Occasionally at talks I get asked what drew me to become a historian. It's a very good and somewhat obvious question, but it still catches me off guard. I've known I wanted to do this since high school, so it's difficult to think back
One of the media's favorite activities is demanding that Democratic politicians denounce individuals on their side who have made extreme statements. This is a pattern that stretches back to the 1992 presidential campaign, when Democratic presidential Bill Clinton denounced Sistah Souljah – a minor rapper who had made extremist
Work in Progress is a recurring feature on CAMPAIGN TRAILS, in which I share some of the more interesting materials I’ve uncovered in my book-in-progress on the work of John Doar and the Civil Rights Division in the 1960s. As I noted a couple days ago, when
Work in Progress is a recurring feature on CAMPAIGN TRAILS, in which I share some of the more interesting materials I’ve uncovered in my book-in-progress on the work of John Doar and the Civil Rights Division in the 1960s. On this date in 1965, President Lyndon Johnson
In recent weeks, Republican representatives in Congress have repeatedly insisted that specific groups of immigrants in their communities will never be assimilated into American life, that they pose a serious danger to their neighbors, and therefore that they should be forcefully removed from the United States. On Monday, for instance,
This past week I spent goofing off with my daughter before she heads off to college, which meant that I largely avoided real work. But I had a little downtime to keep my writing skills sharp, and used it to push back on Stephen Miller's argument that it&
Over the last month, there's been a flurry of panic from self-styled moderates and centrists in the Democratic Party about the success of a few socialist candidates in party primaries. Some of this grumbling has simply been the self-interested reaction of inert incumbents who are (rightly)
Using the Past to Make Sense of the Present
President Donald Trump, the nation's vandal-in-chief, has made an absolute mess of Washington over the past year. The botched renovation of the Reflecting Pool is merely his latest and least accomplishment in a long string of defiling and defacing the District of Columbia. But coupled with
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was
This coming Sunday, the Trump White House is holding "Rededicate 250," a massive religious event on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., designed to "give thanks for God's providence, reflect on our nation's story, and rededicate America as One Nation under God.
Last night I gave this talk to the Princeton Adult School about the connections between the civil rights movement of the 1960s and similar struggles in our own time, pulling together a few things I've written about in the past and packaging them for a general audience. I
The Trump administration and its allies have been busy for weeks now insisting that their war with Iran is not, technically speaking, a "war." And now that this not-a-war war is likely expanding beyond air strikes to include the deployment of troops inside the region, they
This morning, Elon Musk – the world's richest man and a key ally to the president of the United States – posted the content below to the white nationalist chat room and CSAM emporium he owns There's a lot here that's laughably dumb, even for someone
Leaders of the civil rights movement called their protests "demonstrations" because they aimed to make visible the systems of political repression and physical violence that were all too often hidden from public view. Because they wanted to force the nation to confront the ugly realities of racism and
The Trump administration is, at its core, a white nationalist project. The president's personal racism, of course, has always been crystal clear, not just from the start of his political career but from the much older start of his public career. His first mention in The New York
Over the past year and, in particular, over the past month, the United States has suffered an alarming rise in the number of verbal threats, physical assaults, and even murders committed by agents of the federal government against citizens and undocumented immigrants alike. Encouraged to act irresponsibly by Acting President
Work in Progress is a recurring feature on CAMPAIGN TRAILS, in which I share some of the more interesting materials I’ve uncovered in my book-in-progress on the work of John Doar and the Civil Rights Division in the 1960s. There's currently a rebellion brewing in
Work in Progress is a recurring feature on CAMPAIGN TRAILS, in which I share some of the more interesting materials I’ve uncovered in my book-in-progress on the work of John Doar and the Civil Rights Division in the 1960s. In my last post, I talked about the
The term "revisionist history" routinely gets thrown around in popular discourse as a shorthand for "lying about the past." I've noted before that this is actually quite different from how historians use that term, as we understand that all good historical work is inherently