Taylor Kordsiemon

I’m speaking in generalities, of course. As @gowder.io has pointed out, some good libertarians remain. But I’ll never trust those other self-proclaimed “champions of freedom.” And nobody should let them pretend as if they recognized and took the threat seriously from the beginning.

Libertarian theory has some insights for the current moment.

But modern libertarianism is convinced that more welfare spending poses an equal or greater threat to freedom than handing the presidency to a racist, vindictive, dishonest, and corrupt madman. Anyone who disagrees is branded as “woke.”

In the last decade, there is no question that growing racism and authoritarianism on the American right has presented the primary threat to liberty. But a glance at Reason.com shows that libertarians are equally or more concerned about the dire threat of “wokeness.”

But even setting those things aside, nothing has pushed me away from libertarianism more than libertarians themselves.

Law school exposed me to a huge group of diverse thinkers that challenged my beliefs. Even if I sometimes disagreed with classmates or professors, there was no denying the power of their intellect. And more than a few of them managed to change my mind on certain topics.

There were obviously other contributors.

When my son was born at 26-weeks gestation, Medicaid paid the $1M tab for his lifesaving care. That experience really exposed the myth that personal responsibility can obviate the need for welfare and a public safety net.

I identified as a libertarian throughout undergrad. Now I call myself a liberal even though I still have a libertarian streak.

A huge part of my decision to disassociate with libertarianism was the utter failure of its adherents to rise the the moment in the face of Trump. Or worse, support Trump.

When I worked for Reason magazine during Trump's rise to power in 2016, I was explicitly forbidden by the editor in chief from writing about Trump's racism, or the violence and racism at his rallies.

It was a "sideshow," I was told.

Opinion | Libertarians Tried to Warn You About Trump

I feel like I'm losing my goddamnned mind.

This op-ed was written by Kathrine Mangu-Ward. Katherine is editor-in-chief of Reason magazine.

Reason fired @shikhadalmia.bsky.social for being too anti-Trump.

I came across this exact issue in my practice as a tangential party without any legal interest in the outcome. I thought the administration’s position was so frivolous that it was potentially sanctionable. But I guess the Fifth Circuit disagrees.

Donald Trump is trying to crush a religious uprising against him You might not know that thanks to the media.

www.editorialboard.com/donald-trump...

My friend just hit me with “Third Reich Blind” and I lol’d.

Olympic Officials Investigating Claim Ski Jumpers Are Injecting Acid Into Their Penises.

Olympians, they’re just like us.

They expand on it in pages 246–50 of “The Original Meaning of the 14th Amendment,” but I’m surprised that there hasn’t been more discussion on it because a workable test for recognizing unenumerated rights could be a game changer.

Other unenumerated rights. The privileges or immunities of national citizenship include those unenumerated rights that, when accurately described, are found to be deeply rooted in the nation's history and traditions. Provisionally, we suggest that if individual citizens have for at least a generation-that is, thirty years or more-been entitled to enjoy a right as a consequence of the constitutional, statutory, or common law of a supermajority of the states, it is presumptively a privilege of US citizenship. That presumption can be defeated if it is shown that enforcing the right at issue would necessarily violate a right that falls within category 1, 2, or 3. But this generational approach is a matter of construction and is not compelled by original meaning. If it proves unworkable, we are prepared to discard it. Extract from Barnett and Bernick’s “The Original Meaning of the 14th Amendment.”

Re where to look for unenumerated rights, this from Barnett and @evanbernick.bsky.social has always struck me as reasonable in that it allows for recognition of new collective rights under certain conditions.

We need reconstruction, not restoration—as FDR knew. Eric Rauchway responds in a forum on “How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism.”

“We have been asked to call the centrist response to this presidency “moderation.” Recent events make it clear we should recognize it as appeasement.”

Excellent piece by @rauchway.bsky.social about the importance of building an enduring coalition capable of recovery and reform.

How Not to Defeat Authoritarianism Moderation used to help Democrats win, but its advantages now have been greatly exaggerated.

