More news about lawsuits: court sides with fired professor on free speech grounds. Dr. Shirinian will not be reinstated, but she is closer to getting paid for her trouble (State officials must now approve the settlement). www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-t...

The techlash needs a target close to home, say Arjun Hassard and Erin McElroy, arguing tenant screening—with its algorithmic discrimination, junk fees, and lifelong digital stigma—is the bold, common-sense tech fight candidates should pick.

7 of every 8 renters who lost housing assistance in the past 2 years still needed it. For many, their assistance stopped because of time or assistance limits or the program ran out of money. This and other findings in @nlihc.org's new National Renter Survey nlihc.org/national-ren...

After spring 2024’s revival of the student protest movement at a scale not seen since the 1960s, reactionary administrators & faculty got together to opportunistically discredit & try to reverse intellectual trends they didn’t like and blamed for creating the encampments like Vandy report & this one

“We question the ‘study’s’ purpose in a time of institutional capture by political actors that prohibit independent inquiry and dissent.” New at PB: Iván Chaar López & @erinmcel.bsky.social on Richard D. Kahlenberg and Lief Lin’s critique of American Studies.

Excited for this to be out in the world!

For those in Montreal!

@erinmcel.bsky.social , co-founder of the Anti-Eviction Mapping Project and author of Silicon Valley Imperialism, will be speaking as a part of our Data Activism in the Age of Trump webinar on April 28. Register at the link below.

Thank you so so much to @muybarra.bsky.social, @desireefields.bsky.social, @liviu-chelcea.bsky.social, Ananya Roy, and Magie Ramirez for their generous reflections on Silicon Valley Imperialism! @dukepress.bsky.social doi.org/10.1080/2325...

Our PhD student Kennedy Orwa, who studies applications of AI to health care, was hastily deported today to Kenya along with his 13-year-old son without opportunity to speak to legal counsel. King 5 reports that he held a valid visa that was rescinded without explanation.

While we can’t levy sanctions as individuals, we can try to make US tech companies feel the pain a bit

The U. of Washington stripped its Director of Middle East Studies of his position for writing an email that said “Israeli actions tell us that they seek the destruction of the state, not just its ruling class” and that Iran had not been pursuing nuclear weapons. In other words, for stating facts.

University of Washington professor fired from director job after sending email criticizing Iran war

NEW: Thomson Reuters, the media company which is also a data broker, has long provided personal data for ICE tools, according to documents obtained by 404 Media and sources. There are also indications its data is now part of the Palantir system ICE uses to find which neighborhoods to target.

The fight against the University of Michigan–Los Alamos data center reveals the “political and planetary stakes” of AI and the threat of “tech-enhanced militarism,” @tisjune.bsky.social , @shreyachowdhary.bsky.social & @nathanckim.bsky.social write in #Academe:

"Siliconization, technofascism, and their unbecomings" journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1... Thanks to Kavita Dattani, Manissa Maharawal, Daniela Rosner, @nassimparvin.bsky.social, @profgillian.bsky.social and @michelelancione.bsky.social @societyandspace.bsky.social @dukepress.bsky.social

🌉 IJURR at AAG 2026 | San Francisco Join us for the IJURR Lecture by Erin McElroy and explore our new Virtual Issue on San Francisco. Check it out 👇 www.ijurr.org/ijurr-at-the...

For those at the AAG, come say hi today! @ijurresearch.bsky.social "Technofeudal Fever Dreams: Silicon Fiefdoms, Doom Loop Dystopics, and the Emancipatory Posssibilities of Failure."

Palestinian activist Leqaa Kordia was released on bond Monday after more than a year in ICE detention.

Daily reminder that calling ai dead labor and stolen labor is literal.

This is a travesty. African and African Diaspora Studies at UT Austin has been one of the best programs in the country. And for historical context, this is explicitly about reversing the gains of student movements in the 60s and 70s. www.statesman.com/news/educati...

ICE has now spent over half a BILLION dollars just on purchasing warehouses around the country to convert into detention camps. If these mega-camps are utilized to the full capacity ICE intends, they'll be the largest prisons in the country, with little real oversight. www.ajc.com/politics/202...

📢Issue 11.3 out now! 2 Engagements, 2 ORAs + the Final Editorial of the 2020-25 ESTS Collective on the difference & promise of leading and running a diamond open access journal #ClimateChange #TransnationalSTS #Retooling #Openness #HousingJustice #OpenScience 👀https://bit.ly/3LoiLxT

Props to the developers behind ICE Map, cataloguing all known ICE incidents www.icemap.dev

New issue of ESTS out, including an interesting article by Luis Felipe R. Murillo and Erin McElroy @erinmcel.bsky.social on possibilities for creating “'political software' aligned with the goals of housing action research" estsjournal.org/index.php/es...

