Heather Randell

Congrats to Rep. @katiejonesmpls.bsky.social and family, who biked to the hospital last week and came back with baby Hans. Here's what she told me about the ride:

A photo of Doc Brown from Back to the Future holding jumper cables labelled "Deranged Activist" with a grant of NIH funding curves below it.

My weekly update on NIH funding

This includes awards made through 2/27/26

Warning: This thread contains data compiled by a known deranged_activist™. Do not read while operating heavy machinery.

1/9

Units across the university are modeling potential double digit potential cuts

While some of USAID’s food assistance programs got moved to USDA, it appears that the Emergency Food Security program, started in 2010 by Obama, got completely axed 💔

I happen to have this info because I just taught a class on US international food aid. Because this administration demolished USAID and erased every sign of its existence on the internet, I couldn’t get any more recent data. I had FY22 data from the last time I taught it the class in 2023.

USAID’s Emergency Food Security Program spent $4 billion in FY2022 to feed 114 million people in 55 countries. We just blew that much money in four days of this war.

With this war on Iran costing $1B per day, we are now at 4$B, an amount that would fund 3,200 five year NIH biomedical research grants.

Gotta show the whole distribution. It’s all good biking weather

just thinking about how USAID was dismantled under the rationale of cost savings but there's an unlimited budget for war

Just another sunny winter day in Minneapolis. 😎

Heads up US demographers. Our main NIH study sections (SSPA/SSPB) are being disbanded. I don’t know what this means. public.csr.nih.gov/StudySection...

I like politicians who tell it like it is.

2 hours ago Shawn McCreesh Reporting from the White House After just a few minutes, Trump has moved on from his war in Iran to the curtains he's picked out for the White House and his new ballroom. "I picked those drapes in my first term," he says. "I always liked gold." There's light chuckling in the room.

If only this were from an article in @theonion.com.

As I ask myself everyday, how is this our reality?

“Social media users are already referring to the attack as “Operation Epstein Fury,” suggesting it is an attempt to distract from…the recent story that the Department of Justice illegally withheld an allegation that Trump raped a 13-year-old.”

'Sinners' Gets an Tiny Desk Concert That's So Damn Good Buddy Guy and Miles Caton don't summon any spirits, but listening to them together will make your day better.

‘Sinners’ Gets an NPR Tiny Desk Concert That’s So Damn Good

Minnesota House Dems propose emergency rental assistance, Republicans vote it down • Minnesota Reformer Democratic lawmakers proposed $50 million in one-time emergency rental assistance to support families impacted by Operation Metro Surge in the first meeting of the year of the House housing committee....

That would be nice, but this is where things are at, for example.

minnesotareformer.com/briefs/house...

And this has not stopped either 👇🏼

bsky.app/profile/tayl...

I wish I could make this, it looks great! I won't be able to get there until Wednesday evening sadly.

This has not stopped despite people here being tired and tapped out of money. 👇

bsky.app/profile/whst...

Sock monkeys holding signs that say “STOP ICE” and “STOP KILLING OUR NEIGHBORS”

Things feels calmer now in Minneapolis but the ICE siege is far from over. Many families are traumatized and remain in hiding, we still have over 900 ICE agents in Minnesota, and the economic impacts on our city—and especially on our targeted neighbors—are staggering.

Sunny skies and houses in South Minneapolis

Another gloriously sunny February day.

My cat sitting on a book entitled I AM A CAT

On the nose like this pic of my cat Oyster.

Thanks, I’ll start checking more closely, thigh it seems like they come from different domains each time. They’re so obviously spammy that I can’t wrap my head around why the spam filter isn’t catching them.

Spam email

Third spam in the last half hour.

I "report spam" every single time BTW.

Spam email that gets through my Gmail spam filters everyday.

Help! I get ~5 spam emails like these in my personal Gmail inbox every single day—they don't go to the spam folder. It's starting to drive me mad. Does anyone know how to make it stop?!?!?

Humphrey School building with bright blue skies.

Case in point: today!

And most crucially, we have MANY sunny days in Minneapolis in the winter.

A Minnesota chickadee license plate with the license plate number CHCKAD

In Minnesota, lots of people get nature license plates to support habitat conservation. This chickadee plate person opted to really go on the nose with their personalization!

ACLU MN reported yesterday that the federal government filed sworn statements that there are 970 agents in Minnesota for Operation Metro Surge & that 407 agents will remain here in March. It’s important to note this is on top of the 190 agents that were already assigned before this surge started.