My day job is at a rural branch of a public library, and we have a Pride display. Yesterday I was at the desk when a man came in. Fifties, maybe, or sixties. Plaid shirt, mesh trucker cap, suspenders. He went up to the display and just stood there for a long moment. Then he came up to the desk. 🧵 1/

In between stealing money from taxpayers to give rewards to terrorists and cop assailants, Todd Blanche is helping Jim Justice poison West Virginians. www.propublica.org/article/trum...

🚨🚨🚨 YOU STILL HAVE TIME to help David Costello, Andrea LaFlamme and/or even Janet Mills salvage the #MaineMess! --If you live in Maine, RANK ALL THREE (but NOT Platner) in whichever order you prefer! --Donate to Costello and/or LaFlamme! secure.actblue.com/donate/senat...

IRS' IG (TIGTA) released a report explaining that after IRS shared data with ICE in June, they shared around 2K (.05X47K) they should not have. www.tigta.gov/sites/defaul...

I should note: This new list appears to drop the "Christian - Other" category altogether. So if your Christian tradition (that isn't non-denominational) isn't among those listed, I guess you're subsumed within "other religions"?

In 1982 Wood published a brilliant article about the role of conspiracy theories in the age of the American Revolution that very much speaks to our present moment. The way this essay blended intellectual and cultural history was very innovative for the time. www.jstor.org/stable/1919580

I've been running Follow the Crypto since 2024. Today I'm relaunching it as Tech Influence Watch, expanded to cover AI political spending alongside crypto. They’ve spent more than $400 million this election cycle, and now you can follow it in close to real time. influence.citationneeded.news

BREAKING: NSO Group caught trying to hack across #WhatsApp. Again! Defying 🇺🇸US Courts. WhatsApp disrupted the Pegasus campaign & says it violates US Federal injunction they won against NSO. Asks Federal judge to hold NSO Group in contempt. Many implications... 1/ about.fb.com/news/2026/06...

Unpaywalled: archive.ph/g8Oed

Set aside at least an hour to read Heidi Blake's Tate brothers' piece. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

Here's what I don't understand re: the legit questions about Aughinish. What are the solutions? Could Ireland nationalize it (I know, right?). How about buy it? Is there a way to reimpose sanctions on it? @conorgallagher.bsky.social www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2026...

Politico wrote a 10K word piece on Ric Grenell's effort to influence Venezuela that doesn't mention Chris Kise is Trump's former criminal defense attorney and Harry Sargeant funded much of Rudy's effort to frame Joe Biden in 2019. Aaron Schock plays a part. www.politico.com/news/2026/06...

The National Park Service has opened public comment on POTUS Trump’s proposed arch in DC: parkplanning.nps.gov/commentForm.... Deadline: June 15. Construction crews are already working on the site, despite the absence of democratic legitimacy from intentionally obtaining the consent of the governed.

I don't think Harry Enten declaring a Rural Revolt has gotten enough notice. I hate Enten's schtick but this is the kind of thing Trump would be shown and it would leave a mark. It's probably a big part of why he's in WI. www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0x1...

There are currently more bills attacking trans youth’s right to play sports across the U.S. than there are trans youth in school sports.

Pretty good headline. Just need to work DOGE in there, IMO. www.politico.com/news/2026/06...

Part of me wonders whether Trump isn't bigfooting this series bc he knows Mamdani is more popular than he is now.

This actually may be one of Welker's best moments in this role. He looks positive insanely, even before the sweaty face.

Reupping my vid on how Trump's insecurities about the Black president preventing him from getting out of Iran. www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5RB...

The lawsuit against the Park Service for allowing the UFC fight invokes what a shithole Conor MacGregor is. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

DOJ Remains Panicked about So-Called "Duplicative" Jeffrey Epstein Files emptywheel.net/2026/06/07/d...

In the end, Bari Weiss is little different from Tricia McLaughlin. www.nytimes.com/2026/06/07/m...

Which will make Trump saddest if/when it flops: The now-canceled America's 250 concert The UFC cage fight The World Cup

Trump responds to charges that pardons are for sale by pardoning a guy named Buyer www.nytimes.com/2026/06/06/u...

Mike Lee started this tirade, then John Curtis (the other Senator from UT) joined in. This strikes me as very smart politics, and a way to unpack the rest of the stupid list.

