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Trump’s election-rigging claim will backfire. Here’s the evidence.
By Pippa Norris
In recent days, Donald Trump has ratcheted up claims of voter fraud, claiming that the Nov. 8 election may be “rigged” against him. In Wednesday’s debate, he refused to pledge that he would accept the result if he loses, saying that he would keep the nation “in suspense.”
These sorts of claims are common among sore losers in authoritarian states, sometimes not without good reason. But casting serious doubt on the outcome is a radical departure from established practices among political leaders in democratic states during the modern era — and from previous U.S. nominees in our lifetime. Trump’s claims are particularly concerning given that there is little evidence of voter fraud in modern elections.
So why make these false allegations?
These types of claims may serve several strategic functions. They provide sore losers with a way to save face, excusing a poor performance. They also may erode the electoral legitimacy of the winner, sowing doubts about their governing authority, as well as causing chaos by making it harder to bring Congress and the country together after a bitterly fought campaign.
[It’s not just Trump. Authoritarian populism is rising across the West. Here’s why.]
The main effect of these charges on the mass electorate may be to discourage turnout (“Why should I bother to vote if it’s all rigged?”), weaken confidence in the presidency, Congress and political parties, and erode satisfaction with the performance of American democracy. My book “Why Electoral Integrity Matters,” the first volume in a trilogy on the subject published by Cambridge University Press, demonstrates consistent evidence from the World Values Survey that these sorts of perceptions of electoral integrity matter for trust and confidence in elections and democracy in many countries.
But do they also affect turnout in U.S. elections?
In 2012, the most authoritative and long-standing academic survey of the electorate, the American National Election Study, asked a series of questions to monitor citizens’ views about the integrity of elections. Because parties are polarized about electoral malpractice, like everything else in American politics, the items sought to test the effects of diverse claims common among different parties. In particular, Republicans are more prone to argue that the vote count is unfair (Rudolph W. Giuliani: “Dead people generally vote for Democrats”). They are also most likely to charge that news media coverage is unfair, as journalists are assumed to share a liberal bias (Trump: “The media is rigged against us”).
By contrast, liberal Democrats such as Sen. Bernie Sanders are more prone to argue that the process is corrupt because rich people buy elections. Minor party candidates like the Greens’ Jill Stein also often regard ballot access as unfair, reducing genuine choice for voters at the ballot box. Moreover, the allegation that electoral officials are unfair is heard among candidates from all parties, whether because of the imposition of strict photo ID requirements that are thought to restrict voter’s rights or because of overly lax security thought to allow disqualified citizens to register and vote.
Evidence shows that those who question the integrity of the voting process are far less likely to participate. That’s clear in the graph below.
Among Americans in the 2012 ANES survey who believe that votes are “very often” counted fairly, over three-quarters (77 percent) reported that they voted. By contrast, among those with strong doubts about this process, just two-thirds (64 percent) bothered to vote, generating a net 13-point gap.
When asked whether they thought that electoral officials were fair, similar patterns can be observed, where greater trust is significantly associated with higher voter turnout. None of the other claims about electoral malpractice was observed to have a similar effect on turnout, including problems of media bias, lack of genuine choice and campaign finance.
Of course, it’s difficult to figure out which way the causal arrow goes — do people stay home because they don’t trust the election, or are people who don’t vote simply more likely to hold anti-establishment views? Regardless, cynicism about the electoral process and turnout are negatively related.
Q: “In your view, how often do the following things occur in this country’s elections?” (Very often, fairly often, not often, or not at all often? Votes are counted fairly. Electoral officials are fair. Source: 2012 American National Election Study N. 5452)
Who stays home?
But will the Trump-Pence strategy actually serve to depress turnout among Hillary Clinton supporters? Data from political scientist Charles Stewart suggests that Trump’s talk of a rigged election is actually making Democrats more confident in the electoral system. Other data point to the fact that Trump’s claims of vote rigging might backfire and damage his own support.
[Donald Trump’s rigged election talk is changing minds. Democrats’ minds, that is.]
First, the polls clearly show that it is Republicans, not Democrats, who are more likely to believe the Trump claims of alleged malpractices. It may be his own supporters who are most likely to be discouraged from voting.
In September 2016, a Gallup poll found that only 6 in 10 Americans were very or fairly confident that their vote would be accurately cast and counted in the U.S. election, down from around three-quarters of all Americans a decade earlier. But among Republicans, the proportion who were confident dropped to around half, the lowest which the Gallup poll has ever recorded on this question when asked in a series of surveys. Other polls have found that Trump voters are especially likely to believe that voter fraud occurs often.
Trump’s talk may also make it more difficult for him to mobilize independents, whom he needs to expand his base, who typically have low turnout, and who are often deterred from voting by claims of unfairness.
Q: “In your view, how often do the following things occur in this country’s elections? Votes are counted fairly.” (Very often, fairly often, not often, or not at all often?
Source: 2012 American National Election Study N. 5452)
Overall, therefore, Trump’s charges of rigged elections in this campaign are factually inaccurate, highly damaging for trust and confidence in U.S. elections and democracy, and potentially corrosive for voting by his own supporters. Even worse, his claim that he may or may not accept the legitimacy of the outcome if he loses is simply un-American and doubtless welcome by dictators around the world who express similar sentiments when they lose.
[This new book helps explain the unlikely rise of Donald Trump]
Pippa Norris is the McGuire Lecturer in Comparative Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University; ARC Laureate Fellow and professor of government and international relations at the University of Sydney; and author of “Why Electoral Integrity Matters” (Cambridge University Press, 2014).
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Federal employees lag behind private sector workers in salaries by 32 percent on average, report says
By Eric Yoder
Eric Yoder
National reporter focusing on internal federal government personnel, management and budget policies
Federal employee salaries on average lag behind those of similar private-sector workers by just under 32 percent, a pay advisory council has said, while also deciding to reassess how it annually reaches similar conclusions, which are at odds with the findings of other pay comparisons.
