2025-12-04 07:00:00
2025年11月30日，唐纳德·特朗普在乘坐空军一号前往华盛顿特区途中向媒体发表讲话。| Pete Marovich/Getty Images
本文出自《Logoff》每日通讯，旨在帮助您了解特朗普政府的动态，而不让政治新闻占据您的生活。欢迎订阅。
欢迎来到《Logoff》：特朗普政府宣布暂停来自19个国家的移民申请，以回应上周华盛顿特区发生的两名国民警卫队士兵遇害事件。具体变化是什么？此次暂停涵盖了此前已实施旅行禁令的12个国家，以及另外7个面临部分限制的国家。根据新政策，来自这些国家的移民将暂停所有绿卡和公民身份申请。美国公民及移民服务局还表示，将重新审查自拜登政府上任以来的所有移民案件。
受影响的国家包括阿富汗、缅甸、乍得、刚果共和国、赤道几内亚、厄立特里亚、海地、伊朗、利比亚、索马里、苏丹、也门、布隆迪、古巴、老挝、塞拉利昂、多哥、土库曼斯坦和委内瑞拉。
背景是什么？这是特朗普政府针对华盛顿枪击事件发起的更广泛的移民收紧措施的一部分，包括暂停庇护申请。枪击案嫌疑人拉卡纳沃尔，是一名阿富汗籍人士，曾在其国内与一家美国中央情报局支持的准军事组织合作，之后于2021年进入美国。
大局如何？即使在最近的限制措施出台之前，特朗普（以及白宫副幕僚长兼反移民激进分子斯蒂芬·米勒）已经大幅削减了美国的移民来源。今年10月，特朗普政府将年度难民配额设定为仅7500人，而拜登政府则为125000人。这7500人中，几乎全部可能是白人南非人——受益于特朗普政府所构想的所谓“难民危机”。
这有什么意义？特朗普正利用华盛顿枪击事件来推动更广泛、更恶劣的反移民议程，特别关注排除来自非白人国家的移民。最新例子就是昨天在内阁会议上，特朗普攻击了索马里移民，称他们为“垃圾”，并告诉记者“我不希望他们进入我们的国家”。
无论新闻多么糟糕，与朋友面对面相处（最好是远离手机）都是改善世界现状的一种方式。这可以有多种形式，但我的同事艾莉·沃尔普有一个具体的建议：尝试重新举办睡衣派对。她写道，与朋友随意共处是放松身心、加深友谊的好方法，无论年龄大小。您可以在这里阅读她完整而有说服力的论述。
一如既往，感谢您的阅读，祝您有一个美好的夜晚，我们明天再见！
This story appeared in The Logoff, a daily newsletter that helps you stay informed about the Trump administration without letting political news take over your life. Subscribe here.
Welcome to The Logoff: The Trump administration is stopping all immigration applications from 19 countries in response to last week’s deadly shooting of two National Guard soldiers in Washington, DC.
What’s changing? The pause covers 12 countries that were already under a travel ban imposed earlier this year, as well as seven others facing partial restrictions. Under the new policy, all green card and citizenship applications will be halted for immigrants from those countries. US Citizenship and Immigration Services also said that immigration cases dating back to the start of the Biden administration will be re-reviewed.
The affected countries are Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela.
What’s the context? This is part of a broader immigration crackdown by the Trump administration in response to the DC shooting, including a pause on asylum applications. The shooting suspect, 29-year-old Rahmanullah Lakanwal, is an Afghan national who worked with a CIA-backed paramilitary unit in his home country before entering the US in 2021.
What’s the big picture? Even before the most recent restrictions, President Donald Trump (and White House deputy chief of staff/anti-immigration zealot Stephen Miller) choked off many sources of immigration to the US. In October, the Trump administration set its annual refugee cap at just 7,500 people, compared to 125,000 under President Joe Biden. Of those 7,500, nearly all may be white South Africans — beneficiaries of what is largely an imagined crisis on the part of the Trump administration.
Why does this matter? Trump is seizing on the DC shooting as an opportunity to advance a much broader, much uglier anti-immigration agenda, with a particular focus on excluding immigrants from non-white countries. The latest example of that came just yesterday: Trump attacked Somali immigrants in a Cabinet meeting, calling them “garbage” and telling reporters that “I don’t want them in our country.”
There are few ways to feel better about the state of the world, however bad the news might be, than to spend time with friends in person (ideally with phones far away). That can take lots of forms, but my colleague Allie Volpe has a specific recommendation: Try bringing back the slumber party. Simply coexisting with friends in an open-ended hangout, she writes, is a great way to relax and deepen friendships, whatever your age. You can read her full, compelling case here.
As always, thanks for reading, have a great evening, and we’ll see you back here tomorrow!
2025-12-04 06:45:00
迈克尔和苏珊·德尔向美国政府捐赠了前所未有的62.5亿美元，这笔资金将通过所谓的“特朗普账户”惠及2500万儿童。这些账户是根据总统特朗普今年早些时候通过的税法设立的，允许每个在特朗普任期内出生的婴儿获得1000美元的初始资金，用于投资，直到他们年满18岁才能使用。这些账户类似于为儿童设立的401(k)退休账户，每年最多可存入5000美元，包括父母或雇主的贡献。资金必须投资于低成本的指数基金，预计如果父母每年存入并投资全部金额，孩子成年后账户资产可能达到19.1万美元，其中8.3万美元来自投资收益。
特朗普账户计划于2026年美国建国250周年之际启动，面向所有18岁以下且拥有社会保障号码的儿童。虽然这一计划与许多州已有的529教育储蓄计划类似，但其规模和影响力更大。德尔的捐赠是迄今为止美国历史上最大的一笔，仅用于那些居住在家庭收入中位数低于15万美元的社区的儿童。这与政府的1000美元启动资金不同，但覆盖了大部分美国社区。
尽管这一计划理论上有助于缩小贫富差距，但其实际效果取决于是否能有效推广。目前，特朗普账户需要家庭主动申请，而低收入家庭可能缺乏必要的金融知识或时间去完成这一过程。此外，税法同时削减了食品援助（如SNAP）和医疗补助（如Medicaid）的资金，这可能使低收入家庭难以负担这些账户的费用。因此，这些账户是否能真正帮助最需要的孩子，仍有待观察。
虽然特朗普表示希望有“数百家大型公司”加入这一计划，但目前只有德尔公司承诺匹配联邦政府的1000美元启动资金，其他公司尚未表态。不过，这一模式的公开性和协调性可能促使更多人关注并参与。是否能成为新的捐赠模式，还取决于该系统是否有效运作，以及不同政治立场的捐赠者是否愿意支持以特朗普命名的账户。
When billionaire Michael Dell was 8 years old, he opened his first savings account.
Every time that young Michael forked a quarter over to the bank teller, he felt a rush from the “power of compound interest,” as he said from the White House on Tuesday, hours after he and his wife Susan gifted an unprecedented $6.25 billion to help some 25 million kids amass savings of their own.
They will be held in so-called “Trump accounts,” which are essentially miniature trust funds with a couple of strings attached. Established under President Donald Trump’s sprawling tax bill that passed earlier this year, the savings accounts will allow every baby born during his current term to receive $1,000 in funds for investment that they will be able to tap into when they turn 18 — as long as their parents remember to sign them up for the accounts.
