The public has a right & a duty to understand immigration policy. I used to help out with that as a reporter; now I do it at @immcouncil. All tweets my own.

Washington, DC
NEW FROM ME: The government will do things that hurt people. But knowing exactly what it is doing — & therefore who’s most at risk — is at the foundation of fighting against it. Anything else is doing Trump’s job for him. Here’s a start. nytimes.com/2024/11/21/opini…
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So...I just saw about the part of Mark Zuckerberg’s speech last week where he says he founded Facebook because the Iraq War told him more people needed their perspectives heard. And as a 2005-present Facebook user, I have never felt so gaslit in my life. That’s not what it was.
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Me, the last 6 months: TOO MANY PEOPLE RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT Me, today: WAIT IF MEGAN RAPINOE TURNED 34 THIS WEEK SHE’LL BE 35 AS OF NOVEMBER 2020
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I want to get one thing straight: If you’re not calling the $12B emergency tariff-aid package the “baleout,” you’re a disgrace to journalism and to the memory of the New York Daily News.
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For years, I’ve used Twitter favs (now “likes”) for bookmarking. Now that The Algorithm promotes tweets I like into followers’ feeds, I’m getting “why did you like this?” queries from ppl who disagree with the tweet. Thanks, Twitter, for yet another step toward unusability.
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This scenario is something an entire cohort of kids have been expecting and fearing. I’ve spoken to school employees in cities where there were no raids, at times when there were no raids, saying that sometimes kids came in midday asking to call and see if parents were still home
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I want to know whose tipping point for getting the vaccine was the _second_ Krispy Kreme donut.
Krispy Kreme ups the ante, now offering two free doughnuts with vaccine card hill.cm/903zL85
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If there are 10 babies on the floor of the senate it constitutes a Baby Quorum and they can form their own Baby Senate.
“What if there are 10 babies on the floor of the Senate?" apnews.com/f4538d1b6f9947e3b…
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It’s legal to seek asylum in the US without papers. If you present yourself at a port of entry you break no US law. The last caravan did just that.
To those in the Caravan, turnaround, we are not letting people into the United States illegally. Go back to your Country and if you want, apply for citizenship like millions of others are doing!
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PSA: this @nytimes headline is flat-out wrong. The Supreme Court explicitly found that Trump COULD end DACA if he went about it a different way. Be careful out there, news consumers.
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Replying to @emilynussbaum
TikTok is just dramatized Twitter is just screencapped Tumblr
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Hi. I spent tonight at a Jewish wedding. We’ve been here for 4,000 years and we’re going to be here for 4,000 more. And may everyone who thinks otherwise go fuck themselves.
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A few reminders re early FB: -News Feed wasn’t part of the original UI. -Status updates weren’t part of the original UI. -Wall posts as discrete entities weren’t part of the original UI (it was just a text-box sandbox). -groups were only open to a given school.
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How is the entire timeline not mourning this. We just lost the oldest human fossil ever discovered in the Americas, y’all.
Rio's 200-year old National Museum hit by massive fire reut.rs/2Cb8YXp
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In other words...no way to use FB to share your individual perspectives; no way to use FB to develop connections beyond your “bubble”
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It turns out that if you give every detained immigrant a lawyer, up to 12 TIMES AS MANY of them win deportation cases. vox.com/policy-and-politics/…
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ICE IS NOT THE BORDER ENFORCEMENT AGENCY THE BORDER ENFORCEMENT AGENCY IS CBP, THE AGENCY THAT HAS "BORDER" IN THE NAME If even the Senate Majority Leader doesn't know this, I give up.
McConnell to Politico re: Crowley defeat: “It was a stunning development. The energy in the Democratic Party is self-avowed socialists, open borders. We even had a credible potential candidate for president in 2020 suggest we get rid of ICE, the border enforcement agency...
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Does Sean Duffy realize that he’s casually accusing the Trump White House of the most epic counterintelligence failure in American history?
Sean Duffy on CNN on Army Lt. Col. Vindman: "It seems very clear that he is incredibly concerned about Ukrainian defense. I don't know that he's concerned about American policy ... we all have an affinity to our homeland where we came from ... he has an affinity for the Ukraine."
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Media coverage of the Starr report taught me what oral sex was, but go on ahead
On Fox, Ken Starr complains that Mueller report has "too much detail" and is "special counsel overkill" mm4a.org/4Do
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This is just a reminder that a lot of people you interact with (on here or strangers you deal with in person) have been trying to work and care for their children full-time, without school, for going on three months, and are probably beyond exhausted.
