The midterm elections made it clear that citizens and public officials alike want more common sense and more civic engagement from leaders of the AI revolution. Crossbow recommends a dynamic program that can position the hyperscalers as leaders and the voice of reason on artificial intelligence and data center development. It can help build awareness, understanding and support among stakeholders around the world. It can help overcome objections, while optimizing stakeholder value and shareholder value.

Voters decided on dozens of local ballot measures regarding data centers in 13 states: Arkansas, California, Florida, Illinois, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Dakota, Ohio, and Wisconsin.

Voters overwhelmingly chose to limit data center development across the United States, passing restrictions in nearly every community where the issue was on the ballot.

Many communities have concerns that data centers consume mass quantities of electricity, water and land. Others don’t want to give data centers tax breaks and financial incentives.

A wave of local ballot initiatives saw residents push back heavily against the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence infrastructure. Voters decided on more than 40 measures on Election Day. Of those, voters approved restrictions or rejected pro-development measures in all but one community in North Dakota. 

Harwood, North Dakota had an initiative on the ballot that would have required additional community review before the city approves industrial developments, including data centers. Opponents defeated the initiative with 76 percent of the vote.

Elsewhere across the country, communities enacted outright bans, temporary or retroactive moratoriums, strict energy and water use limitations, and mandatory public voting requirements before construction can begin on a data center.

The nationwide resistance was driven by deep bipartisan community anxieties regarding rising electricity costs, massive water consumption, severe noise pollution, and the loss of rural farmland to industrial facilities. Of course, most are concerned about a loss of property value. According to an NBC exit poll, 56 percent of voters said AI and data centers played a “crucial or major factor” in their vote for Congress. A poll published by UMass Amherst earlier this year found that only 11 percent of Americans would support the construction of an AI data center in their community.

Ohio had more ballot initiatives related to data centers than any other state (21). Ohio is already saturated with 154 data centers that are operational (27 more under construction and 57 more being planned). Voters went against data center development in all 21. Eleven bans passed. The statewide ban that missed this year’s ballot could return in 2027.

Illinois had 7 measures, all advisory. All seven went against data centers. All three Kansas bans passed. Alhambra, California and Edgewater, Florida voted on outright bans. 

Six measures were decided between March and September. All six went against data center development, by margins of 66 to 90 percent. Monterey Park, California passed a ban in June with 88 percent. Augusta Township, Michigan voters rejected a rezoning for a proposed data center with 90 percent voting no. Wrightstown, Wisconsin voters said no, 87 to 13, to committing public resources to a large-scale data center.

All of these ballot initiatives are expensive and time consuming for everyone. They are a symptom of an emerging industry that needs more civic engagement and more transparency. To help facilitate better dialogue and better solutions site-by-site, Crossbow proposes a dynamic civic engagement program that will optimize benefits to all stakeholders.

Our Proposed Solution

We propose a very specialized program to serve cities, communities and citizens first. It will even benefit cities and communities that will never host a data center. Hyperscalers, government and other leaders will sponsor and support the program, which will promote America’s AI Action Plan in many ways:

• Overcome concerns from stakeholders regarding site selection, permitting and operations;
• Streamline site selection, community acceptance and development;
• Promote AI within government at all levels;
• Promote American AI systems and standards internationally; and
• Serve as a platform of diplomacy where all like-minded countries can work together to encourage the development of AI in line with our shared values.

The Greener Cities program will transcend data centers and AI to help communities around the world optimize efficiency and resilience. It will help them with visioning, strategic planning, resource optimization, risk management and more. These mutually beneficial relationships will help allied industries build stronger foundations for growth and prosperity.

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs firm. We influence public opinion and public policy around the world.

The post Civic Engagement Part Of The AI Revolution appeared first on Crossbow Communications.

PFAS are a large group of manufactured chemicals that are used to make everyday products, including cosmetics, carpet, food packaging, Teflon and fire retardants. There are several forms of PFAS, which are collectively referred to as forever chemicals.

PFAS are used in aerospace, automotive, construction, electronics, and military. They also are used to keep food from sticking to pots and pans. Others are sprayed on shoes, clothing and paper products to make them waterproof. Forever chemicals are everywhere.

PFAS is often listed on products as PTFE (polytetrafluoroethylene), perfluorooctyl triethoxysilane, perfluorononyl dimethicone, perfluorodecalin, and perfluorohexane. More than 9,000 different types of PFAS have been identified.

These forever chemicals come into contact with humans through two main pathways. The first is through the manufacture and use of products that directly contain PFAS, like food wrapping, firefighting foam, floss, pizza boxes, napkins and toilet papers. 

The second major pathway is through contaminated water and soil, and the things that grow in soil or consume water, such as livestock, fish, and produce. Recent data even suggests that forever chemicals can be found in snow and raindrops.

Firefighting foam, commonly used at military bases, is considered a significant source of contamination, particularly through drinking water. Aqueous Film-Forming Foam (AFFF) made from forever chemicals became popular due to its ability to quickly extinguish fires and prevent reignition. By the 1960s, the U.S. Navy mandated that its vessels carry AFFF. In 2014, 664 U.S. military training sites were identified as likely to have PFAS contamination.

While the health effects of PFAS are still being explored, evidence indicates that forever chemicals cause several health issues, including reduced fertility and increased cancer risk. 

“Our findings support the growing body of research linking firefighter exposures to cancer risk,” said Dr. Lauren Teras, senior scientific director, epidemiology research at the American Cancer Society and lead author of the study. “The associations with skin, kidney, prostate, and colorectal cancer are evident.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) found PFAS in the blood of 97 percent of Americans. PFAS also is commonly found in breast milk. It’s safe to say that PFAS has contaminated most of the food and water supplies around the world. The contaminant also threatens fish, wildlife and livestock.

The problem is that PFAS molecules are composed of carbon and fluorine atoms. The carbon-fluorine bond is extremely strong, which means that these chemicals do not degrade in the environment or in our bodies. In fact, scientists are unable to estimate an environmental half-life for PFAS. 

PFAS are known as forever chemicals because they remain highly toxic forever. Forever chemicals have leached into our soil and water, which means that food supplies have been contaminated.

Since PFAS don’t break down, they accumulate in the tissue of humans, wildlife and livestock. In addition to cancer, PFAS cause cancer, liver, thyroid, and kidney disease. They weaken the immune system, alter the metabolism, and disrupt the reproductive system. They cause infertility, miscarriage and birth defects. They cause neurological disorders. It also can blacken the teeth of those exposed. 

This week, 3M agreed to a $7.35 billion personal injury settlement in November 2026 to resolve approximately 115,000 to 120,000 lawsuits linked to “forever chemicals” (PFAS) in its military-grade firefighting foam (AFFF).

The settlement offer is for some personal injury and health claims (including certain cancers and immune, thyroid, or fertility issues) from firefighters, military personnel, and individuals exposed to AFFF runoff. Under 3M’s proposal, the company will pay $7.35 billion over nine years. 3M has the right to walk away from the deal if a minimum threshold of eligible plaintiffs choose not to accept the settlement. 3M maintains that the settlement is not an admission of wrongdoing or liability.

“Cancer is now one of the biggest fights we face in the fire service, but we are determined to do all we can to end this deadly scourge,” said IAFF General President Edward Kelly. “PFAS has been proven and linked to cause these cancers among our firefighters.”

This agreement is separate from 3M’s prior $10.3 billion to $12.5 billion settlement in 2023 that addressed PFAS contamination in U.S. public drinking water systems. This settlement will provide $10.3 billion to $12.5 billion over 13 years to U.S. public water suppliers for testing and filtering PFAS. The payments are managed through the Public Water Systems Settlement Program.

PFAS are still manufactured and used in the United States, though certain specific compounds have been phased out or restricted. While major older compounds like PFOA and PFOS were officially pulled from primary domestic production years ago, other PFAS chemicals continue to be manufactured, used in industrial processes, or generated as byproducts.

Several original forms of PFAS have been removed from many industrial applications, but not all. Unfortunately, products that contain them are still imported into the U.S. from other countries.

New Jersey is the poster child for PFAS relief. The state has the highest share of public water systems with PFAS levels above federal limits. In August 2026, New Jersey approved a legal settlement with DuPont and 3M to remediate statewide contamination and damages across four former industrial facilities and their surroundings in New Jersey. The settlement is worth more than $2 billion, which makes it  the largest environmental settlement ever by a state.