The Federal Salary Council on Tuesday reported that what is commonly called the “pay gap” is 31.86 percent, slightly below previous figures, in the 34-35 percent range. The report also again showed that federal employees are furthest behind in the San Francisco area, with the second-widest gap in the Washington-Baltimore area.
The council, consisting of unions representing federal employees and nongovernmental pay experts, oversees the pay system for most white-collar employees below the executive level, the General Schedule. Under a 1990 law, its findings are passed to a higher-level body of administration officials, who in turn make recommendations to the White House for specific raises for 44 city zones and a single figure for all areas outside those zones. While the process focuses on GS employees, the resulting localized raises commonly are extended to those under other pay systems.
The law envisioned virtually closing the pay gaps through those targeted raises, but that has not happened because of the potential cost, which the White House last year said would be $26 billion, and disagreements over how to compare salaries between the two sectors, including whether benefits should be taken into account.
Federal employee organizations consider the Salary Council figures as the authoritative numbers; some conservative and libertarian organizations cite their own reports showing an advantage for federal workers of about the same magnitude or more.
Last year the Congressional Budget Office concluded that federal employees overall earn 3 percent more on average but that there are large differences by educational level: from a 34 percent advantage for federal workers with a high school education or less to a 24 percent shortfall for those with a professional degree or doctorate.
[Federal employee pay, benefits ahead of private sector on average, CBO concludes]
Council members agreed to a review at the suggestion of the recently appointed chairman, Ronald Sanders, a longtime federal personnel official and consultant who is now a clinical professor of public administration at the University of South Florida. “If the goal [of the 1990 law] is to assure that the government can recruit and retain the best talent, what’s the best methodology to attain that goal?” he asked.
He said that should start with a better understanding of the current method, which uses several sets of Bureau of Labor Statistics data to compare nearly 100 occupations at various levels in 250 geographic areas.
“The math behind that is very, very complex,” Sanders said after the meeting, held at Office of Personnel Management headquarters. “While I’m sure it’s all consistent with data science principles, it’s hard to know what that number reveals and what it masks. … It’s not clear to me that it truly represents what the pay gap is.”
He noted testimony at the meeting from representatives of federal agencies in the Charleston, S.C., area who described serious difficulties in attracting and keeping employees despite paying various forms of incentives. However, according to the council’s own method, the area does not merit having separate, higher salary rates than are paid there now as part of the catchall locality.
Witnesses from the Nashville and Southern California areas made similar arguments in person, as did written submissions coming from more than a dozen other areas.
Sanders said he hopes the council can finish its review in time for decisions to be effective in January. In addition to reporting on the local pay gaps, the council also can recommend creating new localities and redrawing boundary lines. Rules are being drafted to add at least four, and potentially six, new localities and to expand two existing zones starting next year.
The work could have little immediate effect, however, since President Trump has recommended that federal salary rates be frozen in 2019, while creating a $1 billion fund to reward top performers.
[Budget provides no raise, targets retirement benefits for federal employees]
National Treasury Employees Union President Tony Reardon, a council member, said: “We can talk about the methodology, but the underlying concern is that there is a discussion of a pay freeze. A lot of these agencies are having trouble recruiting people, retaining people, and at the heart of it is salaries.”
After a freeze during the Obama administration in 2011-2013, annual raises have ranged from 1 to 2.1 percent on average, with higher amounts paid in the city areas with the largest gaps.
J. David Cox Sr., American Federation of Government Employees president and also a council member, said that the requests to create and expand zones for higher pay show that “the effect of three years of a pay freeze and then very, very minimal raises is certainly showing up. Why would we freeze federal pay when every federal agency is screaming that we can’t hire and retain?”
The unions back a proposal by some congressional Democrats for a 3 percent boost. Following its pattern of recent years, Congress so far has been silent regarding a raise. Under the pay law, inaction amounts to action, since it allows the White House recommendation on pay to take effect automatically.
The proposal for a performance rewards fund, which would require congressional approval, also has not been considered.
Eric Yoder Eric Yoder is a National reporter at The Washington Post. He has reported for The Post since 2000, concentrating on federal employee issues, the budget and government management policies. Follow
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Gangnam Nationalism: Why Psy’s anti-American rap shouldn’t surprise you
South Korea's Psy performs at a 2006 concert in Incheon. (Chung Sung-Jun -- Getty Images)
By Max Fisher
Nationalism is a complicated force, and it might not always mean the same thing within one culture as it does in another. Keep that in mind as you read about how Psy, the South Korean rapper beloved in the United States for his mega-hit Gangnam Style, participated in two anti-American performances a few years before he became a big star here. And keep in mind that this is bigger than just Psy and his performances, particularly as controversy is likely to build over President Obama and his family's plans to attend a charity concert featuring the Korean pop star.
In 2002, Psy walked onto the stage at a massive performance meant to protest the large U.S. military presence in South Korea. He wore an outlandish, glittered red costume and gold face paint. As the crowd cheered him on, Psy lifted a large model of a U.S. tank and, to cheers and applause, smashed it against the stage.
Two years later, Psy joined several other performers in a concert, this one also protesting the United States and its military. He rapped a song titled "Dear American." The song is not his – the original is by South Korean metal band N.EX.T – but here are the lyrics, in English and in Korean, in case any readers would like to suggest a better translation:
싸이 rap : 이라크 포로를 고문해 댄 씨발양년놈들과
고문 하라고 시킨 개 씨발 양년놈들에
딸래미 애미 며느리 애비 코쟁이 모두 죽여
아주 천천히 죽여 고통스럽게 죽여
Kill those ------ Yankees who have been torturing Iraqi captives
Kill those ------ Yankees who ordered them to torture
Kill their daughters, mothers, daughters-in-law, and fathers
Kill them all slowly and painfully
Americans don't hear much about these anti-American protests in South Korea. It's a strong American ally, after all; a liberal free market democracy; home to tens of thousands of American troops; and a partner, ever since so many Americans fought and died in the Korean War, in containing North Korea's threat to the world. Shouldn't they love us?
