Another shooting in Minneapolis

[Rideback]

It's highly unusual to see an AUSA crack like this. Just last week ads were plastered all over from DoJ looking for more attorneys after so many have left.

[just-jim]

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From HCR’s column today:

“Robert Downen of Texas Monthly noted that in the final days of the campaign, the Wambsganss campaign spent $310,000 while Rehmet spent nothing, and Daniel Nichanian of BoltsMag posted that overall, Wambsganss spent nearly $2.2 million more than Rehmet in the campaign. Both Texas governor Greg Abbott and Trump himself publicly supported Wambsganss.

And yet, as G. Elliott Morris of Strength in Numbers noted, voters flipped a district that Trump won in 2024 by 17 points to Rehmet, electing him by a 14.4-point margin. After removing the minor-party candidates in the vote, the swing from the Republican in 2024 was 32 points toward the Democrats. In Texas.”

[Rideback]

They're referring to an ICE memo, which has already been ruled against by numerous judicial orders.

Rep's are no longer falling in lock step with Trump's policies, as evidenced by the Special Election this week in Texas for State Senate. Take a look at how many Rep's checked the blue box

[PAL]

Referring to the post before this really great one, I love how Spokane News last night reported that "ICE can now enter residences without a warrant".
They totally ignored the fact that the Constitution is being violated.

[Rideback]

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/combat-s ... 7a0a4a/amp READ THE ARTICLE

[Rideback]

5 year old who was kidnapped by ICE and then used as bait to grab his father was flown to TX with his father and put into the detention center. A judge ruled on Friday that they must both released. Rep Joaquin Castro (TX) met them in the detention center and was a part of the team working on their release. His statement today:

"Yesterday, five-year-old Liam and his dad Adrian were released from Dilley detention center. I picked them up last night and escorted them back to Minnesota this morning.
Liam is now home. With his hat and his backpack.
Thank you to everyone who demanded freedom for Liam. We won’t stop until all children and families are home."

Here is the judge's ruling on the case:

""The case has its genesis in the ill-conceived and incompetently-implemented government pursuit of daily deportation quotas, apparently even if it requires traumatizing children."
"Apparent also is the government's ignorance of an American historical document called the Declaration of Independence. Thirty-three-year-old Thomas Jefferson enumerated grievances against a would-be authoritarian king over our nascent nation. Among others were:
1. "He has sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People."
2. "He has excited domestic Insurrection among us.”
3. "For quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us."
4. "He has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies without the consent of our Legislatures."
"We the people" are hearing echos of that history."
"And then there is that pesky inconvenience called the Fourth Amendment:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue,but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and persons or things to be seized."
"Civics lesson to the government: Administrative warrants issued by the executive branch to itself do not pass probable cause muster. That is called the fox guarding the hen house. The Constitution requires an independent judicial officer."
"Observing human behavior confirms that for some among us, the perfidious lust for unbridled power and the imposition of cruelty in its quest know no bounds and are bereft of human decency. And the rule of law be damned."
"Philadelphia, September 17, 1787: "Well, Dr. Franklin, what do we have?" "A republic, if you can keep it."
"With a judicial finger in the constitutional dike,It is so ORDERED."
Thank you Judge Biery!

[Rideback]

The Boss tonight in Minneapolis with his new song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyPFxh_ ... rt_radio=1

[Rideback]

They get bonuses based on the number of arrests, even if the arrests are unjustified and people are released. In MN the people arrested have their phones confiscated, coats taken and they're shoved out into the street in freezing temps and no way to contact help. That's led to a new support group rising that stays outside the building so that when people are released they are given a burner phone, a cup of coffee, a hug and a way home.

[PAL]

Setting a quota of 3000 arrests a day is impossible. It is different in that they are going into the neighborhoods, wearing masks because they are "scared" to death of the populace and making smirking comments about people, etc. Some of these guys are outright thugs.

[Rideback]

It's important to understand that undocumented is a civil not criminal offense and doesn't carry jail time as a penalty in this Country.

[Rideback]

Nice try Ken. https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil. ... -overview/

ICE & CBP actions in this administration are operating in stark contrast to the operations of previous administrations, both Rep & Dem.

[dorankj]

That's why 'sanctuary' status is unconstitutional (confederate, illegal) and the core problem/cancer that is the cause of all the crazy there. There are ICE/CPB operations all over the US and have been for years without any of this psycho-ness. If the local authorities would turn over (notify) the CRIMINALS they have in jails (not the prisons who do as Waltz (the lying po*) falsely conflated) then operations can be orderly and safer. But 'officials' stirring up mobs and saying 'Nazi, gestapo, etc.' bull*** that are known lies and despicable will only cause dummies to falsely believe they can obstruct law enforcement and in some cases get themselves killed! Having a gun (without ID, announcement etc.) and intervening in law enforcement IS ILLEGAL (and utterly moronic). Freaking out and ramming your car into law enforcement (whether totally intentional or not) may lead to horrible outcomes including death. DON'T DO IT AND DON'T ENCOURAGE IT!

[Rideback]

"Because Tom Homan-on-the-rocks-with-a-whiskey-chaser is standing at a podium drunkenly talking BS yet again, let me clarify one more time:
"Being in the country illegally" is not a criminal offense. If you enter the U.S. legally and fall out of status in some way—overstay a visa, fail to satisfy a condition—that is a civil infraction, not a crime. If you enter without inspection (enter "illegally") that is only a misdemeanor so long as you have no prior convictions for entry without inspection.
There are a thousand reasons why the horrors these thugs are inflicting on whole communities are constitutionally, legally and morally outrageous. Let's start by getting clear on this basic proposition: You are a not a criminal if you are simply in the United States without regular immigration status."
Tobias Barrington Wolff, Columbia Law School professor

[Rideback]

Yes, and by the day the MN protectors are getting better trained, better organized and coverage is getting out globally. Pushback from Conservatives against the ever changing narratives and use of AI generated pictures has forced the Senate work on the funding Bill that comes due this Sat to separate out the ICE/CBP elements so that the rest of funding has a chance of going through. Reps are not good at reading the room now but the room is reading itself very loudly.

