My org, @wola-org.bsky.social, has fought since the 1970s to stop US aid to Latin American forces that violate human rights. Through the Dirty War, Iran-Contra, Plan Colombia. But now, US forces are cutting out the middleman: violating human rights directly in the region. It's a horrendous shift.

With Iceberg, Titanic Lists Ocean-Bottomward as North Atlantic Exerts Influence

“Pelayo said her dad described being held in a room with at least 150 other men as ICE officers constantly yell at them and call them slurs. He also told his daughters detainees are only given food and water based on good behavior.” These are the conditions at the site of yesterday’s protest.

So many questions. Like, were the bills in a paper bag? A briefcase? Sealed cans of gourmet crushed tomatoes?

Looks like something out of Alabama circa 1963.

Important thread.

“Oh that’s too bad,” say people moving cocaine via cargo containers, submersible vessels, and the Pacific route that, in fact, accounts for 80% of traffic

No location info provided. This ups the death toll to 17 in three air strikes on alleged drug smugglers in the Americas.

If you get tickets to see the band Wednesday at DC’s 9:30 Club in November, please tell me how to convince your calendar app that you’re not doing “Club” next Wednesday morning at 9:30.

38% increase in Border Patrol migrant apprehensions from July to August at the US-Mexico border. July-August change for nationalities over 50 apprehensions: Colombia +132% Cuba +98% Nicaragua +61% Honduras +46% Mexico +44% Other Countries +27% El Salvador +24% Venezuela +22% Guatemala -2%

This is an agent of the US federal government, armed for live-fire combat against a modern army, slamming a passive and nonviolent female candidate for the US Congress into asphalt. Then walking away without checking if she has injuries, with his identity concealed behind a black facemask.

This week's @wola-org.bsky.social Border Update has links to many investigations and reports about miserable conditions in US immigration detention, and about defense and law enforcement personnel diverted away from their “real” jobs to support “mass deportation.”

“It was not an authorization for the use of military force. Just because something is labeled a terrorist organization does not give you the authority to fire anything at them.”

“Silence will certainly save us. Authoritarianism is like measles: Ignore it and it will go away. I have this guidance straight from Secretary Kennedy.” — @petridishes.bsky.social:

Of great interest to perhaps 0.5% of readers: - yt-dlp, a command-line app, can finally download videos of Senate hearings. This has never worked. - Whisper speech recognition (an app like MacWhisper) can quickly turn the downloaded audio into a decent-quality transcript. github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp

This is the claim that the Trump-appointed Judge Tim Kelly said "crumbled like a house of cards."

If major outlets don't stop yielding, the US media landscape will soon resemble this graphic from the Wikipedia entry for "Long Tail." The admin will control media in the green "head." What's left of a free press (much of it small individual and worker-owned outlets) will be the yellow "tail."

Peru (entire central government budget roughly US$65 billion) plans to spend $3.42 billion on 12 fighter jets from the US (F-16s, plus related parts, weapons). www.dsca.mil/Press-Media/...

The Trump-Miller administration's single-minded focus on migration is starting to impact the availability of drugs in the US, according to this detail from a very good investigation @wsj.com published today. www.wsj.com/world/americ...

Re: boat bombings: “This is so beyond anything that the most lawless administration ever did before that to treat it as somehow continuous is a real disservice to thoughtful people.” — former Yale Law dean and State Dept assistant secretary Harold Koh: www.politico.com/news/2025/09...

Whistleblowers repped by @govacctproj.bsky.social say Angie Salazar, a career ICE-HSI official now heading the Office of Refugee Resettlement, signed off on expelling at least 30 unaccompanied Guatemalan kids despite evidence that it would endanger them. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Tomorrow night is the latest deadline for the temporary restraining order keeping the Trump administration from whisking unaccompanied Guatemalan kids out of the country against their will. (And keep an eye on possible renditions of Honduran kids.) www.courtlistener.com/docket/71240...

In a letter to Rubio and Noem, @chrismurphyct.bsky.social, an appropriator, demands information about the El Salvador CECOT renditions that would already have been public if the administration were even trying to maintain a thin veneer of democracy. www.murphy.senate.gov/newsroom/pre...

