(sorry, I have strong opinions about the state of 'independent' journalism) Anyway, for real independent journalism I prefer @thetriibe.com and @kcdefender.bsky.social for good (if local) news.

BREAKING: Kansas City's North Lawn Tenant Union won a sweeping agreement. Rent frozen. Debt erased. Heat by October 1. And the first right to buy their homes. kansascitydefender.com/housing/nort...

Twenty-five years ago this week, the body of a three-year-old Black girl was found in the woods at 59th and Kensington in Kansas City. For four years, the public had no name to say. The headlines called her Precious Doe. Her name was Erica Green. @kcdefender.bsky.social great story this morning.

Once again, an @npr.org station waffles on good vs evil.

"A piece about whether a white abolitionist deserves moral standing has been constructed entirely without the Black people whose lives and freedom he died to protect. One begins to understand, reading it, why John Brown felt the need to raise an army" This is the only kind of "history" MAGA wants

“The question KCUR is asking is not a new question. It is the question the white press has always asked about people who fight for Black freedom.” Read our latest; kansascitydefender.com/propagandaob...

“The question KCUR is asking is not a new question. It is the question the white press has always asked about people who fight for Black freedom.” Read our latest; kansascitydefender.com/propagandaob...

A cable signed by Marco Rubio directs every U.S. embassy worldwide to suppress “anti-American propaganda” using Pentagon psyops units. Weeks earlier, the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria had already directed the country’s secret police to arrest two citizens over tweets critical of israel & the U.S.

"One radar system destroyed in this war cost [US] taxpayers a billion dollars. One. That is more than enough to fund every public school in Kansas City, build 5 full-service grocery stores ... and completely eradicate homelessness in Kansas City. Instead, it is smoldering wreckage in [Qatar]."

"Over 165 schoolgirls buried. 66 schools bombed." "The capitalist imperialist forces that bomb children abroad are the same ones that starve our children." "Empire does not stop at the border. It starts at home." #Missouri #USA #Iran #Israel #Education #Military

"[T]he return of CoreCivic to Leavenworth carries such a deep historical weight." "The haunting and once distant stain on the history of Kansas – Leavenworth's pro-slavery past – is once again knocking on the door." #Kansas #USA #Incarceration #Deportation #EthnicCleansing #Slavery #Torture

"[V]ocabulary of empire." "Imagine bombs falling on Manhattan. Imagine ten waves of airstrikes over five days on a city that size and then try to tell me who the terrorists are." #USA #Iran #Israel #Protest #Media #Education #Military #Nuclear #Weapons

We are proud to announce Jon Jeter as the KC Defender's first International Correspondent. Jon is a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist, former WaPo Bureau Chief, and the author of one of the most important books written this century about Western economic policy. He currently writes from Kenya.

Left media workers & publishers are opening physical spaces aimed at building collective power. my latest for @truthout.org truthout.org/articles/the...

"Every dollar spent settling lawsuits for [KCPD officer] Blayne Newton’s violence is a dollar stolen from mental health services, from housing, from education, from the material conditions that actually produce safety. @kcdefender.bsky.social kansascitydefender.com/justice/kcpd...

BREAKING: Kansas City is one of seven "mega centers" in ICE's planned nationwide concentration camp network. A local real estate company, Platform Ventures, sold out Kansas City by selling a taxpayer-subsidized warehouse to make it happen. Federal agents are already terrorizing KC residents. 🧵

BREAKING: Kansas City is one of seven "mega centers" in ICE's planned nationwide concentration camp network. A local real estate company, Platform Ventures, sold out Kansas City by selling a taxpayer-subsidized warehouse to make it happen. Federal agents are already terrorizing KC residents. 🧵

Thank you to @sixtyinchesfromcenter.org for giving this piece a home. I really admire Ryan Sorrell and the @kcdefender.bsky.social— they move in alignment with a deep radical lineage and political values while also producing impactful work. Grateful for this conversation and more to come.

support nonprofit Black community news in the Midwest! the KC Defender recently published a hell of a story about Kansas City nightlife establishment getting hit with RICO charges for conspiring to shut out Black business owners give it a read and give em a few bucks!

This is why I pay for the @kcdefender.bsky.social even though I don't live in KS anymore. Investigative journalism costs $$ and they do a great job

Every corner of this country deserves to have a journalistic resource and community asset like the @kcdefender.bsky.social - I hope their model gets taken up everywhere (PS - thanks for saving and stewarding the space of Willa's Books and Vinyl!)

At 84 years old, Willa Robinson is retiring and closing Willa’s Books and Vinyl, the store where she’s spent years selling works by Black artists. She’s placing the beloved space in the hands of @kcdefender.bsky.social, which will preserve her vast archive.

Congratulations to our colleagues at @kcdefender.bsky.social for winning the 2025 @inn.org Community Champion Award! Read about their groundbreaking B-REAL Freedom School here.

The Small Division winner of the Community Champion Award is “BREAL Academy: Black Radical Education for Abolition and Liberation” from @kcdefender.bsky.social.

Movement media is a key tool to fight fascism. In the @truthout.org Center for Grassroots Journalism newsletter, see the latest from @wagingnonviolence.org @hammerandhope.bsky.social @convergencemag.com @kcdefender.bsky.social @deceleration.news & more! ❤️ mailchi.mp/truthout.org...

