Man, @donmoyn.bsky.social's substack remains one of the best places to get concrete political science insights into our authoritarian consolidation. His guest authors today talk about secret police. I will definitely be getting their book open.substack.com/pub/donmoyni...
excellent deep dive into all of the ways that the Trump administration has used the federal budget to keep punishing critics and trying to bend them to his will. FWIW, this is precisely how Viktor Orban crushed the opposition in Hungary 15 years ago. The national budget is a powerful weapon.
New in PN: Trump's Iran War and the Article One crisis
"Unless and until the GOP acknowledges that the country is in the grip of a madman bent on consolidating all constitutional power in him and him alone, Trump is free to singlehandedly decide to go to war. That's not how it's supposed to work."
"She really showed you can be a genius and be kind, and one of those things did not have to come at the expense of the other."
NEW: Guards have taken away crayons, colored pencils & paper during recent room searches at Dilley, according to detainees and others. After one inspection, the children just “cried and cried and cried,” a mother said. The facility denies the claims.
By @mckenziefunk.com @micarosenberg.bsky.social
One thing that’s concerning about this (beyond the obvious) is that anything you dump this many billions of dollars into necessarily creates a massive and well-funded political constituency for its own perpetuation.
these are two headlines in the last 24 hours...humanity had a good run
Since this will likely come up in the SOTU: Yes, US stock markets are up since Trump took office (14%).
But in the rest of the world, markets are up WAY more. Cumulative market gains are more than triple ours (43%)
"In 1979, welfare benefits reached eighty-two out of every one hundred families with children in poverty. When TANF was first introduced, that number dropped to sixty-eight. By 2020, a mere twenty-one out of every hundred impoverished families managed to access this resource...That was on a national level. In Georgia, only five out of every one hundred families living below the poverty line received support through TANF in 2020, even though they were eligible for the assistance" (p. 137).
A striking stat from Brian Goldstone’s “There Is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America”
“I heard the officer say ‘that ain’t shit’.”
NASHVILLE — ICE shatter a car window in front of a newborn, refuse to look at man’s license & work visa… drag him out of his car, hit him, mock him for being Guatemalan (he’s from Mexico), laugh when he begs to say goodbye.
One day in the future, this is going to hang on the wall of a museum exhibit people visit in silence.
two headlines tell the story of America
A British grandmother with a valid visa detained by ICE for 6 weeks.
"So why did ICE detain her, and keep her locked up for so long? ICE officers are paid a bonus every time they detain someone. 'Individual ICE agents get money per head that they detain – the guards told me that,' Karen says."
This 53 year old man who lived in my neighborhood w/no criminal record & who had been in the US for 30 years, was detained and thrown into a cold cell for days, caught pneumonia and COVID there and deported.
He finally died.
I am so angry.
www.kptv.com/2026/02/21/n...
An ICE agent shot and killed Ruben Ray Martinez, a US citizen and San Antonio resident, in March 2025. Then ICE and the Texas Department of Public Safety covered it up. He was 23 years old. I am calling for a full investigation into this shooting, including why there was an 8-month cover up.
It is pretty telling that it comes as something of a surprise that the Supreme Court sided with the Constitution over Trump.
we couldn't use government funds to buy coffee (like, folgers ground coffee) when i worked on a CDC outbreak emergency response
Bolsonaro in prison, Yeon sentenced to prison, Andrew arrested on his birthday...and America still holding on to a 34 count felon as President.
I mean, that would be fine if it were true. Obeying the Constitution makes it unfeasible to do certain things, and that’s fine—indeed, it’s sort of the point. But it’s also sort of absurd to act like getting a warrant to execute a home arrest is some crazy insuperable barrier.
Particularly hilarious is his claim that 'nobody dies to defend a "multicultural economic zone"' when in fact a lot of US propaganda during WWII stressed that the nation is a multicultural melting pot. That was how we were going to defeat the master race...the one Musk is pining for.
I realize media doesn’t think it’s a big deal that Trump, Vance & Hegseth continue to give partisan political speeches to troops, evidenced by the fact that they are never asked about it nor are members of Congress, but it is one of the most dangerous things happening right now.
As a direct result of the obscene actions of Russell Vought and Elon Musk in destroying USAID, we can expect “at least 9.4 million additional deaths by 2030, if the current funding trend continues.
About 2.5 million of those deaths are projected to be children under the age of 5.”
NEW: How a Planned Disney World Vacation Turned Into Four Months in Immigration Detention
9-year-old Maria Antonia begged her mom to take her to the park’s annual Halloween celebration. But as soon as she arrived at Miami International Airport, everything started going wrong.
DOGE allegedly used ChatGPT to identify 1,400 NEH grants it said were DEI. Grants were terminated April 2025, according to a court filing. E.g.
Film: 1873 Colfax massacre
Film: first female pilots flying for U.S. military in WWII
Film: “Untold Story of Jewish Women Slave Labor in the Holocaust"
I don’t really know what I expect in posting this, but maybe some people see it and can learn from it.
I’ll call it “lessons from an unwilling immigration attorney.”
1/
There is literally no better example of textbook fascistic thinking than "Who cares about human rights when the rich are doing so very well"
Reminder: It has been a very bad flu season. Undercutting flu vaccination is a perfect Trump Administration special combination of stupid and dangerous.