While Congress and EPA debate federal PFAS policy, many states are taking action. Twenty-eight states have enacted policies to mitigate the proliferation and harms of PFAS, and six more have proposed similar policies. This includes policies on levels of PFAS in drinking water. Eleven states mandate specific drinking water limits for at least one PFAS chemical and another 12 states are adopting guidance or community notification programs on PFAS in drinking water.

Fifteen states are imposing, or will soon impose, specific regulations on PFAS in certain products. Twelve states have chosen to phase out PFAS in food packaging, while 14 states are removing it from firefighting foam. Some states are moving to phase out PFAS in apparel, personal care products and children’s products. Maine, Minnesota, and Washington state stand out for committing to ban PFAS in all products.

Meanwhile, 30 state attorneys general are suing, or have sued, PFAS manufacturers for contamination (some have already been settled). The states of New York, New Mexico, and Washington, as well as cities, businesses, and individuals have pursued lawsuits against the U.S. government for damages caused by firefighting foam.

Regulation and legislation can help prevent PFAS from being manufactured in or imported into the United States. These pathways can also mandate the remediation of PFAS contamination.

For drinking water, EPA has outlined strategies to treat PFAS, including activated carbon, ion exchange, and high pressure membranes.

Forever chemicals can enter the wastewater stream via residential and industrial waste. This might sound benign, but treated wastewater can still contaminate groundwater, wildlife, and food because wastewater treatment does not remove PFAS.

Forever chemicals are also a concern in soil. PFAS can enter soil through groundwater, compost, irrigation, soil additives, air pollution, landfills, and pesticides. When PFAS-tainted sewage sludge (biosolids) is spread on open land, the chemicals can spread to crops, groundwater, livestock, and wildlife.

The 3M settlements are just a few examples of legal proceedings, so far. Many more have been settled, while others are in progress. A global or nationwide class settlement for personal injury claims has not been finalized, though thousands of individual suits and challenges are working their way through the federal AFFF multidistrict litigation (MDL No. 2873).

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs firm. We influence public opinion and public policy around the world.

The post 3M Settles More Liabilities Over Forever Chemicals appeared first on Crossbow Communications.

Data centers have become more controversial than ever, due to several key environmental, economic, and social concerns. Citizens around the world are calling for more common sense and more civic engagement in an attempt to find common goals and common ground.

To help facilitate more productive civic engagement, several related issues are on the ballots in several states today. Some states seek moratoriums on new permits. Others seek an outright ban on data centers, while others are railing against local tax incentives. In some states, including Georgia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas, the candidates for governor are distancing themselves from the data center debacle.

As of October 30, voters had decided six of the measures. In each case, a majority of voters favored greater limits on data center development, either by approving new restrictions or requirements or by rejecting a measure that would have facilitated or supported development.

Today, voters will decide on dozens of local ballot measures regarding data centers in 13 states: Arkansas, California, Florida, Illinois, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Dakota, Ohio, and Wisconsin. Voters in Arkansas and North Dakota will cast their ballots in December.

Ohio: There are more ballot initiatives (21) related to data centers in Ohio than any other state, and the state is already a major one for developers—154 data centers are operational, with 27 more under construction and 57 more being planned.

Thirteen municipalities have data center bans on the ballot, including Conneaut, Defiance, Granville, Grove City, Hubbard, Monroeville, Oregon, Pataskala, Piqua, Sunbury, Trenton, Upper Sandusky and Urbana. The townships of Monroe and Sprigg are voting on adopting new zoning regulations that would preserve the “rural and agricultural character” of their areas and effectively ban data center construction—the two small communities in southern Ohio are possible locations for major projects, including a 1,000-acre site being evaluated for an Amazon Web Services data center.

The town of Wilmington will vote on four questions related to zoning in four specific sites that would allow a data center project to move forward—after the Ohio Supreme Court upheld the local county’s board of elections’ decision to block a referendum on establishing broader restrictions. Voters in Ashville will decide whether to block a data center already under construction, while residents in Perry will vote on a resolution requiring developers to earn tax breaks with financial guarantees and noise limits.

Illinois: Six municipalities in the Land of Lincoln are voting to advise their local governments on whether to approve or build new data centers: Chouteau, Granite City, Joliet, Morgan, Nameoki and Venice. Meanwhile, voters in Bloomington will decide whether to approve a full moratorium on future data centers, after the city and nearby Normal enacted a six-month moratorium earlier this year on facilities using more than 5 megawatts of power.

Wisconsin: voters in Janesville will decide whether future projects costing above $450 million at an old auto parts factory should require a majority vote approval from the community, essentially deciding whether it can be used for data center construction. The question refers specifically to the site of a former General Motors plant that ended production in 2008 during the auto industry crisis, and left a toxic brownfield after it closed. Janesville has struggled to redevelop the site and has recently explored building a data center on the site—a proposal that has prompted significant public backlash.

Local governments in several other cities in Wisconsin have imposed temporary data center moratoriums over the course of the year, including Madison in January and Milwaukee in October.

Kansas: The towns of El Dorado and Emporia will vote on whether to ban “high impact” data centers, while the town of Ottawa will vote on a ban on “utility-intensive” data centers, or facilities that use more than 25 megawatts of power.

Maine: Four municipalities in the Pine Tree State are voting on data center moratoriums, but most of these have time limits: Peru and Wells are voting on 180-day moratoriums, while Wiscasset is voting on a six-month ban on new data centers and expansion projects. The town of North Berwick is separately voting on its own ban on data centers larger than 25,000 square feet. Larger cities in Maine, including Bangor, have already enacted local moratoriums, and Maine’s legislature passed a statewide moratorium earlier this year—which Gov. Janet Mills vetoed in April.

The measures outlined above extend the momentum created in dozens of communities over concerns that data centers consume mass quantities of electricity, water and land. Many of the communities with measures on the ballot today are in Republican-led districts.

Ballot initiatives are expensive and time consuming. They are  a symptom of an emerging industry that needs more civic engagement and more transparency. To help facilitate better dialogue and better solutions site-by-site, Crossbow proposes a dynamic civic engagement program that will optimize benefits to all stakeholders.

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs firm. We influence public opinion and public policy around the world.

The post Artificial Intelligence Versus Common Sense appeared first on Crossbow Communications.

The United States has more than 3,000 operational data centers now. More than 1,500 new data centers are in various stages of development nationwide. As demand for artificial intelligence accelerates, citizens are standing up for common sense.

Data centers are huge industrial buildings that house computer servers, data storage systems, and networking equipment. They act as the physical backbone of the internet, powering online tools, including cloud storage, applications, banking, and artificial intelligence (AI). 

Fears that these centers will increase electricity prices, deplete water supplies and compete for farmland have prompted people across the country to pack meetings of zoning boards and county commissions to oppose the projects, while fueling calls from leaders in both parties for state or national moratoriums. That opposition has become a rising obstacle for an industry that is developing an estimated 1,500 data centers, in large part to support the growth of artificial intelligence.

• 67 percent of planned data centers are in rural areas, while 87 percent of existing data centers are in urban ones.
• 39 percent of planned data centers are in counties that don’t have any today.

Most of the planned construction of U.S. data centers will happen in the South and Midwest. Three-quarters of all planned data centers will be built in these two regions, with the South alone accounting for nearly half of them (48 percent).

Virginia and Texas have the most planned data centers (287 and 170, respectively). They are followed by Georgia (141), Illinois (123) and Arizona (86). Virginia and Texas also have the most currently operating data centers (398 and 296, respectively). They are followed by California (277), Ohio (166) and New York (148).

Currently, 38 percent of Americans live within 5 miles of at least one operational data center.

These structures tend to be built in clusters: Nine-in-ten data centers are within 5 miles of another one. As a result, a majority of Americans who live near one data center also live near at least one more.

Another 4 percent of Americans don’t live near a currently operational data center but live within 5 miles of one that’s planned. That means 42 percent of the population lives close to an existing or planned data center. Most Americans have similar views about the impact that data centers have on things like the environment, home energy costs and local jobs.

They have become a major flashpoint of controversy—particularly with the massive boom in AI infrastructure—due to several key environmental, economic, and social concerns. For example, data centers require immense amounts of electricity to run servers and cooling systems 24/7, straining local power grids and driving up utility bills for nearby residents. Traditional facilities use millions of gallons of water for evaporative cooling, raising scarcity concerns in drought-prone areas.

The AI boom is compelling data center companies to communicate more with the public

Many of the messaging battles have been local. Patrick Hughes, a senior vice president for the National Electrical Manufacturers Association, said the resistance is particularly fierce when a company doesn’t provide information to communities before breaking ground on a construction project.