Conflicting info about whether Pretti was murdered by ICE or CBP makes it clear that ICE is not single "rogue agency" ICE, CBP and ALL policing & borders must be abolished. This isn't just one agency; its an entire infrastructure of carceral control, illegalization & criminalization, and fascism.

There is no "immigration problem" There is no migrant problem There is no problem with illegals There is no border crisis Only a problem of the border and the machinery of death that upholds it.

New: Alex Pretti, the man killed by the Trump-Vance mob of agents was an outdoorsmen, a mountain biker, an ICU nurse who "would go out of his way to help," say Veterans Affairs colleagues. Cheerful. Funny. Gentle. And still, per sources, Trump officials are urging staff to call him a "terrorist."

NEW: ICE Agents Fatally Shoot Observer in Minneapolis unicornriot.ninja/2026/ice-age...

Excited to have this out in the world “Disciplining Through Landlord Technologies: Why the Carceral Logics of Tenant Surveillance Require Abolition” onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... @antipodeonline.bsky.social

‘They’re trying to get rich off it’: US contractors vie to rebuild Gaza, with ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ team in the lead

Join us as we “reflect on what bringing abolitionist and ant- imperial geographies together in post-socialist contexts can do. Just as global capital connections mapped the Siliconizing moment, other connections scaffold the very possibilities of unbecoming Silicon Valley.”

I would say this because I edited it but @mshannahmurphy.bsky.social's piece on tech bros founding their own for-profit cities really is unmissable reading www.ft.com/content/b127...

Advancing techno-fascism, the EO edition.

Don’t give up. Don’t give in. Let’s be inspired together on December 7!

My latest is a love letter to Chicago. "I see you stumbling through the stubborn, awkward rhythm of showing up, again and again. I see you fighting alongside people who sometimes frustrate and confuse you, and defending neighbors you may have never met, because you know they’re all your people."

For those in San Diego tomorrow! Political Technology: Silicon Traps and Cartographic Contradictions Wednesday, October 29 · 4 - 5pm PDT www.eventbrite.com/e/political-...

BREAKING: Dozens of Northern California immigrants abruptly summoned to ICE office for weekend check-ins www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/arti...

For those in DC!

Join the Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies on Wed, Oct. 8 at 4 p.m. for the launch of Technocreep and the Politics of Things Unseen—a feminist take on why our ties to tech often feel “creepy.” go.umd.edu/technocreep

This explains a lot. For a moment, I wondered why they'd do something as ridiculous as drop agents on the roof of the apartment building from helicopters, but of course, they did it for this footage. The same reason they were marching in formation downtown and snatched a family in Millennium Park.

WE WON: "This case -– perhaps the most important ever to fall w/in..this district court squarely presents the issue whether non-citizens lawfully present here in US..have the same free speech rights as the rest of us. The Court answers this Constitutional question unequivocally “yes, they do.”"

Catch authors @burrata.bsky.social, @pepepierce.bsky.social, @nassimparvin.bsky.social, @erinmcel.bsky.social , & @emmaamador.bsky.social at events in October! buff.ly/piYqz0R

And now this is the first statement from a named White House official, hours before the proclamation is set to go into effect. Despite saying “to be clear,” her first tweet in this thread contained an FAQ posted yesterday which contains NONE of the information she lists below.

NEW: Hours before a new entry ban is supposed to go into effect, the federal government officially acknowledges for the first time that the restrictions do NOT apply to people who currently have H-1B visas. Link: www.uscis.gov/sites/defaul...

What happens when your landlord turns your home into a surveillance zone? From facial recognition cameras to automated fines, tenants are finding their daily lives policed in new ways. Hear Erin McElroy on Against the Grain unpack the rise of “landlord tech.” Full interview → kpfa.org #KPFA #BayArea

Anduril found another cash soaked sucker for their war fantasies. Microsoft failed for years and wasted tons of money on IVAS only for the kits to crap out in the field. Leave it to zuck to jump into another metaverse. thedefensepost.com/2023/09/27/u...

"The Supreme Court on Monday cleared the way for federal agents to conduct sweeping immigration operations for now in Los Angeles, the latest victory for President Donald Trump’s administration at the high court." apnews.com/article/supr...

Alright, so I've been afraid to say this out loud, but I think after today, I can say it: In the first Battle of Los Angeles, the good people of LA County have prevailed. We beat ICE back. 1/