Agreed to take a phone survey on vaping and the guy doing the interviewing is 1) def a vaper and 2) is telling me his beliefs after I answer. I am stopping myself from giving him feedback on this as a survey researcher, but I wouldn’t trust the data from his batch.

This exhibit at @bampfa.bsky.social looks amazing. Pedagogical sculpture 🎨

“Amid ongoing book bans and defunding in education, Syjuco insists on the enduring value of collective knowledge and radical pedagogy.” Love art as messing-making. Resonates with @thetattooedprof.bsky.social’s Radical Hope. (Berkeley is not the only place for this message though.)

Promises made, promises kept!

My new theory paper (early draft) A new reason why concentrated wealth destroys democracy: common ownership A standalone media owner maximizes profit. A common owner like Musk (who owns X + SpaceX) will run the media firm at a loss to increase the $ of his total portfolio tinyurl.com/mcekr7cd

For years I've tracked billionaire excess. Each year I show students a chart that blows their minds. This year I had to redraw it for a trillionaire: Elon Musk, $1.32T. Depressing that we're here. Silver lining: couldn't have happened to a less deserving person, proof that wealth ≠ merit.

Congrats to my friend Mark Rosenbaum, a lawyer whose work you almost certainly know even if you don’t know his name. His career has been spent fighting some of the country’s most important civil rights battles, often on behalf of people with little power and very few champions. Keep up the fight!

Goddamn that's fire.

The Obamas reminding us why they live rent free in the minds of their haters. What I would give to be in Chicago right now. What a party this is! And I’d take this vision of America over the one Trump and his ilk are selling any day.

You've got to work quite hard these days to write a piece about Black voters and not have insights from folks who study these topics for a living. Sure, there aren't nearly as many of us as there should be, but there are lots of us. Expertise and nuance matters. www.nytimes.com/2026/06/16/o...

When I was doing research for my book on BLM, I interviewed a police officer who told me that in law enforcement they often know charges won’t stick but they file them because “you might be the wrap but you won’t beat the ride.” The point is torment, conviction would be a happy accident.

The center-white punditocracy spent ~2 decades sarcastically scare-quoting through takes like "Oh, sure, Oberlin students. Eeeverything's about gender and race. Eeeverything's about how white men perform their masculinity & their whiteness." Next thing you know: Pete Hegseth & UFC White House Night.

My partner @villarrecords.bsky.social has a new essay on Stephanie Syjuco's Present Tense (Roll Call), a 63-foot installation he curated at @bampfa.bsky.social. Essay & installation ask how we sustain learning when knowledge is under attack. On view thru 6/28. journalpanorama.org/article/call...

Our department has three calls for tenure track positions. IE is a fast growing group of scholars doing top-notch work, which offers very attractive conditions in a great European city. If you are looking for an academic job in Europe, definitely do consider applying.

Fascinating work by my pal @naunovmartin.bsky.social. Add this to your Pride month reading list.

I love how people can breezily be like “so much that divides people” like it’s a brunch menu when the division is over whether people should be dead or not

Baseball and How Not To President. Plus so many links @hakeemjefferson.bsky.social @rickhasen.bsky.social @dcinbox.bsky.social @smotus.bsky.social @mirandayaver.bsky.social @dandrezner.bsky.social @jennmjacksonphd.bsky.social and many more goodpoliticsbadpolitics.substack.com/p/baseball-a...

YOLO

If you study the politics of education (or, honestly, the politics of anything else in the U.S.), this is worth a read Jefferson helps clarify some of the issues I've been struggling with as I write a book on the causes and consequences of rising partisan conflict in K-12 education

Tldr: I am all for coalition building, but I agree 💯 with this piece that the insistence of gradual consensus-building in climate debates - as in others (eg race, sexuality, etc) - is not fit for this historical moment. If anything, this has created cracks that are feeding authoritarians now. 6/

In line with what @hakeemjefferson.bsky.social writes here, I've heard smart people talking about the current climate cultural wars with a ~mea culpa attitude, as if progressive activists and climate scientists should have seen this coming and must have insulated from polarization on the matter. 2/

