US democratic backsliding looks very fast if you mark the start at 2025. But it’s been going since 2017, so I disagree with @donmoyn.bsky.social @jburnmurdoch.ft.com etc. Abuse of emergency powers, normalization of bribery, de facto death of War Powers Act all term 1. Immunity case in the interim.

The erosion of democracy in the US is clear even if you don't use intl comparisons. From the Century Foundation: "In the first year of Trump 2.0, the United States went from being a passing if imperfect democracy to behaving like an authoritarian state." donmoynihan.substack.com/publish/post...

Leigh Wambsganss raised nearly $2.3 million for the SD9 district, much of it coming from three billionaire-funded PACs. Taylor Rehmet raised $346,000, most of it coming from donations of $100 or less. His biggest donor gave him $12K, and a bunch of local unions also cut him larger checks.

Academics vying for a spot in Epstein‘s world. There are so many. I feel the need to make a thread, so I don’t keep confusing them. 1/

As more academic names keep coming up in the Epstein files, I keep thinking about this NYT interview with the Bard president from a few years ago, and wondering how many people were rationalizing in similar ways. www.nytimes.com/2023/05/05/u...

Be the change, you want to see in this world* and be in charge. I do not see this as inevitable for academia and therefore act accordingly. *Not a Gandhi quote even if AI says so.

"Kabinet heeft negentien miljard euro nodig voor defensie en haalt daarvoor tien miljard weg bij zorg en bijna 6,5 bij sociale zekerheid: de WW, de arbeidsongeschiktheid en door verhogen van pensioenleeftijd." Volgende week kan Bezemer uitleggen dat we meer dan genoeg geld hebben.

It should not take a court order to get a toddler out of a prison.

Als er een coalitieakkoord gepresenteerd wordt, bladeren de echte nerds naar de bijlagen met de begrotingstabellen. In de begrotingstabellen worden de echte keuzes gemaakt. Hier kunnen we ook zien wie de echte winnaars en verliezers zijn. 🧵

Huh. This entire administration is an Epstein Island afterparty.

Maybe it's a pure coincidence that Jeffrey Epstein met with 4chan creator Christopher Poole the day /pol/ was created, the seminal moment for a decade of madness. But people who study this world of disinfo and extremism are shocked. 6/

Iedereen die mijn reposts volgt kan dit alleen maar ten volste beamen. De toestand in de VS is verschrikkelijk.

Lees dit interview met Steven Levitsky, een van de meest vooraanstaande democratie-onderzoekers., over de staat van de democratie in de VS. „Ik vond mezelf altijd een doemdenker. Maar het is veel, veel erger dan ik had verwacht.” www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2026/...

I might get a Nobel Prize before Trump!

Today, Rep. Castro and I visited precious Liam and his father, Adrian, at the Dilley Detention Center. My heart absolutely breaks for Liam, his family, and every person being wrongfully detained.

De universiteit stopt vanaf 1 januari 2027 de vergoeding voor De Kattekop, het kinderdagverblijf voor medewerkers en studenten. ‘We kregen uit het niets de mededeling.’

Interesting avenue on the US. Mathias Risse: “In contemporary politics, the rise of a leadership style centered on “gaslighting”—persuasion through systematic besmirching, belittling, and the inversion of shared norms—poses profound challenges to democracy…” www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

So revealing (and funny).

ICE is changing tactics in Maine: "Now, the volunteers in Maine say federal agents have started showing up at their homes and intimidating them or threatening arrest. Some of them, masked and wearing tactical gear, have issued stark warnings not to follow them." www.pressherald.com/2026/01/23/i...

More than 7,800 research grants terminated or frozen. Some 25,000 scientists and personnel gone from agencies. Proposed budget cuts of 35% — amounting to US$32 billion. These are just a few of the ways Donald Trump has downsized and disrupted US science go.nature.com/4sTPWdp

Here's the thing, Greg — free speech is still protected by the First Amendment under the Constitution. If you want folks to stop saying you're the secret police who are kidnapping and killing people, maybe stop acting like the secret police who are kidnapping and killing people.

Nearly half of the mortality gap between Black and White adults can be traced to the cumulative toll of a lifetime of stress and heightened inflammation, a new study shows.

"Don't forget to add the bit about people only having rights if they agree with what the government is doing."

Twice this week when meeting a new person I've gotten an excited "Wow, it must be an exciting time to be a political scientist!" and both times I've answered "Not really. That's like telling someone it's an exciting to be a surgeon when there's a 63 car pileup on the highway."

Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara: "People have had enough. This is the third shooting in less than 3 weeks. The MPD went the entire year last year recovering about 900 guns from the street, arresting hundreds of violent offenders, and we didn't shoot anyone ... this is not sustainable."

Just got an alert that my syllabus is being FOIAed by some right-wing thinktank, and since I welcome constructive criticism here it is in full. (I redacted my office number/classroom meeting space.)

Absolute drivel from the BBCs live feed. Despite there being abundant evidence to contradict the repulsive Noem, her words are reported uncritically, in line with the apparent belief that presenting a lie alongside the truth and calling both “narratives” has anything to do with journalism.

So important. What they say is not the story. That is never the story. What happened is the story. Write what happened.

These types of statements have such a sanitizing effect in knowing who the real heroes are despite the smear campaigns. Every single word can be replaced with the opposite.

As a reminder, the University of Minnesota had nicely listed all the amendments to the US Constitution. A long time overdue to dust this off. hrlibrary.umn.edu/education/al...

Absolutely reprehensible that AG Bondi is offering ICE stand down in exchange for access to voting rolls. Outrageous and disgusting. It shows ICE is in Minneapolis is not for law enforcement purposes. Instead it’s a way to stir up shit in blue states and extort them.

Since July, I've tracked at least 2,300 cases in which federal judges have ruled ICE has illegally detained people without bond or due process. This is one that stands out: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

The Netherlands 😲😠😢

Trump is coming after all of us. All of us who oppose his tyranny and brutality. All of us who defy his dictatorship. All of us who seek accountability and challenge his murderous goons. All across America we must rise up against this oppression, as peacefully but as definitively as we can.

Abolish ICE, abolish DHS, redistribute the other agencies, prosecute actual criminals, such as people who commit execution-style murders of Americans in broad daylight.

The term “law enforcement” should not be used by media, except perhaps in quotations. It has sadly become an Orwellian term that is used to magically sanctify violence. Language matters. Be specific. Describe individuals with names and ranks. Say exactly what they did. Don’t repeat fascist hocum.

Alex Pretti "used to tell people off when they made sexist comments to female physicians. He bought me coffee when I had a really bad day as an intern...I laughed alongside him daily. He made a point to teach medical residents without judgement, but with a smile on his face and a joke."

Live General Strike March against ICE in -10° degrees | Live in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Sources: @meidastouch.com and @statuscoupnews.bsky.social

The bill provides $10 billion to Immigration and Customs Enforcement with no meaningful constraints on its often violent tactics in Minnesota and elsewhere.

White House posts digitally altered image of woman arrested after ICE protest

There’s so much IR in here. My favorite is this: “The system’s power comes not from its truth but from everyone’s willingness to perform as if it were true. And its fragility comes from the same source: when even one person stops performing…the illusion begins to crack” www.pm.gc.ca/en/news/spee...

I know people keep saying this but it’s hard to communicate the depth of active resistance here. Like, I’m on random cafes and people are checking in for observation shifts. Signs everywhere. Folks in visibility vests on the corners. It’s wild. Absolutely wild.

My pinned post from a year ago. I am glad to see many people are not obeying in advance and are seeing through the Trump administration as a fantastical spectacle surrounding one person with the urge to breach boundaries. The emperor has no clothes, but it takes time and audacity to see this.

This headline is admirably straightforward. This is exactly what the 8th Circuit has done through their one-sentence administrative stay of a district judge's detailed, 80-page ruling. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

"Liam’s teacher, Ella Sullivan, teared up when thinking about Liam. 'He’s a bright young student,' she said, 'and he’s so kind and loving. His classmates miss him.'" www.startribune.com/preschooler-...

One court decision, two different headlines. Guardian on the left, NY Times on the right. Which one more directly conveys information and the stakes to the reader?

Minnesota: "School officials say the [5-year-old] child was used as bait. They say [ICE] agents made little Liam knock on the door to ask to be let in in order to see if anyone else was home."

🚨HOLY CRAP. An ICE whistleblower just revealed a secret memo authorizing ICE officers to break into homes without a judicial warrant, which DHS's own legal training materials say is unconstitutional! ICE then hid the memo from the public, passing it along by word of mouth and private conversation.

A standing reminder: a small handful of Republicans in Congress could stop this chaos tomorrow. They simply choose not to.