Think Tanks
Here's a look at documents from think tanks
Featured Stories
Ifo Institute: Rising Energy Prices and Low Water Levels Have Only a Limited Impact on the German Economy
MUNICH, Germany, Oct. 31 -- ifo Institute issued the following news release:
* * *
30 October 2026
Rising Energy Prices and Low Water Levels Have Only a Limited Impact on the German Economy
The sharp rise in energy prices and low water levels in German rivers weighed on industrial activity and the consumer economy in Germany in the third quarter of 2026. "Nevertheless, the upturn in the German economy has slowed only slightly," says Timo Wollmershauser, Head of Forecasts at ifo, commenting on the increase in gross domestic product by 0.2 percent. In the three previous quarters, economic output ... Show Full Article MUNICH, Germany, Oct. 31 -- ifo Institute issued the following news release: * * * 30 October 2026 Rising Energy Prices and Low Water Levels Have Only a Limited Impact on the German Economy The sharp rise in energy prices and low water levels in German rivers weighed on industrial activity and the consumer economy in Germany in the third quarter of 2026. "Nevertheless, the upturn in the German economy has slowed only slightly," says Timo Wollmershauser, Head of Forecasts at ifo, commenting on the increase in gross domestic product by 0.2 percent. In the three previous quarters, economic outputhad grown on average by 0.3 percent.
According to Wollmershauser, the German economy is likely to pick up steam again by the end of the year, and the upswing is expected to continue.
The improvement in the ifo Business Climate in recent months indicates that. While fiscal policy continues to provide a boost, recovery in the crisis-stricken manufacturing sector is gradually spreading.
As a result, companies in the electronics industry and mechanical engineering are benefiting from growing foreign demand and have significantly revised their export forecasts upward. Private consumption, on the other hand, continues to suffer from inflation, which is expected to pick up again during the winter half-year.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.ifo.de/en/pressemitteilung/2026-10-30/energiepreisanstieg-und-niedrigwasser-bremsen-deutsche-wirtschaft-nur-wenig-aus
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
30 October 2026
Rising Energy Prices and Low Water Levels Have Only a Limited Impact on the German Economy
The sharp rise in energy prices and low water levels in German rivers weighed on industrial activity and the consumer economy in Germany in the third quarter of 2026. "Nevertheless, the upturn in the German economy has slowed only slightly," says Timo Wollmershauser, Head of Forecasts at ifo, commenting on the increase in gross domestic product by 0.2 percent. In the three previous quarters, economic output ... Show Full Article MUNICH, Germany, Oct. 31 -- ifo Institute issued the following news release: * * * 30 October 2026 Rising Energy Prices and Low Water Levels Have Only a Limited Impact on the German Economy The sharp rise in energy prices and low water levels in German rivers weighed on industrial activity and the consumer economy in Germany in the third quarter of 2026. "Nevertheless, the upturn in the German economy has slowed only slightly," says Timo Wollmershauser, Head of Forecasts at ifo, commenting on the increase in gross domestic product by 0.2 percent. In the three previous quarters, economic outputhad grown on average by 0.3 percent.
According to Wollmershauser, the German economy is likely to pick up steam again by the end of the year, and the upswing is expected to continue.
The improvement in the ifo Business Climate in recent months indicates that. While fiscal policy continues to provide a boost, recovery in the crisis-stricken manufacturing sector is gradually spreading.
As a result, companies in the electronics industry and mechanical engineering are benefiting from growing foreign demand and have significantly revised their export forecasts upward. Private consumption, on the other hand, continues to suffer from inflation, which is expected to pick up again during the winter half-year.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.ifo.de/en/pressemitteilung/2026-10-30/energiepreisanstieg-und-niedrigwasser-bremsen-deutsche-wirtschaft-nur-wenig-aus
[Category: ThinkTank]
Hudson Institute Issues Commentary: Latin America Policy Is About to Get More Complicated
WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary to The Dispatch:
* * *
Oct 30, 2026
The Dispatch
Latin America Policy Is About to Get More Complicated
Gil Guerra
When future historians try to pinpoint the high-water mark of the second Trump administration's Latin America policy, they may very well settle on March 7, 2026, and the inaugural Shield of the Americas summit.
That Saturday, at his golf resort in Doral, Florida, President Donald Trump addressed a dozen leaders ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary to The Dispatch: * * * Oct 30, 2026 The Dispatch Latin America Policy Is About to Get More Complicated Gil Guerra When future historians try to pinpoint the high-water mark of the second Trump administration's Latin America policy, they may very well settle on March 7, 2026, and the inaugural Shield of the Americas summit. That Saturday, at his golf resort in Doral, Florida, President Donald Trump addressed a dozen leadersfrom Latin America and the Caribbean. On hand were old friends like Javier Milei, the Argentine firebrand whose ardent support Trump could always count on, and El Salvador's Nayib Bukele, one of the administration's most enthusiastic partners on immigration enforcement.
Promising new allies were present too, like Bolivia's Rodrigo Paz and Chile's Jose Antonio Kast. Even once-prickly partners like Panama's Jose Raul Mulino had come more fully into the fold.
The heads of the assembled countries were open to partnering with Washington, and it wasn't hard to understand why. Trump was riding high on the spectacular success of Operation Absolute Resolve, the January raid that had captured Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro and wiped out 32 of his Cuban bodyguards without losing a single American life. True, Venezuela had not democratized overnight, and some allies were uneasy about the new role of interim president Delcy Rodriguez. But the raid had demonstrated that Washington was serious about prioritizing the region, a shift that held tantalizing prospects of greater investment and security assistance.
It could pay to be America's friend, and it could be exceptionally painful to be its enemy. Cuba had been starved of oil for almost three months and was resorting to putting state workers on a four-day workweek to save fuel. On the day of the summit, about two-thirds of the island was without power, and the regime's total collapse was treated almost as a foregone conclusion. In Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo's dictatorship had hurriedly scrapped its visa-free policy for Cubans shortly after the Maduro raid, in an apparent attempt to avoid drawing American ire. Nonstate actors were also feeling the weight of the new American commitment to the region: The U.S. had carried out 34 strikes on suspected drug boats to that point, and showed no signs of slowing down.
Relations with Mexico had been transformed too. Under the Biden administration, the border had served as a leverage point for Mexico. But now Claudia Sheinbaum's government was cooperating with the United States on border enforcement, and border encounter numbers had plunged to record lows. American pressure also had led Sheinbaum's government to halt oil shipments to Cuba, and it had extradited 92 cartel figures to American custody. Perhaps wary of the Trump administration's undisguised appetite for unilateral military operations on its soil, Mexico had also just worked with U.S. intelligence to carry out its most ambitious operation against a drug kingpin in years.
The United States seemed capable of squeezing friend and foe alike to get what it wanted, and no one could say with certainty what it might do next, or whether there were limits to what it could achieve. Almost eight months later, some of those limits are beginning to crystallize. The Iran war has become a counterexample to the decisive outcome of Operation Absolute Resolve, Trump's attention has been diverted by domestic political issues, and developments in the region have taken a few surprising turns.
Right-wing momentum stalls.
A string of right-wing political victories in the region has buoyed the Trump administration's strategy. From January 2025 to July 2026, conservative candidates won all seven presidential elections in Latin America. Trump ally Flavio Bolsonaro's lead in the first round of Brazil's election raised hopes that South America's largest country would soon throw its considerable weight behind the administration's regional efforts.
Instead, Bolsonaro lost in a surprise upset to leftist incumbent Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and found himself going from being the president-in-waiting to having to flee the country for the United States for fear of being arrested by Lula's government.
Bolsonaro's loss is not the only complication for the administration's hemispheric strategy. The region's right has seen a drop in popularity: Seven of the 11 right-of-center presidents in Latin America have negative approval ratings, and only Bukele and Costa Rica's Laura Fernandez command the support of comfortable majorities.
Some are also hedging by strengthening ties with China. Ecuador's Daniel Noboa made his first state visit to China in August, Chile has reaffirmed the one-China policy, Kast is meeting with Xi Jinping at the APEC summit in Shenzhen next month, and Peru's Keiko Fujimori has reportedly assured China that Peru attaches great importance to its ties with the nation.
Progress in Venezuela, site of the administration's crowning foreign policy achievement, has been rocky. A devastating set of earthquakes in June set back the country's recovery efforts. Impatient with the private sector's unwillingness to commit to revitalizing Venezuela's oil industry, the White House directly facilitated and joined an oil deal some of its usual supporters have been critical of.
The return of Maria Corina Machado, Venezuela's leading opposition figure, also introduces an element of turbulence into the stability the administration has thus far enjoyed in Venezuela. Calls for elections are growing in strength, and the political situation threatens to begin taking on a life of its own.
Far from collapsing or acquiescing, Cuba and Nicaragua have only grown more brazen in their hostility toward the United States. At the U.N. this week, a Cuban diplomat tried to interrupt Ambassador Mike Waltz's remarks on the embargo and made physical contact with an American diplomat. Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel later swore that Cuba "will not back down ... in the face of Yankee pressures and orders."
The Nicaraguan regime has gone even further, shamelessly consolidating its grip on power through an announcement that the country would cease to hold elections, a declaration later converted to a formal constitutional reform process that would see Ortega and Murillo functionally installed as dictators for life.
Out of focus.
What happened? Rightly or wrongly, many actors in the region have determined that the American approach to the region is not going to be the one Washington seemed to be taking in March, for three broad reasons.
