Elizabeth N. Saunders
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profsaunders.bsky.social
Elizabeth N. Saunders
@profsaunders.bsky.social
19K followers 3.2K following 2.3K posts
Professor of Political Science & Director of the Saltzman Institute of War & Peace Studies, Columbia. New Book: The Insiders' Game: How Elites Make War and Peace https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691215808/the-insiders-game
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profsaunders.bsky.social
The quotes in this story...this is not a video game.
“Maduro is about to find himself trapped and might soon discover that he cannot flee the country even if he decided to,” the source said. “What’s worse for him, there is now more than one general willing to capture and hand him over, fully aware that one thing is to talk about death, and another to see it coming.” Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article312722642.html#storylink=cpy
October 31, 2025 at 12:56 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Sign with Trump hair saying “It’s you, hi, I’m the problem it’s you”
October 18, 2025 at 5:35 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Sign saying “ICE belongs in Antarctica” with a penguin
October 18, 2025 at 5:27 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
The masterstroke was to force Netanyahu to apologize to the Qataris. Not just the call, but releasing news of the apology, with a photo. Kudos to whoever thought of that. It was a costly signal from Bibi and showed Trump was seriously pressuring Israel. 5/
www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/u...
Photo released by the White House showing Netanyahu on the call, apologizing to the Qataris, while Trump balances the phone on his lap.
October 15, 2025 at 3:35 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
So much for the foreign policy justification of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the nation's top diplomat, whose interviews are extensive quoted in the opinion:
"It is also arbitrary or capricious because it reverses prior policy without reasoned explanation or consideration of reliance interests, and is based on statutes that have never been used in this way."
September 30, 2025 at 6:35 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
This does not mince words about how Rubio and Noem misused the powers of their office to chill free speech. Undiplomatic and now, ruled unconstitutional.
For all these reasons, this Court finds as fact and concludes as matter of law that Secretaries Noem and Rubio and their several agents and subordinates acted in concert to misuse the sweeping powers of their respective offices to target noncitizen pro-Palestinians for deportation primarily on account of their First Amendment protected political speech. They did so in order to strike fear into similarly situated non-citizen proPalestinian individuals, pro-actively (and effectively) curbing lawful pro-Palestinian speech and intentionally denying such individuals (including the plaintiffs here) the freedom of speech that is their right. Moreover, the effect of these targeted deportation proceedings continues unconstitutionally to chill freedom of speech to this day.
September 30, 2025 at 6:16 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
🧵So this Trump post gives it away. Whatever this mysterious "Article 5-like" security guarantee Wittkoff mentioned, it'll be worth the paper it's printed on (and left on a hotel printer. 1/
Trump post on Truth social: "President Zelenskyy of Ukraine can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight. Remember how it started. No getting back Obama given Crimea....and NO GOING INTO NATO BY UKRAINE. Some things never change!!"
August 18, 2025 at 1:07 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
News from the Federal Register: the State Department Historical Advisory Committee’s functions, including oversight of the Foreign Relations of the United States series, transferred to the Assistant Secretary of Administration.
Federal Register announcement of delegation of authority from Historical Advisory Committee to the Assistant Secretary for Administration
August 6, 2025 at 6:37 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Essential paragraph:
Excerpt: "The Trump administration talked about expanding manufacturing at home. But across the country, 400,000 factory jobs were currently vacant. “That’s what’s so crazy about this,” I was told by another community-college leader who asked not to be identified, out of fear of retaliation from federal and state officials. (“The stakes are too high for the students that we serve.”) Why short-circuit the schools that were the local engines of building the work force? Community colleges already subsisted on budgets that most four-year schools would find laughable, lean operations that delivered hefty returns on investment for their areas. Get care at a local doctor’s office, or prepped for surgery at a hospital, or treated after an accident, or have someone come to your home to do repairs — “those are all community-college grads, all of them,” the community-college leader told me. “This collateral damage is going to end up being regional economic damage.”"
August 4, 2025 at 1:32 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Public wants moderate policies (secure border & path to citizenship, no dumb wars but fight necessary wars). But moderate policies will miss some calls, and hawkish turn won't help with the very sticky reputation on this issue. Don't believe me? Look at D reputation on natsec despite many D wars. 7/
Graph of Gallup responses from 2002-2020 to question, "Looking ahead for the next few years, which political party do you think will do a better job of protecting the country from international terrorism and military threats, the Republican Party or the Democratic Party?" D's never crack 50% and top R's only once, at nadir of Iraq War.
