I like this trend of state birds becoming symbols of resistance.

Under this HUD rule, about 37,000 children born in the U.S. could face homelessness because someone in their family lacks papers. That's roughly a baseball stadium full of kids. Deliberate, gratuitous cruelty masquerading as housing policy.

this all points to the same thing as a lot of the Epstein emails: these people aren't smarter, better, harder-working or more moral, just richer, and protecting the absolute immunity of the other members of their club is their highest social good bsky.app/profile/jfal...

ICE is very much still in Minneapolis and terrorizing our communities. And while we are under attack from the federal government, our neighbors are struggling to make rent and keep food on the table.

First Black woman on the US Olympic hockey team is wonderful but also why’s it take until 2026?! In MN, Mosaic Hockey is a nonprofit supporting BIPOC kids in hockey, donate to help them continue and grow - linktr.ee/mosaichockey...

One of my favorite things about this hellish timeline is hearing a mom with a perfect Minnesota accent chime in “Dispatch, this is Yippee-Ki-Yum on W 7th. I have eyes on a tinted out Wagonneer Echo Charlie Lima 724 northbound at St. Clair. Two agents, tactical vests, will tail to downtown. Out.”

Mercury and baby brains: "neurotoxin that attacks the central nervous system, causing severe damage to brain function and development. It crosses the blood-brain and placental barriers... symptoms like cognitive impairment, memory loss, tremors, and sensory deficits." www.nytimes.com/2026/02/18/c...

Black Girl Magic in Watercolors by Ravynn Stringfield “Casta Davis could fly, and no one believed her.” It hooked my attention immediately. The line is concise, resigned, and beautiful—a callback to "The People Could Fly" by Virginia Hamilton. I loved the relatability of no one believing in…

HELL no. Your own hometown newspaper (which in better times for the paper I used to write for) gets your identity wrong with a racist photoswap in a post about the biggest night of your life? A paper serving a majority Asian American metro population? Apology, retraction, sackcloth and ashes.

I see Omar is inviting three local citizens to the State of the Union. All were illegally detained by ICE. Points for her.

Brian is worth reading here. He is literally writing the book on gambling and its growing impact on sports journalism.

Kavanaugh's dissent in the #SCOTUS decision striking down Trump's tariffs as illegal is partially based on the idea that it is a mess to try to refund tariffs. That's like saying you have to let a bank robber go because it's too difficult to get him to pay back the money he stole. #USpoli #cdnpoli

Reminder: No government ever builds concentration camps it does not intend to fill.

So there's a black girl scout troop trying to raise money to to to Europe but they aren't close to their goal as of yet. Please share this and buy some cookies if you can digitalcookie.girlscouts.org/scout/reagan...

Putting a lot of work into a grant that probably won't get funded due to lack of funding in NIH/NSF. So I'm curious scientists: what work were you excited about that didn't get funding? Non-scientists, this is the work we are missing out on in the US when we don't fully fund NIG/NSF/USDA/etc

I was in these conversations. Every single meeting someone would say "We have to change these things because they're illegal." Then i would grind my teeth and explain that they weren't illegal. Some people just didn't do the reading, some were afraid of getting sued someday, and others wanted it

The NIH has this great project called LitCovid that gathers Long COVID research in one place. It's kind of amazing to see the studies piling up and getting better. Science takes its time, but it does show up. www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/cor...

COMO RESIDENTS: We are looking for people to host a PurpleAir sensor who live in the Como neighborhood. It will help the MPLS health dept better understand overall air quality and how air quality varies by neighborhood. Details: www.eastbankmpls.org/updates/como...

"Her organization has been receiving reports of agents going door-to-door pretending to be environmental canvassers. These tactics have had an impact on her organization’s canvassing group, who are now at risk of being furloughed while ICE operations continue." sahanjournal.com/immigration/...

It’s giving middle passage

this is right. the same piece, but ethical.

Question for newsletterers: Let's say you have a friend (let's call him "me") who is planning to move off Substack to either ghost or beehiiv. Your friend is functionally illiterate with all-things-code, so he should pick the option that is more total-idiot-friendly. Which site would you recommend?

Supreme Court strikes down Trump's global tariffs. (gift link) www.wsj.com/us-news/law/...

god grant me the confidence of a Victorian man disagreeing with several centuries worth of recorded evidence based purely on vibes

I LOVE when science is applied to "toddler questions" like "Why is the sky blue?" or "Why is ice slippery?" Because the answers can be so SUPRISING. Let's dig into recent revelations about how ice skates work & why tires skid across black ice. First, we'll dismiss 3 VERY GOOD hypotheses as wrong.

