Omar García-Ponce

NYT op-ed headline about his Trump's authoritarian ambition

Screen shot of Trump approval rating, 39% approve, 57% disapprove

The two competing dynamics that will define Trump's second term:

1) He wields more unchecked power than his first term—and arguably than any other president in history.

2) He is deeply unpopular, and getting more so.

Priority Theme Spotlight: Omar García-Ponce and Isabel Laterzo – EGAP Author: Max Méndez Beck

Today we are sharing our conversation with @garciaponce.bsky.social ‏and co-author Isabel Laterzo about their paper, “Who is to Blame? Youth Crime and Attribution of Responsibility in Urban Mexico”.

Check it out: buff.ly/6n4yjKY

MUSINGS 2 “No Kings!”

“No Kings!” by Adam Przeworski open.substack.com/pub/adamprze...

Mexico’s economy surprises to the upside, but outlook is weak The Mexican economy grew during the first half of 2025, surprising analysts who had anticipated a recession. However, the outlook is weak, with the consensus forecast implying economic slowdown during...

www.dallasfed.org/research/eco...

Demand for human-generated, trust-certified internet content is skyrocketing.

There is a major business opportunity, in *every* country, for media firms to meet this rising demand with innovation.

Fascinating new experiment by @filipecampante.bsky.social et al.—> filipecampante.org/wp-content/u...

Some thoughts on trends in political violence and where we are headed in the U.S.

First, violence has been part of U.S. politics since the beginning.

$3 a day: A new poverty line has shifted the World Bank’s data on extreme poverty. What changed, and why? In June 2025, the World Bank increased its extreme poverty estimates by 125 million people. This doesn’t mean the world has gotten poorer: it reflects a new, higher International Poverty Line of $3 a ...

When the World Bank publishes new poverty estimates, it makes headlines. But making sense of these numbers is harder than it looks! Inflation, PPPs, national poverty lines, real incomes…There’s a lot going on.

In this article my colleagues explain where the new numbers come from and what changed

Job Description: The Department of Justice, Law & Criminology in the School of Public Affairs at American University invites applications for a full-time, tenure-track position beginning in Academic Year 2026-2027. The position will be at the rank of Assistant Professor. For this position, the department is seeking a scholar with substantive expertise in political violence and terrorism. The search is open regarding specialty, but the Department is especially interested in a scholar whose research and teaching interests include terrorism, political violence, radicalization, extremism, or cybersecurity.

We're hiring!

The @au-spa.bsky.social is hiring an assistant professor specializing in political violence and terrorism.

Deadline: September 22nd.

Feel free to reach out if you have questions!

See below for the job ad and application.

american.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/AU/job/Main-...

Cover image of my book. Orange cover with bold white font of the title, and a large wrench superimposed over a forest fire.

No Option but Sabotage The Radical Environmental Movement and the Climate Crisis Thomas Zeitzoff Provides a unique perspective on one of the most important and salient issues facing the public: the threat of climate change and how activists are confronting it Features in-depths interviews with more than 100 past and current activists and experts Incorporates case studies of the radical environmental movement from origins of Earth First! to the ELF to ecofascism to present-day climate activists

Thrilled to share the cover of my upcoming book, out February 2026 from @oxfordacademic.bsky.social

NO OPTION BUT SABOTAGE
The Radical Environmental Movement and the Climate Crisis

global.oup.com/academic/pro...

Really cool and important post by @kwcollins.bsky.social and the team at Survey 160 on the promise and pitfalls of using “silicon samples” (LLM -generated simulated survey responses) for polling and public opinion research.

www.survey160.com/methodologic...

Ecuador's homicide rate remains astoundingly high, hovering around 40 per 100,000 people in the past couple of years.

My ballot

The Tech Bros are:

1. Even less socially altruistic

2. Richer, more powerful, and less accountable

3. And have much weirder preferences—“the AGI Singularity is almost here!”— that makes them want to dismantle more of society.

Priority Theme Spotlight: Omar García-Ponce and Isabel Laterzo – EGAP Author: Max Méndez Beck

For today's spotlight, we are highlighting work by @garciaponce.bsky.social and @isabellatingley.bsky.social Read more about their paper, “Who is to Blame? Youth Crime and Attribution of Responsibility in Urban Mexico” on the EGAP site.

I mean, with Santana in the mix, that’s practically half Mexican 😂

🚨Now Accepting Applications!

The Data Analytics for Policy Professionals (DAPP) program at GW’s Elliott School is offering new courses this Summer & Fall.

Designed for policy professionals looking to sharpen their data skills.

Learn more & apply 👉 elliott.gwu.edu/data-analyti...

Important piece in the Michigan Law Review by Steffen Seitz on the growing use of conspiracy charges against left-wing activists—from Stop Cop City to pro-Palestine students.

The charges are designed to suppress and kill social movements

papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Based on official data, these are the homicide and disappearance rates in Mexico since the onset of the drug war.

Over 100K people have been reported missing & remain unlocated, while nearly half a million have been killed since 2007.

One key question is how many of the disappeared remain alive?

A few thoughts on AI and higher ed:

1) It’s coming whether we like it or not

2) Many students are using LLMs, but are nervous that any use is “cheating” and they don’t know the good cases to use it (e.g. like help “coding”)

1/ I just published a new article titled “Criminal Violence, the State, & Society” in the Annual Review of Political Science, which examines the growing political science research on criminal violence over the past 15 years.

Link 👉https://go.shr.lc/3GnoH7f

Here is a summary of some key insights...

Super important work on the politics of criminal violence by @garciaponce.bsky.social

👇👇👇

12/12 Finally, many fantastic scholars have contributed to the field. Here is some of the work cited!

11/ I also discuss where this research falls short, why it matters for policy, the field’s ethical considerations, and where future work should go.

10/ "Voice" includes political participation, protest,
and collective resistance (e.g., vigilantism); while "loyalty" can take the form of compliance with either state authorities or organized criminal groups.

9/ The diverse ways society is impacted by and responds to criminal violence can be conceptualized through Hirschman's framework of exit, voice, and loyalty. For instance, "exit" manifests through migration, political disengagement, or complete withdrawal from public life...

8/ Emerging scholarship highlights the potential of institutional reforms (e.g., police forces, judicial systems, penal institutions) and community-based interventions (e.g., community policing, services, etc.), although rigorous evidence on their effectiveness remains limited.

7/ State responses to criminal violence vary considerably across contexts. Although "mano dura" or punitive approaches remain predominant—particularly in Latin America—there is growing evidence that these approaches have mainly produced ineffective or mixed results.

6/ Furthermore, extensive research has shown that both economic incentives and political conditions shape how criminal organizations operate and use violence. The structure of illegal markets and the political environment matter.

5/ Understanding the sources & dynamics of violence requires reconceptualizing the relationships between states & criminal orgs, which often coexist not as substitutes but as complements. Recent research sheds light on this symbiosis between the state and the criminal underworld.