Melissa S. Williams
@melissa1008.bsky.social
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Professor of Political Science, University of Toronto
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Melissa S. Williams
Rick Hasen
2 months ago
Test run for 2026. Here's what I wrote in the NY Times about the federal government potentially interfering with the 2026 elections and what we need to do about it.
www.nytimes.com/2025/08/20/o...
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Denise Wheeler
2 months ago
🧵Let's talk about the obvious: Where in the fuck did all the historic artwork and priceless furnishings go, including the gold leaf Steinway piano that was presented to FDR from the Steinway family? Did Trump steal all this when he demolished the East Wing? Why aren't Dems demanding to know?
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Aaron Rupar
3 months ago
Pritzker: "People of Illinois, we need your help. Get our your cell phones, record and narrate what you see. Put it on social media. Peacefully ask for badge numbers and identification. Speak up for your neighbors. We need to let the world know that this is happening and that we won't stand for it."
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Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò
3 months ago
I fully understand how difficult it is to remain focused on any one particular atrocity but this really ought to be a serious scandal and people need to pay heavy prices for this
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Connor Ewing
3 months ago
I was assured these interactions would be “brief” and easily resolved.
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Kai Ryssdal
3 months ago
Yes
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Andrew Stroehlein
3 months ago
Read this. Seriously, read it. The Trump regime is declaring open season on its critics - NGOs, philanthropists, activists. They will be harassed, arrested, jailed. The silencing effect on others who might speak out will be huge. This is authoritarianism.
www.whitehouse.gov/presidential...
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Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence
NATIONAL SECURITY PRESIDENTIAL MEMORANDUM/NSPM-7 MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF STATE THE SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/09/enforcing-the-death-penalty-laws-in-the-district-of-columbia-to-deter-and-punish-the-most-heinous-crimes/
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Jan-Werner Mueller
3 months ago
Bernard Harcourt with a helpful analysis of different conceptual frameworks and theoretical models trying to make sense of what is happening in the US:
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Twilight of American Democracy
Mapping A Democratic Breakdown in the United States
https://bernardharcourt.substack.com/p/twilight-of-american-democracy
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Rafi
3 months ago
I have approximately zero following on this app, sharing in the hopes it can get in front of the right person. A man I went to college with’s wife was kidnapped by ICE at a green card hearing, and he’s trying to find a reporter who will speak to him about the situation
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eileen chengyin chow
3 months ago
The South Korean Ministry of Defense has awarded medals of merit to 11 officers for disobeying direct orders of superiors during the martial law fiasco, orders that they deemed to be contrary to the constitution and endangerment to democracy.
www.chosun.com/english/nati...
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National Defense Ministry Honors 11 Soldiers for Refusing Illegal Orders
National Defense Ministry Honors 11 Soldiers for Refusing Illegal Orders Honored for rejecting illegal orders during martial law, Marine death probe
https://www.chosun.com/english/national-en/2025/09/23/B3ZEYVBMNBDMRHJL5SP7SJOLAI/?fbclid=IwY2xjawNFD0pleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETEwTXFDWlNHMW53b1JYeWtRAR6V8x5LAZN5dVoEgFMldFSwOPLYQINc6MHEyd8gXuMn6rzGrGz5N173OUUIvg_aem_w2CmH92vGXbEx2Q9Pac4-g
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Cas Mudde
3 months ago
I feel like this needs to be said, as I don’t feel many Americans get this: THIS IS NOT NORMAL!!! No, not even for authoritarian leaders in nominally democratic regimes. In Hungary, Poland, even Turkey*, authoritarian leaders do/did not regularly send the military into its peaceful cities!
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Radley Balko
3 months ago
Sure seems like the president just instructed the military to use lethal force against US citizens.
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Andrew Lawrence
3 months ago
the president just said the military should start shooting american civilians if they want to
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Who are the political scientists talking most insightfully about Israel/Palestine?
3 months ago
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Timothy Snyder
3 months ago
This is, without any exaggeration, exactly how Putin and Orbán proceeded — using antisemitism to discredit the idea of civil society and political opposition, and as an excuse to undo the rule of law.
www.nytimes.com/2025/09/25/u...
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Justice Dept. Official Pushes Prosecutors to Investigate George Soros’s Foundation
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/25/us/politics/justice-trump-george-soros-foundation.html
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Beth Popp Berman
4 months ago
You know things are rough when the AAUP's advice on how to use social media is just "set all your accounts to private."
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Michael S Roth
4 months ago
Judith Butler:"It is important to refuse the notion that this is just how things are..invoking a feckless realpolitik that justifies complicity with a brutal & rising authoritarianism. It is time to resist the injustice that now threatens to be normalized"
www.chronicle.com/article/when...
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Opinion | When Universities Become Informants
A practice from the McCarthy era makes an ugly return.
https://www.chronicle.com/article/when-universities-become-informants
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Erin J. Wamsley 🧠📈😴
4 months ago
Here's a partial list of university faculty who have been fired or suspended this week. 🧵 How are free speech and academic freedom doing at your university?