“Where projects go astray is when the community finds out because a plot of land is being cleared and construction is already going,” Hughes told POLITICO. “At that point, it’s already too late to have that conversation around how this is going to benefit people.”

Noise and Infrastructure: Large cooling fans and backup generators (often powered by natural gas) create constant noise pollution.

Industrial Footprint: These massive complexes alter rural or residential landscapes, increasing traffic, emissions, and local air pollution.

Few Local Jobs: Despite their massive size, completed data centers employ relatively few permanent workers.

Tax Breaks vs. Public Cost: Tech companies often secure heavy government tax incentives, meaning local taxpayers may shoulder the burden of upgrading public roads, water lines, and electrical grids without seeing proportional tax revenue. 

Many residents view data centers as an unwelcome physical incursion by Big Tech, serving an AI industry that yields profits for private corporations while imposing local costs.

“Data center companies aren’t marketing a consumer product,” said Wes Cummins, chairman and CEO of the data center developer and operator Applied Digital. “You don’t typically have a big PR department that has dealt with anything like this before.”

Data centers typically keep their plans quiet. Nondisclosure agreements with local officials have been common practice. Such agreements have recently compounded the problem with citizens in places such as Salem, Oregon, and Posey, Indiana.

“When [data center companies] have gone into communities, they’ve had those municipalities enter into non-disclosure agreements, so the data around consumption have been in a black box,” said Michelle Lopes Maldonado, associate director of AI policy at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. “It’s when we don’t share the full picture that people start to fill in the gaps with their own information.”

Higher electricity costs, for example, are Americans’ top concern when it comes to building data centers, the results show. In January, 43 percent of Americans said they believe that “data centers raise people’s electricity bills.” This month, that share jumped 16 points to nearly 60 percent of Americans who said the same.

U.S. data centers consumed 183 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity in 2024, according to IEA estimates. That works out to more than 4 percent of the country’s total electricity consumption last year – and is roughly equivalent to the annual electricity demand of the entire nation of Pakistan. By 2030, this figure is projected to grow by 133 percent to 426 TWh.

As of 2024, natural gas supplied over 40 percent of electricity for U.S. data centers, according to the IEA. Renewables such as wind and solar supplied about 24 percent of electricity at data centers, while nuclear power supplied around 20 percent and coal around 15 percent.

Natural gas is projected to continue supplying the largest share of energy at data centers through 2030, but nuclear power could eventually play a larger role. Several tech companies have recently announced purchasing agreements with nuclear power startups. Plans are also in the works to revive two retired nuclear power plants – Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania and Duane Arnold in Iowa – to meet growing energy demand from data centers.

One study from Carnegie Mellon University estimates that data centers and cryptocurrency mining could lead to an 8 percent increase in the average U.S. electricity bill by 2030, potentially exceeding 25 percent in the highest-demand markets of central and northern Virginia.

The share of Americans who said data centers deplete the water supply grew from 34 percent to 55 percent during the same period.

Spreading the message on data centers’ purported benefits and costs has been a challenge, according to Software and Information Industry Association President Chris Mohr. He told POLITICO that the industry broadly needs to work on getting that information to local government leaders, who are often in the best position to communicate with residents.

“Local communities have been vocal about these projects,” said Mohr. “It’s imperative that their leaders be armed with facts.”

Statewide Moratoriums Under Consideration

Democratic New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed an executive order in July establishing the United States’ first statewide pause on large data center construction, and progressives in Congress have proposed such a moratorium for the nation.

New York became the first state in the nation to enact a statewide moratorium on certain AI data center development projects—marking a significant departure from the local and municipal restrictions that have characterized regulatory responses to date. Others have followed its example. Others??? Maine?

While the immediate impact on nationwide data center growth may be limited, the move could mark a change in how states approach the future of AI infrastructure.

Historically, efforts to slow or pause data center growth have occurred at the municipal or county level, often driven by local concerns surrounding energy consumption, land use, water resources, and community impact. New York’s action is notable because it represents the first statewide moratorium of its kind.

The development bears close watching as several other states—including Minnesota, Michigan, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, New Hampshire, and Virginia—are considering legislation that could impose similar restrictions on future data center projects. If additional states follow suit, New York’s decision could become the beginning of a broader regulatory trend rather than an isolated event.

New York’s moratorium might be the first salvo in a broader conversation about how states regulate the AI economy. Growing local opposition to data center projects, combined with increased legislative activity at the state level, has elevated regulatory risk as a key factor in development planning. Industry participants—including data center developers, hyperscalers, and emerging AI infrastructure providers—are closely monitoring state legislative developments as they evaluate where to deploy capital and build new facilities.

In addition to the moratorium, New York Governor Kathy Hochul has indicated plans to pursue repeal of the state’s sales tax exemption for large data centers. Such a change could significantly affect project economics.

For facilities currently under development—or those in the planning stages—the loss of these exemptions could increase costs associated with purchasing critical equipment and construction materials. This includes major infrastructure investments such as long-lead electrical equipment, as well as high-value computing hardware like GPUs and CPUs that are central to AI workloads.

Developers might face both regulatory uncertainty and increased capital expenditures, potentially reshaping investment decisions in the state. New York’s moratorium represents an important milestone in the evolving regulatory landscape surrounding AI infrastructure.

At least twenty-seven states are advancing state data center legislation that requires developers to cover data center energy costs and report usage, with California, Ohio, and Utah already enacting laws that go beyond the federal government’s voluntary Ratepayer Protection Pledge.

On March 4, 2026, in conjunction with the White House, several major data center developers signed the Ratepayer Protection Pledge, committing to cover the full cost of new electric generation resources needed to meet their energy demands. The pledge addresses one of the central concerns driving state legislation, though it does not have a legal enforcement method, and does not appear to have stalled state legislation moving forward.

Maine is poised to become the first state to implement data center construction moratoriums, pausing new projects until November 2027, with several other states and localities considering similar measures despite federal efforts to speed up development.

In July 2025, President Trump issued an executive order to rapidly and efficiently build out data center infrastructure by “easing federal regulatory burdens.” The order applies to data centers requiring more than 100 MW new electricity load, costing at least $500 million to build, or those that protect national security. The order attempts to streamline environmental review and permitting processes, orders the Secretary of Commerce to provide financial support and incentives for qualifying data center projects, and allows the Secretaries of Defense, Interior, Commerce, or Energy to designate other data center projects subject to the order, but does not lay out any criteria to determine which projects qualify.

The order’s reach is limited to federal policies. It does not preempt state permitting requirements, zoning laws, or energy regulations, meaning a data center that meets federal requirements can still face significant state and local challenges. The order does not impact state and local policymakers’ authority over land use or utility regulations.

On social media, Trump urged the U.S. to “let Data Reign.” He stated that data centers bring jobs, lower taxes, and wealth, and warned that stopping them helps China win the AI race. He warned that towns that reject them risk ending up “backwards and poor.”

As opposition to datacenters grows, the research group Data Center Watch found that grassroots groups blocked or delayed at least 75 datacenter projects worth approximately $130 billion in the first three months of 2026.

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs and government affairs firm. We specialize in public health and environmental issues. We serve the world.

The post U.S. Wants More Data Centers appeared first on Crossbow Communications.

Thanks to an industrial chemistry experiment gone awry, most people in the world have a harmful chemical in their bodies. A chemical cocktail designed to help families, firemen and others is the focus of an international industrial crime.

PFAS, including PFOA and PFOS, are man-made synthetic chemicals known as forever chemicals because they do not break down easily in the environment or the human body. These chemicals have been used to make everyday products, including cosmetics, carpet, food packaging, Teflon and fire retardants for decades. PFOA and PFOS are two chemicals in the larger class of PFAS. More than 9,000 different types of PFAS have been identified.

Thanks to negligence and fraud, the vast majority of Americans of all ages are now part of this chemistry experiment. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey found forever chemicals in the blood of 97 percent of Americans, including breast milk. IForever chemicals have contaminated most of the food and water supplies around the world. The contaminant also threatens fish, wildlife and livestock.

People are most likely exposed by consuming PFAS-contaminated water or food, using products made with PFAS, or breathing air contaminated with PFAS.

Since PFAS don’t break down, they accumulate in the tissue of humans, wildlife and livestock. PFAS causes cancer, liver, thyroid, and kidney disease. They weaken the immune system, alter the metabolism, and disrupt the reproductive system. They cause infertility, miscarriage and birth defects. They cause neurological disorders. It also can blacken the teeth of those exposed. Much more research is needed to fully understand the public health and ecological impacts. Unfortunately, Pandora left the box long ago.

