Ben Helms

Wrote a short article for @voxdev.bsky.social using results from my primary data collection. This article is based on a forthcoming @thejop.bsky.social piece where I argue that male migration is an under-examined pathway for female political engagement. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Title: Both Liberal and Conservative Judges Rule Against Trump Description: A scatter plot showing the rulings of judges against or in favor of Trump, categorized by ideology using the DIME score. The x-axis represents Judge Ideology (DIME Score), ranging from liberal (-1) to conservative (1), and the y-axis represents the case outcome (against or for Trump). • Blue dots represent liberal judges, purple dots represent moderate judges, and red dots represent conservative judges. • Some judges are labeled, including Rudolph Contreras, Lauren King, John Coughenour, and James Emanuel Boasberg on the liberal to moderate side, and Carl Nichols, Richard J. Leon, and Joseph N. Laplante on the conservative side. • A note mentions that Boasberg, though slightly right-leaning, was initially appointed by George W. Bush. • The visualization suggests that judges from both ideological backgrounds ruled against Trump.

1/🧵 Judges across ideological lines are ruling against Trump at strikingly similar rates (84% liberal, 86% centrist, 82% conservative). This isn't partisan opposition to Trump—it's the judiciary functioning as intended by cutting across partisan lines to uphold the Constitution.

My Turn | How USAID funding cuts hurt Illinois "The domestic consequences of the USAID shutdown will hurt the entire country directly," writes UI Assistant Professor Cleo O'Brien-Udry. "Illinois will be dramatically impacted due to its large agric...

wrote an op-ed in our local paper drawing attention to the effects of USAID cuts on Illinois businesses

TL;DR it's bad!!

How USAID funding cuts hurt Illinois

www.news-gazette.com/opinion/gues...

The White House Demonstrates USAID’s Efficiency The White House issued a press release three days ago apparently designed to justify the ongoing stop-work orders at USAID, alongside pulling agency staff out of the field and locking them out of…

The White House's press release on widespread USAID fraud shows nothing of the sort, @charlesjkenny.bsky.social writes. He explains in a new blog post:

Screenshot of map of farms/ports impacted by USAID shutdown

Interactive map of USAID agriculture cut impacts on farms, ports across the US storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/29fc...

PBS News Hour live episode, Feb. 5, 2025 YouTube video by PBS NewsHour

Andrew Natsios, USAID administrator in the George W. Bush administration, has a few things to say about the Trump/Musk/Rubio assault on the agency. Worth watching. No pulling punches. via PBSNewsHour www.youtube.com/live/ZI6XIKx...

‘What Elon Musk Said Is a Bold-Faced Lie’ A former Republican director of USAID says the agency is critical to U.S. interests and can’t be abolished or folded into the State Department.

Right on the money, from my esteemed colleague.

www.politico.com/news/magazin...

Interesting to not see Texas among the GOP states initially supporting Trump’s birthright citizenship EO irp.cdn-website.com/6a12d959/fil...

Labor Market Policy as Immigration Control: The Case of Temporary Protected Status Abstract. Controlling immigration has become a central political goal in advanced democracies. Politicians across the world have experimented with a range

@benjaminhelms.bsky.social and I published a paper in 2022 showing that TPS, because it increases remittances, actually decreases subsequent unauthorized migration.

academic.oup.com/isq/article-...

Quick effort by a group of USAID supporters to mobilize against the shutdown and takeover -- includes a rally in DC on Wednesday. Website here:

Our congressional delegation pursuing oversight on reports of Elon Musk’s illegal activity at USAID was just barred from entering the building on the orders of Musk and the Trump Administration.

Nobody elected Musk — this is illegal and corrupt and we will keep fighting it.

