Kyle Barry
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kylecbarry.bsky.social
Kyle Barry
@kylecbarry.bsky.social
2.3K followers 1.3K following 530 posts
Director, State Law Research Initiative (SLRI) http://state-law-research.org; Formerly @theappeal.bsky.social, NAACP LDF, @afjustice.bsky.social. I write about state courts & dismantling mass incarceration. https://open.substack.com/pub/slri
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Reposted by Kyle Barry
adamserwer.bsky.social
This has nothing to do with faith or observance btw. It’s just about establishing an official hierarchy of citizenship where they are on top. bsky.app/profile/mark...
markjacob.bsky.social Mark Jacob @markjacob.bsky.social · 3d
Here’s the U.S. government being officially religious in a country with no official religion.
Homeland Security tweet: Merry Christmas, America. We are blessed to share a nation and a Savior.
December 25, 2025 at 9:11 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
jesspish.bsky.social
the least shocking thing in the epstein files that wont get enough attention. police regularly arrest and charge victims to coerce them into participating, often jailing them in conditions that are worse.
sababausa.bsky.social ❀°。Der Siebenschläfer *.ﾟ✿ ⋆ @sababausa.bsky.social · 5d
jesus the Palm Beach Police really sought arrest warrants against underage Epstein victims for coming forward and cooperating, and (purported) admitting to crimes, and it caused the victims to become uncooperative with the federal investigation
. . . very cooperative, but the police at that point had to let [redacted] know that what she had done that she could be facing charges. Q And that was after they had told her earlier that she didn't need an attorney present, correct? A Exactly. Q Okay. So this happens to her with the Palm Beach Police Department and did the Palm Beach Police actually present or propose charging [redacted]? A They did get a probable cause affidavit against [redacted]. Q And is that why Ms. [redacted] and her attorney were concerned about her testimony here? A Yes. Q Now was a subpoena issued for Ms. [redacted] on behalf of this grand jury? A Yes, it was. Q And before Ms. [redacted] would comply with that, did she -- did her attorney request some sort of order? A Yes. Q And what did he ask for? A He asked for immunity for [redacted].
December 23, 2025 at 8:10 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
adamserwer.bsky.social
The people who profited most from the cancel culture/free speech panic were less interested in actual freedom of speech than establishing their own control over public discourse. You don't even have to take my word for it. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/1...
Every society that has ever existed has had views that are mainstream and views that are fringe. The free-speech frauds who captured the discourse over the past decade understood this, but their true objection was that they did not unilaterally have the power to define which was which. For example, in a 2018 Times column, Weiss complained that “leftists” were engaged in a “concerted attempt to significantly redraw the bounds of acceptable thought and speech.” This was meant to sound sinister, menacing. In fact, this is politics. Every faction is always trying to “redraw the bounds of acceptable thought and speech.” In a free society, the government allows people to have those arguments. Such disputes are not a threat to free speech; they are free speech. When I say that CBS News’s Bari Weiss understood this, you needn’t take my word for it. In November, shortly after being given the reins to one of the oldest broadcast-news organizations in the country, Weiss used identical language to describe her own project: “I think it’s about redrawing the lines of what falls in the 40-yard lines of acceptable debate and acceptable American politics and culture,” Weiss said at the Jewish Leadership Conference. “And I don’t mean that in, like, a censorious, gatekeeping way.” What’s the difference between her “redrawing the lines” of acceptable speech and other people doing it? What makes one “censorious” and “gatekeeping” and the other not? Well, because she gets to decide. That’s what so much of the free-speech panic was ever about: making sure the right people were in charge of what you see, hear, and read. Notably, this has very little to do with reporting the news, which is supposed to be what CBS News does. But if the point of installing Weiss was to ensure that she would gatekeep on behalf of right-wing interests, that is precisely what she appears to be doing.
December 23, 2025 at 6:17 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
lizdye.bsky.social
How racist do you have to be to freak out Hans von Spakovsky???

reason.com/volokh/2025/...
Breaking: Cully Stimson and Hans von Spakovsky Resign From Heritage
The Meese Center is basically empty now.
reason.com
December 22, 2025 at 8:26 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
bubbaprog.xyz
The full spiked 60 Minutes CECOT package, clean & subtitled. 1/5
December 23, 2025 at 1:28 AM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
phillewis.bsky.social
I just uploaded @jasonparis.bsky.social 's recording of the segment CBS News pulled from "60 Minutes" to YouTube:
WATCH: Segment CBS News Pulled From "60 Minutes"
YouTube video by Phil Lewis
www.youtube.com
December 22, 2025 at 10:45 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
kylecbarry.bsky.social
Some rage in this one.

For years, the CO Supreme Court has used a made-up, asinine rule to preemptively deny people serving long prison terms their constitutional rights.

