🧪Did I really have time for this story? No, I did not, for reasons I'll be sharing soon. Did I absolutely feel compelled to write it anyways? You know I did! A viral mystery solved by science. Read on @sciencenews.bsky.social Also, I have a new to-do for my trip to Chicago for #SciWri25 next month!

EXCLUSIVE: Thousands of leaked messages show leaders of Young Republican groups joking about gas chambers, slavery and rape in a private Telegram chat. Inside rising GOP leaders’ racist chats — obtained by POLITICO and spanning more than 7 months👇

Damn, folks. This left-wing political correctness on campus at (*checks notes*) … er, Indiana University? — is out of control.

6:50p UPDATE: Tsunami waves are expected to reach Oregon around 11:40 p.m., with waves forecast to be up to 2 feet above the tide. Tsunami waves could continue to hit the Oregon coast for 15 hours after they arrive. www.oregonlive.com/pacific-nort...

"The National Cancer Institute is being targeted by the Trump administration’s downsizing. Current and former employees report that morale has “tanked” as the administration hollows out the agency, with many scientists leaving in frustration." Seems bad for Americans.

PBS News is not going anywhere. We will continue our work without fear or favor, as we have for nearly five decades on the air. We are profoundly grateful to Viewers Like You for your loyalty and unwavering support.

Portland, Oregon #NoKings

Still trying to process and figure out how to deal with our current world. To quote a friend: “I’ve never felt so seen” www.theguardian.com/wellness/ng-...

Some of the CDC's main channels for communicating urgent health information to the public have gone silent.

60 Minutes could find no criminal records for 75% of the Venezuelans the U.S. sent to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador. https://cbsn.ws/4clubLP

You may be fearing your 401k is no longer enough for you to retire. But with all the cuts to NIH and Medicare you also won't live as long. So the policies are integrated.

We the people are taking action to stop a hostile government takeover. On April 5, 5.2 million people across the country stood up to say HANDS OFF our democracy! Save the date for our next national day of action on April 19th. #50501movement #PeoplesMovement #FiftyFiftyOne #April5 #HandsOff

An image of and quote from Harriet Tubman have been removed from a National Parks webpage about the “Underground Railroad,” following several prominent changes to government websites under the Trump administration.

🧵 We're extremely concerned DOGE has gained access to data that would help them target farmworkers & organizations serving them. Please help us spread the word in your communities. 🚨 Here's what we know.

Among cuts at HHS: most of the workers at NIOSH, incl Pittsburgh national lab that approves and ensures continued quality of respirators - N95s + breathing devices for firefighters, miners, people working w chemicals, construction dust. “Nothing is happening to make sure they continue to be safe”

If one of us stands up, they can pick that person off. If ten or a hundred or a thousand, they can pick those people off. And they're picking off people--immigrants, dissidents--to make an example of them. But if ten million people stand up, they cannot stop us all.

DOGE just closed down 50 vaccination clinics in Texas amid a measles outbreak. Musk and the Trump admin directed federal agencies to pause the disbursement of $11.4 billion in community health loans and grants this week. The timing couldn't be worse. thehill.com/policy/healt...

Trump and Musk believe our country belongs to them. They're taking everything they can get their hands on and daring us to stop them. On Saturday, we're taking to the streets nationwide to fight back with a clear message: Hands off! Please join us: handsoff2025.com/?SQ...

📢 On April 5, we’re joining hundreds of thousands across the country to say: Hands off! Hands off our Social Security. Hands off our services. Hands off our democracy. AFT members will be in the streets this Saturday—will you join us? Find an event near you: www.mobilize.us/handsoff

It's getting a lot of attn today. But even before today most of the country had very little idea of what has happened at NIH or through it the entire ecosystem of biomedical research in the US. Simply put, Musk, Kennedy & Trump exploded a bomb right in the middle of cancer cure research in the US.

My latest story: The CDC Buried a Measles Forecast That Stressed the Need for Vaccinations. The move — along with the CDC’s explanation — is a sign that the public health agency may be falling in line under HHS Secretary RFK Jr. www.propublica.org/article/meas...

This letter appeared in the Bloomsburg PA Press Enterprise this morning. I am assured the writer is who he purports to be, an Air Force veteran.

