Natalia Forrat

In turn, a 64 percent majority of Republicans now say immigration is a good thing for the country, up from 39 percent last year."

whose support for lowering immigration rates plummeted to 48 percent, from 88 percent just one year ago. Although a plurality still want immigration to decrease, an increasing share expressed a desire to keep immigration at current levels.

Support for Immigration Rebounds as Trump Cracks Down on It, Poll Finds

Wow. I don't remember if I ever saw that big of a shift in public opinion in just one year.
www.nytimes.com/2025/07/11/u...

"The recent shift in attitudes about immigration has been driven primarily by Republicans,

The embassy never responded. Cristosal’s U.S.A.I.D. funding has since been canceled; the head of its anticorruption unit, Ruth López, was arrested last month, and is still in prison."

When Cristosal’s director, Noah Bullock, heard Mr. Rubio would visit the country, he asked the embassy if the secretary would make time to meet with representatives from civil society groups like his, as had often been the case for such visits around the world.

One of the groups that U.S.A.I.D. funded in El Salvador, Cristosal, is a human rights group that investigates corruption by the country’s government.

Now, Mr. Rubio was meeting with Mr. Bukele, who has called himself the world’s “coolest dictator,” to discuss sending undocumented migrants from the United States to a notorious Salvadoran prison.

The agency spent more than $50 million on human rights and other pro-democracy programs in El Salvador last year, according to federal data.

Missteps, Confusion and ‘Viral Waste’: The 14 Days That Doomed U.S.A.I.D.

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/22/u...
"That Mr. Rubio was in El Salvador on the day of U.S.A.I.D.’s demise carried a particular resonance.

A line chart with a blue line showing a large growth of protest events from Jan 20 - May 31, 2025, and a green line showing the relatively modest growth of protest events during the same period in 2017.

My team and I at the Crowd Counting Consortium (@djpressman@bsky.social, Soha Hammam, & Chris Shay) have a new piece out: wagingnonviolence.org/2025/06/amer.... In it, we show that through May 2025, the size and scale of anti-Trump protests have dwarfed those in 2017. 🧵

Unity, Division, and the Grassroots Architecture of Authoritarian Rule Dr. Natalia Forrat, a comparative political sociologist and lecturer at the University of Michigan’s Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies, explores how authoritarian regimes are mai...

The TLDR version of the talk:
cddrl.fsi.stanford.edu/news/unity-d...

For those who did not make it to my book talk on April 1st, I will be doing it again tomorrow at the Stanford's CDDRL @ noon Pacific Time.
Stanford people - see you in person; everyone else can join via Zoom. @stanfordcddrl.bsky.social

cddrl.fsi.stanford.edu/events/socia...

DHS threatens to revoke Harvard’s eligibility to host international students unless it turns over disciplinary records | CNN Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is threatening to strip Harvard University of its ability to enroll international students if it doesn’t turn over records on international studen...

I'm far from saying that the US is like Russia, but it seems that in all countries, government funds and accreditation/certification are the sticks used by autocrats to tame universities. Kudos to Harvard for standing up to this. Universities have the power!
edition.cnn.com/2025/04/16/u...

Ask Trump whether he's still convinced Pu wants peace.

Another year of programming to be proud of @umichDemocracy!

ii.umich.edu/emerging-dem...

Any institution that stands up to Mr. Trump should be prepared to make sacrifices. ... One mistake that the submissive law firms made was imagining they had any chance of emerging unscathed once Mr. Trump targeted them."

"A crucial fact about these agreements is that they include no binding promises from the White House. ... The university did not even win the restoration of that funding when it agreed to his demands; it won merely permission to begin negotiating with the administration.

Opinion | A Playbook for Law Firms and Colleges to Stand Up to President Trump Law firms and universities do not need to capitulate. Here’s how they can fight back.

"The playbook begins with a recognition that capitulation is doomed."
www.nytimes.com/2025/04/06/o...

He never knew a day of peace

Still shocking to me how quickly universities are giving up. Maybe they never went through a real test of their integrity, and their true essence is now being revealed.

NYU canceled talk on USAID cuts for being ‘anti-governmental’, doctor says University called Dr Joanne Liu, ex-head of Doctors Without Borders, after planning to speak on Gaza and federal cuts

"Liu, who said she was already in New York when she received the call, told CTV News that she was told that the slides about Gaza “could be perceived as antisemitic” and that the USAID slides might be perceived as “anti-governmental”."
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

This was….five months ago

This one is has nothing to do with peace talks. Putin signs those twice a year. Every year

Dear all - if you're free at lunchtime (EST) tomorrow (April 1), come or connect to my book talk at the University of Michigan Center for Emerging Democracies! THIS IS NOT A JOKE!

Zoom registration link: myumi.ch/qV3kX

Also, check out the book in your library: global.oup.com/academic/pro...

Trump Warned U.S. Automakers Not to Raise Prices in Response to Tariffs The threat came in a call earlier this month, leaving CEOs worried they would face punishment if prices go up.

I guess we should now be waiting for executive orders against automakers who raise prices? By the way, very happy to see that some law firms choose to fight rather than concede.
www.wsj.com/business/aut...

— and from young moderates and progressives who chose to stay home because they thought Ms. Harris was either too progressive or not progressive enough."

Opinion | Have Young People Really Turned MAGA? Feeling empowered is different from numerical growth.

"The data suggest that the swing in young adults voting for Trump did not reflect a major shift in ideology. ... the swing seems to have resulted from moderate-to-somewhat-liberal young voters deciding to bet on Mr.Trump out of concern about the state of the economy..
www.nytimes.com/2025/03/26/o...

Trump's talk about the US taking control of Ukraine's nuclear facilities has nothing to do with peace-making. Most likely, it's joint effort by Ru and the US to make sure Ukraine cannot develop its own nuclear deterrent. A Budapest Memorandum 2 proposal, if you will, w more useless assurances.

Chart of cumulative protests reported from Jan 22 - Feb 28, 2017 vs 2025:

U.S. Denied Entry to French Scientist Over Views on Trump Policies, France Says The French authorities said the academic had been traveling to a conference near Houston when border officials blocked his entry because of conversations found on his phone.

Clean your devices before crossing the US border, ladies and gentlemen. Probably even if you are US citizens. This is a 101 survival skill under autocracy; time to learn it.
www.nytimes.com/2025/03/20/w...