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Eric Rittinger

@ericrittinger

Associate Professor of Political Science at Salisbury University, teaching and writing on US foreign policy, IR theory, and civil-military relations in Latin America

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Latest posts by Eric Rittinger @ericrittinger

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Washington’s Corruption Has Created Another Humanitarian Crisis in Puerto Rico The island’s earthquakes are its latest man-made disaster.

If you didn’t catch the significance of the exploding transformers in Bad Bunny’s halftime show, I gotcha. Here’s one of a bunch of pieces I wrote from/on Puerto Rico about the crisis—and Trump’s role in it. slate.com/news-and-pol...

09.02.2026 01:59 👍 5295 🔁 2115 💬 43 📌 41
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ICE operation near Salisbury school sparks outrage, questions Witnesses say an apparent ICE raid near a Salisbury elementary school involved smashed car windows and terrified neighbors.

Wednesday morning, 7 ICE agents in Salisbury, MD, smashed in windows & violently dragged a mother out of her car while she was dropping her daughter off at elementary school.

These abusive tactics are absolutely unacceptable.

www.baltimoresun.com/2025/12/17/s...

18.12.2025 22:30 👍 438 🔁 203 💬 32 📌 10

I think people really struggle w partially consolidated authoritarianism, either understating our problem or understating our power

It's like we're in a liminal fascist space. And not recognizing how far gone we are or thinking we're simply too far gone are both grave errors we can't afford to make

28.08.2025 18:45 👍 1091 🔁 316 💬 21 📌 17

Just in case anyone forgot which sphere we get to influence

15.08.2025 17:46 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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The Imperial Boomerang Lands in Los Angeles As police and the National Guard escalate against anti-ICE protesters, the Department of Homeland Security bridges US violence abroad and US violence at home.

Were Aime Césaire alive to conduct a structural analysis of the advancing militarization of American law enforcement since 9/11, I suspect he would have understood DHS as a template for how Imperial Boomerangs operate in the 21st century.

Me for @zeteo.com on LA, and what led to it.

10.06.2025 01:13 👍 409 🔁 157 💬 8 📌 8
Room set up with seating in a square

Room set up with seating in a square

Great room for a Security Council simulation btw

07.05.2025 01:43 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
University signage for a room scheduled to hold a UN simulation and a bible study group

University signage for a room scheduled to hold a UN simulation and a bible study group

Campus life - something for everyone

07.05.2025 01:25 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
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Authoritarian Consolidation in Times of Crisis: Venezuela under Nicolás Maduro Bringing together experts from across the social sciences, this volume examines the consolidation of authoritarianism in Venezuela under the government of Nicolás Maduro. Taking a comparative perspect...

I'm delighted that Authoritarian Consolidation in Times of Crisis: Venezuela under Nicolás Maduro, the book I co-edited with Raúl Sánchez Urribarrí, has officially been published!

It is available at in paperback, hardcover and eBook almost everywhere. See: www.routledge.com/Authoritaria...

31.03.2025 18:47 👍 25 🔁 12 💬 1 📌 0
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Diary Week 1

I am keeping a diary of daily events, as they unfold open.substack.com/pub/adamprze... It is available to everyone. I am new to Substack, so please let me know if something is wrong with the link or the file.

19.02.2025 15:56 👍 444 🔁 164 💬 16 📌 58

Taking back the Canal” would indeed be a violation of treaty, actually two treaties! It would undermine US relations with one of our closest ally in the region & piss off every other country in Latin America! And would be a gift to Chinese pretensions in the region…other than that…a great idea! 🙄

20.01.2025 17:59 👍 1 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 1

Reminder that the US didn't lose "38,000 lives" building the Panama Canal, or even the estimated 5,600 who died on America's watch. Almost all who died were underpaid Afro-Caribbean workers living in U.S.-imposed conditions of segregation.

Also China doesn't control the canal.

20.01.2025 17:36 👍 303 🔁 41 💬 2 📌 1
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A photographer's devastating documentation of El Salvador's civil war in the 1980s In Legacy of Lies, El Salvador 1981-1984, photojournalist Robert Nickelsberg documents how U.S. foreign policy fueled a violent 13-year civil war in El Salvador.

In Legacy of Lies, El Salvador 1981-1984, photojournalist Robert Nickelsberg documents how U.S. foreign policy fueled a violent 13-year civil war in El Salvador.

24.11.2024 16:37 👍 859 🔁 198 💬 29 📌 19
Post image Post image

Short-term: Lots about November 5 was poli-sci-normal and not a particularly sound impetus for massive intra-Dem recriminations.
Long-term: The party's central crisis remains class dealignment and there's no quick or easy way out of it.
democracyjournal.org/arguments/th...

19.11.2024 20:11 👍 56 🔁 12 💬 3 📌 3
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The U.S. Should Welcome Immigrants With Open Arms—and Open Borders The US would reap economic and geopolitical benefits from adopting an “open border” immigration policy.

If Trump is keen on adopting 19th Century policies, then one that I encourage is a streamlined and open immigration policy.
www.worldpoliticsreview.com/immigration-...

19.11.2024 00:47 👍 26 🔁 9 💬 0 📌 0
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Trump in the Garden - Dissent Magazine Eight years into the fascism debate, few skeptics seem to be willing to admit that they were wrong.

It took me eight years to write something about the Fascism Debate, so let me say this: what is most exasperating is that no one (save Paxton) seems to be willing to change their mind. Well...

29.10.2024 20:51 👍 122 🔁 45 💬 9 📌 12
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How should we think about a mass exodus of Palestinians from Gaza? Countries, armed groups, and organizations use mass migration as a tool of war.

Today in Good Authority, @profsaunders.bsky.social interviews Kelly Greenhill, author of Weapons of Mass Migration, about how states and non-state actors can use mass migration as a tool of war. Greenhill offers context for the current crisis.

goodauthority.org/news/how-sho...

20.10.2023 15:18 👍 23 🔁 12 💬 1 📌 0
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Have We Learned Nothing? | David Klion There’s a pervasive censoriousness right now—conservatives denouncing liberals, liberals denouncing leftists, leftists denouncing other leftists—that’s immediately familiar from the days and w...

For @nplusonemag.bsky.social, I wrote about how we're living through the post-9/11 period all over again, in all the worst ways

11.10.2023 21:57 👍 1003 🔁 449 💬 40 📌 81