“In a vacuum, I would certainly run the risk of a misdemeanor, as opposed to actively supporting concentration camps,” Rachel Cohen, a Chicago lawyer who went viral for an Instagram video stating she wouldn't pay federal income tax this year, said of ICE detention centers. @hurwitz.bsky.social
in January, the National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee—around since the 80s—held its largest-ever War Tax Resistance 101 training. such trainings used to draw about a dozen attendees; 2 months ago, nearly 500 showed up, and the group’s site had over 110k visitors. @hurwitz.bsky.social
Sophie @hurwitz.bsky.social on war tax resistors today in @us.theguardian.com!
"It’s not a new form of dissent—one of the first protests in the United States was, after all, a protest of unfair taxation—but it’s gaining steam, as Americans reject how their tax dollars are being spent under Trump."
ICYMI
After months of protests, a drone manufacturer lost its lease at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. But can activists permanently demilitarize one of New York’s most storied industrial sites?
By: @hurwitz.bsky.social
inkstickmedia.com/how-to-demil...
@hurwitz.bsky.social has a new story at @inkstickmedia.com about another anti-war "site fight" that evicted a drone manufacturer from NYC. These stories are rare but indeed occur!
inkstickmedia.com/how-to-demil...
Staff at the nation’s largest Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility have placed bets on which detainee will be the next to die by suicide, according to new reporting from the Associated Press based on 911 calls and detainee accounts.
IRE calls for the immediate release of Estefany Rodríguez, a reporter for Nashville Noticias and Univision 42 Nashville, who was taken into custody while in a marked news vehicle, according to reports.
Read the rest of our statement: https://bit.ly/4sto4Mh
I regret my decision to watch the White House / Big Tech press conference about their "ratepayer protection pledge."
The highlight was when he went off-script and admitted that this is all about providing "PR help" to Big Tech companies.
these laws are a political project by which the state attempts to assume the power to decide sex and gender, power it does not have—and power it will express “incorrectly” because that’s power, too
‘The digital colonization of flyover states’: how datacenters are tearing small-town America apart
Hello! I am a trans journalist looking to speak with trans kids and parents of trans kids across the US who have been impacted by the clinic closures---please get in touch or share!
An ADSBx map of Europe showing 13 USM aircraft, mostly C-17 Globemasters, many of which appear to heading toward the Middle East.
An ADSBx map showing the lower-48 with a 13 military aircraft, mostly over the East Coast. Two appear to be C-17s heading toward Europe. One appears to be a KC-135 Stratotanker returning from Europe.
There are as many US military aircraft over Europe right now (that we can see!) as over the US.
Iran's Article 51 letter to the Security Council: "the air strikes carried out by the United States and the Israeli regime constitute a clear violation of Art 2(4) of the Charter of the UN and amount to an open armed aggression against the Islamic Republic of Iran"
Back after 3 hours of sleep. They are reigning hell on my people
This story was fun to write bc it’s mostly older trans guys being like “we used to bind uphill both ways in the snow”
But in all seriousness, binding used to be the wild west. Duct tape, electrical tape, ACE bandages. Now we have good products. But the FDA is cracking down on those. Read more:
Two big attacks on climate accountability lawsuits made the news last week -- and both were pushed by the Republican Attorneys General Association.
Connecting the dots to some of RAGA's biggest funders: the same major oil industry players facing those lawsuits.
www.exxonknews.org/p/the-top-co...
I stared at that phrase for a very long time today before checking the Polymarket odds on how many measles cases there will be in the US by the end of February
“Publics are made and maintained, not discovered preformed, like rock formations. It is a sign of a fatally limited imagination to assume that we can only ever desire the pittance to which we are currently reconciled.”
ily Becca Rothfeld
A recent Congressional letter accuses DHS of not being compliant with a major civil rights law due to the mistreatment of disabled ICE detainees. As I reported for @motherjones.com, this is worsened by the fact DHS' office for civil rights has TWO EMPLOYEES now.
www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
the university of michigan is pushing to build a $1B facility in collab w/los alamos national laboratory. it's basically a huge datacenter. under the current neoliberal framework of every higher ed investment needing to "pay off", how does that project cash out for the university? because it has to.
NEW: @aarmlovi.bsky.social resigned from the Rent Guidelines Board today.
This gives @mayor.nyc.gov a total of six seats to play with on the nine-member board. His appointments could deliver his promise of a rent freeze for a million rent-stabilized apartments.
www.thecity.nyc/2026/02/17/r...
@rikiwilchins.bsky.social 2026 Feb 16 Conversation:
New study finds that funding surgery and hormones cuts down dramatically on mental health needs for trans kids and adult and would easily save national health services like Medicare tens of millions annually.
On Nov. 16, a mental health counselor recorded in Kamilla’s medical records that her mother reported the girl had lost her appetite after being “served food that contained worms.” A week later, the couple said, children were told to gather in the gym for what they believed would be a Thanksgiving celebration. Excitement spread as families saw tables set with turkey, sandwiches, pastries and pies, they said. The children waited expectantly. But when a parent asked when the celebration would begin, Oksana said, staff told them the holiday meal was for employees, not detainees. The children, she said, watched despondently as the feast was packed away.
On Thanksgiving, the immigrant children held at the Dilley detention center gathered in the gym for what they thought was a holiday feast.
The kids salivated over a spread of turkey, sandwiches, pastries and pies, a family told me.
But the food wasn’t for detainees — it was for the staff.
journalism as a profession should be noble. on balance it is net monstrous
Wow!
Palestine Action win judicial review - Guardian report.
This is a *big* legal win.
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
News: The Bari Weiss-led CBS News is set to slash its staff by at least 15% in the coming months, according to people briefed on the network's layoff plans.
More details in @status.news: www.status.news/p/cbs-news-l...
There's so much other stuff going on that's absolutely horrifying that I worry this won't make much noise. It's absolutely horrifying.
www.cnn.com/2026/02/12/c...
Bianca Sonnenberg’s uniform has become her security blanket. Before ICE arrived in Minneapolis, she would change when she finished her route.
Recently, she’s hoped her identity as a US Postal Service worker would protect her from getting targeted by ICE operations.
My team at the Crowd Counting Consortium (@djpressman.bsky.social, Soha Hammam, & Chris Shay) has shared a big data update, covering all recorded US protests through Jan 2026. Some key takeaways 🧵:
