is, the consumption of music that does not need to be downloaded—represents a significant milestone in the history of music. Streaming services have made listening to music easier than ever before and have facilitated a rise in music industry revenues, revenues that had suffered as CD sales declined in the 2000s. Take, for...
By Alex Simard (PO’22) Content Warning: This article, as it centers on the death penalty and a man condemned to it, contains depictions of gun violence, murder, and domestic and sexual violence, including rape. It also contains graphic depictions of petitioner’s medical condition and brief depictions of 17th- and 18th-century modes of punishment, including torture. In 1944, Albert Trop, a...
By Katya Pollock (PO’21) In March 2019, the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces announced that they had secured the last ISIS stronghold in Syria, the small town of Baghouz at the eastern border of the country. In the nearly five years since ISIS’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, first declared the creation of an Islamic caliphate, the group has controlled a territory as large as Great...
By Rafael Santa Maria (PO ’20) Last week, the Supreme Court implemented official rule changes that reduce the word limits in court briefs and identify potential conflicts of interest. Originally proposed last November, these changes intend to reduce the Court’s caseload and make it clear when justices must recuse themselves from certain cases. These new rules go into effect on July first...
By Savannah Green (CMC ’20) One of President Trump’s major economic issues has been the US’s increasing trade war with China. In 2017, the US carried out an in-depth investigation into Chinese hacking, following reports that the Chinese government was targeting key US industries as a way of gaining new technology. In response to the investigation’s findings, the US government imposed...
