Featured Stories
ICTD at the 2026 IMF/World Bank Annual Meetings
BRIGHTON, England, Oct. 3 -- The International Centre for Tax and Development, an independent research centre that says it focuses on improving tax policy and administration in lower-income countries, issued the following news:
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ICTD at the 2026 IMF/World Bank Annual Meetings
ICTD is co-hosting two side events at the 2026 IMF/World Bank Annual Meetings, taking place in Bangkok between 12 - 18 October.
The Annuals present a unique opportunity to connect with global leaders from governments, industry, international and multilateral organisations and civil society. In what ICTD describes
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BRIGHTON, England, Oct. 3 -- The International Centre for Tax and Development, an independent research centre that says it focuses on improving tax policy and administration in lower-income countries, issued the following news:
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ICTD at the 2026 IMF/World Bank Annual Meetings
ICTD is co-hosting two side events at the 2026 IMF/World Bank Annual Meetings, taking place in Bangkok between 12 - 18 October.
The Annuals present a unique opportunity to connect with global leaders from governments, industry, international and multilateral organisations and civil society. In what ICTD describesas the tax era for development, domestic resource mobilisation is playing a central role to how lower-income countries finance their development priorities, in the face declining aid flows, rising debt burdens and growing financing needs. ICTD will
Roundtable: Enhancing Transparency, Accountability and Effectiveness of Tax Expenditures, 09:00-10:30, 15 October, Valia Hotel
Tax expenditures, including exemptions, deductions, credits and reduced rates, are among the most widely used tax policy tools, yet they are often costly, poorly governed and subject to limited scrutiny. Revenue foregone through tax expenditures worldwide amounts to around USD 4 trillion annual, equivalent to 3.7% of GDP and 23% of tax revenue on average. Amid growing fiscal pressures, improving the governance of tax expenditures offers governments an opportunity to strengthen domestic resource mobilisation and ensure that public resources are directed towards development priorities.
ICTD and IISD are hosting this side event as members of the Coalition on Tax Expenditure Reform (COATE), a global multi-stakeholder initiative launched in 2025 under the Sevilla Platform for Action. This event will bring together government officials, international organisations, researchers and civil society to discuss COATE's proposal for minimum voluntary standards on reporting and this could support transparency and reform.
* Alexandra Readhead, Director, Tax and Sovereign Debt, IISD
* Giovanni Occhiali, Senior Research Fellow, ICTD
* Juvy Danofrata, Assistant Secretary, Department of Finance and Head of the Fiscal Incentives Review Board, Republic of the Philippines
* Dr. Saliou Diallo, Economist, Director General, Strategy and Development Office, Ministry of Economy, Finance, and Budget, Republic of Guinea
* Shari Spiegel, Director, Financing for Sustainable Development Office, UN
This is an invitation-only event, please contact Hande Ayan Khanijo for more information.
Cashless Payments and State Capacity, 12:00-13:00, 15 October, Valia Hotel
This event, co-hosted with the Global Development Network and AfricaNenda, this event will explore how cashless-payment infrastructure can expand financial inclusion and strengthen state capacity, with tax as one use case. Focus on where digital models still fail or exclude users and merchants; the inclusion-informality-visibility trade-off; responsible reuse of payment data; and the safeguards needed to sustain trust.
Speakers
* Devendra Damle, GDN (tbc)
* Fabrizio Santoro, ICTD
* Kamal Andiwal, GSMA
* Lucia Rossel, ICTD
* Sabine Mensah, AfricaNenda Foundation
* Sridhar Ganapathy, Artha Global
This event will be followed by a networking lunch then a side event organised by AfricaNenda Foundation and the Africa Union Commission on Enabling Regulatory Harmonization for Instant Cross-Border Payments in Africa.
Please contact Hande Ayan Khanijo for more information on how to register for this event.
Meet the team and connect during the Annual Meetings
The Annual Meetings are also an opportunity to connect with partners, collaborators and others working on tax and development.
* Martin Hearson, Research Director
* Fabrizio Santoro, Senior Research Fellow (DPI)
* Giovanni Occhialli, Senior Research Fellow (COATE)
* Lucia Rossel, Research Affiliate
* Hande Ayan Khanijo, Policy Engagement Consultant
Please reach out to colleagues directly or contact Hande Ayan Khanijo (h.ayankhanijo@ictd.ac) to organise bilateral meetings and for other enquiries relating to the ICTD side events. .