First, in his own rhetoric, Trump has repeatedly stated that the U.S. will deal with Cuba after it finishes with Iran. This may be honest and even prudent, but the lessons the Cubans (and the Nicaraguans, who are sometimes mentioned as being next on the administration's to-do list after Cuba) have taken from it are that they are safe as long as the U.S. remains mired in war with Iran. They have evidently decided that they can hold out until the midterm elections, when they expect Republican losses will weaken the president and potentially restrain his Western Hemisphere policy further.
Second, the administration's priorities have sometimes come across as inconsistent. The crux of current American regional strategy, as outlined at the Doral summit, is that the U.S. will not "allow hostile foreign influence to gain a foothold in this hemisphere." This was clearly aimed at China and Russia, but since then, Trump has made a state visit to China, hosted Xi Jinping at the White House, and generally taken a more conciliatory approach to U.S.-China relations than expected.
A military pact with Nicaragua that Russia ratified in April was not met with a dramatic response, and Trump has recently sought to bargain with Russia as well. These developments have made it more difficult for Latin American leaders to discern exactly where the administration's lines are when it comes to engaging with China and Russia.
Third, the United States has not always treated its friends in a friendly manner. Nine of the 12 governments in the Shield of the Americas coalition in March were hit by the forced-labor tariffs that Washington announced in July. These tariffs were particularly harsh for Chile, whose strategic importance and friendly president couldn't save it from being placed in the highest tariff tier of 12.5 percent. The message actions such as these have conveyed is that spending political capital to align with Washington doesn't necessarily buy protection or preferential treatment.
None of this means that Washington has walked away from the region, that it has neglected its partners, or that it has given up on Cuba and Nicaragua. The U.S. has announced plans for $1 billion in security assistance to Colombia, continues to signal forthcoming action in Cuba, and is increasing its scrutiny of the Ortega-Murillo regime.
But compared with how things stood in March, the regional order that Operation Absolute Resolve seemed to be ushering in now appears far less certain.
Running out the clock.
Next week's midterms could further complicate the administration's hemispheric strategy. If Democrats win the Senate and the House, they will likely use their subpoena power to investigate a number of the administration's actions in the region, from the drug-boat strikes to the terms of the Venezuelan oil deal to the State Department's role in the Brazilian election. They could also use spending bills to limit the tools at the White House's disposal. This could include barring funds for unauthorized military actions against Cuba or restricting the Pentagon office that holds Washington's stake in the Venezuelan oil deal.
However, it seems unlikely that Democrats will gain the supermajorities necessary to override a White House veto, and paradoxically a political environment that limits Trump's ability to pass his agenda in Congress could lead him to focus more on foreign policy, where the executive branch enjoys its broadest remit.
Regardless of the midterms' outcome, the administration will have its hands full in the region. Bolsonaro's flight to the U.S. will create another recurring issue in relations with Brazil, and consequential trade talks with Mexico are ongoing.
A military operation in Cuba could also be in the cards. Despite Trump's professed confidence that a deal with the island's communist leaders will come together, diplomacy appears to have stalled. While tensions with the Cuban government have been simmering for months, given Trump's particular loathing for being defied or insulted publicly, Cuban behavior at the U.N. this week could prove to be a tipping point.
While Cuba has rightly become a core issue in the administration's regional strategy, the U.S. might have an easier time reestablishing deterrence and credibility in the region by mounting a swift response to the growing problems in Nicaragua. The region is united in its view that Nicaragua has become a destabilizing presence, and the Nicaraguan regime has never faced the kind of pressure campaign the United States could bring to bear upon it. Taking decisive action against the Nicaraguan dictatorship would send a message to both the Cuban regime and remaining Chavista figures in Venezuela that Operation Absolute Resolve was not a one-off but rather the opening move toward establishing a safer, more prosperous democratic order.
The stability of that order will require the U.S. to demonstrate a willingness to make trade-offs that benefit its friends, such as conditional tariff relief for countries that continue to align with Washington. Perhaps most important, it will also require the U.S. to see the return of democracy to Venezuela through to the end. If the U.S. can prove that it is capable not only of destroying things that are evil but also of building things that are good, American power will seem like something to follow rather than to fear.
Read in The Dispatch (https://thedispatch.com/article/latin-america-trump-donroe-doctrine-venezuela-brazil/?gift_key=d7f35ea38a7c01a2&gift_ref=5022860&utm_source=giftlink&utm_campaign=membergift&utm_medium=copy_link).
* * *
Gil Guerra is a fellow at Hudson Institute. He specializes in United States strategy for the Western Hemisphere, with a focus on the political, economic, and security dynamics shaping Latin America and the Caribbean and their implications for US interests.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.hudson.org/foreign-policy/latin-america-policy-about-get-more-complicated-venezuela-mexico-argentinagil-guerra
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
Oct 30, 2026
The Dispatch
Latin America Policy Is About to Get More Complicated
Gil Guerra
When future historians try to pinpoint the high-water mark of the second Trump administration's Latin America policy, they may very well settle on March 7, 2026, and the inaugural Shield of the Americas summit.
That Saturday, at his golf resort in Doral, Florida, President Donald Trump addressed a dozen leaders ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary to The Dispatch: * * * Oct 30, 2026 The Dispatch Latin America Policy Is About to Get More Complicated Gil Guerra When future historians try to pinpoint the high-water mark of the second Trump administration's Latin America policy, they may very well settle on March 7, 2026, and the inaugural Shield of the Americas summit. That Saturday, at his golf resort in Doral, Florida, President Donald Trump addressed a dozen leadersfrom Latin America and the Caribbean. On hand were old friends like Javier Milei, the Argentine firebrand whose ardent support Trump could always count on, and El Salvador's Nayib Bukele, one of the administration's most enthusiastic partners on immigration enforcement.
Promising new allies were present too, like Bolivia's Rodrigo Paz and Chile's Jose Antonio Kast. Even once-prickly partners like Panama's Jose Raul Mulino had come more fully into the fold.
The heads of the assembled countries were open to partnering with Washington, and it wasn't hard to understand why. Trump was riding high on the spectacular success of Operation Absolute Resolve, the January raid that had captured Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro and wiped out 32 of his Cuban bodyguards without losing a single American life. True, Venezuela had not democratized overnight, and some allies were uneasy about the new role of interim president Delcy Rodriguez. But the raid had demonstrated that Washington was serious about prioritizing the region, a shift that held tantalizing prospects of greater investment and security assistance.
It could pay to be America's friend, and it could be exceptionally painful to be its enemy. Cuba had been starved of oil for almost three months and was resorting to putting state workers on a four-day workweek to save fuel. On the day of the summit, about two-thirds of the island was without power, and the regime's total collapse was treated almost as a foregone conclusion. In Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo's dictatorship had hurriedly scrapped its visa-free policy for Cubans shortly after the Maduro raid, in an apparent attempt to avoid drawing American ire. Nonstate actors were also feeling the weight of the new American commitment to the region: The U.S. had carried out 34 strikes on suspected drug boats to that point, and showed no signs of slowing down.
Relations with Mexico had been transformed too. Under the Biden administration, the border had served as a leverage point for Mexico. But now Claudia Sheinbaum's government was cooperating with the United States on border enforcement, and border encounter numbers had plunged to record lows. American pressure also had led Sheinbaum's government to halt oil shipments to Cuba, and it had extradited 92 cartel figures to American custody. Perhaps wary of the Trump administration's undisguised appetite for unilateral military operations on its soil, Mexico had also just worked with U.S. intelligence to carry out its most ambitious operation against a drug kingpin in years.
The United States seemed capable of squeezing friend and foe alike to get what it wanted, and no one could say with certainty what it might do next, or whether there were limits to what it could achieve. Almost eight months later, some of those limits are beginning to crystallize. The Iran war has become a counterexample to the decisive outcome of Operation Absolute Resolve, Trump's attention has been diverted by domestic political issues, and developments in the region have taken a few surprising turns.
Right-wing momentum stalls.
A string of right-wing political victories in the region has buoyed the Trump administration's strategy. From January 2025 to July 2026, conservative candidates won all seven presidential elections in Latin America. Trump ally Flavio Bolsonaro's lead in the first round of Brazil's election raised hopes that South America's largest country would soon throw its considerable weight behind the administration's regional efforts.
Instead, Bolsonaro lost in a surprise upset to leftist incumbent Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and found himself going from being the president-in-waiting to having to flee the country for the United States for fear of being arrested by Lula's government.
Bolsonaro's loss is not the only complication for the administration's hemispheric strategy. The region's right has seen a drop in popularity: Seven of the 11 right-of-center presidents in Latin America have negative approval ratings, and only Bukele and Costa Rica's Laura Fernandez command the support of comfortable majorities.
Some are also hedging by strengthening ties with China. Ecuador's Daniel Noboa made his first state visit to China in August, Chile has reaffirmed the one-China policy, Kast is meeting with Xi Jinping at the APEC summit in Shenzhen next month, and Peru's Keiko Fujimori has reportedly assured China that Peru attaches great importance to its ties with the nation.
Progress in Venezuela, site of the administration's crowning foreign policy achievement, has been rocky. A devastating set of earthquakes in June set back the country's recovery efforts. Impatient with the private sector's unwillingness to commit to revitalizing Venezuela's oil industry, the White House directly facilitated and joined an oil deal some of its usual supporters have been critical of.