It's a lazy & cowardly abdication of duty that 2 justices finally want to change. More here: slri.substack.com/p/issue-38-t...
The Court concedes that this “shortcut” is “unique to Colorado law” and that it “eliminates a longstanding layer of due process for criminal defendants.” Nonetheless, it remains on the books because it supposedly “saves time” and promotes “consistency.” I would submit that “saving time” is never a good reason to dispense with constitutional rights, but the Court’s claims to efficiency are dubious in any case. Now, instead of properly analyzing its cruel and unusual clause, the Court spends its time hopelessly trying to figure out wtf “per se grave or serious” actually means and what offenses it applies to. With this rule in place, and with prosecutors thirsty to invoke it, the first part of every excessive punishment analysis turns into Tom Cruise cross-examining Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men: “Q: Grave Danger?” A: [raises eyebrow] “Is there another kind?” Perhaps I am thinking too hard about this. Such an arbitrary, court-created rule—born out of some combination of cowardly deference to extreme punishments and sheer laziness, and that even prosecutors agree is “a weird concept anyway”—doesn’t deserve that much credit. The point is: The Colorado Supreme Court’s rule, it turns out, is less a shortcut and more a barrier to protecting fundamental constitutional rights that should be torn down. [People v. Kennedy]
December 22, 2025 at 5:37 PM
kylecbarry.bsky.social
Some rage in this one.

For years, the CO Supreme Court has used a made-up, asinine rule to preemptively deny people serving long prison terms their constitutional rights.

It's a lazy & cowardly abdication of duty that 2 justices finally want to change. More here: slri.substack.com/p/issue-38-t...
The Court concedes that this “shortcut” is “unique to Colorado law” and that it “eliminates a longstanding layer of due process for criminal defendants.” Nonetheless, it remains on the books because it supposedly “saves time” and promotes “consistency.” I would submit that “saving time” is never a good reason to dispense with constitutional rights, but the Court’s claims to efficiency are dubious in any case. Now, instead of properly analyzing its cruel and unusual clause, the Court spends its time hopelessly trying to figure out wtf “per se grave or serious” actually means and what offenses it applies to. With this rule in place, and with prosecutors thirsty to invoke it, the first part of every excessive punishment analysis turns into Tom Cruise cross-examining Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men: “Q: Grave Danger?” A: [raises eyebrow] “Is there another kind?” Perhaps I am thinking too hard about this. Such an arbitrary, court-created rule—born out of some combination of cowardly deference to extreme punishments and sheer laziness, and that even prosecutors agree is “a weird concept anyway”—doesn’t deserve that much credit. The point is: The Colorado Supreme Court’s rule, it turns out, is less a shortcut and more a barrier to protecting fundamental constitutional rights that should be torn down. [People v. Kennedy]
December 22, 2025 at 5:37 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
adamserwer.bsky.social
The maga divide summarized: does the gutter racism that is the mortar of our coalition apply to Jews or not? And if it doesn’t do we mean that or are we just pretending for the moment?
December 22, 2025 at 12:33 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
bgrueskin.bsky.social
Here’s a gift link to this stunner Washpost story, quoting the 60 Minutes correspondent on the CECOT story, who accuses Bari Weiss of spiking the piece all because the Trump Administration wouldn’t comment.

“Government silence is a statement, not a VETO.”

wapo.st/3YL4T3D
‘60 Minutes’ correspondent says CBS’s Bari Weiss abruptly pulled segment on Trump deportations
CBS News pulled a ‘60 Minutes’ segment about a prison in El Salvador one day before it was set to air because the Trump administration declined to participate.
wapo.st
December 22, 2025 at 3:14 AM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
hamiltonnolan.bsky.social
Woman comes to US at age 6. Graduates nursing school. Work permit. No criminal record. Snatched and imprisoned by ICE for 6 months now. About to be forced back to Honduras. A life destroyed and one less nurse. Merry Christmas.

www.nola.com/news/educati...
December 20, 2025 at 1:22 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
billycorriher.bsky.social
A quick thread on Republicans packing state supreme courts in the past 10 years. They hate voters and democracy. 🧵
murshedz.bsky.social Murshed Zaheed @murshedz.bsky.social · 11d
👀 Utah Republicans are threatening to expand the size of their state supreme court from 5 to 7 so they can get a favorable outcome in their redistricting appeal in time for 2026.

