Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 1d

Bending over to accept authoritarianism: “Please, sir, may I have some more?”

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

David_j_roth @davidjroth.bsky.social · 1d

It is tacky for really famous people to be in TV commercials for products. Their gambling debts/boat repairs are not my problem, those roles should belong to actors like the Time To Make The Donuts guy and the actress who said "who are you calling a cootie queen you lint licker" in that Orbit ad.

120 240 2.5K

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Marisa Kabas @marisakabas.bsky.social · 1d

This is the response I received from ICE when I inquired about the 13-year-old they abducted from Everett, Mass. on Friday:

Good afternoon, Marisa.
Please see the below from DHS on the 13-year-old alien.
Please feel free to direct any questions to them.
Respectfully,
James

Tricia McLaughlin
@TriciaOhio • 6h
S...
Here are the facts: he posed a public safety threat with an extensive rap sheet including violent assault with a dangerous weapon, battery, breaking and entering, destruction of property.
He was in possession of a firearm and 5-7 inch knife when arrested.

140 750 2.7K

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Ruth Delgado @heylookitsruth.bsky.social · 1d

A mom in Houston reported her 15-year-old son with autism missing. She spent 6 days terrified, searching for him. The whole time, Houston police knew exactly where he was since they helped ICE place him in a refugee facility.

This is beyond cruel.
www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston...

Missing teen with autism transferred to refugee facility by HPD

He is currently being held at an Office for Refugee Resettlement facility.

www.houstonchronicle.com

99 1.9K 3.6K

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Jonathan M. Katz @katz.theracket.news · 1d

There were at least two ceasefires under Biden! In which more than five times as many living Israeli hostages were released in exchange for 240 Palestinians! Has everyone forgotten this?

Coffee Indiana @coffeeindiana.bsky.social · 1d

Also, ceasefires have happened under prior Presidents! The day he gets Palestine their own country he can be told he's the most special boy deserving of a shiny prize.

72 810 2.6K

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Brandon Friedman @brandonfriedman.bsky.social · 1d

Promoting the editor-in-chief's personal side project. Zero named sources in a story that promotes the editor-in-chief's personal political position. Misspelling the subject's name. It took one day for CBS News to become a conservative blog.

www.cbsnews.com/video/some-n...

CBS News: Some NYPD officers worry about Mandani becoming NYC mayor the Free Press reports.

160 1.8K 6K

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Caitlin G. DeAngelis @caitlindeangelis.bsky.social · 2d

ICE kidnapped a 7th-grader with a pending asylum claim and spirited him out of state without notifying his parents, seemingly with the cooperation of the local police in Everett, MA.

www.bostonglobe.com/2025/10/12/m...

Everett 13-year-old arrested by ICE and sent to Virginia detention facility
By Marcela Rodrigues Globe Staff,Updated October 12, 2025, 44 minutes ago

31
A 13-year-old boy was arrested by ICE in Everett and sent to a juvenile detention facility in Virginia.
A 13-year-old boy was arrested by ICE in Everett and sent to a juvenile detention facility in Virginia.
A 13-year-old boy was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Everett after an interaction with members of the Everett Police Department and sent to a juvenile detention facility in Virginia, according to his mother and immigration lawyer Andrew Lattarulo.

The boy’s mother, Josiele Berto, was called to pick her son up from the Everett Police Department on Thursday, the day he was arrested. After waiting for about an hour and a half, she was told her son was taken by ICE, Berto told the Globe in a phone interview.

“My world collapsed,” Berto said in Portuguese.

From the police department, the boy was taken to ICE’s holding facility in Burlington on Thursday evening, where he spent a night before being transferred by car to the Northwestern Regional Juvenile Detention Center in Winchester, Va., on Friday morning, his mother said. The juvenile facility is more than 500 miles away from Everett.

The boy is a 7th-grader at Albert N. Parlin School in Everett, his mother said. The teen and his family, who are Brazilian nationals, have a pending asylum case and are authorized to work legally in the United States, Lattarulo said.

490 6K 10K

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Ryan J. Reilly “paints a vivid and urgent portrait of… disarray” @ryanjreilly.com · 4d

PORTLAND, Ore. — A small group of federal agents in camouflage and face masks watched from atop the immigration processing center Thursday night as a unicorn, peacock, dinosaur and raccoon danced to Cher’s “If I Could Turn Back Time.” www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...