MEDIA ADVISORY: Congressional Delegation To Host Press Availability Today At USAID Headquarters Amid Illegal Shut Down Of Agency February 3, 2025 (Washington, D.C.) – Reps. Don Beyer (D-VA), Gerry Connolly (D-VA), Jamie Raskin (D-MD), Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), and Rep. Johnny Olszewsi (D-MD) will hold a press availability to discuss the far-reaching consequences of the Trump Administration and Elon Musk’s illegal shutdown of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) on national security, the economy, and public health. DATE: Monday, February 3, 2025 at 1:00 PM WHO: Rep. Don Beyer Sen. Chris Van Hollen Rep. Gerry Connolly Rep. Jamie Raskin Rep. Johnny Olszewski Additional Speakers Possible

FYI

Can the President Dissolve USAID by Executive Order? Congress established USAID in statute, and the president may not unilaterally override a statute by executive order.

Can the president dissolve USAID without an act of Congress? No.

www.justsecurity.org/107267/can-p...

Flyer for a rally. Restore Foreign Aid Now: keep America SAFE, STRONG, and PROSPEROUS. To be held at Upper Senate Park (Constitution and Delaware Avenues NE) Wednesday February 5, 2025 at 1130 AM. Join retired and former USAID and State Department staff, development and humanitarian assistance implementers, and other supporters of U.S. Foreign Affairs. Congress must act now to protect USAID and U.S. foreign aid, vital to our security, economy, and global leadership -- oppose defunding and ensure bipartisan support

Congratulations, Noah! Incredible news!

🚨Why do people turn out less in some places than others, even in compulsory voting systems?🚨

In our new paper, forthcoming at BJPS, we highlight the role of migratory turnover in increasing voting costs for communities and test it using new municipal panel data from Brazil.

OK, here is my pre-registered take: Trump will make American immigration attitudes great again, again.

goodauthority.org/news/trump-2...

Me too. And thanks for the invitation, I would love to come back and give a talk anytime!

Thanks so much! You may remember me as one of your students, many years ago now!

A 75-degree day in Houston - who knew it could happen?

Spot my newest office decoration.

This paper was very much an interdisciplinary effort - combining insights from consumer psychology and international relations. We hope that it provides a novel empirical finding that helps us better understand the microfoundations of IR.

We use supermarket scanner data to explore how ordinary people react to external threats in IR. We find that local casualties during the Iraq War caused increased market share for products perceived as more "American," suggesting the embrace of national identity in the face of external threat.

Excited to share that my article "War on Aisle 5: Casualties, National Identity, and Consumer Behavior", coauthored with Sonal Pandya and Rajkumar Venkatesan, has been published in the Journal of Conflict Resolution!

Take a look here: doi.org/10.1177/0022...

This piece builds on research by David and I showing that temporary protection for migrants, when it allows labor market access, can increase remittances and decrease the demand for subsequent migration. Read more here: doi.org/10.1093/isq/...

Polisky

Opinion: A smart and humane answer on immigration | CNN The Biden administration’s Temporary Protected Status (TPS) program is a humane policy that will improve the lives of people living here and abroad, write authors Ben Helms, David Leblang and Tom Ja...

"By extending temporary protection to certain people who are already here and giving them the opportunity to work, TPS is a smart and humane way to improve the lives of people living here and abroad."

Check out my piece on TPS with David Leblang and Tom Jawetz with CNN

www.cnn.com/2023/10/05/o...

Labor Market Policy as Immigration Control: The Case of Temporary Protected Status Abstract. Controlling immigration has become a central political goal in advanced democracies. Politicians across the world have experimented with a range of po

See our article in ISQ here: academic.oup.com/isq/article-...

U.S. Will Allow Nearly 500,000 Venezuelan Migrants to Work Legally The move, announced late Wednesday, followed intense lobbying by New York Democrats before and during President Biden’s visit to New York City this week.

The Biden administration has extended TPS to more Venezuelans, offering them legal labor market access in the US. In research with David Leblang, we find that TPS helps migrants send remittances home, and if anything, reduces subsequent migration. www.nytimes.com/2023/09/20/n...