The return of Maria Corina Machado, Venezuela's leading opposition figure, also introduces an element of turbulence into the stability the administration has thus far enjoyed in Venezuela. Calls for elections are growing in strength, and the political situation threatens to begin taking on a life of its own.
Far from collapsing or acquiescing, Cuba and Nicaragua have only grown more brazen in their hostility toward the United States. At the U.N. this week, a Cuban diplomat tried to interrupt Ambassador Mike Waltz's remarks on the embargo and made physical contact with an American diplomat. Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel later swore that Cuba "will not back down ... in the face of Yankee pressures and orders."
The Nicaraguan regime has gone even further, shamelessly consolidating its grip on power through an announcement that the country would cease to hold elections, a declaration later converted to a formal constitutional reform process that would see Ortega and Murillo functionally installed as dictators for life.
Out of focus.
What happened? Rightly or wrongly, many actors in the region have determined that the American approach to the region is not going to be the one Washington seemed to be taking in March, for three broad reasons.
First, in his own rhetoric, Trump has repeatedly stated that the U.S. will deal with Cuba after it finishes with Iran. This may be honest and even prudent, but the lessons the Cubans (and the Nicaraguans, who are sometimes mentioned as being next on the administration's to-do list after Cuba) have taken from it are that they are safe as long as the U.S. remains mired in war with Iran. They have evidently decided that they can hold out until the midterm elections, when they expect Republican losses will weaken the president and potentially restrain his Western Hemisphere policy further.
Second, the administration's priorities have sometimes come across as inconsistent. The crux of current American regional strategy, as outlined at the Doral summit, is that the U.S. will not "allow hostile foreign influence to gain a foothold in this hemisphere." This was clearly aimed at China and Russia, but since then, Trump has made a state visit to China, hosted Xi Jinping at the White House, and generally taken a more conciliatory approach to U.S.-China relations than expected.
A military pact with Nicaragua that Russia ratified in April was not met with a dramatic response, and Trump has recently sought to bargain with Russia as well. These developments have made it more difficult for Latin American leaders to discern exactly where the administration's lines are when it comes to engaging with China and Russia.
Third, the United States has not always treated its friends in a friendly manner. Nine of the 12 governments in the Shield of the Americas coalition in March were hit by the forced-labor tariffs that Washington announced in July. These tariffs were particularly harsh for Chile, whose strategic importance and friendly president couldn't save it from being placed in the highest tariff tier of 12.5 percent. The message actions such as these have conveyed is that spending political capital to align with Washington doesn't necessarily buy protection or preferential treatment.
None of this means that Washington has walked away from the region, that it has neglected its partners, or that it has given up on Cuba and Nicaragua. The U.S. has announced plans for $1 billion in security assistance to Colombia, continues to signal forthcoming action in Cuba, and is increasing its scrutiny of the Ortega-Murillo regime.
But compared with how things stood in March, the regional order that Operation Absolute Resolve seemed to be ushering in now appears far less certain.
Running out the clock.
Next week's midterms could further complicate the administration's hemispheric strategy. If Democrats win the Senate and the House, they will likely use their subpoena power to investigate a number of the administration's actions in the region, from the drug-boat strikes to the terms of the Venezuelan oil deal to the State Department's role in the Brazilian election. They could also use spending bills to limit the tools at the White House's disposal. This could include barring funds for unauthorized military actions against Cuba or restricting the Pentagon office that holds Washington's stake in the Venezuelan oil deal.
However, it seems unlikely that Democrats will gain the supermajorities necessary to override a White House veto, and paradoxically a political environment that limits Trump's ability to pass his agenda in Congress could lead him to focus more on foreign policy, where the executive branch enjoys its broadest remit.
Regardless of the midterms' outcome, the administration will have its hands full in the region. Bolsonaro's flight to the U.S. will create another recurring issue in relations with Brazil, and consequential trade talks with Mexico are ongoing.
A military operation in Cuba could also be in the cards. Despite Trump's professed confidence that a deal with the island's communist leaders will come together, diplomacy appears to have stalled. While tensions with the Cuban government have been simmering for months, given Trump's particular loathing for being defied or insulted publicly, Cuban behavior at the U.N. this week could prove to be a tipping point.
While Cuba has rightly become a core issue in the administration's regional strategy, the U.S. might have an easier time reestablishing deterrence and credibility in the region by mounting a swift response to the growing problems in Nicaragua. The region is united in its view that Nicaragua has become a destabilizing presence, and the Nicaraguan regime has never faced the kind of pressure campaign the United States could bring to bear upon it. Taking decisive action against the Nicaraguan dictatorship would send a message to both the Cuban regime and remaining Chavista figures in Venezuela that Operation Absolute Resolve was not a one-off but rather the opening move toward establishing a safer, more prosperous democratic order.
The stability of that order will require the U.S. to demonstrate a willingness to make trade-offs that benefit its friends, such as conditional tariff relief for countries that continue to align with Washington. Perhaps most important, it will also require the U.S. to see the return of democracy to Venezuela through to the end. If the U.S. can prove that it is capable not only of destroying things that are evil but also of building things that are good, American power will seem like something to follow rather than to fear.
Read in The Dispatch (https://thedispatch.com/article/latin-america-trump-donroe-doctrine-venezuela-brazil/?gift_key=d7f35ea38a7c01a2&gift_ref=5022860&utm_source=giftlink&utm_campaign=membergift&utm_medium=copy_link).
* * *
Gil Guerra is a fellow at Hudson Institute. He specializes in United States strategy for the Western Hemisphere, with a focus on the political, economic, and security dynamics shaping Latin America and the Caribbean and their implications for US interests.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.hudson.org/foreign-policy/latin-america-policy-about-get-more-complicated-venezuela-mexico-argentinagil-guerra
[Category: ThinkTank]
Center for American Progress: Plan Outlines Practical Steps To Make America's Food, Drinking Water, and Everyday Products Safer
WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Center for American Progress issued the following news release:
* * *
Oct 30, 2026
New Plan Outlines Practical Steps To Make America's Food, Drinking Water, and Everyday Products Safer
Washington, D.C.-- A new report from the Center for American Progress outlines a comprehensive plan to protect Americans from unsafe food, contaminated drinking water, and toxic chemicals in everyday products. The new report continues to build out CAP's new science-based agenda that would remove corporate and political influence from regulatory agencies and empower families to make ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Center for American Progress issued the following news release: * * * Oct 30, 2026 New Plan Outlines Practical Steps To Make America's Food, Drinking Water, and Everyday Products Safer Washington, D.C.-- A new report from the Center for American Progress outlines a comprehensive plan to protect Americans from unsafe food, contaminated drinking water, and toxic chemicals in everyday products. The new report continues to build out CAP's new science-based agenda that would remove corporate and political influence from regulatory agencies and empower families to makehealthy choices.
Americans overwhelmingly express concerns about the safety of the products they consume. 176 million Americans are drinking water that has tested positive for cancer-linked forever chemicals, 1 in 6 Americans gets sick from contaminated food every year, ultra-processed foods account for 70 percent of packaged foods and beverages in the United States, and nearly 14 million children face food insecurity. Yet the Trump administration has rolled back protections against toxic chemicals, weakened food safety enforcement, and cut nutrition programs.
"The Trump administration has weakened safeguards that protect the safety of food, drinking water, and consumer products, undermining public health," said Jill Rosenthal, director of public health policy at CAP and co-author of the report. "Americans want their government to put their health and safety above corporate profits. By strengthening oversight, empowering families, and investing in programs that promote access to toxic-free and minimally processed products, we can prevent harm and improve lives."
CAP outlines a series of actions to strengthen consumer protections and improve Americans' health, including:
* Stronger oversight of toxic chemicals. CAP proposes establishing stronger federal limits on heavy metals in food, especially foods that are consumed by children, banning dangerous pesticides, and restoring PFAS protections in drinking water.
* Restoring food safety inspections and corporate accountability. CAP urges leaders to adequately fund the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to improve food contamination tracking, oversight of infant formula safety, and corporate accountability.
* Closing loopholes on unsafe ingredients. CAP proposes an end to the "Generally Recognized As Safe" loophole that allows food manufacturers to declare ingredients as safe without FDA oversight. Additional proposals include strengthening safety reviews of cosmetics and dietary supplements before they reach consumers and requiring companies to disclose potentially harmful ingredients.
* Clearer information for families. CAP outlines requiring easy-to-understand nutrition labels on the front of food packaging, strengthening protections against misleading marketing, and limits to marketing of unhealthy food to children.
* Greater access to affordable, healthy food. CAP's plan outlines expanding incentives for fruits and vegetables, investing in local farmers and food systems, restoring nutrition assistance programs, and ensuring underserved communities have access to nutritious foods.
* Protecting underserved communities. CAP recommends solutions to address the root causes of unequal exposure to harm and to expand access to safe, healthy, affordable food and products for all communities.
* Trusting independent science over corporate influence. CAP highlights the need to strengthen federal consumer protection agencies, improve product recalls and enforcement, and ensure federal dietary guidelines are backed by scientific evidence.