There are many things, like foreign aid, that I think we need to be discussing how to fix from the post WWII era, to make more resilient.

Reminder that there was a dedicated guy who worked Iran nukes stuff, Nate Swanson. But Laura Loomer had him purged.

Bc folks are discussing Hunter Biden's art, a reminder that the claims of influence peddling were based, in significant part, on a Matt Viser error he never came clean about. emptywheel.net/2024/01/27/n...

MN Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Cowan Wright recommends dismissing case v Kirubele Adbebe (one of the protestors Pam Bondi used as a trophy) with prejudice, agreeing w/him that DOJ dismissed case to avoid her discovery orders. Whole report is worth reading. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

This is the editorial that the physicians were sharing at the American Diabetes Association conference To appease the MAGA/MAHA Administration, the ADA called the cops to get the physicians removed These physicians are heroic If you can’t speak out & condemn authoritarianism NOW, then when?

"By nationality, I'm Venezuelan," Andry Hernandez Romero told me. "But in my heart, I'm American." He is the gay makeup artist Trump sent to the CECOT torture prison in El Salvador. Andry is in Spain now, rebuilding his life and haunted by his experience. www.advocate.com/news/andry-h...

Happy 82nd D-Day Anniversary to ANTIFA! The fight is not over! #DDay #Normandy

"The problem we face is not inherently the fact that people can and do say controversial things online. It is that our information ecosystem is now built on economic rewards for the production of outrage, division and extremity. "

Daily Mail claims Susie Wiles is furious about the Bill Pulte to ODNI pick, in part bc she tried to fire him over the Jesus meme. The story says she was also unhappy about Blanche promotion. www.dailymail.com/news/article...

Kalshi was paying Gunther Eagleman while he was spreading false claims about the LA Mayoral race. Holding my breath for Bill Essayli to investigate him for fraud. [Clarified that Kalshi was not funding this on purpose.] www.semafor.com/article/06/0...

EXCLUSIVE: Bill Pulte is set to become the acting director of national intelligence. His father and grandfather had multiple ties to The Family, the secretive Christian group pushing right-wing agendas around the world.

Yaakov Roth was a Harvard Law School grad, SCOTUS clerk, and longtime BigLaw partner. His resume, law students were always told, was a sign that he was among those at the top of the legal profession. Today, he said Trump could tear down the Statue of Liberty tonight and no one could stop him.

Incredibly disturbing story broken by @medpagetoday.com team. www.medpagetoday.com/special-repo...

Need some help trying to figure out wtf the orange guy was up to this week? Come join me & @emptywheel.bsky.social Marcy Wheeler for another Emptywheel Friday! 3ET/12PT at youtu.be/TtOSAx0C4vQ, nicolesandler.com, pod, nicolesandler.substack.com, emptywheel.net

This is what @emptywheel.bsky.social was advocating for: blocking the extension of 702 over the nomination of Bill Pulte as acting DNI. www.pbs.org/newshour/pol...

New crusade: FILL THE CHART Tag yourselves, comrades, which word are you putting into circulation this month

The U.S. has spent the last 2.5 years trying and failing to stop the Houthis from disrupting and attacking shipping through the Red Sea. It famously drained US munitions as million-dollar missiles were used against cheap drones. THIS HAPPENED IN VERY RECENT MEMORY!!

New: we've obtained a DHS document outlining ICE's plan to give potentially more than a thousand local law enforcement agencies a facial recognition app that would query a database of hundreds of millions of images to verify someone’s immigration status www.404media.co/ices-plan-to...

The "secret donors" that funded the MUTUAL AID tent outside Delaney Hall—which was provided in the winter LONG BEFORE these recent protests—was: The Local Essex County government....

Periodic reminder that Teapot Dome, the worst scandal in American history prior to Watergate, involved $9 million changing hands. That’s adjusted for inflation. This story by itself is 55500% bigger than Teapot Dome. That’s not a typo.

I did an entire video on this a month ago. www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5RB...

Trump is refusing to turn over financial information to BBC. www.ft.com/content/d2a0...

Happy 250th everyone. The Founders’ faith is now disqualifying.

Great explainer from @crampell.bsky.social on why we’ll all be invested in Musk open.substack.com/pub/thebulwa...

Viory offers journalists training in fact-checking and #OSINT for verification. OSINT is indeed very useful. Here's how I used it to prove that Viory is not the independent organisation it claims to be.