Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

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Sara Nović @novicsara.bsky.social · 2h

Proof that public outcry can still be helpful, if temporarily. The money was rerouted to the National Center on Deafblindness, who will then distribute to the other programs. But it is only one year's worth, so keep an eye on it.

Jodi Cohen @jodiscohen.bsky.social · 5h

U.S. Department of Education reverses decision and will fund programs for students who are both deaf and blind.

But the money will flow a different way.

www.propublica.org/article/trum...

Students With Hearing and Vision Loss Get Funding Back Despite Trump’s Anti-DEI Campaign

Following public outcry, the Department of Education has reversed its decision to cut funding for students who have both hearing and vision loss, opting instead to reroute grants to an organization th...

www.propublica.org

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HarleyMonsterCat @harleymonstercat.bsky.social · 15h

Adam Keiper @adamkeiper.com · 17h

This is a really well done—I hope it catches on: A silent roadside protest staged over the weekend in Westerville, Ohio, and posted to the Facebook page of the Westerville Progressive Alliance.
www.youtube.com/shorts/TpZFS...

Signs of Fascism!

YouTube video by COOLHAND

www.youtube.com

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David Bier @davidjbier.bsky.social · 3d

ICE agents to US citizen: Turn around or you're getting the dog.

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Preorder Read This When Things Fall Apart @mskellymhayes.bsky.social · 2d

My publisher’s been very patient. I’m not doing everything I said I’d do to promote this book (out in a few weeks) because I’m an organizer in a city under federal attack. My days are full and emotionally exhausting. Any help getting the word out means a lot. It's a book people need right now.

Read This When Things Fall Apart by Kelly Hayes | Pilsen Community Books

A bundle of letters to activists and organizers on the frontlines in catastrophic times from Let This Radicalize You co-author Kelly Hayes In social movements, some heartbreaks are all but inevitable.

www.pilsencommunitybooks.com

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Jeff VanderMeer @jeffvandermeer.bsky.social · 1d

This heartfelt and meaningful statement by Portland resident and author Cristina Breshears on another social media platform bears reposting here. I don't think the intent is to idealize Portland but to remind all of us what is important and why. (Posted here with permission.)

For nine nights now, the steady thrum of Black Hawk helicopters has circled over Portland. The sound is constant, invasive; a low mechanical beating above our homes. It’s expensive. It’s intimidating. And it’s unnecessary.

Our protests have been largely peaceful. There is no insurrection here. Yet this federalized military presence makes us feel like we are living in a war zone (the very kind of chaos this administration claims to be protecting us from).

The irony is painful: it is only this occupation that makes Portland feel unsafe.

Each hour of helicopter flight costs taxpayers between $2,000 and $4,000, depending on crew, fuel, and maintenance. Multiply that by multiple aircraft over multiple nights, and you’re looking at hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of dollars burned into the sky.

Meanwhile, the Woodstock Food Pantry at All Saints Episcopal Church — which feeds working families, elders, and people with disabilities — has seen its federal funding slashed by 75%. How can we justify pouring public money into intimidation while cutting aid to those who simply need to eat?

This is waste, fraud, and abuse in plain sight:
* Waste of public resources on military theatrics.
* Fraud in the name of “public safety.”
* Abuse of the communities that federal agencies claim to protect.

Portland is a Sanctuary City. A sanctuary city is not a fortress. It’s a promise — a living vow that a community will protect the dignity and safety of everyone who calls it home. It means that local governments and ordinary people alike will refuse to criminalize survival. That schools, clinics, churches, and shelters will remain safe spaces no matter who you are or where you were born. But the term reaches far beyond policy. It’s an ethic of belonging; a refusal to criminalize need, difference, or desperation.

Sanctuary isn’t weakness. It’s courage. It takes moral strength to meet suffering with care instead of punishment, to believe that our neighbors’ safety is bound up in our own, to insist that safety is not achieved through force but through community, inclusion, and trust. It is living Matthew 25:40 out loud and in deed. It is an act of moral imagination and moral defiance. To hold sanctuary is to say: you belong here.

When we hold space for the most vulnerable — refugees, the unhoused, the undocumented, the disabled, the working poor, the displaced — we become something larger than a collection of individuals. We become a moral body. We do more than offer charity. We offer witness. We declare that the measure of a nation is found not in its towers or tanks, but in its tenderness.

Sanctuary cities are not lawless; they are soulful. They represent the conscience of the nation, a place where the laws of empathy still apply. To make sanctuary is to affirm that the United States is not merely a geographic territory, but a moral experiment: a republic that must constantly choose between fear and compassion, between domination and democracy.