But the Dells’ donation, which is likely one of the largest in American history, may also foretell something bigger. If Trump has it his way, then this will be the first of many donations headed directly into American children’s investment accounts.
Slated to launch as part of America’s 250th birthday bash in 2026, the Trump accounts will be open to anyone with a Social Security number who is under the age of 18.
These savings accounts will act like something like a 401k for kids. Up to $5,000 can be added to the accounts per year, including contributions from parents or their parents’ employers. We don’t know most of the details yet, like where the accounts will reside, but any money saved must be invested in low-cost index funds.
$5,000 may not seem like a lot, but if parents contributed and invested the full amount each year for 18 years, with a reasonable 6 percent rate of return, the fund could reach up to $191,000 by the time their child is old enough to cash it out — with $83,000 of that money made from investment gains. Neither the capital nor the returns can be touched, with very limited exceptions, until the kid turns 18. At that point, they can use the funds to pay for tuition or, eventually, a down payment, while what’s left continues to grow in what essentially becomes an investment account that can help them build wealth over their lifetime. If that smart 18-year-old opts to leave the $191,000 untouched through adulthood, their accounts assets will likely climb to over $2 million by the time they turn 60, according to an estimate from Charles Schwab.
While anyone under 18 can qualify to begin a Trump account, in order to qualify for the government’s $1,000 starting boost, you have to be a baby born between January 1, 2025, and December 31, 2028.
For middle-class or wealthier families, all of this will sound familiar; Trump Accounts aren’t too dissimilar from the state-run 529 accounts that many parents use to help save for college and other educational expenses. The idea for the new accounts is rooted in longstanding policy efforts that have aimed to help children from lower-income families tap into the same kind of financial tools that wealthier Americans have long used to give their kids a head start.
The gap is real: Fewer than a quarter of American families use 529 plans to help their children save for tuition or other education expenses. Many low-income families simply can’t afford to stash away money from their paychecks each month and may not be aware of the programs.
Democrats like Sen. Cory Booker have long championed the idea of building federally funded savings accounts to help close the gap between the haves and have nots of saving for college, but bipartisan support for such plans has been increasingly growing in “leaps and bounds” in recent years, said Rebecca Loya, research director at the San Francisco Office of the Treasurer, home to the country’s first universal automatic children’s savings account program. Since then-mayor Gavin Newsom launched the program in 2011, the city has automatically created a savings account with a $50 initial deposit for every kindergartener enrolled in public school.
“There’s been a lot of work over many years to try to get legislation at the federal level,” Loya said. “I didn’t expect it to happen this way.”
Which brings us to the Dells’ $6.25 billion donation, which will translate into $250 in newfound savings for about 25 million older kids under the age of 10 who didn’t qualify for the $1,000.
“We believe the smartest investment that we can make is investment in children,” said Michael Dell, who is one of the richest people on earth — with a fortune of nearly $159 billion — at the White House briefing.
But $6 billion is a lot, even for him. It’s more than double the roughly $3 billion he and his wife have given to charity over the course of the past 25 years.
Unlike the government infusions, the Dells’ gift will only go to kids who live in zip codes where the median household income is below $150,000. (That’s not very targeted, though; it includes the vast majority of American neighborhoods, barring very wealthy enclaves like Soho or Tribeca.)
In his remarks at the White House, Sen. Ted Cruz, who has partnered with Booker on pushing the idea of children’s savings accounts through Congress and getting it up and running, said he hopes the investments will help American kids see companies like Dell not as “big, bad, scary, corporations,” but as a foothold for “a new generation of capitalists.”
This is not the first time a billionaire has distributed cash — or, more accurately, investment funds — directly to ordinary people.
Giving unrestricted cash to people who need it through one-time infusions — like Covid-era stimulus checks — or regular payments has become an increasingly popular, if at times polarized, way to give, both for the government and for philanthropists. Many of these evidence-backed programs have been funded by philanthropy or public-private partnerships.
But the Dells’ donation is by far the biggest and most visible.
“When I started [Dell Computers] 41 years ago, we created the direct model” of selling computers straight to consumers, Dell told the New York Times this week. “This is sort of the direct model philanthropy.”
Most billionaire philanthropy doesn’t work this way, relying instead on foundations or middlemen to distribute funds, often ever so slowly over time. Take Elon Musk, whose $14 billion philanthropic foundation has consistently failed to give away even 5 percent of its assets as required by law each year.
But, even billionaires known for their large-scale philanthropy, like Bill Gates or MacKenzie Scott, give most of their charity in the form of grants to organizations, not direct payments to people in need.
And while other philanthropists have donated to smaller-scale children’s savings accounts programs or basic income pilots, none of the experts I spoke with could point to another time in American history when a donor collaborated with the federal government at such a scale.
“Anybody who gives away $6 billion in one go is really inspiring and exciting,” said Caitlin Hannon, a philanthropic advisor and president of Building Impact Partners, noting that most donors are also averse to direct payments, because they can’t control where the money lands. “We don’t see philanthropy behaving in this way very frequently.”
On paper, it very well could. Children’s savings programs like the one Loya helps run in San Francisco have shown real results.
One study found that San Francisco students with savings accounts were 6 percent more likely to attend college, rising to 12 percent for students of color otherwise underrepresented in higher education. And that’s with just $50 in starter cash for each account.
“Income allows families to meet their immediate needs, but wealth is what gives you the opportunity to weather the unexpected and unlock future opportunities,” said Katherina Rosqueta, founding executive director of the Center for High-Impact Philanthropy at the University of Pennsylvania, which considers children’s savings accounts to be a highly effective intervention. “When a child knows that there will be resources available to them for the future, it also helps them think about their future.”
But, there is a major catch. As it stands, families who want Trump accounts — including those $1,000 baby bonuses — will need to opt in to get the money, rather than being automatically enrolled as they are in San Francisco.
“It’s not fundamentally bad, right? It’s free money,” said Elaine Maag, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute. But when families need to sign up to participate instead of being automatically enrolled, many of the low-income kids who could most benefit from the funds are more likely to fall through the cracks, she said.
Their parents might not have the financial literacy to realize the benefits of such accounts — after all, they probably didn’t grow up with a savings plan of their own — and getting the word out about yet another government program can be a major challenge.
And even if the program does succeed at getting low-income families on board, the savings won’t help them cope with the broader challenges many are facing right now. While establishing the accounts, the tax bill simultaneously gutted funding for food assistance like SNAP and health programs like Medicaid.
“The Trump accounts are not a substitute for any benefits being delivered monthly,” said Maag. “In an ideal world, people have access to sufficient resources today and some savings” tomorrow.
The administration has yet to confirm that the accounts won’t be counted as income when it comes to qualifying for those public benefits, which are typically only available to families whose income stays below a tight threshold. If that happens, the accounts could become untenable for low-income families who rely on programs like SNAP to feed their families.
Until all of those details are sorted out by the Treasury Department, it’s hard to know if Trump accounts will help millions of kids or just the ones whose parents had the time to navigate the paperwork.
At least one has promised to, so far.