For media enquiries, please contact Emilie Wilson at e.wilson@ids.ac.uk.
2 October 2026
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Original text here: https://ictd.ac/general/ictd-at-the-2026-imf-world-bank-annual-meetings/
[Category: ThinkTank]
Center of the American Experiment Issues Commentary: President Obama Was Right - "Electricity Rates Would Necessarily Skyrocket"
MINNETONKA, Minnesota, Oct. 3 -- The Center of the American Experiment, a civic and educational organization that says it creates and advocates policies, issued the following commentary:
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President Obama was right: "electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket"
Written by Darren Nelson | October 2, 2026
Note: Renewable portfolio standards (RPS), and clean energy standards (CES), are considered by most experts to be less economically efficient than a cap-and-trade system. Thus, ipso facto, "electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket" under RPS/CES as well or worse.
I presented essentially
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MINNETONKA, Minnesota, Oct. 3 -- The Center of the American Experiment, a civic and educational organization that says it creates and advocates policies, issued the following commentary:
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President Obama was right: "electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket"
Written by Darren Nelson | October 2, 2026
Note: Renewable portfolio standards (RPS), and clean energy standards (CES), are considered by most experts to be less economically efficient than a cap-and-trade system. Thus, ipso facto, "electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket" under RPS/CES as well or worse.
I presented essentiallythe same PowerPoint twice this week, at two different conferences held in the Twin Cities. Both were an honor to speak at. Both were run with great leadership.
The first one was on Tuesday afternoon, speaking before government, business and others in the fields of nuclear power, waste and transport. That being, the Midwestern Radioactive Materials Transportation Committee of the Council of State Governments Midwest.
The second was on Wednesday afternoon, speaking in front of government, business and others in the fields of mining, energy and data centers. That being, the Mining and Energy Expo put on by Better In Our Back Yard.
The first PowerPoint was a little less "red meat" in tone. That is the one replicated further below. However, both PowerPoints have the same thesis which can be summarized as Renewables are:
* Uneconomic
* Unpopular
* Unremitting
* Unreliable
* Unsustainable
* Unused
* Unaffordable
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Darren Nelson is a Policy Fellow at Center of the American Experiment. darren.nelson@americanexperiment.org
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Original text here: https://www.americanexperiment.org/president-obama-was-right-electricity-rates-would-necessarily-skyrocket/
[Category: ThinkTank]
CSIS Issues Newsletter: What Should Korea's Take on 'The Asian NATO' Be?
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following newsletter:
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What Should Korea's Take on "The Asian NATO" Be?
by Ho-Young Ahn
October 1, 2026
Mr. Shigeru Ishiba has been a longtime proponent of the Asian NATO. His inauguration as Prime Minister of Japan in October 2024 brought about renewed interest in the idea, especially in Northeast Asia. Questions were raised in national parliaments, government leaders were called upon to respond to the idea, newspapers chimed in with editorials, and academic articles were written.
Even after his resignation
... Show Full Article
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following newsletter:
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What Should Korea's Take on "The Asian NATO" Be?
by Ho-Young Ahn
October 1, 2026
Mr. Shigeru Ishiba has been a longtime proponent of the Asian NATO. His inauguration as Prime Minister of Japan in October 2024 brought about renewed interest in the idea, especially in Northeast Asia. Questions were raised in national parliaments, government leaders were called upon to respond to the idea, newspapers chimed in with editorials, and academic articles were written.
Even after his resignationas prime minister, Mr. Ishiba continues to work to propagate his belief in the Asian NATO. This spring, he visited Seoul to make a keynote speech at the Asan Plenum under the theme "Modernizing Alliances," where he again made a strong case for why we need an Asian NATO.
Meeting of Minds on the Asian NATO
At the Asan panel exploring this issue, it was interesting to observe an emerging meeting of minds on the Asian NATO. All the panelists expressed understanding of why the idea continues to attract attention in Northeast Asia: the deteriorating security environment in the Indo-Pacific; the return of the Russia-North Korea alliance; a more assertive China and shrinking U.S. commitment to the region; and the retreat of liberal multilateralism.
