Author: Heather Cox Richardson

From the time he took office in January 2025, Trump and his cronies have not simply challenged laws or constitutional provisions. They have acted as if the Constitution doesn’t exist. That’s an important distinction. The former accepts the constitutional order by working within it to challenge it. The latter rejects the constitutional order entirely. Their actions align with the strategy of Nazi political theorist Carl Schmitt, whose writings seem lately to have captivated leaders on the American right. Schmitt opposed liberal democracy, in which the state enables individuals to determine their own fate. Instead, he argued that true democracy...

“The Republican Party’s new favorite talking point is calling Democrats communists,” Representative Jim McGovern (D-MA) said on July 21 on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives. “Really? Communists? Did we accidentally step into a time machine?” “I get it,” he said. “They don’t want to talk about the real issues, the bread and butter issues. They don’t want to talk about affordability. I guess my question is, is Joe McCarthy back from the dead? Because it sounds like that’s who wrote all the garbage coming from Republicans, about communism. “These guys, they dust off the same, tired,...

A federal agent from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good on January 7 as she was driving away from ICE agents on a residential street in Minneapolis, Minnesota. According to Minneapolis leaders, Good was a legal observer: a volunteer trained to observe police conduct in case of future legal action. Three videos taken at the scene show a maroon SUV perpendicular on a snowy street. A silver SUV driving up the street stops. Two officers wearing badges that say “police” and body armor get out of the vehicle and walk toward the maroon...