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Dean Jackson

@dwj88.bsky.social

1.3K followers 2.3K following 240 posts

Unreal birb. Principal, Public Circle Research & Consulting Contributing Editor, Tech Policy Press Learn more: https://www.publiccircle.net/home

www.publiccircle.net

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

Sam Woolley and I have a piece out in
@jodemocracy.bsky.social on the true dangers AI poses to democracy in the years ahead.

While acknowledging immediate harms like discrimination, we eschew catastrophism and explore the cumulative impact of already visible trends.

muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

"AI's Real Dangers for Democracy," by Dean Jackson and Samuel Woolley

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 12h

If only there were some way of knowing

Renee DiResta @noupside.bsky.social · 14h

“Who was president in 2020?” is the question of our time

Senator Jim Banks V
@SenatorBanks
Follow g..
The 2020 Census was a fraud. The Biden admin used a shady "privacy" formula that scrambled the data and miscounted 14 states.
It included illegal immigrants and handed
Democrats extra seats. Americans deserve a fair count and l'm fighting to fix it.
Zinited Statcs SScnate
MASHNORON DEYNN
October 6, 2025
an. Thow arewutn
Socretary
U.S. Department of Commerce Washington, DXC 20230
Dear Secretary Lutaick:
I urge you to investigate and correct erroes from the 2020 Census that handed disproportionntd political power to Democrats and illogal alicns. The Census Burcau adoptod a now and opaque
voting districts. As preparod by the Biden administration, the 2020 Censas roports miscountod the population of fourteen states, ' wrongly allocating six congressional scats aod Electoral
xx conwuu tmora uy, toc taroro tu mot đoo tnn Cunu lc pung t imber of votine districts. And the reoorts de aniovety inchaded ilecnl nhens widhout track those aliens' citiz enship status, If left uncorrected, these erroes will coetinue diluting the political power of American citizens.
Consus data plays a crucial role in allocating political roprescntation and goverment funding
Under the Constitution, cach state gets Congressional represcotutives and Electoeal College votes- based on "the whole number of persons" within the state." The number of persoes is in
tum clabaabod by a consttubocalty-mandalcd dcccacaal ccavas. Pcual agcco nely on census data to allocate billions of dollars in federal funding, much of which hinges ee opulation. And states use consus data to deaw congrossicnal and voting districts, »hich the
The it eiy of tie soaren alie n tor dur at ce hor inc ae oam toy ee n
nght wilbout statsica ly signilicant ciroo.
Diffcrcntial privacy is opaque and liable to mistakcn count totals. Sure cnough, the 2020 Ccnsus ovarocunted the noculation in cicht states and undercounted it in six." Tihe most extrcmi andercount was Arkansas, at 5.04%, and the larg…

Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

All of this and more, via @techpolicypress.bsky.social

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

Just look at the pieces in the "related" column. Not to blow our own horn, but is anyone telling this story better than @techpolicypress.bsky.social ?

www.techpolicy.press/trumps-state...

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

Very little of this is about free expression. If it were, the administration would say much more about repression in places like Russia, which State Dept. staff were told is "not a priority" for the admin.

This is about overturning the postwar European order in favor of the post-liberal right.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

(The two individuals most likely to be responsible for releasing these files--Mike Benz and Darren Beattie--both have a history of association with white nationalists. Benz himself has made a career of sloppy reporting full of inaccuracies about technology researchers counter-disinfo programs.)

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

In another shift, the USG hub for countering authoritarian media influence was closed. State alleges it is a "Biden-era censorship apparatus" despite its origins in 2016.

Sec. Rubio has signaled support for releasing GEC's files, which could have lethal implications for former US partners.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

The VP's office also asked staff to find examples of European regulators demanding tech platforms remove content.

They struggled to so and asked companies to bring examples directly. Only X responded to this request.

They provided a handful of examples of reprehensible, often illegal content.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

Samson and Vance appear to take notes from a far-right group called the Alliance Defending Freedom. State Department Staff were asked to verify ADF's allegations of censorship in Europe, but the facts of these cases were often more complicated than ADF alleged.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

One of the people driving this agenda is a young man named Sam Samson, who believes conservatism should redefine freedom to better align with his view of "the good"--even if that means suppressing the speech of others. See his own words here:

www.theamericanconservative.com/the-rights-w...

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 18h

A secret meeting with X. A senior State Dept. advisor just out of college. The VP's speech in Munich. Pressure on European regulators.

What do they share? They're all part of an agenda to turn the transatlantic alliance into a far right international:

www.techpolicy.press/trumps-state...

