Dr. Ricardo J. Valencia

Journalist Mario Guevara speaks on deportation and time in ICE custody: "They destroyed my family" Journalist Mario Guevara says the separation from his family following his deportation has left him devastated.

Mario Guevara’s deportation was cruel and unjust. But don’t expect him to back exiled journalists — in the U.S., he served the powerful. In El Salvador, he might do the same for Bukele as a propaganda asset.
www.cbsnews.com/amp/atlanta/...

I am proud to be born a Muslim.
I am proud to be born in Somalia.
I am proud to have become an American.

None of you can change that no matter how much you rage tweet.

Drink some water and touch grass.

Censorship Is the Authoritarian’s Dream The right to free expression must include the right to say horrible and evil things.

"More professors in the United States have been fired for controversial views in the past week than any other week in all of American history."
www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...

Germany updates: Talks with Taliban ongoing for deportations – DW – 09/15/2025 Germany's interior minister has confirmed direct talks with Afghanistan's rulers to facilitate "regular" deportations. Meanwhile, Chancellor Merz has declared 'war' on antisemitism. Follow for the lat...

This explains why the German Chancellor almost called Trump a full-blooded German
www.dw.com/en/germany-u...

Supreme Court allows Trump to fire FTC commissioner Trump's actions are in direct tension with a 1935 ruling that upheld restrictions on the president's ability to remove FTC commissioners without cause.

👀 Brown skin? 🗣️ Speaking Spanish? 🧹🛠️ Working in manual labor or low-wage jobs? 📞 Call ICE.
www.nbcnews.com/politics/sup...

Chema Tojeira, a vital figure in El Salvador’s history, has passed. In 1989, he bore the heavy task of identifying the UCA martyrs, killed by a military squad.As a student at UCA, I got to know his wisdom and humility through a small reading group. His quiet strength made me want to be a Jesuit.

Great piece by @lrb.co.uk
Torture chambers like Bukele's CECOT aren't unique—nor is their use by global powers. What’s unique is that he keeps his in plain sight, even turning it into a tourist attraction. Bukele himself has posted on social media the very evidence of his decay.

www.lrb.co.uk

Column | The political ‘diploma divide’ now applies to members of Congress A new study shows that over the past 50 years, fewer and fewer Republicans have attended elite colleges, while an increasing share of Democrats attend those schools.

This explain a lot.

www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

Professional liers. I lived in DC and did all that.

Weird that two of the cities with the highest homicide rates in the US are in Red states, but don't get presidential threats

At Harvard, Trump administration cuts hit young scientists hard More than 700 graduate students and nearly 800 postdoctoral researchers at Harvard get salaries, stipends or tuition support from federally funded research.

It's interesting to see how heavily elite universities rely on federal funding for their research. While I support this investment, perhaps a larger share should go to state schools, which educate the vast majority of Americans.

www.washingtonpost.com/education/20...

We are the luckiest species because we have dogs as friends. We don't deserve them. They are angels.

No. I will be jumping, winning one of three.

Good!

Bukele, el dictador que vende orden pero siembra incertidumbre El 31 de julio de 2025, la Asamblea Legislativa de El Salvador —controlada en su totalidad por el presidente Nayib Bukele y sus aliados— aprobó una reforma constitucional que autoriza la reelección pr...

Mi opinion en El Faro: "Hoy, la principal exportación de Bukele es un modelo de represión brutal, empaquetado como éxito gubernamental. El problema es que esa propaganda, eficaz en redes sociales, también lo expone a procesos internacionales por crímenes de Estado".
beta.elfaro.net/opinion/buke...

La frontera, el borde,

Apparently, the new way to travel as a brown person is carrying a passport—even within California.

Canada is trying to salvage its relationship with Mexico after falling out with Trump Prime Minister Mark Carney is scrambling to save his country's relationship with Mexico after it disintegrated late last year when Canadian officials suggested they'd be better off negotiating a trade deal with the Trump administration alone.

Apparently, Sheinbaum’s pragmatic approach to Trump has proven far more effective than the one led by emotionally driven Canadian men

www.reuters.com/world/americ...

YouTube video by The Bulwark EXCLUSIVE: Andry Hernández Romero Tells His Story

Andry—a man with no criminal convictions in either the U.S. or El Salvador—was imprisoned under Bukele’s regime, where he reports enduring human rights violations, including sexual assault. It’s time to end U.S. support for a third-world fascist dictator.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ySs...

"Because it is with this same imperialism that present-day simulators attempt to make the real, all of the real, coincide with their models of simulation.."Baudrillard

As I mentioned at the @uniondemcomm.bsky.social conference, Bukele was disturbingly sadistic and relentless in promoting his gulag—live-streaming human rights abuses for the world to see. Fascist!

They said the same with crypto

‘Welcome to hell’: Inside the megaprison where the U.S. deported migrants Interviews with 16 former detainees of El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center offer the most complete view yet of conditions inside the notorious prison.

One was beaten unconscious. Others were covered in bruises, struggling to walk or vomiting blood. Another said he’d been sexually assaulted.

These are the stories of 16 former detainees who were deported to El Salvador’s mega prison.

Now That They’re Free, Venezuelan Men Want the World to Know What They Endured in CECOT Venezuelan men deported by the Trump administration say they endured months of physical and mental abuse inside a Salvadoran prison. Though happy to be home, they say the fact that they were released ...

NEW: Now That They’re Free: Venezuelan Men Sent to CECOT on What They Endured and Reuniting With Their Families, by @propublica.org and partners

The need for food in #Gaza is desperate. Aid is the only lifeline.

WFP stand ready to assist the entire population - we have the food, the capacity and the systems.

We need access: more trucks allowed in daily, all entry points open, and safe routes to reach every community.

Netanyahu is morally and legally responsible for this catastrophe, the massacre and starvation of Gaza’s civilians. He & his forces have destroyed most homes, schools, hospitals, shops - everything! They are withholding food. Even today, the amount of food that was admitted is insufficient

Venezuelan detainee in Bukele’s CECOT—an asylum seeker with no criminal record—claims he was a victim of sexual abuse in concentration camps in El Salvador.

t.co/38Ok9aslL0

I've watched this unfold in phases:

No illegal immigrants, only legal ones.

Only U.S. citizens deserve rights.

Real Americans are American-born.

"American" really means white European

The mask slips, layer by layer.

Even the brutal Spanish Empire debated Indigenous rights—Las Casas wrote about it. Yet 300 yrs later, the U.S. greenlit the Trail of Tears, a cruelty that might’ve shocked 16th-c. colonizers. You can hear echoes in today’s ICE raids.
bit.ly/3Q8iOEt

Friedrich Merz: Germany ‘cannot cope’ with asylum seekers The chancellor is jettisoning his predecessor Angela Merkel’s liberal policies and is stepping back from his country’s ‘welcome culture’ towards migrants

Germany did terrible things in the past, and now they should be paying their due by allowing more immigrants
www.thetimes.com/world/europe...