Irrespective of these reasons for renewed interest in the Asian NATO, the panelists also had realistic views on why these reasons are insufficient to lead to the institutionalization of the Asian NATO. They pointed to the lack of a common threat perception among key U.S. allies in the Indo-Pacific region; lingering historical issues between Korea and Japan; and the absence of a clear and proximate threat.
Between the widely felt need for the Asian NATO and the bottlenecks to its realization, the panelists proposed not rushing the idea, but steadily building upon the bilateral alliance with the U.S. and further deepening security cooperation among like-minded countries in the region. These efforts will send a potent message to China, Russia and North Korea, and thus have the effect of complementing the set of bilateral security alliances that regional countries have developed with the U.S. Furthermore, if and when the need arises for the formal institutionalization of an Asian NATO, the experience of cooperation among like-minded countries in the region will facilitate that institutionalization.
What Should Korea's Take on "the Asian NATO" Be?
Sitting through Mr. Ishiba's keynote speech and the panel discussions, my thoughts constantly came back to the question: what should Korea's take on "the Asian NATO" be? In fact, I could agree with most of the views expressed by the panelists on the necessity of an Asian NATO, the barriers inhibiting its institutionalization for now, and the way forward. On that basis, I thought about what efforts Korea has made so far and what additional efforts we should make down the road.
Korea has, in fact, been an important actor in developing the multi-layered security architecture. Korea has consistently strengthened its security alliance with the U.S. On that basis, Korea has gradually strengthened security partnerships with the other "spokes" of the U.S. security network in the Indo-Pacific, especially Japan, Australia, and the Philippines. With Japan, President Lee Jae Myung resumed shuttle diplomacy and met with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi no fewer than three times in about six months. With Australia, Korea has started regular 2+2 ministerial meetings between foreign and defense ministers. With the Philippines, the two countries enhanced their relations to a "strategic partnership," and are now strengthening cooperation in the defense industry, maritime security, and military training. The leaders of the Republic of Korea (ROK), the United States, and Japan opened a new era in trilateral cooperation among the three allies with the historic Camp David summit in August 2023. In the face of the deteriorating security reality in the Indo-Pacific, Korea now has to build upon these efforts and further strengthen each layer of Korea's multi-layered security architecture.
With respect to Korea's security alliance with the U.S., this is not a time to question the value of the alliance. Korea is faced with North Korea's development of nuclear weapons, the renewed alliance between North Korea and Russia in the aftermath of the Ukraine War, China's changing strategy on the Korean Peninsula, and North Korea's professed hostility toward South Korea. The Lee government is intensely focused on the return of wartime operational control (OPCON) from the U.S. to Korea, with the self-imposed timeframe of completing the transfer during the Lee presidency. The issue was previously carefully reviewed by Korea and the U.S., and a decision was made in 2014 to make the transfer based not on a fixed timeframe but on the fulfillment of three conditions. One of the conditions is that the ROK military must acquire the critical capabilities required to command and lead the future Combined Forces Command (CFC). That condition has not been met. In particular, Korea's C5ISR capabilities are assessed as needing major improvements. The second condition is that the alliance must have comprehensive, verified capabilities in place to deal with North Korea's nuclear and missile threats. The Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG) was formed for that purpose in April 2023. The Group had auspicious start. However, after the leadership changes both in Washington, D.C., and Seoul, the NCG process has effectively stalled. Further progress must be made on these conditions before we move wartime OPCON back to Korea.
With respect to strengthening security partnerships with other "spokes" of the U.S. alliance network in the region, Korea's efforts lag far behind those of Japan. Japan strengthens partner capacity via its Official Security Assistance program, defense equipment transfers, joint training, and strategic dialogues. With the Philippines, Japan entered into a Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) to streamline joint military training and mutual troop deployments in August 2025. These efforts add to Japan's integrated defense capability and also help to further strengthen bilateral security ties with the U.S. Japan's efforts should inspire Korea's approach to strengthening security partnerships with the other "spokes" of the U.S. alliance network in the region.
With respect to lattice-type security partnerships, again Korea is far behind Japan's efforts. Japan is forging plurilateral security partnerships not only among Korea, Japan, and the U.S., but also among Japan, Australia, and the U.S. and among Japan, the Philippines, and the U.S. The Iran War and the closing of the Strait of Hormuz have once again awakened Korea to the importance of securing sea lines of communication (SLOCs) for trade, logistics, and naval operations. Seoul has a vested interest in the preservation of unimpeded maritime routes. More than 90 percent of Korea's maritime trade volume passes through the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea. Korea should keep in mind that Japan's efforts to forge lattice-type partnerships were inspired by similar trade, logistics, and security concerns.
