September 6–September 12, 2025

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THIS WEEK IN…

DEMOCRATIC EROSION

On Monday, the conservative majority on the Supreme Court handed down a one-page order that allowed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to conduct roving patrols and effectively use racial profiling to stop and detain people for no other reason than their skin color, the language they are speaking or suspicions about their national origin, without requiring clear evidence or a warrant. In essence, the court has allowed federal agents to target people not for what they have done, but for who they appear. Civil liberties advocates warn that this undermines the Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable search and seizure.

Historian Garrett Graff on what the decision means for civil liberties and how it marks the arrival of an unprecedented style of domestic policing: ICE is Eating the Soul of America.

Matt Ford on the decision’s implications for U.S. democracy: Brett Kavanaugh’s Shadow Docket Attack on Your Civil Liberties. Whether motivated by animus or naïveté, the justice’s rationale for permitting law enforcement to racially profile suspects has dark implications for democracy.

Erwin Chemerinsky Dean of UC Berkeley School of Law on how any hope the court would be a check on the Trump administration seems lost: The Supreme Court’s brazen approval of racial profiling.

Cartoon by @knecessary.bsky.social.

Investigative journalist Radley Balko put together a list of what happened in just one month of the Trump administration’s dizzying push toward autocracy, painting a dire picture of the state of U.S. democracy: One Month of Authoritarianism

…in other news

The constant presence of heavily armed troops and police take the joy out of spending a lovely late summer evening at a street cafe or restaurant in Washington, D.C. Some businesses struggle to stay afloat. What is it like on the frontlines of the president’s war against the city? 

The president could not enjoy his dinner, either, though for different reasons.  “Trump is the Hitler of our time”, chanted the protestors who joined the president during his restaurant visit.

August 30–September 5, 2025

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THIS WEEK IN…

ELECTION INTERFERENCE

Donald Trump and his allies are orchestrating a multifaceted effort to interfere in the upcoming midterm elections to help the GOP retain full control of Congress.

Ari Berman, Mother Jones’ national voting rights correspondent looks at Project 2026: Trump’s Plan to Rig the Next Election. From nationalizing voter suppression to flooding the streets with federal agents, the president and his allies are using all the tricks in the authoritarian playbook to tilt the midterms in their favor.

Atlantic Monthly on how Fear of Losing the Midterms Is Driving Trump’s Decisions. The specter of investigations and impeachment has fueled many of the president’s most dramatic actions.

Jasleen Singh at the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program on The Trump Administration’s Campaign to Undermine the Next Election. The executive branch is interfering in U.S. elections in unprecedented ways.

One example of what the GOP redistricting efforts mean for Black and Latino representation in a rapidly diversifying Texas county. Despite explosive growth, turning Tarrant into a racially diverse swing county, two new political maps will leave it with whiter, more Republican representation.

…in other news

A group of mostly retirees prove Trump’s designation of Los Angeles as a “trash heap” wrong. They call themselves “Trashers” and set out to clean up the city. In return, they find purpose and friendship, writes the Los Angeles Times.

August 23–August 29, 2025

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THIS WEEK IN…

ASSAULT ON HEALTHCARE

Having so far failed to dismantle the Affordable Care Act, one of President Obama’s signature achievements, which provides health insurance to millions of Americans, the second Trump administration has still found ways to significantly disrupt healthcare in the U.S. One of Trump’s campaign promises was to “let Kennedy go wild on healthcare” and now the nation’s preventative vaccinations programs are under serious threat. In “The Plot Against Vaccines” Mother Jones investigates how Robert F Kennedy III and his allies are actively undermining immunization efforts. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is struggling to fulfill its mission to protect public health, its bullet-riddled facade symbolic of the agency’s fractured leadership and depleted staff. Experts and senior officials warn that “people will die because of this.”

…in other news

Demonic symbols on a Chinese food receipt were among the signs that Stein-Erik Soelberg found as proof in communicating with ChatGPT that his mother was spying on and trying to poison him. The chatbot confirmed Soelberg’s deranged suspicion and even expanded on the misguided beliefs that he could be a target of assassination attempts. Soelberg became so convinced of the evil plans against him that he killed his mother and committed suicide.