Speak up now, together, university presidents. Keeping your heads down is not going to work. Again, we know this from lots of past experience. You're totally ceding the public & political debate to the authoritarians, & it's the worst possible strategy you could pursue. bsky.app/profile/mcop...

i think shutting the government down is preferably to nullifying article i of the constitution

There were howls of protest and denial from the GOP any time we pointed out that Republicans want to cut Social Security. Now the most powerful official in the White House goes on TV and calls it "the big one to eliminate."

Musk has now poured $8.3 million into buying the tie-breaking Wisconsin Supreme Court seat for Brad Schimel. That is vastly more than any other single donor—to eliminate a state-level check on his and Trump's power. Help us fight back and elect Susan Crawford: PeopleVMusk.com

Yes. If DHS can barge in, say your visa was revoked, be told you have a green card, say it's revoked too, and then disappear you so that neither your lawyer nor your family can find you, then all the guardrails are gone. There is no policy, practice, or law protecting anyone.

“The scariest words in the English language are ‘I’m from the private sector and I’m here to maximize efficiency.’”

‘Silence is complicity’ — universities must fight the anti-DEI crackdown: Higher-education establishments must not be bullied into abandoning their mission of diversity, equity and inclusion. www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Today, a broad coalition of scientific professional societies who represent over 92,000 scientists are speaking out against the politicization and demonization of Federally funded science and government scientist jobs. It was an honor to help the Union of Concerned Scientists with this! 🧪🌎

Universities Are Under Attack. Silence Is Not an Option: University presidents are staying quiet as Trump tries to destroy their institutions. It won’t work. www.thenation.com/article/soci...

Another NIH grant rescinded - The Epidemiology of Alzheimers Disease and Related Dementias in Sexual and Gender Minority Older Adults: Identifying Risk and Protective Factors - 1K01AG056669

The problem I have with these sorts of pieces is that they don't acknowledge the role that the press played in spreading Trump's obvious lies. Like yeah, this lady in WaPo thought Trump was going to make IVF free. I wonder where she got that idea...

So all NIH websites appear to be down.

NOTE: The opponents of DEI are purging anyone who is not a white man from military leadership This is not about merit; it’s about normalizing racism and misogyny

Francis Collins, longtime NIH director with bipartisan bona fides*, retires as of yesterday. He returned to NIH in 2023 to focus on research in his own lab, in the NIH in-house intramural research campus. His letter seems to imply he wasn’t ready to leave. NIH is being torn down. 1/🧪 #academicsky

My accomplishments from last week: 1. Advanced a national DEI research project. 2. Helped plan a conference supporting health equity education. 3. Taught a class on equitable medical education. 4. Worked on strategic planning for health equity education. 5. Reminded the C-suite this work matters.

THIS IS HOW YOU STAND UP: EEOC admin judge Karen Ortiz resisted an order to hand over all LGBT cases for “review” and told colleagues to resist too. She knows she’ll likely to be fired. “I can exist on cornflakes and community if it means that my soul is intact.” www.nytimes.com/2025/02/22/u...

I present to you the next deputy director of the FBI!

PLEASE: Watch what happened in Coeur d'Alene Idaho today. This is fascism. Unmarked cops. 1A violations. RESIST.

Senators can, at any time, tell Trump he has exceeded his power. Instead, they have conceded their power, turning themselves into beggars. www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

This is an absolute scandal. Trump and Marco Rubio abandoned American workers and their families abroad, delaying waivers to provide for their safe return to the United States. As these civil servants lost their possessions, housing, and money, Elon Musk was slandering them with bogus accusations.

#DEI #Censorship, #Reasearch & #Education #PublicHealth #MedSky #EpiSky #SocialEpi www.bostonglobe.com/2025/02/10/m...

Here's a list of DOGE staff, assembled and annotated by my colleagues at BI. Whatever you do, please don't share it. www.businessinsider.com/doge-staff-l...

NIH doesn’t just support infectious disease research—it drives breakthroughs in cancer, childhood diseases, heart disease, diabetes & more. Thanks to NIH, we have: 💉 Cancer immunotherapy ❤️ Cholesterol-lowering statins 🩸 Insulin for diabetes Investing in NIH = investing in life-saving discoveries.

If you or a loved one has cancer or Alzheimer's, or are in clinical trials for these or other diseases, you should know the Musk-Trump shutdown of medical research funding is a major threat to our ability to find cures. We are shouting this out with one voice: beyer.house.gov/news/documen...