For the reasons discussed above, the Asian NATO is unlikely to be institutionalized in the near future. However, keeping the issue alive can serve as an aspirational goal. That aspiration will push Korea to further strengthen all the layers of its multi-layered security architecture. Eventually, the aspiration could become more than just an aspiration if the need grows stronger amid a more serious deterioration in the security situation in the Indo-Pacific.
Korea Chair Platform is produced by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a private, tax-exempt institution focusing on international public policy issues. Its research is nonpartisan and nonproprietary. CSIS does not take specific policy positions. Accordingly, all views, positions, and conclusions expressed in this publication should be understood to be solely those of the author(s).
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Ho-Young Ahn
Former Ambassador of the Republic of Korea to the United States; Chair Professor, Kyungnam University
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Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/what-should-koreas-take-asian-nato-be
[Category: ThinkTank]
CSIS Issues Commentary: Trump's Greenland Deal - Modest Gains, Lasting Costs
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary:
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Trump's Greenland Deal: Modest Gains, Lasting Costs
Commentary by Otto Svendsen
October 2, 2026
A saga that risked a severe rupture in the transatlantic relationship may have come to an end. On the sidelines of last week's UN General Assembly, President Donald Trump, Greenlandic Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen, and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen signed an accord strengthening the defense of Greenland. The deal gives the United States greater flexibility to augment its
... Show Full Article
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary:
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Trump's Greenland Deal: Modest Gains, Lasting Costs
Commentary by Otto Svendsen
October 2, 2026
A saga that risked a severe rupture in the transatlantic relationship may have come to an end. On the sidelines of last week's UN General Assembly, President Donald Trump, Greenlandic Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen, and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen signed an accord strengthening the defense of Greenland. The deal gives the United States greater flexibility to augment itsArctic military posture, binds Greenland to NATO even if it achieves independence, and boxes U.S. adversaries out of the island. The Kingdom of Denmark, for its part, has ended a tense year of coercive U.S. diplomacy without conceding much in terms of sovereignty or Greenlandic self-determination.
But the deal is only a marginal improvement on the status quo. Existing agreements already allowed the United States to expand its presence in Greenland, and Copenhagen had long kept U.S. adversaries from investing in Greenland. The one genuinely new breakthrough--permanently binding a future independent Greenland to NATO and to U.S. basing--would likely have been on the table without threats to use military force against a treaty ally. Those threats have alienated one of the United States' staunchest allies and damaged U.S. credibility across Europe. In short, the agreement is sound on substance but was obtainable without coercion. Its gains for Washington are marginal, while the real diplomatic winners are Copenhagen and Nuuk, who will hope this is now settled.
What the Deal Changes and What It Doesn't
President Trump heralded the agreement as giving the United States "permanent control over security and all other needs on that territory," adding that "no U.S. adversary will ever be permitted to establish a military presence in Greenland any more, or make sensitive investments there without our express written approval." Secretary of State Marco Rubio struck a similar note, saying the deal "permanently and completely addresses our national security concerns in Greenland."
Yet the agreement is less transformative than those statements suggest, as a recent CSIS Critical Questions piece explains in more detail. Washington's rights on the island rest on the 1951 Agreement Pursuant to the North Atlantic Treaty between the United States and the Kingdom of Denmark Concerning the Defense of Greenland, which already allows the United States to establish new defense areas, base forces in them, and travel relatively freely across Greenland and its waters. Those rights sustained a Cold War presence of 17 installations and more than 10,000 U.S. personnel.
Last week's deal supplements the 1951 agreement in three ways:
1. Expanded U.S. Military Access: The agreement specifically designates two new defense areas, at Narsarsuaq and Mestersvig; allows the United States to expand and modernize the Pituffik Space Base; and spells out explicit U.S. undersea access rights in Greenlandic waters.
2. Permanent Conditions: The agreement has no end date, in contrast to the 1951 agreement being tied to the duration of the North Atlantic Treaty, and would apply to an independent Greenland.
3. Formal Exclusion of Adversaries: The agreement also grants the United States a formal role in screening investments in Greenland's strategic sectors from entities that are not from NATO, NATO partner, or EU countries, while barring non-NATO military installations unless all three signatories agree.
