Oh

ICE just released updated detention statistics. As of December 13, 2025, ICE reports a total of 68,442 people are held in immigration detention. www.ice.gov/detain/deten...

Today I wrote about 60 Minutes' decision to obey in advance and why it represents the sad end to the storied franchise. We are in desperate need of strong independent media. You can help Democracy Docket be a part of it by becoming a premium member today. hubs.ly/Q03CbHTt0

blockclubchicago.org/2025/12/21/c... Local man with untreated diabetes who is not a public safety threat dies in ICE custody at 56.

Bari Weiss is even more hamhanded than I imagined her to be. Gift link:

Ok so if no one cares about the airborne virus that infects the lining of your blood vessels and breaks basically every part of your body, maybe they'll be interested in cleaning the air because it's also full of microplastics (those little threads floating in a sunbeam aren't pixie dust).

The term "heritage American" being bandied about is irritating b/c of its imprecision. Is it based on length of time in the US of your ancestors, being from England, whiteness, legal citizenship, or some other unspoken category? Because the migration trends in the colonial period & early republic 1/

SNAP is a lifeline for workers in low-wage jobs. Meanwhile, CEOs are paid 280x as much as the typical worker. Don’t be angry at workers for using food stamps. Be angry at the corporations paying them so little that they need them.

Emergency Medicaid accounts for less than 1% of total #Medicaid spending, even in states with large undocumented populations. ja.ma/4b6fYng

I think bigotry has become a kind of loyalty ritual among young republicans, it’s how you show you’re one of them www.thecrimson.com/article/2025...

Proud Boy leader, J6 organizer, and recipient of Trump pardon Enrique Tarrio has been a bit more active on social media lately. Today he is promoting a woman who organized a Mein Kampf reading group and proudly identifies as a "white power" advocate of the US being a White Christian "ethnostate."

They really think everyone else is as stupid as they are.

these documents are more blacked out than Pete Hegseth on New Years Eve

Here's a quilt of Volume 4 of the Epstein document dump. Gives you a 10,000 foot view of the redactions. that's 2,704 docs.

Congress demanded Jack Smith testify about his investigations, but kept him behind closed doors during his sworn deposition. If we care about transparency, then Congress should release the transcript. My thoughts in Bloomberg. www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

"For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil..." -1 Timothy 6:10 (New International Version)

The administration has bypassed critical international law thresholds with potentially devastating precedence for the international order and, more concerning, U.S. domestic law. usni.org/magazines/p...

Where have immigrants arrested during the so-called "Operation Midway Blitz" in Chicago ended up? New data reveals the privately-run detention facilities and local jails where ICE is holding people. @geoffhing.bsky.social @jillcastellano.bsky.social www.themarshallproject.org/2025/12/18/i...

Family separation is happening inside the U.S. too. This report details how thousands of migrant families have been split apart through arrests, detention, and deportation under Trump-era policies. www.reflector.com/news/nationa...

Border Patrol's Greg Bovino walked away when I asked him today if it were hypocritical to talk about foreigners with DUIs when there's a history of that in his family. Bovino's dad went to prison after killing a woman while driving drunk - as we detailed in this profile www.wbez.org/immigration/...

Trump's reprehensible attempt to deport courageous Chinese dissident Guan Heng is part of a broader pattern of deporting dissenters/victims of persecution back to their oppressors. The policy is simultaneously evil and stupid: reason.com/volokh/2025/...

Border patrol under command of Greg Bovino running a checkpoint at the exit to the Uber lot at O’Hare airport in Chicago, asking drivers for proof of valid residency in this country

Border patrol is forcing rideshare drivers at the O’Hare lot to show proof of citizenship before they can exit the lot and pick up rides at the airport

The Trump admin says it aims to file 100-200 denaturalization cases per month, a huge increase. But these cases are hard to file and win, and require a lot of DOJ resources, and the DOJ is incredibly stretched thin already. So we’ll see; I have serious doubts about their ability to do this.

my latest is on the odd confluence of unitary executive theory with a president who is mostly AWOL from the business of governance (gift link)

Illinois vaccine committee votes to keep recommending hepatitis B vaccine for newborns The move marks the second time that state public health officials have broken away from guidance under U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime critic of vaccines. www.wbez.org/health-medic...