This is all true, but the Korean-American alliance can sometimes look a bit different from the other end of the Pacific. Some crucial events inform – though do not, on their own, fully explain – why Psy and other Korean performers would show such animosity toward the United States.
On June 13, 2002, one of the many U.S. military vehicles in South Korea struck and killed two 14-year-old girls walking along the side of a road outside Seoul. Because of the terms of the U.S.-South Korean treaty that allows for America's military presence there, the incident was considered a "military operation" and thus outside of Korea's jurisdiction. A U.S. court martial acquitted the driver and his commander.
Furious at the acquittal, Koreans protested for months, some seeing echoes of the foreign empires that had dominated their country for centuries. Universities became hotbeds of anti-American rage. A Gallup poll found that 75 percent of 20-something Koreans said they disliked or hated Americans. Many charged that the United States was making South Korea its pawn. Psy's 2002, gold-faced performance was, for all its shock-value when seen in isolation, nothing atypical of the year's backlash.
The 2004 performance is more complicated. In May of that year, an extremist group led by al-Qaeda's Abu Musab al-Zarqawi captured a South Korean Christian missionary in Iraq. They demanded that Seoul cancel its plan to send 3,000 troops in support of the U.S.-led invasion and, when South Korea refused, sent a tape of his beheading to Al Jazeera. "Korean citizens, you were warned," the executioner announced. "Your soldiers are here not for the sake of Iraqis, but for cursed America."
Koreans again took the streets in protest, first against the terrorists in Iraq, but then against the governments they saw as responsible for putting Koreans in harm's way. "While most of the peninsula's fury was directed towards terrorists in Iraq as well as Korean government policy, some anti-US military protesters seized the moment to put forth their cause," Korea-based journalist Bobby McGill explains. "Once again, PSY was involved. This time he admonished not only the terrorists and then president Roh Mu-hyun, but he also allegedly unleashed a vitriolic condemnation of American military personnel and military brass." That would be the song "Dear American," lyrics from which are posted above.
Cultural and political forces much larger than Psy, or even than the 2002 and 2004 outbursts of anti-American sentiment in South Korea, may help inform how these two incidents led to such severe vitriol.
One of those forces is the "Sunshine Policy," South Korea's pursuit of rapprochement with North Korea from 1998 to 2008. The policy attempted to soften the tension between the two Korean nations, something that often required breaking, rhetorically or even politically, with the United States. President Roh Moo-hyun did this in part by criticizing the U.S. containment policy – and thus, implicitly, the enormous American military force stationed in his country – in an effort to demonstrate goodwill toward North Korea and, he hoped, to lay the groundwork for real cooperation. A 2003 State Department report warned that the Sunshine Policy, and the political rhetoric and media coverage it produced within South Korea, were raising anti-American sentiment and risking the entire U.S.-South Korean alliance.
But there is also something perhaps deeper, something alluded to in the 2002 protests, in which Koreans accused Washington of trying to control their country, as past Asian empires had done. As South Korea transitioned from military dictatorship to democracy, and from a poor rural country to an advanced urban society, Koreans started to feel "new stirrings of nationalism arising from their country's rapid economic growth and political liberalization," historian Jinwung Kim has written. That nationalism manifested, in part, as a rejection of "Korea's 'big brother,' the United States," Kim wrote. Research by Katherine H.S. Moon, an academic at Wellesley College, linked the "rejection of authoritarianism" and growing national consciousness to "resurgent nationalism" and a newly mainstream anti-Americanism.
These attitudes peaked in the late 1990s and early 2000s – just as Psy dropped a model tank before cheering crowds in Seoul – and, Moon writes, focused on the ever-visible American military presence. South Koreans were newly organizing themselves around a national pride and consciousness. But their nationalist energies, which they had developed as they formed a civil society and rejected the military dictatorship, suddenly lacked an outlet. Probably no one decided to re-focus those energies on opposing the U.S. military presence, but it's not hard to see how that might have happened organically, as Moon suggests. Though the U.S. force serves South Korean interests, it also can be seen as an insult to Korean nationalism, a reminder that it still relies on outside powers, and an intimation, however true or false, that the country might not be fully in Korean control.
These political currents – "sunshine" with North Korea, opposition to the U.S. military presence, rising nationalism – defined the era, however recent, in which Psy so egregiously insulted America. That doesn't mean what he said or did was okay or that Americans should shrug it off. If anything, the fact that someone like Psy – political, but mildly so, criticizing opulent wealth and materialism in his "Gangnam Style" hit – could have participated in such anti-American performances might be a cause for even stronger reaction.
The Sunshine Policy of the 2000s is over, and so are the protests from nearly a decade ago, but the enormous U.S. military presence remains in South Korea. As South Korea continues to rise and build a national sense of itself, it's not guaranteed that the country will welcome American G.I.s with open arms for all eternity. And it's not just South Korea; Japanese have been protesting U.S. bases in their country as recently as October, most recently over a soldier's alleged rape of a local woman. Nationalism in South Korea, or in Japan, could continue to guide policy toward the United States, something that will only become more important as China continues to rise. Psy's silly tank stunt and shocking rap lyrics aren't definitive of how South Korea feels toward the United States, but they do represent a very real cultural force that matters for America's place in the world, whether we want it to or not.
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WorldViews Analysis
Analysis Interpretation of the news based on evidence, including data, as well as anticipating how events might unfold based on past events
Iran’s president faces a tough fight for reelection
By Ishaan Tharoor
Ishaan Tharoor
Reporter covering foreign affairs, geopolitics and history
Want smart analysis of the most important news in your inbox every weekday along with other global reads, interesting ideas and opinions to know? Sign up for the Today's WorldView newsletter.
It may be a busy election cycle in Europe, with attention focused on upcoming parliamentary votes in France, Britain and Germany. But don't forget about Iran. On May 19, Iranians will go to the polls to elect their next president. Current President Hassan Rouhani is the front-runner, but his victory is far from guaranteed.