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Everyone accusing Scott Walker of lying about marginal tax rates fails to consider that maybe he was talking to a room full of fifth graders with weekly allowances of $11,539
Explaining tax rates before Reagan to 5th graders: “Imagine if you did chores for your grandma and she gave you $10. When you got home, your parents took $7 from you.” The students said: “That’s not fair!” Even 5th graders get it.
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On January 17th, after WaPo published an article questioning Trump's stories of women gagged with tape and smuggled over the border, a top Border Patrol officer sent out an email asking for "any information" to back up the claim. vox.com/2019/1/27/18198729/w…
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This is what it looks like when you're released from jail on federal charges...on the condition that you stop showing up to protests. propublica.org/article/defen…
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I'm sorry, I'm still having trouble processing that they're on the verge of passing a bill that they're still, essentially, brainstorming.
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As a couple you should own a minimum of the following: -30 linear feet of bookshelves -35 linear feet of books -Oh crap guess you need another bookshelf or two -Now you have half-empty bookshelves, that’s dumb, gotta buy more books -Uh oh you bought too many books guess what
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At least a dozen Portland protesters charged in federal court (many of them for minor crimes like "failing to obey a lawful order") have been banned from attending any more protests as a condition of their release from jail pending trial. propublica.org/article/defen…
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Area Lawyer Discovers To His Horror That Pretrial Detention Is A Thing
.@AlanDersh: Why does the government get to put Paul Manafort in jail without trial? There’s something wrong with a system that assumes guilt this way.
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I can’t fact-check this. I can’t. Because it neither exists nor even bears any colorable relationship to anything that exists. It’s just spun out of thin air.
Replying to @ddale8
Trump just making stuff up: "Every single Democrat in the U.S. Senate has signed up for the open borders - and it's a bill. And it's called The Open Borders Bill. What's going on? And it's written by - guess who - Dianne Feinstein."
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I’ve been hoping for more people to think seriously about detoxifying masculinity. Anthony Bourdain not only had no time for misogyny, but owned up to the role his early career played in creating a toxic archetype. We still need that. We still need him.
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It really is a lot to ask Washington, DC, a city with no representation in Congress, to put up with tanks rolling through without question.
NEW — @USArmy says armored vehicles WILL move through WASHINGTON TONIGHT. Specifically: Two M1 Bradley Armored Personnel Carriers. Army spokesperson says, “you’ll see them moving through your neighborhood, but DON’T PANIC.” @WUSA9 #SaluteToAmerica #FourthofJuly
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This tweet is fake news. For one thing, the remark is from May 2018. For another thing, while there was a whole controversy then about whether Trump was referring to MS13 members or to unauthorized immigrants, he most certainly was NOT referring specifically to asylum-seekers.
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No, seriously, when did Aretha Franklin do something that could be described as "working for" Donald Trump?
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Can someone explain to me why it is a good idea to ask the FBI to investigate a 36-year-past event that pretty much everyone on both sides concedes will never be proven either way, and NOT to investigate whether someone lied to Congress 72 hours ago?
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It’s weird how personally I feel about this. I was only very briefly a Facebook superuser (at least, compared to other people who were in college 2005-09) but I feel like my age cohort’s history is being revised before we even turn 40.
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1. The patriarchy.
"Is there anything more obnoxious than a bachelorette party at the ballpark?" -- ESPN announcer Matt Vasgersian during the Cards-Cubs game.
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I can't believe I have to fact-check the president on this, but you can't "apply for citizenship" at the US border. You can only apply for it if you have a green card, which you can only get if you have specific existing ties to the US.
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"Apparently that early vote, which skews Democratic, has not yet been counted!" -- Wolf Blitzer, with a tone of discovery, 11:10pm EST, November 3, 2020.
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I am actually livid right now. It is unconscionable that a president whose media consumption is so heavy, and his media habits so well-known, should be so offensively ignorant about the human impact of the decisions he is making.
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Most prisons aren't private. Most private prisons aren't federal. Most fed private prisons are run by DHS. New memo affects 13 prisons.
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I have a lot of words TK between now and the speech but in the meantime, I'd like to point something out: Donald Trump's very favorite rhetorical mode is that immigrants are coming across the border to kill you. Heretofore IACATBTKY. A thread.
