Maxwell School News and Commentary

"We’ve recommended that the medical experts be up front and center, and the political leaders take a step back and defer to the doctors and to the head of the health agencies, because that’s who anxious people want to hear from," says Shana Gadarian, associate professor of political science.

Brian Taylor, professor and chair of political science, says "he's [Russian president Vladimir Putin] leaving the presidency, but he’s almost certainly going to take some other position and try and stay on."

"The authorities made a calculation back in the summer: that it was better to keep the actual opposition candidates — the people associated with Navalny — off the ballot and take the protests over the summer, than it would be to steal the elections in September and face protests over that," says Professor of Political Science Brian Taylor, about the Russian election.

"It’s possible for Congress to enact—over a veto—funding restrictions on this or new funds that the president wants or needs. There’s lots of horse trading to come," says Professor Emeritus William Banks.

"This is a real institutional threat to the separation of powers to use emergency powers to enable the president to bypass Congress to build a wall on his own initiative that our elected representatives have chosen not to fund," says William C. Banks, professor of public administration and international affairs. 

"On one hand, it is kind of ridiculous because there is nothing approaching an invasion there," says William C. Banks, professor of public administration and international affairs. "There is no indication that there is a force lining the border that [Customs and Border Protection] couldn’t take care of. But on the other hand, if you take the Cabinet order’s language at face value, and take what the president is saying as credible threats, then it becomes grayer."

According to Professor Emeritus William C. Banks, U.S. troops can’t detain, arrest or search anyone at the border. That’s a law enforcement function, and the military can’t perform those duties on U.S. soil unless there’s no other way to enforce the law. 

"People have always been susceptible to misinformation," Emily Thorson, assistant professor of political science, says. "The real challenge now lies in the immediacy, scope and ease of dissemination we now see with new technologies like social media."

"Social Security is wildly popular," says Leonard Burman, professor of public administration and international affairs. "People support the regressive payroll tax because they like what it pays for and because it’s automatically withdrawn from their paychecks, unlike the reviled income tax that requires an obvious and painful annual reckoning."