Today, Condoleezza Rice announces the launch of the Hoover Institution’s new Substack publication, Freedom Frequency; Peter Berkowitz considers the “least bad option” for achieving peace in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank; and Eugene Volokh analyzes the First Amendment implications of the Trump administration’s proposed “Compact for Academic Excellence” with American universities.
Hoover Institution News
This morning, Director Condoleezza Rice announced the launch of the Hoover Institution’s new Substack publication, Freedom Frequency. “There has never been a better time to bring history and ideas to bear on today’s challenges, and to work together for a future where freedom continues to flourish,” writes Rice. “Freedom Frequency will present reliable perspectives—serious, clear, and accessible analysis grounded in research, guided by values.” The new publication will feature regular writing from authoritative contributors including Senior Fellows Victor Davis Hanson, Steven J. Davis, Elizabeth Economy, and Barry Strauss, as well as Distinguished Visiting Fellow Matt Pottinger, among many other eminent Hoover scholars. Columns at Freedom Frequency will apply nonpartisan analysis to pressing policy challenges with a focus on elevating solutions and actionable insights. As Rice explains, “Freedom Frequency is a way to examine the American project deeply and widely—and share the journey directly with subscribers, without barriers, and in a spirit of open debate.” The launch of Freedom Frequency was also covered by Axios. Read more here.
The Middle East
In his weekly column for RealClearPolitics, Senior Fellow Peter Berkowitz takes stock of recent negotiations to bring an end to the Hamas-Israel war in Gaza. As he writes, “On Friday morning, Oct. 3, Trump gave Hamas an ultimatum: Accept [his proposed] plan by Sunday, Oct. 5, 6 p.m. EDT or face obliteration. Within hours, Hamas agreed to release the hostages and relinquish power, and to negotiate other elements of Trump’s plan.” But Berkowitz cautions that these "stunning developments" represent “at best the early stages of a long, winding, and arduous undertaking.” Berkowitz turns to ongoing debates in US foreign policy circles over the best long-term solution to the conflict between Israel and Palestinian populations in Gaza and the West Bank. He concludes that a “focus on small-scale and near-term improvements” in the West Bank, paired with redevelopment of Gaza, “has only a modest chance of long-term success,” but still “may represent the least bad option.” Read more here.
Law & Policy
In a post for his blog at the Reason site, Senior Fellow Eugene Volokh examines the Trump administration’s recent proposal of a new compact between universities and the federal government. Volokh focuses his analysis on the First Amendment dimensions of the proposal, noting several areas where it may face legal challenges. For example, while noting the federal government’s power to consider prospective foreign students’ speech when making a student visa issuance decision, Volokh says he does not think the government “can demand that universities, in exercising their own decisions about whom to associate with and whom to speak to, exclude foreign students based on the students' viewpoints.” Among other issues, Volokh also discusses the important difference between setting academic viewpoint diversity as an “aspirational goal” versus enforcing it as a mandate. Read more here.
Hoover Senior Fellow Michael McConnell joined the Stanford Legal podcast to discuss what he sees as “the biggest separation-of-powers controversy since the steel seizure case in 1952.” Back in April, President Trump declared a national emergency and levied tariffs on goods imported from a host of nations. McConnell, a constitutional law expert and former federal judge, serves as one of the attorneys representing the challengers to the president’s decree. On the podcast, he discusses whether presidents have the authority to tax through tariffs without clear congressional approval; the historical and constitutional roots of “no taxation without representation”; and the seismic ramifications of a possible redefinition of the limits of executive economic power that this case could trigger. As McConnell notes, the long-term significance of this case could stem more from its impact on the constitutional separation of powers than from its recent and near-term economic impact. Listen or read here.
Environment and Economics
In a new paper published at Nature Human Behavior, Hoover Fellow Valentin Bolotnyy and coauthor A. Patrick Behrer evaluate whether outmigration from US counties increases after a severe storm. Using data on the paths of all Atlantic basin hurricanes and tropical storms from 1992 to 2017, the authors find that on average, storms are not followed by outmigration from affected areas, and total population-weighted exposure to storms increases over the sample period. In the case of very destructive storms, however, the paper suggests that outmigration does result, but often to other high-risk counties. Counties with high economic activity see net in-migration after a storm. The authors conclude that given existing policies and incentives, the economic and social benefits of high-risk areas currently appear to outweigh the incentive to reduce exposure to future storms by relocating across counties. Bolotnyy and Behrer suggest that this research can help inform our understanding of future responses to climate change. Read more here.
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