#academicsky
#edusky
#aaup
#freespeech
1/x 1. A tenured Professor at Florida Atlantic:
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FAU professor put on leave after social media comments about Charlie Kirk assassination
FAU President Adam Hasner released a statement Saturday on X, saying he became aware of repeated comments made online by the professor.
https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/local/boca/2025/09/14/fau-professor-put-on-leave-after-social-media-comments-about-charlie-kirk/86154498007/?gnt-cfr=1&gca-cat=p&gca-uir=true&gca-epti=z112626p000750c000750e005200v112626b0046xxd004665&gca-ft=29&gca-ds=sophi
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Jacob T. Levy
4 months ago
new from
@emmettmacfarlane.com
emmettmacfarlane.substack.com/p/u-of-t-pro...
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U of T prof's tweet, assumed by some to refer to Charlie Kirk killing, was bad, but so is the University's reaction
[Note: a commenter has pointed to this PressProgress report suggesting that the media’s coverage of this story, including the CBC story linked below, may be in fundamental error, as the tweet in quest...
https://emmettmacfarlane.substack.com/p/u-of-t-profs-tweet-on-charlie-kirk
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Emmett Macfarlane 🇨🇦
4 months ago
Post now updated with a note at the top, and with a slightly changed headline, because apparently almost every media outlet also may have gotten the story wrong.
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Thor Benson
4 months ago
Yeah, you can call it fascism
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Adil Haque
4 months ago
Full text of the International Association of Genocide Scholars Resolution on the Situation in Gaza:
genocidescholars.org/wp-content/u...
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The Guardian
4 months ago
Israel committing genocide in Gaza, world’s top scholars on the crime say
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Israel committing genocide in Gaza, world’s top scholars on the crime say
Almost 90% of leading academics on subject back resolution stating that Israel’s actions meet legal definition An overwhelming majority of members of the world’s leading genocide scholars’ association has backed a resolution stating that Israel’s actions in Gaza meet the legal definition of the crime. Eighty-six percent of those who voted in the 500-member International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) supported the motion. The resolution states that “Israel’s policies and actions in Gaza meet the legal definition of genocide in Article II of the United Nations Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948).” Continue reading...
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/sep/01/israel-committing-genocide-in-gaza-worlds-top-scholars-on-the-say?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=bluesky&CMP=bsky_gu
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robin celikates
6 months ago
Hirsch, the daughter of Holocaust survivors, is now thinking of leaving the classroom: “A university that treats criticism of Israel as antisemitic & threatens sanctions for those who disobey is no longer a place of open inquiry … I just don’t see how I can teach about genocide in that environment.”
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Boston Review
6 months ago
Almost a year ago, Israel’s finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, lamented that while “it may be just and moral” to starve Gaza’s two million residents, “no one in the world would let us.” What an incredible shame on us all that he was wrong.
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Can Anyone Hear Me? - Boston Review
Palestinians are only allowed to exist if we don’t cause discomfort for those who seek to erase us.
https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/can-anyone-hear-me/
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Ashwini Vasanthakumar
5 months ago
"Much of it is the unspeakable stuff nobody admits to but is clear to anyone who reads or observes: ... that it’s more expedient to be against evil after it’s over; that western countries preach justice and democracy, but act to protect wealth and power."
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George Conway ⚖️🇺🇸
5 months ago
Former Green Beret officer who was engaged in humanitarian work in Gaza: “I witnessed the Israel Defense Forces fire a main-gun tank round from a Merkava tank into a crowd of people.”
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Mehdi Hasan
6 months ago
"I was shocked to see one of the nurses who I worked with carrying my daughter... she was dead." This broke me. Dr Khaled Hamouda, Gaza surgeon, in tearful testimony to 'Gaza: Doctors Under Attack,' the film they didn't want you to see. Full film, that the BBC dropped, from Zeteo:
gazadoctors.film
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Ruth Ben-Ghiat
7 months ago
Why are no headlines focusing on the unconstitutional and dictatorial nature of this action?
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jamelle
7 months ago
a sitting federal judge — appointed by trump of course — awarded a student for a paper that basically says dred scott was right and should have gone further
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A powerful piece by Miko Zeldes-Roth on Arendt, Jewish sovereignty, and the substitution of violence for power.
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7 months ago
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Sherrilyn Ifill
9 months ago
And here we are.
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Timothy Snyder
9 months ago
"the president defied a Supreme Court ruling to return a man mistakenly sent to a gulag... and spoke of sending Americans to foreign concentration camps. This is the beginning of an American policy of state terror, and it has to be identified as such to be stopped"
snyder.substack.com/p/state-terror
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State Terror
A brief guide for Americans
https://snyder.substack.com/p/state-terror
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Malinda Lo
9 months ago
Harvard redid its whole homepage to push back against the administration’s demands. I mean, this is just a website but I think it’s kind of a great PR move:
www.harvard.edu
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Harvard University
Harvard University is devoted to excellence in teaching, learning, and research, and to developing leaders who make a difference globally.
https://www.harvard.edu/
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“The university will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights,” the letter said. “Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government.”
www.nytimes.com/live/2025/04...