A nation’s soul is measured not by the might of its military, but by the mercy of its people. When helicopters circle our skies in the name of order, while food pantries struggle to feed the hungry, we are forced to ask: What are we defending, and from whom? The soul of a nation survives only when we make sanctuary for one another. Not through walls or weapons, but through compassion and collective will. If we allow intimidation to replace compassion, we will have traded our conscience for control.

Please know that despite the hum of war machines overhead, the conscience of our city — whimsical, creative, stubbornly kind — can still be heard.

Portland is not the problem. Portland is the reminder. A reminder that a city can still choose to be sanctuary. That a people can still choose to be human.

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Scared Bootecki (but really Jared Rutecki) 🎃 @jaredrutecki.bsky.social · 3d

Taxpayers should pay $7.5M to the family of a Chicago pastor and her husband, who were struck and killed by a driver being chased by Chicago police, city lawyers recommended, the latest massive settlement prompted by a police pursuit that violated department policy. (by @heathercherone.bsky.social)

Pay Family of Couple Killed by Driver Being Chased by Police $7.5M, City Lawyers Recommend

Nine cases alleging Chicagoans were hit or killed during a police chase that violated department policy cost taxpayers more than $75 million to resolve between Jan. 1 and July 31, according to WTTW Ne...

news.wttw.com

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Lynda Lopez @lyndab08.bsky.social · 23h

The deployment of tear gas throughout the Chicago area is a growing health concern. ICE is deploying tear gas in residential neighborhoods, near children, playgrounds, stores, etc. What are the health implications on our communities?

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Jonathan Cohn @jonathancohn.bsky.social · 1d

An assault on the livability of the planet, the vitality of local economies, and the livelihood of workers because Trump wants to further enrich fossil fuel barons

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Trump officials cancel major solar project in latest hit to renewable energy

Esmeralda 7 in Nevada would have produced enough energy to power 2m homes

www.theguardian.com

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HarleyMonsterCat @harleymonstercat.bsky.social · 1d

I think it’s fair to say they’ve been all over the city.

www.reddit.com/r/chicago/s/...

From the chicago community on Reddit

Explore this post and more from the chicago community

www.reddit.com

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Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior.bsky.social · 2d

If you like my work, please share and subscribe. I'm trying to override a variety of shadowbans and broken algorithms. Thank you!

Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior.bsky.social · 2d

New Q & A answers are up! Readers sent in thoughtful questions on city raids, digital surveillance, the disappearing internet, and much more: sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/panopticon...

PanoptiCon Artists: Your Questions Answered

On digital surveillance, ICE city raids, the need for new parties, and more.

sarahkendzior.substack.com

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Jim Daley @jimdaleywrites.bsky.social · 3d

Pass it on: If you FILE A COMPLAINT about police activity, it flags the body-worn camera video so reporters can obtain it later via FOIA requests.

City: www.chicagocopa.org/complaints/i...
County: apps.cookcountyil.gov/oiig/
State: oeig.illinois.gov/complaints/o...

The People's Fabric @peoplesfabric.com · 3d

State troopers just dragged three people out of the crowd.

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Gabe Ortíz @tusk81.bsky.social · 3d

$20 BILLION.

Remember that we’re being lied to whenever we’re told that we can’t afford something that helps American families.

The Washington Post @washingtonpost.com · 3d

The Trump administration confirmed that the U.S. bailed out Argentina.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he had directly bought Argentine pesos in global currency markets in a bid to relieve pressure on the nation’s embattled President Javier Milei, a supporter of President Trump.

The U.S. just bailed out Argentina, Treasury Secretary confirms

The US Treasury has finalized a $20 billion financial rescue of Argentina, including a currency swap arrangement with the country's central bank.

www.washingtonpost.com

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The Daily Show @thedailyshow.com · 3d

The following is REAL footage from Portland, 2025. Viewer discretion is advised.

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Heather Cox Richardson (TDPR) @hcrichardson.bsky.social · 5d

People ask what they can do in this moment: here's a crucially important election. There are 52,000 elections taking place next month, many of which will be determined by turnout.

Alex Burness @burness.bsky.social · 6d

Dispatch from Pennsylvania on a highly unusual state Supreme Court election—one of the few most consequential matters on the ballot anywhere in the country next month. New from me in @boltsmag.org: boltsmag.org/pennsylvania...

