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If real, lasting change is to occur, it must come through Congress—not merely through executive orders that can be reversed by future administrations or overturned in court.

Democrats are taking stock. Some are arguing for a major overhaul in light of growing defections of working-class, Black, and Latino voters. Others want to stay the course. Some want to work with Trump when possible while others advocate for a program of permanent resistance.

Look up oligarch in a dictionary and you may find it defined as “someone who is extremely rich and powerful, especially a person from Russia who became rich after the end of the former Soviet Union.” Oligarchy is defined as “government by a small group of very powerful people.”

January 21, 2025, marked the 15th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling, a decision that opened the floodgates for unlimited corporate spending in elections. Since that ruling, super PACs and outside spending have skyrocketed, and the voices of everyday voters have been drowned out by wealthy donors and corporate interests. The impact of Citizens United is clear: the political system is increasingly controlled by the rich, while ordinary voters are left behind.

Before going home for Christmas, Congress passed a continuing resolution to fund the federal government through Friday, March 14, 2025. This was essentially a stop-gap measure to buy Congress more time to negotiate a full-year funding bill. Those discussions between leading House and Senate appropriators are underway as Congress looks to avoid a government shutdown.

In late 2024, the Herbert Institute at Utah Valley University released two reports on Utah’s ranked choice voting (RCV) pilot program. In the reports, Professors Alan Parry and John Kidd and co-authors Michael Erickson and Addison Stott capture the high level of support for RCV among Utah voters, as well as the strong foundation that RCV has in mathematics. 

This morning, KIRO News Radio reporter Matt Markovich had exciting news for political reformers: Washington lawmakers have introduced and held their first public hearing on House Bill 1448, which allows local governments across the state to adopt ranked choice voting (RCV).

Ballotpedia reports this week that in 2026, Alaska’s independent voters will have the chance to solidify their role as election reform pioneers by voting on two initiatives.

The Chamberlain Project, an organization I co-founded with Peter Ackerman a decade ago, has been dissolved. The Chamberlain Boards have voted to combine all of Chamberlain’s associated entities, including Americans Elect, Level the Playing Field, the Committee for Ranked Choice Voting, and Citizens to End SuperPACs, with the Foundation for Independent Voter Education (FIVE),

Donald Trump will be inaugurated in a few days. In his second term, just as in his first, he’ll likely spark passionate disagreements about news media: what is “fake news” and what isn’t, which media sources should be trusted and which should be doubted.