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Protesters carry an Indonesian flag and a flag from Japanese anime 'One Piece' during a protest outside Jakarta police headquarters, in Jakarta, Indonesia, on August 29, 2025.
What We’re Watching: Killing further inflames Indonesian protests, India and Canada mend ties, El Salvador continues authoritarian drift
Protests erupt further in Indonesia
Demonstrations in the capital Jakarta have intensified after a police vehicle rammed into a taxi there on Thursday, killing the driver. The protests, which have now spread across the country, first came following reports that lawmakers had been receiving a monthly housing allowance of 50 million rupiah ($3,075) in addition to their salaries. This was especially irksome for Indonesia’s 280-million-plus population as many have been struggling to find jobs. Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, who has faced political challenges since coming into office last year, apologized for the excessive violence and urged calm.
India and Canada continue to mend ties after Sikh separatist killing
Nearly two years after the Vancouver murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a leading advocate for a Sikh homeland in India, Ottawa and New Delhi appear to be patching things up. The tension had spiked when Canada expelled India’s high commissioner last October amid allegations that New Delhi was involved in the killing of Nijjar. Now each side has appointed new high commissioners to the other country, though this has garnered criticism from the 770,000-strong Sikh community in Canada.
El Salvador schools enforce military haircuts
El Salvador’s new military-run education ministry is enforcing strict discipline in schools, including mandatory army-style haircuts, etiquette rules, and nationalistic rituals. Rights groups say it marks another step in President Nayib Bukele’s authoritarian drift, as he deepens military control over civilian life while maintaining strong popular support.
Here's why Israel will accept a Gaza ceasefire soon
Despite the foot dragging and all the threats of taking over Gaza City, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu will find his way to a ceasefire in Gaza this September. Here's why.
First, domestic pressure is growing. Israel is witnessing some of the largest street protests it's seen in the past two years. They're repetitive, they're consistent, they're ongoing. Second, there's growing international pressure. It is not only the Saudis that are leading the charge for recognition of a Palestinian state at the United Nations this September. It's also the French and the British and other European and Western allies of Israel. By signing on to a temporary ceasefire, Bibi can preclude some of that pressure.
There are also opportunities here. Netanyahu is better positioned against members of his own coalition who have been threatening to leave it if he signs onto that ceasefire, namely, ministers Ben Gvir, Smotrich are in a weaker position right now in the polls that they had been previously. They need him more than he needs them in the lead up to expected parliamentary elections next year.
There's also President Trump and rumors around Washington have it that he will be willing to visit Israel after a stopover in the UK on the 17th to the 19th of September if in fact Bibi finds his way to that temporary ceasefire. And lastly, what Hamas is putting on the table here is an acceptance of the American plan, otherwise known as the Witkoff plan named after the American envoy who tabled it last spring, but couldn't get itself to accept it. So for Bibi not to accept an American plan that he signed off on back in spring is counterintuitive.
So for all those reasons, we think that there will be a temporary ceasefire in September. It's not a total end to the war. It's a 60-day reprieve. Israel can find itself back at war in Gaza, perhaps occupying the entire strip. That will be the negative and brutal scenario. One would hope that diplomacy will find a way and will reign supreme by the end of that 60-day ceasefire.
Erik Prince, founder of Blackwater, attends a police and military presentation, in Guayaquil, Ecuador April 5, 2025.
What We’re Watching: Haiti turns to foreign fighters, China’s economy slumps, protests flare-up in Serbia
Haiti turns to foreign guns as gangs tighten grip
Blackwater founder Erik Prince is ramping up his private security firm’s presence in Haiti, deploying hundreds of fighters from the US, Europe, and El Salvador to battle gangs controlling much of the country. Prince’s Vectus Global, active there since March, says it’s working under a 10-year deal with Haiti’s government, including a role in tax collection. The move — involving snipers, helicopters, and drones — comes after gangs toppled the government in February, causing ongoing chaos in Port-au-Prince.
The stakes of China’s economic slowdown
China’s economy stumbled in July, with factory output hitting an eight-month low, though still 5.7% higher year-over-year than the previous July. The relative slowdown reflects weakening domestic demand, property sector woes, extreme weather, and fierce market competition — compounded by uncertainty over Donald Trump’s trade policy. Beyond the economic hit, analysts note that prolonged weakness could limit Beijing’s ability to come into impending trade talks on strong footing.
