Ian Vandewalker
@ianvan.bsky.social
Policy advocacy and research on money in politics and disinformation. Senior Counsel & Manager, Brennan Center.
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
FOUR new deaths in ICE detention. That puts the total this year at 30 people dead; the highest in ICE's history and worse than even during the COVID years.
It's clear that the system is breaking down. Many of these are preventable deaths.
It's clear that the system is breaking down. Many of these are preventable deaths.
In the 90 minutes since I posted this, I've gotten two more death notifications.
ICE has a responsibility to take care of these people, something they are clearly disregarding. This is beyond horrifying. We must ensure dignity and humanity for detained people in this country.
ICE has a responsibility to take care of these people, something they are clearly disregarding. This is beyond horrifying. We must ensure dignity and humanity for detained people in this country.
Within 15 minutes today, I got two back-to-back notifications of deaths at ICE facilities.
28 people have died in ICE custody since Trump took office. These facilities are overcrowded & are putting their own profits over health and safety. We need oversight & accountability NOW.
28 people have died in ICE custody since Trump took office. These facilities are overcrowded & are putting their own profits over health and safety. We need oversight & accountability NOW.
December 18, 2025 at 7:53 PM
FOUR new deaths in ICE detention. That puts the total this year at 30 people dead; the highest in ICE's history and worse than even during the COVID years.
It's clear that the system is breaking down. Many of these are preventable deaths.
It's clear that the system is breaking down. Many of these are preventable deaths.
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
Today, my colleague David Yaffe-Bellany and I published an investigation into the frenzied world of crypto unleased by Trump.
Risk taking, profiteering & yes, innovation, as crypto bros sense that this is the moment crypto will go mainstream in the U.S.
Free link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/t...
Risk taking, profiteering & yes, innovation, as crypto bros sense that this is the moment crypto will go mainstream in the U.S.
Free link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/t...
What Trump’s Embrace of Crypto Has Unleashed
www.nytimes.com
December 18, 2025 at 4:22 AM
Today, my colleague David Yaffe-Bellany and I published an investigation into the frenzied world of crypto unleased by Trump.
Risk taking, profiteering & yes, innovation, as crypto bros sense that this is the moment crypto will go mainstream in the U.S.
Free link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/t...
Risk taking, profiteering & yes, innovation, as crypto bros sense that this is the moment crypto will go mainstream in the U.S.
Free link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/12/17/t...
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
NEW: Without USAID funding to help buy food for refugees, the World Food Program rushed to prioritize families based on need, determining that only half the population would get food.
Refugees learned which half they were in from a number stamped on the back of their ration card.
Refugees learned which half they were in from a number stamped on the back of their ration card.
After Trump Officials Cut Food Aid to Kenya, Children Starved to Death
“Brutal and traumatizing”: Interviews and a trove of internal documents show government officials and aid workers desperately tried to warn Trump advisers about impending disaster and death.
www.propublica.org
December 17, 2025 at 12:00 PM
NEW: Without USAID funding to help buy food for refugees, the World Food Program rushed to prioritize families based on need, determining that only half the population would get food.
Refugees learned which half they were in from a number stamped on the back of their ration card.
Refugees learned which half they were in from a number stamped on the back of their ration card.
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
As I explain in our new @freepress.bsky.social report, CHOKEHOLD, creeping authoritarianism can be hard to recognize in real time. Leaders subvert reality, suppress dissent, reward harassment, and sideline independent journalism & marginalized voices. www.freepress.net/attack-on-fr...
Chokehold: Donald Trump’s War on Free Speech & the Need for Systemic Resistance
This Free Press report examines the Trump administration’s hostile relationship with dissent and free expression in 2025. It analyzes how Trump and his political enablers have sought to undermine and ...
www.freepress.net
December 15, 2025 at 4:25 PM
As I explain in our new @freepress.bsky.social report, CHOKEHOLD, creeping authoritarianism can be hard to recognize in real time. Leaders subvert reality, suppress dissent, reward harassment, and sideline independent journalism & marginalized voices. www.freepress.net/attack-on-fr...
