Author: brletters
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ICE Shock Gloves
New tech being deployed to make the compliance state more efficient. What could go wrong? On August 10, the Department of Homeland Security announced plans to spend up to twenty million dollars on electric shock gloves for ICE officers. The device, called the Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter or G.L.O.V.E., is made by Compliant Technologies…
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Trump vs Nursing Home Voters
The administration is systematically making it harder and harder to hold it to account at the ballot box, targeting one vulnerable population after another. On July 20, the Trump administration threw out the federal rules that told nursing homes to help their residents vote. Two million Americans live in long-term care. Since 2020, federal memos…
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Children In Court Alone
Children, detained and alone, facing the government of the United States. This is what deporting the so-called worst of the worst looks like. On Friday, the Trump administration awarded a no-bid $158 million contract for legal services to unaccompanied immigrant children. It went to a group called Our Rescue. Multiple women have sued its founder…
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Building a Permanent Guard in DC
Our national capital has what appears to be a permanent occupying force. One year ago today, armed National Guard troops began patrolling the streets of Washington, DC. Donald Trump declared a crime emergency and moved to take over the city’s police. Courts pared that back but the troops stayed. Today there are 4,600 of them,…
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Trump Anti-Birthright Orders
We are one changed mind away from reopening the question of who is born a citizen. The administration seems intent on doing so. On Thursday, Donald Trump signed two executive orders seeking again to restrict birthright citizenship. Five weeks ago, on June 30, the Supreme Court struck down his first attempt to do so. Trump…
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Trump Nepo Government
Would-be kings assemble royal courts and hand out titles to family and friends. On Monday, Donald Trump signed an executive order creating the President’s Military Spouse Commission and naming Jennifer Hegseth, wife of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, as its chair. Christie Mullin, wife of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, also serves on it. Add them…
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ICE Airport Arrests
The airport security every traveler passes through is now part of the immigration dragnet. This week the Washington Post reported that ICE is expanding arrests inside airports nationwide. Documents obtained by watchdog groups show how it works. In May 2025, ICE and the TSA signed a data-sharing agreement. Several times each week, TSA sends ICE…
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Ohio Antigay Billboards
The scapegoat list always grows. Yesterday trans people, today gay families, tomorrow whoever is next. This month, billboards went up across rural Ohio reading “No child has two dads. No child has two moms.” The messages were paid for by Seattle-based Them Before Us, part of a coalition of more than 50 groups pushing the…
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National Guard Detains Veteran
Troops trained for combat, stationed in neighborhoods, produce exactly this. On July 29, the ACLU filed a legal claim on behalf of Anna King, a retired Army captain who earned a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart in Iraq. The claim seeks 3 million dollars from the Defense Department and the Idaho National Guard. On…
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Ballot Emergency?
The emergency appears to be that too many people might vote in a way the leader does not like. On Monday, in an emergency filing to the Supreme Court, the Trump administration asked the justices to revive his executive order restricting mail voting. The filing calls the situation an emergency because the administration says it…
Notes To My Future Self 