Tension in Serbia flare
Tensions in Serbia escalated this week after supporters of President Aleksandar Vučić and his ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) hurled flares at anti-government protestors late Wednesday. The violence follows nine months of demonstrations sparked by the deadly collapse of a train canopy in Novi Sad that killed 16 last year – an incident which protestors have blamed on state corruption and mismanagement. With Serbian Prime Minister Miloš Vučević having already resigned earlier this year, we’ll be watching to see if Vučić can outlast this growing political crisis.
French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou speaks during a news conference to present a major public finance recovery plan in Paris, France, July 15, 2025.
Hard Numbers: French prime minister on the ropes, Hong Kong dissidents appeal convictions, Lesotho MP accuses his king, & More
€40 billion: French Prime Minister François Bayrou is set to present a 2026 budget Tuesday that aims to cut the size of the country’s 2026 annual deficit by €40 billion ($46.7 billion). However, all opposition parties are expected to reject the proposal – and that could spell the end for Bayrou’s minority government.
12: Hong Kong’s pro-democracy dissidents aren’t going to go gentle into that good night. Twelve of them have appealed their recent subversion convictions in a move that shines a fresh light on Beijing’s anti-democracy crackdown in the city. The case, which challenges China’s draconian 2021 national security law, is drawing international attention: foreign diplomats from over six countries were present at the trial. The appeals are expected to take 10 days.
59: Lesotho won independence from the United Kingdom 59 years ago, but one member of the tiny southern African nation’s parliament has accused its king of signing parts of the country away again – to its neighbor South Africa. The accusation stems from a decades-old border dispute, but the MP who leveled the charge now faces criminal charges for doing so. Lesotho gained notoriety in March when US President Donald Trump said “nobody has ever heard of” the country.
6: Six members of United Torah Judaism – an ultra-Orthodox political party – have quit Israel’s ruling coalition again over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s failure to guarantee military exemptions for yeshiva students. While Netanyahu has survived this once before, their departure leaves him with yet another slim majority in parliament.U.S. Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) speaks to reporters between votes at the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, U.S., January 23, 2024.
What We’re Watching: Senate vote on Trump’s big bill, Thai PM in hot water, Japan's name-change game
Trump’s tax-and-spending bill faces razor-thin Senate vote
The US Senate will vote today on President Donald Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill”. The legislation would make many of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts permanent and would boost spending on the military and immigration enforcement, but its proposed cuts could also leave nearly 12 million people without health insurance by 2034. That, and a projected $3.3 trillion national debt increase over the next decade, has stoked opposition even within the Republican party. GOP Senators Rand Paul and Thom Tillis – who announced he won’t seek reelection – are already opposed, meaning Trump can afford only two more defections. Expect today to be a marathon of votes and revisions to the legislation.
Thailand’s PM in hot water over cross-border phone call
Thousands of protestors gathered in Bangkok yesterday, demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra over a leaked phone call in which she was heard obsequiously flattering Cambodia’s still-influential former leader Hun Sen. The call played poorly in the light of a recent border spat between the two countries. Paetongtarn defended the call as a negotiation tactic, but the streets say she’s compromising Thailand’s sovereignty. Thailand’s Constitutional Court will rule this week on a petition calling for her removal.
Japan’s name change game
A campaign is afoot in Japan to relax a law that effectively requires women to take their husband’s last names. Proponents of the change, which is supported by most Japanese, say it will increase gender equality, boost Japan’s alarmingly low birthrate, and avoid a situation in which, over time, everyone ends up with the most common last name: “Sato.” But the governing LDP’s hard-right wing is opposed, and with an upper house election in July, the party wants no trouble. For now, “Satos all the way down” looks like Japan’s destiny after all.
Was it legal for Trump to deploy federal troops to Los Angeles?
In this clip from a larger interview for the latest episode of GZERO World, New York Times Magazine staff writer and Yale Law School fellow Emily Bazelon sits down with Ian Bremmer to unpack President Trump’s unprecedented decision to send National Guard troops and US Marines into Los Angeles without the governor’s consent. She argues the administration may have intentionally provoked the unrest through targeted immigration raids in the Latino neighborhoods of a densely populated city.
