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  • Ruth Ben-Ghiat
    History professor

    Ruth Ben-Ghiat is a professor of history and Italian studies at New York University who writes frequently for CNN Opinion.

    Full Bio

  • U.S. President Donald Trump discusses the potential impact of Hurricane Michael during a meeting with Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and FEMA Administrator Brock Long in the Oval Office of the White House on October 10, 2018 in Washington, DC.

    In suspending Global Entry, a spiteful Trump makes us all less safe

  • In impeachment hearings, lessons on the erosion of American democracy

  • US President Donald Trump speaks to the press after arriving on Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, September 26, 2019, after returning from New York.

    Trump's authoritarian tendencies come back to bite him

  • An Air Force flyover while President Donald Trump speaks, during an Independence Day celebration in front of the Lincoln Memorial, Thursday, July 4, 2019, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

    There's an irony in Trump making this July 4th all about the military

  • U.S President Donald Trump delivers a speech during the commemoration ceremony for the 75th anniversary of D-Day at the American cemetery of Colleville-sur-Mer in Normandy, France, June 6, 2019. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

    Trump in the Old World: Pictures tell the story

  • COLUMBIA, MO - NOVEMBER 10: Students walk along on the campus of University of Missouri - Columbia on November 10, 2015 in Columbia, Missouri. The university looks to get things back to normal after the recent protests on campus that lead to the resignation of the school's President and Chancellor on November 9. (Photo by Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images)

    Gutting US foreign language education will cost us for generations

  • The Statue of Liberty seen on October 28, the statue's 125th birthday.

    My word of the year is freedom

  • How a century-old war affects you

  • circa 1917: Two U.S. soldiers wear gas masks while walking through plumes of smoke during World War I. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

    What we learned from WWI, the first "total war" -- that changed everything

  • WEST COLUMBIA, SC - JUNE 25: People shout behind CNN reporter Jim Acosta before a campaign rally for South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster featuring President Donald Trump at Airport High School June 25, 2018 in West Columbia, South Carolina. (Photo by Sean Rayford/Getty Images)

    Mail bombs: Hate speech can have consequences

  • U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg speaks at an annual Women's History Month reception hosted by Pelosi in the U.S. capitol building on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. This year's event honored the women Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court: Associate Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan.

    RBG revolutionized the world for women. We should listen to her

  • US President Donald Trump (L) and Russia's President Vladimir Putin attend a joint press conference after a meeting at the Presidential Palace in Helsinki, on July 16, 2018. - The US and Russian leaders opened an historic summit in Helsinki, with Donald Trump promising an "extraordinary relationship" and Vladimir Putin saying it was high time to thrash out disputes around the world. (Photo by Brendan SMIALOWSKI / AFP) (Photo credit should read BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty Images)

    Trump and Putin: the pictures tell the story

  • Take Back the Workplace

    The sexual harassment we don't talk about