Of course, there is a justified tendency to view any election in Iran with skepticism. In the Islamic republic's theocratic system, the presidency is just one pillar of executive power. The six presidential candidates were allowed on the ballot only after being vetted by the country's Guardian Council, a body of 12 powerful theologians and jurists. And it is Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who ultimately calls the shots.
Nevertheless, the election campaign in Iran is exposing curious divisions. In televised debates, Rouhani has sparred with his more hard-line rivals, deeming them “extremists.” He has accused Iran's influential Revolutionary Guard Corps of attempting to sabotage the 2015 nuclear deal signed with world powers. And, at his rallies, Rouhani's supporters have chanted for the release of the country's two most prominent reformist leaders, who remain under house arrest.
Female Rouhani supporters attend a campaign rally in Tehran on May 9, 2017. (Vahid Salemi/Associated Press)
It is a mark of the strangeness of Iran's politics that the sitting president can still seem to be a figure of the opposition.
Rouhani, a former cleric who is hardly a reformist himself, surged to power in 2013 with the support of voters eager for a moderate leader who could lead Iran away from the legacy of his firebrand predecessor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Rouhani sought to bring Iran out from its deepening isolation with the nuclear deal, which imposed strict curbs on the country's nuclear capabilities in return for an easing of sanctions. But sluggish economic growth has cooled enthusiasm for his government.
“There's a good chance Rouhani might not be reelected, because a lot of people may not feel compelled to go vote,” said Alireza Nader, an Iran analyst at Rand Corp., speaking in Washington at a panel I moderated at the Middle East Institute this week.
Video: #Iran's Voters Go to the Polls | Panel discussion w/ @nazilafathi @AlirezaNader @AlexVatanka & @ishaantharoor https://t.co/2XfF6NCAQ6 pic.twitter.com/SnHdgaKt7W
— MiddleEastInstitute (@MiddleEastInst) May 10, 2017
“For the average person, the nuclear agreement has been a big disappointment,” he added. “In terms of economic benefits, the average person is not seeing a lot. Oil production is back to pre-sanctions levels, but that doesn't really create jobs.”
Rouhani's closest challenger, Ebrahim Raisi, a conservative cleric who runs one of Iran's holiest shrines, has seized on widespread frustrations over an economy in recession. Not unlike Ahmadinejad in a previous era, Raisi has campaigned on a platform of populist nationalism — a “Make Iran Great Again” agenda, if you will — promising to triple handouts to the poor and create 1.5 million jobs while also taking a more confrontational stand against the West. Another hard-line candidate, Tehran Mayor Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, said 5 million jobs would be created under his watch.
Rouhani's supporters insist that Raisi and Qalibaf are selling a false bag of goods. But there is no question that Rouhani has a real image problem.
“He has cornered himself as the 'elitist mullah' who cares about buying Airbus and Boeing planes but not [about providing] subsidies and handouts for the poor,” said Alex Vatanka, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute. “Rouhani needs to play that populist game. To get people out, he can't just talk about foreign policy — detente with the United States, reconsidering our position with Israel. That's all great for city folks, but out in the countryside, they want to know, 'How am I going to feed my family?'”
Ebrahim Raisi stands among his supporters during a campaign rally in Tehran on April 29, 2017. (Ebrahim Noroozi/Associated Press)
For Khamenei, the ailing, 78-year-old supreme leader, the election may have considerable consequences for his own succession planning. In the event of his death, the Iranian president would be part of a three-member council that would act in the supreme leader's place until a successor was appointed.
It is rumored that Raisi has the support of both Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guard Corps, an institution that maintains significant business interests within the country and is deeply invested in proxy wars elsewhere in the region, including in Syria. There are also suggestions that Raisi's campaign could be a trial run for the job of supreme leader itself, with a strong electoral showing here boosting his chances for the future. Rouhani has publicly criticized Raisi for his involvement, as then-public prosecutor of Tehran, in the executions of thousands of political prisoners in 1988.
Meanwhile, it's hard to overstate the role of the Revolutionary Guard in the country's politics.
“The Guards have never been this powerful in the history of the Islamic Republic,” said Nazila Fathi, a former Tehran correspondent for the New York Times, who also spoke on the MEI panel. “In addition to political and economic ambitions, they also have regional ambitions: It's the Guards who are meddling in other parts of the Middle East.”
Their clout and influence make nearly impossible any dramatic pivot in foreign policy — particularly regarding Iran's arguably destabilizing actions in its neighborhood.
“I don't expect if Rouhani gets reelected you can see a different Iranian policy in Syria,” said Vatanka. “Or if the hard-liners win, that they're going to walk away from the nuclear deal” — a pact, after all, that had Khamenei's blessing.
Ultimately, the presidential election is about jockeying among factions within a complex regime. “You have these two camps competing for power, and this is key. It's about power, not ideas,” said Vatanka.
But Fathi argued that a Rouhani victory, especially if buoyed by a big turnout from Iran's youthful electorate, would still send a message: “That vote would constitute another rebuke to the rule of the conservatives, including the Revolutionary Guards and the supreme leader.”
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After the Parkland shooting, pro-Russian bots are pushing false-flag allegations again
People attend a candlelit memorial service on Feb. 15 for the victims of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School that killed 17 people in Parkland, Fla. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
By Anne Applebaum
Columnist focusing on national politics and foreign policy
For most Americans, the Parkland shooting was a terrible tragedy. But for social media accounts that promote the interests of Russia in the United States, it was a fantastic opportunity.
On the morning after the tragedy, the Russia-linked accounts were commenting fiercely, pushing the “crazy lone killer” explanation for the shooting and mocking advocates of gun control. According to Hamilton 68, a tracker website created by the German Marshall Fund, a lot of them linked to photos of guns and ammunition on the Instagram account of the suspected killer, plus a screenshot of a Google search for “Allahu akbar.” Others linked to a fact- checking website that debunked some statistics about gun crime. By Friday morning, some of the same accounts were also pushing something slightly different: the hashtag #falseflag. That’s a reference to the conspiracy theory, already widespread 48 hours later, that the shooting never happened, that the attack is a “false flag” operation staged by the U.S. government as a prelude to the seizure of guns.