Ds across the country can take note especially if Ds get back in control of Cong/WH again.
www.abc4.com/news/politic...
"Inside Utah Politics Utah legislature to expand state Supreme Court to seven, senator says by: Lindsay Aerts Posted: Dec 16, 2025 / 04:57 PM MST Updated: Dec 16, 2025 / 05:21 PM MST SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — It appears the Utah legislature is poised to expand Utah’s Supreme Court from five members to seven in the 2026 legislative session. “Like most states of our size, we’re going to go up to seven and that will probably happen in the first week of the session,” said state Senator Todd Weiler on his local podcast this week. Weiler and local lawyer, Corey Astill, host a weekly right-leaning show called Political as Heck, where they discussed the recent special session and the ramifications of Judge Dianna Gibson’s November redistricting ruling that deemed that the Utah legislature didn’t follow Utah’s anti-gerrymandering law known as Proposition 4 when they were told to redistrict by the courts. "
December 18, 2025 at 7:38 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
parkermolloy.com
David Brooks, who wrote in the NYT last month, "The Epstein Story? Count Me Out" is... in the latest Epstein photo dump published by @oversightdemocrats.house.gov.

He should absolutely be fired by NYT for this. Major conflict of interest that he didn't disclose.
David Brooks: The Epstein Story? Count Me Out. David Brooks in the epstein photos
December 18, 2025 at 5:35 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
johnpfaff.bsky.social
So exhausted by this craven stenographic journalism.

It's still the DoD.
It's still the Kennedy Center.

ESPECIALLY when it comes to names on things, Trump has no magic "he'll just do it anyway" power, because WE ARE THE ONES WHO USE THE NAMES.
kairyssdal.bsky.social Kai Ryssdal @kairyssdal.bsky.social · 10d
You guys. No. It's named by statute. Do better.
axios.com Axios @axios.com · 10d
BREAKING: Kennedy Center to be renamed Trump-Kennedy Center
December 18, 2025 at 7:09 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
jacobdcharles.bsky.social
I'm sorry but Judge Thapar's concurrence/dissent show one absolutely bonkers way to do constitutional law!
December 15, 2025 at 11:25 PM
kylecbarry.bsky.social
For Alito and other Republican justices, the "Purcell Principle" is the "tails I win, heads you lose" of Supreme Court doctrines ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...
How the Supreme Court Warps This “Bedrock Principle” of Election Law to Help Republicans Win
Republican lawmakers are brazenly gerrymandering their states because they know the Republican justices will have their backs
ballsandstrikes.org
December 16, 2025 at 1:40 AM
kylecbarry.bsky.social
Great to see @law360.bsky.social reporting on this trend of state appellate courts rejecting regressive SCOTUS law and actually expanding rights against extreme criminal punishments (w/ quotes from me & @kasiawolfkot.bsky.social of @statecourtreport.org): www.law360.com/articles/242...
2025 Sees State Courts Diverge From Federal Criminal Norms By Brandon Lowrey · Listen to article Law360 (December 12, 2025, 12:30 PM EST) -- Some of this year's most notable criminal appellate rulings homed in on differences between state and federal constitutional protections against the most serious punishments, with movement in Michigan, bucking the trend in Wyoming, and an ambiguous but potentially earthshaking decision out of Texas. Michigan's high court has a history of departing from federal precedent, said Kyle Barry, director of the State Law Research Initiative. "Michigan has justices who have taken a real interest in whether extreme punishments are serving any sort of legitimate purpose whatsoever, and they're actually looking at evidence like neuroscience and psychology in assessing especially long prison terms for younger people," he said. "These are people who have the capacity to change, and it makes no penological sense whatsoever to decide that they must die in prison with no chance of ever getting released."
December 12, 2025 at 6:13 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
mjsdc.bsky.social
This is really incredible. The government's battle to deport Abrego Garcia has apparently been based on a lie from the start. Not even the "gang affiliation" lie or the "human smuggling" lie, but the more basic assertion that he was ordered to be deported in the first place.
reichlinmelnick.bsky.social Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 17d
🚨Judge Xinis finds that, incredibly, Mr. Abrego Garcia was never ordered deported in 2019. She notes that every since this saga began all the way back in March, the government has NEVER been able to produce any evidence that the immigration judge actually issued a removal order.
B. No Order of Removal Exists for Abrego Garcia No such order of removal exists for Abrego Garcia. When Abrego Garcia was first wrongly expelled to El Salvador, the Court struggled to understand the legal authority for even seizing him in the first place. At the first hearing in Abrego I, the Court inquired of Respondents’ counsel: The Court: I want to ask, though, the very specific question, if there is a final order of removal, what . . . document got this process started? There is no warrant for his arrest by an order of removal. There is no statement of probable cause. There’s no charge. There’s no report that says that anyone saw Mr. Abrego Garcia doing anything illegal or criminal. So what is the actual document that gave these officers the authority to start this process? Counsel: That is not in the record, and the government has not put that into the record. And that’s the best I can do. Abrego I, ECF No. 33 at 21:11–22. The Court continued to press counsel about the existence of a removal order and was told plainly that none can be found: The Court: Okay. So if there’s a Title 8 removal order, there would be an order of removal that’s being executed, and we don’t have one for Mr. Abrego Garcia, right? . . . Do you have that order? . . . Is it in the record? Counsel: I do not have that order. It is not in the record. Id. at 23:7–24:4. Since that time, Respondents have never produced an order of removal despite Abrego Garcia hinging much of his jurisdictional and legal arguments on its non-existence. ECF No. 1 ¶¶ 68–69; ECF No. 32 at 10, 15–17, 27; ECF No. 87 at 11–12. Indeed, Respondents twice sponsored the testimony of ICE officials whose job it is to effectuate removal orders, and who candidly admitted to having never seen one for Abrego Garcia. See ECF No. 107 at 30:16–22 (testimony of Cantú) (“Q: Based upon your many years of experience you described to us, you know what a final order of removal looks like, right, sir? Cantú: I do. Q: And have you seen a final order of removal in regard to Mr. Abrego Garcia? Cantú: I have not.”). See also Abrego I, ECF No. 234 at 46:6–12 (testimony of interim Assistant Director for ICE Removal Operations, Thomas Giles (“Giles”)) (“Q: You have not seen the final order of removal, have you, sir? Giles: What do you mean by that? Q: I mean, you have not seen a piece of paper that represents the final order of removal vis-a-vis Mr. Abrego Garcia, correct? Giles: No, I have not.”).15 Based on this, the Court concludes that no order of removal exists.
December 11, 2025 at 4:16 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
kenwhite.bsky.social
“According to a source Ms. Halligan became enraged when a grand juror told her that the word ‘indict’ is pronounced ‘in-DITE,” not “in-DICKT.”
Justice Department again fails to indict New York Attorney General Letitia James
The Justice Department also tried and failed last week to secure a new indictment against James in Norfolk, Virginia.
www.nbcnews.com
December 11, 2025 at 9:18 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
atrupar.com
Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara to US citizen detained by ICE: "I apologize that this happened to you in my city with people wearing vests that say 'police.' That's embarrassing."
December 11, 2025 at 3:39 AM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
ndhapple.bsky.social
Strange things start happening when a President’s approval rating hits 36%
ariberman.bsky.social Ari Berman @ariberman.bsky.social · 17d
Breaking: Indiana State Senate rejects 9-0 Republican gerrymandered congressional map, stands up to Trump’s pressure campaign of threats and intimidation. Huge victory for democracy & defeat for Trump in gerrymandering war he started
December 11, 2025 at 9:39 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
taniel.bsky.social
Indiana’s Senate has voted AGAINST the GOP gerrymander that’d have locked in a 9-0 map.

