The fact that Mamdani just seems like a cheerful normal guy who's policies are things like "we're going to tax second homes to fund pothole repairs" or whatever and yet this generates panicked responses like "This is basically Stalin's great purge turned up to eleven" is... telling. It tells things.

you know you gotta get in formation/

“Corruption is the Achilles’ heel of autocrats. It’s not a bug in the system. It’s the model,” the New Yorker staff writer Jane Mayer says. www.newyorker.com/podcast/poli...

Just keeps getting better!

"The University of California system, the California State system, the City University of New York — these are the institutions actually educating America’s workforce, actually moving first-generation students into the middle class, actually delivering on higher education’s democratic promise."

"the colleges that dominate the headlines are not the colleges that most Americans attend their core mission: to serve students from all backgrounds, at a price families can actually afford, prepare graduates for real careers and meaningful lives." www.geneseo.edu/enrollment-m...

DOJ demanded voter files from all 50 states. DOJ sued 31 states for refusing their demand. My law firm intervened to protect voters in those cases. DOJ is now 0-5. My firm is 5-0. Lesson: When we fight we win.

Urge Stanford to reject the DOJ's demands for sensitive personal information about Stanford Medical School students: Please sign & share the petition: alumni.standforcampusfreedom.org/petitions/ca...

Every media outlet covering the Yale report should pair it with this @aft.org @aaup.org initiative! (All credit to my colleague Surya Parekh who suggested adding the word “indispensable” to the mantra I’ve been using for years. Now it’s going national! #PublicGoodU) www.aft.org/ae/spring202...

In American Educator, @rweingarten.bsky.social and @proftwolf.bsky.social explain why we must defend higher ed institutions and the economic benefits they have for graduates and the greater society—spurring local business development, providing jobs, & generating tax revenue⤵️ aft.org/ae/spring202...

I’m under no illusion that our reports will get more views or reads or headlines than Yale’s. But we really need to rethink what are “leading” universities in the United States. (Of course I’m proud of Stony Brook’s former president. SBU’s new one is a gem!) president.yale.edu/sites/defaul...

Part of the larger solution is for New York State to redouble its efforts to fund, price, staff, & govern SUNY and CUNY like the indispensable public goods they are. With the NYS budget about to go into quadruple overtime, there’s still time to make this open letter count! hdl.handle.net/1951/88718

I’m one of four faculty on the Chancellor’s Working Group on Faculty/Staff Well-Being and Development. The Ethics white paper was part of the diagnosis that led to its formation. I’m so grateful to the Student Life Committee for its green paper that will help shape the working group’s prescription!

Let’s make this a challenge! If you haven’t read the Ethics white paper, here’s the link! hdl.handle.net/1951/88640

Publication Alert! I predict this Student Life green paper will go even bigger than the Ethics Committee’s excellent white paper on faculty/staff burnout and morale (which recently became our 2nd-most-viewed document in our digital repository). hdl.handle.net/1951/88947

The national media is eating up this report as justification for perpetuating the lie that universities themselves - as opposed to decades of attacks from the far right authoritarian party - are responsible for eroding trust in higher education. You can almost hear them salivating at the chance.

Important questions! No easy answers. Our job is to protect Public Good U against—and against becoming—Police U, Grift U, Vichy U. Let’s discuss what “AI for the Public Good” should be. We know of folks in NY, CA, MI, NC doing this. We’re putting together a #PublicGoodU webinar series. You in?

he’s not as visible as most of the folks in the administration but after stephen miller vought is probably the most evil of the lot he is ideologically committed to destroying the entire concept of the public good

Many of the criticisms in this report are true or partially true, but the biggest problem that's brought down U.S. colleges is indeed the 50-year crusade by the right to wipe away any notion that higher ed is a public good, massively cut funding for publics, and create the student debt crisis

This is what realizing the promise of #PublicGoodU looks like: doing the research to identify problems and solutions. Read the thread!

Join @rweingarten.bsky.social and @vinguptamd.bsky.social on 4/30 for a Vital Lessons webinar on medical debt and healthcare affordability. They'll share findings from AFT's latest survey and explore practical resources you can use now to navigate costs. Register ⤵️ sharemylesson.com/webinars/med...

HELU's Vice Chair Jenna Chernega is, "excited to see working people join together on May Day to build power and solidarity. This is how we overcome the authoritarianism in our government and also create a new and better world for tomorrow." 👀 Watch this space for May Day resources, coming soon!

Across the country, higher ed workers are organizing for May Day. Join Meghan from Wayne Academic Union in Detroit and many others in flexing our collective power! Learn more and get involved at www.labor4highered.org #maydaystrong #mayday #mayday2026

Read about the Amherst Compact – "the first of its kind in higher education" – a pledge from labor unions representing faculty and staff members at 125 campuses across the Northeast to work together toward shared bargaining goals. Learn more @chronicle.com: www.chronicle.com/article/dive...