Thanks to one very tenacious lawyer named Robert Bilott, legal battles are gaining momentum. The movie Dark Waters summarizes Bilott’s courageous work.

The Problem With Sewage Mismanagement

Wastewater is the largest waste stream in the world and the most toxic waste stream in the world. It contains anything and everything that people, factories, hospitals and more can flush down a toilet. This massive wastestream is largely unregulated. Wastewater treatment basically separates the solids from the water and sends each stream back into our watersheds in highly toxic forms.

As such, sewage sludge is one of the most toxic substances on earth. It isn’t fertilizer and it isn’t safe. Wastewater isn’t drinking water or irrigation water. Show me where these processes account for unstoppable prions – the deadly protein that fuels and spreads neurodegenerative disease.

Thanks to reckless policies around the world, this waste stream has contaminated food, water and air around the world with neurotoxins, carcinogens, radionuclides, forever chemicals and more.

There was a time when human sewage was a fairly benign substance that cities and towns could disperse naturally without threatening an entire nation.

Under existing federal regulations, biosolids can be applied to agricultural lands, forests, tree farms, golf courses, turf farms, and other types of land. Biosolids can also be bagged and sold at stores for use on lawns or in home gardens. Biosolids generally are not used on specialty crops, such as fresh produce, and generally are used on crops where edible parts are not in contact with the soil. Some states, Tribes, or counties also have additional rules around the use of sewage sludge and biosolids.

In an attempt to protect public health and more, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a draft memorandum that would provide guidance to operators of wastewater treatment plants (WWTP) and related facilities, landowners and farmers, state and Tribal water agencies, and the public on ways to reduce potential risks posed by perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) in biosolids (sewage sludge). Unfortunately, the damage has already been done. Virtually every creature on earth now has forever chemicals in their blood. Sewage sludge and biosolids dumped on open land have been contaminating food and water supplies for decades. Neurotoxins, carcinogens and radionuclides also are part of the threat posed by using sewage sludge as fertilizer and reclaiming wastewater for agriculture and municipal supplies.

EPA is taking a radically transparent approach by ensuring robust input is gathered to inform next steps. EPA will solicit comment on the draft guidance for 60 days following publication in the Federal Register. Once the notice is published, comments can be submitted using Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OW-2026-2509. The notice will contain additional information on how to submit a comment.

“One of EPA’s top priorities is to Make America Healthy Again, and reducing risk from PFOA and PFOS in biosolids is a critical part of that effort,” said EPA Assistant Administrator for Water Jess Kramer. “This draft guidance will provide Americans with commonsense recommendations that can protect public health, while also supporting wastewater systems and beneficial use of biosolids when appropriate.” 

The Trump EPA has gathered feedback from a wide range of stakeholders on this topic and recognizes the complexity associated with biosolids contaminated with PFOA and PFOS. Key Recommendations include:

• Land Applicators: Avoid applying biosolids near reservoirs, drinking water sources, or fishable waters;
• Crop Producers: Prioritize low-risk crops (such as fiber, grain, or corn for ethanol) over food crops with higher human exposure potential (such as soft fruits or leafy greens); and
• WWTP Operators: Implement improved system monitoring and alternative sludge management or disposal strategies.

We’re all part of the sewage problem, but misinformation, disinformation, incomplete science and more have compounded the problem. It has caused an environmental catastrophe and a public health disaster that is still unfolding.

Wastewater treatment plants are barely able to separate the liquids from the solids in this high-volume, toxic soup. Neutralizing and removing all neurotoxins, forever chemicals and radionuclides, for example, is impossible. Safe handling and disposal of this deadly waste stream is imperative, but the reality is much different. After superficial treatment, the water and the solids are pumped right back into the homeland for reuse.

Just a few years ago, sewage sludge killed underwater ecosystems, when dumped at sea. Today, it is hyped as fertilizer for farms, ranches, golf courses, parks, ballparks, school grounds, cemeteries, forests and beyond. Like magic, sewage sludge became biosolids and wastewater is now drinking water. Thanks to the EPA, the waste stream is the new gold rush.

The Marine Protection, Research and Sanctuaries Act

In October 1972, Congress enacted the Marine Protection, Research and Sanctuaries Act (MPRSA), a.k.a. the Ocean Dumping Act, to regulate the dumping of all materials that adversely affect human health, welfare or amenities, or the marine environment. It took the Ocean Dumping Ban Act of 1988 (an amendment to the MPRSA) to prohibit the dumping of municipal sewage sludge, industrial waste and medical waste into the ocean.

Bans were motivated by the discovery of contaminated wastes from sewage-derived microorganisms at public beaches, toxic metals in shellfish beds, and parasites in fish. Sewage sludge can contain heavy metals like cadmium and copper, which sewage treatment plants can’t filter out. Ocean dumping can destroy marine habitats and ecosystems. 

Unfortunately, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been pushing a different story for the past 30 years. In response to the ban on dumping sewage sludge at sea, the EPA expedited a flawed, if not fraudulent, risk assessment and concluded that the toxic waste that destroyed marine ecosystems was actually beneficial to open land, including farmland, ranches, forests, parks, golf courses, school grounds, ballparks and city parks. The public was not aware of the threat from forever chemicals at the time. We also didn’t know about deadly prions, which are driving the global surge in neurodegenerative disease.

“Biosolids is a glorified term for sewage sludge,” said Gary Chandler, CEO of Crossbow Communications. The EPA estimates that more than 2.4 million tons of sewage sludge are applied to land annually as fertilizer.”

Biosolids are made from both municipal and industrial waste, and although they are treated to remove some pathogens and some other materials, PFAS are not removed during treatment and EPA does not currently limit the amount of PFAS they can contain.

It calls biosolids a cheap fertilizer (they pay farmers to take this toxic waste off their hands). Now, many farms and ranches are paying the ultimate price for this cheap fertilizer.

Make America Healthy Again 

During the Biden administration, EPA released a draft risk assessment aimed at understanding potential risks posed by PFOA and PFOS in sewage sludge. After reviewing the comments provided by stakeholders, it determined “that the Draft Risk Assessment exhibited a number of flaws that have caused confusion among the public. This confusion has resulted in a lack of clarity in how stakeholders could apply the preliminary findings of the Draft Risk Assessment in their daily lives, or put another way, in how to determine what the findings of the Draft Risk Assessment means to them.” 

According to EPA, based on the hypothetical biosolids and sewage sludge use and disposal scenarios modeled and presented in the Draft Risk Assessment, the EPA’s focus on higher-risk scenarios, the lack of discussion about risks to the public, and the use of one part per billion as the modeled concentration resulted in a misconception that all biosolids and sewage sludge use and disposal practices will negatively affect the public. 

The draft guidance aims to provide clarity to stakeholders about the more common potential risks from PFOA and PFOS and identify some potential practices that can be taken to reduce PFOA and PFOS exposures. EPA notes that the draft guidance memorandum does not have the force and effect of law, nor does it bind the public in any way. Comments are due September 4, 2026.

EPA Settlement Reforms Some Policies, Practices

On June 24, 2026, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), and the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WV DEP) announced the first comprehensive federal settlement with a major PFAS manufacturer, Chemours. EPA alleges that Chemours released PFAS into the Cape Fear River (North Carolina), the Delaware River (New Jersey), and the Ohio River (West Virginia) — in some cases without required permits, and in other cases in violation of those permits.  

Under the $450 million settlement agreement, Chemours will spend more than $337 million on injunctive relief, including an estimated $280 million to provide alternative drinking water, $60 million to ensure compliance with the law at its West Virginia facility, and additional funds to ensure compliance at its other facilities. Additionally, Chemours will conduct projects under a multi-year, government-supervised $90 million per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) mitigation program. EPA states that the settlement “further advances EPA’s ‘polluter pays’ commitment, holding accountable those who have significantly contributed to the release of these ‘forever chemicals.’”

According to the EPA, the settlement addresses alleged Clean Water Act (CWA) and West Virginia Water Pollution Control Act violations, including unauthorized discharges and permit violations. EPA states that the settlement also addresses Chemours’ alleged violations of requirements under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) associated with environmental release restrictions for multiple PFAS, including restrictions on releases to air and water at four facilities in West Virginia, North Carolina, and New Jersey. Finally, the settlement addresses alleged Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) violations of accepting shipments of hazardous waste in violation of its RCRA permit and unauthorized storage of hazardous waste. EPA notes that in addition to addressing PFAS contamination, the settlement also resolves other environmental violations.

