Media Mentions

When does political loyalty cease to be an expression of shared principles and become an abdication of independent judgment?

Davina Hurt, director, government ethics, reflects on the historic 2026 midterm election results, which resulted in major shifts in both the U.S. House and Senate, and result in a massive shift in political power. She raises questions about democracy, loss of public trust, and a responsibility to ethical leadership in governance.

Drawing an analogy with Hamlin's story of the Pied Piper, where "Pied Piper’s greatest power was not simply his ability to play a captivating tune. It was his ability to persuade others to follow without questioning where their journey would end."

Hurt reminds us that In a democracy, voters retain the right to question the destination a leader is asking them to follow, and says voters have a responsibility to reconsider promises and withdraw their support when they don't like the direction. She says, "Political loyalty is not a debt citizens owe their leaders. It is a trust that leaders must continually earn."

"Political cooperation is essential to governing. But cooperation becomes ethically troubling when loyalty to an individual displaces the obligation to question, deliberate and act independently," writes Hurt.

"An election can change the balance of power overnight. It cannot, by itself, restore public trust or guarantee ethical leadership. That requires leaders willing to place constitutional responsibility above political convenience, institutions prepared to exercise meaningful oversight, and citizens who refuse to surrender their judgment to the most compelling voice in the room."

Davina Hurt, director, government ethics, published by Salon.

Science has measurements that evaluate aging, but what are we actually measuring, and what criteria are being used to determine what is considered success?

Director of Bioethics, Guadalupe Hayes-Mota, distinguishes between recording a health condition and assigning meaning to it: “Writing down someone’s bone density or walking speed is documentation. Calling their aging ‘unsuccessful’ is a verdict.”

Describing an outcome as successful can imply achievement by the individual, even if the individual had no control over the conditions leading to the outcome. “Once you can measure aging and do something about it, decline starts to look like a choice,” observes Hayes-Mota.

“Once optimization becomes a duty, society can hand the problem of aging back to individuals,” Hayes-Mota said. “Then it never has to ask why some of them had so much less to work with.”

Guadalupe Hayes-Mota, director, bioethics, quoted by The Care Capitalist Substack.

Ann Skeet, interim executive director, said Google’s apparent change of heart signals “that they are appreciating the importance of allowing educators to be in the driver’s seat when it comes to children’s education.”

The initial announcement smacked of hubris, Skeet said, with Google appearing to believe it may “understand better than life-long educators what’s best for students.”

Ann Skeet, interim executive director, quoted by The Mercury News (paywall) and republished by Government Technology, and SiliconValley.com.

Catholics protesters gathered last week in protest to Oakland Bishop Michael Mayer's recent participation in a meeting with President Trump held in the Oval Office. Protesters say the visit gave the appearance of political support against Pope Leo's position for Catholic leaders to stay out of partisan politics.

David DeCosse, director, religious and Catholic ethics believes the visit was unethical in that "This clouded the role of the church in our political life in a way that is reasonably and genuinely confusing."

David DeCosse, director, Religious and Catholic Ethics, quoted by ABC 7.

Davina Hurt, director, government ethics, quoted by Agence France-Presse (AFP) and distributed across multiple markets, including Barron's, Japan Times, Yahoo News, and others.

Experts warn that the partnership between prediction markets like Polymarket and Kalshi and prominent news organizations to report on information from the betting markets and the election predictions and projections they spur, could result in confusion and misinformation.

"Elections are not games," Davina Hurt, director, government ethics told AFP. "My concern is that we've reached a point where financial market expectations carry more weight in the public's mind than the votes themselves."

A high probability "is not a promise," Hurt said. "When the prediction fails, that's not evidence that elections fail. But people are going to read that in."

Davina Hurt, director, government ethics, quoted by Agence France-Presse (AFP) and distributed across multiple markets, including Barron's, Japan Times, Yahoo News, and others.

Testimony describes plans for clandestine 2019 meeting between co-defendants in ex-mayor’s corruption trial, in which Thao has been accused of sharing information from the Council's closed session meetings, which would violate state laws about what types of information can be shared from such meetings.

Closed sessions are “supposed to be a private space where councilmembers can have frank discussions about what’s before them,” said Davina Hurt, director of government ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics. “Anytime someone discloses what happens, it jeopardizes the case, it weakens the position of the city and it costs taxpayers.”

Davina Hurt, director of government ethics, quoted by The Mercury News.

Increased ICE raids have rattled Central California residents impacting both school attendance and worker participation. Bishop Joseph V. Brennan, from the diocese of Fresno pushed back against the raids.

William O’Neill S.J., director of immigration ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics argued that the Church has never advocated for open borders.

“I’d say that’s a primary misunderstanding,” O’Neill said. “The recognition that the state, by its very nature, has a right to control its borders has always been a part of Catholic social teaching.”

O’Neill noted that the church strives to find a middle ground, “to have a safe and legal pathway [to stay] in accordance with international law.”

Fr. Bill O'Neill, director of immigration ethics, quoted by the Los Angeles Times.

Many U.S. states have laws that prohibit wagering on elections, but most consider it a misdemeanor. In two states, Nebraska and Illinois, election betting can be prosecuted as a felony. Despite the legal risks, people have spent more than $3.1 million, on sites like Kalshi and Polymarket betting on the Nebraska Senate race alone.

Interim Executive Director of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, Ann Skeet, warns that an expansion of gambling or trading into elections will cause harm with the possibility of insider trading.

Prediction markets “erode the common good,” Skeet said.

“Trust is actually kind of an intangible common good, and our trust in our election processes and our elected officials is one example of something that serves the community as a whole,” she said.

Ann Skeet, interim executive director, quoted by Nebraska Public Media.