Dan Friedman

ICE Has Taken More Kids Than Liam Ramos From Minnesota Schools Liam Ramos, 5, isn’t the only child in detention. Teachers and parents describe kids being hunted by federal agents.

Really crazy to hear Lyons keep saying ICE agents in MN are simply carrying out targeted, intelligence-driven enforcement operations.

ICE is literally circling elementary schools in this Minneapolis suburb every day, looking for brown and Black children to nab. www.huffpost.com/entry/ice-mi...

Trump's Stablecoin USD1: Binance Holds 87% After Founder's Pardon World Liberty Financial's founding document describes the company as "pioneering a new era of Decentralized Finance." Its flagship stablecoin is anything but.

New: Binance holds 87% of the Trump family's stablecoin—$4.7 billion—a higher concentration than any other major stablecoin has at any single exchange.

Its U.S. affiliate holds $1,119.

me, for @forbes.com

“Collection of Handwritten Letters from Children in Detention Center” sounds like an exhibit in the Holocaust Museum.

You can still read our MJ cover story on how Trump has taken over, and ruined, the anniversary celebrations as part of his broader war on American history. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Trump's "Freedom 250" group promises that anyone who gives them $2.5 million will have a chance to speak on July 4 at the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. It's exciting to consider how many rich whack jobs may take this chance to air their takes to the nation.

Lutnick's lie is especially damning because he says that knew Epstein was a piece of shit in 2005. If he claimed he didn't realize or believe that, that would be one thing, but it appears now he did conclude Epstein was a "disgusting person" in 2005, but hung out with him anyway.

In the UK, the PM faces calls to resign and his chief of staff and comms guy quit because they named an ambassador with Epstein ties. But here the Commerce Secretary, caught redhanded in a lie about his financial and personal links to Epstein, hopes to brazen it out. www.cbsnews.com/news/howard-...

Take a break from the head smashing and read about America 250.

Big picture, Trump took over the previously bipartisan planning for the country's 250th anniversary, with a car races and a UFC fight on his birthday, is using it as another way to shake down corporate donors, but is also spending taxpayer $ on it, without oversight, and is forcing feds to go along.

Park Service employees are being bombarded with guidance telling them to promote Freedom 250, the Trump-run org, in place of America250, the statutorily-bipartisan congressional commission. They were even urged to add the Freedom 250 logo to email signatures. www.documentcloud.org/documents/26...

Frequently Asked Questions (DOI Guidance)

Here is an Interior Department guidance document disbributed last month that puts this takeover in writing. "Freedom 250 is the Administration’s primary branding for all federal agencies participating in 250th activities." www.documentcloud.org/documents/26...

Freedom 250, the Trump-run group the NYT reports is offering big donors special access, has totally supplanted America250, the congressional org that had been organizing 250th events, as we reported last week .So Trump is turning 250th into a party for himself, with taxpayer $, but no oversight.

1/ @motherjones.com reported extensively on this group, Freedom 250—and the larger effort to whitewash our history and get corporations to fund that destruction—in our cover story that went up last week: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

by @dfriedman.bsky.social and @noturtlesoup17.bsky.social

MS NOW’s Crooked Play MS NOW’s push into video podcasts is accelerating, with the progressive network now in advanced discussions to license popular digital shows for air from Crooked Media and others, Status has learned.

Scoop: As Washington Post leadership laid off hundreds of staffers this week, exec editor Matt Murray blocked the paper’s media desk from covering the cuts, spiking a pre-written story despite internal lobbying

www.status.news/p/ms-now-cro...

He Was Laid Off at The Washington Post After Working There 60 Years

"belletristic riffs on the sociology of clouds, rain and sun"
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/05/b...

MOTION TO DISMISS PURSUANT TO FED. R. CRIM P. 48 The United States, by and through its attorney ANDREW S. BOUTROS, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, respectfully moves, pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 48(a), that the information filed against defendant ERIK MEIER in the above-captioned case on October 6, 2025, be dismissed.

JUST IN: Federal prosecutors in Chicago move to dismiss charges against another defendant tied to Operation Midway Blitz.

Erik Meier faced trial 3/9 for resisting a federal officer. Once the motion is granted, he will be the 16th of 32 known defendants cleared.

No known convictions.

Polk attacked Mexico to expand US territory. People can support that, but it wasn't a defensive war. And lots of Americans opposed it. Manifest destiny did not, in fact, beat in every American heart.
Anyway, you can read more on this kind of crap here: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

For years, Weil has written these elegies about the weather that might be a bit much but are often the most interesting writing in the paper. I want a local publication that runs this. www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/202...

Small scoop here: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

"...dictate the presentation of US history and culture ..." I meant. USA! www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Trump's war on history As America's 250th anniversary approaches, the president wants to control the country's future by bulldozing its past.

Turning America's 250th anniversary into a tacky, Trumpy celebration of himself is part of a broader effort. It also includes removal of Smithsonian exhibits on slavery, National Park signs about geology(!), closing the Kennedy Center and bullying local libraries. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

We also report on how America250, back when Trumpers cared what it did, unilaterally cut ties with organizations that had agreed to be partners on the anniversary celebrations, apparently because they weren't pro-Trump enough. Those include YWCA and Advancing American Freedom, Mike Pence's group.

Now Freedom 250 is organizing various high-profile, partisan, goofy events, like a UFC fight on the WH lawn for Trump's birthday, an IndyCar race in DC, that DJT wants, using in part taxpayer money. And America250 is sidelined, meaning no congressional oversight. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Trump's war on history As America's 250th anniversary approaches, the president wants to control the country's future by bulldozing its past.

Story: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

But as we report in the new piece, Trump has seized full control of the anniversary planning by creating a new public-private org, "Freedom 250," which is now organizing all the high-profile events the president wants to hold this year, nominally to mark the 250th, but really to celebrate himself.

Exclusive | Group Organizing America’s 250th Birthday Fires Executive Director A bipartisan commission terminated Ariel Abergel after an Instagram post related to Charlie Kirk, he said.

Last fall, America250 fired that guy, Ari Abergel for stuff like using their social media to post about Charlie Kirk, and unilaterally ending partnerships with orgs he felt were not Trumpy enough. So it seemed Congress was regaining some control over the anniversary plans.
wjla.com/news/nation-...

How MAGA took over America’s 250th birthday Trump's military parade is just the beginning.

Me and @noturtlesoup17.bsky.social wrote in June about the MAGAfication of America250, the congressionally-chartered group organizing the anniversary celebrations. We first reported the group had hired a 25-year old former Fox News producer as executive director. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

I was not involved with the art or this alt text, but I dig it. In a "parody of the famous "The Spirit of ’76," painting...Pete Hegseth, dressed in a soldier's uniform, is holding a bottle of wine in celebration." www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Our hot new MJ cover story on all the idiotic things Trump is doing to control America's 250 anniversary celebrations and ictate the presentation of US history and culture is online. Read it before the First Amendment gets canceled. www.motherjones.com/politics/202...