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HELLO. MAKE SURE YOU HAVE SUBMITTED YOUR CENSUS INFORMATION. MAKE SURE EVERYONE YOU KNOW HAS SUBMITTED THEIR CENSUS INFORMATION. PARTICIPATION IS IMPORTANT. AND YOU HAVE LESS TIME THAN EXPECTED. npr.org/2020/08/03/898548910…
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There is literally an entire suite of "Alternatives to Detention," from ankle bracelets to a high-touch case management system Trump ended in 2017, that allows DHS to monitor ppl in deportation proceedings. Release isn't just "release."
.@hogangidley45: “There are only one of two things that can happen when they come here: you have to either release them into the interior of the United States as a family unit, or you have to separate the families. That’s what the law says.”
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Stop the presses. This suit over the H1B visa ban has the best name of any litigation filed under Trump and possibly ever.
Panda v. Wolf, 1:20-cv-1907 (DDC) — Motion for Preliminary Injunction in the morning. #H1B @wasdenbanias
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BREAKING: DEPORTATION MORATORIUM TO START JANUARY 22 content.govdelivery.com/acco…
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Patti Lupone originated the title role in Evita on Broadway. The musical has a rather famous political balcony scene, and is also, famously, the favorite musical of President Donald Trump.
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This is...actually what being a journalist on Twitter feels like in 2019 tho
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The next 24 hours might be a little tonally weird on here, because I strongly suspect members of the media are going to be a lot more horrified by this than others. But this is why. Seeing your (in my case former) workplace singled out like this is...really a lot.
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USPS is, for my money, the most underhyped (which is to say, what most people mean when they say "why isn't the media covering this??") story of 2020.
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Good morning, everyone! I’m seeing a lot of tweets about how 1,475 children “taken from their parents” were lost by HHS. That’s wrong. Most children sent to HHS—before last fall, ALL children sent to HHS—arrived in the US as unaccompanied minors.
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If you have a blue check you really owe it to to society not to tweet assertions that aren’t clearly labeled as baseless speculation That goes 10x if your bio identifies you as a journalist And no, “it’s plausible”/“it makes sense” doesn’t exempt you from “baseless”
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Hold on. Joe Biden seriously said the Obama administration “didn’t lock people up in cages”? ? ??
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So...Hispanic people are not American. Got it.
.@MarkSteynOnline on DACA: "In Arizona, a majority of the grade school children now are Hispanic. That means Arizona's future is as a Hispanic society. That means in effect, the border has moved north." #Tucker
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So Obama has to spend time giving Remedial Presidency lessons to dude who called him an affirmative-action admit to Harvard? Sounds right
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Instant visas aren’t a thing. There is legal authority to simply allow people into the US without visas by paroling them into the country. It’d be great if people tried to understand the existing options before advocating for creation—much less presuming existence—of new ones.
Time is running out for the US to give instant visas on the tarmac to at-risk Afghans, such as interpreters and women's rights advocates, get them on planes out of the country, and sort things out later. That's not optimal, but it's the right thing to do.
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The second sentence of this is a flat rejection of any right to seek asylum in the United States.
We cannot allow all of these people to invade our Country. When somebody comes in, we must immediately, with no Judges or Court Cases, bring them back from where they came. Our system is a mockery to good immigration policy and Law and Order. Most children come without parents...
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The "Trump didn't do anything Obama didn't do on family separations" narrative has become the knee-jerk accepted truth among large swaths of conservatives and it is incredibly wrong
Replying to @ReichlinMelnick
Rep Collins implies (falsely) that Obama separated families the same way that Trump did. As @DLind has written, this isn't true at all. While some family separations did occur, it was never as systematic and at the same scale. vox.com/2018/6/21/17488458/o…
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So uh...why didn’t Dolly Parton get vaccinated first
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Journalists' job is not to tell you how to feel about things. Any responsible journalist will tell you impt facts and trust you to decide how to feel about them. People really need to stop assuming that every communication about a fact is a statement about how to feel.
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This is governance by tantrum. Even under Trump, admin has generally seen aid as a central component of curbing migration. And hard to overstate how much this threatens to throw off regional dynamics, including US/MX. Really rec u read my Thurs piece. vox.com/2019/3/28/18283941/t…
Trump plans U.S. aid cut to 3 Central American countries as fight widens over U.S.-bound migrants wapo.st/2U3V16l
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Just to be clear. “registering with the government” is also something refugees do.
Mary and Joseph weren't refugees, you illiterate. They were going to Bethlehem TO REGISTER WITH THE GOVERNMENT.