July 8, 2025 at 4:22 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
What is time anyway
Trump says talks with Iran scheduled, Wittkoff says “will be in next week or so”
July 7, 2025 at 11:47 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
As @stevenmazie.bsky.social notes here, it means issues that are truly national will be handled in a crazy patchwork. Congress is the missing institution here.
“Which means a baby born in NY to undocumented parents will be a citizen. But a baby born to undocumented parents in Kentucky will not be a citizen. This is madness.”
June 27, 2025 at 2:34 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
(For the record, here's the State Department website as of 9:19pm EDT on 6/21, which contains a statement issued when Israel first bombed 8 days ago):
State Dept homepage as of 9:19pm 6/21: "Israel's Unilateral Action Against Iran"
June 22, 2025 at 1:20 AM
profsaunders.bsky.social
5. Where is Hegseth? The Department of Defense? This is the homepage as of 9:15 EDT:
DoD homepage as of 9:15pm EDT 6/21: "Nascar Driver Ross Chastain Shares 'Get Up and Do the Job' Motivation During Pentagon visit; photo of him shaking hands with Hegseth
June 22, 2025 at 1:17 AM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Unhappy to confirm that the entire Historical Advisory Committee at the State Department received termination notices this afternoon (myself included). The HAC, set up by Congress, oversees the office that produces the FRUS series. history.state.gov/about/hac/in... 1/
Tim Naftali's tweet on the termination of the HAC members without cause.
April 30, 2025 at 9:29 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
And here is a screenshot with the mouse on the "read the op-ed" button, and you can see it brings up the link to the Substack.
Hovering over the "read the op-ed" button brings up a link to the substack.
April 22, 2025 at 4:28 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
FOLKS: Don't miss that the State homepage briefly linked to this Substack as an "op-ed," but now it is gone from the State website. Here is a screenshot from shortly after 11am. SO is this an official statement from the Secretary of State? This is one reason not to do govt-by-Substack. 1/
Screenshot of State homepage from shortly after 11am
April 22, 2025 at 3:42 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Also maybe nothing but I took this screenshot of the State homepage a little after 11am and now it's disappeared though the substack is still there:
April 22, 2025 at 3:27 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
OK, already seems gone from State website. Here is a screenshot of the State homepage from ~15 min ago. @marisakabas.bsky.social worth investigating? The homepage link went to the State substack and what appears to be a Rubio op-ed.
Screenshot from shortly after 11am of State Department homepage
April 22, 2025 at 3:22 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Best footnote ever
In which the inspiration for the last line of our letter endorses it
March 17, 2025 at 9:50 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
I can’t even. “Ukraine-splain”? Rubio is the top diplomatic representative of the United States.
Rubio says Zelenskyy Ukraine-splained
March 2, 2025 at 4:32 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
What’s really going on with Trump and Ukraine? What’s always been going on with Trump and Ukraine. The key conclusion of my @goodauth.bsky.social post: goodauthority.org/news/why-hig...
The talks in Riyadh show U.S. diplomacy is part of the omnicrisis This is a long post, but it is worth explaining why none of this is likely to lead to a fair, lasting peace for Ukraine. And that brings us to the Occam’s razor explanation: Trump is not interested in a fair, lasting peace for Ukraine. The wreckage of the Trump team’s appearances in Europe and Rubio’s trip to Riyadh, show that whatever Trump is after, it’s not keeping Ukraine sovereign and in the European orbit, or making Russia pay any price for its illegal invasions. As I wrote here at Good Authority before the election, Trump’s foreign policy, for all his claims of unpredictability, is quite predictable in its fundamentals. Trump disdains trade pacts and alliances, and he admires dictators. The speed and force of the Musk-DOGE assault on the U.S. government may have been a genuine surprise even to Rubio. But it is only likely to accelerate the outcome Trump already wanted: a peace deal favorable to Russia and disastrous for Ukraine and its European supporters, along with – or maybe as a way to bring about – the demise of the State Department as an instrument of U.S. power.
February 20, 2025 at 12:59 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Even after all this time, we should never, ever forget how shocking headlines like this are.
Headline reports he blames Ukraine for the war and calls Zelenskyy a dictator. Top of Trumps head visible. You can tell from the hair.
February 20, 2025 at 1:48 AM
profsaunders.bsky.social
February 6, 2025 at 6:07 PM
profsaunders.bsky.social
Elite leadership of elite opinion (the isolationist view will now consolidate in the GOP, but was elevated by Trump to the party’s position and it wasn’t inevitable it would still dominate had he lost).
November 14, 2024 at 10:07 PM