A manual for ICE's immigrant-targeting computer system, Palantir ELITE, was leaked today. Let's look at it, then step back to evaluate how far we've come along a dangerous road and where that road might take us. 🧵

1. ICE is using Palantir apps to collect biometric data on protestors. I'm working closely with @markey.senate.gov to stop this.

People from outside the area can't be expected to know that Raygun is a jokey t-shirt store that will also be a loadbearing part of the Iowa liberation struggle

Roman statue fascist bewildered by *checks notes* the concept of courage

On this topic I feel I'm eternally shouting into a void, but: Insecure and corrupt government contracting is really bad! It funds scams and criminals. This bad contract was signed back in 2024, a golden age of moral rectitude compared to today, with billionaire scammers directly in charge.

I think this is correct hence I'm going to delete a previous post in which I called someone out in this way. I genuinely want to welcome people who join in the fight.

This will never actually happen. Stephen Ehikian announced he would rewrite Federal Acquisition Regulations with AI a year ago, then he "failed up" to become an AI CEO instead. DOGE repeatedly announced AI would rewrite all IRS COBOL or whatever but none of it ever actually happened.

I went to a Wikipedia 25th birthday party yesterday. I helped an old man cite an article he'd published decades ago; for years he'd dreamed of seeing it on Wikipedia but he didn't know how to start! I reassured people that they wouldn't be judged for contributing wrong. They wouldn't break anything.

"The search and seizure of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson’s records ... was a fishing expedition intended to intimidate and retaliate against a journalist who had managed to cultivate sources all over the government," FPF's Seth Stern said. Read more in @arstechnica.com:

"ICE has made the classic Nazi mistake. They've invaded a winter people in the winter."

I don't even like to look at federal news anymore because there's so much of this: yet another SpaceX guy — so in other words a DOGE guy under Musk's control — getting appointed at the taproot of federal bureaucracy. And no one really notices.

DOGE pushed @chuckborges.bsky.social out of the SSA for revealing this data breach. But now they admit he was telling the truth.

When LEAVING the US. We are in fully in the "your papers, please" mode of fascism.

This makes every other Hatch Act violation look cute We really need a Privacy Act with teeth

my 75 year old mother is the "webmaster" for the county democrats because she's the most qualified. please. don't make her be the webmaster

DOGE actually *signed a contract* to steal Social Security data for an explicitly illegal purchase

I took infant CPR training yesterday where we pictured a lot of horrible situations but none of them were this bad

Yes, ICE is not title 18 law enforcement. They are civil title 8 immigration enforcement. They are legally allowed very narrowly defined enforcement mechanisms because they ARE NOT law enforcement. Partnering with local police or the FBI allows them to utilize title 18 law enforcement privileges.

Anyone with government experience know what an "immigration agreement" with ICE is?

"Some leaders may want to believe that ICE arrests and the icy streets of Minnesota are far enough away from their own boardrooms not to have any impact, but that belief might not hold much longer."

don't be afraid RESIST

'Why do good people resign before they are made complicit in potential crimes?' Bravo to @skiles.blue for taking on and crafting an excellent and thoughtful response but sad that someone really had to even ask. 2026 is starting out so well. #DOGE #civilservice

"when the person at the end of the telephone chain has the largest megaphone on the planet and zero interest in accuracy, that lie reaches millions of people who will never see any correction." Everything DOGE did resulted from just this type of lie-generating machine

over the course of 1871, congress held seven months of hearings on ku klux klan and other white vigilante violence in the south, they took detailed testimony from hundreds of black men and women attesting to klan terror. (1/?)

@Thanks @skiles.blue @emptywheel.bsky.social & everyone who shared perspectives here. After Trump’s 1st term, career professionals who stayed, slowed bad decisions, preserved institutional norms, and later testified. When people of integrity leave, we lose some of that remaining guardrail.

I had a lot of angst in leaving government. I WANTED to make a principled stand & go out in a blaze of glory. But there was never any stand to take - everything they did was malicious & haphazard illegality that changed every hour. There was never a plan to disrupt, & it was comply or be fired.

I hesitate to name examples but, there are all kinds of ways fascists could be using the power of government for harm, and they aren't doing so because they don't know about those powers

The entire thread is worth reading. But I'll add my own two cents, building on what John has to say: 1) Life is miserable for them. I know someone who left who says that the DOGE boys routinely opened staff meetings with racist jokes. 2) Sometimes you must refuse to be a cog in the machine.

It’s actually astounding how many prosecutor’s offices rely on one guy like this whose work is almost all in his head and who can take it all with him if he leaves, ESPECIALLY complex cases. Extend this to specialized skill sets including everything from IT to surveillance to combat training.

Agree! These are also lawyers, who have specific ethical obligations, violation of which could jeopardize their licenses. They are also likely limited in what they could say publicly, so these high-profile (coordinated?) resignations are probably their best way to draw attention to the issue.

This is a good question. Let's talk about it! Why do civil servants resign in protest? Couldn't they have done more good on the inside? 🧵

Destroy the Elon Musk infinite tax money machine

Anyway it would be cool if the left was willing to organize around women’s liberation, because the right is definitely organizing around misogynist contempt.

"the fascism that killed her is misogynistic to its core"

I keep thinking of the way this admin uses the word "fraud." Officially the DHS agents murdering people are a "fraud investigation" in Minneapolis. Fraud, to them, is being Somali, being queer, being disobedient.

I sometimes I hear "the fascists sure do hate a lot of people but at least not gay people anymore" and I really don't think that's how fascism works

You can tell from the web design of the GPS Operations Center that it's foundational infrastructure for the entire modern world. (Via @berthub.eu) gwcc-ws.cce.af.mil/gpsoc/

This after crushing CISA, DOGEing all federal tech capacity, ending the Secure by Design pledge, and cancelling grant funding for state and local cybersecurity We have invented a special new kind of danger for ourselves

Reactionary propaganda outlets publish government worker names all the time. Guess it only becomes illegal when Anna Luna doesn't like it.

If any one person saved our republic during the 21st century it was Eugene Goodman and I am sure that he hasn’t been thanked enough.

We should all know by now that, to the Trump admin, "finding fraud" means stealing personal data

The United States was the gold standard for science and technology for decades, and there was never any reason that had to end.

sometimes I like to give myself a brain owie the way you might eat a spicy pepper for fun by thinking “what if earth really does have the only life in the universe and the entire cosmos was meant to be our garden, but this is what we’re doing as a species to ourselves and our planet instead”

This is also my plan for 2026, unfollow me if you don't want patriotism content

2026, the year the world declares independence from America

It’s generally assumed that “Moby-Dick” has a canonical start date in December 1841, so there’s a good chance that Ishmael has entered the AME Zion church (then on South Second St, three blocks from the water) and the preacher he sees is Frederick Douglass. 🐋

We are losing a basic function of government

Writing hacker plots for Black Ice is a lot of speculating "will this exploit still exist in 2080?" I had used this one for the tutorial's prank war between 2 CEOs to hack a vending machine to taunt their employees. I figured a vending machine would still have this vuln but now, maybe more will...

Government is unlike anything else in society. It has unique potential to create immense value. Don’t cheap out or give up on government bc you’re hurting everyone if you do. Instead, pick *good* leaders with an appetite to invest in you and the future, bc government can when nobody else will.