Is Ice Trump’s Gestapo?

“Renee sparkled. She literally sparkled. I mean, she didn’t wear glitter but I swear she had sparkles coming out of her pores. All the time. You might think it was just my love talking but her family said the same thing. Renee was made of sunshine.”

The words are those of Renee Good’s wife Becca. They cut to our heart – our humanity. She was shot in the face by an ICE agent, who then muttered: “Fuckin’ bitch.” The murder of this 37-year-old mom as she tried to drive around the ICE guys who stopped her is national news, of course. Almost everyone has seen at least one of the many videos of the incident and, you might say, the national dialogue about virtually anything else has been put on hold.

Free Press is committed to documenting the people taken by ICE

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has arrested, detained, deported, and/or imprisoned many people that it has unilaterally determined to be undesirables.  At first, they claimed they would deport only criminals, but it has already gone beyond that.  We at the Free Press consider every person who has been sent to the Tecoluca (El Salvador prison), Guantanamo naval base, or detained in other prisons throughout the country to be innocent until proven guilty. We will include students who have been expelled for protesting genocide.  It appears the government will revoke Visa's to get rid of undesirable students.  This article will be updated as long as is necessary.

Familiar tale gracefully blends feminism and fantasy

Feminism has a crucial role to play in modern life, but I sometimes wish it would leave our fairy tales alone. The results of its revisionist meddling are too often unconvincing and unsatisfying.

Remember last year’s Maleficent? It turned an age-old story on its head by revealing that the fairy (Angelina Jolie) who turned a princess into a “Sleeping Beauty” was not evil at all. No, she was merely wronged and misunderstood. Worst of all, we learned that the somnambulant princess could not be awakened by a kiss from the handsome prince, but only by a motherly peck from that same fairy.

How heartwarming. And how utterly unromantic.

Thank goodness Disney’s new live-action version of Cinderella doesn’t wear its feminism on its sleeve. It has nods to modern sensibilities, to be sure, but they’re handled with a lighter touch.

Crossing the Border . . . Into Sanity

And here I am, an American, staring at the border again . . . and slowly coming to realize the paradox of it. Borders don’t actually exist. They’re invisible lies. They’re also virtually everywhere.

Consider the border Alex Pretti crossed on Jan. 24, on a street in Minneapolis, as he stepped between some U.S. Border Patrol agents and the woman they had just pushed down. He crossed the border that separates ordinary people from the federal Proud Boys (or whoever they are), the masked invaders who were occupying the city to enforce The Law. Pretti interfered with them! He dared to try to protect the fallen woman, who herself had just crossed the same border. In so doing, they both went from being ordinary citizens to “domestic terrorists.”

“Yet our greatest threat isn’t the outsiders among us, but those among us who never look within.”

Lend Me Your Ear

ICE Watch and Community Defense Training (virtual)

Details about event

Wednesday, January 28, 7-8:30pm EST
Register for Zoom here

Join this 90-minute training from States at the Core and Protect RP on effectively protecting your neighborhoods from federal enforcement incursions.

ICE Watch and other rapid response tactics are key strategies being used by people across the country to protect their communities against aggressive activity from federal law enforcement agencies like ICE and Border Patrol. Whether or not you are part of an established community response network, this training will share important skills for building neighborhood resilience, documenting ICE activity, and supporting neighbors. In addition to covering the basics of ICE Watch, we will discuss new analysis on ICE operations, rapid response tactics, and safety guidance.

Please Note: Due to security and safety concerns, we do not record these trainings. To keep up to date on upcoming sessions, sign up for our Substack: https://statesatthecore.substack.com/

Shooting from the Lipp: ICE and CPB strike again

Dave Lippman and sign about Alex Pretti

Watch video here

ICE and CPB strike again, and again, while Trump-Rex substitutes himself for the UN. Pinochet returns from the dead in Chile and Bibi promises to destroy more of the West Bank to catch up to Gaza. Trump finds time to attack his base in Colorado, while transforming foreign aid from transcontinental to transactional, sacrificing humans in favor of minerals. No news here, eh!

You Can’t Bomb Your Way to Democracy

Calls for U.S. military intervention to bring democracy to Iran rest on a dangerous illusion: that democracy is something foreign powers can install from the outside. History suggests the opposite. When democracy is imposed through force, it rarely produces freedom—and often strengthens authoritarianism.

Democracy is not just a set of institutions like elections or constitutions. At its core, it is about collective self-rule. A people is free only when it participates in shaping the laws and institutions that govern it. When political systems are imposed by foreign powers, even in the name of liberation, that basic principle is violated.

ICE Watch and Community Defense Training (virtual)

Details about event

Wednesday, January 28, 7-8:30pm EST
Register for Zoom here

Join this 90-minute training from States at the Core and Protect RP on effectively protecting your neighborhoods from federal enforcement incursions.

ICE Watch and other rapid response tactics are key strategies being used by people across the country to protect their communities against aggressive activity from federal law enforcement agencies like ICE and Border Patrol. Whether or not you are part of an established community response network, this training will share important skills for building neighborhood resilience, documenting ICE activity, and supporting neighbors. In addition to covering the basics of ICE Watch, we will discuss new analysis on ICE operations, rapid response tactics, and safety guidance.

Please Note: Due to security and safety concerns, we do not record these trainings. To keep up to date on upcoming sessions, sign up for our Substack: https://statesatthecore.substack.com/

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