Josh Chafetz
@joshchafetz.bsky.social
150K followers 890 following 4.6K posts
Agnes Williams Sesquicentennial Professor of Law and Politics, Georgetown Law: https://www.law.georgetown.edu/faculty/josh-chafetz/ Author, most recently, of _Congress's Constitution_: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0300248334/
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joshchafetz.bsky.social
everyone knows that civil servants' paychecks just have "The King" on the signature line ...
atrupar.com
Bessent: "No Kings means no paychecks. No paychecks and no government."
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
jamalgreene.bsky.social
Also, despite the headline, only one law school is mentioned in the piece. This is a classic misinformation tactic.
donmoyn.bsky.social
This framing is a bit of a choice:
What happened: Ilya Shapiro and the Federal Society wanted an event on anti-semitism at NYU. Campus officials proposed another day, worried about the anniversary on Oct 7. After pushback, they relented. Is this a cancelation?
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/13/o...
Opinion | I Resigned as Manhattan’s U.S. Attorney. Law Schools Are Missing the Point of My Story.
www.nytimes.com
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
pahuski.com
Happy Columbo’s Day
Screenshot from Columbo. He his talking to his dog, which is sitting is the drivers seat of a car. “Okay, I’m gonna put you in charge. You take care of the car. You’re a responsible dog. When I get back, if the car’s okay, I’ll give you another cookie.” “If the car’s gone,” “I’ll give you another cookie anyway” “because I love you.”
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
nathankalmoe.bsky.social
Re: “community heroes” edu in k-12…

There’s a cult of police/military that exaggerates their helps & ignores their harms.

Other public servants get ignored or worse, even when they do more good AND face greater risks than most military/police, incl. brave scholars who tell the truth about America.
joshchafetz.bsky.social
I thought you needed three examples to make an "era." I only see one link ...
joshchafetz.bsky.social
who demands an actual signature these days?
joshchafetz.bsky.social
no one can stop it, but this administration is doing everything it can to minimize the extent to which Americans benefit from it
washingtonpost.com
Renewables are expected to overtake coal as the largest global source of electricity by next year despite the pullback of the U.S.

“No one can stop the energy transition,” said the director general of the International Renewable Energy Agency.
The real winners of Trump’s attack on clean energy aren’t American
U.S. politics are undercutting clean energy at the same time economics are propelling it forward globally. Can the U.S. afford to sit this out?
www.washingtonpost.com
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
leedrutman.bsky.social
New study finds Democrats represent public opinion better than Republicans: "the quality of statehouse democracy, here meaning the dynamic relationship between opinion and policy, is substantially weakened by Republican Party control of state government."

www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/epdf/10....
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
cethompson.bsky.social
Just think of how many TT faculty lines, graduate stipends, and resources for teaching and research this kind of money could buy...
nkalamb.bsky.social
the more things change, the more they stay the same in college football (coaches being showered in cash for not working)
Firings so far this season by Arkansas, Oklahoma State, Oregon State, Penn State, UAB, UCLA and Virginia Tech have those schools committed to buyouts totaling $93.9 million, subject to mitigation and offset, but not including amounts that also will be owed to assistant coaches
joshchafetz.bsky.social
But the claim that “people vehemently disagree with me; therefore I must be right. Cf. Galileo!” is even lazier than “people agree with me; therefore, I must be right!”
joshchafetz.bsky.social
Standing your ground *when you have good independent reason to believe that you are right* is admirable. And you defend that by bringing forward evidence that you are, in fact, right—whether it is accepted in the moment or not.
joshchafetz.bsky.social
If you think being yelled at is eo ipso a badge of honor, you’re doing thinking wrong.
joshchafetz.bsky.social
would read Baumann & Emily Chertoff on this …
joshchafetz.bsky.social
I want to live in a world in which every type of civil servant’s threat to walk if a certain person is elected is taken exactly as seriously as a cop’s threat to walk.
misoshnik.bsky.social
Lmao is this supposed to be a bad thing?
A tweet from Bari Weiss that says “"It's shaken me to my core," a lieutenant said of Mamdani's unexpected victory in June. "The absolute dread I feel is palpable.
"
Today in @TheFP our @Olivia_Reingold talks to the cops who say they will walk if Zohran Mamdani is elected in November:”
joshchafetz.bsky.social
*nods sagely* today feels like fall. I approve.
joshchafetz.bsky.social
In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story that only someone in your profession would understand:

Editorial manager profile created.
kevinmkruse.bsky.social
In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story that only someone in your profession would understand:

Archives banned making copies.
philistella.bsky.social
In honor of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story that only someone in your profession would understand:

New library catalogue website.
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
lakshya.splitticket.org
Graham Platner is a very high-ceiling candidate in Maine with a lot of potential. He's also extremely untested and while he looks promising for Democrats, it's pretty important to have a primary here to see if there are any red flags that bubble up.

Just let it go and log off.
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
tedmccormick.bsky.social
Shared courtesy of my Penn History colleague, Ben Nathans
Image: A variation on Benjamin Franklin’s “Join, or Die” engraving, originally published in the Pennsylvania Gazette in 1754. Each segment of the snake has the name of a university sent Trump’s “compact”: Texas, AZ, Vanderbilt, USC, Dartmouth, UVA, Brown, Penn, MIT.
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
kylegriffin1.bsky.social
Sens. Schumer, Merkley, Murray, and Peters are calling for the resignation of OMB Director Russell Vought.

"By impounding billions of dollars … and aggressively pursuing the illegal use of pocket rescissions, Vought has done everything in his power to gut the federal government piece by piece."
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
mcopelov.bsky.social
Not sure why it has taken until late 2025 to see this, but this is how you do it. Every time. For every one of these guests.
atrupar.com
STEPHANOPOULOS: I didn't insinuate anything. I asked you whether Tom Homan accepted $50k as was heard on an audio tape recorded by the FBI in September 2024. You did not answer the question. Thank you for your time.

VANCE: No, George, I sai--

STEPHANOPOULOS: We'll be right back
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
jamellebouie.net
a key thing about vought — and all of these guys — is that they have a totally top down and hierarchical vision of the world. they believe that the cultural changes they hate can be turned off by destroying the federal government because they can’t imagine that they emerged bottom-up in society
thomaszimmer.bsky.social
What he’s railing against is a profound shift in culture, status… He’s obsessed with the idea that America is controlled by a leftist “ruling elite” - but “elite” isn’t defined socio-economically or by political power, it means something like: Getting to define “real America” and who gets to belong.
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
elizabethbitmeehan.com
help your #polisky colleagues out in this rough market year y'all
landgravephd.bsky.social
Just want to thank folks contributing to the #psjminfo job status update section of the site. It's a small thing, but I know people appreciate knowing the status of jobs.

www.politicalsciencejobs.org/status-updates
PS Jobs - Status Updates
This is a listing of job market updates. You can submit updates here.
www.politicalsciencejobs.org
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
theatlantic.com
With the government shutdown well into its second week, Democrats are far from folding, @russellberman.bsky.social and @jonlemire.bsky.social report. While still at an impasse, they have succeeded at elevating one key issue for the party:
Why Democrats Think They’re Winning the Shutdown Fight
They’ve clearly succeeded in elevating the issue of health care.
bit.ly
Reposted by Josh Chafetz
histoftech.bsky.social
The Virginia Senate just told UVA it’s not getting state funding if it accepts the compact since UVA exists to serve Virginia, its residents, & their interests—not be a tool of the federal govt. Scoop from our student newspaper, who’ve been doing vital reporting www.cavalierdaily.com/article/2025...