NBC News finds that: -- ICE has shortened its training from 13 weeks to six. -- Nearly half of recruits couldn’t pass an open-book written exam. -- Recruits "are supposed to attest" they can pass the physical-fitness test, which requires them to run ... 6 mph. www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcn...

#tradwives - and the broader womanosphere - are not harmless social media trends. They’re an intentional right-wing strategy to tap into what so many women are feeling: exhaustion. Listen to today’s episode of White Picket Fence with guests @annehelen.bsky.social and Sophie Lewis. lnk.to/wpf-ep5

Updating my LEGO White House

See what they’re doing here? Moving oversight of the most essential resources for children with disabilities to the guy who…has said reprehensible things about children with disabilities and is spewing disinformstion about autism. #ProtectSpecialEducation share.google/p6rJvmXXk6R3...

This is what democracy looks like. #NoKings

Chilling.

I was delighted to be joined by @jmillzdc.bsky.social, Pasha Dashtgard from @perilresearch.bsky.social & @kathrynajoyce.bsky.social on ep. 4 of White Picket Fence to discuss young men’s rightward turn and the massive, decades-long investment in media that facilitated it. 🎧 now: lnk.to/wpf-ep4

The Trump Administration just hollowed out the office within the Department of Education that administers IDEA, which supports students with disabilities. Apparently, this horrific history is what they aspire to recreate. #IDEA #SpEd #educationforall

Sick and amoral. abcnews.go.com/amp/Politics...

True scientific method in action: 1) Draw your conclusion 2) Gather "data" and conduct "analysis" to align with conclusion 3) Develop post hoc "theory" that links your conclusion to your "results" 4) Restate your conclusion and pat yourself on your back for your prescience

Loved having you on the show, @kieraevebutler.bsky.social! Check out today’s episode, which examines how pronatalism is part of a larger gender backlash.

We loved having you on the show! @praeyesright.bsky.social

I was delighted to welcome Annie Wilkinson from @praeyesright.bsky.social on this week’s episode of White Picket Fence to explain why the weaponization of gender and sexuality is a universal feature of authoritarianism. 🎧 here: lnk.to/wpf-ep2

NEW—US Department of Education sent out standard Out of Office language to employees on Wednesday in light of shutdown. Later yesterday, workers tell me they found someone had updated their auto-responses without consent to a new one blaming Democrats. Version of original on left, updated on right:

We loved having you on, @bschillace.brandyschillace.com! Such important history - and parallels to today.

✨ Check it out - season 6 episode of my podcast, White Picket Fence, just dropped! ✨ Our first episode features @imarajones.bsky.social from @translash.org and @gbbranstetter.bsky.social from @aclu.org disucssing how anti-trans attacks are part of a larger gender backlash. 🎧 here: lnk.to/wpfep1

If you’re interested in conversations about gender politics and its impact on American life, subscribe and listen to this season of the award-winning podcast, White Picket Fence, with @juliekkohler.bsky.social.

The trailer for the 6th season of my podcast, White Picket Fence, just dropped! This season tackles the growing gender backlash in the U.S. - from anti-trans attacks to pronatalism to online “manosphere” influencers - and asks what it means for our democracy. Subscribe now! 🎧 lnk.to/wpftrailer

Facilitating a descent into authoritarianism at every step. #capturedcourt www.nytimes.com/live/2025/09...

Never been so happy to be a YouTube TV subscriber. Bye, Fox! 👋 variety.com/2025/tv/news...

“After years watching Hungary suffocate under the weight of its democratic collapse, I came to understand that the real danger of a strongman isn’t his tactics; it’s how others, especially those with power, justify their acquiescence.” www.nytimes.com/2025/07/23/o...

NEW: We found the politicization of intelligence. Tulsi Gabbard is running a con job generating fake evidence for a fake criminal case against Obama and others—all to help Trump distract from the Epstein mess and feed Trump’s desire for revenge. This is fraud. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

“A society is only as strong as its most vulnerable members.” On that account, we are failing miserably. #Medicaid #Medicaidcuts www.nytimes.com/2025/07/21/w...

