Ep 70. School shooting increases congressional campaign funding by 2820%

Ep 73. Why students cancelled an AI surveillance contract

Guest: Danny Otten [https://www.linkedin.com/in/danny-otten/], PhD candidate in computer science and VP of the Graduate Student Association at William & Mary in Virginia Background: * William & Mary students vote to end AI surveillance contract [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/p/students-vote-to-end-ai-surveillance] * AI system failed to identify a school shooting in progress at Antioch High [https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/01/us/ai-gun-detection-software-antioch-school] * AI classified Doritos chips as a gun and then police pointed real guns at students [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/p/ai-classified-doritos-chips-as-a?utm_source=publication-search] * FTC take action on the false marketing claims of an AI metal detector company [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/ftc-takes-action-on-school-security] * AI camera system dispatch police for an active shooter who was a band student holding a clarinet [https://futurism.com/future-society/ai-surveillance-school-clarinet] * Another AI camera system dispatched an active shooter response for a student holding a bag of Doritos chips [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/ai-classified-doritos-chips-as-a] * CCTV system at a major university failed to record photos of the assailant entering or leaving the campus [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/brown-university-has-1200-security] David Riedman [https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-riedman-90088b132/], PhD is the creator of the K-12 School Shooting Database [http://k12ssdb.org/], Chief Data Officer at a global risk management firm [https://www.merrillherzog.com/], and a tenure-track professor. Listen to my podcast—Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education & Security [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/podcast]—or my recent interviews on Freakonomics Radio [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/school-shooting-is-final-link-in] and the New England Journal of Medicine [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/keeping-schools-safe-with-evidence]. Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security at riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Ep 72. Secretary of Education on preventing school shootings

Guest: Dr. Daniel Hamlin [https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-hamlin-618b0821/] is the Oklahoma Secretary of Education, a Presidential Professor in education policy, and Faculty Director of the Oklahoma Center for Education Policy (OCEP) Paper: Stopping Violence Before It Starts: An Analysis of How Potential School Gun Attacks Are Exposed [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/08862605261429532] Plain language summary: Four ways school shootings are averted [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/p/four-ways-school-shootings-are-averted] Abstract: Gun violence in U.S. schools continues to be a persistent concern. A promising line of scholarship focuses on potential school gun attacks that were stopped before they could occur, but this work is limited to a small number of studies. * This study investigates how potential school gun attacks were exposed by analyzing 124 publicly reported cases from 2018 to 2023. For the analysis, we generated descriptive data on the school contexts, individuals, and processes associated with exposing potential school gun attacks both on and off school grounds. * Findings indicated that in most cases, suspects communicated their intentions, which created opportunities for exposing potential attacks. Students were the most common source for exposure, reporting 42% of cases, while teachers, parents, and community members played smaller but important roles. * To illustrate the interacting factors behind exposing a potential attack, we further describe four recurring scenarios: (1) public signaling of intent, (2) private disclosures to confidants, (3) discovery of written plans or private communications, and (4) detection through safety measures. These pathways to exposing a threat suggest that positive relationships in schools, open lines of communication, and high expectations for reporting serious threats may be central to averting school gun attacks. Prior episode: Ep 24. Understanding Different Forms of Gun Violence in American Schools [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/p/ep-24-understanding-different-forms?utm_source=publication-search] David Riedman [https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-riedman-90088b132/], PhD is the creator of the K-12 School Shooting Database [http://k12ssdb.org/], Chief Data Officer at a global risk management firm [https://www.merrillherzog.com/], and a tenure-track professor. Listen to my podcast—Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education & Security [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/podcast]—or my interviews on Freakonomics Radio [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/school-shooting-is-final-link-in] and the New England Journal of Medicine [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/keeping-schools-safe-with-evidence]. Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security at riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Ep 71. Terrorist attacks at schools and future of the war in Iran with Bruce Hoffman

Background: Terrorists attack 2 US schools on the same day [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/p/terrorists-attack-2-us-schools-on] Guest: Dr. Bruce Hoffman [https://gufaculty360.georgetown.edu/s/contact/00336000014RVAcAAO/bruce-r-hoffman], Georgetown University, author of Inside Terrorism [https://cup.columbia.edu/book/inside-terrorism/9780231174770/] Professor Bruce Hoffman has been studying terrorism and insurgency for nearly five decades. He is a tenured professor in Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service where from 2010 to 2017 he was the Director of both the Center for Security Studies and of the Security Studies Program and from 2020-2023 the director of the Center for Jewish Civilization. In addition, Professor Hoffman is Professor Emeritus of Terrorism Studies at St Andrews University, Scotland. He previously held the Corporate Chair in Counterterrorism and Counterinsurgency at the RAND Corporation and was also Director of RAND’s Washington, D.C. Office. Professor Hoffman also served as RAND’s Vice President for External Affairs and as Acting Director of RAND’s Center for Middle East Public Policy. Appointed by the U.S. Congress to serve as a commissioner on the Independent Commission to Review the FBI’s Post-9/11 Response to Terrorism and Radicalization, Professor Hoffman was a lead author of the commission’s final report. He was Scholar-in-Residence for Counterterrorism at the Central Intelligence Agency between 2004 and 2006; an adviser on counterterrorism to the Office of National Security Affairs, Coalition Provisional Authority, Baghdad, Iraq in 2004, and from 2004-2005 an adviser on counterinsurgency to the Strategy, Plans, and Analysis Office at Multi-National Forces-Iraq Headquarters, Baghdad. Professor Hoffman was also an adviser to the Iraq Study Group. Professor Hoffman was the founding Director of the Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the University of St Andrews in Scotland, where he was also Reader in International Relations and Chairman of the Department of International Relations. Professor Hoffman is Editor-in-Chief of Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, the leading scholarly journal in the field. and a member of the advisory board of Terrorism and Political Violence. He is also editor of the Columbia University Press Series on Terrorism and Irregular Warfare. He has been a Distinguished Scholar, a Public Policy Scholar, a Senior Scholar, and a Global Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, D.C.; a Senior Fellow at the Combating Terrorism Center, U.S. Military Academy, West Point, N.Y.; a Visiting Professor at the Institute for Counter-Terrorism, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, Israel; and, a Visiting Professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He is also a contributing editor to The National Interest and a member of the Jamestown Foundation’s Board of Directors; a member of the board of advisers to the FBI Intelligence Analysts Association; and, serves on the advisory boards to the Arms Sales Monitoring Project at the Federation of American Scientists and of Our Voices Together: September 11 Friends and Families to Help Build a Safer, More Compassionate World. David Riedman [https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-riedman-90088b132/], PhD is the creator of the K-12 School Shooting Database [http://k12ssdb.org/], Chief Data Officer at a global risk management firm [https://www.merrillherzog.com/], and a tenure-track professor. Listen to my podcast—Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education & Security [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/podcast]—or my interviews on Freakonomics Radio [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/school-shooting-is-final-link-in] and the New England Journal of Medicine [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/keeping-schools-safe-with-evidence]. Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security at riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Ep 70. School shooting increases congressional campaign funding by 2820%