Settlement Doesn’t Ban Forever Chemicals

• Bring its facilities back into compliance with the law;
• Complete 14 treatment system projects to reduce PFAS in wastewater, stormwater, and groundwater at its West Virginia facility;
• Control releases of GenX (a type of PFAS) from each facility at an efficiency of at least 99 percent;
• Test drinking water and provide treated or alternative water to communities near its plants in West Virginia and New Jersey;
• Implement controls at its North Carolina facility based on recommendations from an independent engineering firm;
• Start enhanced leak detection programs and conduct engineering reviews to assess and reduce additional PFAS releases;
• Certify that it is properly storing hazardous waste; and
• Undertake projects under a multi-year, government-supervised $90 million mitigation program.

Pursuant to EPA policy, EPA assessed Chemours a $22.5 million civil penalty based on ability to pay. EPA notes that this amount was set after EPA and DOJ reviewed Chemours’ financial records. According to EPA, the settlement “allows Chemours to continue manufacturing PFAS for critical commercial and military applications, including those where substitutes are not readily available, while preventing future contamination and protecting communities from that contamination.” The proposed consent decree was filed with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia. Comments are due to DOJ by July 29, 2026.

Some states and public health advocates have been critical of the deal, which explicitly allows Chemours to continue manufacturing PFAS. North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson, for example, described the settlement as a “backroom deal” and an “insult” to the people of the state. Other groups, like the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), raised concerns that the penalty amount — $22.5 million — was far lower than EPA’s headline, and inadequate to address the harms and discourage future pollution. The public comments on the proposed settlement and how the court will consider those proposed terms will be worth keeping an eye on.

Sewage Sludge Spreads Prions

Despite trillions of dollars spent on homeland security and defense over the past two decades, most Americans and others around the world are consuming PFAS-contaminated water and/or food, using contaminated products or breathing contaminated air. At least 45 percent of America’s tap water is estimated to have one or more types of the chemicals known as per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances, or PFAS, according to a 2023 study by the U.S. Geological Survey.

There are more than 12,000 types of PFAS, not all of which can be detected with current tests; the USGS study tested for the presence of 32 types. PFAS is just the tip of a very large and very toxic iceberg. Unstoppable neurotoxins might pose an even more formidable threat.

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs and government affairs firm. We specialize in public health and environmental issues. We serve the world.

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Like many of you, I enjoy volunteering and doing pro bono work for nonprofits. When I moved to Denver way back when, I volunteered to be a Big Brother. That experience alone was rewarding. My Little Brother and I spent several Saturdays skiing at Winter Park and exploring the world. I’m grateful for the experience. Above and beyond those rewards, my friends and colleagues answered the call numerous times for various fundraisers and recruitment campaigns. I’m grateful for those experiences and I thank everyone again. Below is one of those stories.

Forty years ago, the Denver Broncos started a spectacular Super Bowl campaign. They fell just short of the championship that year, so Denver claimed another crown.

In the 1986 season, John Elway passed for 3,485 yards with the help of veteran wide receiver Steve Watson and rookie Mark Jackson.

In the AFC Championship game, the Broncos faced a tough test on the road against the Cleveland Browns. During Elway’s historic 98-yard game-tying march (The Drive), Jackson caught a crucial 20-yard pass on 3rd-and-18. A few moments later, he caught a 5-yard touchdown pass with 31 seconds left.

In overtime, Elway launched a 28-yard pass to Steve Watson. His catch put Denver deep into Cleveland territory, which set up a game-winning field goal from Rich Karlis. The Broncos advanced to Super Bowl XXI in Pasadena to face a the New York Giants. Although Denver led the Super Bowl at halftime, the Broncos lost 39-20.

To help harness the lightning from that amazing season, Watson and Jackson joined our outreach campaign for Big Brothers of Metro Denver.

Ironically, Denver had the largest chapter of Big Brothers in the nation at the time. Unfortunately, it still had a waiting list of children. It was a chance for Big Brothers to build even more support in the community.

Thanks to the help of many people, the campaign came together quickly. In addition to Mr. Jackson and Mr. Watson, our team included:

• Scott Watson (my Little Brother, #7 — no relation to Steve Watson)
• Mike Stillman, Photographer
• David French
• Continental Airlines
• Channel 9
• The Denver Post
• The Rocky Mountain News
• Mike Naughton Ford
• Brian Kinkel
• Greg Ferri
• Jim Dudley
• Jeff Pester
• Derek Okubo

Thanks to these supporters and many others, this is still one of my favorite campaigns. It was opportunistic and strategic, but the community support was overwhelming.

The campaign generated several new Big Brother matches, while generating more than $1 million in cash, in-kind donations and national media coverage. Those who donated $500 or more received two round-trip airline tickets from Continental Airlines. We used the D&F Tower on the 16th Street Mall as a barometer of donations (below).

Big Brothers began in 1904 as an alternative to the juvenile justice system. Ernest Coulter, a New York City court clerk, saw an endless cycle of young boys in court. He recognized that the legal system wasn’t what these children needed. He believed that the guidance of a caring adult could help these young men. He recruited 39 volunteers to become the first “Big Brothers.”

Simultaneously, the Ladies of Charity (later Catholic Big Sisters) began befriending girls entering the New York Children’s Court. Among these pioneers were Mrs. O’Keefe and Mrs. Parker, two of the first Big Sisters who realized that equity in mentorship was just as vital for young women.

Since 1918, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Colorado (BBBSC) has believed in the incredible potential that exists within every child. As part of the nation’s largest mentoring network, BBBSC creates meaningful matches between adult mentors (“Bigs”) and youth (“Littles”) through Community-Based and Site-Based Mentoring.

Additionally, BBBSC’s School-Based (STARS) program provides peer-to-peer group mentoring, while Big Futures supports high school students with post-secondary planning. Through these programs, BBBSC fosters positive relationships that create lasting impact and empower young people to achieve their full potential.

For more information, visit https://biglittlecolorado.org/

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs and government affairs firm. We are a Colorado-based corporation. We serve the world.

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In my opinion, the United States is facing an existential threat right now. Debt and dysfunction are taking a heavy toll on what’s left of our democracy.

The constitution and our institutions got us through 250 years of trials and tribulations. We must purge corruption and blackmail out of the system if we hope to survive much longer. If not, it will impair our ability to compete in the world. It will destroy what’s left of our fragile democracy, if it hasn’t already.

Unfortunately, new cracks are emerging in the fiber of this great nation. Corruption and collusion are on full display.

Our system of checks and balances has been exposed by the Epstein files. The Epstein files have revealed that the U.S. government and many others have been overthrown by a massive and aggressive criminal operation. As shocking as the revelations have been, the cockroaches and the rats aren’t running from the spotlight. In fact, it appears that the criminal enterprise is doubling down and speeding up its agenda of world domination.

The United States is being misguided and bankrupted thanks to indiscretions of elected and appointed leaders. Business leaders and Hollywood influencers also are being blackmailed due to their indiscretions with the international sex traps (control). The massive scheme has been unfolding for years. We all are paying a price for this evil scheme right now.

Ironically, the president warned Iran about killing unarmed protestors, but his staff immediately supported the killing of two young Americans in the streets? We pretend to have gun rights, but shoot innocent citizens multiple times for having one in its holster. We frame these citizens as terrorist threats despite video evidence to the contrary. What is really going on?

The Constitution Is Under Assault

Meanwhile, the constitution itself is under assault by our own government. So are public schools, public health and public opinion. Not a good sign for the global economy or the future of America. Investors are flocking to hard assets to avoid the collapse. The future is very uncertain with this much momentum. Financial markets suggest that a shocking event is imminent. It appears that the whole world knows what is happening to the United States, except American citizens. 

We have a nation of laws that is led by a convicted felon. A man who has bankrupted an airline, casino and a university. Will he bankrupt the United States to clear the path for the New World Order?

The president is giving Americans the finger as he fights for people in the shadows and those who have invaded his office. He fired most five-star generals and the joint chiefs of staff last year. He gave Musk access to our Social Security files, including personal contact information. It has already been put to work and sold cyber punks around the world. The President of Venezuela is allegedly selling pardons to criminals and fraudsters, while supposedly cracking down on fraud, waste and abuse. Now, he is pushing for the nationalization of all elections. Another unconstitutional and un-American proposal.

