Poland Raises Defenses Against Cyberattacks Before the Vote
(Bloomberg) -- Poland is working to bolster online security and talking to social media platforms in anticipation of increased cyberattacks ahead of the presidential election, according to Deputy Prime Minister Krzysztof Gawkowski.
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A so-called 'election umbrella' is designed to protect the voting process from any external interference, said Gawkowski, who is also minister of digital affairs. The government wants social media platforms to help if attacks intensify closer to the May 18 ballot, he added.
Warsaw is on high alert after allegations of foreign interference in Romania's presidential election last year prompted an unprecedented top court ruling to cancel the vote and order a re-run. Gawkowski said he was confident the security services would be able to prevent similar attempts at meddling from happening in Poland.
The stakes are high as Prime Minister Donald Tusk hopes his ally, Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, will become the next president and help the government press on with its agenda after almost a decade of nationalist rule.
Gawkowski said his ministry is in regular contact with the campaign teams of individual presidential candidates. It also met twice with representatives of companies including Meta Platforms Inc., Alphabet Inc. and Microsoft Corp., which have the authority to clamp down on disinformation efforts such as troll farms.
'Disinformation happens every day,' Gawkowski said in a Bloomberg interview. The so-called troll farms, which can spread disinformation through multiple fake accounts or profiles, could be activated shortly before election day, the minister said. 'This is what we need to pay attention to,' he said.
The authorities warned in January that they were observing organized actions and provocations aimed at destabilizing the election, including attempts to recruit individuals to spread disinformation.
But Poland hasn't seen any instances of foreign support being granted to candidates akin to what Elon Musk did during last month's parliamentary election in Germany, where the billionaire openly backed the far-right AfD party.
'Everyone can say what they want about the Polish election, but it's important that they don't interfere,' Gawkowski said. 'That means not setting up algorithms and not allowing for illegal financing. Today we're not seeing anything like this.'
--With assistance from Fraidoon Poya.
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37 minutes ago
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Chuck Colson, one of Nixon's most hardcore aides, tried to pressure both CBS and The Washington Post over their coverage of the administration by threatening FCC action to revoke the licenses of local television stations they owned. Colson and Nixon openly strategized about holding open the threat of a federal antitrust investigation to pressure the three television networks. According to research by Mark Feldstein, a professor of broadcast journalism at the University of Maryland, the plumbers even fleetingly discussed ways to assassinate investigative journalist Jack Anderson before they were diverted to a more urgent project — the Watergate break-in. In his obsessive hunt for leaks, Nixon illegally wiretapped the phones of both journalists and his own National Security Council aides. All these resentments converged in the development of what became known as the enemies list. The White House actually compiled multiple overlapping lists, all fueled by Nixon's fury at his opponents, real and imagined. 'It clearly originated with Nixon's disposition, anger, reaction to things he would see in his news summary in the morning,' said Dean. In an August 16, 1971, memo — titled 'Dealing with our Political Enemies' — Dean succinctly explained that the list's intent was to find all the ways 'we can use the available federal machinery to screw our political enemies.' Dean told me he wrote the memo in such stark terms because he thought it would discourage the White House. 'I actually wrote that memo that way thinking I would make this so offensive … that they would just say, 'This is silly, we don't do this kind of stuff,'' he said. 'I never got a response to that directly, but when I went to the (National) Archives decades later, (I saw) Haldeman had written 'great' on the memo with an exclamation point.' In fact, though, enthusiasm in the White House did not translate into action at the agencies. On the advice of Treasury Secretary George Shultz, the IRS commissioner put the list in his safe and ignored the White House request that he audit the people on it. Subsequent investigations found no evidence that those on the enemies list faced excessive scrutiny from the IRS or other government harassment. Once Dean revealed the list's existence during the 1973 hearings of the Senate Watergate Committee, inclusion on it became 'something for people to celebrate,' he recalled. 'I have actually spoken to (reunions of) a couple groups of members, people who have been on the list, because they had no consequences other than a badge of honor.' That was a common outcome for Nixon's rages. The Justice Department eventually dropped the case against Wallace. The courts blocked Lennon's removal. The Washington Post did not lose licenses for any of stations, said Feldstein, author of 'Poisoning the Press,' a book about Nixon's relationship with the media. 'Trump is doing what Nixon would have liked to have done,' Feldstein said. 'Even Nixon didn't take it as far.' The differences between Nixon and Trump in their approach to federal enforcement and investigative power extends to their core motivations. Nixon, as Dean and other close observers of his presidency agree, wanted to retaliate against individuals or institutions he thought opposed or looked down on him. Trump certainly shares that inclination. But Trump's agenda, many scholars of democratic erosion believe, pushes beyond personal animus to mimic the efforts in authoritarian-leaning countries such as Turkey and Hungary to weaken any independent institutions that might contest his centralization of power. 'Although some of it was (motivated by) revenge, the huge difference here is most of what Nixon did was to protect himself, politically and personally,' said Fred Wertheimer, who served as legislative director of the government reform group Common Cause during the Watergate scandal. 'Trump is out to break our democracy and take total control of the country in a way that no one ever has before.' One telling measure of that difference: Trump is openly making threats, or taking actions, that Nixon only discussed in private, and even there with constant concern about public disclosure. Trump's willingness to publicly deliver these threats changes their nature in several important ways, said David Dorsen, an assistant chief counsel for the Senate Watergate Committee and former federal prosecutor. Simply exposing an individual or institution to such an open threat from the world's most powerful person, Dorsen noted, can enormously disrupt their life, even if the courts ultimately prevent Trump from acting on it — a point recently underscored by Miles Taylor in an essay for Politico. And because Nixon's threats were always delivered in private, Dorsen added, aides dubious of them could ignore them more easily than Trump officials faced with his public demands for action. Maybe most important, Dorsen said, is that by making his threats so publicly, Trump is sending a shot across the bow of every other institution that might cross him. 'Trump is legitimizing conduct that Nixon did not purport to legitimize,' Dorsen said. 'He concealed it, he was probably embarrassed by it; he realized it was wrong.' As the IRS pushback against the enemies list demonstrated, Nixon's plans faced constant resistance within his own government, not only from career bureaucrats but often also from his own appointees. 'He failed in getting key officials in the government to do what he wanted,' said Wertheimer, who now directs the reform group Democracy 21. If that kind of internal stonewalling is slowing Trump's sweeping offensives against his targets, there's little evidence of it yet. Congress was another constraint on Nixon. Not only did the administration need to fear oversight hearings from the Democrats who controlled both the House and Senate, but at that point a substantial portion of congressional Republicans were unwilling to blink at abusive actions. Ultimately it was a delegation of Republican senators, led by conservative icon and former GOP presidential candidate Barry Goldwater, who convinced Nixon to resign during Watergate. By contrast, Trump today is operating with 'a completely compliant Republican Congress' and has filled the federal government, including its key law enforcement positions, with loyalist appointees who 'operate as if they are there to carry out his wishes, period,' said Wertheimer. As Feldstein pointed out, Trump also can worry less about critical press coverage than Nixon, who governed at a time when 'there were just three networks and everybody watched those.' That leaves the courts as the principal short-term obstacle to Trump's plans. In Nixon's time, the federal courts consistently acted across party lines to uphold limits on the arbitrary exercise of federal power. Three of Nixon's own appointees joined the unanimous 1974 Supreme Court decision that sealed his fate by requiring him to provide Congress his White House tapes. John Sirica, the steely federal district judge who helped crack the scandal, was appointed by Republican President Dwight Eisenhower. Today, federal district and appellate courts are mostly demonstrating similar independence. The New York Times' running tally counts nearly 190 rulings from judges in both parties blocking Trump actions since he returned to office. 'I think we've seen the largest overreach in modern presidential history … and as a result, you've triggered a massive judicial pushback,' said Norm Eisen, co-founder and executive chair of the Democracy Defenders Fund, a group fighting many of Trump's initiatives in courts. 'I won't say democracy has won so far, because of the damage that Trump and his ilk have done, but I will say Trump lost.' But even if courts block individual Trump tactics, the effort required to rebuff his actions still can impose a heavy cost on his targets. And, on the most important cases, these lower court legal rulings are still subject to reconsideration by the Supreme Court — whose six- member Republican-appointed majority has historically supported an expansive view of presidential power and last year voted to immunize Trump against criminal prosecution for virtually any actions he takes in office. So far, the Supreme Court has sent mixed signals by ruling to restrain Trump on some fronts while empowering him on others. 'We haven't found out yet what the Supreme Court is going to do when … they get the really big cases,' said Wertheimer. Those decisions in the next few years will likely determine whether Trump can fulfill the darkest impulses of Richard Nixon, the only president ever forced to resign for his actions in office.
Boston Globe
38 minutes ago
- Boston Globe
Can the Ivy League band together to fight Trump's attacks on higher education?
Harvard University has suffered most of President Trump's blows, with the president stripping Advertisement At other schools, university presidents are giving interviews and campus speeches critical of the White House. Professors are unionizing to advocate for their research and students. And many alumni groups are spearheading public awareness campaigns to pressure their alma maters to fight back against Trump. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Because 'The fight is going to be won among the public,' said Jon Fansmith, vice president of the nonprofit American Council on Education. The Trump administration has arguied elite universities force-feed students leftist ideology and allowed antisemitism to run rampant since the Israel-Hamas war began in October 2023. The administration has announced investigations of colleges and universities allegedly discriminating against white people and cut off or threatened to cut federal funding to many schools. Advertisement At Columbia University, leaders in March said they would comply with the administration's demands after officials froze hundreds of millions of dollars in funding because the administration said the school failed to protect Jewish students from discrimination. But that didn't seem to appease the White House, which announced last week it was targeting the school's accreditation, which could ultimately result in Columbia losing federal financial aid for its students. In April, several Big Ten conference schools formally signed on to a 'The Trump administration has no intention of backing down, and the only thing that will work to oppose him is strong collective action where we have each other's backs,' said Lieberwitz, whose university had Students on the campus at Princeton University in Princeton, N.J., on March 7. HANNAH BEIER/NYT University presidents speak out Ivy League university presidents have responded differently to allegations of antisemitism on campus and the Trump administration's attempts to control how they run their schools. A Eisgruber, a constitutional law scholar, has been particularly outspoken, slamming Advertisement 'It's really important for conservative views to be welcome on a campus, but that's different from insisting on ideological balance on a campus,' Eisgruber told the host of The Daily this spring. After Harvard lost billions in science funding in April, Eisgruber posted 'Princeton stands with Harvard,' on his LinkedIn profile. At Brown University, the school's highest governing body recently extended president Christina Paxson's term through June 2028 in a show of confidence. Eisgruber's and Paxson's long tenures put them in better positions to speak out, higher education advocates told the Globe this spring. Other Ivies have recently been plagued by turnover among leaders, including high-profile oustings over responses to pro-Palestinian protests and allegations of antisemitism. The presidents of Yale, Cornell, and the University of Pennsylvania were installed this spring. 'The other university presidents are not standing up for Harvard because they don't want to be the next one on Trump's list,' said Todd Wolfson, president of the American Association of University Presidents, a union. University presidents are also strategizing with lawmakers in Washington D.C., professors told the Globe. The largest public outcry from university presidents came on April 22, when hundreds signed a public statement with the American Association of Colleges & Universities against 'unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education.' Dartmouth president Sian Beilock was the only Ivy president to not sign, despite being urged to by professors and alumni, said Derek Jennings, an active member of the Native American Alumni Association of Dartmouth. The school's director of media relations, Jana Barnello, said like other schools, Dartmouth has filed supporting declarations in lawsuits over the funding cuts. Advertisement Professors rally to organize against Trump While university presidents seem to be taking a more careful and calculated approach, many professors rapidly organized this spring, forming union chapters in an attempt to defend their research. 'The level of increased faculty activism at Dartmouth is demonstrating that those of us who value the ideals and values of higher education are not waiting for administrators to lead on this,' said Bethany Moreton, who helped launch Dartmouth's chapter of the American Association of University Presidents in May 2024. Membership has since ballooned to 150, she said. Across the Ivy League, researchers said they're best suited to publicly advocate for their work, describing their life-saving findings and discoveries at rallies and in letters to lawmakers, groups told the Globe. While some observers warn of a potential brain drain among professors to Canada or Europe in response to Trump's cuts to research funding, some said Trump's attacks are creating more unity among colleagues than they've seen in years. 'If the intention was to divide faculty and pit us against each other with all the threats, it's really not working,' said Princeton English professor Meredith Martin. 'We care so much about our students that, if anything, this is bringing us together and making us stronger.' During the recent school year, membership in AAUP surged to 50,000, from 42,000, with almost all of that after Trump's inauguration in January, according to the group, and is the largest spike since its founding a century ago. Alumni stand up for schools Alumni are also pushing administrators at their alma maters to do more to stand up for their schools' autonomy. Harvard's alumni campaign, Crimson Courage, met Friday in a packed auditorium on the Cambridge campus to discuss how it is 'reaching out beyond Harvard to build the campaign,' an event description said. Advertisement The group Stand Up for Princeton and Higher Education amassed more than 9,000 alumni supporters in the past five weeks. Some held signs and wore buttons while walking the P-rade route on May 24. The group's In Connecticut, the group Stand Up for Yale sent a Similar alumni groups are taking shape across the Ivy League, with several urging university presidents to sign on to group statements, alumni told the Globe. Schools must band together formally, experts say Many graduates said their support is for all of higher education, not just their alma maters. At the recent Princeton reunion after the P-rade, a Yale Divinity School student caught up with a University of Chicago Law School graduate over barbecue. Outside nearby Firestone Library, recent graduates of Yale's and Harvard's law schools enveloped in hugs. 'The education my peers and I received was life changing, and our schools know this and are not backing down on ensuring future students get the same opportunities,' said Joshua Faires, who has an undergraduate degree from Princeton and a master's degree in sociology from Columbia University. HoSang, from Yale's AAUP chapter, said Trump knows higher education institutions depend on each other and share one 'ecosystem,' and so a threat against one is a threat to all, he said. Advertisement 'There is no saving Yale, Harvard, or Princeton without standing up for all of higher education,' HoSang said. Still, faculty and alumni need more support from administrators, some warned —all the way from the presidents at the top, said Wolfson, the national AAUP president. 'I think they need to be bold,' Wolfson said. 'And this is hard to do but I'll say it anyway: They need to put their institution second, and then need to put higher education — as a critical sector in US society — first.' Claire Thornton can be reached at