Guests: Eric A. Baldwin [https://law.stanford.edu/eric-a-baldwin/] is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Donohue Lab at Stanford University and Takuma Iwasaki [https://datascience.stanford.edu/people/takuma-iwasaki] is a doctoral candidate at Stanford Law School and a graduate researcher at Stanford Data Science. Paper: School shootings and the strategic contributions of gun policy PACs in US House elections [https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.2514343123] Abstract: The American public consistently supports stricter gun laws. We show that the gun lobby is most concerned that this support will translate into federal legislative action when fatal school shootings occur. Leveraging a dataset of political action committee (PAC) contributions and school shootings, we implement a staggered difference-in-differences design to estimate the causal effect of fatal school shootings on contributions to House candidates. * Political Action Committees increase contributions by 31% to candidates in districts with fatal school shootings, and 20% for gun safety PACs. Neither show any significant response to nonfatal school shootings or mass shootings. * For both progun and gun safety PACs, contribution spikes emerge in the wake of fatal school shootings, with effects dramatically amplified as Election Day approaches * When a shooting occurs within two months of Election Day, contributions from progun PACs increase by 2,820% while gun safety PAC contributions increase by 917%. These effects are concentrated in competitive districts (5% margins) where the two-sided surge in contributions offsets any measurable electoral impact. These results provide robust evidence that PACs strategically deploy contributions after school shootings, with the magnitude and timing suggesting a deliberate mobilization to advance its agenda. Our findings underscore a gap in democratic accountability: While public opinion should drive policy change, campaign contributions are wielded to blunt electoral responsiveness, providing insight into the inability of Congress to adopt broadly supported gun safety measures. David Riedman [https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-riedman-90088b132/], PhD is the creator of the K-12 School Shooting Database [http://k12ssdb.org/], Chief Data Officer at a global risk management firm [https://www.merrillherzog.com/], and a tenure-track professor. Listen to my podcast—Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education & Security [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/podcast]—or my interviews on Freakonomics Radio [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/school-shooting-is-final-link-in] and the New England Journal of Medicine [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/keeping-schools-safe-with-evidence]. Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security at riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Parent of school shooter convicted of 2nd degree murder (WGN Legal Face-Off)

Last week, Colin Gray was found guilty on 27 felony charges including four counts of second-degree murder and cruelty to children. Gray purchased an AR-15 rifle for his 14-year-old son who had extensive contact with child services and multiple police agencies, had a shrine to the Parkland shooter in his bedroom, and was involved in social media groups that promote mass violence. While parents have faced involuntary manslaughter charges after a school shooting, this was the first murder conviction for a parent. Georgia has a legal framework that made this possible. Under state law in Georgia, second-degree murder can occur when an adult causes a child’s death through second-degree child cruelty (either criminal negligence or reckless actions). Georgia law does not require intent to kill but rather reckless behavior causing a child’s death, such as unsecured firearms or abandonment. Legal Face-Off [https://wgnradio.com/wgn-plus/legal-face-off/the-legal-face-off/] is a fast paced, high energy legal program dealing with the hottest issues of the day. Rich Lenkov and Christina Martini provide a legal point vs. counterpoint perspective on breaking legal news. Rich Lenkov is a partner at Bryce Downey & Lenkov, handling entertainment law, general liability and worker’s compensation. Christina Martini is a partner at McDermott Will & Emery, focusing her practice on domestic and international trademark and copyright law. David Riedman [https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-riedman-90088b132/], PhD is the creator of the K-12 School Shooting Database [http://k12ssdb.org/], Chief Data Officer at a global risk management firm [https://www.merrillherzog.com/], and a tenure-track professor. Listen to my podcast—Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education & Security [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/podcast]—or my interviews on Freakonomics Radio [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/school-shooting-is-final-link-in] and the New England Journal of Medicine [https://k12ssdb.substack.com/p/keeping-schools-safe-with-evidence]. Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Riedman Report: Risk, AI, Education, & Security at riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe [https://riedmanreport.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]