And if you want to go deep, I wrapped together here most of my masculinity politics reporting over the years. It’s all here. This shit is the water we swim in. open.substack.com/pub/danielle...

Meta glasses are creepy and a judge called them out on it.🧑‍⚖️ 👓

Most of the petitions were filed by a newly mobilized army of volunteer lawyers with little or no experience with immigration law — corporate litigators, divorce lawyers, estate planners and criminal defense attorneys minnesotareformer.com/2026/02/19/l...

This picture is so crazy that if you had this as a scene in a made-for-TV dystopian scifi movie in like 2014 people would switch channels because you’d ruined the suspension of disbelief.

“In addition to increasing the age for able bodied adults to work from 54 to 64, the law eliminates exemptions for veterans, people experiencing homelessness, young adults aging out of foster care, and parents and caregivers with children between the ages of 14 and 18.”

Humiliated in the media, denied healthcare, attacked by the human rights watchdog, shut out by the Supreme Court, bullied by social services and the police, disadvantaged in the jobs market, death figures covered up by the State, harassment de facto legalised, and attackers deified by Ministers.

"free/cheap/non-toxic youth sports" feels like one of those skeleton keys that would have knock-on effects accidentally fix 100 unrelated things about America or, you know, even if it didn't, at least a bunch of kids would be able to have fun playing sports

prisons destroy links to outside community, but they also actively destroy links to the supportive communities people create inside, over and over and over again.

"fish are not allowed to be caught by hand in Minnesota"

Every week I get a press release from the state's Department of Environmental Conservation about busting hunters and anglers for various violations (hunting out of season, taking over the limit, etc) and EVERY time it's because someone called and ratted them out. Some people just love snitching!

What an Olympics Alyssa Liu wins gold with the superpower of not caring what other people think Lots of out queer American athletes winning medals and deciding to marry each other A dog joins a cross country skiing race I sort of learn how curling works Just A+++ all around

This is wild. People are so creative!

This one is fantastic

I keep thinking about something @tressiemcphd.bsky.social said during her livestream conversation with @katemanne.bsky.social yesterday: We are living with zombie institutions that have been hollowed out by neoliberalism. That hit like a truth bomb because of ways it reflects my current work life

In addition to being absolutely brilliant, amazing & charming in her own right, we all know she was raised by a single dad w/4 siblings and that he came to the US bc of persecution bc of his participation in the ‘89 Tiananmen democracy uprising, right?

This is Minneapolis: The weekly newsletter from our elementary school includes: -summer school registration link -link to our mutual aid fund -MN Attorney General federal action report form (to share how we've been impacted by ICE) -Know Your Rights information -resources for food insecurity

1/2 🧵CDC posted an average of 45 messages a year on measles spread & prevention since 2021. Measles cases have since exploded under RFK jr’s leadership of HHS, but CDC only posted about measles 10 times in first 8 months of 2025.

My hospital, like one of the flagship ivory tower institutions instantly liquidated all DEI efforts at all levels the second the winds looked to be shifting. God forbid we use those lawyers for anything but union busting.

This years field season is going to come with some choices, with car camping being the best way to save money so we can make it through the season. Roughing it Yellowstone style

In the 1800s, a slave owner purchased over a dozen people in Georgia and set the foundation for his family’s generational wealth Generations later, a railroad company owned by one of his descendants is using eminent domain to seize land of Black farmers

Your periodic reminder that the Nazi's had a program for grassing on your neighbors, but shut it down because most of the complaints were "She doesn't sweep her porch properly!"

🧪We have come a long way For some context, Dr. Dorothy Hodgkin received her PhD from Newnham College Cambridge (1937). Her research was on X-ray crystallography She was: 1. A professor at Oxford 2. The first British woman scientist to win a Nobel

HOLY SHIT

“We like to think of it as parallel to what we know... One man against the authorities. Or one man against a city of zombies. One man Who is not, in fact, a man, sent to understand The caravan of men now chasing him like red ants Let loose down the pants of America. Man on the run.” Tracy K Smith

Starting my day with the brilliance of Tracy K. Smith: "A poem...whispers in your ear--'hey, let me tell you what it was like'-- and proceeds to take you far beyond your known self & your intrinsic view of the world." Wise words from her new book FEAR LESS. #poetry