Read the report: "A Plan To Provide Americans With Healthy and Safe Food, Drinking Water, and Consumer Products" (https://www.americanprogress.org/article/a-plan-to-provide-americans-with-healthy-and-safe-food-drinking-water-and-consumer-products/) by Jill Rosenthal and Kierra Jones
For more information or to speak with an expert, please contact Christian Unkenholz at cunkenholz@americanprogress.org.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.americanprogress.org/press/release-new-plan-outlines-practical-steps-to-make-americas-food-drinking-water-and-everyday-products-safer/
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
Oct 30, 2026
New Plan Outlines Practical Steps To Make America's Food, Drinking Water, and Everyday Products Safer
Washington, D.C.-- A new report from the Center for American Progress outlines a comprehensive plan to protect Americans from unsafe food, contaminated drinking water, and toxic chemicals in everyday products. The new report continues to build out CAP's new science-based agenda that would remove corporate and political influence from regulatory agencies and empower families to make ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Center for American Progress issued the following news release: * * * Oct 30, 2026 New Plan Outlines Practical Steps To Make America's Food, Drinking Water, and Everyday Products Safer Washington, D.C.-- A new report from the Center for American Progress outlines a comprehensive plan to protect Americans from unsafe food, contaminated drinking water, and toxic chemicals in everyday products. The new report continues to build out CAP's new science-based agenda that would remove corporate and political influence from regulatory agencies and empower families to makehealthy choices.
Americans overwhelmingly express concerns about the safety of the products they consume. 176 million Americans are drinking water that has tested positive for cancer-linked forever chemicals, 1 in 6 Americans gets sick from contaminated food every year, ultra-processed foods account for 70 percent of packaged foods and beverages in the United States, and nearly 14 million children face food insecurity. Yet the Trump administration has rolled back protections against toxic chemicals, weakened food safety enforcement, and cut nutrition programs.
"The Trump administration has weakened safeguards that protect the safety of food, drinking water, and consumer products, undermining public health," said Jill Rosenthal, director of public health policy at CAP and co-author of the report. "Americans want their government to put their health and safety above corporate profits. By strengthening oversight, empowering families, and investing in programs that promote access to toxic-free and minimally processed products, we can prevent harm and improve lives."
CAP outlines a series of actions to strengthen consumer protections and improve Americans' health, including:
* Stronger oversight of toxic chemicals. CAP proposes establishing stronger federal limits on heavy metals in food, especially foods that are consumed by children, banning dangerous pesticides, and restoring PFAS protections in drinking water.
* Restoring food safety inspections and corporate accountability. CAP urges leaders to adequately fund the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to improve food contamination tracking, oversight of infant formula safety, and corporate accountability.
* Closing loopholes on unsafe ingredients. CAP proposes an end to the "Generally Recognized As Safe" loophole that allows food manufacturers to declare ingredients as safe without FDA oversight. Additional proposals include strengthening safety reviews of cosmetics and dietary supplements before they reach consumers and requiring companies to disclose potentially harmful ingredients.
* Clearer information for families. CAP outlines requiring easy-to-understand nutrition labels on the front of food packaging, strengthening protections against misleading marketing, and limits to marketing of unhealthy food to children.
* Greater access to affordable, healthy food. CAP's plan outlines expanding incentives for fruits and vegetables, investing in local farmers and food systems, restoring nutrition assistance programs, and ensuring underserved communities have access to nutritious foods.
* Protecting underserved communities. CAP recommends solutions to address the root causes of unequal exposure to harm and to expand access to safe, healthy, affordable food and products for all communities.
* Trusting independent science over corporate influence. CAP highlights the need to strengthen federal consumer protection agencies, improve product recalls and enforcement, and ensure federal dietary guidelines are backed by scientific evidence.
Read the report: "A Plan To Provide Americans With Healthy and Safe Food, Drinking Water, and Consumer Products" (https://www.americanprogress.org/article/a-plan-to-provide-americans-with-healthy-and-safe-food-drinking-water-and-consumer-products/) by Jill Rosenthal and Kierra Jones
For more information or to speak with an expert, please contact Christian Unkenholz at cunkenholz@americanprogress.org.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.americanprogress.org/press/release-new-plan-outlines-practical-steps-to-make-americas-food-drinking-water-and-everyday-products-safer/
[Category: ThinkTank]
Capital Research Center Issues Commentary: Schools for Bullies ... But Not for the Rest of the Kids
WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Capital Research Center issued the following commentary:
* * *
Schools for bullies ... but not for the rest of the kids
Whether out of fear, union pressure, or institutional culture, the duty to protect children is getting routinely abandoned. School choice is how embattled families are escaping.
by Kali Fontanilla
October 30, 2026
Editor's note: as part of a series of essays rated "Best of 2026" by our staff, this is a repost of an article that appeared earlier this year.
-
I recently attended a webinar hosted by the Heritage Foundation titled "Policy Answers ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Capital Research Center issued the following commentary: * * * Schools for bullies ... but not for the rest of the kids Whether out of fear, union pressure, or institutional culture, the duty to protect children is getting routinely abandoned. School choice is how embattled families are escaping. by Kali Fontanilla October 30, 2026 Editor's note: as part of a series of essays rated "Best of 2026" by our staff, this is a repost of an article that appeared earlier this year. - I recently attended a webinar hosted by the Heritage Foundation titled "Policy Answersto Bullying in Public Schools." What immediately stood out was not just the data, which is grim enough, but how clearly it exposed a system that has learned how to legitimize dysfunction while ignoring worried parents. I came away from the webinar with the unsettling conclusion that our public schools are no longer safe.
The most powerful moment came from a black father named Stephen Gilchrist, who is also the Commissioner of Civil Rights for the Trump administration. He shared a heart-wrenching story about what his family endured inside a public school system that claimed it took bullying seriously. His teenage son experienced relentless bullying at his public high school, including being repeatedly punched on the basketball court while teachers stood nearby, scrolling on their phones. When he picked up his son, his face was swollen and bruised. On another occasion, a student took a photo of his son while he was using the bathroom and shared it with classmates online. The caption read: "caught this N word taking a sh*t." The student who posted it was also black, which mattered because it immediately undercut the lazy racial narratives schools often hide behind. He stated that his son could take the physical fighting and the name-calling, but the photo of his moment in the bathroom, this pleading father stated that it "broke his son."
This father did what parents are told to do. He documented everything. He emailed the school more than 180 times. Each incident was met with lip service, promises of "restorative conversations," and assurances that the school was "handling it internally." Nothing changed. The bullies were allowed to stay.
At one point, the district closed the bathroom case entirely. Their explanation was chilling. "Because you and your wife did not file Title IX, the district said the case was closed." Title IX, which was designed to protect students from sex-based discrimination, was now being used as a procedural shield to avoid disciplining violent and abusive students, especially when misconduct is classified as sexual in nature, such as taking photos of a child in a bathroom. As was cited during the seminar, schools are increasingly pointing to the Trump administration's revised Title IX regulations as justification for declining to investigate or discipline at all. The message was clear: if you do not navigate the bureaucracy perfectly, your child is trapped.
Eventually, this father pulled his son from the school. The bullying never stopped, and the system refused to protect him.
This story is not an outlier. Roughly one in three students experiences bullying. According to federal data from the National Center for Education Statistics, the incidence of cyberbullying doubled between the 2009-10 and 2019-20 school years. Even more alarming, the FBI reported that roughly 1.3 million criminal incidents occurred at our public schools between 2020 and 2024. This is with only half of law enforcement agencies reporting, and during a period when many schools were still partially closed. The real number is much higher.
The response from schools has not been to remove bullies. Instead, the victimized students are often reclassified into special needs categories. One panelist noted that students with special needs are disproportionately victims of bullying, even though many of those students don't belong in special needs classes academically, but because schools would rather move the victim than confront the aggressor. It is easier to change a child's label than to enforce discipline.
The webinar also addressed the rise in antisemitism in schools. One example cited was the incident at Cooper Union, a college in New York, where Jewish students reportedly hid in a library to escape hostile protesters. Parents and students are told to file civil rights complaints with the Department of Education, but experience shows that federal enforcement is slow, selective, and unreliable.
The uncomfortable truth is that parents cannot depend on federal law to protect their children. Mandated reporting laws require teachers to report abuse, including abuse inflicted by other students. But many do not. Whether out of fear, union pressure, or institutional culture, the duty to protect children is routinely abandoned.
Against this backdrop, school choice is not a luxury. It is a necessity. There are roughly 50 million K-12 students in the United States, yet only about 1 million currently use school choice. That number is growing rapidly, not just because of ideology, but because families are fleeing systems that no longer function safely for their children.
The scale of the exodus is unprecedented. Arizona has seen enrollment drops exceeding 100,000 students. Florida now has approximately 500,000 students using education savings accounts, out of roughly 3 million students statewide. Districts are closing schools, blaming demographic shifts and declining birth rates (which is happening too), while refusing to acknowledge that parents are voting with their feet.
Federal law already recognizes the problem of bullying in our schools. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act requires districts to report persistently dangerous schools and offer families the option to transfer. In the 2021-22 school year, not a single school nationwide was reported as persistently dangerous. That changed only after pressure from the Trump administration through a Dear Colleague letter, which forced some states to begin reporting honestly.
Florida's Hope Scholarship, designed to help victims of bullying escape unsafe schools, and federal education freedom tax credits that fund scholarships in non-school choice states, point the way to what real solutions can look like. They bypass bureaucracies that protect institutions and instead empower families.
The takeaway from the Heritage webinar was not just that bullying is widespread. It is that the system is accommodating it. While appearing to address the issue on the surface, in reality, the problem is allowed to grow. Until families are given real power to leave unsafe environments, no cliche anti-bullying acronym, or federal report, or useless district policy will fix what has become standard operating procedure in too many American schools.
