2024 Election

June 11, 2024 | Slate

Toni Aguilar Rosenthal Jeff Hauser

Op-Ed

2024 ElectionExecutive BranchProject 2025State Attorneys General

The Worst Possible Trump Attorney General Is the One He’d Be Likeliest to Pick

Donald Trump’s Department of Justice was a nightmare. Jeff Sessions, Trump’s first attorney general, dismantled civil rights and civil liberties protections, instituted heinously cruel border policies, and vociferously attacked the right to vote. William Barr, Sessions’s ignominious successor, then used his time at DOJ’s helm to overtly weaponize the department against voters and Trump’s political opponents.

June 05, 2024 | Revolving Door Project Newsletter

KJ Boyle

Newsletter 2024 ElectionCorporate Crackdown

Trump Is The Corporate Convict Candidate

Trump now holds the unique honor of being the first United States president convicted of a felony. This is a golden opportunity for the Biden campaign to highlight the glaring distinction between the candidates: Trump is a corporate criminal hellbent on using the presidency to further the interests of himself and other corporate criminals. President Biden has leveraged executive branch power to dismantle criminal practices that pad the pockets of corporations. After some initial hesitancy to touch on Trump’s conviction, Biden rightly appears poised to make this a forefront issue in the campaign.

April 15, 2024

Ananya Kalahasti Fatou Ndiaye

Interview 2024 ElectionCongressional OversightExecutive BranchGovernment Capacity

Unpacking The Federal Executive Branch, A Conversation With Vanderbilt University Professor David Lewis

Coverage of presidential elections typically hones in on contestants’ competing legislative visions, which in truth, tend to morph considerably when hit by the reality of an intransigent Congress. This prompts an important question: are presidential elections overrated? Well, before drawing that conclusion, consider one of the underrated consequences of a federal election: the potential for a new administration to alter the management of the federal workforce and the operations of individual departments within the executive branch. Although journalists eschew reporting of these consequences in favor of (legislatively focused) policy platforms and rallies, there is a wide body of academic research which investigates the impact of presidential administrations on the federal executive branch’s ability and capacity to fulfill its roles and responsibilities. 

September 06, 2023 | Revolving Door Project Newsletter

KJ Boyle

Newsletter 2024 ElectionEthics in GovernmentIndependent AgenciesJudiciaryLabor

Cracking Down on Judicial Corruption & Celebrating Pro-Labor Rulemaking

With Labor Day now behind us, Hot Labor Summer has come to a scorching end, but the labor movement is alive and well with several heavyweight bouts looming on the horizon. This transition time is the perfect moment to take stock of the Biden administration’s labor allyship — applauding recent rulemaking efforts, highlighting some shortcomings, and previewing some potential labor strikes coming this fall.

August 17, 2023 | The American Prospect

Timi Iwayemi

Op-Ed 2024 ElectionEthics in GovernmentFinancial RegulationGovernanceRevolving Door

The CFTC Ponders Gambling on Democracy’s Future

As long as one party remains totally united behind a man who attempted to overthrow the government by force, was the most corrupt president in American history, and undermines the public’s faith in elections at every turn, the future of American democratic self-government is at risk.

Sounds scary. But what if I told you this was a great opportunity for fun and profit? Silicon Valley–backed startup Kalshi is attempting to expand the amount of gambling on the country’s elections with the introduction of an “event contract” centered around congressional elections. Simply put, the firm aims to allow traders to bet on the event: Which party will win control of Congress?

June 01, 2023 | The American Prospect

Timi Iwayemi

Op-Ed 2024 ElectionEthics in GovernmentExecutive Branch

How to Cover a Presidential Campaign

As the past six years have clearly illuminated, hollowing out government capacity and rewarding loyalists is at the heart of the Trump gospel, and leveraging power is DeSantis’s modus operandi as well. As coverage of the Republican primaries ramps up, the press must focus on how this style of executive branch mismanagement endangers democracy and the public interest. That’s more important than trying to figure out if DeSantis has the personality to sell this anti-democratic vision.