“A lot of people have a good heart, but they can’t give $6.25 billion dollars,” said Trump, whose own foundation was shuttered due to various illegalities but has pledged to donate to the accounts himself, while “a lot of friends of mine have already told me they’re going to contribute a lot of money.”
He expects “hundreds of major companies” to announce plans to contribute in the coming months. When the program was first announced, Dell, Uber, and Goldman Sachs all talked about making major contributions — to their employees’ children, at least. The Dells have already pledged to match the federal government’s $1,000 seed contribution to every child born to their company’s US employees until 2028. No word yet from the other companies’ CEOs.
But Trumpian bombast aside, there are early signs the model could catch on.
Administration officials have floated the idea of donors “adopting a zip code” or “adopting a street” by dropping investment funds directly into children’s accounts, a pretty straightforward pitch for wealthy individuals who don’t have big philanthropic institutions or a community foundation hoping to get involved.
“The public nature and the coordination of the public announcement raises the visibility of this initiative,” said Rosqueta. “It prompts people to consider, ‘Oh, have I cared about reducing the wealth gap? Is this something that I could contribute to?’”
Whether this becomes a new template for giving may depend on whether the whole system actually works. And whether donors across the political spectrum can stomach giving to accounts named after Trump. (It could be worse; they were originally called MAGA accounts.)
2025-12-04 01:25:00
2025年12月2日，美国总统唐纳德·特朗普与国防部长彼得·海格塞思在华盛顿白宫内阁室举行内阁会议。| AFP/Getty Images
要点如下：
9月初，国防部长海格塞思下令美军对加勒比海的一艘快艇进行“杀光所有人”的攻击。一枚导弹击中该船并引发爆炸。烟雾散去后，美军无人机显示有两人仍抓着残骸。随后，一位海军上将又下令进行第二次打击，这一行为显然违反了多项国际和国内法律。至少这是《华盛顿邮报》最近的一篇报道所声称的。特朗普政府则公开表示该报道是“假新闻”。在闭门向国会议员简报时，五角大楼官员称第二次打击并非旨在杀伤幸存者，而是为了击沉船只以清除其他船只的航行障碍。然而，政府拒绝向公众或国会提供未经编辑的轰炸视频。
在本周五的一条社交媒体帖子中，海格塞思声称这些打击“在美国和国际法下都是合法的”。然而，国会中的许多人对此持怀疑态度，两党制的众议院和参议院军事委员会都誓言要调查此事。这种监督至关重要。我们需要确定国防部长是否授权杀害受伤的、遇险的人员。国际法和美国法律都禁止在战争中杀害已经失去战斗力的人。然而，这场争论也显得有些虚伪。白宫的真实立场似乎并非认为其行动符合战争法，而是认为不应受战争法约束。总统和国防部长不仅通过行动隐晦地表达了这一观点，还曾在公共生活中明确支持战争罪行。
因此，美国军队面临的最大丑闻并非其似乎对无害受害者实施了非法打击，而是其由一些认为这种犯罪行为在道德上可接受且战略上合理的人领导。国际法正是为了禁止这种行为而设立的。
总统和国防部长都曾公开支持战争罪行。海格塞思曾明确表示，美军应更加“无所顾忌”地作战。他去年出版的一本书中甚至直接呼吁美军实施更多战争罪行。他的一些观点包括：
海格塞思一直践行这些原则。作为福克斯新闻主持人，他支持海军海豹突击队成员爱迪·加拉格尔，后者被指控在伊拉克随机射杀一名年轻女孩和一名老人，并杀害一名战俘。海格塞思成功游说特朗普赦免了加拉格尔。
特朗普也多次呼吁美军实施暴行。2015年竞选期间，他主张应针对ISIS战士的家人进行灭绝，并大规模屠杀穆斯林战俘（用沾有猪血的子弹）。2019年，他在X平台的一条信息中，向海格塞思表示，美国对本国战争罪犯进行法律追责是“虚伪的”，因为“我们训练我们的战士成为杀人机器，然后在他们杀人后起诉他们！”
许多保守派人士已经认识到政府对战争法的真实立场，并公开支持这一观点。右翼影响者乔尔·贝利认为，轰炸无害的幸存者只会让自由派感到恐惧，因为“他们忘记了政府的圣经目的：对行恶之人实施愤怒的惩罚。”保守派Sirius XM主持人梅根·凯利也表达了类似的观点，称她希望看到这些受害者在水中死去，并希望他们遭受痛苦，甚至希望特朗普和海格塞思让他们“痛苦地死去”。
我个人对美国政府因非暴力罪行而对人实施酷刑致死的行为存在道德上的疑虑。但即使你接受MAGA右翼的基本观点——即美国应不顾国际法和人权，无情地追求自身利益——你也应拒绝该政府的立场。遵守战争法并非慈善行为。美国有利益去维护各种对地缘政治暴力的限制。禁止杀害失去战斗力的敌人不仅出于人道主义考虑，也出于战略考量。如果你想减少美国士兵在战斗中死亡的数量，你就需要说服外国战斗人员在明显处于劣势时投降，而不是坚持战斗到底。如果他们相信美军不会杀害无害者，他们更可能放下武器。对导弹袭击后无助幸存者的轰炸会损害美国在这一方面的声誉。同样，美国也受益于对民用船只的攻击限制。事实上，美国全球军事存在的一个核心理由是保护海上贸易。确保全球航运安全可以降低美国消费者成本（因为出口商可以支付更少的保险费并以更低的价格出售商品），同时确保我们持续获得重要的商品和物资。
讽刺的是，总统曾公开吹嘘他的加勒比海袭击行动，称“没有人（在委内瑞拉）想再去钓鱼了。没人想在水边做任何事。”美国还对减少武装冲突有利益。战争不仅直接给涉及的国家带来死亡和痛苦，还会对全球产生影响。俄罗斯入侵乌克兰推高了美国的能源价格。叙利亚内战引发了难民危机，扰乱了许多西方国家的政治。如果中国对台湾发动攻击，可能会摧毁全球经济。当然，任何核国家之间的战争都可能摧毁整个世界。国际法旨在通过限制军事力量的合法使用来遏制战争。作为世界上最强大的军事力量，美国有独特的能力来加强或削弱对进攻性战争的规范。即使在特朗普之前，美国也经常选择削弱这些规范。但该政府对自卫的荒谬定义进一步削弱了过去八十年间相对和平（按人类标准而言）的国际规范。
国会有权调查美军对加勒比海快艇的“二次打击”行动。但无需调查就能确定，我们的政府由战争罪行的支持者领导。特朗普和海格塞思持一种邪恶且幼稚的世界观——认为对美军暴行的限制是对其国家利益的阻碍。这种观点比委内瑞拉的可卡因更具破坏性。如果他们真心为美国着想，有良知的保守派人士必须大声反对这种观点。
• Donald Trump’s broader aerial campaign against alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean (almost certainly) violates international law.
• Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth have repeatedly called on the US military to commit more war crimes throughout their careers in public life.
• Violating the laws of war undermines America’s national security interests.
In early September, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the US military to “kill everybody” aboard a speedboat in the Caribbean.