* * *
Kali Fontanilla
Kali is serving as CRC's Senior fellow, particularly focusing on topics related to K-12 public education.
* * *
Original text here: https://capitalresearch.org/article/schools-for-bullies-but-not-for-the-rest-of-the-kids-best-of/
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
Schools for bullies ... but not for the rest of the kids
Whether out of fear, union pressure, or institutional culture, the duty to protect children is getting routinely abandoned. School choice is how embattled families are escaping.
by Kali Fontanilla
October 30, 2026
Editor's note: as part of a series of essays rated "Best of 2026" by our staff, this is a repost of an article that appeared earlier this year.
-
I recently attended a webinar hosted by the Heritage Foundation titled "Policy Answers ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Capital Research Center issued the following commentary: * * * Schools for bullies ... but not for the rest of the kids Whether out of fear, union pressure, or institutional culture, the duty to protect children is getting routinely abandoned. School choice is how embattled families are escaping. by Kali Fontanilla October 30, 2026 Editor's note: as part of a series of essays rated "Best of 2026" by our staff, this is a repost of an article that appeared earlier this year. - I recently attended a webinar hosted by the Heritage Foundation titled "Policy Answersto Bullying in Public Schools." What immediately stood out was not just the data, which is grim enough, but how clearly it exposed a system that has learned how to legitimize dysfunction while ignoring worried parents. I came away from the webinar with the unsettling conclusion that our public schools are no longer safe.
The most powerful moment came from a black father named Stephen Gilchrist, who is also the Commissioner of Civil Rights for the Trump administration. He shared a heart-wrenching story about what his family endured inside a public school system that claimed it took bullying seriously. His teenage son experienced relentless bullying at his public high school, including being repeatedly punched on the basketball court while teachers stood nearby, scrolling on their phones. When he picked up his son, his face was swollen and bruised. On another occasion, a student took a photo of his son while he was using the bathroom and shared it with classmates online. The caption read: "caught this N word taking a sh*t." The student who posted it was also black, which mattered because it immediately undercut the lazy racial narratives schools often hide behind. He stated that his son could take the physical fighting and the name-calling, but the photo of his moment in the bathroom, this pleading father stated that it "broke his son."
This father did what parents are told to do. He documented everything. He emailed the school more than 180 times. Each incident was met with lip service, promises of "restorative conversations," and assurances that the school was "handling it internally." Nothing changed. The bullies were allowed to stay.
At one point, the district closed the bathroom case entirely. Their explanation was chilling. "Because you and your wife did not file Title IX, the district said the case was closed." Title IX, which was designed to protect students from sex-based discrimination, was now being used as a procedural shield to avoid disciplining violent and abusive students, especially when misconduct is classified as sexual in nature, such as taking photos of a child in a bathroom. As was cited during the seminar, schools are increasingly pointing to the Trump administration's revised Title IX regulations as justification for declining to investigate or discipline at all. The message was clear: if you do not navigate the bureaucracy perfectly, your child is trapped.
Eventually, this father pulled his son from the school. The bullying never stopped, and the system refused to protect him.
This story is not an outlier. Roughly one in three students experiences bullying. According to federal data from the National Center for Education Statistics, the incidence of cyberbullying doubled between the 2009-10 and 2019-20 school years. Even more alarming, the FBI reported that roughly 1.3 million criminal incidents occurred at our public schools between 2020 and 2024. This is with only half of law enforcement agencies reporting, and during a period when many schools were still partially closed. The real number is much higher.
The response from schools has not been to remove bullies. Instead, the victimized students are often reclassified into special needs categories. One panelist noted that students with special needs are disproportionately victims of bullying, even though many of those students don't belong in special needs classes academically, but because schools would rather move the victim than confront the aggressor. It is easier to change a child's label than to enforce discipline.
The webinar also addressed the rise in antisemitism in schools. One example cited was the incident at Cooper Union, a college in New York, where Jewish students reportedly hid in a library to escape hostile protesters. Parents and students are told to file civil rights complaints with the Department of Education, but experience shows that federal enforcement is slow, selective, and unreliable.
The uncomfortable truth is that parents cannot depend on federal law to protect their children. Mandated reporting laws require teachers to report abuse, including abuse inflicted by other students. But many do not. Whether out of fear, union pressure, or institutional culture, the duty to protect children is routinely abandoned.
Against this backdrop, school choice is not a luxury. It is a necessity. There are roughly 50 million K-12 students in the United States, yet only about 1 million currently use school choice. That number is growing rapidly, not just because of ideology, but because families are fleeing systems that no longer function safely for their children.
The scale of the exodus is unprecedented. Arizona has seen enrollment drops exceeding 100,000 students. Florida now has approximately 500,000 students using education savings accounts, out of roughly 3 million students statewide. Districts are closing schools, blaming demographic shifts and declining birth rates (which is happening too), while refusing to acknowledge that parents are voting with their feet.
Federal law already recognizes the problem of bullying in our schools. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act requires districts to report persistently dangerous schools and offer families the option to transfer. In the 2021-22 school year, not a single school nationwide was reported as persistently dangerous. That changed only after pressure from the Trump administration through a Dear Colleague letter, which forced some states to begin reporting honestly.
Florida's Hope Scholarship, designed to help victims of bullying escape unsafe schools, and federal education freedom tax credits that fund scholarships in non-school choice states, point the way to what real solutions can look like. They bypass bureaucracies that protect institutions and instead empower families.
The takeaway from the Heritage webinar was not just that bullying is widespread. It is that the system is accommodating it. While appearing to address the issue on the surface, in reality, the problem is allowed to grow. Until families are given real power to leave unsafe environments, no cliche anti-bullying acronym, or federal report, or useless district policy will fix what has become standard operating procedure in too many American schools.
* * *
Kali Fontanilla
Kali is serving as CRC's Senior fellow, particularly focusing on topics related to K-12 public education.
* * *
Original text here: https://capitalresearch.org/article/schools-for-bullies-but-not-for-the-rest-of-the-kids-best-of/
[Category: ThinkTank]
CSIS Issues Commentary: What Latin America Can Teach the U.S. About Drone Defense
WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary:
* * *
What Latin America Can Teach the United States about Drone Defense
Commentary by Henry Ziemer
October 29, 2026
Threats to the U.S. homeland continue to proliferate at a concerning rate. The protection once afforded by oceans and friendly neighbors is eroding as new weapons systems increase the ability of adversaries to hold at risk critical civilian and military infrastructure. In particular, the threat of small uncrewed aerial systems (UASs), often referred to as drones, has attracted ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary: * * * What Latin America Can Teach the United States about Drone Defense Commentary by Henry Ziemer October 29, 2026 Threats to the U.S. homeland continue to proliferate at a concerning rate. The protection once afforded by oceans and friendly neighbors is eroding as new weapons systems increase the ability of adversaries to hold at risk critical civilian and military infrastructure. In particular, the threat of small uncrewed aerial systems (UASs), often referred to as drones, has attractedsignificant attention from homeland defense planners. Indeed, the 2026 U.S. National Defense Strategy highlights the need to "develop and deploy capabilities and systems to counter unmanned aerial systems" in its first line of effort.
However, the drone threats the United States is seeking to prepare for have already arrived in Latin America. According to recent data from the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, approximately 480 weaponized drone attacks took place in the region between January 2025 and August 2026. These attacks have been highly concentrated in Mexico and Colombia, but the threat is metastasizing throughout the region. In Brazil, the Comando Vermelho gang, recently designated as a foreign terrorist organization, uses drones to strike at police forces as well as provide overhead surveillance in dense urban confines. In Ecuador, drones are used to smuggle weapons, explosives, and other contraband into the country's prisons, fueling deadly massacres. Still, Colombia stands out as a particularly dire warning of how cheap commercial drones can be leveraged by malign actors to gain an asymmetric advantage against state forces.
* * *
Figure 1: Targets of Drone Incidents in Colombia, 2023-2026
* * *
Colombia's armed forces remain some of the best-trained in the region, and they are key security partners for the United States. However, the rapid adoption of UASs has thus far outpaced the Colombian government's ability to respond, especially in rural areas where state presence was already weak. Drones allow nonstate armed groups to strike without exposing their fighters to direct retaliation, gather intelligence on military and police movements, and even threaten Colombia's ability to move forces by air.
The United States cannot stand by as its allies suffer the depredations of a criminal air force. Not only do nonstate drone attacks undermine the security and stability of partner governments in the Americas, but they also reveal similar vulnerabilities that adversaries could use to strike the U.S. homeland in the near future. Confronting the drone threat is accordingly a hemispheric challenge, and an area where the United States can play a leading role. More specifically, the United States should look to fortify cooperation between Joint Interagency Task Force-401 (JIATF-401), the Pentagon's dedicated counter-drone organization, and U.S. Southern Command's newly established Joint Task Force Western Hemisphere. In addition, the United States could consider piloting a "lend-lease" program in which it provides partner governments in the Americas with counter-UAS (cUAS) technology and training in exchange for data and operational insights that will allow it to further refine its own drone defenses.
