My latest at @talkingpointsmemo.com:
War With Iran? A Blood Moon on Purim? For Some Christian Influencers, That Can Mean Only One Thing: The End Times talkingpointsmemo.com/news/iran-bl...
My latest at @talkingpointsmemo.com:
War With Iran? A Blood Moon on Purim? For Some Christian Influencers, That Can Mean Only One Thing: The End Times talkingpointsmemo.com/news/iran-bl...
The admin started off by saying the war would last a few days, then a few weeks, then four weeks. Now, Hegseth is saying eight weeks
apnews.com/live/iran-wa...
"There is scarcely even the pretence that it was compelled by evidence of an Iranian dash for a bomb or an imminent attack. Such claims do not survive scrutiny; they barely withstand repetition." www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2026/ma...
04.03.2026 15:28 — 👍 16 🔁 4 💬 0 📌 0Not enough being said about how little preemptive work the Trump admin put into getting Americans evacuated from countries near Iran. Only telling people on a long list of nearby countries to leave yesterday "via commercial means" when it was already too late to fly out?
03.03.2026 16:40 — 👍 108 🔁 28 💬 6 📌 4
Congressional candidate Brandon Herrera — also known as "the AK guy" — thanked Trump in an interview with TPM for clearing a path for him to make offensive jokes
03.03.2026 14:21 — 👍 26 🔁 13 💬 0 📌 0
The DA in Minneapolis is investigating Bovino and others.
02.03.2026 19:38 — 👍 15241 🔁 3525 💬 343 📌 201
Saw a bad argument yesterday from a Trump 1.0 Iran hawk that the 2001 AUMF authorizes the use of force against Iran.
Nope.
Amongst other things, the argument ignores verb tense and the stated purpose of the AUMF.
The richest Americans saw their net worth soar 120% from 2017-25 and the number of US billionaires jumped 50% to more than 900. Overall, the top 1% now control $55.8 trillion in assets — more than the GDP of the US and China combined. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/u...
02.03.2026 14:40 — 👍 234 🔁 130 💬 17 📌 10
It's hard to read this 2024 campaign piece and not gag www.nytimes.com/2024/08/09/u...
02.03.2026 14:30 — 👍 29 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Read @kateriga.bsky.social on SCOTUS gutting the Voting Rights Act and the groups preparing for the day after
talkingpointsmemo.com/news/voting-...
“This is the eighth military intervention of Trump’s second term in office”
28.02.2026 12:58 — 👍 802 🔁 262 💬 46 📌 25Imagine if we lived in a world where powerful media figures faced professional consequences for being badly wrong on important issues.
28.02.2026 14:13 — 👍 145 🔁 38 💬 5 📌 0
Under no circumstances do you "gotta hand it to" to the Bush admin. But they did still make a case for invading Iraq. Trump reneging on anything more than a video released in the middle of the night is a reminder of how contemptuous he and his admin are of the public
www.wsj.com/livecoverage...
It's still a mystery to me why anyone believed Trump's "no new wars" line. Wishful thinking is powerful, but his first-term record was enough to show that his rhetoric during the campaign was as opportunistic as anything else
28.02.2026 14:00 — 👍 50 🔁 4 💬 5 📌 0
In a statement, Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, accuses the Trump admin of peddling "misrepresented intelligence" to justify war with Iran
28.02.2026 14:00 — 👍 54 🔁 10 💬 1 📌 3
FBI Director cites NSPM-7 as enabling its crackdown on left-leaning activists.
18.02.2026 19:47 — 👍 32 🔁 12 💬 5 📌 0
Here's what went on at that Pentagon service yesterday: publicwitness.wordandway.org/p/doug-wilso...
18.02.2026 15:36 — 👍 6 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 0
Wilson opened a DC outpost of his church in July; I was there for the first service, which Hegseth attended. He and his followers see Trump II as a generational opportunity to spread christian nationalism aggressively
talkingpointsmemo.com/news/christ-...
talkingpointsmemo.com/news/russ-vo...
Doug Wilson, who once told me that he is trying to "get back to America in 1892," spoke at the Pentagon yesterday.
A few stories from the archive, including our scoop last year on when he first met Pete Hegseth
talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/an...
