Ian Bassin is co-founder and Executive Director of Protect Democracy, a nonpartisan pro-democracy organization. A recipient of the MacArthur \u201cGenius\u201d award, he previously served as Associate White House Counsel, where in addition to counseling the President and senior White House staff on administrative and constitutional law, his responsibilities included ensuring that White House and executive branch officials complied with the laws, rules and norms that protect the fundamentally democratic nature of our government. His writing on democracy, authoritarianism, and American law and politics has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Atlantic, Slate, Salon, The New York Review of Books and other publications. He was named to the Time Magazine 100Next list of rising global stars, is a recipient of the Skoll Award for Social Innovation, and has repeatedly been listed among the 500 most influential people in Washington by Washingtonian Magazine. His TED talk on \u201cHow to Spot Authoritarianism and Choose Democracy\u201d has been viewed more than half a million times. He received his J.D. from Yale Law School and a B.A. from Wesleyan University.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"