These changes mostly formalize what was already possible. Nothing in the existing framework stopped the United States from expanding its military footprint; the post-Cold War drawdown was Washington's own choice. Nor has a Chinese or Russian military presence ever been a realistic prospect: Denmark spurned a Chinese bid for the former Danish Gronnedal naval base in 2016, and U.S.-Denmark coordination fended off Chinese interest in Greenland's airport expansion two years later. A genuinely new element in the agreement is its permanence. Binding a future independent Greenland to the new terms addresses a blind spot in the 1951 agreement, namely that its effectiveness, from a U.S. perspective, was contingent on close coordination with Denmark. That is a real, if long-term, gain. But viewed against President Trump's prior demand for full control, the deal is a considerable climb-down.
The Trump administration deserves some credit for putting Greenland and Arctic security firmly on the U.S. defense and foreign policy agenda. Greenland is central to U.S. homeland defense. It lies beneath the shortest route for Russian ballistic missiles and bombers bound for North America, which is why Pituffik hosts U.S. missile warning and space surveillance radars. It also anchors the Greenland-Iceland-UK (GIUK) gap, the chokepoint Russia's Northern Fleet must transit to reach the Atlantic. China and Russia are increasingly active in the Arctic writ large: Their strategic bombers flew a first joint patrol off Alaska in July 2024, their coast guards followed with a first joint Arctic patrol that fall, and Chinese research vessels have operated in or near U.S. Arctic waters in unprecedented numbers in 2025. Chinese container voyages along Russia's Northern Sea Route have also doubled since 2023, reaching a record 14 in 2025. Around Greenland itself, however, Chinese and Russian military activity remains practically nonexistent.
Greenland and Denmark, for their part, played a difficult hand exceedingly well. Persistent and discreet diplomatic efforts paid off, eschewing public confrontation and undue escalation. The deal entrenches the status quo while giving legal force to Copenhagen's and Nuuk's red lines regarding the Kingdom of Denmark's territorial sovereignty and Greenlandic self-determination. For example, the agreement avoids a Cyprus-style arrangement in which the United States would hold sovereign base areas on Greenlandic soil, as the United Kingdom does at Akrotiri and Dhekelia. And although their ties have often been strained, Nuuk and Copenhagen largely presented a united front and coordinated their responses to Washington's demands throughout the crisis. Despite President Trump's claims on Truth Social that there will be "NO COST to the United States," it is also highly unlikely that Denmark or Greenland will shoulder the financial burden of an expanded U.S. military presence.
In fact, the agreement may end up strengthening the political union between Denmark and Greenland. It narrows the room for maneuver of Greenlandic pro-independence forces, since a future independent Greenland would remain bound to host U.S. bases and to restrict investment from the countries the agreement excludes. This does not diminish the strong desire among Greenlanders for eventual independence, nor does it rule out the possibility that an independent Greenland will one day emerge with support from the United States and Denmark alike. But the tangible economic benefits of remaining within the kingdom--including an annual block grant from Denmark that provides more than half of Greenland's public sector revenue--combined with the limited political and economic upside of independence may lead future Greenlandic leaders to question its allure.
The Long-Term Costs of the Greenland Deal
The administration's persistent threats and coercive tactics have dealt a severe blow to U.S. relations with Denmark and with European allies more broadly. In a January 2026 poll for the Danish public broadcaster, 60 percent of Danes described the United States as an adversary, while only 17 percent still considered it an ally. Apps helping consumers identify and boycott U.S. products topped the Danish app store at the height of the crisis. In March, Denmark joined seven other European countries in accepting France's invitation to deepen strategic cooperation on nuclear deterrence--a remarkable step for a country that has long relied exclusively on the U.S. nuclear umbrella.
The threats to the Kingdom of Denmark's sovereignty in early 2026 were also a breaking point for Europe as a whole. When President Trump threatened escalating tariffs on eight European countries that had sent troops to Greenland, Europe mounted a unified and firm response. The European Parliament froze approval of the U.S.-EU trade deal, and leaders openly discussed deploying the European Union's Anti-Coercion Instrument, which was originally designed in response to Chinese economic coercion against individual EU member states. This provided a degree of economic deterrence: Trump backed off his tariff threats and ruled out the use of force at Davos days later.