The Supreme Court ruled that Trump is essentially above the law. Checks and balances are gone and the fourth estate, freedom of the press, has been challenged like never before. Now, just a few billionaires own the major media and social media outlets in the United States. Censorship has replaced editorial freedom in most news rooms. A free market demands a free press.

More Than A Distraction

Some argue that this is all just a tactic to stall the full release of the the Trump-Epstein files. Those released so far paint a very ugly picture about sex, lies and schemes to control the world. They also speak about high crimes, including rape, murder and elaborate government cover-ups. The DOJ and the FBI have been sitting on bone-chilling testimony for years. The world already knows about Sasha, Bubba and Lake Michigan. We know about “Jerky” and adrenochrome. We know that Epstein was much more than a perverted sex trafficker. He is clearly a foreign agent who did his job extremely well. He did it so well that he is still alive today (playing video games in Tel Aviv). If he wasn’t smuggled out of prison in the dark of night, he would have released the Epstein files in retaliation. Crooks and cowards at the highest levels don’t commit suicide.

What else is this administration hiding? What are foreign governments hiding? It’s time to shake the tree at all levels, not just the predatory pawns who have sold out the United States.

The president of the United States/Venezuela pardoned hundreds of criminals, including hundreds who attempted to overthrow the U.S. government on January 6, 2021. On January 20, 2025, during the first day of his second term, United States president Donald Trump granted blanket clemency to all people, nearly 1,600, convicted of or awaiting trial or sentencing for offenses related to the January 6 United States Capitol attack. Several of those pardoned have been arrested again for new crimes, including sex crimes against children. Others are working for ICE.

Meanwhile, our nation ignores important laws that are intended to protect our air, food and water. Despite the calls for homeland security and a healthier America, we are spraying tons of toxins into the atmosphere with zero transparency every day. This chemical cocktail settles into the lower atmosphere where we inhale it. It settles into our water where we consume it. It contaminates fruit-bearing trees and vegetables in the fields. Fish and livestock are contaminated.

It has been going on for years. It has been referred to as geo-engineering. Others call the toxins chemical trails or chemtrails. It is bioterrorism. It is a clear violation of H.R.3448 – Public Health Security and Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response Act of 2002. Geo-engineering is not science fiction. Geo-engineering is not climate protection. It is biological warfare. Even Trump called it “spraying.” Isn’t that what Hitler called his gas chambers.

Failure to enforce our laws undermines public health and productivity. It makes America a more unstable place for investments. China is doing a better job of purging corruption than the U.S. and that effort will spur innovation and competitiveness. America can’t afford more corruption, collusion and extortion.

Now, the U.S. government is brazenly executing citizens in the streets for exercising their constitutional rights. Free speech and the right to carry a gun have been massacred. Our voices have been silenced. Taxation without representation is tyranny.

When lies are this blatant and frequent, something is very wrong. This isn’t about immigration, distraction, ego or personal wealth. There is an end game in play and it is moving fast. Citizens can’t afford any distractions. Our nation demands truth, transparency and accountability immediately. Several people need to fall on their proverbial dagger in order to end the cycle and fully expose the dark side.

The Great American Experiment is under siege like never before. As ugly as our so-called democracy appears at the moment, we can’t afford to let the next government shutdown be its last. If we default on our debt, bankruptcy will end our great nation as we know it. Some appear to be counting on this outcome. Gold, silver and most assets are skyrocketing as the dollar is being destabilized. Bankruptcy is like the neutron bomb for crisis capitalists. It  will benefit a few, while seizing property and wealth from the masses and the nation. A failed nation has no laws to enforce. It will be chaos until crisis capitalism comes to the rescue. It’s a playbook that was launched by Ronald Reagan and Milton Friedman. The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein describes how this neofascist playbook has already shaped geopolitics.

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs and government affairs firm. We specialize in public health and environmental issues. We serve the world.

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Karrin Vasby Anderson, Colorado State University

In an authoritarian state, the leader engages in unconstitutional or undemocratic practices for the purpose of consolidating power.

Key components of authoritarianism include rejecting democratic rules; denying the legitimacy of opponents; tolerating or encouraging political violence; and curtailing the civil liberties of opponents.

Since he took office for a second time, President Donald Trump has sent National Guard troops to Los Angeles and Washington, named other cities run by Democrats as targets for military intervention, deployed masked and unidentifiable agents in immigration raids, explicitly threatened the city of Chicago with a military invasion and used government power to persecute his perceived political enemies.

Many news outlets have yet to call Trump an authoritarian.

As a political communication scholar, I study how media framing shapes people’s understanding of the world.

Because authoritarianism is most visible in hindsight, people often don’t recognize it until it’s too late. Erica Chenoweth, a Harvard political scientist, notes that when it comes to democratic backsliding, “there are no bright lines … people often find out the world they’re in after the fact.”

That’s why it’s particularly important for journalists to label authoritarians as such when the evidence warrants. In Trump’s case, I believe the U.S. is well past that point.

Trump’s Authoritarianism

Scholars with expertise in authoritarianism have been sounding the alarm about Trump for years.

Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt’s book “How Democracies Die” describes how, during the 2016 campaign and his first presidential term, Trump exhibited the key indicators of authoritarian behavior. He undermined the legitimacy of elections Republicans lost, baselessly described his rivals as criminals, refused to unambiguously condemn violence committed by his supporters, and threatened to punish critics and members of the media.

Levitsky and Ziblatt argue that “no other major presidential candidate in modern U.S. history, including Richard Nixon, has demonstrated such a weak public commitment to constitutional rights and democratic norms.”

That intensified when Trump returned to office in 2025.

Levitsky and Lucan A. Way documented Trump’s “path to American authoritarianism” for the journal Foreign Affairs in early 2025. In March, Levitsky told New York magazine that things were going worse than even he expected, asserting, “We’re pretty screwed.”

Levitsky is not alone in that view. In a February 2025 survey of political scientists conducted by Bright Line Watch – an academic organization that researches democratic health – the percentage of scholars plummeted who said that the U.S. “mostly or fully” meets the standard for democratic health.

That was before Trump, via social media, promised to go to war in Chicago. When asked about his post, Trump said, “We’re not going to war. We’re going to clean up our cities,” but he did not back away from the intent to deploy troops against the wishes of Illinois Governor JB Pritzker.

Pritzker responded to Trump’s post by noting, “This is not a joke. This is not normal.”

On Sept. 7, 2025, New York Times opinion columnist Ezra Klein itemized some of Trump’s authoritarian actions, concluding, “This is not just how authoritarianism happens. This is authoritarianism happening.”

What Journalists Have Been Saying

Although other opinion journalists like Jamelle Bouie, M. Gessen, Jonathan Chait and nearly every MSNBC anchor have been labeling Trump an authoritarian for some time, much hard news coverage of the Trump administration has not.

When Trump deployed troops to Washington, The Atlantic’s Quinta Jurecic dismissed it as “farcical” and “not a likely prelude to full authoritarian takeover.”

A CNN analysis similarly minimized the action as a “gambit,” a “distraction” and a “neat political trick.” CNN characterized concerns about authoritarianism as “hyperbolic warnings of looming tyranny that circulate all day on liberal media programs — whatever Trump does” and asserted that such reports “don’t really help voters understand what is going on.”

The New York Times’ Aug. 3 story by Peter Baker on Trump’s “tendency to suppress facts he doesn’t like and promote his own version of reality” bore a headline that read “Trump’s Efforts to Control Information Echo an Authoritarian Playbook,” suggesting that his actions were authoritarian without applying the label to Trump directly.

During the April 14, 2025, broadcast of CNN News Central, anchor Jessica Dean spoke with Nikolas Bowie, a Harvard Law School professor participating in a lawsuit against the Trump administration.

Bowie repeatedly called Trump an authoritarian for illegally freezing federal research funding awarded to Harvard.

When Dean noted that the “Trump administration says it’s doing all of this in an effort to combat antisemitism on campus,” Bowie responded that “antisemitism is really just a pretext for what is really an authoritarian attack on higher education.” Federal Judge Allison Burroughs later agreed with that interpretation in her ruling against the Trump administration.

Dean, however, sidestepped that interpretation, saying, “What I’m hearing is you think that enough was done to combat antisemitism, that this is about something else.”

Competitive Authoritarianism

There are reasons why journalistic outlets may hesitate to identify the “something else” as authoritarianism, or portray it as a looming threat rather than a current danger.

Trump’s propensity to sue journalists, and large media corporations’ decisions to settle even when the law was on their side, have likely made journalists and editors hesitant to describe Trump as an authoritarian.