Elections keep breaking spending records, thanks largely to big donors and super PACs. www.brennancenter.org/our-work/ana...
Odd-Year Elections Break Spending Records
Several state and local elections this year saw new highs of spending, especially from megadonor-fueled super PACs.
www.brennancenter.org
December 11, 2025 at 9:01 PM
Elections keep breaking spending records, thanks largely to big donors and super PACs. www.brennancenter.org/our-work/ana...
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
Our new, one-of-a-kind guide for litigators, Countering Originalism, equips lawyers with the strategies, arguments, and citations they need to address the originalist arguments they encounter in their cases.
Countering Originalism
This guide offers lawyers strategies, arguments, and citations to address originalist claims they encounter in litigation.
www.brennancenter.org
December 11, 2025 at 1:28 PM
Our new, one-of-a-kind guide for litigators, Countering Originalism, equips lawyers with the strategies, arguments, and citations they need to address the originalist arguments they encounter in their cases.
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
But misinfo is harmless... "South Carolina measles outbreak is 'accelerating,' driving hundreds into quarantine. Some students who remain unvaccinated are now in a second 21-day quarantine since the beginning of the school year." www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...
South Carolina measles outbreak is 'accelerating,' driving hundreds into quarantine
Some students who remain unvaccinated are now in a second 21-day quarantine since the beginning of the school year.
www.nbcnews.com
December 10, 2025 at 10:21 PM
But misinfo is harmless... "South Carolina measles outbreak is 'accelerating,' driving hundreds into quarantine. Some students who remain unvaccinated are now in a second 21-day quarantine since the beginning of the school year." www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...
School vouchers have always been just about taking money away from public schools. They're not even keeping track of where it went instead. www.washingtonpost.com/education/20...
How Florida lost track of 30,000 students, a ‘cautionary tale’ for vouchers
The state’s auditor general found “a myriad of accountability problems” in the nation’s largest voucher program.
www.washingtonpost.com
December 8, 2025 at 6:45 PM
School vouchers have always been just about taking money away from public schools. They're not even keeping track of where it went instead. www.washingtonpost.com/education/20...
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
Billionaires are inheriting record levels of wealth, UBS report finds reut.rs/3MFJWnW
Billionaires are inheriting record levels of wealth, UBS report finds
The spouses and children of billionaires inherited more wealth in 2025 than in any previous year since reporting began in 2015, according to UBS's Billionaire Ambitions Report published on Thursday.
reut.rs
December 4, 2025 at 12:35 PM
Billionaires are inheriting record levels of wealth, UBS report finds reut.rs/3MFJWnW
Several state and local elections broke campaign spending records, thanks mostly to big donors and super PACs. www.brennancenter.org/our-work/ana...
Odd-Year Elections Break Spending Records
Several state and local elections this year saw new highs of spending, especially from megadonor-fueled super PACs.
www.brennancenter.org
December 4, 2025 at 3:26 PM
Several state and local elections broke campaign spending records, thanks mostly to big donors and super PACs. www.brennancenter.org/our-work/ana...
"[O]utside groups have spent more than $6.5 million on the race, including more than $1.6 million from the pro-Trump MAGA Inc. super PAC. Two-thirds of the total super PAC spending has come in the last two weeks...." www.npr.org/2025/12/02/n...
Democrats and Republicans are pouring money into a special election in Tennessee. Here's why
Tuesday's special election for Tennessee's 7th Congressional District between Democrat Aftyn Behn and Republican Matt Van Epps has attracted outsize attention and spending from both parties.
www.npr.org
December 2, 2025 at 7:26 PM
"[O]utside groups have spent more than $6.5 million on the race, including more than $1.6 million from the pro-Trump MAGA Inc. super PAC. Two-thirds of the total super PAC spending has come in the last two weeks...." www.npr.org/2025/12/02/n...
