Michael Linhorst

This is one of my favorites! Such a great song.

Do I Have the Right to Film ICE? Despite government attacks against protesters and the press, documenting interactions with law enforcement and federal agents is protected by the First Amendment. Here’s what you need to know.

Yes.

ICE agents don't get to carve out a First Amendment exception for themselves.

ICE is spending huge amounts of money on private prisons. I profiled the founder of ICE's biggest for-profit prison contractor, Geo Group, for @fastcompany.com last year: www.fastcompany.com/91396722/the...

Supreme Court Unanimously Strikes Down Private Prison Immunity Case The Supreme Court has ruled against private prison operator Geo Group.

and the news from yesterday: newrepublic.com/post/207034/...

The Case That Could Rein in Private Prison Abuses—or Turn Them Loose One of the biggest firms in the industry wants the Roberts court to grant it sovereign immunity. Even the Trump administration is in opposition—to a point.

An update on my article from November about the private prison company and ICE contractor Geo Group asking the Supreme Court for immunity from lawsuits: the court unanimously said no yesterday.

Here's my earlier piece in @newrepublic.com about the case: newrepublic.com/article/2020...

I had an AA flight getting into LGA at 9:30 tomorrow night, and they cancelled it two hours ago

Journalists Arrested in Cameroon While Reporting on Trump’s Secretive Deportation Program

"An Associated Press reporter was beaten by the police and detained along with three other journalists on Tuesday in Cameroon while reporting on a secretive Trump administration program to deport migrants to the Central African country, according to two of the people detained." (gift link)

The Mom-and-Pop Contractors Helping ICE Rapidly Expand Even as ICE sparks rising public horror with its tactics and killings, a raft of companies that have never before worked with the federal government are signing up to work with the agency.

These first-time contractors offer ICE everything from sniper training to cubicles.

Their contracts show how, even as ICE’s masked agents launch raids in American cities and public opposition skyrockets, some Americans are still looking to cash in.

newrepublic.com/article/2064...

The Mom-and-Pop Contractors Helping ICE Rapidly Expand Even as ICE sparks rising public horror with its tactics and killings, a raft of companies that have never before worked with the federal government are signing up to work with the agency.

The Mom-and-Pop Contractors Helping ICE Rapidly Expand — my latest for @newrepublic.com, tracing the small-time firms that are signing up to work with ICE, despite everything newrepublic.com/article/2064...

Leaked Email Suggests Ring Plans to Expand ‘Search Party’ Surveillance Beyond Dogs Ring's CEO told staff the feature is “first for finding dogs,” indicating a plan to expand.

SCOOP: Ring’s controversial, AI-powered “Search Party” feature isn’t intended to be limited only to dogs, the company’s founder, Jamie Siminoff, told Ring employees in an internal email obtained by 404 Media.

The current person in charge of ICE's procurement for detention is a GEO Group executive who ran the company's immigration detention portfolio. He was granted an "ethics waiver" from DHS allowing him to hand out contracts to GEO in his new role.

The Rabbit Hole: Covering the Courts from a Windowless Office For more than a decade, Rachel Weiner, until quite recently a Washington Post journalist, chronicled the news involving the D.C. metropolitan area, which included stints at the Eastern District of Vir...

"The collapse of that ethos would be a hell of a story. But AP never replaced me, and after the bloodbath at the Post, I just don’t think anyone’s there any more to report it."

www.courtwatch.news/p/the-rabbit...

In a call with investors just now, George Zoley says his private prison company is considering the "opportunity" of managing the immigrant warehouses that ICE is now buying

GEO Group also reported its 2025 results this morning, which apparently disappointed investors. Its stock is currently down 17 percent today.

The house that ICE built Geo Group, America's largest for-profit jailer of immigrants, is preparing for a windfall under Trump. Its chairman is an immigrant himself.

Big news for the private prison company GEO Group, ICE's biggest contractor: its CEO is stepping down after little more than a year and company founder George Zoley is replacing him.