And this is just the beginning. Over the next few days, many of these same kinds of accounts will invent a whole range of conspiracy theories about the shooting. If the past repeats itself, pro-Russian, alt-right, white-supremacist and pro-gun social media accounts will promote the same hashtags and indulge in the same conspiracy theories. Each group has its own interests in pushing #falseflag, but the Russian interest is clear. They do it because it helps undermine trust in institutions — the police, the FBI, the media — as well as in the government itself. They also do it because it helps to amplify extremist views that will deepen polarization in U.S. political life and create ever angrier, ever more partisan divides.
Over the next few days, the operatives who run these accounts may even seek to create events on the ground. We know they might do this because that’s what they’ve done in the past. On Friday, a federal grand jury indicted 13 Russian nationals for “violating U.S. criminal laws in order to interfere with U.S. elections.” The indictment said the group had not only organized pro- Donald Trump, pro-Jill Stein and anti-Hillary Clinton messages online, but also that they organized Trump rallies, hired a Clinton impersonator to appear at them, stole Social Security numbers and created fake PayPal accounts.
But if these kinds of actions are repeated as well, will we stop them? As the Parkland, Fla., #falseflag campaign shows, the Russian effort to shape U.S. politics, U.S. emotions, even the U.S. gun-control debate did not come to an abrupt halt with the election of Trump. It continues — and since the events of 2016, very little has changed. Despite the bad publicity, Twitter has not removed bots from its network, and despite some theatrical agonizing from its chief executive, Facebook has not taken steps to ensure that its targeted advertising systems are not still spreading disinformation, too.
No serious attempt has been made to put pressure on any of the tech companies, let alone to regulate them. No major institutions, government or non-government, have launched digital- literacy campaigns to help teach people how to identify disinformation campaigns, Russian or not.
Despite what is now overwhelming evidence of Russian involvement in the last U.S. presidential election, no one at the highest level of the U.S. government has made a significant commitment to prevent Russian involvement in the next election, or the next debate, or the next national argument, either. Trump continues to regard Russian intervention as a “hoax.” Trump’s aides and lieutenants have refused to spend any time or political capital on finding solutions. Money Congress allocated for that purpose has never been spent by Trump’s administration. Remember all of that over the next few days as you read the indictment of the Russian Internet team, along with the commentary — because the same tactics, the same games, are already in use once again.
Read more from Anne Applebaum’s archive, follow her on Twitter or subscribe to her updates on Facebook.
Michael Gerson: How Trump handles scandal — conspiracy theory after conspiracy theory
Kathleen Parker: Remember those Russian bots from 2016? They’re coming back.
Jennifer Rubin: We’re defenseless against Russian sabotage in the midterm elections. And Trump’s not helping.
Elizabeth Brueing: The latest schoolhouse slaughter shows we have been defeated
Anne Applebaum Anne Applebaum is a Washington Post columnist, covering national politics and foreign policy, with a special focus on Europe and Russia. She is also a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and a professor of practice at the London School of Economics. She is a former member of The Washington Post's editorial board. Follow
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DeSantis says Florida voters would ‘monkey this up’ if they elect Gillum as governor
By John Wagner and
John Wagner
National reporter leading The Post's breaking political news team
Reporter on the National desk.
Fresh off his surprise win in Florida’s Democratic gubernatorial primary, Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum on Wednesday tangled with President Trump and accused his Republican opponent of mimicking the president’s racially tinged attacks.
The day of heated exchanges in the race between Gillum and Rep. Ron DeSantis (R) illustrated how Trump and his aggressive style of politics has already emerged as a key factor in one of this year’s marquee midterm contests — with candidates on both sides eager to make him a centerpiece of the campaign.
While both Trump and DeSantis attacked Gillum as not good for the state of Florida, DeSantis also used language criticized by members of both parties as racist. Gillum would be Florida’s first African American governor.
DeSantis, whose rise to national prominence was bolstered by his frequent appearances on the network, praised Gillum on Fox News on Wednesday as “an articulate spokesman” for those holding “far-left views” but warned that he would be damaging to the state.
“The last thing we need to do is to monkey this up by trying to embrace a socialist agenda with huge tax increases and bankrupting the state,” DeSantis said. “That is not going to work. That’s not going to be good for Florida.”
The use of language seen as containing coded racism prompted an extraordinary rebuke from the network.
“We do not condone this language and wanted to make our viewers aware that he has since clarified his statement,” Fox News Channel’s Sandra Smith said on air. Smith also read from a statement in which DeSantis’s campaign suggested it was “absurd” to characterize the candidate’s remarks as racist.
The NAACP Florida State Conference responded to DeSantis, calling comparisons to monkeys “by far the best-known racist references to African Americans in our national folklore.”
In an interview on the network Wednesday afternoon, Gillum suggested that DeSantis was “taking a page directly from the campaign manual of Donald Trump.”
He added: “In the handbook of Donald Trump they no longer do whistle calls — they’re now using full bullhorns,” Gillum said.
Asked about DeSantis’s comments by reporters at the White House, Trump said he “didn’t hear” the Florida Republican’s remarks, but he continued to praise him.
“He’s an extreme talent,” Trump said of DeSantis.
Earlier Wednesday, Trump had attacked Gillum in a tweet, calling him a “failed Socialist Mayor” and the “biggest dream” for DeSantis, whose victory over a more moderate opponent in Tuesday’s GOP primary was propelled by Trump’s endorsement.
Trump alleged that Gillum “has allowed crime & many other problems to flourish in his city,” adding: “This is not what Florida wants or needs!”
Gillum fired back at the president on Twitter, writing: “What our state and country needs is decency, hope, and leadership.”
With his Tuesday primary win, Gillum became the first African American nominee for governor of the country’s third-most-populous state, emerging as a new focal point for the national party’s liberal wing. He has embraced liberal policies, such as a “Medicare-for-all” health-care system, but he has not identified as a socialist.