A missile then shattered the vessel and set its fragments ablaze. When the smoke cleared, US surveillance drones showed two people clinging to the smoldering wreckage. An admiral then ordered a second strike against these flailing survivors — an act that violated a wide array of international and domestic laws.
Or at least, this is what a recent report in the Washington Post alleges.
The Trump administration publicly insists that the Post’s account is “fake news.” In closed-door briefings with lawmakers, Pentagon officials have reportedly claimed that the second strike was not intended to kill survivors, but rather, to sink the boat so as to clear a navigation hazard for other vessels. Yet, the administration has refused to provide either the public or members of Congress with unedited video footage of the bombings.
In a social media post Friday, Hegseth argued that the strikes were “lawful under both U.S. and international law.” Many in Congress are skeptical, with the bipartisan House and Senate Armed Services Committees both vowing to investigate the incident.
Such oversight is vital. It’s important to determine whether America’s Defense Secretary authorized the killing of wounded, shipwrecked persons. Both international and US laws forbid the killing of anyone who has already been rendered defenseless, even amid warfare.
And yet, there is also something a bit disingenuous about this debate.
By all appearances, the White House’s true position is not that its actions are consistent with the laws of war but that it should not be bound by such laws. The president and defense secretary have not only conveyed this belief implicitly through their actions; they’ve also explicitly advocated for the commission of war crimes throughout their time in public life.
The biggest scandal facing the US military therefore is not that it appears to have committed a lawless strike on defenseless victims, but that it is indisputably led by men who believe such criminality is morally permissible and strategically sound.
We do not yet know with certainty that the US military targeted survivors of a boat strike at the Defense Secretary’s encouragement. But, we do know that the bombing in question was illegal, regardless.
Officially, Hegseth ordered that attack to combat drug trafficking. Since September, the administration has conducted more than 20 lethal strikes on boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, killing over 80 people. In each case, the White House claimed that the targeted vessels were transporting narcotics on behalf of drug cartels, although they’ve presented no evidence to support those allegations.
Of course, the US military has not traditionally claimed the authority to summarily execute criminal suspects. When the government believes that an individual is selling illegal substances, it typically arrests that person and puts them on trial.
The Trump administration insists, however, that South America’s drug cartels should be considered terrorist organizations — and that each time these groups export narcotics across our border, they effectively commit an attack on US soil. Therefore, the US has the right to “secure our homeland from the drugs that are killing our people” by waging war against Venezuela’s narcoterrorists (and/or small fishing boats that could theoretically be carrying contraband).
This reasoning is absurd on its face. Supplying cocaine to Miami dance clubs and flying planes into New York skyscrapers are categorically different offenses. To define the former as an act of war is to drain that term of all meaning. In practice, it also entails empowering the president to kill anyone he suspects of engaging in illegal commerce. No past administration has ever asserted this authority, and no domestic or international legal body has ever affirmed its legitimacy.
What’s more, the president’s position isn’t just theoretically unsound but factually baseless. In justifying its campaign, the Trump administration has constantly invoked America’s overdose epidemic. In September, Hegseth called his missile strikes a “defense of the American people,” since “100,000 Americans were killed each year under the previous administration.” President Donald Trump, meanwhile, claimed that each individual speedboat the military has incinerated would have killed “25,000 American people” (a claim that is, of course, mathematically ludicrous).
Yet, America’s overdose crisis is driven by fentanyl, which comes from labs in Mexico, not South America. Venezuelan drug runners generally export cocaine, which, by itself, accounts for a tiny fraction of US overdoses (less than one in 10 overdoses are attributable to cocaine unpaired with opioids). And in any case, it’s not clear that the targeted boats were even hauling blow. After one of the administration’s strikes, the military captured two survivors — and then proceeded to let them go instead of making them stand trial for drug trafficking. This invites the suspicion that our government does not actually have strong evidence against the supposed criminals it is incinerating.
More broadly, the administration’s focus on Venezuelan cocaine traffickers — instead of Mexican fentanyl labs — suggests that its fundamental concern is not with reducing US drug deaths. Trump and his allies have long sought to remove Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro from power. The president reportedly encouraged Maduro to leave office in a recent phone call. And his administration has dubiously declared the Venezuelan leader to be the head of a “narcoterrorist organization.”
It, therefore, looks like America is bombing civilian ships as a means of toppling a sovereign government that has committed no act of war against the United States. This is precisely the kind of behavior that international law was constructed to forbid.
There is no reason to believe that Trump and Hegseth are earnestly confused about the laws of war. Rather, they have each repeatedly expressed contempt for that very concept.
The defense secretary has been particularly clear on this point. Just last year, Hegseth published a book that explicitly argued for the U.S. military to commit more war crimes. Among the Pentagon chief’s insights:
• “Should we follow the Geneva Conventions? What if we treated the enemy the way they treated us? Would that not be an incentive for the other side to reconsider their barbarism?”
• “If our warriors are forced to follow rules arbitrarily and asked to sacrifice more lives so that international tribunals feel better about themselves, aren’t we just better off winning our wars according to our own rules?!”
• “[I]f we’re going to send our boys to fight—and it should be boys—we need to unleash them to win. They need them to be the most ruthless. The most uncompromising. The most overwhelmingly lethal as they can be. We must break the enemy’s will. Our troops will make mistakes, and when they do, they should get the overwhelming benefit of the doubt.”
Hegseth has lived by these principles. As a Fox News host, he championed the cause of Eddie Gallagher, a Navy SEAL accused by fellow serviceman of randomly sniping a young girl and elderly man in Iraq, as well as stabbing a prisoner of war to death. Hegseth successfully lobbied Trump into awarding Gallagher a pardon.
For his part, the president has repeatedly called on the US military to perpetrate atrocities. As a candidate in 2015, Trump argued that America should target the wives and children of ISIS militants for extermination and mass murder Muslim prisoners of war (with bullets dipped in pig’s blood). In a 2019 post on X addressed to Hegseth, meanwhile, Trump suggested that it was hypocritical for the US to hold American war criminals legally accountable since “we train our boys to be killing machines, then prosecute them when they kill!”
Many conservatives have recognized the administration’s true position on the laws of war and forthrightly defended it. Joel Berry, a right-wing influencer, contended that the bombing of defenseless survivors only horrifies liberals because “they’ve forgotten the biblical purpose of government”: “to execute wrath on him who practices evil.”
Conservative Sirius XM host Megyn Kelly voiced similar sentiments, saying of the strike’s victims: “I really do kind of not only wanna see them killed in the water, whether they’re on the boat or in the water, but I’d really like to see them suffer. I would like Trump and Hegseth to make it last a long time so they lose a limb and bleed out.”
Personally, I have some moral qualms about the US government torturing people to death for nonviolent offenses that were never proven in court. But, even if you embrace the MAGA right’s basic normative view on this question — that America should ruthlessly pursue its interests without concern for international law or human rights — you should still reject the administration’s position.
Adhering to the laws of war is not an act of charity. The United States has an interest in upholding various constraints on geopolitical violence. The prohibition against killing enemies who’ve been rendered defenseless isn’t just rooted in humanitarian considerations, but also strategic ones. If you want to minimize the number of Americans who must die to prevail in battle, then you need to persuade foreign combatants to surrender when they’re clearly outgunned, rather than fighting to the last man. And such combatants are more likely to lay down their arms if they believe that the US military does not execute the defenseless. Bombing the helpless survivors of a missile strike undermines America’s reputation on this front.