Wanted to highlight @kathrynpost.bsky.social's latest on this because she's been covering it from the start. Also, highlighting 👇 this speedy, robust report from the Wheaton Record (Ruch's church is in Wheaton, IL). Aggressive reporting from the student paper! thewheatonrecord.com/2025/12/16/b...

A reminder tonight that Venezuela has nothing to do with fentanyl. The vast majority of the fentanyl supply begins as precursor chemicals in China, is manufactured in Mexico, and makes it to the U.S. by land, mostly smuggled by U.S. citizens hiding it within lawful trade and traffic at entry points.

ProPublica could not find evidence Trump ever lived at either of the two Florida properties he claimed as principal residences in the 1990s. Legal documents and other records from the period give his address as Trump Tower in Manhattan.

The situation right now is developing fast; Border Patrol is detaining people across SW side. Community members are following their caravan. Agents are threatening people who film with pepper ball and tear gas dispensers. It's going to take time for rapid response to tally arrest totals.

A large CBP presence is back in Chicago this morning, with sightings and arrests reported across the southwest side and Cicero. Bovino is also here.

“We should not let our guard down,” Gonzales said. “I grew up in this neighborhood, it’s my community. It makes me angry to watch innocent people get taken.” Back to terror for the southwest side. Something about Chicago keeps bovino coming back. He hates the immigrant community & the resistance.

I’ve been waiting for this kind of profile on Greg Bovino. Some stunning (and some… just weird?) details in here. chicago.suntimes.com/the-watchdog...

Consequences of the erasure of civilian/combatant distinction.

“I can’t think of any other way to describe it but an attack on the independence of the judiciary and the International Criminal Court’s independence as an institution, which is why I’m so interested in the public hearing this.” www.irishtimes.com/world/us/202...

While most reporters focused on the 5yrs social media disclosure to visit the US, few noticed that US Customs and Border Protection could soon also demand your DNA as part of an ESTA (Electronic System for Travel Authorization) application just to visit the US. www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-...

NEW: A review of more than 100 Alabama court cases found some immigrants saw harsher punishments than citizens, even when they have fewer prior convictions. Defendants said they believe their citizenship status tipped the scales of justice against them. By @amyyurkanin.bsky.social

I moderated a discussion of the Page Act of 1875 with Catherine Ceniza Choy, Cybelle Fox, and Leti Volpp in April. You can now watch a video of the event! news.berkeley.edu/2025/12/12/b...

Stephen Miller is employing state terror in service of the open goal of shifting the ethnic mix of the country. In numerous ways he's doing this at the expense of public safety. We spent weeks reporting on Miller's real aims. Here's the result. We hope you'll read: newrepublic.com/article/2041...

In 2024, when #H5N1 #birdful was rampaging through dairy farms in the major producing states, Wisconsin never reported a case. The 2nd largest dairy producer seemed to have extraordinary luck. Luck's over. #USDA reports milk testing has turned up a positive in WI. www.aphis.usda.gov/news/agency-...

#Wisconsin Dairy Cattle now testing positive for #H5N1 / #birdflu “the first such case documented among dairy cattle in Wisconsin” “The new case was found through routine National Milk Testing Strategy testing, rather than surveillance that is required before moving cattle across state lines”

In late 2020 a Chinese man called Guan Heng travelled to Xinjiang with our BuzzFeed map of detention facilities to provide ground truth for our work - he provided the first corroborating evidence for many sites. He escaped to the US - then ICE detained him. www.wsj.com/world/china/...

“Is it Too Late?” open.substack.com/pub/sherrily...

This is insane. Of course, US citizens do not have immigration documents to produce. So what he’s really saying is carry your papers, but if you are a citizen you must submit to a facial recognition scan if you don’t want to be arrested. Dystopia.

Trump attacks quickly turn to threats: www.nbcnews.com/politics/don...

So, El Fasher looks like one of the worst single event atrocities to happen this century so far, but the evidence has come in such a trickle it seems to only now be getting verified

Cartoon by @bagleycartoons.bsky.social.

In a dramatic series of overnight developments, the Trump administration took extraordinary steps to try to re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia within hours of his court-ordered release, but a federal judge stepped in and blocked the move.

My full write-up: In a dramatic series of overnight developments, the Trump administration took extraordinary steps to try to re-detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia within hours of his court-ordered release, but a federal judge stepped in and blocked the move. talkingpointsmemo.com/morning-memo...