“The arrests of Galicia and his cellmates point to an apparent collaboration between Fort Hunter Liggett police and immigration agents that has ensnared at least 15 men since 30 December…”

I have spent the past several months studying the cutting-edge research on modern democracies that have defeated authoritarian leaders. I've learned that the conventional wisdom on the topic is wrong — in ways that have clear implications for the US going forward THREAD www.vox.com/politics/479...

5 members of a CPD tactical team have been stripped of their badges ands gun after the agency tasked with investigating misconduct identified a troubling pattern of undocumented and unprofessional traffic stops of Black Chicagoans. @wttw.bsky.social

just learning of Google’s AI-generated push alert re: the BAFTA awards clusterfuck and… holy shit. it says a lot about the company, testing, and safeguards that that was even possible.

Can’t even have fun in the snow without cops trying to turn it into a riot.

Tostrud finds all the government officials named jointly and severally liable, but notes that he did so because the court still doesn't know who is to blame for the contemptuous actions. Tostrud says he'll amend the order if DOJ "file[s] a motion identifying the responsible Respondent."

The ax is falling at WGN-Ch. 9, cutting a wide swath out of “Chicago’s Very Own” TV newsroom. Eight veteran reporters and anchors were laid off Monday, according to newsroom sources.

SCOOP: IL-9 congressional candidate and current state senator Mike Simmons had police called on him in Buena Park while canvassing for votes. No arrest was made. Here’s the video of the interaction @senmikesimmons.bsky.social recorded and shared with me.

Why do I have to pretend that I'm going to print something in order to save it as a PDF. Why do I have to engage in a little ruse.

Hello, Chicago folks! I'm working on a story for @theprogressivemag.bsky.social on unhoused people who shelter on or near CTA facilities. If you do any homeless outreach at CTA stations, bus stops, or elsewhere in the city, or know those who do, I'd love to chat!

Virginia Giuffre's family on the arrest of ex-U.K. Ambassador Peter Mandelson: "The contrast with the continued inaction in the United States is undeniable. Survivors deserve transparency, swift investigation, and real justice, no matter who is implicated." Full statement

“Though unrelated, Mecklenburg’s departure also marks the second time in two months that the lead prosecutor in a controversial criminal case stemming from Operation Midway Blitz has left the office shortly before trial.” oh I doubt it’s fundamentally unrelated. this case is an embarrassment.

you have to click the story to see that the lead prosecutor for the Broadview 6 case that largely targeted Democratic officials and candidates got a "temporary detail" with the Senate Judiciary Committee... for Democrat Dick Durbin.

It’ll be kind of funny to unleash this on the load bearing pillars of finance after we avoided serious consequences with Y2K. not really ha ha funny, but stupid funny

BREAKING Charles Kushner, the US Ambassador to France, has been banned from meeting with members of the French government after he failed to show up to a diplomatic summons with the French Foreign Minister.

Confirmed. My story here: gillianbrockell.ghost.io/breaking-sha...

“USPS announced that this practice was now official policy: It would no longer postmark mail automatically on the date it is received.”

We murdered three more people in boats today

this stuff is so funny, truly. tech has created a genie that will grant unlimited wishes but randomly fulfills them in disastrous ways.

Let the dominoes fall.

Just a reminder that every high-profile shooting by an ICE/CBP agent this past year was done by a long-time veteran who went through more extensive training, with many refresher courses over the years, and at least a couple were instructors themselves.

Well this story blew up. Went to the front page of reddit, hacker news, Gizmodo. People donated thousands of dollars to the legal fund of Jeff Sovern, who dismantled 13 Flock surveillance cameras. The response was near-universal enthusiasm for the project of smashing invasive, exploitative tech.

No real details yet, but it appears Border Patrol shot an individual in the middle of the night last night in New Hampshire.

I’m gonna salute every snowplow that passes me.

A defense motion in the “Broadview 6” case today says body cam footage from the scene shows Congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh move away from the agents’s vehicle she was allegedly impeding, grab a megaphone and tell the crowd “that’s private property back there- come back.”