The Florida race now stands as a national test for the base of each major party — as well as of Trump’s swaying power.
Earlier Wednesday, Gillum said in a CNN interview that he does not fear Trump’s expected heavy involvement in the general election — and that he “absolutely” believes the president should be impeached.
“Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis are both scraping from the bottom of the barrel,” Gillum said. “I actually believe that Florida and its rich diversity are going to be looking for a governor that’s going to bring us together, not divide us, not misogynists, not racists, not bigots.”
DeSantis’s “monkey this up” comments brought a swift condemnation from Terrie Rizzo, chairwoman of the Florida Democratic Party. The Democratic Governors Association and other political groups also levied criticism.
“It’s disgusting that Ron DeSantis is launching his general election campaign with racist dog whistles,” Rizzo wrote on Twitter.
It's disgusting that Ron DeSantis is launching his general election campaign with racist dog whistles. #FlaPol https://t.co/T9qRVYtbv3
— Terrie Rizzo (@TerrieRizzo) August 29, 2018
Stephen Lawson, a DeSantis spokesman, later said that any characterizations of racism were unwarranted.
“Ron DeSantis was obviously talking about Florida not making the wrong decision to embrace the socialist policies that Andrew Gillum espouses,” Lawson said. “To characterize it as anything else is absurd.”
On Wednesday, former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele on MSNBC described DeSantis’s remarks as “how white folks talk about black men who are successful.”
On Tuesday night, Gillum presented himself as an unusual Democrat with the ability to bring together various factions of his party because he had received support from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) even after he had backed Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential race.
Asked in a Washington Post interview about the chance to be Florida’s first black governor, Gillum said, “I’m trying to be the next governor of Florida. I just happen to be black.”
But he also has argued that his “lived experience” growing up in a working-class family in which he was the first to attend college has helped him connect with struggling Florida voters.
Gillum has also drawn parallels between his candidacy and that of Georgia’s Stacey Abrams, the first black woman in the country to win a major-party gubernatorial nomination.
“The same part of this country that was built by people of color may soon be led by people of color,” he told The Washington Post in a recent interview.
Felicia Sonmez contributed to this report.
Read more at PowerPost
John Wagner John Wagner is a national reporter who leads The Post's new breaking political news team. He previously covered the Trump White House. During the 2016 presidential election, he focused on the Democratic campaigns of Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley. He also chronicled Maryland government for more than a decade. Follow
Vanessa Williams Vanessa Williams is a reporter on the National desk. Follow
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U.S. officials planning for a future in which Huawei has a major share of 5G global networks
The Huawei logo is seen at a fair in Germany on April 1. (Jens Schlueter/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)
By Ellen Nakashima and
Ellen Nakashima
National security reporter
Souad Mekhennet
Reporter covering national security, Middle East, North Africa, terrorism, Europe.
U.S. national security officials are planning for a future in which the Chinese firm Huawei will have a major share of the advanced global telecommunications market, and have begun to think about how to thwart potential espionage and disruptive cyberattacks enabled by interconnected networks.
“We are going to have to figure out a way in a 5G world that we’re able to manage the risks in a diverse network that includes technology that we can’t trust,” said Sue Gordon, the deputy to the director of the U.S. intelligence community. “We’re just going to have to figure that out.”
Officials have not let up on their campaign to urge other countries to block Huawei — a firm with close ties to the Chinese government — from their burgeoning 5G networks, which will power everything from self-driving cars to military operations.
[Huawei reports record profits despite U.S. pressure campaign]
But they are cognizant that many countries already use low-cost Huawei equipment and will probably continue to rely on it as they transition to the next generation of mobile telecommunications, which will be up to 100 times faster than current 4G platforms.
“You have to presume a dirty network,” said Gordon, at an intelligence conference at the University of Texas at Austin last week. “That’s what we’re going to have to presume about the world.”
Already, officials have begun discussing ways to use encryption, segmented network components and stronger standards to protect key systems. Several years ago, the major U.S. telecom providers began designing into their 5G network features aimed at keeping domestic systems safe from spying and cyberattacks by adversaries and criminals.
U.S. officials, frustrated by persistent demands that they reveal a “smoking gun” to back up their warnings that Huawei represents a security risk, have pushed the argument that Chinese laws compel firms such as Huawei to cooperate with intelligence agencies, without the judicial and legal safeguards that exist in the United States.
Some experts, such as the Center for Strategic and International Studies senior adviser Scott Kennedy, say the argument, simply put, is: “China is a strategic competitor and Huawei plays for the home team.”
Gordon’s remarks — striking for their candor about the need to prepare for a future with Huawei in the networks — reflect the twin pressures officials face as they to try to persuade allies that long-term national security interests should take precedence over short-term economic benefits.
Huawei’s founder, Ren Zhengfei, insists his company has never enabled Chinese government espionage and it doesn’t plan to. “For the past 30 years we have never done that, and the next 30 years to come, we will never do that,” he told CBS News in February.
[British government delivers scathing assessment of security risks posed by Huawei to U.K. telecom networks]
German security officials have also urged their ministers to block Huawei from the 5G networks. But there, as in other European countries, appeals to heed the security risks are competing with Huawei’s aggressive price-slashing that especially targets firms under economic duress.
“I can’t understand how German telecom providers are so naive about Huawei,” said one senior German security official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter. “If the Chinese authorities want access [to the networks], Huawei will have to grant it and that’s a problem.”
Already, Huawei controls the 4G market in Africa, much of the Middle East, southern Europe and parts of Southeast Asia. “Huawei has a desire to dominate the 5G market,” said James Lewis, a technology and cybersecurity policy expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “There’s no way we’re going to keep them out everywhere.”
The fear that major U.S. telecoms have is that if Huawei corners the market, shutting out the handful of European competitors that exist, there will be no option for other countries in the future but to use Huawei.