The Evolving Drone Threat
More concerning than the mere rate of drone attacks is the sophistication of nonstate drone tactics in the Americas. For example, in February, Colombian authorities confirmed the first instance of an attack using a fiber-optic cable connected to a drone to render it immune to radio-frequency jamming. In October 2026, Mexico seized a cache of drones that included at least 15 fiber-optic spools. The adoption at scale of fiber-optic drones could leave regional governments further behind in the innovation battle. Indeed, at least in the case of Mexico, it seems likely that interest in fiber-optic technology is being driven by advances in rival cartels' cUAS capabilities, while the Mexican state's drone defenses are of even lesser concern.
Increasingly, criminal groups are recruiting from the ranks of foreign fighters serving in Ukrainian drone units. Mexico's Jalisco New Generation Cartel has reportedly been one of the most active in this regard, sending members to the front to learn drone tactics firsthand. Recent reporting from the Financial Times documented the emergence of an organized recruiting effort seeking to funnel Latin American foreign fighters from Ukraine into Colombian and Mexican criminal outfits. These individuals tend to be sought after for their knowledge of how to modify drones to make them more resilient to jamming, or their tactical expertise as pilots. In Colombia, for instance, recent attacks have employed "swarm" tactics, whereby multiple drones strike at the same targets near-simultaneously to overwhelm defenses. Such operations require close coordination among multiple pilots, expertise that can be difficult to acquire without the kind of instruction that service in Ukraine provides. However, this pipeline is hardly the only means for diffusing drone expertise and tactics, and as UASs are adopted by criminal and nonstate groups in the Americas, it seems likely that more regionally tailored expertise will emerge.
There is every reason to expect that the scale, sophistication, and geographic coverage of nonstate drone tactics in the Americas will continue to increase. Regional governments face steep learning curves, resource constraints, and bureaucratic hurdles that complicate the rollout of drone countermeasures at scale. All the while, criminals and insurgents are innovating at a rapid pace. Two especially concerning developments to watch for include the design and manufacturing of original drone models by criminal groups, as well as the diversification of drones away from UASs to ground and maritime platforms. There are already troubling signs that nonstate groups have begun experimentation in both areas.
While most criminal groups purchase commercial drones that are then modified to incorporate weapons, advances in 3D-printed firearms show that these groups could begin to manufacture their own custom platforms in the future. Many groups already make use of rudimentary 3D printing for certain components such as winglets for drone-dropped munitions, while a raid by the Venezuelan armed forces in September 2025 reportedly recovered eight printers used for manufacturing drones. In Colombia, the seizure of a remotely piloted semisubmersible "narcosub" in July 2025 also points to criminal innovation in the design of uncrewed surface vessels (USVs). USVs offer a number of advantages for drug traffickers, including reduced heat signatures, the ability to loiter off the coast for extended periods, and reduced overhead personnel costs for traffickers. To date, no groups in the region have sought to employ weaponized USVs; however, the lessons from Ukraine's campaign against the Russian Black Sea Fleet illustrate the threat such platforms pose for Latin American navies and coast guards.
Incomplete Countermeasures
Governments throughout the Western Hemisphere have been slow to react to the drone threat, but not stagnant. Under former president Gustavo Petro, Colombia announced a $1.68 billion "drone shield" program aimed at procuring additional sensors and countermeasures to defeat UAS threats. While the program continues to advance, Colombian security forces have targeted drone operators in recent operations in a bid to sever the pipeline funneling drone expertise to nonstate armed groups. Colombia's National Directorate of Taxes and Customs has also implemented new guidance for screening imports of drones and drone parts through the Bogota airport and port of Cartagena in an effort to clamp down on the criminal UAS supply chain. Nevertheless, Colombian armed groups have seemingly accelerated their deployment of weaponized UASs in response to President Abelardo de la Espriella's intensified security campaign. The drone threat in Colombia will likely continue to worsen before it has a chance to get better.
The United States itself has not been spared from such challenges. Cartel drone incursions along the U.S.-Mexico land border illustrate one vector for future adversaries to strike the U.S. homeland. Unauthorized drone incursions at military bases, particularly in the wake of the start of hostilities in Iran, reveal that even static defense of strategic bases represents a challenge. Despite these challenges, the United States continues to make strides in the counter-UAS domain. JIATF-401 has played an especially important role integrating perspectives across the government as well as testing and scaling cUAS options. JIATF-401 also operates a digital cUAS marketplace, where law enforcement, military, and partner-nation actors can interface directly with vendors to quickly procure new sensors and countermeasures.
The United States has also had success recently along the southwest land border following a series of embarrassing false positives and interagency coordination failures earlier this year. The Federal Aviation Administration and the Pentagon inked a safety agreement in April for the use of directed-energy cUAS platforms along the border. In August, Joint Task Force-Southern Border announced it had successfully interdicted three drones using a high-energy laser, the first publicly acknowledged use of such a system in a real-world counter-drone context. Since then, drone activity along the Rio Grande Valley has reportedly fallen by 75 percent. U.S.-Mexico cooperation has also been moving in a positive direction on the counter-drone front, with the two countries recently signing a letter of intent to grant Mexico access to the United States' digital marketplace for drone and counter-drone equipment. In September, the two countries launched the joint Operation Aguila Alta (High Eagle) near the Tijuana-San Diego border to monitor and interdict illicit drone activity.
Although these recent moves are welcome developments, the threat profile of drones along the border differs substantially from that found elsewhere in Mexico, let alone the rest of the Americas. Drones are primarily used by nonstate actors to monitor the movements of border patrols to identify new smuggling routes, or, in some cases, to move contraband via air into the United States. By contrast, in Mexican states such as Michoacan and Jalisco, drones are used to directly attack rival cartels, state forces, and civilians, at times in conjunction with ground offensives and assaults by improvised armored fighting vehicles (often referred to as "narco tanks"). These areas represent the true front line of illicit drone innovation, and a more pressing threat from the Mexican government's perspective. Combating such a threat requires a layered approach that includes sensing, hard- and soft-kill countermeasures, and regulatory alignment across military and civilian institutions.
Forging Lend-Lease for Counter-UAS
By helping its partners in Latin America defeat their own drone threats, the United States can gain valuable insights into how it can better protect its own homeland from future attacks. To do so, the United States must confront two interlocking challenges: the pace of criminal UAS innovation and the constraints partner governments face in defense procurement and adoption. Even in the face of growing drone threats, Latin American militaries face significant budget constraints that could make them reluctant to expend resources on technologies that may not have a significant operational track record and could even be rendered obsolete by the latest nonstate innovation. On top of this, simply pushing capabilities into the hands of regional armed forces will do little to curb the drone threat if they are not accompanied by new tactics, techniques, and procedures to make the most of these systems.
To rectify this, the United States should consider lending cUAS equipment to partner governments in the Americas free of charge for a trial period. In return, these governments would allow U.S. personnel to embed with their forces and access operational data that could be fed back into planning for homeland counter-drone force design. At the conclusion of the trial, governments could have the option of buying the equipment directly, potentially at a discounted rate to reflect asset depreciation during the testing period, or returning it in the event that it did not meet expectations or operational realities. This model would not only allow Latin American governments to start reclaiming the initiative in the innovation battle by rapidly unrolling a range of new cUAS capabilities for relatively low cost, but would also grant the United States access to a wealth of real-world intelligence on the performance of different drone countermeasures.
From a defense-industrial standpoint, the value of real-world testing cannot be overstated in helping planners make better decisions on what kinds of equipment to procure for the future U.S. force. So far, Ukraine has proved the gold standard for such tests, but Latin America can reveal important new insights such as the performance of systems in jungle, riverine, and irregular warfare conditions. This model could also be rolled out using existing cooperation mechanisms, potentially through JIATF-401's cUAS marketplace, which Argentina, Mexico, and Panama have reportedly either expressed interest in or joined. The United States can also leverage the Americas Counter Cartel Coalition and ongoing security cooperation with Colombia and Ecuador as another channel.
To be sure, this approach is only one of a range of actions the United States should take to harden regional capabilities against the illicit drone threat. Washington should always seek to ensure new equipment is accompanied by robust technical assistance. To this end, JIATF-401 and U.S. Southern Command should explore options for deepening cooperation with regional militaries on counter-drone best practices. Beyond strengthening military-to-military ties, the United States should also encourage exchanges between law enforcement and private-sector actors to help build out whole-of-government and whole-of-society strategies for combating the drone threat. The United States should also take care to learn the right lessons from its Latin American partners: The tactics and equipment that may work along the southwest land border may not be suitable for base defense, just as the squad-level tactics used to fend off cartel UAS attacks may not necessarily be indicative of how a peer competitor would employ uncrewed systems in a future high-intensity conflict. Nevertheless, by joining its southern neighbors in their fight against illicit drones, the United States can reap a wealth of vital information for protecting its own homeland, infrastructure, and people.
* * *
Henry Ziemer is a fellow with the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/what-latin-america-can-teach-united-states-about-drone-defense
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
What Latin America Can Teach the United States about Drone Defense
Commentary by Henry Ziemer
October 29, 2026
Threats to the U.S. homeland continue to proliferate at a concerning rate. The protection once afforded by oceans and friendly neighbors is eroding as new weapons systems increase the ability of adversaries to hold at risk critical civilian and military infrastructure. In particular, the threat of small uncrewed aerial systems (UASs), often referred to as drones, has attracted ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary: * * * What Latin America Can Teach the United States about Drone Defense Commentary by Henry Ziemer October 29, 2026 Threats to the U.S. homeland continue to proliferate at a concerning rate. The protection once afforded by oceans and friendly neighbors is eroding as new weapons systems increase the ability of adversaries to hold at risk critical civilian and military infrastructure. In particular, the threat of small uncrewed aerial systems (UASs), often referred to as drones, has attractedsignificant attention from homeland defense planners. Indeed, the 2026 U.S. National Defense Strategy highlights the need to "develop and deploy capabilities and systems to counter unmanned aerial systems" in its first line of effort.