The episode may have accelerated a structural shift already underway, in which Europe is steadily attempting to reduce its dependence on the United States. Transatlantic trade remains robust--U.S.-EU goods trade grew to more than Euros900 billion in 2025--but Brussels is actively diversifying its external relationships away from Washington. Within weeks of the Greenland crisis, the European Union signed its long-stalled trade agreement with Mercosur and concluded a free trade agreement with India, and the bloc has since intensified trade talks with several other partners. Europe's commitment to lessening its dependence on the United States will not reverse just because the Greenland dispute appears to have been settled.
In short, Washington paid a steep and lasting price for terms it could largely have had for free.
Looking Ahead
As with other recent deals struck by the Trump administration, the devil will be in the details and implementation of the agreement. The parties' diverging framings may foreshadow diverging interpretations of the legal text. President Trump has presented the agreement as permanent U.S. security control, while Danish and Greenlandic officials stress that it operates strictly within a NATO framework and fully respects Danish sovereignty and Greenlandic self-determination.
Despite the continued uncertainty, the agreement moves the transatlantic relationship closer to a stable equilibrium, and leaders across Europe will be breathing a sigh of relief. Above all, it sharply reduces the risk of a full-blown U.S.-EU trade war, given the staunch and near-universal European support for Denmark earlier this year.
The larger open questions concern U.S. defense policy toward the Euro-Atlantic. The Trump administration is pushing for an overhauled "NATO 3.0" in which European nations assume greater responsibility for their own conventional defense, freeing the United States to focus on other strategic priorities. Yet Washington has just secured two new defense areas whose geography lends them primarily to Euro-Atlantic defense. How these new areas fit into the ongoing review of U.S. force posture in Europe, and how Greenland will factor into the Golden Dome missile defense shield, will indicate whether the agreement reflects a coherent strategy or simply a desire for control. Either way, rebuilding the trust lost along the way will take far longer than negotiating the deal did.
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Otto Svendsen is an associate fellow with the Europe, Russia, and Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.
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Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/trumps-greenland-deal-modest-gains-lasting-costs
[Category: ThinkTank]
America First Policy Institute: Treasury Confirms Married Couples Can Give $3,400 Under the Education Freedom Tax Credit
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following news release:
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Treasury Confirms Married Couples Can Give $3,400 Under the Education Freedom Tax Credit
October 2, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C--The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) applauded the U.S. Department of the Treasury for releasing proposed regulations implementing the Education Freedom Tax Credit (EFTC), the first federal scholarship tax credit and the largest expansion of school choice in American history.
In a major win for children across the country, the rules confirm that each spouse filing jointly
... Show Full Article
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following news release:
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Treasury Confirms Married Couples Can Give $3,400 Under the Education Freedom Tax Credit
October 2, 2026
WASHINGTON, D.C--The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) applauded the U.S. Department of the Treasury for releasing proposed regulations implementing the Education Freedom Tax Credit (EFTC), the first federal scholarship tax credit and the largest expansion of school choice in American history.
In a major win for children across the country, the rules confirm that each spouse filing jointlycan claim the full $1,700 credit. That means a married couple can give up to $3,400 to scholarship granting organizations (SGOs) and receive a dollar-for-dollar credit for every dollar donated. This provides needed clarity for millions of married households and will unlock more giving to SGOs, putting more scholarships in the hands of children.
Treasury released temporary regulations that set the procedures for the credit's successful launch, along with proposed regulations open for public comment through December 2026. Together, these rules give donors, SGOs, and states greater confidence as they prepare for the credit to open on January 1, 2027. The rules also reflect several recommendations AFPI made in its public comment last December.
"Governors in the 20 states that have not yet opted in, several of whom said they were waiting to review the regulations, now have answers and every reason to opt in," said Erika Donalds, Chair of Education Opportunity at AFPI. "Now the only question is whether their families get these scholarships or watch the dollars go to children in other states."
States that stay on the sidelines will forfeit billions in charitable giving, according to AFPI's analysis, as donations will instead fund scholarships for children in 30 other participating states.
"Under these rules, an Education Freedom Tax Credit scholarship can be seamlessly stacked with a state-level school choice program," said James Paul, Director of State Education Policy at AFPI. "States with existing programs can use the federal credit to supercharge school choice options for families."
Treasury has committed to future guidance clarifying qualified expenses and which specific learning environments are eligible for scholarships. AFPI will continue working to ensure children in homeschools, microschools, and hybrid programs aren't left out simply because their preferred education doesn't look like a traditional classroom.