The four major U.S. firms — AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile — have pledged to the U.S. government that they will bar Huawei and another Chinese firm, ZTE, from the 5G networks. But they must still connect with foreign networks, and if they are running Huawei, American traffic will traverse boxes that Huawei controls.
That has prompted warnings from officials, such as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo who in Budapest in February told allies that using Huawei could make it difficult for the United States to “partner alongside them” if their equipment ties into “important American systems.”
The U.S. ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, in March sent a letter to German officials saying the United States would limit intelligence-sharing with Berlin if Huawei is allowed to provide its 5G network.
U.S. intelligence sharing “is a matter of life and death for us,” said the German security official. Last year, for instance, the United States passed intelligence to the Germans that helped them track an alleged terrorist plot involving the deadly biotoxin ricin developed by a Tunisian extremist living in Cologne who was suspected of being inspired by the Islamic State.
Though the German government has ruled out a ban on Huawei, Jürgen Hardt, a member of the German parliament, said he believes officials in Berlin are taking the potential threat seriously. “We are aware of the challenge and we are handling that challenge well,” he said.
Hardt said authorities have set a high barrier for participation in construction of the 5G network, insisting on strict security protocols he said would be difficult for Huawei to meet.
The German security official said he believed Huawei equipment would not be in any systems that underpin military or critical infrastructure such as water and electricity.
Britain already bars Huawei from the government and all critical networks. And its presence in the commercial 4G system is limited to one-third of the components that are separate from the network core. The other two-thirds are split between the Finnish company Nokia and the Swedish firm Ericsson.
Some U.S. officials say the greater threat is not espionage, but disruption of critical systems in a crisis.
Telecom firms such as AT&T and Verizon have engineered features such as gateways through which all untrusted international traffic must pass to be scrubbed for malware or other forms of attack.
“The 5G standard is being built with security from its inception, building on lessons learned from previous generations of wireless,” said one telecom industry official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the issue. “And it is an iterative process, so that as problems arise, they can be addressed.”
Experts say that while 5G services will emerge over the next few years, a full build-out in developed countries could take up to 10 years. It takes time to install network antennas on street corners across the nation, to produce fleets of cars that can drive themselves and deploy sensors that will power smart cities and factories.
That gives the U.S. government time, if it starts now, to execute a strategy to seed innovation in 5G technologies so that more players can enter the market for integrating the hardware and software to compete with Huawei, said Thomas Donahue, a retired CIA analyst and former White House official who devoted 30 years to technology and national security issues.
But, he said, “we will not succeed unless government and industry come together. This requires leadership from the U.S. government — from the top. In this regard, we may have something to learn from China.”
Mekhennet reported from Berlin. Griff Witte in Berlin contributed to this report.
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Rana Kapoor recognized as ‘Icon of the Year’
Mumbai, September 18, 2017:Mr. Rana Kapoor, MD&CEO, YES BANK, India’s 5th largest private sector Bank has been awarded the ‘Icon of the Year’ at Brands Academy’s flagship “Icon of the Year Awards” in Mumbai on September 17, 2017.
Speaking on this recognition, Mr. Rana Kapoor, MD&CEO, YES BANK said, “The ‘Icon of the Year’ award is a significant recognition and I am deeply honoured to receive it. At YES BANK, we are working towards establishing a truly differentiated Financial Brand, with laser focus on Professional Entrepreneurship, Human Capital, Innovation and Responsible Banking. This recognition is a huge encouragement and will motivate us even further to achieve our uncompromising vision of ‘Building the Finest Quality Bank of the World in India by 2020’”
As a professional entrepreneur, since 2003, Rana Kapoor, Managing Director & CEO of YES BANK has progressively established a high quality, customer centric, service driven, private Indian Bank with a vision of building the “Building the Finest Quality Bank in India by 2020”.
Under Mr. Kapoor’s leadership, YES BANK has established itself as India’s fourth largest private sector bank with a Total Balance Sheet size of over INR 2 lakh Crore, sustained profit growth and steadily increasing granular CASA portfolio, making it the fastest growing bank in India. In its 13th year of operations, YES BANK has achieved several significant milestones such 1,000 branches, over 20,000 employees, 31.1% growth in net profit in FY17 and crossing balance sheet size of USD 1 Billion in its IFSC Banking Unit (India’s first) at GIFT City, Gandhinagar.
As a Change Agent, Mr. Kapoor has woven sustainability and CSR into the DNA of the bank with focus on climate finance, water, livelihood security and rural impact amongst others. He is spearheading digital transformation at YES BANK by embracing technology and innovation to create a ‘Digital First’ Bank and aid the ongoing transition to a ‘less-cash’ economy. Mr. Kapoor has pioneered new paradigms in Digital Banking through an ‘Alliances, Relationships & Technologies (A.R.T)’ framework to foster entrepreneurship through YES FINTECH Accelerator and YES Head-Startup programs at YES BANK.
As Chairman of YES Global Institute, a practicing think tank established by YES BANK, Mr. Kapoor is driving interventions to create social impact and foster innovations based on Design & Innovations led Creative Entrepreneurship (D.I.C.E.).
Brands Academy is one of the top brand management consultancies in India, offering a plethora of branding services corporate, start-ups and NGOs. The Award provides a unique platform to the achievers from industry sectors to celebrate their success together.
YES BANK, India’s fourth largest private sector bank is a high quality, customer centric and service driven Bank. Since inception in 2004, YES BANK has grown into a ‘Full Service Commercial Bank’ providing a complete range of products, services and technology driven digital offerings, catering to corporate, MSME & retail customers. YES BANK operates its Investment banking, Merchant banking & Brokerage businesses through YES SECURITIES and its Mutual Fund business through YES Asset Management (India) Limited, both wholly owned subsidiaries of the Bank. Headquartered in Mumbai, it has a pan-India presence across all 29 states and 7 Union Territories in India including an IBU at GIFT City, and a Representative Office in Abu Dhabi.