Likewise, Americans benefit from norms against attacks on civilian ships. Indeed, one of the core justifications for our nation’s globe-spanning military presence is that it helps safeguard maritime trade. Maximizing the safety of global shipping reduces American consumers’ costs (as it allows exporters to pay less for insurance and charge less for their wares) while ensuring our continuous access to vital goods and commodities. Perversely, the president has actually bragged about deterring legitimate commerce with his attacks in the Carribean, telling donors in October, “Nobody [in Venezuela] wants to go fishing anymore. No one wants to do anything near the water.”
Americans also have an interest in minimizing armed conflict. War doesn’t just inflict death and suffering on nations directly involved but also imposes costs on the wider world. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine pushed up Americans’ energy bills. The Syrian Civil War generated a refugee crisis that roiled the politics of many Western countries. A Chinese attack on Taiwan could devastate the global economy. And, of course, any war between nuclear weapons states would threaten to devastate the entire world.
International law seeks to deter war by placing restrictions on the legitimate use of military force. As the world’s preeminent martial power, the US has a unique capacity to reinforce — or erode — norms against offensive wars. Even before Trump, America frequently chose to do the latter. But this administration’s farcically expansive definition of self-defense has further undercut the conventions that have made the past eight decades unusually peaceful (by our species’ belligerent standards).
Congress is right to investigate the US military’s “double tap” strike on a Caribbean speedboat. But, no probe is necessary to determine that our government is led by war crimes enthusiasts.
Trump and Hegseth subscribe to a vicious and juvenile worldview — one that equates restraints on our military’s brutality with impediments to our nation’s interests. That idea is more toxic than Venezuelan cocaine. If they wish to put America first, conservatives of good conscience must loudly reject it.
2025-12-04 00:45:00
在哥伦比亚的波哥大，照护工作——通常被忽视且未被支付——每年消耗超过350亿小时的劳动时间。这种负担主要落在女性身上，使她们几乎没有时间从事其他生活方面的事情。然而，波哥大也是“照护革命”的中心，这里创新的社区中心开始关注照护者本身，而不仅仅是她们所从事的工作。本月的封面故事中，Rachel Cohen Booth前往波哥大，探讨当一个社会认真对待女性无偿劳动时会是什么样子。本期其他内容还包括：有意识地收听播客的必要性；新一代对抗疟疾的工具；在“捐赠星期二”之前，如何更好地进行捐赠并做善事。 * * * ## 疟疾的终结 By Bryan Walsh * * * ## 如何摆脱“金钱畸形心理”——以及3个关于慷慨的其他建议 By Sigal Samuel * * * ## 播客对大脑的影响 By Adam Clark Estes * * * ## 使用Ozempic的人正在失去肌肉质量——这让他们感到恐慌 By Dylan Scott * * * ## 为什么政治正在毁掉我们看电影的方式 By Kyndall Cunningham（12月4日出版） * * * ## 当一座城市认真对待女性无偿劳动时会发生什么？ By Rachel Cohen Booth（12月5日出版）
In Bogotá, Colombia, care work — often overlooked and unpaid — eats up more than 35 billion hours of labor per year. It’s a burden which falls disproportionately on women, and can leave little time for other parts of life. But Bogotá is also the center of a “care revolution,” where innovative neighborhood hubs are centering caregivers themselves, not just the work they do. In this month’s Highlight cover story, Rachel Cohen Booth travels to Bogotá to investigate what it looks like when a society decides to take women’s unpaid work seriously. Also in this issue: The case for intentional podcast listening. A new generation of tools to fight malaria. And ahead of Giving Tuesday, advice for giving better and doing good.
By Bryan Walsh
By Sigal Samuel
By Adam Clark Estes
By Dylan Scott
By Kyndall Cunningham
Coming December 4
By Rachel Cohen Booth
Coming December 5
2025-12-03 20:15:00
今年的流感、新冠和RSV病毒可能非常严重，但你可以采取措施保护自己。
美国联邦政府在冷流感季节到来前，已经采取了一些削弱公众对疫苗信任的行动。尽管其部门批准了今年的新流感疫苗，但顾问还建议从流感疫苗中去除某些成分，而这些成分并不用于大多数疫苗。此外，政府已取消对新冠疫苗的具体推荐，转而鼓励人们自行决定。
与此同时，美国食品药品监督管理局（FDA）的一位高级官员警告称，现有的疫苗程序不足以应对当前的疫情，还声称新冠疫苗导致了少数儿童死亡，但这些说法缺乏证据支持。
目前，美国的流感疫苗接种率是过去六年最低，新冠加强针的供应也在持续减少，而Kennedy Jr.领导的卫生部门决定限制接种。今年，不到15%的美国成年人接种了新冠加强针，包括不到三分之一的65岁以上老人。针对婴儿的RSV疫苗接种率也令人失望。
这意味着，今年冬天，我们每个人都要自己应对流感、感冒、RSV和新冠。联邦政府不再是可靠的盟友，因为它在Kennedy的带领下，经常忽视已有的科学结论。医疗界正在努力填补这一空白，但许多人，包括Kennedy的“让美国再次健康”运动成员，以及政治光谱中的其他群体，已经不再信任专家。
在这种情况下，人们在应对疫情时可能采取不同的策略。有些人可能完全不采取任何预防措施，即使病例正在上升。但你仍然可以采取行动来保护自己的健康。
过去，公共卫生措施受到广泛支持，例如20世纪根除脊髓灰质炎和天花，以及21世纪初控制麻疹。这些成就得益于更好的卫生条件、疫苗接种和更高的公众意识。
然而，近年来，反对疫苗和公共卫生措施的人逐渐增多。Robert F. Kennedy Jr.在新冠大流行之前就是一个边缘人物，他散布关于疫苗和自闭症之间关系的阴谋论。即使特朗普在任期间，也曾避免与Kennedy接触，据称是受比尔·盖茨的劝阻。
尽管Kennedy及其支持者对疫苗信任度有所削弱，但大多数美国人仍然认为接种疫苗是重要的。但如今，情况已大不相同。
二十年前，94%的美国人认为接种儿童疫苗非常重要；而到2025年，这一比例已降至69%。2020年3月，85%的美国人信任CDC提供可靠的疫苗信息；到2025年10月，这一比例下降到了50%。
今年早些时候，美国西部得克萨斯州爆发了多年来的最严重麻疹疫情，而当地卫生官员失去了联邦资金，CDC的支持也十分有限，而Kennedy则对疫苗的价值持怀疑态度，并支持未经证实的治疗方法，如鱼肝油。
在密尔沃基市，由于政府机构被解雇，居民在面对铅中毒危机时无人可求助。百日咳也再次出现，且比以往更严重，而Kennedy却对疫苗问题保持沉默，尽管有共和党参议员呼吁他公开支持百日咳疫苗。
如今，美国社会在公共卫生问题上存在严重分歧，这意味着很多邻居可能不会采取预防措施。
如果你担心自己的健康，首先要考虑自己的风险。
对各种防疫措施（如戴口罩、疫苗强制规定）的反对，往往源于人们对风险的评估和容忍度不同。例如，有人会问：“为什么一个没有严重健康问题的年轻人必须接种疫苗？”
确实，不同人对新冠、流感或RSV的感染风险不同，因此在冷流感季节，他们的行为和选择也可能不同。
如果你是25岁、没有孩子、很少接触老人，你可能认为在流感高发地区外出是合理的。但如果你是65岁且有慢性病或免疫系统受损，你可能更愿意采取预防措施，比如在社区病例多时戴口罩。
作为38岁的父母，我可能处于两者之间。你需要根据自己的情况和日常接触的人来评估风险。
与你经常接触的人（如家人、朋友和同事）保持一致也很重要。你们不必完全同意风险容忍度，但应坦诚交流彼此的想法。如果某些情况是你不能接受的（例如你不希望有人在流鼻涕或发烧时到你家），可以提前沟通应对方式。
接下来，你需要可靠的信息。冬季到来时，病毒活动会增加，因此要密切关注本地情况。
大多数州政府会发布传染病数据仪表盘，而地方卫生部门通常会在本地病例激增时发布通告。我住在俄亥俄州，这里是我的本地信息来源。
这些资源能帮助你了解本地疫情的发展情况，从而评估自己的风险并决定是否调整行为。
虽然联邦政府不再可靠，但你仍然可以在这个冬天建立一个更具抗病能力的社区。关键在于你自己。
This winter was already shaping up to be one of the strangest cold and flu seasons in recent memory.
