Author | Lightnews

Kavitha Rajagopalan

@kxraja.bsky.social

1.2K followers 890 following 1K posts

Founding director, Asian Media Initiative @ccmnewmarkj.bsky.social. Writer. Previously Sr Fellow Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affrs. Global migration + Asia-Pacific. Pediatric transplant mom.

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Kavitha Rajagopalan @kxraja.bsky.social · Sep 8

Thrilled to kick off this series! Community journalism has long advanced democracy in immigrant communities and is a bulwark against digital authoritarianism — but today faces escalating threats and revenue loss.

This series showcases Nepali, Indonesian, Chinese, and Filipino media. Follow along!

steve-npq.bsky.social @steve-npq.bsky.social · Sep 8

Today @npquarterly.bsky.social starts a 6-part weekly series, "The New Asian Diaspora Media: Defending Democracy Locally and Globally." First up: @kxraja.bsky.social. [Amid anti #immigrant backlash], "AAPI community journalism is more important than ever." See: nonprofitquarterly.org/how-asian-di...

How Asian Diaspora Digital Community Media Advance Democratic Practice - Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly

Asian American community news media help their audiences participate in civic life, a role that has become even more important as immigrants face increased repression.

nonprofitquarterly.org

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unraveled @unraveledpress.com · 52m

For folks asking if they've made it *inside* a Home Depot yet as the business has clearly just continued letting agents do whatever they want in their lots, the answer is yes. This is from yesterday in Evanston.

Threads post from julieceye

At my local Home Depot today in Evanston, IL. They abducted 5 people in my immediate area.

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Hidetaka Hirota @hidehirota.bsky.social · 1h

Berkeley history graduate students reimagine their campus as a public history site. Topics include CA Indigenous history, relationship between CA and Asia/Pacific, campus policing, & campus protest. This is such an amazing project! @historians.org #AHAPerspectives
www.historians.org/perspectives...

New Campus Cartographies – AHA

Infusing historical research into walking tours has helped Andrew Hardy and his fellow graduate students remake their campus into a public history site.

www.historians.org

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Matt Novak @paleofuture.bsky.social · 3h

Trump just murdered some more people, this time on the Pacific side of South America

U.S. strikes 8th alleged drug vessel, this time on the Pacific side

This is the first U.S. strike against an alleged drug vessel on the Pacific side of South America.

www.cbsnews.com

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Heba Gowayed هبة جويد @hebagowayed.bsky.social · 3h

Wanting to continue the momentum after the No Kings March? Here's a protest you can join tonight in Foley Square to demand ICE removed from our city.

Ice out of new york: Stop the deportations
Wednesday Oct 22 - 6 PM
Foley Square

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Tressie McMillan Cottom @tressiemcphd.bsky.social · 5h

The clips and conversations I’m hearing about the SNAP (food stamp) cuts should be above the fold everywhere. It’s a scary time for a lot of people.

Christopher Webb @cwebbonline.com · 7h

Families are already hanging by a thread, but the sad truth is it’s about to get a lot worse when SNAP benefits don’t go out in November.

It’s time to find our local food banks and help out with donations and volunteer hours if you are able.

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Leila @leilashami.bsky.social · 6h

Cedric, who I recently spoke to for @syriapodcast.bsky.social published a moving first hand testimony of the violent attacks in Sweida in July
theamargi.com/posts/syria-...

Syria: A Testimony by a Foreigner Caught in the Suwayda Massacres

Photo Credits: Santiago Montag Between February 28 and July 22, 2025, the author was in the Suwayda province in Southern Syria, where his family, belonging to the Druze community, resides. He witnes...

theamargi.com

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Sarah Lazare @sarahlazare.bsky.social · 7h

It’s hard to convey just how much Chicagoans are mobilizing against ICE. Don’t want to downplay the harm, or make it seem like a fair fight. But in neighborhoods across this city, ICE is getting chased by people blowing whistles and shouting. People are running TOWARD ICE to protect their neighbors.

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elia ayoub @ayoub.bsky.social · 23h

Y’all, a friend of mine helped create the Free Sudan Gazette and I highly recommend checking it out

freesudangazette.com/2025/10/21/s...

Sudan’s Emergency Response Rooms: A Decolonized Model of Humanitarian Aid

As war rages in Sudan, where the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have been locked in a brutal conflict since April 2023, a remarkable grassroots movement…

freesudangazette.com

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jenn m. jackson @jennmjacksonphd.bsky.social · 18h

41 million people (including 20 million kids) will lose access to food in a few days while a new 90,000 square foot ballroom is being added to the White House.

This political moment is profoundly disgusting.

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Kavitha Rajagopalan @kxraja.bsky.social · 7h

My favorite man has gotten into making homemade skincare products, elegant jewelry, and fine tailoring! He’s awesome and also very straight and male.

Cheryl Lynn Eaton @cheryllynneaton.bsky.social · 20h

People act like all the men are gone. The men are attending protests. The men are putting together scooters for their kids. The men are getting a set of turntables for the first time. The men are buying Nikes. The men are getting super into noir. They're not Nazis and they're fine. Keep your freaks.

