New gig announcement: I'm very happy to report that today is my first day at @lookoutnews.bsky.social I'll be covering the Arizona statehouse, immigration and border issues, and plenty more. Follow Lookout, www.lookoutnews.org, read our work, and reach out with tips or comments!

Full write up on Tuesday’s Surprise City Council meeting where 1000+ community members showed up to oppose a recently purchased industrial warehouse located across from a high school, a preschool and middle school that DHS/ICE plans to use as a concentration camp. It’s the size of 7 football fields.

After a few weeks delay, ICE just released new detention statistics. They show 70,766 people in detention as of 1/26/2026. I believe this is the first time this data source has reported a detained population over 70k.

Yesenia had walked thousands of miles through the Darién Gap and through Mexico to get a modicum of safety and security for her children in Tucson. Then a traffic stop destroyed it all @jwashing.bsky.social follows the story of one family after deportation azluminaria.org/a-long-way-h...

Federal immigration agents shoot another person, south of Tucson: via @maxgranger.info maxgranger.substack.com/p/breaking-b...

Three free (and very relevant) e-books available from @haymarketbooks.org right now "Unbuild Walls" by @silkys13.bsky.social "Border and Rule" by @harshawalia.bsky.social and my "The Case for Open Borders" www.haymarketbooks.org/blogs/525-fr...

For @truthout.org I wrote an analysis of the mass deportation boom during 2025. Amid all the spectacle, the passage of the funding bill in July was an ominous milestone in the history of U.S. immigration policy and the Trump administration's aspiring fascism. truthout.org/articles/tru...

Here's the follow up to last year's story of a Venezuelan snatched off the streets for driving too slowly and deported to Mexico. Violence of arrest/detention caused her to miscarry. Collaboration with Erik López of La Silla Rota & @azluminaria.org johnwashington.substack.com/p/blowtorch-...

www.bunkhistory.org/resources/th... h/t @jwashing.bsky.social

The Washington Post just reported that the death of Geraldo Lunas Campos at the detention facility in El Paso known as Camp East Montana on January 3 may have been a homicide. Coroner reports suggest that he died from asphyxiation — possibly from a choke hold. www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/...

This year felt like a decade. I wanted to highlight some of the immigration reporting I've done over the past 12 months: In January, I wrote about the big money fueling the right's plot to end birthright citizenship.

Last newsletter of the year, a recap of my reading and how I worked through a writer’s block. johnwashington.substack.com/p/best-of-2026

Looking for someone who can help me accurately translate a few short lines of Turkish. It's for a chapter of my book on immigration detention centers. Any takers, contacts, or tips would be very much appreciated.

American Immigration Council said in October that the Trump admin has been deadlier for ICE detainees than the COVID-19 pandemic. And, as Rep. Jayapal notes below, more immigrants have died since then: www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/blog/trump-d...

Due process at work. I traveled to El Salvador because Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s case was always about more than one man. It was about our constitutional rights. We’re fighting for fair treatment for every immigrant wrongfully detained or deported. We need to stay loud.

On Immigration “extremism”. My latest newsletter: substack.com/@jbwashing/n...

ICE raid today in Tucson. Newly seated Rep Adelita Grijalva and protesters who turned out to protect their neighbors got flash-banged, pepper sprayed, pushed. At least two were arrested.

And another important story from @jwashing.bsky.social reveals that county supervisors rejected efforts (3-2) to weigh the health and water impacts of Project Blue, a last-ditch effort to conduct more oversight of the proposed massive data center. azluminaria.org/2025/12/02/p...

“More than a million immigrants have disappeared from the US workforce since Trump took office.” @andrewperez.bsky.social reports on an anti-ICE ad campaign calling for ICE agents to quit. Read more: zeteo.com/p/ad-campaig...

What interviews were 'Best of 2025'? Our July guests: @jwashing.bsky.social, “The Roots of Bukele’s Gulag" @nyrb-imprints.bsky.social. Suzy Hansen, "Crimes of the Century" @nymag.com. @kamaufranklin.bsky.social, "No Cop City, No Cop World" @haymarketbooks.org). www.patreon.com/posts/on-sev...

Nearly 1400 people have been ordered into Pima County’s Restoration to Competency program to see if they can stand trial That can mean more than a year in jail, waiting. My colleague @jwashing.bsky.social writes about when jail becomes a mental health facility azluminaria.org/2025/11/24/w...

Congress wrote into the law that someone who overstays a visa while applying for asylum is not considered to be accruing “unlawful presence,” but it didn’t explicitly say those people couldn’t be arrested and detained — because it was presumed that they wouldn’t be. Well, Trump is doing it.

Want some background reading to better understand the slow (but really not that slow) explosion of immigration detention capacity? My latest newsletter, plus an update on my book in progress. johnwashington.substack.com/p/reading-re...

I never realized that when I stick my reporter’s notebook in my back pocket like this the pages flap down. (Shot by a friend in Rio Negro, Alta Verapaz, Guatemala)

John Washington has been doing some incredibly impactful storytelling on borders, immigration, and now enforced disappearance. Check out his latest piece and be sure to follow him.