As California Governor Gavin Newsom sues the federal government, Bazelon makes clear that legal recourse may be limited. Even if Newsom wins, she says, Trump could comply with consultation requirements after the fact and proceed as planned. “The judges cannot save the country from an authoritarian president... by themselves,” Bazelon warns.
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).
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A tank on display at a park in Washington, D.C., on June 12, 2025, two days ahead of a military parade commemorating the U.S. Army's 250th anniversary and coinciding with President Donald Trump's 79th birthday.
What We’re Watching: Trump’s parade prompts protests, Kenya protests turn deadly, Mongolia picks new leader
Trump’s military parade sparks backlash
The official reason for this weekend’s military parade in Washington DC is to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the US Army – but the occasion also just happens to fall on President Donald Trump’s 79th birthday. That coincidence has raised alarm among Trump critics worried about his perceived authoritarian inklings. Hundreds of “No Kings” protests are planned across the country for the same day. Meanwhile, the courts are still trying to decide whether Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to Los Angeles was legal. The decision will set an important precedent for Trump’s handling of protests going forward.
Protests erupts in Kenya after blogger dies in custody
Protests erupted in Nairobi, Kenya, this week over the death of a 31-year-old political blogger in police custody. Albert Ojwang was arrested last week on charges of criticizing the country’s deputy police chief. While police originally claimed that his death was caused by self-inflicted injuries – authorities said he hit “his head against a cell wall” – doctors later determined that it was more likely the result of an assault. Ojwang’s death has only added to the population’s long-held anger at Kenya’s security services.
Mongolia gets a new prime minister
After protests toppled his predecessor ten days ago, Zandanshatar Gombojav became Mongolia’s new prime minister on Thursday in a near-unanimous parliamentary vote. The former head of Mongolia’s largest bank takes power amid political unrest over the belief that the country's rich mineral wealth has only lined the pockets of the elite. He says his first priority is to increase taxes on luxury consumption, but also to decrease government spending. Let’s see if he can get the protesters onside.8 thoughts on Trump’s Los Angeles crackdown
On Saturday, US President Donald Trump activated 2,000 members of the California National Guard to quell protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s deportation efforts in Los Angeles, after small but highly visible demonstrations had popped up across the city in the days prior – with some instances of violence, opportunistic looting, and property damage. California Governor Gavin Newsom disputed that federal intervention was necessary and condemned Trump’s deployment decision as illegal and inflammatory, blaming it for stoking the protests.
Though the protests had largely petered out by then, on Tuesday the president dispatched an additional 2,000-plus National Guard troops and 700 active-duty Marines to the area. Downtown LA had a quiet night on the back of a curfew, but anti-ICE (and, more broadly, anti-Trump) demonstrations have started to spread to other major cities like New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Austin, Dallas, and Atlanta, with more planned in Las Vegas, Minneapolis, San Antonio, and Seattle. Texas Governor Greg Abbot has already called in the National Guard ahead of any potential unrest in his state.
Here are my eight key takeaways:
- Trump’s decision to send federal troops into Los Angeles was extreme. It marked the first time in 60 years that the National Guard had been deployed to a US state without the consent of its governor. The last such instance was in 1965, when President Lyndon B. Johnson federalized the Alabama Guard in defiance of Governor George Wallace, one of the nation’s leading segregationists, to protect civil rights demonstrators led by Martin Luther King Jr. from violence. Needless to say, federal supremacy over states’ rights is being asserted in a very different context, by a very different president, and in service of a very different goal today.
- It’s legal – for now. Trump’s deployment pushes the envelope politically, but as long as the troops limit their role to protecting federal personnel and facilities while refraining from taking law-enforcement actions (as they reportedly have thus far), it will stay within the bounds of presidential authority. That’s a key legal distinction, as the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act bars active-duty forces from engaging in domestic law enforcement unless the president invokes the 1807 Insurrection Act. That’s a step Trump hasn’t taken (yet at least), suggesting that he still sees as high a bar for it as he did during the George Floyd protests in 2020.