“To tell such egregious lies for the approval of some higher authority is to prostrate yourself — to show, for the world to see, your lack of self-respect.” Perfectly stated, @jamellebouie.net. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/19/o...

NEWS from me: The Trump administration has decided to destroy almost $10 million worth of contraceptives rather than send them to women in need overseas. The destruction itself will cost $167,000, the state department told me. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

👏👏👏, @annagreenberg.bsky.social. There is a difference between finding ways to address the challenges men are experiencing (esp. as a result of decades if failed economic policies) and kicking women to the curb. thehill.com/opinion/camp...

5 rural nursing homes in upper PA are at risk of closing b/c of GOP cuts to Medicaid. The nursing homes are in districts represented by Republicans who voted to close them. “The cuts represent the largest cuts to Medicaid in history & are going to have impacts across PA.” @alexsjacquez.bsky.social

Destroying everything public how you destroy a sense of shared identity. Of connection. Of shared fate. It is how you sow division and resentment and chaos.

NEW: The US government has added the DNA of approximately 133,000 migrant children and teens to a criminal database, which critics say could mean police treat them like suspects “indefinitely.”

Thanks to yesterday’s #SCOTUS ruling, it is about to become much harder to ensure that disabled students receive the free, adequate public education to which they are legally entitled. #SpecialEducation www.urban.org/urban-wire/h...

I feel seen.

Devastating. But I guess SCOTUS is letting its true color fly. Anyone who thinks that Roberts and Barrett will save us should, once again, understand that they are 💯 on board with this agenda. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

You think you can’t be shocked anymore. And yet…

“At Mason, the foxes are in the henhouse….It’s an inside job.” @bletiecq.bsky.social calling out the right’s war on higher ed. 👏

“The idea that they’ve been hiring the best and the brightest is laughable,” said one career diplomat. “This has been a windfall for young and often mediocre White men.” www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

The maintenance of an extreme and innate gender binary is fundamental to the maintenance of the gender hierarchy.

This is a really important tool. Many health insurance corporations routinely unjustly deny claims just because they know many patients won’t fight. Demand that they account for their decisions and provide the care they are legally required to provide (all while fighting for a better system)!

White Picket Fence, won a Webby Award! Since then, the “marriage panic” has grown and become intertwined with a broader “anti-gender” movement. Starting this Sept, we’ll explore the gender backlash - what it is, why it’s happening, & what we can do to stop it. Stay tuned! 🎧 #signalboost #sociology

We are in a pronatalist dystopia: paying girls to have babies when they are barely adults themselves.

The tip of the horrible iceberg that is coming our way under RFK Jr’s HHS…

​"Holy shit, a real masks-off moment," one professor said of the Trump IRS letting churches endorse political candidates. "The divide between church and state is already falling. The divide between church and political group will disappear." www.commondreams.org/news/johnson...

Can I get an “Amen” from the parents buckling under the horror that is summer camp schedules?! Also, just a friendly reminder that this is all is going to get much worse this fall, thanks to the Trump Administration’s withholding of $7B in education funding.

Of course they did. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/u...

"At this rate, housework [between men and women] will be equal sometime around the year 2066." 🫠 www.nbcnews.com/data-graphic...

The cruelty is the point. Trump Withholds Nearly $7 Billion for Schools, With Little Explanation www.nytimes.com/2025/07/01/u...

Terrific. These guys sound fun. 👀 www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

I am grieving the barbarism that is going to unfurl from all this. People are going to die. Livelihoods gone. All to feed a corrupt kleptocracy. I see every day up close how different it is from the first time around. There are no guardrails. A disaster. I’m sorry we have to live through this.

Trump and the Republican Congress literally just took health care and food from struggling families to give a TRILLION dollars to the top 1% over the next decade. They own that now.

I don’t think anyone is prepared for what they just did w/ ICE. This is not a simple budget increase. It is an explosion - making ICE bigger than the FBI, US Bureau of Prisons, DEA,& others combined. It is setting up to make what’s happening now look like child’s play. And people are disappearing.

Lunacy. They just funded Trump’s private army.