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 […]
Pentagon Restricts Journalist Access to Unclassified Information
Freedom of the press is enshrined in the very first amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Not the second, not the last, but the first. This fundamental right is vital to holding the government accountable and maintaining an informed citizenry, both of which ensure our democratic strength as a nation. However, it is becoming increasingly clear […]
The Case for a “Civil Gideon”
Across cases nationwide, unaccompanied immigrant children walk into courtrooms alone, with no attorney by their side. Without guaranteed access to legal representation in immigration proceedings, they are often left to confront the full force of the American legal system on their own, along with the subsequent life-altering consequences. In these moments, the idea of “due […]
DOGE Doom and Gloom: The Gutting of the CFPB
The past weeks have generated national outrage in response to the mass federal employment cuts pursued by the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). From Raleigh, North Carolina, to Washington, D.C., protestors are standing up to DOGE and DOGE-overseer Elon Musk after mass dismissals of federal workers. The Billionaire CEO has sought to reap the […]
Space Race 2.0: Profits, Power, and the Politics of the Cosmos
Capitalism is out of this world—quite literally. The commercialization of space is propelling us into a second space race, one that is fundamentally different from its Cold War predecessor. Unlike the 20th-century contest between the United States and the Soviet Union, this new race is driven by private enterprise, technological ambition, and the pursuit of […]
The U.S.-China Brain Drain
This publication, the Berkeley Political Review, is situated within the Bay Area, a section of California that is best known for its incredible innovations in the technology field. The ecosystem created in Silicon Valley is unlike any other comparable industry ecosystem in the world and has led to the creation of world-conquering technology companies. Focusing […]
The War on Terrible Healthcare? How the VA Has Stoked Useless Partisanship and Invoked Special Interest
We are in the middle of a “war.” No, it’s not of the same magnitude as the Second World War, or of Vietnam for that matter. There isn’t any foreign aggression that we have to be afraid of. Don’t worry, our boys and girls aren’t going to be sent overseas; they’ll be at safe at […]
Misstepping in a Multi-Polarizing World: Trump Stumbles in Pivot to Asia
Following President Trump’s visit to China in his 2017 Asia-Pacific tour, both Xinhua News, the official press agency of the People’s Republic of China, and Trump himself touted his rapport with President Xi Jinping. Yet no sooner had Xi and Trump waxed their platitudes than they were advocating opposing stances on regional trade and leadership […]