An ICE agent no longer needs to ask for your papers; they can simply point a smartphone at your face. Armed with artificial intelligence, the current administration has transformed mundane spaces, such as school parking lots and busy intersections, into instruments of mass surveillance. By weaponizing this technology against immigrants and U.S. citizens alike, the […]
Tag: Trump Administration
The Distortion of America 250
As the United States of America approaches its 250th anniversary, or the semiquincentennial, the federal government intends to celebrate. However, both how and what it celebrates has mutated into an ideological, partisan, and personalist endeavor by the current administration, or rather, by the president himself. From changing historical sites to splashing Donald Trump’s face on […]
Closing the Door on Public Service
One of the biggest sources of stress for a college student is the relentless search for a summer internship. For those not lucky enough to land a job at their parents’ company, the spring is spent writing dozens of cover letters, doom scrolling LinkedIn, and waiting by the phone for ghosting employers. For students interested […]
One Battle After Another for the Arts
If there was ever a nadir of the arts, a year in which artistic freedom and independent media nearly met their demise, it would have been 2025. The War for Representation Acquiesce, for a moment, to a reading of last year’s tempestuous politics as a climactic battle for the arts, a conservative D-Day in America’s […]
The Bay Area Tech Companies Bowing Down to President Trump
In a picturesque scene of decadent place settings and gold-accented tablecloths, President Donald Trump hosted his cadre of tech powerhouse CEOs and business tycoons at a lavish dinner honoring their donations to his White House ballroom — and among those in attendance, the Bay Area was abundantly represented. Late this summer, the president announced his plan […]
How the Ellison Empire is Killing America’s Democratic Media
Rockefeller, Carnegie, Vanderbilt: the names of American billionaires who became famous in the Gilded Age of the late 19th century. They grew their fortunes through the consolidation of major industries such as oil, steel, and railroads. In the present, billionaires are making their fortune through the consolidation of the media industries. Names such as Bezos, […]
Soft Secession: California’s Antidote to Trump
Sending ICE to raid workplaces and schools, separating families, and deporting both undocumented immigrants and U.S. citizens. Federalizing the National Guard and deploying it to Los Angeles, using military-style force against protesters. Cutting federal funding and withholding aid during the L.A. fires. These are just some of the federal government’s attacks on California over the […]
Caught in the Crossfire: UC Berkeley and the Federal War on Higher Education
At the crossroads of politics and pedagogy, the Department of Education has become a focal point of national controversy under the Trump Administration. Since 1867, the Department of Education has widely administered and funded state-run education in the United States. Along with this function, it also operates investigations on the grounds of racial preferences, and […]
The Geopolitical Strategies Behind the U.S. Visa Waiver Program
After a nine-hour flight from Buenos Aires to Miami en route to Washington, a delegation of Argentine officials planned to meet with Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem to sign an agreement adding Argentina to the Visa Waiver Program (VWP). Noem had already signed a statement of intent to explore Argentina’s membership in the VWP. […]
Policy Over People
Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI): the three terms that have become trigger words within an escalating culture war. Across decades, though particularly during the Biden Administration, several government initiatives focusing on the expansion of DEI programs were implemented, aiming to tackle discrimination based on race and gender and increase environmental justice efforts to aid disadvantaged […]