Kavanaugh’s “it’s just not that big of a deal” concurrence isn’t so popular.

Good statement from UN human rights experts about the murderous civilian boat bombings in the Caribbean: www.ohchr.org/en/press-rel...

Here’s a new “weekly” e-mail about stuff I’ve been working on, for those who’ve signed up to receive them.

After living in Washington the past 8 months, this is looking pretty good

Good resource from Women's Refugee Commission: a "Detention Pregnancy Tracker," because "Despite significant reports of harms to pregnant detainees, there is insufficient data to understand the scope and scale of the problem. Immigration detention has become a black box."

It’s the expected result in Colombia: a drug decertification with a waiver (suspension of penalties). A symbolic scolding from the Trump administration.

Another video showing lethal force and no evidence of self-defense. A cop can't shoot a fleeing person in the back because they suspect a terrorist carrying cocaine. A pilot can't take down a Cessna on that suspicion. A drone can't blow a civilian motorboat out of the water. Nothing works this way.

From overdose prevention to supporting civil society in Venezuela to curbing illicit financial flows, the administration is taking key tools out of its toolbox while swinging a military sledgehammer. New @wola-org.bsky.social podcast on the US military in the Caribbean:

In the days before the admin. tried to deport unaccompanied Guatemalan children in the pre-dawn hours of Labor Day weekend, many of their immigration cases were abruptly closed. I'm now hearing that this is happening to some Honduran kids. This says 300 kids may be vulnerable:

(En español) Here's audio of my interview this morning with Colombia's *La FM* radio about the US drug "certification" decision coming later today: www.lafm.com.co/internaciona...

Si entiendes español: Here's an in-depth interview with Cecilia Orozco, of Colombia's Revista Raya, about the Trump administration's imminent decision about whether to "decertify" Colombia as a partner nation in the drug war, which would be a mistake. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjQ8...

Latin America-Related Events in Washington and Online This Week 8 events about Latin America this week, that I know about, that can be attended in person in Washington or online anywhere.

Please, please, no more finger in the wind stuff.

In this week's @wola-org.bsky.social Border Update: - Supreme Court upholds “roving patrols” and profiling - Elsewhere in the courts: unaccompanied kids, CECOT deal, TPS - Surges in Chicago and Boston, detention abuses, rising deportations www.wola.org/2025/09/week...

Look at the rich culture we missed out on while wasting precious years "having a job," "raising a kid," "being in our community," "trying to be helpful," "seeking meaning," and "going outside."

"acceptance" already, that was fast

From @wola-org.bsky.social: Do not decertify Colombia. The Petro gov't has failed to meet its own drug policy goals—due to mismanagement, not malice. A "decertification" would compound the damage at a time of worsening security challenges in Colombia. The certification process needs to go away.

What in the world happened with ICE's flights to southern Mexico in August? That's the most flights to any country in a single month since @thcartwright started this essential monitoring project back in 2020. Don't miss this report.

Thank goodness the Tren de Aragua tattoo experts minored in trans arrows

Missed this last wknd: Jesus Munoz-Gutierrez, the Mexican man the US sent to South Sudan in July, is back in Mexico. He said Sudan treated him well. Mexico pledged no “torture, inhumane or degrading treatment, or undue prosecution.” Only 1 country mistreated him. www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/...

Guilty www.theguardian.com/world/2025/s...

From this story: what they saw at ICE's Alexandria Staging Facility in Louisiana. Six months apart.

Plume of smoke rising from the Pentagon, taken with a primitive digital camera from the balcony of my old apartment in Washington's Woodley Park neighborhood 24 years ago today.

"There's no doubt he remembers that" (from www.ft.com/content/41af...)

"Officials briefed on the strike said that the video does not tell the entire story. It does not show the boat turning after the people aboard were apparently spooked by an aircraft above them, nor does it show the military making repeated strikes on the vessel even after disabling it."

Do this, condemn all political violence, condemn all gun violence, no exceptions.