Trump’s State Department Wants to Use Tech Policy to Remake Europe In Its Image | TechPolicy.Press

Tech policy is a key part of the Trump administration's dramatic project to replace the US's traditional European alliances, Dean Jackson writes.

www.techpolicy.press

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Reposted by Dean Jackson

Anil Kalhan @akalhan.bsky.social · 19h

The new white nationalist State Department: undertaking "a dramatic project to replace the United States’ traditional alliances with European nations, including through efforts to support ideological allies on the continent’s far-right"

Justin Hendrix @justinhendrix.bsky.social · 19h

The Trump administration appears to be engaged in a dramatic project to replace the United States’ traditional European alliances, with tech policy and culture wars over social media a key to the effort, Tech Policy Press contributing editor Dean Jackson writes:

Trump’s State Department Wants to Use Tech Policy to Remake Europe In Its Image | TechPolicy.Press

Tech policy is a key part of the Trump administration's dramatic project to replace the US's traditional European alliances, Dean Jackson writes.

www.techpolicy.press

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 20h

Also, the piece is just... bad? It's a bad defense of content moderation. "I don't like Tucker Carlson's speech so he should be deplatformed" is not a nuanced take.

The piece is also too long! Bring back gatekeepers AND editors

Berin Szóka @berinszoka.bsky.social · 1d

Hanania continues to rebrand as a serious person. He's also the guy whose 2019 study claimed that Twitter was 21x more likely to "censor" "conservatives," 14 of which were literal Nazis, as he himself had been. That study was cited endlessly to prove that social media were systematically biased...

Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 4d

Dare to resist fascism in education

Rebekah Tromble @rebekahtromble.bsky.social · 4d

Hand holding a frying pan with a fried egg in it, with the words “This is your university if you sign” at the top. Image is from the 1980s “This is your brain on drugs” campaign.

Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 5d

Jim Jordan is full of it, ex. 1,654:

@noupside.bsky.social and @mmasnick.bsky.social unpack the times that Google, under oath, contradicted how Jordan describes its letter to the Judiciary Committee.

A letter that btw was pure capitulation to gov pressure.

www.techdirt.com/2025/09/30/t...

Techdirt Podcast Episode 432: The Fictional Censorship Cinematic Universe

Support us on Patreon » Last year, Renée DiResta joined us on an episode of the podcast to talk about her book, Invisible Rulers: The People Who Turn Lies Into Reality, all about the peo…

www.techdirt.com

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

One last thing: During my first "real" job in DC, I sat across the hall from @jodemocracy.bsky.social's editorial staff, who are thoughtful people I am grateful to know and have worked with. I'm proud to have found myself in their esteemed pages.

Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

The second is @knightcolumbia.org's essay on "AI as Normal Technology," which explores the diffusion of past technologies to predict AI's impact and, crucially, to emphasize our agency over that process.

knightcolumbia.org/content/ai-a...

AI as Normal Technology

knightcolumbia.org

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

The first is @himself.bsky.social's March essay on DOGE, which goes into greater detail on our flawed political discourse about AI and how it has already affected governance.

www.programmablemutter.com/p/should-agi...

Should AGI-preppers embrace DOGE?

There's magical thinking about the magical thinking

www.programmablemutter.com

Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

None of this is inevitable. To correct course we must reject AI speculation and acknowledge that humans determine how tech is designed and implemented.

On this point, two pieces for further reading, to which we owe a debt.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

Rather, we lack political will because the conversation about AI in Washington is dominated by industry players and talking points.

Democracy advocates start from a place of deep disadvantage against AI moguls who hold the commanding heights of the economy and a formidable grip on elite opinion.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

We end on a frustrated note. Avoiding "synthetic democracy" is not difficult because we do not know how. Policy proposals exist for promoting deliberation and representativeness in government, reversing inequality, bolstering worker power, and supporting free media.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

Third, AI threatens the health of the information ecosystem in ways that may harm democratic governance. Publishers are already seeing declining revenue from search, weakening independent media.

But those LLM-powered search results are also vulnerable to political manipulation.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

Today's tech moguls see a future in which AI increases returns to capital and replaces workers with machines. They hope to make the public and its inconvenient demands for government services and social justice irrelevant.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

Second: Democracy in a capitalist system is possible
because elites value an educated workforce enough to tolerate political demands for redistribution; workers’ bargaining power further buttresses the system. What happens when elites believe that AI can replace those workers?

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

Deliberation is central to both public debate and legislative processes. Through it, people challenge biases, question assumptions, solicit information, and forge compromise,
reaching more defensible conclusions and durable decisions.

AI cannot offer a shortcut through that process.

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Dean Jackson @dwj88.bsky.social · 6d

First: Attempts to replace government functions with AI through artificial polling or AI-generated legislation or judicial decisions (a la former Google CEO Eric Schmidt's predictions) neglect decades of work from neuroscience and poli sci that find deliberation is central to group decision making.

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