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A single 2017 incident — in which 6 perpetrators threw tree branches, rocks and bottles at 7 BP agents — counted as 126 "assaults" in DHS data. Conventional LE accounting would have counted it as 7.
How the Border Patrol faked statistics showing a 73 percent rise in assaults against agents interc.pt/2HjBw37 by @DebbieNathan2
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Furloughed fed: "Shit like this is why we moved the potted plant in front of the Trump portrait we're required to hang by the front door of the office."
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This was not a U-Turn. Full-length family detention is what the administration has said it wants since before it implemented zero-tolerance, and now it is working toward having both.
Trump's U-Turn is one of the biggest wins for the resistance so far. But public views about immigration are deeply schizophrenic--and that poses a lasting challenge with which we must seriously reckon. My latest for @slate. slate.com/news-and-politics/…
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I can't get over the fact that Putin pulled an "OJ wants to find the real killer" on Trump and Trump ENTHUSIASTICALLY PRAISED THE SUGGESTION vox.com/2018/7/16/17576788/p…
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I know I’m shouting into the void here, but: separating families to prosecute parents was briefly policy for Trump, never for Obama. The Obama administration tried to detain families (together) in immigration custody, before (and then appealing) federal judges said no.
“Oh, what about the children that they were separated?' Give me a f****** break. Where they were saying anything when Obama did that?” amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/10/01/p…
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Scooping myself a little here, but I think it's important for folks to know this: Today, the US Attorney and federal defender in Portland made a joint request to the court to stop barring people from attending protests as a condition of release.
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A present for my dear friend @MattGertz.
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(Midwestern defenses activate) THIS IS THE RIGHT WAY TO DO THIN CRUST PIZZA
.@PeteButtigieg just sent out a fundraising email offering supporters a chance to get pizza with him. Look at how they cut the pizza.
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If you are going to kill your Twitter: Please spend at least a week actively paying attention to the kinds of information/perspectives you get on here that you find useful. Then sit down and make a _plan_ for how you'll get that info/those perspectives without Twitter.
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Never let it be said that the gentle lie is a lost art.
"We have received inquiries about a visit to the White House. With several players either pursuing pro opportunities or moving on from UVA, it would be difficult, if not impossible to get everyone back together. We would have to respectfully decline an invitation.” - Tony Bennett
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I knew acutely at the time _it was for self-fashioning._ Because of course it was, it was for college students and that’s what college students thought (during an age of campus political quietism!) college was for. The interaction came when it needed to encourage repeat traffic.
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Psssst...What if I told you that men were also less interested in mentoring women ~before~ #MeToo
Another Side of #MeToo: Male Managers Fearful of Mentoring Women - The New York Times nytimes.com/2019/01/27/world…
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Anyone saying the US is taking in “100K Ukrainian refugees” is lying to you. & when you see “up to 100K Ukrainian refugees,” remember: -In FY21, the US committed to bring in up to 62.5K refugees & admitted 11.4K; -For FY22, US said up to 125K. It’s on pace (as of Feb) for 16K.
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I’ve been working on this—my first @ProPublica feature—for months. It’s the story of one family, split in half for no reason by Border Patrol. It’s also a story of how completely US border policy has changed in past yr. Lemme (ahem) explain. 1/ propublica.org/article/women…
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That's incorrect. As admin officials explained to us Friday, parents are given a flyer with information about the number to call to _locate_ their children, and what information about the child they need on hand to facilitate that process.
Padilla: Every parent gets "a sheet"w info on where their kids are.
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Reminder: a bunch of local reporters are out right now, and have been out all weekend, to give you the truth of what's going on, _while_ trying to deal with furloughs at their outlets. Give money to local journalism. If you read it this weekend, and it helped you, support it.
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NEW FROM @immcouncil: A mass deportation operation would cost the US government an estimated $315 billion. "Starting" with 1 million people a year? That's $88B annually. And GDP would take a hit of 4.2-6.8%. That's the Great Recession on the LOW end. americanimmigrationcouncil.o…
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I can’t imagine a context in which this would be appropriate, but asking a Jewish reporter what his ethnicity is in the context of whether certain Americans should be considered Americans or foreigners who should “go back” to their countries is EXTREMELY NOT IT
'What's your ethnicity?' Kellyanne Conway asks @AndrewFeinberg on the White House driveway, trying to redirect question about Trump's 'go back' tweet on congresswomen
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This stay only covers the airport detainees/those in transit. It doesn't change ban going forward.
