Elizabeth Langosy

Harvard Will Not Comply With a List of Trump Administration Demands (Gift Article) Federal officials said Harvard must enact “merit-based reform” in hiring and admissions and report international students who broke rules, among other steps. Harvard called the demands unlawful.

Excellent news. Hope this is the first of many refusals and that we band together to support our educational institutions in the face of Trump's unlawful and revenge-fueled demands.

‘One million.’ The private goal driving Trump’s push for mass deportations. Immigration officers and analysts are increasingly skeptical the Trump administration can deport that many immigrants in a single year.

Gift article from WaPo. "Noem said in the guidance that immigrants must prove that it is more likely than not that they will be tortured if removed. If they cannot prove that, they will be removed... Or, she wrote, ICE may choose another country for removal."

Trump administration overrode Social Security staff to list immigrants as dead A senior executive who objected was marched out of his office and put on leave, while earlier warnings about the agency’s deaths database were ignored.

Gift article from the Washington Post. "Labeling people dead strips them of the privacy protections granted to living individuals... This is in addition to the harm inflicted on those suddenly declared dead, who become unable to legally earn a living wage or draw benefits they may be eligible for. "

With Orders, Investigations and Innuendo, Trump and G.O.P. Aim to Cripple the Left (Gift Article) The president and his allies in Congress are targeting the financial, digital and legal machinery that powers the Democratic Party and much of the progressive political world.

"Mr. Trump and his allies are aggressively attacking the players and machinery that power the left, taking a series of highly partisan official actions that, if successful, will threaten to hobble Democrats’ ability to compete in elections for years to come."

Opinion | ‘Is the Destruction the Point?’: Three Opinion Writers on Trump’s First 50 Days (Gift Article) Michelle Goldberg and Frank Bruni join Patrick Healy to discuss the issues that have defined Trump’s presidency thus far.

"It is all about displays of brute strength. He gets off on that, and in that sense, it seems not so much an autocracy but a flexocracy. Let me show you how I can flex my bicep as I use it to power my fist coming into your face."

Watchlist March 2025 - Civicus Monitor CIVICUS Monitor Watchlist: 5 countries where there has been a decline in civic freedoms

The USA has been added to the Civicus watchlist for violations of civic freedom.

Covid’s Long-Term Effects on the Lungs, Gut, Brain and More (Gift Article) Five years on, scientists are starting to understand how the virus can lead to long-term, sometimes invisible changes.

Long Covid is terrible

bsky.app/profile/geor...

Opinion | Covid’s Deadliest Effect Took Five Years to Appear (Gift Article) What once belonged to all of us now belongs to corporations.

"Covid didn’t just change billions of individual lives. It changed our country’s basic approach to public health, in fundamental ways that are becoming fully visible only now — and which the Trump administration looks likely to render irreversible."

Trump turns Congress speech into a sordid campaign rally, igniting a Democrat fightback In a long and menacing – but also boring – speech to Congress, Trump mocked his opponents. Across the aisle the resistance was stirring

"The Democrats bolted for the door, having metaphorically done what Nancy Pelosi did five years ago when she tore up Trump's speech in this chamber. They had given hope to the resistance and shown the world what they are against. Now can they show the world what they are for?"

Opinion | 20 Years Ago, Democrats Found a Way Out of the Wilderness. They Can Again. (Gift Article) What the left chooses to fight on now will shape future elections.

Good advice.

Opinion | The Barrage of Trump’s Awful Ideas Is Doing Exactly What It’s Supposed To (Gift Article) Amid an onslaught of bad ideas, Democrats need to muster a better vision for the future.

"Bad ideas do a lot of the work of building autocracy. By forcing us to engage with them, they make our conversations, our media and our society dumber."