Thoughts from Montgomery County, Maryland, on the results of the local public campaign financing program making elections more accessible. montgomeryperspective.com/2025/11/21/o...
On Public Financing, Part Ten: Lessons Learned - Montgomery Perspective
By Adam Pagnucco. This is the tenth(!) post on Montgomery County’s public financing system, making it one of my longest series ever. But public financing...
montgomeryperspective.com
December 2, 2025 at 7:13 PM
Thoughts from Montgomery County, Maryland, on the results of the local public campaign financing program making elections more accessible. montgomeryperspective.com/2025/11/21/o...
Last month's odd-year elections in the states broke spending records, a sign that we haven't yet seen the high-water mark of the big-money flood unleashed by the Supreme Court and other deregulatory actions. www.brennancenter.org/our-work/ana...
Odd Year Elections Break Spending Records
Several state and local elections this year saw new highs of spending, especially from megadonor-fueled super PACs.
www.brennancenter.org
December 1, 2025 at 5:58 PM
Last month's odd-year elections in the states broke spending records, a sign that we haven't yet seen the high-water mark of the big-money flood unleashed by the Supreme Court and other deregulatory actions. www.brennancenter.org/our-work/ana...
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
ICE arrests, detains British woman with US husband and newborn when she shows up for her green card interview. She’s now in a detention center, separated from her 6-month-old. No criminal record. She had overstayed her visa.
www.lbc.co.uk/article/brit...
www.lbc.co.uk/article/brit...
British mum detained by ICE agents in California as six-month old baby and stunned husband watch on | LBC
Katie Paul, 33, was in the process of applying for a green card when she was ambushed by immigration agents
www.lbc.co.uk
November 25, 2025 at 11:13 AM
ICE arrests, detains British woman with US husband and newborn when she shows up for her green card interview. She’s now in a detention center, separated from her 6-month-old. No criminal record. She had overstayed her visa.
www.lbc.co.uk/article/brit...
www.lbc.co.uk/article/brit...
Trump is the only president to fundraise for a super PAC while constitutionally prohibited from running again. (To be fair, only one other president, Obama, even had the chance.) www.nytimes.com/2025/11/21/u...
Trump to Hold Two Fund-Raisers for His Super PAC Next Year
www.nytimes.com
November 24, 2025 at 6:29 PM
Trump is the only president to fundraise for a super PAC while constitutionally prohibited from running again. (To be fair, only one other president, Obama, even had the chance.) www.nytimes.com/2025/11/21/u...
Convicted of defrauding the govt of $38M and pardoned by Trump after spending almost $1M to lobby for a pardon. Admin says lobbying had nothing to do with pardon decision. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...
The case of a felon who paid lobbyists nearly $1 million to seek a Trump pardon
Nursing home magnate Joseph Schwartz was sentenced in April to three years for defrauding the government of $38 million. Seven months later, Trump pardoned him, but the White House denies a lobbying t...
www.washingtonpost.com
November 23, 2025 at 8:24 PM
Convicted of defrauding the govt of $38M and pardoned by Trump after spending almost $1M to lobby for a pardon. Admin says lobbying had nothing to do with pardon decision. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...
"How did the technology sector achieve so much power under the second Trump administration? One undeniable factor is money – more than $1 BILLION in influence spending" www.citizen.org/article/robo...
Robo-Trump: Big Tech’s Big Spending and the Republican Effort to Delete State Laws Against AI Harms - Public Citizen
www.citizen.org
November 21, 2025 at 5:17 PM
"How did the technology sector achieve so much power under the second Trump administration? One undeniable factor is money – more than $1 BILLION in influence spending" www.citizen.org/article/robo...
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
We spent a year investigating billionaires for @washingtonpost.com.
We found: the wealthiest 100 Americans gave $1.1 billion to influence the 2024 elections — 140x more than they did in 2000. And almost all of that giving boosted Republicans.
washingtonpost.com/politics/int...