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This is the biggest development in the DACA court fight since January. It all but erases the possibility of immediate resolution in Trump's favor. DACA renewals may well be safe thru June 2019. vox.com/2018/8/31/17806724/d…
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FL is currently the #1 state for felon disenfranchisement. It just passed re-enfranchisement by ballot initiative. Apparently resoundingly.
This is BIG for Florida: Amendment 4 passed. This restored voting rights to former felons who served their sentence. This will have an impact on 1.5 million Floridians. pnj.com/story/news/2018/11/0… via @
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Feds working unpaid: I will anonymously tweet out any reactions I get to Kudlow's assessment. DMs are open.
After telling the press that federal workers are "volunteering" by continuing to come to work without pay, a reporter calls out Larry Kudlow's incorrect assessment and he fumbles further, saying they are working without pay out of respect for the presidency and Trump.
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WHOA. This is a major development.
Huge news! NY Court System issues rule prohibiting ICE from making courthouse arrests without a judicial warrant. immigrantdefenseproject.org/…
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I shouldn’t just tweet this without a link. Here’s a link. dailydot.com/layer8/mark-zuc…
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"The president should remain in office" isn't generally the rallying cry of anarchists
CNN has begun calling these individuals anarchists and the events an insurrection
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Either the president just busted the cover on some extremely secretive negotiations with Congress, or the president is referring to internal executive-branch discussions about what to do with DACA as “negotiations.”
Trump just said we're going to take care of DACA and DREAMers. We're negotiating now.
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Furloughed fed: "I'm not working, but it's not volunteering. Volunteering is what Jose Andres and all are doing at the Food Kitchens or Food Bank. What Fed workers who are working with no pay are doing is what I would call SLAVE LABOR."
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Do we know if this is Trump misunderstanding the nature of the Congressional request (which was to the IRS, not to Trump), or Trump thinking that he just naturally has the power to decide what the IRS does?
President Trump privately told his advisers that he will not hand over his tax returns to Congress and "he would fight the issue to the Supreme Court," according to the Washington Post. on.msnbc.com/2UfT1rP
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New from me: Trump’s visa ban couldn’t’ve been worse timed for hospitals expecting a new crop of residents. Consulates refused to stamp visas for weeks (in many cases, until we asked State what was up 🤔)—creating a staffing crisis that’ll last into fall. propublica.org/article/hospi…
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Okay, I’m tweeting this out now and then, I promise, not again until Election Day: If you’re criticizing “the media” for something and you do not literally mean all media, NAME THE OUTLET/S YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT. Otherwise you just decrease trust in the outlets you _do_ rely on.
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I never want to hear anything about how the Jews control the media ever again.
This is quite a correction
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This isn’t what either the families nor CBP are saying. CBP is investigating both deaths. The extent to which Trump, in the name of defending Border Patrol, runs roughshod over what the people closer to the ground are actually doing is really underappreciated.
...children in question were very sick before they were given over to Border Patrol. The father of the young girl said it was not their fault, he hadn’t given her water in days. Border Patrol needs the Wall and it will all end. They are working so hard & getting so little credit!
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An extremely serious question I need someone to ask the Biden transition team: Which Cabinet position(s) are you reserving for “someone who can plausibly be played by Kate McKinnon”?
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Families who are reunited and released from detention—the lucky ones—have 7-10 days to make it to ICE check-ins 100s of miles away, sometimes w/o $ for bus ticket or even change of clothes. An impromptu network of Americans is there to help. My story: vox.com/2018/7/26/17608480/s…
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So I have a problem. I don’t want to get in fights on the internet tonight. But. I just saw Mary Poppins Returns. And I don’t understand how some of y’all didn’t find this movie delightful.
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You know that Mr. Rogers quote about his mother telling him that when he sees something scary on the news, "look for the helpers"? This is your "look for the helpers" story about family separation. vox.com/2018/7/26/17608480/s…
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I’ve really been wondering when it’s going to break through that tremendous amounts of government business is just being conducted by unFOIAable means now.
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NEW: "Fakhruddin Akbari is allowing his full name to be published because he is certain he is going to die." On the hundreds of Afghans who won the "visa lottery" in May 2019, and became some of the unluckiest people alive. propublica.org/article/these…
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At present, the US’ border policy is mass expulsion under Title 42–which is still in place because of an injunction in a lawsuit against the Biden administration’s move to end it, championed by the state of Texas.
“These deaths are on Biden,” Abbott says of 40+ people found dead inside tractor-trailer in San Antonio, believed to be migrants
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