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Original text here: https://americafirstpolicy.com/issues/treasury-confirms-married-couples-can-give-3400-under-the-education-freedom-tax-credit/
[Category: ThinkTank]
America First Policy Institute: Myths vs. Facts - Camp Safety
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following fact sheet:
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Myths vs. Facts: Camp Safety
October 2, 2026
MYTH: Camps are regulated like schools and childcare centers that serve the same children.
FACT: Camps face looser standards than schools, and many states exempt entire categories of camps from licensure and the inspection, screening, and registration that come with it.
* In many states, day programs, religious camps, and municipal recreation programs fall outside child care licensing, and the American Camp Association's voluntary accreditation covers
... Show Full Article
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following fact sheet:
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Myths vs. Facts: Camp Safety
October 2, 2026
MYTH: Camps are regulated like schools and childcare centers that serve the same children.
FACT: Camps face looser standards than schools, and many states exempt entire categories of camps from licensure and the inspection, screening, and registration that come with it.
* In many states, day programs, religious camps, and municipal recreation programs fall outside child care licensing, and the American Camp Association's voluntary accreditation coversabout 2,400 of the more than 20,000 camps serving 26 million campers a year.
* A Bethany, CT, parks employee charged in 2024 with abusing children at the town-run camp had never been screened there, though he passed fingerprint and registry checks when the town's schools hired him in 2019. The state Office of the Child Advocate found the omission, "while egregious from the perspective of child safety, was not a violation of the law."
MYTH: A licensed camp that passes its state inspection is a safe camp.
FACT: Camp Mystic was licensed and passed its annual inspection two days before the July 4, 2025, flood killed 25 campers and two counselors. The inspection confirmed an emergency plan existed but not what it said.
* The inspectors were sanitarians, certified in clean water and waste disposal, not emergency response. The plan told campers to shelter in place during a flood and had no evacuation procedure; staff were never trained to evacuate.
* A flash flood warning went out at 1:14 a.m., but none of the 39 or more adults on site had an assigned emergency role, and evacuation began only after 3:00 a.m. The Texas Legislature's joint investigation found every camper had time to reach safety on foot.
MYTH: Every adult working at a camp has passed a background check.
FACT: Whether a camp worker is screened depends on the type of camp, its state, and how the worker was hired, and the checks that are run often miss out-of-state records.
* In an FBI pilot of national fingerprint checks, more than 6% of prospective volunteers had records of concern, 40% of them in another state. Congress made the check permanent in 2018, but implementation still lags.
* In Ohio, a registered sex offender worked for weeks at a children's camp through a staffing agency and the camp's cleaning contractor, and the camp did not know who he was.
* A 2025 Texas bill to write background checks into statute passed the House 128 to 3 and died without a Senate hearing. Similarly, Alabama's 2026 Sarah Marsh Heaven's 27 Camp Safety Act bars camps from retaining staff whose background check reveals a sexual or violent conviction but does not expressly require every camp to check every staff member.
MYTH: Parents can easily look up a camp's safety record before enrolling.
FACT: No national system tracks deaths, injuries, or abuse at camps, and parents usually cannot confirm a camp's license, see its inspection findings, or learn what happened there last summer.
* When a five-year-old nearly drowned at a New York camp, a county health inspector found too few lifeguards at the pool, a problem cited before, and his parents had no place to look up that history.
MYTH: Drowning is not a camp problem once a lifeguard is on duty.
FACT: Drowning is the leading cause of death for children ages one to four and the second leading cause of unintentional injury death for ages five to 14, and camp drownings have happened with lifeguards on duty and supervision rules on the books.
* Pools are among the most common features at day camps in the American Camp Association's member survey. In 2022, six-year-old T.J. Mister drowned at a summer camp run by St. Louis County, MO, and in 2024, a six-year-old drowned in a New Jersey day camp pool with a lifeguard on duty.
* New York mandates lifeguard ratios and swim assessments, yet all three non-fatal drownings at its regulated camps in 2025 involved deficiencies in those requirements.
MYTH: Families can hold a negligent camp accountable in court.
FACT: Waivers, charitable immunity, and confidential settlements often stand between families and accountability and keep the failures behind an injury or abuse case from public view.