And the imperative for balance sometimes results in a “both sides-ism” that misrepresents what authoritarianism actually looks like.

When California Gov. Gavin Newsom gave a speech asserting Trump’s military response to immigration protests in California was an assault on democracy, the New York Times covered it, quoting Newsom at length about the danger Trump presented. The article also quoted Republicans who alleged that Newsom’s public health directives during the COVID-19 pandemic made him “the ultimate authoritarian.”

But the particular nature of the authoritarianism the U.S is facing in the 21st century also plays a role.

Levitsky and Way have written about “competitive authoritarianism,” a new version of authoritarianism that doesn’t look like 20th-century fascism.

Many laypeople associate the word authoritarianism with military dictatorships and totalitarian rule. In competitive authoritarian regimes, however, there’s a constant push and pull between democratic and autocratic impulses. Levitsky and Way write that elections are held, but they may not be fair. The authoritarian regime uses power gained democratically to break democratic norms, undermine democratic institutions and tilt the playing field in its own favor.

Constraining Free Speech

Journalistic norms of independence can pressure even ethical journalists into acquiescence to competitive authoritarianism because they want to avoid looking partisan when all coverage that falls outside the authoritarian’s approved message gets characterized as resistance.

Paramount settled what one free speech advocate described as a “widely derided lawsuit brought by Donald Trump against ’60 Minutes,’” and CBS recently pledged to stop editing recorded interviews on “Face the Nation” after complaints lodged by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.

The Paramount and CBS cases suggest that, left unchallenged, a competitive authoritarian leader will use their leverage to influence what should be independent journalism.

Words matter. And how a democratic society responds to its leaders can make the difference between a free society and one in which a leader increasingly suppresses the voices, rights and will of the governed.

Karrin Vasby Anderson, Professor of Communication Studies, Colorado State University This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs and government affairs firm. We specialize in public health and environmental issues. We serve the world.

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According to the U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert Kennedy, Jr., the United States is the sickest nation on earth. If the dysfunction on Capitol Hill and within the White House are any indication, he might be right.

The Senate Healthcare Committee grilled Kennedy for more than three hours last week about the health of the nation and the future of vaccine policy. The conversation again demonstrated that our government is protecting special interests, including their own, more than the American people. Kennedy promises to remove politics from the process.

“That’s my job,” Kennedy told the committee.  

Despite the drama, grandstanding and rhetoric at the Senate meeting, health outcomes for people of all ages in the United States are poor compared to other high-income nations. Despite spending the most on healthcare, the U.S. ranked last overall in a 2024 Commonwealth Fund report on healthcare system performance.

According to reports from The Commonwealth Fund and the National Institutes of Health, the U.S. lags behind other wealthy nations in several critical health areas: 

• Life expectancy: The U.S. has the lowest life expectancy at birth among high-income countries, with Americans dying younger and experiencing higher rates of disease.
• Avoidable deaths: The U.S. has the highest rates of preventable and treatable deaths. Causes of death that are unusually high in the U.S. include drug overdoses and gun violence.
• Infant and maternal mortality: The U.S. has the highest rates of infant and maternal mortality among its peer nations.
• Autism: After decades of surging autism rates in the U.S., there still is no state or national screening programs to track incidence rates in hopes of turning the tide. In 2015, the Centers For Disease Control (CDC) reported that 1 in 45 children in the United States had autism spectrum disorder (ASD), which includes Asperger’s Syndrome (a milder version of the disease). Despite the lack of any formal testing program, the CDC just updated those statistics to 1 in 31 children. Boys are five times more likely to be autistic than girls. It’s clearly driven largely by neurotoxins in food, water, air and soil. Some states are worse than others. Some countries are worse than others. Are we really supposed to believe that the ongoing surge in autism is related to pregnant mothers taking Tylenol? To Kennedy’s credit, he also points to unnamed environmental factors. Let’s hope that he looks at the undeniable exposure to neurotoxins in our food and water supplies. 
• Chronic disease: Americans have the highest burden of chronic disease and the highest obesity rate among high-income countries. Americans also report higher rates of conditions such as diabetes and heart disease compared to their counterparts.
• COVID-19 deaths: The U.S. experienced a higher rate of excess deaths related to the COVID-19 pandemic than other wealthy nations.

Unfortunately, Kennedy and every other politician has an agenda that they are trying to promote, while posturing, exaggerating and outright lying about the problems and the solutions. Right now, we need MAHA to stand for honesty, integrity and consistency in government. The truth matters. Science matters. Democracy matters. Conflicts of interest matter.

Several factors within the U.S. healthcare system and society contribute to poor health:

• No universal coverage: The U.S. is the only high-income nation without universal health coverage, leaving a significant portion of the population uninsured or underinsured. This creates financial barriers that prevent people from seeking timely and adequate care.
• Health equity issues: The U.S. has deep-seated inequities in healthcare, with significant disparities in access and treatment based on income, race, and ethnicity. Racial discrimination and an inadequate social safety net lead to poorer health outcomes for Black, Indigenous, and Latino populations, as well as low-income and rural communities. The U.S. ranks lowest in health equity.
• High costs: The U.S. spends far more per capita on healthcare than any other high-income country, but these high costs do not translate into better health. High out-of-pocket costs, expensive procedures, and administrative burdens deter many Americans from getting care. Americans have the worst access to care, particularly due to costs, according to the report.
• Inadequate primary care: The U.S. has an insufficient supply of primary care providers and a less-developed primary care system compared to other countries. This leads to less frequent check-ups and less effective chronic disease management.
• Societal factors: Beyond the healthcare system, social factors like gun violence, the opioid crisis, and unhealthy diets characterized by processed foods contribute significantly to the U.S. health disadvantage.

Meanwhile, The Make America Healthy Again Commission yesterday released the Make Our Children Healthy Again Strategy, a plan that lacked details, goals or timelines. The report listed more than 120 initiatives to reverse policies that it blames for America’s childhood chronic disease epidemic. 

The assessment identified four potential drivers behind the rise in childhood chronic disease that present the best opportunities for progress: 

Poor Diet: The American diet has shifted dramatically toward highly processed foods, leading to nutrient depletion, increased caloric intake, and exposure to potentially harmful or unhealthy additives. Over 60 percent of children’s calories now come from highly processed foods, contributing to obesity, diabetes, and other chronic conditions. 

Chemical Exposure: Children are exposed to an increasing number of synthetic chemicals, including PFAS, which have been linked to developmental issues, chronic disease and terminal disease. The current regulatory framework should be continually evaluated to ensure that chemicals and other exposures do not interact to pose a threat to the health of our children.

Lack of Physical Activity and Chronic Stress: American children are experiencing unprecedented levels of inactivity, screen use, sleep deprivation, and chronic stress. These factors significantly contribute to the rise in chronic diseases and mental health challenges. 

Overmedicalization: There is a concerning trend of overprescribing medications to children, often driven by conflicts of interest in medical research, regulation, and practice. This has led to unnecessary treatments and long-term health risks.

Unfortunately, I didn’t see any specific references to the following threats to American citizens, including our children:

• Neurodegenerative Disease. Neurodegenerative disease is the fastest-growing cause of death in the world. Despite no national screening program, and the suppression of thousands of diagnoses, we know that prion disease is escalating around the world. Misinformation and disinformation are fueling the flames. The medical term for prion disease is transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE). TSEs are always fatal. There is no cure. As the name implies, TSEs are transmissible. We know TSEs by the clinical terms of Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, mad cow disease and chronic wasting disease. Why is government and industry suppressing the truth and failing to protect pathways?
• Mental Health: According to a new report, the United States has an all-time high depression rate. With adequate screening and access to care, I’m sure that we would find that the rate is even higher. How about anxiety and paranoia. Deep cuts to Medicaid will only exacerbate the problem.
• Soldier Suicides: Veterans are at 58 percent higher risk of suicide than those who haven’t served. We lost 6,407 veterans to suicide in 2022. More than 6,000 soldiers have taken their lives every year since the year 2000.
• PFAS: Thanks to lies, collusion and corruption, 99 percent of the people in the world have harmful forever chemicals (PFAS, PFOAS and many more) in their bodies. The chemicals are still in production and widespread use today.

Although the Senate Committee meeting gave the illusion of bipartisan support for Making America Healthy Again, a heated conversation about vaccines just scratches the surface. Unfortunately, we need a more comprehensive vision and agenda to really promote the health of all citizens and not just industries and corporations.

It should have been a session about sanity and insanity. Yes, there is a mental health crisis in America and it seems to be trickling down from the top.