We found: the wealthiest 100 Americans gave $1.1 billion to influence the 2024 elections — 140x more than they did in 2000. And almost all of that giving boosted Republicans.
washingtonpost.com/politics/int...
November 21, 2025 at 2:56 PM
We spent a year investigating billionaires for @washingtonpost.com.
We found: the wealthiest 100 Americans gave $1.1 billion to influence the 2024 elections — 140x more than they did in 2000. And almost all of that giving boosted Republicans.
washingtonpost.com/politics/int...
We found: the wealthiest 100 Americans gave $1.1 billion to influence the 2024 elections — 140x more than they did in 2000. And almost all of that giving boosted Republicans.
washingtonpost.com/politics/int...
Americans overwhelmingly agree on a range of key democracy issues, like limiting the influence of the wealthy, cultural pluralism, facts matter, and violence is unacceptable. news.gallup.com/poll/696494/...
Americans Show Consensus on Many Democracy-Related Matters
A Kettering Foundation/Gallup survey finds most Americans support political compromise, view multiculturalism as a strength and reject political violence.
news.gallup.com
November 20, 2025 at 5:39 PM
Americans overwhelmingly agree on a range of key democracy issues, like limiting the influence of the wealthy, cultural pluralism, facts matter, and violence is unacceptable. news.gallup.com/poll/696494/...
These idiots are lying about vaccines to pander to the politics of cruel stupidity, and they are going to kill children.
The CDC amended its website to suggest that vaccines may cause autism. It now declares that experts “ignored” a potential link between infant vaccination and autism, and asserts that its earlier rejection of such a link was not “evidence-based.”
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/20/h...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/20/h...
C.D.C. Changes Website to Reflect Kennedy’s Vaccine Skepticism
www.nytimes.com
November 20, 2025 at 4:24 PM
These idiots are lying about vaccines to pander to the politics of cruel stupidity, and they are going to kill children.
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
Good morning. I've got a banger new post out today that develops a new method for placing voters on the left-right ideological spectrum, and adds a new, "non-ideological"/affordability axis to usual way we chart & think about US voters (esp swing voters). www.gelliottmorris.com/p/not-just-l...
Not just left vs right: Most voters think about affordability and material wellbeing, not in ideological terms
Most voters want a party that emphasizes cost of living issues and makes the world a better place. Few Americans think in solidly ideologically terms. "Moderates" are mostly non-ideological.
www.gelliottmorris.com
November 20, 2025 at 1:00 PM
Good morning. I've got a banger new post out today that develops a new method for placing voters on the left-right ideological spectrum, and adds a new, "non-ideological"/affordability axis to usual way we chart & think about US voters (esp swing voters). www.gelliottmorris.com/p/not-just-l...
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
Ought to be front-page headlines.
Trump is calling for the six Democratic lawmakers who urged the military not to follow any illegal orders to be arrested, and he’s reposting replies saying they should be hanged and calling them terrorists.
November 20, 2025 at 2:38 PM
Ought to be front-page headlines.
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
wrote about the president’s flagrant and destructive corruption in a column that references street fighter, the simpsons, machiavelli, and a host of revolutionary-era americans (gift link)
Opinion | The White House Gold Rush Is On
www.nytimes.com
November 19, 2025 at 11:51 AM
wrote about the president’s flagrant and destructive corruption in a column that references street fighter, the simpsons, machiavelli, and a host of revolutionary-era americans (gift link)
Reposted by Ian Vandewalker
The majority of the corporations known to have donated to the fund for Trump's new White House ballroom are represented by three lobbying firms. www.cbsnews.com/news/corpora...
Majority of corporate Trump ballroom donors represented by 3 lobbying firms, watchdog says
Lobbyists from the three firms mingled with top tech executives and President Trump at a dinner for White House ballroom donors last month.
www.cbsnews.com
November 19, 2025 at 2:42 PM
The majority of the corporations known to have donated to the fund for Trump's new White House ballroom are represented by three lobbying firms. www.cbsnews.com/news/corpora...