* In some states, a parent's signed waiver bars a child's negligence claim unless the camp acted with gross negligence, recklessness, or willful misconduct.
* Trey Carlock, abused as a child by a director at Missouri's Kanakuk Kamps, settled under a nondisclosure agreement so restrictive his family says he feared discussing the abuse even in therapy. He died by suicide in 2019 at age 28. Missouri and Texas voided such agreements in 2025 under "Trey's Law."
MYTH: Stronger camp safety laws will close small, rural, and church camps.
FACT: When mandates outrun what camps can afford, safe camps shut down and no child is safer. The remedy is standards every camp can meet, not exemptions for the camps serving the most children.
* Roughly 80% of camps are nonprofits, with many of them faith-based. Texas's post-flood rules required fiber-optic service at every licensed camp. Rural operators put the cost above $100,000; 19 camps sued; and the state agreed to accept cellular, microwave, or satellite service instead.
* In Iowa, where church-related youth programs are exempt from child care licensing, deputies removed 88 children from a faith-based camp over abuse and endangerment allegations.
AFPI'S SIX PILLARS FOR SAFER CAMPS
The six pillars below define what every parent should expect from any camp in America. Achieving them requires state, local, and federal governments working together.
1. Preparedness: When disaster strikes, the adults in charge should already know what to do, which requires a plan suited to the campground and practiced by staff before the season begins.
2. Accountability and Coordination: Parents cannot verify a camp's flood risk, emergency plan, or hiring practices on their own and depend on state and local oversight, which works only when standards are written into law, county emergency officials know which camps operate locally, and operators who ignore a known danger face real consequences.
3. Rural and Remote Infrastructure: Many camps sit in remote areas with unreliable cell and broadband service, where a warning can be issued and never arrive. Every camp, wherever it is, should be able to receive emergency alerts and call for help.
4. Faith-Based and Nonprofit Camps: Most camps are nonprofits, many run by churches on limited budgets. They should meet the same safety and screening standards as every other camp, with reasonable timelines and help to comply and stay open, because exempting them leaves their campers less protected.
5. Screening & Abuse Prevention: Many camp workers never take a background check. Every employee and volunteer should pass a fingerprint-based check, every adult working with campers should be required to report suspected abuse, and settlements should not be allowed to keep abuse confidential.
6. Parental Communication and Transparency: Parents usually cannot find a camp's license status, inspection results, or safety record before enrolling. That information should be public, and every camp should be able to reach families reliably in an emergency.
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Greg Glod
Director, Law and Justice
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Original text here: https://americafirstpolicy.com/issues/myths-vs-facts-camp-safety/
[Category: ThinkTank]
America First Policy Institute Issues Commentary to RedState: California Changed the Title of Proposition 39. Voters Should Know Why.
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following excerpts of a commentary on Oct. 2, 2026, to RedState:
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California Changed the Title of Proposition 39. Voters Should Know Why.
Words matter. And when those words come from the government and appear on a ballot, they matter even more.
When ballots drop on October 5th, Californians will begin voting on Proposition 39, a constitutional amendment concerning voter identification and citizenship verification. But before voters ever reach the substance of the measure, they will encounter something worth examining:
... Show Full Article
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 -- The America First Policy Institute issued the following excerpts of a commentary on Oct. 2, 2026, to RedState:
* * *
California Changed the Title of Proposition 39. Voters Should Know Why.
Words matter. And when those words come from the government and appear on a ballot, they matter even more.
When ballots drop on October 5th, Californians will begin voting on Proposition 39, a constitutional amendment concerning voter identification and citizenship verification. But before voters ever reach the substance of the measure, they will encounter something worth examining:the words the State of California has chosen to describe it.
When the initiative that became Proposition 39 qualified for the ballot, the Secretary of State announced it using the Attorney General's circulating title: "Establishes Additional Voter Identification and Citizenship Verification Requirements."
To read the full article, click here (https://redstate.com/mike-garcia/2026/10/02/california-changed-the-title-of-proposition-39-voters-should-know-why-n2207636).
Originally published by RedState (https://redstate.com/mike-garcia/2026/10/02/california-changed-the-title-of-proposition-39-voters-should-know-why-n2207636)
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Mike Garcia
Chair, America First California
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Original text here: https://americafirstpolicy.com/issues/california-changed-the-title-of-proposition-39-voters-should-know-why/
[Category: ThinkTank]