With Robert F. Kennedy at the helm of the US Department of Health and Human Services, the federal government has been casting doubt on the value of vaccines in the months leading up to virus season. Even though his department did approve a new flu vaccine for this year, his advisers also recommended removing certain ingredients from flu shots, even though those materials are not used in the vast majority of vaccines.
They have also removed any specific recommendations for the Covid vaccinations and, instead, told people to depend on “individual decision making.” On the cusp of flu activity picking up in the US, a top Food and Drug Administration official is warning that the vaccine process should be overhauled because it is not sufficient, while making unsubstantiated claims that the Covid shots have killed a small number of children.
And now, the forecast for the next few months is getting worse.
Not only is there disarray among public health authorities, but this year’s cold and flu season is looking to be especially bad. That is partly bad luck; developing a new flu shot every year is always a guessing game, and this year’s shot is not very well matched to the most widespread flu strains. But, it’s also partly a matter of choice, a consequence of the anti-public health mania Kennedy has helped stoke. The number of flu vaccinations administered between August and October was the lowest in the past six years. The number of Covid boosters available to the public has been steadily dropping with each new shot, and now, Kennedy Jr.’s health department has decided to limit access. Less than 15 percent of US adults have received a Covid booster this year, including less than 1 in 3 seniors over 65. New RSV vaccines for infants have had discouragingly low uptake.
This winter, more than ever, we are all on our own in combating flu, cold, RSV, and Covid-19. The federal government is no longer a reliable ally, because it has shown, with Kennedy leading the charge, that it will routinely ignore established science. The medical community is scrambling to fill the void, but the fundamental challenge is that many people, not only within Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again movement but across the political spectrum, no longer trust the experts.
In this new reality, not everyone will be on the same page. Some people may choose to take no precautions at all, even as cases rise. But, you do have agency to protect your personal well-being.
For a long time, public health was embraced by the public. It had stacked up wins over the decades: eradicating polio and smallpox in the 20th century and measles at the turn of the 21st. Diseases that had killed millions over millennia were relegated to the past as better sanitation, vaccinations, and greater awareness — the bedrock of the public health playbook — became woven into everyday life.
As recently as a decade ago, the people who opposed vaccinations and other public health interventions remained well outside of the mainstream. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. himself was, before the start of the Covid pandemic, a marginal figure who spewed conspiracy theories about vaccines and autism. Even Trump kept his distance from Kennedy during his first term, reportedly at the urging of Bill Gates, despite his own past flirtations with anti-vaccine rhetoric. And while Kennedy’s influence and the work of other anti-vaccine activists may have chipped away at the public’s belief in vaccinations, they had limited success. Most Americans still thought getting their annual shots was a good idea.
But, we live in a different reality now.
Two decades ago, 94 percent of Americans believed it was extremely or very important to get children vaccinated — near unanimity, according to Gallup. In 2025, just 69 percent still agree. In March 2020, 85 percent of Americans trusted the CDC to provide reliable information about vaccines, per KFF polling. By October 2025, that share had fallen to 50 percent.
When the worst measles outbreak in years took hold in West Texas earlier this year, local health officials were losing their federal funding and getting limited support at best from the CDC while Kennedy waffled on the value of vaccines and embraced unproven treatments such as cod liver oil. As Milwaukee contended with a lead poisoning crisis in its school buildings, its residents had no one in Washington to call, because the relevant team had been fired. Whooping cough is back and worse than it’s been in years as vaccination rates fall. Kennedy has been mum on the issue, despite pleas from Republican senators to weigh in publicly and affirm the value of the whooping cough vaccines.
We’re a deeply divided country, specifically on the subject of public health. And that means a lot of your neighbors aren’t going to take precautions.
If you are concerned about your personal health, what do you do?
Let’s start by talking about risk. Much of the backlash to the various pandemic interventions — things like masking and issuing vaccine mandates — was founded in different people’s differing risk assessments and risk tolerance. You would hear it all the time from the opponents of those measures: Why should a young man with no serious health problems be required to get a shot? Many people today find the traditional public health argument — because he might unwittingly pass it along to another person who is more vulnerable — unpersuasive.
And, to be fair, it is true that certain people do have a much higher risk of Covid, or flu, or RSV than others do — and their choices and behaviors during what most of us call the cold and flu season can reasonably differ. No two people are exactly alike.
That is simply the reality we are living in: individual health, not public health.
So, your seasonal strategy should start with assessing your own risk. If you are 25 years old with no children and minimal exposure to the elderly, you may decide it’s reasonable to take chances on, for example, going out in public when flu activity is high in your area. If you’re a 65-year-old with a chronic health condition or a compromised immune system, you might not be willing to take the same risks; at least, you might want to think about wearing a mask if there are a lot of Covid or RSV cases in your community. If you are, like me, the 38-year-old parent of three, you might fall somewhere in between the two poles.
Think about your own situation and the people you come into contact with every day and use that as a guide by which you can evaluate your risk and make decisions. Get on the same page with the people in your life you see regularly: your family, friends and coworkers. You don’t have to completely agree on your risk tolerance to be open and transparent about your mindset as we head into the season. If there are certain dealbreakers — like, I don’t want you to come to my house if you have a runny nose or fever — talk about how you’ll handle those situations in advance.
From that baseline, you need reliable information as the winter goes on and viral activity starts to pick up. Start local. Most people say they have much more trust in their personal doctor than they do in major medical organizations, including the CDC. If you have a primary care doctor, or you can find one, they will be a reliable source whom you can speak to face to face or over a telehealth call.