The original video: youtu.be/BhQjYxBcqxw The creator, @kcdefender.bsky.social , deserves way more views and subscriptions. As said in this video, this is the future of the United States.

Ever had that "make it make sense?!" feeling when you're reading the news? Yeah. Me too. Conceiving of journalism as political education -- as the @kcdefender.bsky.social does so well -- is one solution and way forward. @objectivejournos.bsky.social objectivejournalism.org/2025/08/make...

North St. Louis is in the middle of a climate warzone. A tornado wiped out 5,000+ homes. Black residents are relying on mutual aid to survive. We went to document climate collapse, ICE kidnappings, and the people fighting back in a city that once sparked a global revolution. youtu.be/BhQjYxBcqxw

A beloved bookstore about to close; a determined volunteer; a local news nonprofit that got creative. Got to write about a Kansas City icon named Willa Robinson and what @kcdefender.bsky.social is doing to preserve her remarkable book collection and legacy. www.niemanlab.org/2025/07/miss...

Exciting developments at the @kcdefender.bsky.social, providing a other example of the importance of grassroots Black Press organising www.niemanlab.org/2025/07/miss...

absolutely loved this piece about @kcdefender.bsky.social and a bookstore called Willa's by @speppered.bsky.social www.niemanlab.org/2025/07/miss...

The @kcdefender.bsky.social is fundraising to purchase the collection and turn it into a public archive, making “Miss Willa’s” bookstore space into its first-ever public headquarters. www.niemanlab.org/2025/07/miss...

How do you reach young audiences that traditional media misses? In our latest Q&A, @kcdefender.bsky.social‬ founder Ryan Sorrell explains how "grocery buyouts" built trust with Gen Z audiences.

Missouri is home to a growing coalition of people determined to stop the encroachment of white supremacist groups on their communities (via our partner @kcdefender.bsky.social). kansascitydefender.com/justice/fasc...

Kansas City’s brief invasion by white supremacist fascist group, Patriot Front, made two things clear: Missouri is a central theater for 21st-century neo-Nazism, and our state also houses a growing coalition determined to stop it. kansascitydefender.com/justice/fasc...

The reason I’m so loud about my respect and admiration about @thetriibe.com is because they laid the groundwork for me. I’ve learned a lot from the innovation happening in Chicago as a whole. I’m also loud about my love for Scalawag in the south and @kcdefender.bsky.social

🗞️ NEW from @kcdefender.bsky.social on what’s at stake in our fight to #SaveOurTransit:

!!!

My hope in 54 yrs of journalism was to equip the community with facts and solutions that can improve life. Ryan Sorrell at the Kansas City Defender @kcdefender.bsky.social has a 21st Century definition for his newsroom that works for me: "Power-building organization." www.poynter.org/business-wor...

Kansas City Leaders Speak Out Against New $800 Million Jail

Journalists should look beyond other journalists for inspo: "Study content creators … I listen to a lot of marketing podcasts because I think that they have a lot of the most innovative strategies," says Ryan Sorrell, @kcdefender.bsky.social founder. nationalpress.org/topic/social...

As Kansas City’s most powerful unelected official, Brian Platt has built his career on lies, retaliation, corruption, targeting Black employees, women, and whistleblowers who dared to challenge him. This exposé uncovers the shocking truth behind Platt’s reign. kansascitydefender.com/politics/kan...

@kcdefender.bsky.social is dropping bombs. Follow them. And read this insane news (because you need more of that IYL right now sorry: #KC #KCMO #BrianPlatt

Thank you for your reporting, @kcdefender.bsky.social Oof! I had no idea about this Hernandez suit too. kansascitydefender.indiegraf.com/lt.php?x=3DZ...

As Kansas City’s most powerful unelected official, Brian Platt has built his career on lies, retaliation, corruption, targeting Black employees, women, and whistleblowers who dared to challenge him. This exposé uncovers the shocking truth behind Platt’s reign. kansascitydefender.com/politics/kan...

🚀 In February 2025, The Defender officially launched B-REAL Academy, a radical education & organizing initiative born out of crisis. Our first cohort brings together Black radicals ages 11-86, equipping them with organizing skills, Black radical movement history, abolitionist writing and more.

CoreCivic is quietly planning a new ICE detention camp in Leavenworth, Kansas – a for-profit facility designed to cage immigrants. This dystopian ICE facility, fueled by political lobbying and blood money, echoes the horrors of history’s concentration camps.

CoreCivic is quietly planning a new ICE detention camp in Leavenworth, Kansas – a for-profit facility designed to cage immigrants. This dystopian ICE facility, fueled by political lobbying and blood money, echoes the horrors of history’s concentration camps.

Private prison company wants to turn Leavenworth prison into ICE camp (via our partner @kcdefender.bsky.social) kansascitydefender.com/national/imm...

📢The Kansas City Defender, a Pivot Fund grantee, hires Mili Mansaray as its new Editor and Director of Radical Media Initiatives! 📢 A fearless journalist committed to Black liberation, Mansaray is dedicated to community-driven media. #BIPOCMedia #News @kcdefender.bsky.social 🔗 More: bit.ly/4hqmoy6