Senator Bernie Sanders summed it up quite well. 

“Republicans and Democrats alike – everyone in this room – have received money from pharmaceutical PACs. Does that mean that we all are corrupt?”

The Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) annual budget is a multi-trillion dollar federal outlay, with the FY2025 President’s Budget Request proposing outlays of approximately $1.802 trillion, an increase of $132 billion from the FY2024 estimate.

HHS is the largest category of all federal spending. It consumes at least 20 percent of all federal spending. 

I need to spend more time reviewing the details of the plan to Make Our Children Healthy Again, but I see potential for good. I also see a platform that can be interpreted and twisted, as usual, to serve special interests instead of American citizens. Let’s hope for the best and brace ourselves for the worst as the fine print becomes available in this plan and the one ahead for the entire American population, not just children. Let’s hope that Kennedy can steer the HHS ship in the right direction fast. As usual, the devil is in the details. Failure isn’t an option.

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs and government affairs firm. We specialize in public health and environmental issues. We serve the world.

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If we hope to have a planet that will sustain our children, grandchildren and beyond, corporations have to be part of the solution. Political and regulatory solutions are a myth.

Many of the largest companies in the world are gaining a competitive edge by optimizing operational efficiency, including their supply chains. In many cases, board members are leading the charge by demanding more productivity and less waste to build their bottom lines. Fortunately, efficiency and sustainability can be part of the same business strategy.

According to the 2025 State of Sustainability Survey, conducted by Forbes Research, there are several areas where revenue is linked to a company’s commitment to sustainability. In fact, sustainability ranks as a top-three priority in 89 percent of the companies that generate more than $15 billion annually. As revenue decreases, so does the percentage of executives who place sustainability in their top three.

This level of commitment extends to procurement as larger companies are also more likely to work with their partners on making supply chains more sustainable. Approximately three-quarters of those in the $15 billion-plus bracket want a sustainable supply chain versus a third of companies in the $500 million to $1 billion range.

It appears that corporate boards at large companies have a more prominent role in setting the sustainability agenda than boards at smaller organizations. Seventy percent of executives at $15 billion-plus companies say the board is ultimately responsible for sustainability decisions.

A survey by EY found that 82 percent of CEOs embrace sustainability as a strategic opportunity. For example, ESG strategies can help a company build customer loyalty, attract and retain loyal employees, attract capital and more.

Meanwhile, the market itself continues to prefer companies that embrace sustainability as part of their mission and vision.

Despite all of the headwinds in Washington, DC, consumers across demographics still care about sustainability and climate change, but Gen Z and Millennials are particularly vocal, willing to change their purchasing habits and pay more for sustainable products and practices, according to a new survey by global professional services firm Deloitte.

For the report, the 2025 Gen Z and Millennial Survey, Deloitte surveyed more than 23,400 Gen Z (those born between 1995 – 2005) and millennial (born 1983 – 1994) respondents across North America, Latin America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia-Pacific. Deloitte noted that Gen Zs and Millennials are anticipated to make up 74 percent of the global workforce by 2030.

Both Millennials and Gen Z are feeling the impacts of global warming and climate change now. Approximately 70 percent of global respondents in these age groups have experienced an extreme weather event in the past 30 days.

Gen Z is the largest and most influential consumer segment. It is emerging as the sustainable generation.

Gen Z (20-30ish) is the first consumer group to grow up in an all-digital world—digital natives. Just like the cutting-edge technology that is their second nature, members of Gen-Z are breaking rules and charting new lifestyles, a challenge for consumer-facing companies to target.

Gen-Z represents only 5 percent of U.S. consumer spending today, in five or so years, it will be closer to 20 percent, as they start to enter their peak earning years and become about a third of the workforce.

A recent report reveals that 62 percent of Gen Z shoppers prefer to buy from sustainable brands, and 73 percent are willing to pay more for sustainable products.

Gen Z and Millennials are the most likely to make purchase decisions based on personal, social, and environmental values. Brands must prioritize sustainability to remain competitive.

Millennials, alongside Gen Z, prioritize environmental sustainability and are a driving force for change through their actions, purchases, and career choices. They expect employers and businesses to be accountable and they expect governments to facilitate sustainable practices.

Nearly half of respondents in each group (48 percent of Gen Z and 47 percent of Millennials) reported that they and their colleagues have put pressure on their employers to take action on protecting the environment.

While younger demographics are more vocal, older generations (like me) also demonstrate concern for sustainability.

Generation X includes those born primarily between the mid-1960s and the early 1980s. It is the generation between the Baby Boomers and the Millennials.

Gen X feels a strong sense of responsibility towards future generations and is compelled to make sustainable choices for a better world. Generation X also cares about sustainability and climate change, showing significant concern and a willingness to make sustainable choices, though their level of engagement may differ from younger generations. Gen Xers often make lifestyle changes to reduce their environmental footprint. Like younger generations, they also are willing to pay more for sustainable products, while increasingly considering sustainability factors in their investment decisions.

Despite the challenges, many Gen Xers remain optimistic about the possibility of addressing climate change and environmental damage.

Baby Boomers (born between 1946- 1964) also care about climate change and sustainability, with surveys showing that they are environmentally conscious and willing to make changes to protect the environment. Baby Boomers (28 percent of the general population) are often over-represented in the environmentally-minded consumer group. A 2024 survey found that nearly 2 in 5 environmentally-minded consumers are Baby Boomers. Research indicates that more than 90 percent of Baby Boomers are willing to make future lifestyle changes to help protect the environment. 

Boomers also are becoming a new force in the climate action movement. They are concerned about the long-term health of the environment, extreme weather impacts, and are increasingly motivated to take action. They are increasingly concerned about toxins in food and water.

Boomers are environmentally-minded consumers who pay more attention to the news, particularly through left-leaning networks, and are more likely to lean left politically. They’re more duty-bound to the needs of their communities and society as a whole. Brands that claim to be environmentally responsible in their marketing must back it up.

Overall, consumers are assessing producers’ sustainability practices, including production methods and recycling, eco-friendly packaging, and making a positive impact on nature and water conservation. Some consumers are willing to pay 10 percent or more for goods that meet their environmental concerns.

“Who wants to buy products and services that harm people and the planet,” said Gary Chandler, CEO of Crossbow Communications. “Who wants to insure companies that are creating unknown liabilities regarding public health and natural resources? There are still penalties for dirty businesses, despite the unstable regulatory environment.”

Sustainability is core to business strategy and operations. Companies are redesigning processes, procurement, and marketing. Sustainability teams are collaborating with finance and risk teams to assess impacts and opportunities. 

It’s good to see that common sense continues to link sustainability and profitability on Main Street and Wall Street. Hopefully, the White House will get out of the way and let free-market capitalism drive innovation, efficiency, sustainability and profitability around the world.

Unfortunately, Donald Trump spent much of his address to the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday disparaging renewable energy sources and challenging the scientific consensus on climate change. He called climate change “the greatest con job perpetrated by the world.” Sad.

Among the president’s remarks were unsubstantiated claims about climate change, renewable energy sources and the environment.

Trump claimed that clean energy sources, such as solar and wind, don’t work and are more expensive than fossil fuel options. He also said the U.N. was incorrect in its predictions about the consequences of climate change. And the president repeatedly warned that the economics of renewable energy are harming the economy and resulting in higher energy costs.

In 2024, 80 percent of the growth in global electricity generation was from renewable and nuclear sources, contributing 40 percent of the world’s total electricity generation for the first time, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). Solar and wind accounted for 16% of the United States’ electricity, surpassing coal.

More than 90 percent of new renewable projects are now cheaper than fossil fuel alternatives, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). In 2024, solar photovoltaics (PV) were, on average, 41 percent cheaper than the lowest-cost fossil fuel alternatives, while onshore wind projects were 53 percent cheaper. Answers begin with the truth.

Donald Trump has the lowest 100-day job approval rating of any president in the past 80 years, with public pushback on many of his policies and extensive economic discontent, including broad fears of a recession, according to a new ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll.

Yet Trump still beats the Democrats in Congress in terms of trust to handle the nation’s main problems. That is a sad statement about the state of democrats and democracy.

Thirty-nine percent of respondents in this ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll said they approve of how Trump is handling his job as president, down 6 percentage points from February, while 55 percent said they disapprove.

The previous low in approval for a president at or near 100 days in office, in polls dating to 1945, was Trump’s 42 percent in 2017.

Crossbow Communications is an award-winning public affairs and government affairs firm. We specialize in public health and environmental issues. We serve the world.

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