This is Democracy – Episode 12: Congress and Democracy

How has Congress changed in the last few decades? How can new, young leaders (hopefully elected this November) reform Congress to serve our democracy better?

This week, Jeremi talks to domestic policy specialist and LBJ School professor, Ruth Ellen Wasem. They discuss how Congress could adapt to a changing political climate, and if it truly represents U.S. voters.

Zachary sets up the interview with his poem, “One Man.”

For more than 25 years, Ruth Ellen Wasem was a domestic policy specialist at the U.S. Library of Congress’ Congressional Research Service. She has testified before Congress about asylum policy, legal immigration trends, human rights, and the push-pull forces on unauthorized migration. Wasem earned master’s and doctoral degrees in history at the University of Michigan, largely funded by the Institute for Social Research. Wasem currently is engaged with a group of international scholars who are researching asylum and the rise of the political right, and she presented research papers focused on the U.S. context in Italy and Belgium over the summer of 2017. She is also writing a book about the legislative drive to end race- and nationality-based immigration. From this research, she has written “The Undertow of Reforming Immigration,” for “A Nation of Immigrants Reconsidered: The U.S. in an Age of Restriction, 1924-1965,” (University of Illinois Press, forthcoming 2018). Other recent publications include “The US Visa Waiver Program: Facilitating Travel and Enhancing Security,” (Chatham House, 2017), “Welfare and Public Benefits” in “American Immigration: An Encyclopedia of Political, Social, and Cultural Change,” 2nd Edition, (M.E. Sharpe, 2014), and “Tackling Unemployment: The Legislative Dynamics of the Employment Act of 1946” (Upjohn Institute Press, 2013).