[mister_coffee]

The scary part of all this is that we are likely going to have a mass casualty event caused by federal law enforcement in the near future.

The Administration's attempts at "de-escalation" are in the most generous interpretation likely to be a day late and a dollar short in terms of rapidly evolving events on the ground. And I bluntly doubt the sincerity of their intentions. In any event a large portion of their supporters want to see a bunch of people killed in the streets.

If you have thousands of poorly trained armed people with bad attitudes and a chip on their shoulder out on the streets of an American city, a city full of pissed-off people who aren't having it, can you really "de-escalate" the situation by bringing in a new commander who has a reputation of being only slightly less hardcore than the maniac he is replacing?

Keep in mind that they are not de-escalating out of a concern for the loss of life. They do not give a solitary f*** about who they kill. They are trying to de-escalate because they are concerned it looks bad for them politically. Which means they are going to try to do something that is publicly visible and half-a$$ed but which will leave the facts on the ground exactly the same. We've seen this tv show before, just not in America.

[Rideback]

"... The agency (Customs and Border Patrol)) is legally required to send an “in-custody” death notification to several committees and members from the victim’s home state within 72 hours. The agency eventually sent the report, which The Intercept is publishing, on Tuesday after the deadline.
But first, it sent a self-Q&A, which can be read in full below. In it, the agency repeatedly declines to answer its own questions.
One question drafted by CBP asks whether agents were wearing body cameras, to which the agency responds that “CBP defers to the investigating agencies.”...
...Last January, President Donald Trump rescinded a Biden executive order on law enforcement data, releasing ICE from its obligation to provide Congress with information on use of force by their agents. The decision will likely stand in the way of the release of new information about ICE agent Jonathan Ross’s fatal shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis earlier this month.
“We’ve all seen a staggering number of videos showing federal agents assaulting peaceful protesters and law-abiding immigrants and that’s because under Donald Trump, violence is a feature, not a bug, of DHS enforcement,” wrote Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., in a statement to the Intercept. “The Trump administration is not documenting these abuses because they know the American people don’t support the brutality and fear that ICE and CBP are inflicting on communities. But if Congress fails to restrain DHS’ campaign of intimidation now, the horror we are seeing unfold in Minneapolis will become the norm across the country.” https://theintercept.com/2026/01/27/cbp ... ex-pretti/

[Rideback]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnPcLkibmlQ

[mister_coffee]

Actually, I'd like to thank Ken for his interesting and provocative take on the 17th amendment. I agree things might well be extremely different if that amendment had never been passed. But it is beyond a simple analysis for me to determine if it would be "better" or "worse".

[Rideback]

The ignorance is breathtaking. No ICE agents you cannot enter a foreign country's consulate
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... inneapolis

[Rideback]

Springsteen's song for Minnesota
https://bsky.app/profile/brucespringste ... iqtpf5qk2e

[Rideback]

How can I help you Ken, are you having a nice day Ken?
https://youtube.com/shorts/TMT-127Go20? ... EvoAP60LVo

[dorankj]

Abolish the 17th amendment, that fundamentally changed our constitution and hugely removed minority rights and the careful balance created in our constitution. It made the senate a 'super' house but with different rules that don't work for that body..

[Rideback]

Boy howdy, this clears everything up!
https://youtube.com/shorts/gPsscw714hA? ... 3weasZB-2B

[Rideback]

Link to Dalia Lithwick's great article in the comments.
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Dahlia Lithwick writes: For years we were told that voters didn’t care about protecting the Constitution or democracy, and they certainly didn’t vote on it.
And certainly that appeared to be true in 2016 and again in 2024. But what we have seen spring up on the streets of Los Angeles and Portland and Minneapolis, and what we saw in the earliest No Kings marches, is that Americans actually care deeply about the law and the Constitution and democracy, and also—to borrow from testimony from Jack Smith last week—that those things have functioned so well in the United States and for so very long that many of us had come to take it for granted.
For the last 15 years at least, after Citizens United, and Shelby County, and Dobbs, when audiences at speeches would ask me “What should I be doing?,” my responses tended to be carefully lawyerly and bloodless: court reform, gerrymandering reform, campaign finance reform. Repair and protect democracy and we could perhaps claw back its original sins as well as its distortions and degradations.
Well, it turns out it’s actually much more basic than that. What we are seeing amid the street protests, and the meal deliveries, and the marches and the legal observers and the calls for a general strike and for defunding DHS and impeachment for criminals, is actually all democracy work, and constitutional work, transmogrified and embodied into American streets and schools and small businesses.
I was struck and moved by Robert Worth’s observation about what he witnessed in Minnesota: “Again and again, I heard people say they were not protesters but protectors—of their communities, of their values, of the Constitution.” And if this is, in fact, the call, then what it might look like to answer it is no longer inchoate or mysterious.
People are fighting and being assaulted and even murdered on their streets for the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, the 14th Amendment … This is a clawing back of the Constitution, amendment by amendment, on the streets, and by the people.

[mister_coffee]

Meanwhile, back at Mar-a-lago: