Experts in the News | Miller Center

Why Did America Cross the Pacific? Reconstructing the U.S. Decision to Take the Philippines, 1898-99

A closer examination of what led President William McKinley to take the Philippines reveals a series of deliberate and thoughtful choices that have often been overlooked or ignored.

Philip Zelikow

Top Trump Aides Knew of Abuse Allegations Against Porter

“The fact that Porter might have held a senior White House position without a security clearance is troubling and merits a full investigation,” said Chris Lu, former cabinet secretary under President Barack Obama and senior fellow at the University of Virginia Miller Center. “I’ve lost count as to how many Trump appointees have been sidelined because of their past views or conduct. But this is further evidence of a non-existent vetting process.”

Chris Lu

Did Donald Trump profit from his own presidential transition?

Chris Lu, the executive director of Obama’s 2008 transition, now a senior fellow at the University of Virginia Miller Center, said transitions are massive endeavors that can be misleading in regard to costs, in part because “you’ve got paid transition staff. You’ve got people who actually are being paid out of the transition payroll and then there’s hundreds of other people who you could pay, but who are simply volunteering out of their own time.”

Chris Lu

Cruelty Is the Policy

What sets Trump's immigration policy apart is not the number of arrests or deportations. While immigration-related arrests were up in Trump's first year, deportations were down thanks to a backlogged system. But Trump has distinguished himself from Barack Obama, who was occasionally derided as "Deporter-in-Chief," not through numbers but through cruelty. Whereas the Obama administration focused on deporting undocumented immigrants who had committed serious, often violent, criminal infractions, the Trump administration has undone the rules guiding prioritization, including those meant to bring humanity to immigration enforcement.

Nicole Hemmer

Will Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Reinvent Health Care?

Guian McKee, the Miller Center's health policy expert, discusses new corporate health care plans

Guian McKee

James F. Byrnes and Franklin Roosevelt

University of Virginia politics professor Sidney Milkis lectures on James F. Byrnes, who served in the U.S. House and Senate, as a Supreme Court Justice and in the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration. He explains how Byrnes, in the 1930s and '40s, was a key figure in the implementation of the New Deal and the management of the wartime economy. Mr. Milkis describes the relationship between FDR and Byrnes and how their work shaped the United States in a time of great uncertainty. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer introduces the speaker. The Supreme Court Historical Society hosted the event in the Supreme Court chamber.

Sidney Milkis