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Opinion | Harvard’s Decision Was the Only Decision
The thrill over its response to the Trump administration is a measure of how low, and how fast, our expectations have fallen.
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/04/07/opinion/thepoint/harvard-trump-administration-statement?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
9 months ago
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Boston Review
9 months ago
Bridging racial and generational divides, coordinating ad hoc good works into workable systems, and cultivating leadership, mutual aid builds progressive movements for the long haul.
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Mutual Aid in the Age of Fascism - Boston Review
As people are being deputized to do violence, building connections is political resistance.
https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/mutual-aid-in-the-age-of-fascism/
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Jacob T. Levy
9 months ago
The slope isn't slippery; the frog isn't gradually getting boiled. Within its first hundred days the Trump administration has openly asserted the right/ power to seize and imprison anyone— including political dissidents, including citizens— and deprive them of any legal recourse at all. 5/
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Abraham Singer
9 months ago
Very excited to see this excellent piece in print. This is the part of a special issue of CRISPP dedicated to the political thought of Joseph Carens', which I co-edited with
@melissa1008.bsky.social
and Kiran Banerjee. More to come!
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Great to see so many of the pieces in this special issue in honour of Joe Carens beginning to appear online!
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9 months ago
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Delighted to see
@abizadeh.bsky.social
's fantastic piece in (virtual) print!
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9 months ago
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Marc Elias
9 months ago
“It’s the most extraordinary attack on voting rights in American history,” Wilentz said. “This is an attempt to destroy American democracy as we know it.
www.democracydocket.com/analysis/the...
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‘The most extraordinary attack on voting rights in American history’: How the SAVE Act upends over a century and a half of protecting voting
Read more here.
https://www.democracydocket.com/analysis/the-most-extraordinary-attack-on-voting-rights-in-american-history-how-the-save-act-upends-over-a-century-and-a-half-of-protecting-voting/
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Reuters
9 months ago
Eight people in South Sudan, including five children, died on a three-hour walk to seek medical treatment for cholera after US aid cuts forced local health services to close, the UK-based charity Save the Children said
reut.rs/3E9kB27
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South Sudan cholera patients died walking to clinic after US cut aid, charity says
Eight people in South Sudan, including five children, died on a three-hour walk to seek medical treatment for cholera after U.S. aid cuts forced local health services to close, the UK-based charity Save the Children said on Wednesday.
https://reut.rs/3E9kB27
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Eman Abdelhadi
9 months ago
Thank you to
@inthesetimesmag.bsky.social
for publishing the text of my letter to Notre Dame after they canceled my speech.
inthesetimes.com/article/notr...
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“Do Not Participate”: The Absurd Excuse Notre Dame Gave Me When They Canceled My Talk
What a tragedy when we cannot rely on universities to house our most critical conversations.
https://inthesetimes.com/article/notre-dame-cancels-eman-abdelhadi-talk-palestine
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Jean Beaman
9 months ago
solidarity with
@emanabdelhadi.bsky.social
:
inthesetimes.com/article/notr...
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“Do Not Participate”: The Absurd Excuse Notre Dame Gave Me When They Canceled My Talk
What a tragedy when we cannot rely on universities to house our most critical conversations.
https://inthesetimes.com/article/notre-dame-cancels-eman-abdelhadi-talk-palestine
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Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò
9 months ago
so we're here now
www.huffpost.com/entry/white-...
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White House Confirms Trump Is Exploring Ways To ‘Deport’ U.S. Citizens
The administration could try removing American citizens if it identifies a pathway it can claim to be legal.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/white-house-confirms-trump-is-exploring-ways-to-deport-us-citizens_n_67f580abe4b0a5ea5c7608d2?d_id=8933014&ref=bffbhuffpost&ncid_tag=fcbklnkushpmg00000063&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&utm_campaign=us_main
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Rachel Maddow
9 months ago
Breaking, per NBC News
@garygrumbach.bsky.social
-- Judge Paula Xinis in the District of Maryland has ruled that the United States Government must return Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the United States by April 7 at 11:59p
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Freddie_Rose🌹 🇨🇦 ⚕️
9 months ago
www.ctvnews.ca/world/articl...
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South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol removed from office over ill-fated declaration of martial law
South Korea’s Constitutional Court removed impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol from office on Friday, four months after he threw South Korean politics into turmoil by declaring martial law and sending t...
https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/article/south-koreas-constitutional-court-is-set-to-rule-on-the-impeachment-of-yoon/
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Heard Island Government
9 months ago
Inspired by
@mark-carney.bsky.social
and Canadians everywhere. We’re all fighting back on our home ice!
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Gary Longsine 📱
11 months ago
There's a school of thought which suggests that the only way to disable the fascist movement is to stop shielding MAGA voters from the consequences of their actions. Well, now that the GOP administration is disabling disease surveillance, response, and even basic research, there's no shield. 1/ 🧵
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Senator Bernie Sanders
9 months ago
The Netanyahu government has killed 50,000 people in Gaza & wounded 112,000. Two weeks ago, they broke the ceasefire and have since killed 322 children & wounded 600. The US must end its complicity. Tomorrow, I will force votes to block $8.8 billion in arm sales to Netanyahu.
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