If you don’t have a primary physician, or you simply want to educate yourself on what leading medical authorities are saying, you can check out the recommended vaccinations for children under 18 from the American Academy of Pediatrics. Different state groups — one on the West Coast, one in New England — are issuing their own vaccine recommendations for adults. The West Coast Health Alliance, for example, advises all adults over 65 to get a Covid shot, people under 65 with certain risk factors, and all adults who are in contact with high-risk patients.
Your insurance coverage could be different this year, too, after the changes to vaccine guidance made by the Trump administration. Kennedy’s health department has scaled back the official government vaccine guidance to “individual decision making” — once again, you’re on your own — and that could affect some insurers’ willingness to cover the cost of a Covid shot. You could call your health plan in advance to find out if it will be covered.
And otherwise, keep an eye on what’s happening in your community. State governments often publish infectious disease dashboards with up-to-date data, and local health departments usually send out advisories when local case loads are high. I live in Ohio, and here’s what my local source looks like. Resources like this will help you understand the specifics of how illnesses are moving through your own community so that you can then weigh your risk and — if you choose — adjust your behavior accordingly.
You can still build a disease-resilient community this winter. But it’s up to you.
2025-12-03 19:45:00
最高法院的裁决似乎不可避免。目前，最高法院的多数法官都是共和党人，因此很难想象他们会支持禁止针对LGBTQ+群体的转化治疗，或者维持《投票权法案》。这些问题上，共和党法官与民主党法官的观点存在巨大分歧，而6-3的共和党多数意味着共和党观点将占据上风。这种“不可避免”的氛围尤其体现在即将于12月9日审理的“国家共和党参议员委员会诉联邦选举委员会”（NRSC v. FEC）一案中。在该案中，共和党要求最高法院推翻一项复杂的竞选资金制度，该制度限制大额捐助者向候选人注资的金额。鉴于最高法院在竞选资金案件中的历史判例，共和党几乎肯定会赢得此案。
在竞选资金监管方面，很少有议题能像这个一样如此清晰地划分两党立场。民主党法官普遍认为，政治中过多的金钱会带来腐败，正如大法官斯蒂芬·布雷耶在2014年的一次异议中所写：“少数大额捐款会淹没多数人的声音。”他们认为，大额竞选捐款会导致政府只对少数富裕捐助者负责。而共和党法官则仅在极少数情况下接受竞选资金法规，如在“公民联合诉联邦选举委员会”（Citizens United v. FEC，2010）一案中，五位共和党大法官认为，只有防止“以权换钱”式的腐败（例如捐助者明确承诺捐款以换取议员的投票）时，才应限制竞选资金。
NRSC案中的具体法律限制了政党组织（如民主党全国委员会或共和党全国委员会）在与个别候选人协调竞选活动时的支出上限。该法律旨在防止捐助者通过向政党委员会捐款来规避对候选人直接捐款的3500美元上限。理论上，这项法律可能符合共和党法官在“公民联合”案中设定的严格竞选资金限制。然而，共和党法官在“麦凯滕霍恩诉联邦选举委员会”（McCutcheon v. FEC，2014）一案中曾驳回类似的反洗钱论点，因此NRSC案中的支出限制很可能无法通过最高法院的审查。
那么，NRSC案中的法律到底做了什么？除了克拉伦斯·托马斯大法官外，其他共和党法官都承认国会可以限制捐助者直接向政治候选人捐款的金额。这种限制的目的是防止捐助者通过向候选人捐款来换取政治利益。例如，如果捐助者向候选人直接捐款3500美元，那么他们不太可能通过这种小额捐款来影响议员的决策。然而，如果这种限制可以被轻易规避，那么它的作用就微乎其微。NRSC案中的法律试图防止捐助者通过向政党委员会捐款来绕过这一限制，因为政党委员会可以将这些资金转交给个别候选人。
不过，自2001年“联邦选举委员会诉科罗拉多州共和党联邦竞选委员会”（FEC v. Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Committee）一案以来，最高法院已经多次驳回类似的挑战。该案认为，如果允许政党无限额地协调支出，捐助者可能会通过政党来绕过对个人捐款的限制。然而，自“公民联合”案以来，最高法院对竞选资金法规的态度变得更加强硬，使得NRSC案中的限制措施几乎不可能被维持。
共和党法官对竞选资金的看法是，他们将“腐败”狭义地定义为“以权换钱”的行为，而其他旨在防止捐助者购买政治影响力或官员感激的法律则不被允许，除非它们明确针对这种交易。他们认为，影响购买是代表制政治的自然组成部分，甚至是一种积极因素。正如“公民联合”案中所言，代表制政治本身就存在偏袒和影响，而当选官员有理由支持那些支持其政策的捐助者和选民。
因此，在共和党法官的宪法解释下，NRSC案中的支出限制无法仅仅因为它们试图限制大额捐款对政府的腐蚀性影响而被维持。这些限制必须针对捐助者试图购买特定政治利益的安排。然而，共和党法官在“麦凯滕霍恩”案中已经拒绝了类似的反洗钱论点，认为这种限制过于牵强。此外，自“公民联合”案以来，最高法院对竞选资金法规的敌意态度已经使得NRSC案中的限制措施几乎不可能幸存。
共和党在NRSC案中的一个主要论点是，捐助者可以通过超级政治行动委员会（Super PAC）向支持的候选人提供任意金额的捐款，而无需通过政党委员会。因此，他们认为无需通过政党来绕过捐款限制。超级政治行动委员会源于“公民联合”案，可以接受无限额的捐款并进行无限额的支出。唯一的限制是它们不能与候选人协调支出。然而，共和党在简报中指出，这种限制在实践中并不严格，捐助者经常公开表明他们支持的候选人及其捐款金额。此外，当选官员可以以“恩惠”或“重要职位”来回报慷慨的捐助者，例如埃隆·马斯克。
换句话说，“公民联合”案和其他类似案件已经将竞选资金制度变成了“法律的荒野”，最高法院很难再进一步扩大富裕捐助者对美国政治的影响。
There is a specter of inevitability hanging over much of the Supreme Court’s current term. It is unlikely that any legal argument could persuade the Court’s Republican majority to uphold bans on anti-LGBTQ+ conversion therapy, for example, or to preserve the Voting Rights Act. These are issues where Republican judges have wildly divergent views from Democratic jurists. And, on a 6-3 Republican Court, that means that the GOP’s view wins.
That specter looms particularly large over National Republican Senatorial Committee (“NRSC”) v. FEC, which the Supreme Court will hear on Tuesday, December 9. In that case, the GOP asks the justices to repeal a complicated campaign finance scheme limiting the amount of money big donors can funnel to candidates. And, given this Court’s history in campaign finance cases, it is all but certain that Republicans will win this case.
Few issues split the two parties more cleanly than campaign finance regulation. Broadly speaking, the Democratic justices believe that too much money in politics is inherently corrupting, because, as Justice Stephen Breyer wrote in a 2014 dissent, “a few large donations” can “drown out the voices of the many.”
Under this view, big campaign donations breed a government that is responsive only to a small group of very wealthy donors. In Breyer’s words, “where enough money calls the tune, the general public will not be heard.”
The Republican justices, meanwhile, tolerate campaign finance laws in only the narrowest of circumstances. As five Republicans concluded in Citizens United v. FEC (2010), money and politics may only be regulated to prevent “‘quid pro quo’ corruption,” such as when a donor explicitly promises to donate to a senator’s campaign in return for that senator’s vote on a particular bill.