Inside the Clunky Elections to Control Pennsylvania's Supreme Court - Bolts

The GOP is making an expensive push to end Democrats’ majority on a court at the center of election lawsuits, sparking a fledging campaign season with little precedent or template.

boltsmag.org

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Heather Cox Richardson (TDPR) @hcrichardson.bsky.social · 5d

And another....

David Roberts @volts.wtf · 5d

Today on Volts: hey listen up! The most important election of the year is happening in Georgia next month. Two seats on the (currently all-GOP) Public Service Commission are up & rising electricity prices are on everyone's mind. This is a bellwether for next year's governor & midterm elections!

Pay attention to the most important political race of 2025

With energy affordability set to dominate national politics, Peter Hubbard and Brionté McCorkle explain why a down-ballot Georgia race is ground zero for the fight.

www.volts.wtf

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Scott Stein @sstein.bsky.social · 5d

The Speaker of the House is the lowest-information voter in American history.

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 5d

Q: Do you agree that the mayor of Chicago and governor of Illinois should be in prison?

MIKE JOHNSON: Should they be in prison? I'm not the attorney general. I'm not following the day to day on that

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Melanie D’Arrigo @darrigomelanie.bsky.social · 5d

I feel like this photo of masked, armed men pepper spraying a pastor protecting his community is going to be a defining picture of this moment in America for a long, long time.

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Gwen Snyder is undead @gwensnyder.bsky.social · 5d

ICE now very literally at war with Presbyterians

Jack Jenkins @jackjenkins.me · 5d

Gonna be thinking about this lede for a minute.

(RNS) — Last month, the Rev. David Black stood in front of a Chicago-area U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility and spread his arms wide. Adorned in all black and wearing a clerical collar, the pastor looked up at a group of masked, heavily armed ICE agents on the roof and began to pray.

“I invited them to repentance,” Black, a minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA), said in an interview. “I basically offered an altar call. I invited them to come and receive that salvation, and be part of the kingdom that is coming.”

But when Black began to lower his arms a few seconds later, the agents responded to his spiritual plea by firing pepper balls, or chemical agents that cause eye irritation and respiratory distress, video footage shows. One struck Black in the head, exploding into a puff of white pepper smoke and forcing him to his knees. Fellow demonstrators rushed to his aid, and as the pastor rubbed his face in pain, the agents continued to fire.

“We could hear them laughing,” Black said.

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Governor JB Pritzker @govpritzker.illinois.gov · 6d

What's happening in Chicago is not normal.

The arrest of Alderperson Fuentes is just the latest example of how far Noem and Bovino are willing to go to ignore the rule of law. We must all speak up.

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G @monkeyes2.bsky.social · 5d

Shout out to the Chicago local news! @blockclubchi.bsky.social @thetriibe.com @southsideweekly.bsky.social
@unraveledpress.com
@borderlessmag.bsky.social

Follow the locals!

And the strong reporting hasn’t come only from legacy outlets such as the Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago Tribune but also from newer independent media such as Block Club Chicago, the TRiiBE, Borderless, Unraveled, and South Side Weekly.

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Senator Sheldon Whitehouse @whitehouse.senate.gov · 5d

Today in Judiciary, the MAGA Attorney General falsely accused me of taking money, “not only once but twice,” from “one of Epstein’s closest confidantes.”

She brought it up twice, in response to different questions, so no accident.

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Preorder Read This When Things Fall Apart @mskellymhayes.bsky.social · 6d

This morning, a friend who had been traveling and was out of the loop asked me for resources to catch up on what has been happening in Chicago. If you are in a similar situation and need to catch up on the details, this piece outlines the events of the past week or so.

Trump Is Releasing the Full Force of Federal Police on Chicago

Trump is normalizing attacks on blue cities because he intends to overpower hubs of democratic resistance.

truthout.org

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Democrats @democrats.org · 6d

NEW: We are launching our Spanish-language WhatsApp, Voz Democrática—dedicated to Latino voter outreach, community organizing, content sharing, and more.

Learn more: win.dnc.org/whatsapp

Green-colored graphic with the following text:

Voz Democrática

Join us on Whatsapp

win.dnc.org/whatsapp

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Raider @iwillnotbesilenced.bsky.social · 7d

Leaked: Zach Bryan song 'Bad News'
"And ICE is gonna come bust down your door/try to build a house no one builds no more... the middle fingers rising and it won't stop showing/got some bad news/the fading of the red, white and blue"

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Raider @iwillnotbesilenced.bsky.social · 7d

What are you protecting?

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