However, the drone threats the United States is seeking to prepare for have already arrived in Latin America. According to recent data from the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, approximately 480 weaponized drone attacks took place in the region between January 2025 and August 2026. These attacks have been highly concentrated in Mexico and Colombia, but the threat is metastasizing throughout the region. In Brazil, the Comando Vermelho gang, recently designated as a foreign terrorist organization, uses drones to strike at police forces as well as provide overhead surveillance in dense urban confines. In Ecuador, drones are used to smuggle weapons, explosives, and other contraband into the country's prisons, fueling deadly massacres. Still, Colombia stands out as a particularly dire warning of how cheap commercial drones can be leveraged by malign actors to gain an asymmetric advantage against state forces.
* * *
Figure 1: Targets of Drone Incidents in Colombia, 2023-2026
* * *
Colombia's armed forces remain some of the best-trained in the region, and they are key security partners for the United States. However, the rapid adoption of UASs has thus far outpaced the Colombian government's ability to respond, especially in rural areas where state presence was already weak. Drones allow nonstate armed groups to strike without exposing their fighters to direct retaliation, gather intelligence on military and police movements, and even threaten Colombia's ability to move forces by air.
The United States cannot stand by as its allies suffer the depredations of a criminal air force. Not only do nonstate drone attacks undermine the security and stability of partner governments in the Americas, but they also reveal similar vulnerabilities that adversaries could use to strike the U.S. homeland in the near future. Confronting the drone threat is accordingly a hemispheric challenge, and an area where the United States can play a leading role. More specifically, the United States should look to fortify cooperation between Joint Interagency Task Force-401 (JIATF-401), the Pentagon's dedicated counter-drone organization, and U.S. Southern Command's newly established Joint Task Force Western Hemisphere. In addition, the United States could consider piloting a "lend-lease" program in which it provides partner governments in the Americas with counter-UAS (cUAS) technology and training in exchange for data and operational insights that will allow it to further refine its own drone defenses.
The Evolving Drone Threat
More concerning than the mere rate of drone attacks is the sophistication of nonstate drone tactics in the Americas. For example, in February, Colombian authorities confirmed the first instance of an attack using a fiber-optic cable connected to a drone to render it immune to radio-frequency jamming. In October 2026, Mexico seized a cache of drones that included at least 15 fiber-optic spools. The adoption at scale of fiber-optic drones could leave regional governments further behind in the innovation battle. Indeed, at least in the case of Mexico, it seems likely that interest in fiber-optic technology is being driven by advances in rival cartels' cUAS capabilities, while the Mexican state's drone defenses are of even lesser concern.
Increasingly, criminal groups are recruiting from the ranks of foreign fighters serving in Ukrainian drone units. Mexico's Jalisco New Generation Cartel has reportedly been one of the most active in this regard, sending members to the front to learn drone tactics firsthand. Recent reporting from the Financial Times documented the emergence of an organized recruiting effort seeking to funnel Latin American foreign fighters from Ukraine into Colombian and Mexican criminal outfits. These individuals tend to be sought after for their knowledge of how to modify drones to make them more resilient to jamming, or their tactical expertise as pilots. In Colombia, for instance, recent attacks have employed "swarm" tactics, whereby multiple drones strike at the same targets near-simultaneously to overwhelm defenses. Such operations require close coordination among multiple pilots, expertise that can be difficult to acquire without the kind of instruction that service in Ukraine provides. However, this pipeline is hardly the only means for diffusing drone expertise and tactics, and as UASs are adopted by criminal and nonstate groups in the Americas, it seems likely that more regionally tailored expertise will emerge.
There is every reason to expect that the scale, sophistication, and geographic coverage of nonstate drone tactics in the Americas will continue to increase. Regional governments face steep learning curves, resource constraints, and bureaucratic hurdles that complicate the rollout of drone countermeasures at scale. All the while, criminals and insurgents are innovating at a rapid pace. Two especially concerning developments to watch for include the design and manufacturing of original drone models by criminal groups, as well as the diversification of drones away from UASs to ground and maritime platforms. There are already troubling signs that nonstate groups have begun experimentation in both areas.
While most criminal groups purchase commercial drones that are then modified to incorporate weapons, advances in 3D-printed firearms show that these groups could begin to manufacture their own custom platforms in the future. Many groups already make use of rudimentary 3D printing for certain components such as winglets for drone-dropped munitions, while a raid by the Venezuelan armed forces in September 2025 reportedly recovered eight printers used for manufacturing drones. In Colombia, the seizure of a remotely piloted semisubmersible "narcosub" in July 2025 also points to criminal innovation in the design of uncrewed surface vessels (USVs). USVs offer a number of advantages for drug traffickers, including reduced heat signatures, the ability to loiter off the coast for extended periods, and reduced overhead personnel costs for traffickers. To date, no groups in the region have sought to employ weaponized USVs; however, the lessons from Ukraine's campaign against the Russian Black Sea Fleet illustrate the threat such platforms pose for Latin American navies and coast guards.
Incomplete Countermeasures
Governments throughout the Western Hemisphere have been slow to react to the drone threat, but not stagnant. Under former president Gustavo Petro, Colombia announced a $1.68 billion "drone shield" program aimed at procuring additional sensors and countermeasures to defeat UAS threats. While the program continues to advance, Colombian security forces have targeted drone operators in recent operations in a bid to sever the pipeline funneling drone expertise to nonstate armed groups. Colombia's National Directorate of Taxes and Customs has also implemented new guidance for screening imports of drones and drone parts through the Bogota airport and port of Cartagena in an effort to clamp down on the criminal UAS supply chain. Nevertheless, Colombian armed groups have seemingly accelerated their deployment of weaponized UASs in response to President Abelardo de la Espriella's intensified security campaign. The drone threat in Colombia will likely continue to worsen before it has a chance to get better.
The United States itself has not been spared from such challenges. Cartel drone incursions along the U.S.-Mexico land border illustrate one vector for future adversaries to strike the U.S. homeland. Unauthorized drone incursions at military bases, particularly in the wake of the start of hostilities in Iran, reveal that even static defense of strategic bases represents a challenge. Despite these challenges, the United States continues to make strides in the counter-UAS domain. JIATF-401 has played an especially important role integrating perspectives across the government as well as testing and scaling cUAS options. JIATF-401 also operates a digital cUAS marketplace, where law enforcement, military, and partner-nation actors can interface directly with vendors to quickly procure new sensors and countermeasures.
The United States has also had success recently along the southwest land border following a series of embarrassing false positives and interagency coordination failures earlier this year. The Federal Aviation Administration and the Pentagon inked a safety agreement in April for the use of directed-energy cUAS platforms along the border. In August, Joint Task Force-Southern Border announced it had successfully interdicted three drones using a high-energy laser, the first publicly acknowledged use of such a system in a real-world counter-drone context. Since then, drone activity along the Rio Grande Valley has reportedly fallen by 75 percent. U.S.-Mexico cooperation has also been moving in a positive direction on the counter-drone front, with the two countries recently signing a letter of intent to grant Mexico access to the United States' digital marketplace for drone and counter-drone equipment. In September, the two countries launched the joint Operation Aguila Alta (High Eagle) near the Tijuana-San Diego border to monitor and interdict illicit drone activity.
Although these recent moves are welcome developments, the threat profile of drones along the border differs substantially from that found elsewhere in Mexico, let alone the rest of the Americas. Drones are primarily used by nonstate actors to monitor the movements of border patrols to identify new smuggling routes, or, in some cases, to move contraband via air into the United States. By contrast, in Mexican states such as Michoacan and Jalisco, drones are used to directly attack rival cartels, state forces, and civilians, at times in conjunction with ground offensives and assaults by improvised armored fighting vehicles (often referred to as "narco tanks"). These areas represent the true front line of illicit drone innovation, and a more pressing threat from the Mexican government's perspective. Combating such a threat requires a layered approach that includes sensing, hard- and soft-kill countermeasures, and regulatory alignment across military and civilian institutions.
Forging Lend-Lease for Counter-UAS
By helping its partners in Latin America defeat their own drone threats, the United States can gain valuable insights into how it can better protect its own homeland from future attacks. To do so, the United States must confront two interlocking challenges: the pace of criminal UAS innovation and the constraints partner governments face in defense procurement and adoption. Even in the face of growing drone threats, Latin American militaries face significant budget constraints that could make them reluctant to expend resources on technologies that may not have a significant operational track record and could even be rendered obsolete by the latest nonstate innovation. On top of this, simply pushing capabilities into the hands of regional armed forces will do little to curb the drone threat if they are not accompanied by new tactics, techniques, and procedures to make the most of these systems.
To rectify this, the United States should consider lending cUAS equipment to partner governments in the Americas free of charge for a trial period. In return, these governments would allow U.S. personnel to embed with their forces and access operational data that could be fed back into planning for homeland counter-drone force design. At the conclusion of the trial, governments could have the option of buying the equipment directly, potentially at a discounted rate to reflect asset depreciation during the testing period, or returning it in the event that it did not meet expectations or operational realities. This model would not only allow Latin American governments to start reclaiming the initiative in the innovation battle by rapidly unrolling a range of new cUAS capabilities for relatively low cost, but would also grant the United States access to a wealth of real-world intelligence on the performance of different drone countermeasures.