Under the Republican view, laws that merely seek to limit the influence of the very wealthy, such as by preventing them from buying access to lawmakers, are constitutionally forbidden.
The specific law at issue in NRSC limits how much party organizations, such as the Democratic or Republican National Committees, may spend in coordination with individual candidates for federal office. The idea is to prevent donors from evading the cap on donations to candidates, which is currently $3,500 per federal election, by laundering a much larger donation through a party committee like the DNC or the RNC.
In theory, this law might even comply with the rigid limits on campaign finance law that Republican justices imposed in Citizens United. As the Democratic Party argues in a brief defending the law, “an unbroken line of precedent” stretching back to the 1970s “holds that Congress may impose reasonable contribution limits” on donations directly to candidates. And the law at issue in NRSC merely seeks to ensure that these limits aren’t easily evaded.
But, the Republican justices rejected a similar anti-money laundering argument in McCutcheon v. FEC, the 2014 case where Breyer dissented. So, it is unlikely that the spending limits at issue in NRSC will survive contact with this Supreme Court.
With the exception of Justice Clarence Thomas, even the Republican justices accept that Congress may cap the amount of money donors may give directly to political candidates. The risk of a quid pro quo deal, where a candidate agrees to sell political favors for campaign donations, is particularly high when that donation goes to the candidate’s campaign.
The idea behind a $3,500 cap on donations directly to federal candidates is that this amount is too low to coax a lawmaker or presidential candidate into such a deal — and thus, the cap prevents quid pro quo corruption. According to the Brookings Institution, it cost over $2 million to win a US House race in 2018 and nearly $15 million to win a Senate race.
But a cap on donations directly to candidates means little if it can be easily circumvented. The law at issue in NRSC seeks to prevent donors from bypassing this limit by giving large donations to party committees, which the party can then pass on to individual candidates.
The details of how this scheme works are a little complicated. First, the law caps how much donors can give to party committees like the DNC or RNC at $44,300 per year. That cap is not at issue in NRSC.
Second, current law draws a distinction between so-called “independent” political spending and “coordinated” political spending. Political parties can spend as much money as they want to try to influence a particular election, but only if that spending is not coordinated with any of the candidates in that race. With a few exceptions, the amount of money a party can spend in coordination with a candidate — think of a television ad that tracks the message and political strategy of the campaign but that is paid for by the party and not the campaign itself — is capped by federal law.
The amount of this cap varies depending on how many voters may vote in a particular race. In the smallest US House races, parties may only spend up to $63,600 in coordination with a campaign. In a California US Senate race, they may spend nearly $4 million. The GOP wants the Supreme Court to abolish these caps in NRSC.
About a quarter century ago, in FEC v. Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Committee (2001), the Supreme Court rejected a very similar challenge to an earlier version of these limits on coordinated spending. The Court reasoned that if a party can “make unlimited expenditures coordinated with a candidate,” that would cause donors to “give to the party in order to finance coordinated spending for a favored candidate beyond the contribution limits binding on them.” A donor might give $40,000 to the RNC, for example, knowing full well that this money will be spent on Sen. John Doe’s reelection campaign.
But a lot has changed since Colorado was decided in 2001. Liberal and moderate Republicans have disappeared from the Supreme Court. And the Court’s increasingly hardline Republican majority decided cases like Citizens United and McCutcheon, which cast a cloud of doubt over nearly all campaign finance laws.
So, it is unlikely that the anti-corruption scheme at issue in NRSC will be upheld by the current Court.
Although the Supreme Court has long held that Congress may regulate money in politics to prevent corruption or the “appearance of corruption,” the Republican justices define the word “corruption” very narrowly to include nothing other than quid pro quo arrangements. Under this approach, laws which prohibit donors from buying access to elected officials, or that simply seek to prevent donors from purchasing an official’s gratitude, are not allowed unless they fairly narrowly target explicit deals banning dollars for political favors.
Indeed, under the GOP justices’ vision, influence-buying is an affirmative good. As the Court’s Republican majority said in Citizens United:
Favoritism and influence are not…avoidable in representative politics. It is in the nature of an elected representative to favor certain policies, and, by necessary corollary, to favor the voters and contributors who support those policies. It is well understood that a substantial and legitimate reason, if not the only reason, to cast a vote for, or to make a contribution to, one candidate over another is that the candidate will respond by producing those political outcomes the supporter favors. Democracy is premised on responsiveness.
Thus, under the Republican Party’s version of the Constitution, the limits on coordinated spending at issue in NRSC cannot survive merely because they seek to limit the corrupting effect that large donations can have on government. The limits must target arrangements where donors seek to buy specific political favors from elected officials.
Given this framework, the best legal argument for the spending caps at issue in NRSC is that they prevent money laundering schemes where a donor who wants to give a large donation to a particular candidate may do so, so long as that money passes first through a party committee. If Congress can cap direct donations to candidates in order to prevent donors from buying political favors, then, surely, it should also be able to cap indirect donations that offer the same benefit to the same candidate.
But the five Republican justices who served on the Court in McCutcheon already rejected a similar anti-money laundering argument. That case struck down a federal law that capped the total amount of money a donor could give to all of a party’s various political committees — the idea being that, if a donor could give huge sums to the party, then the party could easily redistribute that money to particular candidates.
McCutcheon deemed the idea that the Democratic or Republican Party’s various subentities “would willingly participate in a scheme to funnel money to another State’s candidates” to be too farfetched. Iowa’s Democratic Party, McCutcheon speculated, “has little reason to transfer money to the California Democratic Party.”
This conclusion is dubious. While Iowa Democrats may have little reason to give money to California Democrats, Democrats in the safe blue state of California certainly have good reason to redistribute their funds to swing states where that money may be most useful. California Democrats, after all, benefit if the Democratic Party is in the majority in Congress.
But, in any event, McCutcheon shows that the Republican justices are unlikely to defer to Congress when Congress believes that a particular law is necessary to prevent money laundering schemes. And, given this Court’s hostility to nearly all campaign finance laws since Citizens United, it’s hard to imagine the spending caps in NRSC surviving.
Indeed, the Roberts Court has made such Swiss cheese out of US campaign finance law that it is unclear whether a decision striking down these caps will really matter. One of the GOP’s strongest arguments in favor of its preferred outcome in NRSC is that donors who want to give massive donations to elect a particular candidate can already give as much as they want to a super PAC that supports that candidate, rather than to a party committee. So, they don’t really need to launder large donations through parties.
Super PACs, which grew out of the Court’s decision in Citizens United, may accept unlimited donations and spend unlimited money. The one limit on Super PACs is that they aren’t supposed to coordinate this spending with a candidate, but, as the GOP argues in its brief, this limit doesn’t really amount to much in practice.
Donors frequently “let it be known who they are helping, and in what amounts.” And elected officials can reward the most generous donors with favors or even plum job assignments — just ask Elon Musk.
Citizens United and similar cases, in other words, have already turned campaign finance into the Wild West. There really isn’t much more the Supreme Court can do to increase the influence of wealthy donors in US politics.