Law & Public Policy Blog

Benjamin Whitney, JD Anticipated May 2022 Among President Biden’s very first acts as the nation’s forty-sixth chief executive was to recommit the United States to the Paris Climate Agreement (Paris). This move comes after the United States’ four-year absence from that international agreement under the Trump Administration. Paris is a watershed multilateral-treaty that brings together 196 adopting nations for one common, fundamental goal––limiting global warming to “well below 2ºC and preferably to 1.5ºC.” The treaty, notwithstanding the temporary absence of …

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Alexander Rojavin ’20, Law & Public Policy Scholar On April 5, Ukraine’s new Center for Countering Disinformation officially came online. Framed by its inaugural director Polina Lysenko as aiming to “to counteract propaganda, destructive disinformation and campaigns, as well as to prevent manipulation of public opinion,” the Center is designed to be a flagship of the Zelensky administration’s counter-disinformation efforts. The administration has every reason to hope for the Center’s success, and if it is indeed successful, the resulting benefits …

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Peter Limburg, JD Anticipated May 2022 Climate change is now more politically polarizing than any issue in American public discourse. In a recent poll from Yale University, American voters were asked to order topics by how important they were to their voting decision in the 2020 presidential election. For liberal Democrats, climate change came third in importance. For conservative Republicans, climate change ranked dead last, in the 29th slot. But it is important to note that global warming was not …

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Sultan-Mahmood Seraj, Law & Public Policy Scholar, JD Anticipated May 2021 The rapid growth of 5th Generation (5G) telecommunication networks and technology is revolutionizing global communication capabilities. The emergence of 5G wireless communication will allow for more connected devices to transmit data at far higher speeds than previously possible. These qualities make 5G transformative, as the technology can be used to accelerate the already rapid growth of Internet of Things (IoT) devices and the development of smart cities, fully autonomous …

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Alexander Rojavin ’20, Law & Public Policy Scholar President Biden assumes leadership of a nation facing a murderer’s row of crises, most of which he identified in a clear-eyed manner at his inauguration: an only-worsening pandemic, “growing inequity,” systems grappling with a legacy of discrimination, a suffering economy, a faltering education system, and a global arena that has spent four years without a particularly involved America. But President Biden also acknowledged that foremost among these, the most insidious crisis underlying, …

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Peter S. Konchak, Law & Public Policy Scholar, JD Anticipated May 2021 Nearly two-and-a-half centuries ago, our republic was conceived in accordance with the general will of the singular, sovereign people of a new nation. In that moment, the permanence of that republic—and that nation—was far from assured. Indeed, the history of that Union has, in no small measure, constituted a continuous struggle for the endurance of a people united in a manner unique in all of human history. For …

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Taylor Maurer, Law & Public Policy Scholar, JD Anticipated May 2022 Over the past summer, courthouses across the United States slowly began to reopen after having been closed since March of last year. The U.S. Supreme Court remains closed to the public, while the majority of states have suspended in-person proceedings either statewide or at the local level. Individuals facing criminal charges have been waiting behind bars because they have yet to be granted an arraignment and request bail. The …

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Brian Maguire, Law & Public Policy Scholar, JD Anticipated May 2022 The outbreak of Covid-19 has reshaped life as we know it. It has changed the way we work, the way we learn, the way we socialize, and—during the 2020 election season—it changed the way we voted. While many of our norms have been adapted to weather the storm we know as coronavirus, it is unclear whether any of these changes will become permanent. State and local jurisdictions all over …

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Araesia King, Law & Public Policy Scholar, JD Anticipated May 2021 The issue with breaking through glass ceilings is that it is nearly impossible to remove the shards. The small pieces of glass stick with you—painful reminders of what you overcame. History has revealed that progress is trauma and revolution is not linear. This is important to keep in mind while processing the recent election. Nothing compares to the sense of empowerment and visibility that I felt watching President Obama’s …

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Joshua Niemtzow, Law & Public Policy Scholar, JD Anticipated May 2021 On October 26th, the United States Senate voted to confirm then-Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court eight days before the 2020 U.S. presidential election. While Judge Barrett received the American Bar Association’s “well-qualified” rating in 2017 when she was confirmed for the 7th Circuit, her present confirmation has sparked intense political controversy and emotionality. That degree of passion and contention has primarily been produced by two realities: …

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