Moving “Gestapo Greg” Bovino out of Minneapolis was a Trump administration costume change as the assaults on constitutional democracy and immigrants grind on in each of our communities. Meanwhile, multiple crises, from the climate emergency to nuclear weapons, increased poverty, and more, are ignored. In no position to compete with the frightening and inspiring headlines from Minneapolis or Trump’s renewed threats to Iran and Cuba, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists reiterated its existential warning that humanity to 85 seconds to midnight, the closest ever to annihilation.
The disconnect between the government and the rest of us is not only related to ICE and Border Patrol murders and brutal deportations. Perhaps most dangerously, there is a massive gap between Trump and many in Washington on arms control and preventing nuclear war as well. A recent YouGov poll tells us that 72% of U.S. Americans want to retain US-Russian nuclear weapons deployment limits. 87% of voters want the US to respect limits on deployment caps. 81% support new arms control negotiations.
It is worth remembering is that nuclear arms control dates to the Kennedy administration and the McCloy-Zorin agreement negotiated at the height of the Cold War. That agreement served as the foundation for future arms control negotiations: the limited test ban, SALT I & 2, NPT, and the START Treaties. This is not an unalloyed tradition. Too often, negotiations led to unspoken agreements about the realm in which the next arms race would take place. But until now it has been worth the ride.
Today, three foundations of restraints on renewed and unlimited arms races – and thus human survival – lie in the balance:
1) the New START Treaty and
2) the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and
3) as a result, the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which is widely understood to be the cornerstone of arms control diplomacy.
We face the expiration of the New START Treaty on February 5. It was negotiated during the Obama Administration and limits the US and Russia to the deployment of 1,550 strategic nuclear warheads each.
Read the rest of the article in Pressenza: https://www.pressenza.com/2026/01/85-seconds-to-midnight-and-challenging-new-start-treaty-likely-demise/