David French

French is a senior editor at The Dispatch and a columnist for Time. His new book is Divided We Fall: America's Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation. He is a former major in the United States Army Reserve.

Recent Articles

American Leaders Made Defeat in Afghanistan Inevitable

There are few items of bipartisan consensus in the United States. Here is one—the leaders of both political parties decided it was time to leave Afghanistan and to lose the 20 year war with the...

By David French

Why Republicans Are Blind to the Truth of January 6th

On Monday a small band of U.S. Capitol Police officers delivered vivid, emotional testimony about a previously unthinkable event—the day a partisan mob stormed the Capitol to try to overturn an American election. Many Americans...

By David French

Loving Your Country Means Teaching Its History Honestly

Why do you love the United States of America? There is no better time to ask that question than on Independence Day. The answer to that question can and should tell us a great deal...

By David French

How Can We Escape the COVID-19 Vaccine Culture Wars?

On Friday, March 19, my wife and I got in our cars to drive an hour south of our home in Franklin, Tennessee, a prosperous suburb of Nashville. The purpose of our trip was simple—to...

By David French

Facebook Oversight Board’s Trump Decision Goes Way Beyond Him

Facebook’s new Oversight Board, a new, quasi-independent organization that acts as a kind of supreme court for Facebook’s moderation decisions, issued its most important decision yet. In a lengthy ruling, it determined that Facebook was...

By David French

Clarence Thomas' Tech Opinion May Signal a Free Speech Shift

A curious thing happened at the Supreme Court a few days ago. One of the justices, Clarence Thomas, broke from his traditional judicial role and weighed in on a matter of public policy. He tried...

By David French

Keep the Filibuster, There Are Better Ways to Reform a Broken System

It took only days for Democratic jubilation to fade. After passing an immense $1.9 trillion COVID aid package that was one of the most expensive and significant pieces of social legislation in a generation, the...

By David French

Trump’s Acquittal Exposed a Republic in Peril

When you read the Constitution and the Federalist Papers, you can see how clearly the Founders understood a single moral maxim—power corrupts. Having just thrown off the yoke of a king they could not elect...

By David French

The Impeachment Trial Is the Ultimate Test

As the second impeachment trial opens for Donald Trump, it’s worth asking a question—why does one of modern America’s greatest political losers still seem to have a tight grip on the Republican Party? After all,...

By David French

Big Tech Made the Right Call About Trump

The story of last week’s social media crackdown – especially the most controversial elements, Twitter’s and Facebook’s decision to ban Donald Trump from its platform and Amazon Web Service’s (AWS) decision to terminate its relationship...

By David French

We Must Impeach Donald Trump Again

If there was any doubt at all, let’s end it today. Words have meaning. When a president tells his followers that the fate of the nation is at stake in a presidential election, millions will...

By David French

A Christmas Hymn for Our Troubled Time

Times of great suffering are also times that can reveal deep truths

By David French

How the Conservative Legal Movement Stopped Trump

On Friday evening, the Supreme Court of the United States unanimously rejected Texas attorney general Ken Paxton’s effort to invalidate the election results in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Seven justices said Paxton had no...

By David French

Only Right-Wing Media Can Save America From Trump

As the United States is now fully engaged in a second week of post-election controversies, two realities are increasingly clear. First, Donald Trump is growing increasingly unhinged in his quest to retain his grip on...

By David French

On Election Day, Polarization Prevailed

On the morning of election day, Americans faced two competing narratives. On the one hand, there was a veritable avalanche of polling data indicating the possibility – even probability – of a blue wave election...

By David French

Column: Political Violence Threatens to Destabilize America

A recent poll showed that American voters believe we’re two-thirds of the way to a civil war

By David French

Donald Trump Is Not Pro-Life

As Americans have begun to vote in the presidential election, one must make an important distinction in Donald Trump’s record in office. It’s entirely fair to call him nominally anti-abortion. It’s not credible to call...

By David French

How to Show Principles Matter in SCOTUS Fight

The Republican argument for immediately nominating and confirming a replacement for Ruth Bader Ginsburg is now stripped of all pretext. It’s about raw power. In fact, it can be boiled down to three words –...

By David French

America Is Being Pulled Apart. Here's How We Can Start to Heal Our Nation

For the first time in my adult life, it's easy for me to foresee the possibility of a genuine constitutional crisis in the United States of America. The scenario is simple. Imagine that either Joe...

By David French

The Problem Isn’t USPS, It’s the President

As millions of Americans consider casting their vote this November, they’re confronted by an abject failure of presidential leadership. Rather than taking the lead in resolving the manageable challenges of voting in a pandemic, President...

By David French
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