This keeps the 7-2 map in place, saving two Democratic seats heading into 2026.

The vote failed big, 19/31.

The MAJORITY of the GOP senators opposed it!
December 11, 2025 at 9:38 PM
kylecbarry.bsky.social
I’m sorry what bsky.app/profile/doug...
dougthelawyer.bsky.social Doug Gladden @dougthelawyer.bsky.social · 19d
Today it was my honor to present oral argument in the 14th Court of Appeals in Houston, Texas, on behalf of my client.

The issue is whether a trial judge in a criminal case can tell the jury that "beyond a reasonable doubt" can be as low as "60 percent."
December 10, 2025 at 4:14 PM
Reposted by Kyle Barry
taniel.bsky.social
A huge night for Democrats:

—They flip Miami's mayorship.
—They flip a state House district in Georgia that had voted Trump by 13%.
—They keep Albuquerque's mayorship, while the liberal faction flips city council.
—And they get big overperformances (+18 & +22) in 2 Florida specials.
December 10, 2025 at 3:26 AM
kylecbarry.bsky.social
The upshot of finding that adolescence extends into one's 30s is that courts should stop tinkering with death-by-incarceration entirely, and finally hold that *all* life without parole prison terms are cruel and/or unusual punishment www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/202...
2. Adolescence There is a dramatic turning point that the researchers saw occurring around the age of nine on average — a time when many children begin to enter puberty. The brain switches gears and starts rewiring to become more efficient. The adolescence phase the researchers identified lasts for two decades, into the early 30s on average. This is when people are most vulnerable to developing a mental health disorder, but it’s also a critical time for brain development. “It is really important to think about adolescence as this protracted window,” said Katie Insel, a psychologist at Northwestern University who studies how the brain changes over the course of adolescence. She said that while in our society we may think of 18- or 21-year-olds as adults, this research adds to a growing body of work suggesting that the brain isn’t fully developed or stable until our late 20s or even early 30s.
December 9, 2025 at 5:25 PM