This is a great read, for how beautifully it is written and all the substantive reasons. It points at something I have been thinking a lot about in my own domain of research, climate politics, in this historical moment. Tldr: polarization is a problem, but depolarization is not the solution. 1/n

Pleased to post my draft article, “Discovering the Historical Anglo-American Constitution.” I study the history of birthright citizenship from the 1100s to the 1700s. The English common-law rule of natural-born subjects was always tied to territory and jurisdiction. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Mike has written a terrific book about what happened in state legislatures after the imposition of Jim Crow. Data are amazing, analysis is nuanced, and the lessons are important. Check it out!

Stolen Representation by Michael P. Olson This book uses a tremendous amount of new historical data to illuminate how voting rights shape legislative representation. 📚 https://cup.org/3PNjr1B

Black Freedom in Banff! Such a thrill to be a part of the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes convening this year, what a wonderful place to celebrate my publication date! June 2!!!

It’s the 19th anniversary of Lori Baker accidentally becoming Tetris world champion. The story is probably best told by her husband here

Dr Pacheco-Vega was an incredibly generous and supportive scholar and teacher. I regret that I never had the honour of meeting him in person but speaking to him on Academic Twitter was always a pleasure. What a heartbreaking loss for his loved ones, colleagues, and students.

Very sorry to hear this tragic news. Raul was an irrepressible force for good, and we're much poorer for his passing. Descanse en paz, Raul.

“Anti diversity stance” there’s a shorter way to say that www.nytimes.com/2026/06/01/u...

My friend @rachelporter.bsky.social producing bangers as always

A brilliant and useful piece you should read by @perrybaconjr.bsky.social and @jakemgrumbach.bsky.social.

this is a sound analysis; I’ve done some psychometric work on the measurement of affective polarization but the latter is interesting only because deeper conflicts about the structuring of society are channeled through the organizational container of partisanship

"I...worry that polarization has become such a dominant lens that it obscures other questions...Questions about power. Questions about democratic commitment. Questions about institutional asymmetries. Questions about who is asked to bear the burden of coexistence in moments of democratic strain."

👇🎯 Purely anecdotal, but I do not think it is coincidental that most of the political scientists in 🇺🇸 that I know & who are more skeptical of polarization are some combination of not-white, not-male, not-Christian, & not-heterosexual.

Yeah, this is the stuff.

That’s right

Here are remarks I gave at the Keeping the Republic Conference at Notre Dame. If you’ve followed me over the past decade or so, my skepticism toward the field’s fixation on polarization likely won’t come as much of a surprise. But here they are, for what they’re worth. substack.com/home/post/p-...

Loved having Hakeem, Ivy, and so many other brilliant folks on campus this week. Hakeem will claim he beat me on a women and politics trivia question but I assure you that is a LIE.

Thanks to the folks at Notre Dame for such a wonderful conference, “Keeping the Republic.” So great spending time with colleagues so deeply committed to understanding this difficult moment for American democracy and trying their best to do something about it. Also, Notre Dame is crazy beautiful!

The repressed conservative ideas courses are so popular that the government has to make students want them.

I say without hyperbole that this is the most brazenly corrupt action in US Presidential history. That it does not immediately lead to impeachment is a dangerous sign of how far the rule of law has declined.

“That’s where billionaires like yourself come in. For a mere $10 million gift, you can help us remake the intellectual landscape by endowing a prestigious chair in an underrepresented subfield, such as geocentric astronomy, high-energy phlogiston physics, or patriotic history.“ 😂

As I’ve said before, Platner is a good example of how perceived electability advantage, often afforded to white men like him, can weaken Democrats’ fidelity to their values and make them more willing to engage in Trump-like excuse making for inexcusable behavior. www.nytimes.com/2026/05/10/o...

Democracy is when fewer votes win.

Important and illuminating conversation

Black people are giving it these Confederates raw and uncut. This is how it’s gonna be now. You wonder what we’re thinking? It’s this. I believe this is activist Gary Chambers again in Louisiana.