This @bostonreview.bsky.social piece by @adambonica.bsky.social and @jakemgrumbach.bsky.social is an absolute must-read, as are many of the responses to it.

Spread this one far and wide.

Agreed. The defining trait of Roberts’ legal career is hostility to minority voting rights, so he and Trump are very much aligned.

I love these games, and I’m skeptical that an adaptation can do them justice.

That said, I think Ryan Hurst as Kratos could be a phenomenal casting choice.

Trumpist legal scholars have doubled down on their Schmittianism, making arguments according to which, for example, the birthright citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment doesn’t mean what it says becasuse undocumented immigrants are somehow outside U.S. jurisdiction—and by some weird magic that degraded status passes to their children, just like slavery did. Philp Hamburger has even been circulating a paper offering a so-called originalist argument against those who are in deportation processes having the full protections of law at all as a basis for some of Trump’s immigration tyranny. Similarly, Ilan Wurman, in an amicus brief in the birthright citizenship case, has gone so far as to say that undocumented aliens lack basic constitutional rights to due process. In Wurman’s words: "An alien caught at the border may be subject to the criminal laws—as the Indian tribes were to some extent—but it does not follow that the nation must allow him to sue on his contracts. As a constitutional default rule, Congress is hardly required to open the nation’s courts in this way. In other words, merely being subject to the criminal jurisdiction of the nation does not imply one has access to the benefits of the sovereign’s jurisdiction more generally, such as the right to sue and be sued in the nation’s courts. " That proposition might sound familiar to you. Here’s a quote from a different Supreme Court that considered an analogous question: "The question is simply this: can a negro whose ancestors were imported into this country and sold as slaves become a member of the political community formed and brought into existence by the Constitution of the United States, and as such become entitled to all the rights, and privileges, and immunities, guarantied by that instrument to the citizen, one of which rights is the privilege of suing in a court of the United States in the cases specified in the Constitution?"

Honestly Wurman's ridiculous amicus brief is a gift. I have a keynote to give next week, and it's about drawing on the past in our present-day constitutional fight against trumpist tyranny. Naturally I have to mention this.

Graph depicting annual measles cases in America. 2023 (63 cases). 2024 (284 cases). 2025 (2253 cases). 2026 (478 cases and rising).

“Make America Healthy Again.”

it is beautiful how we are having another moment of Bluesky unity. everybody basking in the glow of how Ilhan Omar was very visibly gonna punch that dude in the mouth

From "Minnesota Proved MAGA Wrong" by Adam Serwer.

Recommended. [gift link]

www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

The Trump admin is scrambling because the secret police it sends out for kidnappings and rioting has been killing people on video then brazenly lying about it, but Schumer's instinct is to whip his caucus into taking a position *more conservative* than that held by the median voter.

He's got to go.

Okay I think I've mapped out ICE politics as of Monday night

Opinion | Local Prosecution Is the Answer to Federal Lawlessness

In today's @nytimes.com, @barryfriedman1.bsky.social and I argue that, with no *other* means of pursuing accountability for lawlessness by ICE, local/state prosecutions become not just legally viable, but necessary—both to punish past abuses and to deter future ones:

www.nytimes.com/2026/01/26/o...

@nytimes.com, you should let your crossword person know that “quiz” is not the highest-scoring four-letter Scrabble word with 22 points.

Just off the top of my head, “jazz” is worth 29 points.

‘This is what fascism looks like’: terror in Minneapolis reminiscent of civil war Alex Pretti’s death could be a moment of reckoning for Democrats to call time on Trump waging war on his people

‘This is what fascism looks like’: terror in Minneapolis reminiscent of civil war

Federal law enforcement agents shot and killed a man in Minneapolis on Jan. 24 according to local police officials. DHS told Fox News that the man was “armed with a gun”. A video of the shooting appears to show that a gun was taken from the man before the first shot was fired. x.com/BillMelugin_...