Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
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vicky.science
Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
@vicky.science
The friend you send bug pictures to. Also accepting dead-thing-on-beach pictures, dog pictures, and stories about your cats.
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
I just published:

The Taken
Inside the ICE Detention Pipeline for US Citizens and Residents: From Minnesota to Texas

Documented through court records.

Including worms in food, sewage water flooding into eating areas, returned to Minnesota in chains and shackles after courts order release, more.
The Taken: Inside the ICE Detention Pipeline for US Citizens and Residents From Minnesota to Texas
We document these patterns through the use of sworn declarations and court filings.
www.justsecurity.org
February 11, 2026 at 1:32 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
"should the government kidnap 5 year olds and deport them? We asked seventeen ethics professors and they all just screamed"
February 8, 2026 at 5:42 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
Good morning. The President of the United States was in the middle of the most serious child sex trafficking ring of the last quarter century.

He is referenced not a dozen times in the case files. Not 100 times. Not 1,000 times. He’s referenced 38,000 times.
February 8, 2026 at 7:50 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
“If I am killed doing this, throw my body at the White House, martyr the shit out of me & raise hell. Do not be sad. Do not think I would do anything differently. I would do it over & over again — this is too important to sit down & shut up and not do anything.” www.mprnews.org/story/2026/0...
Pursued by federal agents, suburban ICE observers remain resolved
After a frightening pursuit by federal agents, suburban ICE observers say fear hasn’t stopped them from protecting their communities.
www.mprnews.org
February 4, 2026 at 3:45 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
This is the thing. Freelancing happens to work very well for some people as individuals (me, for instance) but society needs real newsrooms and real teams. We gig writers are just part of the ecosystem.
A lot of people cannot just start a paid newsletter or become freelancers to sustain their careers. The sports, metro, and international desks did work that requires *team* resources, like legal checks, documents, access to archives, and long-term beat experience.
February 4, 2026 at 4:42 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
journalists are workers who deserve to be paid fairly for our labor and I think that far too few consumers of media recognize or even care about this fact
February 4, 2026 at 5:20 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
WaPo laid off one of the journalists who won a 2022 Pulitzer Prize for reporting on the January 6th attack on the Capitol.
February 4, 2026 at 6:16 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
INBOX: Washington Post Ukraine Correspondent Lizzie Johnson announces that she has been laid off in the middle of a below-freezing war zone without power, heat, or running water.
February 4, 2026 at 5:11 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
Gonna leave this open for another couple of weeks. Get in while you can!
My daughter is two months old today and (obviously) we spend a whole lot of time thinking about the world she will grow into. Want to play the “will Bea ever need a driver’s license?” game?

@xavd.id
xavdid.fillout.com/predictions
Predictions for the year 2041
Made with Fillout, the best way to make forms, surveys and quizzes your audience will answer.
xavdid.fillout.com
February 2, 2026 at 8:29 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
But you can still keep going! 🐟

#illustration #sunfish #animalart #artsky
January 31, 2026 at 8:13 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
Farewell to Catherine O'Hara, a legend for so many reasons but not least of all for her sweet autoharp chops on this gem, performed with Eugene Levy in A Mighty Wind
Mitch & Mickey - A Kiss At The End Of The Rainbow
YouTube video by mayhew7
youtu.be
January 30, 2026 at 7:01 PM
My daughter *cannot* get this vaccine until she’s a year old and I am FURIOUS that she has purposely been made vulnerable to this absolute bullshit. This disease did not need to be a threat to her. She could have been safe from measles and anti-vaxxers decided to make her unsafe.
(CNN) - The fast-growing measles outbreak in South Carolina is now the largest in the United States since the disease was declared eliminated in this country more than two decades ago.

@cnn.com
www.cnn.com/2026/01/27/h...
January 28, 2026 at 2:19 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
My daughter is two months old today and (obviously) we spend a whole lot of time thinking about the world she will grow into. Want to play the “will Bea ever need a driver’s license?” game?

@xavd.id
xavdid.fillout.com/predictions
Predictions for the year 2041
Made with Fillout, the best way to make forms, surveys and quizzes your audience will answer.
xavdid.fillout.com
January 27, 2026 at 8:18 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
After being held in two of them as a boy, I fought for decades urging America to never again build concentration camps and put human beings in them. It breaks my heart to watch this happen twice now in my own lifetime.
January 27, 2026 at 9:30 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
I was a little bummed to give up my shovel to my neighbors (I assumed they were just doing their sidewalks, I also would like to get ahead as there’s already a foot down and more coming). But they joined the brigade and now the brigade has shoveled my sidewalks for me while I record a lecture 🥹
January 25, 2026 at 7:07 PM
My daughter is two months old today and (obviously) we spend a whole lot of time thinking about the world she will grow into. Want to play the “will Bea ever need a driver’s license?” game?