National Center Executive Director Bill Herbert is quoted in this Chronicle of Higher Education article on the new multi-union regional collective bargaining compact announced by @higheredlabor.bsky.social www.chronicle.com/article/dive...

This May Day, join higher ed workers across the nation and fight for an affordable and safe education that serves the common good. Learn more and register at www.labor4highered.org #HandsOffHigherEd #MayDayHigherEd #HigherEdOverBillionaires #DefendHigherEd

@rweingarten.bsky.social is right. TX built a public university system that was the envy of the world, to create opportunities for generations of Texans. That’s what we’re here to stand up for: Broad based opportunity for all. @utaustinaaup.bsky.social @aaup.org @texasaaup.bsky.social

How is Title VI being weaponized to erode academic freedom? Join leaders from the AAUP's Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom & Middle East Studies Association on April 16 at 2pmET for a conversation on Title VI and more. @mesa1966.bsky.social Register here: zoom.us/webinar/regi...

We launched this platform in the heart of Texas as a reminder: even at ground zero of the attacks on academic freedom & education as a whole, there is a growing resistance movement that is spreading like wildfire fire. And we will win.

Great to have @rweingarten.bsky.social and @proftwolf.bsky.social in Austin for the launch of AAUP/AFT’s new platform! Pictured here with Texas AFT’s @zephcapo.bsky.social (left) and @drleonardbright.bsky.social of the @tamu-aaup.bsky.social

Stop the ban, keep up the fight. Education is a right! 🎓 @aaup.org @afthighered.bsky.social @texasaaup.bsky.social

Austin Texas: Marching from the UT campus to the state Capitol.

Wonderful Jelani Cobb for We The People at UIC! to community slogans and fighting for your fellows! @jelaniya.bsky.social

“They tried to weaken higher education, but instead they built a movement to fight for the future... They can attack our institutions, but they cannot stop our movement….We will not stop until we have the higher education system and the democracy we all deserve.” — Todd Wolfson, AAUP President

✊

I’m excited at the convergence around #PublicGoodU by so many organizations. Folks from NY, California, & Michigan are figuring out what @publicgoodu.bsky.social will become. This thread is an intro to the constellation. I’d love for NPR to bring these voices on air! bsky.app/profile/publ...

Today, the AAUP & @aft.org launched our national policy platform to win back an American higher education system that protects the freedom to teach & learn & strengthens our democracy. Read it in full here: www.aaup.org/blueprint-st... 🧵

We were happy to host national AAUP and AFT leaders in Austin for the launch of their new national policy platform. Education for democracy! ✊🏽✊🏽✊🏽

"The Seattle Loop is an engine for an entire ecosystem of loops. As Seattle’s public bank anchors the city’s finances, it can simultaneously empower myriad additional circuits of desperately needed public provisions."

Peter Magyar has offered a template which can be used, without too much alteration, in defeating populists worldwide open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/...

The Seattle Loop: Reclaiming the Public Interest

This Thursday! Our UC-AFT lecturers will be bargaining at UC Davis. RSVP to observe negotiations and support your table team! docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F... #WeTeachUC

HAPPENING NOW: The AFT and @aaup.org are in Texas launching our new Nnational Higher Education platform ahead of the 2026 midterms. Read more in the release here, and follow along in the thread below. @afthighered.bsky.social

Todd Wolfson, @aaup.org: Let's be clear about what higher education does. It generates groundbreaking research, creates billions in economic output, anchors communities as employers, trains the next generation of workers & creates opportunities for a better life. @afthighered.bsky.social

The new platform from AFT & @aaup.org is focused on: 🎓Restored funding 🎓Freedom to learn 🎓Shared governance: Ensuring faculty and staff—not corporate administrators—make final decisions on curriculum, research priorities and institutional priorities. 🎓Labor reform

I'm in The Blog today on the turmoil in higher education finance. 🧵 The Trump Admin is simultaneously trying to get things back to normal (pre-COVID status quo, but more punitive) and to dismantle the whole system (selling off the portfolio, closing Dept of Ed) lpeproject.org/blog/the-stu...

"Now, more than ever, we need a university that can serve as a beacon for democratic society, by deepening our commitments to academic freedom, shared governance and the public mission of higher education." — Cornell AAUP @cornellaaup.bsky.social

Read the whole thread. And try to convince every follower of yours who is a New Yorker to get on the horn NOW to their state legislators regarding the New York State budget. hdl.handle.net/1951/88718

Read this and act ✊ #cuny #suny