- The door is open to a more radical use of emergency powers. The counterpoint is that Trump referred to the LA protesters as a “violent insurrectionist mob” (he does know a little something about those) and on Tuesday refused to take the invocation of the Insurrection Act off the table. He also warned that any protesters at this weekend’s military parade in Washington, DC – peaceful or not – “will be met with very big force,” and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth hinted at a desire to use military forces on domestic soil more extensively going forward. This pattern suggests that Trump’s threshold for activating emergency powers or using troops against Americans is lower than last time around, when he was repeatedly talked out of extreme steps by institutionalist advisors. I wouldn’t be shocked if the administration invoked the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (aka IEEPA, the same law it used to levy reciprocal tariffs on Liberation Day) to freeze the assets of individual American citizens and organizations it accused of aiding and abetting “foreign invaders” (aka undocumented aliens). Or if it used the Communications Act to pressure internet platforms into throttling protest-related content. These scenarios may sound far-fetched, but so did the unilateral deployment of the National Guard and Marine Corps to Los Angeles less than 200 days into the first year of the Trump presidency. In his second term, Trump has proven willing to push the legal and political limits of executive power, against precedent and despite long odds of success.
- Trump’s LA deployment was designed to score political points, not restore peace. The City of Los Angeles was unaffected by the protests, which were confined to a handful of downtown city blocks. The Los Angeles Police Department had things under control (at least until Trump escalated the situation), and local officials saw no reason to request federal help. In fact, they warned that adding federal troops to the mix would risk heightening tensions and endanger public safety. But Trump wasn’t trying to solve a security problem – he was playing politics.
- Trump is eager to pick public fights over immigration. This is the one issue area where the president has had consistently positive approval ratings, save for a brief dip underwater caused by the administration’s mishandling of the Abrego Garcia case. For Trump, the political upside of doubling down on the migrant crackdown is twofold. First, it shifts attention toward his biggest strength and away from headlines that are more problematic for the administration, such as his failure to secure trade deals, his inability to end the Russia-Ukraine war, and his messy breakup with Elon Musk. Second, it forces Democrats into defending politically unsympathetic targets and positions, much like they did with Abrego Garcia (before the White House overplayed its hand) and Harvard University.
- The optics of the LA protests play straight into Trump’s hands. Images of burning Waymos and protestors flying Mexican flags lend credence to the White House’s false claim that undocumented immigrants are dangerous foreign invaders and their defenders are radical anti-American traitors, allowing the president to discredit opponents of mass deportations as threats to public order and safety. That only a small number of troublemakers were illegal aliens doesn’t matter; Trump is betting (correctly, in my view) those visuals will drive public opinion away from the demonstrators and toward more aggressive deportation policies.
- More deportations are coming. Trump has made measurable progress in curbing illegal border crossings, but so far, deportations have fallen far short of his campaign pledge (and even of deportations during Joe Biden’s last year in office). That’s not surprising; large-scale interior removals are much more politically, economically, and logistically fraught than border enforcement. But according to the Wall Street Journal, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller recently ordered ICE to step up its game, demanding that they stop targeting migrants with criminal records, asylum requests, and court petitions and instead “just go out there and arrest illegal aliens” at their jobs and schools. In other words, snag anyone who looks illegal, no probable cause (let alone warrant) needed. That approach was reportedly what sparked the LA protests last week. The backlash was instrumental to Miller’s goals: by signaling that Trump is making good on his deportation promise, standoffs with law enforcement can make deportations more popular and give Trump the political capital to ramp up more visible and disruptive workplace and neighborhood raids, particularly in Democratic-run cities. These operations will trigger more protests, which will in turn be met with more repression and stepped-up enforcement, and so on.
- On immigration, don’t bet on TACO. Trump faces fewer internal constraints in implementing his policy agenda on immigration than in any other area. Unless and until it starts dragging on his approval ratings, he is likely to double down: more aggressive raids, more confrontations with Democratic governors and mayors, more troop deployments to quell public protests. Mass deportations will disrupt local life in places like Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, and Chicago. Backlash to aggressive enforcement tactics, family separations, and mistaken detentions will be the primary source of domestic unrest in the coming months, but Trump won’t back down. This is a fight the White House is happy to fight.
Trump's deployment of troops to Los Angeles was less about taking control of the streets and more about taking control of the narrative. The strategy is confrontational by design, with immigrants and Democrats as foils and civil unrest as a feature, not a bug. This playbook may work politically. But in the long term, the result will be more conflict: between cities and Washington, between red and blue, between civilians and the military, and between competing visions of American identity. The most politically divided and dysfunctional industrialized nation will only become more so.