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Bringing live debate to campus
ASU’s Institute of Politics, in partnership with nonprofit media platform Open to Debate, brings live debate to campus this year in a special nonpartisan series titled PRO/CONversations. Produced by Arizona PBS the series will model civil discourse for students while offering journalism students hands-on production experience.
“ASU has long set the standard for innovation in higher education, and now we’re proud to lead in modeling civil discourse,” says Ambassador Flake. “Partnering with Open to Debate brings a national platform to ASU’s campus and underscores the university’s commitment to showing that respectful and constructive debate still has a place in American public life.”
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Fall 2026 debate topic:
Should AI deepfakes be treated as protected political speech?
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When seeing is no longer believing
AI can convincingly fabricate what political figures say and do. As deepfakes become increasingly realistic, how do we protect both free expression and public trust?
Join ASU’s Institute of Politics and Open to Debate for a PRO/CONversations debate exploring the boundaries of political speech. With elections, democracy and the First Amendment at stake, four leading experts will consider whether AI deepfakes deserve constitutional protection—or whether the law should limit their use.
Hear the arguments, examine competing perspectives and consider where you stand.
Join the conversation on Friday, Nov. 13 from 1 to 2 p.m.
Arizona PBS Studio A, Downtown Phoenix campus
555 N. Central Avenue Phoenix, AZ 85004
PRO / Arguing for protection
Nina Jankowicz
CEO of The American Sunlight Project; Former Executive Director of the Department of Homeland Security's Disinformation Governance Board
Nina Jankowicz is an internationally-recognized expert on disinformation and democratization, one of TIMEmagazine’s 100 Most Influential People in AI, and the author of two books: "How to Lose the Information War," which The New Yorker called “a persuasive new book on disinformation as a geopolitical strategy,” and "How to Be A Woman Online," an examination of online abuse and disinformation and tips for fighting back, which Publishers Weekly named “essential.” Jankowicz writes a weekly newsletter on navigating the modern information environment, The Wayfinder, and hosts the podcast DISARMED: How the United States Gave Up the Fight Against Falsehoods. She is the co-founder of the American Sunlight Project, a non-profit focused on countering disinformation, and an adjunct professor at Syracuse University. Jankowicz has advised governments, international organizations, and tech companies, and testified before the U.S. Congress and the UK, Canadian, and European Parliaments.
PRO / Arguing for protection
Robert Corn-Revere
Chief Counsel of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE)
Robert Corn-Revere is Chief Counsel of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). He has been a First Amendment litigator for more than four decades and has argued numerous cases in courts across the United States, including the Supreme Court. He is regularly listed as a leading First Amendment and media law practitioner by The Best Lawyers in America, SuperLawyers Washington, D.C., and by Chambers USA. Best Lawyers in America named him as Washington, D.C.’s 2017 “Lawyer of the Year” in the areas of First Amendment Law and Litigation – First Amendment. He was again named as Best Lawyers’ “Lawyer of the Year” for First Amendment Law for 2019 and 2021, and in Media Law for 2022. He is listed in Washingtonian Magazine's Top Lawyers Hall of Fame for Lifetime Achievement. Before joining FIRE in 2023, Corn-Revere was a partner at Davis Wright Tremaine for 20 years, and before that, a partner at Hogan & Hartson. Earlier in his career he served as legal advisor and later chief counsel to Federal Communications Commission Chairman James H. Quello. His published books include "The Mind of the Censor and the Eye of the Beholder: The First Amendment and the Censor’s Dilemma" and co-authorship of "Modern Communication Law," a three-volume treatise on communications law. In 2003, he successfully petitioned Governor George E. Pataki to grant the first posthumous pardon in New York history to the late comedian Lenny Bruce, who was convicted for “obscene” comedy routines.
CON / Arguing against protection
Susan Benesch
Founder and Director of the Dangerous Speech Project
Susan Benesch, Faculty Associate of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University, teaches human rights at American University’s School of International Service and directs the Dangerous Speech Project. Susan has taught human rights and refugee law at Georgetown and Princeton, among other universities, and has lectured at schools including Yale, Duke, Johns Hopkins, Virginia, and Humboldt University in Berlin. A human rights lawyer trained at Yale, she has also worked for the Center for Justice and Accountability, Amnesty International, and the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights (now Human Rights First). Her interest in speech dates back to her first career as a journalist. Before law school, she was chief staff writer for the Miami Herald in Haiti. She also covered wars in El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala, and reported from many countries for The New Republic, the Columbia Journalism Review, and the Crimes of War website, among other publications.
CON / Arguing against protection
Ryan Calo
Legal Scholar and Co-founder of the Center for an Informed Public, Society + Technology at UW, and the Tech Policy Lab at the University of Washington
Ryan Calo is the Virginia and Prentice Bloedel Professor at the University of Washington. He co-founded the interdisciplinary UW Tech Policy Lab, the Society + Technology at UW initiative, and the UW Center for an Informed Public. Calo holds a joint appointment at the Information School and an adjunct appointment at the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering.
Calo's research on law and emerging technology appears in leading law reviews and technical publications. His work has been translated into five languages and is frequently referenced by the national media. Calo has testified four times before the U.S. Senate. He is the author, most recently, of "Law and Technology: A Methodical Approach.”
Calo is a board member of the Electronic Information Privacy Center and the literary organizations Hugo House and The Frost Place. He serves on the steering committee of Stanford A100 and We Robot, an annual robotics and law conference which he co-founded, as well as the advisory boards of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Schwartz Reisman Institute, and other organizations. He also serves as a privacy judge for the World Bank. In 2026, he was selected as a Top 50 Legal Innovator in Academia by the National Law Review.
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Previous PRO/CONversations Debates
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Should America end birthright citizenship?
ASU's IOP hosted it's first PRO/CONversations Nonpartisan Debate on Thursday, October 9. The question was: “Should America End Birthright Citizenship?”
Arguing in favor of ending birthright citizenship was Center for Immigration Studies Executive Director Mark Krikorian, a nationally recognized expert on immigration issues, and constitutional scholar Horace Cooper, a senior fellow with the National Center for Public Policy Research.
Arguing against ending birthright citizenship was Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes and National Day Laborer Organizing Network Legal Director Chris Newman, who has worked with day laborers since 2002.