From a defense-industrial standpoint, the value of real-world testing cannot be overstated in helping planners make better decisions on what kinds of equipment to procure for the future U.S. force. So far, Ukraine has proved the gold standard for such tests, but Latin America can reveal important new insights such as the performance of systems in jungle, riverine, and irregular warfare conditions. This model could also be rolled out using existing cooperation mechanisms, potentially through JIATF-401's cUAS marketplace, which Argentina, Mexico, and Panama have reportedly either expressed interest in or joined. The United States can also leverage the Americas Counter Cartel Coalition and ongoing security cooperation with Colombia and Ecuador as another channel.
To be sure, this approach is only one of a range of actions the United States should take to harden regional capabilities against the illicit drone threat. Washington should always seek to ensure new equipment is accompanied by robust technical assistance. To this end, JIATF-401 and U.S. Southern Command should explore options for deepening cooperation with regional militaries on counter-drone best practices. Beyond strengthening military-to-military ties, the United States should also encourage exchanges between law enforcement and private-sector actors to help build out whole-of-government and whole-of-society strategies for combating the drone threat. The United States should also take care to learn the right lessons from its Latin American partners: The tactics and equipment that may work along the southwest land border may not be suitable for base defense, just as the squad-level tactics used to fend off cartel UAS attacks may not necessarily be indicative of how a peer competitor would employ uncrewed systems in a future high-intensity conflict. Nevertheless, by joining its southern neighbors in their fight against illicit drones, the United States can reap a wealth of vital information for protecting its own homeland, infrastructure, and people.
* * *
Henry Ziemer is a fellow with the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/what-latin-america-can-teach-united-states-about-drone-defense
[Category: ThinkTank]
America First Policy Institute Issues Commentary to Newsweek: Europe is Burning. America Cannot Let the Same Happen Here
WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following excerpts of a commentary:
* * *
Europe is Burning. America Cannot Let the Same Happen Here
October 30, 2026
On October 17, more than half a million French citizens marched peacefully over the cost of living and failing schools. By nightfall, the town hall in Limoges, which had survived two world wars, was a smoldering shell. Nearly 2,400 people were arrested. Roughly 1,000 police officers and firefighters were injured and at least 3,000 businesses were looted or damaged. Countless cars burned. What began as a public ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following excerpts of a commentary: * * * Europe is Burning. America Cannot Let the Same Happen Here October 30, 2026 On October 17, more than half a million French citizens marched peacefully over the cost of living and failing schools. By nightfall, the town hall in Limoges, which had survived two world wars, was a smoldering shell. Nearly 2,400 people were arrested. Roughly 1,000 police officers and firefighters were injured and at least 3,000 businesses were looted or damaged. Countless cars burned. What began as a publicprotest has become a crisis of public order--and a warning to the entire West.
France, and Europe for that matter, has seen protests before. But as these protests spread beyond the French borders, a troubling question emerges: What happens when organized radical movements exploit legitimate grievances to weaken the institutions that make a free society possible? It is the erosion of a civilization's confidence in its ability to defend itself.
To read the full article, click here (https://www.newsweek.com/europe-is-burning-american-cannot-let-the-same-happen-here-opinion-12625717).
Originally published by Newsweek (https://www.newsweek.com/europe-is-burning-american-cannot-let-the-same-happen-here-opinion-12625717)
* * *
The Honorable Chad Wolf
Chair, Homeland Security & Immigration Policy and Chair, Western Hemisphere Initiative
* * *
Original text here: https://americafirstpolicy.com/issues/europe-is-burning-american-cannot-let-the-same-happen-here/
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
Europe is Burning. America Cannot Let the Same Happen Here
October 30, 2026
On October 17, more than half a million French citizens marched peacefully over the cost of living and failing schools. By nightfall, the town hall in Limoges, which had survived two world wars, was a smoldering shell. Nearly 2,400 people were arrested. Roughly 1,000 police officers and firefighters were injured and at least 3,000 businesses were looted or damaged. Countless cars burned. What began as a public ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following excerpts of a commentary: * * * Europe is Burning. America Cannot Let the Same Happen Here October 30, 2026 On October 17, more than half a million French citizens marched peacefully over the cost of living and failing schools. By nightfall, the town hall in Limoges, which had survived two world wars, was a smoldering shell. Nearly 2,400 people were arrested. Roughly 1,000 police officers and firefighters were injured and at least 3,000 businesses were looted or damaged. Countless cars burned. What began as a publicprotest has become a crisis of public order--and a warning to the entire West.
France, and Europe for that matter, has seen protests before. But as these protests spread beyond the French borders, a troubling question emerges: What happens when organized radical movements exploit legitimate grievances to weaken the institutions that make a free society possible? It is the erosion of a civilization's confidence in its ability to defend itself.
To read the full article, click here (https://www.newsweek.com/europe-is-burning-american-cannot-let-the-same-happen-here-opinion-12625717).
Originally published by Newsweek (https://www.newsweek.com/europe-is-burning-american-cannot-let-the-same-happen-here-opinion-12625717)
* * *
The Honorable Chad Wolf
Chair, Homeland Security & Immigration Policy and Chair, Western Hemisphere Initiative
* * *
Original text here: https://americafirstpolicy.com/issues/europe-is-burning-american-cannot-let-the-same-happen-here/
[Category: ThinkTank]
AFPI Files Amicus Brief Backing DOJ Efforts to Protect Election Integrity in California
WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following news release:
* * *
AFPI Files Amicus Brief Backing DOJ Efforts to Protect Election Integrity in California
October 30, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) has filed an amicus brief in United States v. California, supporting the Department of Justice's (DOJ) efforts to protect election integrity after it identified more than 20,000 likely noncitizen voters in California.
AFPI's brief urges the court to require California officials to set aside ballots associated with these individuals ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following news release: * * * AFPI Files Amicus Brief Backing DOJ Efforts to Protect Election Integrity in California October 30, 2026 WASHINGTON, D.C. - The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) has filed an amicus brief in United States v. California, supporting the Department of Justice's (DOJ) efforts to protect election integrity after it identified more than 20,000 likely noncitizen voters in California. AFPI's brief urges the court to require California officials to set aside ballots associated with these individualsuntil their citizenship can be verified, ensuring that only eligible Americans' votes are counted.
Every American deserves the confidence of knowing that their vote has been lawfully counted and is not diluted by fraudulently cast votes. The discovery of more than 20,000 potentially illegal votes erodes public trust and violates election integrity.
"Every vote matters. The Department of Justice is taking the necessary steps to protect the integrity of our elections, and AFPI is proud to stand alongside them with this amicus brief," said Chad Mizelle, AFPI Chair of Litigation. "Ensuring that only eligible citizens cast ballots is not a partisan issue. It is a fundamental obligation to the American people. No state should put politics ahead of election integrity."
AFPI's brief outlines the common-sense safeguards that will ensure that citizenship is verified, and that no lawfully cast ballots are lost. American elections cannot be free and fair without the required verifications made before ballots are counted. Read the full brief here (https://americafirstpolicy.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/2026.10.26-USA-v.-CA-Amicus-Brieft-TRO-Filed.pdf).
* * *
Original text here: https://americafirstpolicy.com/issues/afpi-files-amicus-brief-backing-doj-efforts-to-protect-election-integrity-in-california/
[Category: ThinkTank]
* * *
AFPI Files Amicus Brief Backing DOJ Efforts to Protect Election Integrity in California
October 30, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) has filed an amicus brief in United States v. California, supporting the Department of Justice's (DOJ) efforts to protect election integrity after it identified more than 20,000 likely noncitizen voters in California.
AFPI's brief urges the court to require California officials to set aside ballots associated with these individuals ... Show Full Article WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following news release: * * * AFPI Files Amicus Brief Backing DOJ Efforts to Protect Election Integrity in California October 30, 2026 WASHINGTON, D.C. - The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) has filed an amicus brief in United States v. California, supporting the Department of Justice's (DOJ) efforts to protect election integrity after it identified more than 20,000 likely noncitizen voters in California. AFPI's brief urges the court to require California officials to set aside ballots associated with these individualsuntil their citizenship can be verified, ensuring that only eligible Americans' votes are counted.
Every American deserves the confidence of knowing that their vote has been lawfully counted and is not diluted by fraudulently cast votes. The discovery of more than 20,000 potentially illegal votes erodes public trust and violates election integrity.
"Every vote matters. The Department of Justice is taking the necessary steps to protect the integrity of our elections, and AFPI is proud to stand alongside them with this amicus brief," said Chad Mizelle, AFPI Chair of Litigation. "Ensuring that only eligible citizens cast ballots is not a partisan issue. It is a fundamental obligation to the American people. No state should put politics ahead of election integrity."
AFPI's brief outlines the common-sense safeguards that will ensure that citizenship is verified, and that no lawfully cast ballots are lost. American elections cannot be free and fair without the required verifications made before ballots are counted. Read the full brief here (https://americafirstpolicy.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/2026.10.26-USA-v.-CA-Amicus-Brieft-TRO-Filed.pdf).
* * *
Original text here: https://americafirstpolicy.com/issues/afpi-files-amicus-brief-backing-doj-efforts-to-protect-election-integrity-in-california/
[Category: ThinkTank]