Mia Valentina Paz Faria A 7-year-old from Venezuela who was living in Austin, Texas Detained for 70 days “I don’t want to be in this place I want to go to my school.”
UPDATE: Staff at the ICE concentration camp in Dilley, Texas have begun raiding the dormitories of kids and their parents to confiscate and destroy letters from the children. This is in response to the ace reporting by @micarosenberg et al for ProPublica:
“I don’t want to be in this place I want to go to my school.”
- 7 year old imprisoned by ICE for 70 days in a concentration camp in Texas.
Today, after @propublica.org published this story, the camp was raided to confiscate letters from the children.
www.propublica.org/article/ice-...
A protester accused of being part of a Texas "antifa cell" was held in solitary confinement for three months.
“They went and poisoned everyone against the defendants before we ever even knew what was going on,” her sister told
@joshkovensky.bsky.social
talkingpointsmemo.com/news/guilt-b...
Defendants form a version of “antifa” that a prosecutor in the case described as an “anti-President Trump and anti-ICE movement,” but that experts warn tips dangerously toward an attempt to prosecute based on ideology. talkingpointsmemo.com/news/guilt-b...
16.02.2026 22:31 — 👍 118 🔁 57 💬 6 📌 6
Guys I found the best Epstein Files email. The one that illuminates an elite class that's cocooned themselves into an unaccountable shell of wealth and privilege, fighting to protect their secrets and offenses.
I could write a novel about this email.
prospect.org/2026/02/17/e...
Bukele has focused lobbying on courting MAGA politicians and “positioning narratives” in US media. He’s paying for it through a public electricity company that shields financial information through a private subsidiary.
@periodistagl.bsky.social in today's newsletter beta.elfaro.net/en/el-salvad...
Guilt by Association: First ‘Antifa’ Case Sweeps Anti-Trump Activists Into One Terrorism Conspiracy
talkingpointsmemo.com/news/guilt-b...
The conspiracy theories have triggered chaos in the Ohio city, where Haitian immigrant families and the groups working with them are already on edge. talkingpointsmemo.com/news/tiktoke...
16.02.2026 13:18 — 👍 126 🔁 57 💬 1 📌 7![Following the electoral chaos caused by the COVID pandemic,
Texas modernized its election security laws. S.B. 1 aimed to make “the
conduct of elections . . . uniform and consistent throughout [the]
state[,] . . . reduce the likelihood of fraud in the conduct of elections, protect
the secrecy of the ballot, promote voter access, and ensure that all legally cast
ballots are counted.” Tex. Elec. Code § 1.0015. Because “the potential
and reality of fraud is much greater in the mail-in ballot context than with inperson voting,” S.B. 1 added additional election integrity provisions to
prevent mail ballot fraud. Veasey v. Abbott, 830 F.3d 216, 239 (5th Cir. 2016)
(en banc). Mail ballots are more susceptible to fraud because they render
election workers incapable of knowing what happens to the ballot once it is
mailed out. Due to the inherent vulnerability of mail ballots, “[f]raud is a real
risk that accompanies mail-in voting.” Brnovich v. Democratic Nat’l Comm.,
594 U.S. 647, 686, 141 S. Ct. 2321, 2348 (2021). In particular, “[v]ote buying
schemes are far more difficult to detect when citizens vote by mail.” Id. at
685, 141 S. Ct. at 2347 (quoting Report of the Comm’n on Fed. Election
Reform, Building Confidence in U.S. Elections 46 (Sept. 2005)).](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:6h7b2i6ttw3l4t7pvbvxdith/bafkreic5uwmtwbnt53dr6x5i7gch7x4fan6cbt6ywnyafhtl3the7qpjd4@jpeg)
Following the electoral chaos caused by the COVID pandemic, Texas modernized its election security laws. S.B. 1 aimed to make “the conduct of elections . . . uniform and consistent throughout [the] state[,] . . . reduce the likelihood of fraud in the conduct of elections, protect the secrecy of the ballot, promote voter access, and ensure that all legally cast ballots are counted.” Tex. Elec. Code § 1.0015. Because “the potential and reality of fraud is much greater in the mail-in ballot context than with inperson voting,” S.B. 1 added additional election integrity provisions to prevent mail ballot fraud. Veasey v. Abbott, 830 F.3d 216, 239 (5th Cir. 2016) (en banc). Mail ballots are more susceptible to fraud because they render election workers incapable of knowing what happens to the ballot once it is mailed out. Due to the inherent vulnerability of mail ballots, “[f]raud is a real risk that accompanies mail-in voting.” Brnovich v. Democratic Nat’l Comm., 594 U.S. 647, 686, 141 S. Ct. 2321, 2348 (2021). In particular, “[v]ote buying schemes are far more difficult to detect when citizens vote by mail.” Id. at 685, 141 S. Ct. at 2347 (quoting Report of the Comm’n on Fed. Election Reform, Building Confidence in U.S. Elections 46 (Sept. 2005)).
