Ending US financial backing for attacks on civilians in Israel and Palestine is a noble cause, and deserves the backing of all Americans. But when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee attempted to address the matter with the Taylor Force Act, they did it with the wrong framing and focus, advocating...
Material Support and the new FBI
The soon-to-be Director of the FBI has a concerning track record on First Amendment rights. “As expected” is the best description of the Senate confirmation hearing for President Trump’s pick to be the next Director of the FBI, Christopher Wray. Wray responded to a variety of questions about his independence...
Update: The Muslim Ban in the Courtroom
Today the Supreme Court affirmed an expansion of “familial relationships” exception to Trump’s Muslim Ban, but allowed the Administration to further limit refugee resettlement until later courts weigh in. WHERE WE ARE NOW: Citizens of Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Yemen and Iran are not allowed to travel to the United...
Sam Harris: Perpetually Misunderstood
If you ever go online to criticize renowned ‘New Atheist’ Sam Harris for any of his baseless assertions or wrong-headed arguments, you’ll likely find yourself on the receiving end of literally hundreds of tweets claiming you were misquoting him, misunderstanding him, or reading him out of context. Though Harris’s tweeps...
U.S. Government avoids investigating and defining the faith of nearly two billion people by five votes
Early in July Representative Trent Franks of Arizona offered a troubling amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018. That amendment was entitled “Strategic assessments of the use of violent or unorthodox Islamic religious doctrine to support extremist or terrorist messaging and justification.” The amendment sought to empower the...
Hidden Damages: The Lasting Impact of Trump’s Budget on Public Service Loan Forgiveness
By Sarah Decker “One of the most damaging but least talked about components of Trump’s Budget is its proposal to terminate public service loan forgiveness.” When asked what she was most concerned about with the new administration’s 2018 budget, SurvJustice founder Laura Dunn was clear: the elimination of the program that...
From Riyadh to Warsaw: Trump’s Foreign Policy clarified
Last week President Trump visited Poland to deliver his second international speech, with the first in Saudi Arabia back in May. The speeches he delivered in Riyadh and Warsaw have clarified the Trump administration’s attitude and general approach to foreign policy: that of insisting there is a civilizational divide in the world, placing the...
FY 2018: Proposed Cuts to Federal Rights Agencies
By Kai Wiggins As a follow up to our recent congressional briefing, we have shared some additional information regarding the Trump administration’s proposed budget for the 2018 fiscal year. This document (linked here and below) highlights some of the major reductions and eliminations to federal agencies entailed in the Trump...
Disguised as a platform geared toward fiscal conservatism and shrinking government, the Trump administration’s proposed budget for the 2018 fiscal year targets the country’s most vulnerable populations by proposing cuts in the federal government’s infrastructure for the protection of civil rights and anti-discrimination. Spanning across key agencies including the Department...
By Haley Arata & Annie Riley In our post 9/11 society, “Fear mongering makes it incredibly easy for people to support bad policy,” Vanita Gupta, former head of the Civil Rights Division of the DOJ, said during the Georgetown Law Center on Privacy & Technology hosted The Color of Surveillance: Government Monitoring of...