Costumed protesters in Portland defy description of the city as a 'war zone'

Dancing frogs, peacocks and unicorns outside the federal immigration building present a joyful contrast to the Trump administration's portrait of the Oregon city, they say.

www.nbcnews.com

39 570 2.3K

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Mark D. Levine @marklevinenyc.bsky.social · 3d

Almost every critical function of the CDC has now been undermined. Our ability to identify, respond to, and plan for outbreaks has been dealt a devastating blow.

This comes after a leadership purge, multiple rounds of defunding, and relentless anti-science attacks on the agency by RFK Jr. 2/3

1 6 23

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Mark D. Levine @marklevinenyc.bsky.social · 3d

Trump just eviscerated the CDC.

This is not hyperbole.

Using the shutdown as a pretext, last night he fired—illegally—100s of key scientists, disease detectives, immunologists, respiratory disease experts, the entire Office of the Chief Medical Officer, the CDC's entire Washington office, etc. 1/3

4 12 39

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Thomas Zimmer @thomaszimmer.bsky.social · 3d

What happened at WaPo matters because it captures a broader rightward shift in elite business and media circles - a pervasive tendency of civic institutions to accommodate and acquiesce the regime, to choose appeasement and even active complicity.

That is how authoritarian rule is consolidated.

4 36 140

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Amanda Katz @katzish.bsky.social · 7d

Horrific reporting from the AP on the Myanmar families watching their kids starve to death from Trump and Musk’s aid cuts apnews.com/article/myan...

Starving children screaming for food as US aid cuts unleash devastation and death across Myanmar

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has repeatedly said “no one has died" because of his government’s decision to gut its foreign aid program.

apnews.com

56 1.4K 2.4K

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 4d

Am I the only one who sees sad faces on the potatoes?

1 2

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Aaron Sojourner @aaronsojourner.org · 5d

If Dems are in control, why are they airing this on the airport TVs?
www.cnn.com/2025/10/09/u...

46 120 430

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 4d

I still remember when @schatz.bsky.social seemed like one of the good ones.

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 13d

The ADL cares about Jews the way Columbia cares about students.

1 1

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Prem Thakker ツ @premthakker.bsky.social · 4d

Huh: TikTok took down my 8-second video featuring this image of Debbie Brockman — the news producer just detained by Trump’s CBP agents — saying it violates the “joy of TikTok”

320 2.7K 7.2K

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.bsky.social · 4d

aaand we are officially in the hide-your-neighbors stage

Sophie Sherry @sophiesherry.bsky.social · 4d

During a military-style raid on a building in Chicago’s South Shore, one resident heard a knock on his door.   It wasn’t the feds — it was a mom and her 7-year-old daughter, pleading for help.

He let them hide in his unit for the next 3 days.

chicago.suntimes.com/immigration/...

Neighbor shielded 7-year-old during South Shore federal raid: ‘I didn’t want them to take her’

During the Sept. 30 raid one tenant protected a terrified girl and her mom. Remnants at the complex, including a detailed map of all the units, offer clues to what authorities may have known before th...

chicago.suntimes.com

300 7.7K 19K

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 5d

Um, so RFK Jr. thinks it’s better if you’re circumcised . . . late? True, you won’t be given Tylenol then—you’ll be put on a propofol drip!

Reposted by Nikki Columbus

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 6d

Jonathan Choe to Trump: "Another group right now that is behind antifa and working with antifa very closely based on the research that we have right now that we're gonna give to you and your team are the Democratic Socialists of America."

270 210 860

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 8d

And on US censorship: “When They Came for Culture”

drive.google.com

2

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 8d

Read all about it—

How Germany Silenced Its Artists to Support Israel

As Israel intensified its genocide in Gaza, Germany ramped up its long-simmering war on dissent, silencing Palestine solidarity while bolstering its own far right.

www.thenation.com

1 4

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 8d

She seems to be back already? Or at least, her account is here.

1 1

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 8d

So true. Maybe I will write one for you.

1

Nikki Columbus @nikkicolumbus.bsky.social · 8d

I grew up with the still-living @thedanrather.bsky.social, who was always my favorite of the three big network anchors. You could tell he actually cared about the stories he was reporting.

1 2