Reposted by Kavitha Rajagopalan

SEA Junction @seajunction.bsky.social · 8h

Join us Public Discussion "#SEABlings: An Emerging Solidarity Movement in Southeast Asia?"

🗓 28 October 2025
⏰ 5:30 – 7:00 pm
📍 SEA Junction, Room 407–8, 4th Floor, BACC

Please read more info seajunction.org/event/seabli...

#SEABlings #discussion #solidaritymovement #southeastasia

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Skye @simplyskye.bsky.social · 16h

New Yorkers never disappoint #NYC

Woman in a dress and blazer stands in the street giving two middle fingers while blocking a HSI/police vehicle in New York City.

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unraveled @unraveledpress.com · 1d

As most are aware by now, ICE is slamming the north side today. They've been seen in Andersonville, Rogers Park, West Ridge, Edgewater + Evanston. Several people abducted, agents still active.

Shared with permission—rapid response whistle team at Bryn Mawr & Broadway this morning.

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John Fugelsang @johnfugelsang.bsky.social · 23h

The average age of U.S. homebuyers is now 56, up from 49 last year.

In 1981, the year trickledown economics began, it was 31.

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Caroline (Carrie) T. Schroeder @ctschroeder.bsky.social · 22h

and if you think he's going to willingly leave his newly renovated manse Jan 20 2029....
This demolition is a statement of *ownership*

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 22h

the president has destroyed the east wing of the white house without so much as a word of input from anyone else to build a royal ballroom paid for with bribes

Chris Geidner @chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 23h

NEW: After The Washington Post reported Monday on the demolition of the "East Wing facade," a new picture obtained by Law Dork that was taken on Tuesday shows that a substantial portion of the entirety of the East Wing has been demolished.

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Jeff Sharlet @jeffsharlet.bsky.social · 1d

Read this: "Nothing is Holy," by Ava Razavi. I taught a course on writing about the Trumpocene. Ava said, "I don't want to think about it." But she couldn't stop thinking about it. Gorgeous, heartbreaking prose by a new writer on looking for answers. callingallsyllables.substack.com/p/nothing-is...

Nothing is Holy

Ava Razavi on trading in American dreams for nightmares.

callingallsyllables.substack.com

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Angus Johnston @angus.bsky.social · 18h

On top of everything the fuck else, a crucial task of the insurgent wing of the Democratic Party right now is to make it the anti-Nazi party in US politics.

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rev. howard arson @theophite.bsky.social · 1d

like in the past two days he started illegally tearing down the white house to build a ballroom paid for from money extorted from american companies and demanded that the government secretly pay him a quarter of a billion dollars for investigating him for crimes he more or less admits to

rev. howard arson @theophite.bsky.social · 1d

there is a new scandal as bad or worse than what got trump impeached the first time about every 48 hours

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Oni Blackstock, MD MHS @oniblackstock.bsky.social · 19h

One of the many public health impacts of data centers - In Mexico, a community experienced a hepatitis outbreak because the data center had depleted the village's water supply.
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/20/t...

From Mexico to Ireland, Fury Mounts Over a Global A.I. Frenzy

www.nytimes.com

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Felipe De La Hoz @felipedlh.bsky.social · 19h

Here is my fuller dispatch from this afternoon in @hellgatenyc.com

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Kavitha Rajagopalan @kxraja.bsky.social · 19h

Also very bad for local journalism when people like this destroy trust and cause harm like this. Why we need a news ecosystem that skews heavily toward community centered / in language reporting by journalists with cultural competency.

Jessica Pishko @jesspish.bsky.social · 19h

So stupid that some influencer can shitpost and then people get kidnapped

Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 19h

Over on X, a conservative influencer is taking credit for this.

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Heba Gowayed هبة جويد @hebagowayed.bsky.social · 19h

I have to say I’m really fucked up by the events of today. I have been interviewing recent arrivals from west Africa and stories include political persecution, people fleeing to protect daughters from FGM, people escaping enslavement in Mauritania.

To think they’re just rounded up? It’s too much.

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Hamilton Nolan @hamiltonnolan.bsky.social · 19h

Hundreds of people protesting ICE in downtown manhattan right now. Reads and Broadway. NYPD cops in riot gear on scene.

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Violet Miller @vimiller.bsky.social · 19h

State rep. Hoan Huynh shared video of agents surrounding his vehicle/stopping him + staffers shortly after he said one agent pointed a gun inside his vehicle at him while another threatened to break a window. They were following feds in Albany Park after four people were reportedly taken.

Story tk.

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The Xylom @thexylom.com · 20h

NEW: Scientists are using non-targeted analysis to detect wide swaths of whatever chemicals are lingering out there, ones that government agencies like the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency aren’t looking for or don’t even know about.

This story was first published by @knowablemag.bsky.social.

Tracking Down the Hidden Pollutants That Make Wildlife Sick

Since some chemicals become increasingly concentrated in animal tissues as they move up the food chain, long-lived, top predators like alligators — which may spend 50 years or more swimming and eating...

www.thexylom.com

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