For more information, please visit the Bank’s website at http://www.yesbank.in/
Alisha Prakash
Email: alisha.prakash@yesbank.in
Adfactors
Jyothi Goswami
Email: jyothi@adfactorspr.com
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Nick Ahad: Why the arts are worth more than just money
Robert Pickavance, who plays Scrooge in A Christmas Carol at Leeds Playhouse.
Nick Ahad
The plan this week was to write about something extraordinary that has been achieved at the Leeds Playhouse this theatre season.
Then Ofsted’s chief inspector Amanda Spielman suggested that colleges who encourage young people to take arts courses are giving ‘false hope to students’ because of the ‘relatively poor career opportunities’ in the arts once they graduate. Obviously, I have to write about that. Also, fairly obviously, I suggest that Spielman is talking drivel. On social media the arts world responded to her assertion by pointing out that school and college training for the fourth biggest employer in the UK – the arts industry – is fairly important. In a similar vein I point to a press release issued by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport in November last year that came with the headline: ‘Creative Industries’ Record Contribution to UK Economy: £92bn sector growing at twice the rate of the economy’. So yes, young people who choose to train in the arts, something which might prepare them for a career in this £92 billion industry, are probably making a better career decision than Spielman suggests.
My argument against this nonsense that arts subjects are not worth studying, though, is more aligned to Tracy Brabin’s response. The Batley and Spen MP wrote on Twitter: “Access to the arts isn’t only about careers. It’s about confidence, articulacy, emotional intelligence, creative problem solving and teamwork.”
It’s about all of those things and more. In fact, to demonstrate how much more, I return to the Leeds Playhouse. This year the Playhouse is undergoing a major refurbishment and has moved into a temporary space for this season. It has also decided to have a rep company for the first time in two decades, with a core group of nine actors appearing in all of the productions. Watching the ensemble in A Christmas Carol last week, I enjoyed something I haven’t previously experienced at this theatre.
Watching actors like Robert Pickavance, Darren Kuppan, Tessa Parr and all the others, seeing how each of them shift and change as they bring different roles to life, I was struck by how their relationship with the audience shifts and alters with each new role at the same theatre. We feel like we know these actors; seeing how a role in Road informs a role in Europe (two ensemble productions) has brought a depth of appreciation to the craft of each of the actors in the rep. It’s something incredibly special, but it comes with a problem. I can describe the feeling of seeing this, but I can’t measure it. I can’t put a number next it or put a pound sign on it. I can tell you it’s invaluable, priceless even; as is giving all young people access to creativity and the opportunity to study the arts, impressive career prospects or not.
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Princess of the Hither Isles
A Black Suffragist’s Story from the Jim Crow South
Adele Logan Alexander
392 pages, 6 1/8 x 9 1/4
9 b/w illus.
A compelling reconstruction of the life of a black suffragist, Adella Hunt Logan, blending family lore, historical research, and literary imagination
Born during the Civil War into a slaveholding family that included black, white, and Cherokee forebears, Adella Hunt Logan dedicated herself to advancing political and educational opportunities for the African American community. She taught at Alabama’s Tuskegee Institute but also joined the segregated woman suffrage movement, passing for white in order to fight for the rights of people of color. Her determination—as a wife, mother, scholar, and activist —to challenge the draconian restraints of race and gender generated conflicts that precipitated her tragic demise.
Historian Adele Logan Alexander—Adella Hunt Logan’s granddaughter—portrays Adella, her family, and contemporaries such as Booker T. Washington, Susan B. Anthony, Frederick Douglass, George Washington Carver, Theodore Roosevelt, and W. E. B. Du Bois. Alexander bridges the chasms that frustrate efforts to document the lives of those who traditionally have been silenced, weaving together family lore, historical research, and literary imagination into a riveting, multigenerational family saga.
Adele Logan Alexander taught for many years at George Washington University. She is the author of Ambiguous Lives: Free Women of Color in Rural Georgia, 1789–1879 and Homelands and Waterways: The American Journey of the Bond Family, 1846–1926.
“In her magnificently achieved book in which narrative verisimilitude compensates history’s indifference to the un-white, the poor, and the female, Adele Logan Alexander spins a multi-generational family saga of stunning interracial complexity, remarkable cosmopolitanism, and heart-rending injustice. Looming over their lives was slavery’s aftermath, the nemesis ultimately fatal to Alexander’s indomitably modern Princess.”—David Levering Lewis, author of W. E. B. Du Bois, recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for Biography and the Bancroft Prize in History
“If you combine the pleasures of a seductive novel, discovering a real American heroine, and learning the multiracial history of this country that wasn't in our textbooks, you will have an idea of the great gift that Adele Logan Alexander has given us in Princess of the Hither Isles. By writing about her own grandmother, she helps us discover our own country.”—Gloria Steinem
“There is a beauty in reading Adele Logan Alexander’s epic biography of her grandmother that comes with knowing it is, for her, a devotional act, not to romanticize the past but to set out fearlessly to unearth – and touch – its very heart. Alexander’s Princess of the Hither Isles is both a definitive rendering of a life and a remarkable study of the interplay of race and gender in an America whose shadows still haunt us today.”—Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Harvard University
“At the center of this extraordinary book is Adella Hunt Logan, the early 20th century suffragist, whose story has been shrouded by myth, inattention to race and gender, and the cruel ironies of biracial identity. In reconstructing her life through past generations, memoir, history, and fable come to life, Adele Alexander has given us a rich saga of family and nation.”—Paula J. Giddings is the author of IDA, A Sword Among Lions: Ida B. Wells and the Campaign Against Lynching
A Short History of the American West
Robert V. Hine and John Mack Faragher
Peace Now!
American Society and the Ending of the Vietnam War
Rhodri Jeffreys-Jones
An Early American History
Sarah M. S. Pearsall
The Iron Way
Railroads, the Civil War, and the Making of Modern America
William G. Thomas
Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy
Michael H. Hunt; With a New Afterword by the Author
The Souls of Black Folk
W. E. B.
History > African American Studies
Biography > Memoir
History > Women's Studies
History > Southern Studies
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