I profiled Zoley and his for-profit prison firm for @fastcompany.com last year: www.fastcompany.com/91396722/the...

A for-profit immigrant prison run by the company CoreCivic

The Washington Post just laid off its entire award-winning photo team. They were our eyes in places we'll never see. It's a horrifying loss at a time when lying governments, propaganda and AI slop are on the rise.

Democracy dies in oligarchy.

DHS Secretary says filming ICE is illegal and amounts to doxxing.

They’re absolutely wrong.

Recording law enforcement in public spaces is protected by the First Amendment — and courts have affirmed that right time and again.

Watch @freedom.press’s @trevortimm.bsky.social explain.

Homeland Security is targeting Americans with this secretive legal weapon Under Trump, the Department of Homeland Security has weaponized administrative subpoenas to attack free speech, according to privacy and civil rights groups.

New territory. Must read story from a colleague. www.washingtonpost.com/investigatio...

As She Raises Millions, Hochul Isn’t Saying Who She’s Meeting With The governor’s meeting logs are 15 months out of date, and she won’t release her calendar.

Want to know who the governor is meeting with? How she's spending her workdays? Good luck. Hochul's office won't release any of her calendars from the past 15 months.

Great FOIL reporting recently by @nysfocus.bsky.social & @chrisbragg1.bsky.social nysfocus.com/2026/01/20/h...

For the avoidance of doubt, releasing the names of federal officers who shot and killed an American citizen is not in any way shape or form doxing.

They're an important writing tool. LLMs use periods, too, but that doesn't mean good writers should stop punctuating the ends of sentences.

Don't surrender! We had it first.

Federal Agents Keep Invoking Killing of Renee Good to Threaten Protesters in Minnesota In apparent references to Renee Good, multiple agents have asked protesters: “Have y’all not learned from the past couple of days?”

Filming the police isn't a crime.

"Government invasion into a reporter’s home and the seizure of journalistic materials is exactly the kind of scenario our First Amendment was conceived to protect against."

‘Tip of the iceberg’: The FBI search of a reporter’s home has newsrooms bracing for more | CNN Business Inside The Washington Post, the impact was immediate. Reporters called the search “incredibly disturbing.” Hannah Natanson, whose home was raided, urged her Post colleagues to keep reporting.

Until this week's FBI raid on Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson's house, the Justice Department had “never executed a search warrant at the home of a reporter in a national security leak case,” notes @rcfp.org's Gabe Rottman. [via @cnn.com]

RCFP statement on FBI search of Washington Post reporter’s home “[T]his is a tremendous escalation in the administration’s intrusions into the independence of the press,” said RCFP President Bruce D. Brown.

This morning, the FBI executed a search warrant at a @washingtonpost.com reporter’s home.

@rcfp.org President Bruce D. Brown called it “a tremendous escalation in the administration’s intrusions into the independence of the press.”

Read his full statement: www.rcfp.org/fbi-search-w...

“There were cops at my door because of something I said,” Pacheco told The Post on Tuesday. “It felt like such a foreign, alien feeling.” In the day since the officers’ visit, she has retained an attorney and made public records requests about the situation. Should it escalate, she said she was “prepared to sue.” While she described herself as progressive, she said she is “conservative when it comes to the Constitution,” a document she had come to revere since moving to the United States from Portugal in the 1980s. She said she strongly sees Monday’s interaction at her home as a violation of the rights guaranteed by it. “I’m not one to stand down,” Pacheco said. “I don’t do well with bullies.” And the next time she sees a social media post from her mayor, or other elected officials for that matter, Pacheco said she knows what she will do: open the comment section, type her thoughts and hit send.

What an excellent response to a government that doesn't respect the First Amendment. www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2026/...

"Recording law enforcement is not illegal. It is not obstruction. It is a constitutionally-protected activity that district & appellate courts have affirmed." - @attorneynora.bsky.social

@timkarr.bsky.social's latest on Pressing Issues on the right to record:

pressingissues.org/recording-ic...