A look at the legal background of the person who Trump just made one of the top prosecutors in the country so that she can go after his enemies www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Spent some time shadowing Greg Casar (and Dolores Huerta!) during the redistricting fight. His predicament embodied the party's: a rising generation of leaders, caught between a defiant old guard and an opposition willing to change the rules to stop them www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

NEW: “I’m pretty sure that Chuck E. Cheese has more of an in-depth prior hiring process." Mother Jones investigates the man sending armed military contractors to Gaza in an operation some of his own employees have called "amateur."

New: "These guys are literally cowboys." A look at the former Green Beret and hangover prevention company founder now in charge of the heavily armed American contractors accused of misconduct in Gaza. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

"These guys are literally cowboys... They’re not aid workers who have any understanding or any ability to do this work." www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Here is some of the history of the former Green Beret now in charge of the heavily armed American contractors accused of misconduct in Gaza. Read the full story here: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

New: How Jameson Govoni—a little-known former Green Beret and serial small-time entrepreneur—ended up at the center of a dubious scheme to deliver aid in Gaza. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

New: We just published a video featuring parts of our interview with Neri Alvarado, who spent more than 4 months in CECOT after the Trump administration falsely accused him of being a gang member. As you can see in the video, his largest tattoo is an autism awareness ribbon.

“There’s no family here, there are no lawyers here, nobody exists here.” For four months, Neri Alvarado, Julio Zambrano, and so many others wondered if they were ever going to leave CECOT alive. Now, they want to clear their names and justice for what they had to endure. With @nlanard.bsky.social:

NEW: We spoke to 3 Venezuelans about the hell they experienced at CECOT in El Salvador. Neri Alvarado, the 25-year-old with an autism awareness ribbon tattooed on his leg, told us that even the ICE agent who questioned him concluded he was not part of a gang. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

This is a great reporting by Noah Lanard www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

In a previously unreported comment, a person with a username associated with Darryl Cooper/Martyr Made wrote on a white nationalist website: "Think of how most people you know got here. It wasn’t from basic American ideology to reading Mein Kampf and then, boom, they’re onboard. It’s a process..."

New: How Darryl Cooper/Martyr Made went from appearing on an obscure neo-Confederate podcast to bringing David Irving's pseudohistory to millions of people on Carlson and Rogan. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

One of the men @jessicaschulberg.bsky.social and I wrote about is Ysqueibel Yonaiquer Peñaloza Chirinos. He came into the U.S. legally, through the CBP One app. His family has worked tirelessly to secure his release from CECOT. Tonight, they got to hug him again. His mother Ydalys shares this video:

Many of these people came to the United States for protection. Never forget what they got instead. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

CONFIRMED: Arturo Suárez, the musician imprisoned by the Trump admin without due process in El Salvador for 4 months is FREE. A video shows him telling his brother that while they were imprisoned, they were beaten daily by guards. Remember: this is the first ever mass release from CECOT.

Incredibly powerful moment as some of Neri Alvarado's relatives see him walking off the plane in Venezuela after his release from CECOT. He was targeted because of his tattoos—the largest of which is an autism awareness ribbon featuring his brother's name

"The bitterness is still there. The anger about what happened to him is still there.” After four months, more than 200 men sent to El Salvador have been released from CECOT and returned to Venezuela. @nlanard.bsky.social and I spoke with family members and friends waiting to be reunited with them.

CONFIRMED: Neri Alvarado, the Venezuelan man imprisoned by the Trump admin without due process for 4 months in El Salvador because of bureaucratic errors stemming from his autism awareness tattoo honoring his brother, is FREE.

Amazing AP image from Ariana Cubillos of Arturo Suárez, a Venezuelan musician sent to CECOT, walking off the plane. (Identified to me by a relative.) “We spent four months without any contact with the outside world,” Suárez told teleSUR today. “We were kidnapped.”

A sister as well as a friend of Neri Alvarado Borges confirm that he is now back in Venezuela. Neri's wrongful imprisonment attracted international attention. He is the 25-year-old with an autism awareness ribbon tattooed on his leg. This is him leaving the plane.

NEW: Story from @isabelaalhadeff.bsky.social and me based on interviews with families of the men returned to Venezuela tonight after Trump disappeared them to El Salvador in March. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Earlier today, the mother of Julio Zambrano, one of the Venezuelans sent to CECOT, was told to go to Caracas for some "good news." She's at the airport in anticipation of her son's arrival after four long months. @nlanard.bsky.social and I are in touch with other families as they wait for more news.

@isabelaalhadeff.bsky.social and I are in touch with some of the family members of Venezuelans sent to CECOT. They've heard their loved ones are on their way home and are on their way to reunite with them. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

NEW: Jordan Lasker recently made news by leaking hacked admissions data about Zohran Mamdani. Our investigation shows a Reddit user who posted highly specific details that fit with his offline life once wrote: “I actually am a Jewish White Supremacist Nazi.” www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

speaking of checking boxes www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

New: After he leaked Zohran Mamdani’s Columbia application data to the New York Times, critics called Jordan Lasker a “eugenicist.” A Mother Jones report shows there’s much more to his backstory. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Sharing this profile I did of Andy Ogles in light of his disgusting call to deport Zohran Mamdani. This is a guy who appears to have lied about: Speaking German, Japanese, and Russian. Being on the board of a YMCA. A job at a nonexistent company. And much more. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Andy Ogles, by the way, is just a weird sad guy who might literally just be there so he doesn't get fined: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

IDF soldiers in Gaza told Haaretz that "the army has deliberately fired at Palestinians near aid distribution sites." "[C]ommanders ordered troops to shoot at crowds to drive them away or disperse them, even though it was clear they posed no threat." www.haaretz.com/israel-news/...

Highly recommend this New Yorker profile from 2000 of Mira Nair for understanding how Mamdani came to be who he is. "Nair is, above all, a populist—a mass communicator who actually maintains contact with the masses." www.newyorker.com/magazine/200...

a lot wrong here but i think you should simply not wear your vintage Guinness shirt to meet with members of Congress, at a federal building, about your government job

in other mayoral news, my colleagues and I put together a full episode of Reveal on the fracturing of the Democratic party and the clamoring for a course correction, whatever that means. From Tucson to Corona, Queens: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

My big story about Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon: nymag.com/intelligence...

This is how a poster created by a guy who uses the n-word and shares posts from a neo-Nazi ended up on the official White House Instagram account. The image calls on Americans to "Report All Foreign Invaders" to ICE. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

I wrote about the rise and fall of Steward Health Care—fueled by a private equity firm, a real estate trust, & multimillionaire executives. The saga is a stunning indictment of what happens when financiers try to squeeze huge returns from the places that save people's lives. /1 shorturl.at/TcvV7

For Mother Jones, Isabela Dias and I interviewed 6 Venezuelans who were accused without evidence of being gang members, loaded onto a bus at a Texas detention center on April 18, and likely nearly sent to El Salvador without due process. A thread on Stiven Prieto, one of the men targeted by ICE.

“I told him, ‘that’s impossible, they don’t have any evidence of that.’ He said, ‘no sé, mami,’ and he started crying. The other guy next to him said, ‘We have nothing to do with Tren de Aragua.'” www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

“I can’t remember a situation that was this urgent or extraordinary," ACLU's Lee Gelernt told @nlanard.bsky.social and I, "where we were worried that every minute we delayed filing something could mean that our clients would end up permanently in a brutal foreign prison for the rest of their lives.”

I was able to talk about the danger to one of our clients at @unlvimmigration.bsky.social (co-counsel with @aclunv.bsky.social), and the absurdity of giving someone just 24 hour warning that he might be sent to a foreign prison, never to return. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

We just published an investigation about six Venezuelans who were accused of being gang members and likely near sent to a Salvadoran prison this month. They insist they are being falsely accused. A quick thread on who they are and what's happening to them. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

The men include: - Stiven Prieto, a barber who has tattoos relating to his job - Omar Cárdenas, an H-E-B- employee whose pocketwatch tattoo was labeled TDA - Gregori Díaz, arrested in North Carolina, who has tattoos of Pikachu, Mario, stars, and a rose. - José Caldera, whose partner is a citizen.

New: We interviewed six detained Venezuelans who the Trump admin accused of being gang members and likely nearly sent to El Salvador this month without due process. They—and their relatives—insist they are innocent and provided extensive evidence to support that. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

“I felt this kind of fear, like something was telling me we weren’t going to Venezuela at all. Because the cops, when they had us here, they kept laughing a lot." @nlanard.bsky.social and I interviewed six Venezuelans who were nearly removed from Bluebonnet—presumably to El Salvador—on April 18.

BREAKING: SCOTUS orders the government not to remove anyone from the United States under Trump’s Alien Enemies Act proclamation who is a part of the potential class in the Northern District of Texas case until further order of the court. Only Thomas and Alito note their dissent.

New: @isabelaalhadeff.bsky.social and I spoke to lawyers and a relative of Venezuelans at the Bluebonnet detention center in Texas at risk of imminent removal under the Alien Enemies Act—potentially to El Salvador. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Latest with @nlanard.bsky.social: We spoke with relatives of Omar Cárdenas, one of the Venezuelans at the Bluebonnet detention center in Texas who could be removed under the Alien Enemies Act any day now. "He is not a criminal, as he is being portrayed. He is completely and utterly innocent.”

@nlanard.bsky.social and @isabelaalhadeff.bsky.social revealed that immigrants with no criminal record were being snatched by ICE based on their innocuous tattoos. The government claimed that these tattoos were evidence of membership in a notorious gang. bit.ly/42qyCSt

Honored to receive this month's Sidney Award with @isabelaalhadeff.bsky.social. As we continue to report on this, please reach out via email or Signal (link in story below) if there are things you think we should be covering.