![One particularly common form of “mail ballot fraud” is known as
“vote harvesting.” Vote harvesting describes a process whereby paid
election operatives “generate applications for mail ballots in . . . targeted
precincts.” Operatives often go door-to-door, talk to voters, and get them to
sign up to vote by mail. More nefariously, vote harvesting can also be
accomplished by paid operatives forging applications for voters without the
voters’ knowledge or consent. Later, once the voters receive the mail ballots
that were requested by canvassing or by forgery, the same partisan operatives
return to collect the voters’ completed mail ballots. As part of the ballot
collection process, the partisan operatives ensure that the ballots were cast
for a particular candidate.
Unsurprisingly, mail-in voting is a rich field for fraud. Between 2004
and 2021, 72% of all election prosecutions undertaken by the Texas Attorney
General involved mail ballot fraud. “[I]t should go without saying that a State
may take action to prevent election fraud.” Id. at 686, 141 S. Ct. at 2348.
Faced with evidence of mail ballot fraud, Texas enacted S.B. 1, which
contained multiple provisions to address mail ballot fraud.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:6h7b2i6ttw3l4t7pvbvxdith/bafkreiezavaobhc6uyymcnwkbl45gvxs42id3yecrb2myvunggrswfaxki@jpeg)
One particularly common form of “mail ballot fraud” is known as “vote harvesting.” Vote harvesting describes a process whereby paid election operatives “generate applications for mail ballots in . . . targeted precincts.” Operatives often go door-to-door, talk to voters, and get them to sign up to vote by mail. More nefariously, vote harvesting can also be accomplished by paid operatives forging applications for voters without the voters’ knowledge or consent. Later, once the voters receive the mail ballots that were requested by canvassing or by forgery, the same partisan operatives return to collect the voters’ completed mail ballots. As part of the ballot collection process, the partisan operatives ensure that the ballots were cast for a particular candidate. Unsurprisingly, mail-in voting is a rich field for fraud. Between 2004 and 2021, 72% of all election prosecutions undertaken by the Texas Attorney General involved mail ballot fraud. “[I]t should go without saying that a State may take action to prevent election fraud.” Id. at 686, 141 S. Ct. at 2348. Faced with evidence of mail ballot fraud, Texas enacted S.B. 1, which contained multiple provisions to address mail ballot fraud.
Ultra-MAGA Judge Edith Jones of the 5th Circuit peddles deranged conspiracy theories about mass voter fraud and "ballot harvesting," declaring that mail voting "is a rich field for fraud" that's frequently exploited by "operatives" attempting to steal elections. www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub...
12.02.2026 18:18 — 👍 383 🔁 118 💬 33 📌 37Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) telling ICE/CBP heads that if the Pretti probe wraps and they find "nobody is to blame" and "no changes" are being made, "it destroys the trust in ICE." Says people don't trust it'll be a real investigation after administration comments — there have to be "repercussions"
12.02.2026 16:24 — 👍 296 🔁 62 💬 11 📌 8
As the administration dilutes civil rights, activists and constitutional law scholars told TPM the overlap of street-level policing and immigration enforcement poses unique risks to Black Americans whose ancestors were enslaved here.
talkingpointsmemo.com/news/trump-i...
If Clay Parikh's name sounds familiar, it might be because he was Kari Lake's "star witness" in 2022 who helped her [checks notes] lose.
azmirror.com/2022/12/21/n...