"Lutnick and Epstein each signed a contract in 2012—four years after Epstein pleaded guilty to sex crimes—to invest in a digital ad technology company called AdFin Solutions Inc. The deal was dated just five days after Lutnick and his family visited Epstein on his private island. "

SCOTUS material

"The Social Circle city manager was contacted by ICE... “They asked me to turn on the water,” he said of a 1m sq ft warehouse nearby that the government plans to use for locking up as many as 10,000 detainees. “I told them I’m not going to do it,” he said... www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

The other day I saw a video of an historian (maybe?) saying he didn’t understand why billionaires are opposed to being taxed more because “taxation is the compromise.” And that last ~500 years teaches us what happens when that compromise is not struck. Can’t stop thinking about it.

Had to be at least a decade ago that a NPR show hosted a historian who had published a book on the Stasi and the SS. It turned out the SS et al., had not been the magical intelligence machines at all but had relied almost entirely on neighbors lining up to rat out each other.

“No one deserves this, no one deserves to be tortured, no one deserves to be taken away from their families, not knowing you’ll ever see them again, and then truly never seeing them again,” said Martin San Juan.

Part of the context here is that Bucks County recently elected an anti-ICE sheriff to replace their pro-ICE sheriff. The actions of Quakertown police (which is separate) are best understood as a gang that sees its power to intimidate slipping and so has initiated a violent suppression campaign.

INBOX: the police chief of Quakertown, Pa., led a group of plainclothes officers to disrupt a peaceful high school student sidewalk protest yesterday. They threw an underage girl to the ground, choked her, and disconnected all calls to the detention center where she and others are currently held.

Reading this story—about how the Pentagon has been given so much extra money it's struggling to spend it all—while thinking about the formerly homeless tenants I've spoken with in recent weeks whose housing vouchers are being discontinued for "lack of funds."

Kurt Vonnegut stop being so applicable to all time periods of American life, you can’t do that Kurt Vonnegut, your insights are too evergreen Kurt Vonnegut

this is how i witnessed an ICE kidnapping in western mass, i paid a $250 bail for a woman accused of trespassing (right...) and ICE snatched her as soon as we got out the door

The Germans & French didn’t believe it, at least partly because: “They remembered the dubious intelligence case presented to justify the invasion of Iraq two decades previously, and were wary of trusting the Americans on what seemed like a fantastical prediction.”

Discord: You'll need to supply to age verification if you want access to certain features. Users: Hang on, wasn't there a thing in October where user ID data was leaked? Discord: Ok, yes, but the chances of that happening again are-- **one week later**

ICE buys Roxbury, N.J., warehouse. Exact figures for the sale have not been released. Dalfen Industrial sold the site to ICE this afternoon. The sale has been confirmed by the city council and mayor.

Held for no reason in a detention center for six weeks — for no reason — and even after signing self-deportation papers. Based on comments from agents and guards, Newton says she was imprisoned so ICE agents could collect incentive bonuses.

I read this and thought "Oh, this is something a first-year Econ grad student would think of, thinking they're being clever but ignoring 300 different aspects of actual behavior." The guy behind it? Lt. Col. .. sigh ... Justicz (SUCH lazy writers) ... who spent 3 yrs as an Econ grad student at MIT.

The headline does not convey how completely batshit this story is. The Archive Today (archive.ph etc) admin weaponized the site's captcha to attack a blogger who wrote about them and *altered archived screenshots* as part of the attack. arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...

this is some real mindfuckery

For a whole year, DHS hid that they murdered Ruben, a young man in Texas, after a traffic stop. Just like they did with Silverio, Renee, Keith, Alex, and Linda, they lied and avoided accountability. How many more people have to be executed before my colleagues realize that reforms are not enough?

This is really so tragic. My thoughts are with all my 🔭 colleagues who knew and worked with Carl Grillmair. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

Brace yourselves: Trump says he just signed an order to impose a 10% global tariff on top of the levies already in place after the Supreme Court ruled his sweeping emergency tariffs were illegal.