On forced disappearance in Guatemala and the United States open.substack.com/pub/johnwash...

azluminaria.org/2025/10/07/a... New jaguar sighting, bold new resolution from Tohono O'odham's San Xavier District: The jaguar is “a guardian of the people and the natural world,” the resolution reads, “a sacred being with deep connections to O’odham stories and traditional beliefs.”

Breaking: Massive Amazon data center is back in development in Pima County after a fierce fight this summer, in which the greater Tucson community pushed back hard against the developers. Latest, along with @yanak.bsky.social for @azluminaria.org azluminaria.org/2025/09/17/p...

Pima County's jail healthcare provider has been in consistent violation of certain performance indicators over the past year, @jwashing.bsky.social reports azluminaria.org/2025/09/11/s...

I'm writing a new book for @haymarketbooks.org, and I'm writing it fast, so help is most welcome. More here: johnwashington.substack.com/p/how-to-clo...

More on Project Blue, the proposed and (for now) scuttled mega data center project in Tucson. We're releasing some of the early planning docs, obtained via public records requests, which list alternate sites. Latest from @azluminaria.org azluminaria.org/2025/08/15/p...

Responding to vehement opposition and public service journalism, Tucson's mayor/council unanimously vote to reject a mega data center project from Amazon. Tucson ain't Eddington. Read @yanak.bsky.social‬'s latest from city hall. azluminaria.org/2025/08/06/t...

Tucson City council member Nikki Lee says controversial Amazon-run data center project is inevitable. “Project Blue has multiple paths to build here, and every intention to do so,” Lee wrote in her newsletter today, “regardless of what the City of Tucson decides.” azluminaria.org/2025/08/05/t...

📽️ WATCH: “The U.S. sent us to El Salvador so that El Salvador could do the dirty work that the U.S. couldn’t.” Hear from Juan José Ramos Ramos, Andry Omar Blanco Bonilla and Wilmer José Vega Sandia — three of 230+ Venezuelan men the Trump administration sent to CECOT — in their own words:

ICE GOONS draw guns on humanitarian aid workers

More on Tucson's Project Blue, the Amazon data center project cloaked in secrecy for years. @yanak.bsky.social and I pieced together more of the timeline, finding that City of Tucson officials moved to annex the land BEFORE the first public hearing on the project. azluminaria.org/2025/07/28/c...

This is the moment we're in: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

I responded to @markskrikorian.bsky.social's review and misapprehension of my book, The Case for Open Borders. My latest newsletter. johnwashington.substack.com/p/case-count...

I spoke with Dora Rodriguez, Tucson-based immigrant activist who nearly died crossing the desert in 1980, about her memoir. Latest for @azluminaria.org azluminaria.org/2025/07/23/l...

🚨Scoop🚨 The mysterious giant data center planned for Tucson is named in a 2023 doc we obtained from Pima County: Amazon Web Services. The data center—H20 and electricity intensive—has sparked fierce public pushback Latest w/ @yanak.bsky.social for @azluminaria.org azluminaria.org/2025/07/21/a...

NEW EPISODE: Award-winning journalist @azluminaria.org's @jwashing.bsky.social on his writing at @nyrb-imprints.bsky.social, “The Roots of Bukele’s Gulag.” Support our work at patreon.com/thisishell thisishell.com/episodes/1846

Enjoyed this in-depth convo w/ @chuckmertz.bsky.social on This Is Hell!. We discussed deep context of US-Salvadoran relations and Trump admins test-case deportation policies, following my recent work for @nybooks.com thisishell.com/interviews/1... www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

RIP, Fanny. She was a brilliant torchlight of a writer. Also a friend. Read her work.

Imagine people migrating freely and negotiating a niche in their new communities. This 34-min. podcast is an excellent summary of ideas from @jwashing.bsky.social’s humane book. 99percentinvisible.org/episode/633-...

Honored for the dedicated episode from @99pi.org about my book and open borders. Give it a listen here: 99percentinvisible.org/episode/633-... Special thanks to producer Lasha Madan. @haymarketbooks.org

Learned a new word — reboant: (adjective) marked by reverberation; resounding loudly From the excellent newsletter of @jwashing.bsky.social, which you should subscribe to johnwashington.substack.com/p/la-and-the...

I spoke to 11 of 12 candidates vying to fill the seat of late progressive champion Raúl Grijalva & represent CD7 in Arizona, which includes almost all of Arizona's borderlands. Where does each of them stand on border/immigration politics? Latest for @azluminaria.org azluminaria.org/2025/06/18/b...

I wrote about the standoff in LA, what's pushed people into the streets, and how law enforcement is illegally shooting at protesters. My latest newsletter: johnwashington.substack.com/p/la-and-the...

“I am writing to detail my deep concerns about the inhumane conditions” in the Eloy immigration detention center, @repyassansari.bsky.social writes in a letter to DHS. ansari.house.gov/imo/media/do...

I spoke to @repyassansari.bsky.social for @azluminaria.org about her first months in office as the first Dem Iranian-American rep of Congress Ansari has been a vocal critic of deportations to El Salvador, current conditions in US detention centers, and the travel ban azluminaria.org/2025/06/16/q...