@xavd.id
xavdid.fillout.com/predictions
Predictions for the year 2041
Made with Fillout, the best way to make forms, surveys and quizzes your audience will answer.
xavdid.fillout.com
January 27, 2026 at 8:18 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
(Dude suddenly stops pushing his broom across the floor of the Death Star)

Does this look like a big laser to anyone else
Palantir employees are pressing company leadership over its work for ICE in internal company Slacks obtained by @wired.com

"In my opinion ICE are the bad guys. I am not proud that the company I enjoy so much working for is part of this."

Scoop from @makenakelly.bsky.social
Palantir Defends Work With ICE to Staff Following Killing of Alex Pretti
“In my opinion ICE are the bad guys. I am not proud that the company I enjoy so much working for is part of this,” one worker wrote on Slack.
www.wired.com
January 27, 2026 at 2:51 AM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
Wake up. Make breakfast. Do email. Watch a murder. Go to a party for a 5 year old. Laugh with my daughter. See a different angle of that murder. Hear govt officials slander the victim. Play Barbies with my kid. Feed her dinner. Tear up at that victim reading last honors to a vet. Put kid to bed. USA
January 25, 2026 at 4:43 AM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
We lost a giant in public health today.

Dr. William H. Foege helped eradicate #smallpox - the only human disease ever eliminated—through science, surveillance, and vaccines.

His legacy is the antidote to today’s antiscience, anti-vaccine rhetoric.

www.nytimes.com/2026/01/24/u...
William H. Foege, Key Figure in the Eradication of Smallpox, Dies at 89
www.nytimes.com
January 25, 2026 at 5:48 AM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
This is courage. Looking a masked, government fascist dead in the eye, face to face, knowing full well that your life is on the line.

If elected officials had 1/10th of Alex Pretti's resolve, we would have far fewer troubles.
January 24, 2026 at 7:56 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
“Diana, 7, had a nosebleed that just wouldn’t stop and her parents, immigrants from Venezuela with a pending asylum petition, were increasingly worried about her health.

They never got to see a doctor.

Three unmarked cars with immigration agents surrounded their car in the ER parking lot”
ICE detains family seeking emergency care for child at Portland hospital
The Venezuelan parents and their 7-year-old daughter entered the U.S. legally.
www.oregonlive.com
January 24, 2026 at 1:26 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
The US withdrawal from #WHO became official today, leaving the world less prepared for dangerous disease outbreaks. “When that will bite us in the ass, it’s impossible to predict. But there is a 100% certainty that it will bite us in the ass,” one expert told me. www.statnews.com/2026/01/22/u...
U.S. makes exit from the WHO complete
The U.S. withdrawal from the WHO became official Thursday, formalizing a fissure between the Trump administration and the Geneva-based global health agency.
www.statnews.com
January 22, 2026 at 3:52 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
Do you appreciate @nws.noaa.gov's posts on Bluesky?

Did you know that this account is a pilot program that may or may not be continued and even expanded to NWS field offices?

NWS is soliciting comments here! www.surveymonkey.com/r/PrototypeN...
Press release:
www.weather.gov/media/notifi...
⚠️~132 million: Number of people under alerts for snow, sleet, & freezing rain.

A large, long-duration winter storm is expected to bring widespread heavy snow, sleet, & freezing rain from the Southern Rockies & Plains beginning Friday (Jan. 23), spreading eastward toward New England this weekend.
🧵
January 22, 2026 at 7:53 PM
Reposted by Vicky Stein (agentredsquirrel)
The 5-year-old arrested by ICE In Minnesota is detained at Dilley. We reported on conditions there in the below article.

Parents said the food was contaminated with mold and worms & that children were so under so much stress that they were hitting their own faces & wetting themselves.
Analysis by The Marshall Project of ICE data obtained by the Deportation Data Project found that the Trump administration’s revival of family detention has swept thousands of children into ICE custody. At least 3,800 children under 18, including 20 infants, have been booked since Trump took office.
ICE Threw Thousands of Kids in Detention, Many For Longer Than Court-Prescribed Limit
Former immigration staffers argue ICE is choosing to detain families for prolonged periods to speed deportations and compel them to leave.
www.themarshallproject.org
January 22, 2026 at 8:30 PM