Tess
@tesshoffman.bsky.social
Not a bad friend to have in your friend pocket. She/her.
“Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” —Frederick Douglass
“Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” —Frederick Douglass
Maryland folks in District 46--see below and please consider joining if you are able!
District 46: our legislators have real power to help us win for what our communities need. Let’s turn our power into progress!
Join us THIS Weds, December 3 at 6pm at Zion Church. We’ll strategize, plan, and build community (and share some light food).
Reserve your seat today! bit.ly/d46townhall
Join us THIS Weds, December 3 at 6pm at Zion Church. We’ll strategize, plan, and build community (and share some light food).
Reserve your seat today! bit.ly/d46townhall
December 2, 2025 at 1:12 AM
Maryland folks in District 46--see below and please consider joining if you are able!
Reposted by Tess
This is actually quite brilliant, up to and including the final sentence 🔥
December 1, 2025 at 11:09 AM
This is actually quite brilliant, up to and including the final sentence 🔥
Reposted by Tess
I feel much safer today knowing that we deported a Babson College student back to a country where she hasn't lived since childhood.
She wasn't even flying internationally. She was flying to Texas.
She wasn't even flying internationally. She was flying to Texas.
A Babson College student wanted to surprise her family for Thanksgiving. She was deported instead. - The Boston Globe
Any Lucia Lopez Belloza was at Logan to catch a flight to Texas when immigration authorities detained her as she was about to board the plane.
www.bostonglobe.com
November 27, 2025 at 10:47 AM
I feel much safer today knowing that we deported a Babson College student back to a country where she hasn't lived since childhood.
She wasn't even flying internationally. She was flying to Texas.
She wasn't even flying internationally. She was flying to Texas.
Reposted by Tess
For scale: I spent eleven days in the maximum security wing of a local county lockup before a judge heard my case and moved me to min. I had one hour out of the cell a day. The cell was small. There was a speaker in the ceiling. By the end I was talking to the speaker and spending hours each day
Rejon Taylor was one of 37 people on federal death row whose death sentence was commuted by then-President Biden. This year, he learned the Trump administration was sending him to a supermax prison once called a “clean version of hell.”
Death Row Prisoners Granted Clemency by Biden Brace for “Living Hell” Under Trump
Trump officials are retaliating by imposing the harshest conditions in the entire federal prison system, including near total isolation.
boltsmag.org
November 25, 2025 at 12:07 AM
For scale: I spent eleven days in the maximum security wing of a local county lockup before a judge heard my case and moved me to min. I had one hour out of the cell a day. The cell was small. There was a speaker in the ceiling. By the end I was talking to the speaker and spending hours each day
Reposted by Tess
Melissa Tran came here on a Green Card at age 11.
She's since raised 4 kids, started a business, & is a beloved member of the Hagerstown community.
Trump is deporting her, despite a judge saying she poses no threat.
Is she the "worst of the worst"? Do you feel safer yet?
She's since raised 4 kids, started a business, & is a beloved member of the Hagerstown community.
Trump is deporting her, despite a judge saying she poses no threat.
Is she the "worst of the worst"? Do you feel safer yet?
Hagerstown mother and nail salon owner set for deportation to Vietnam
Melissa Tran’s six-month legal battle has highlighted the impacts of President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement campaign on longtime residents and their families.
www.thebanner.com
November 19, 2025 at 6:46 PM
Melissa Tran came here on a Green Card at age 11.
She's since raised 4 kids, started a business, & is a beloved member of the Hagerstown community.
Trump is deporting her, despite a judge saying she poses no threat.
Is she the "worst of the worst"? Do you feel safer yet?
She's since raised 4 kids, started a business, & is a beloved member of the Hagerstown community.
Trump is deporting her, despite a judge saying she poses no threat.
Is she the "worst of the worst"? Do you feel safer yet?
Reposted by Tess
A bad thing is unfolding at NIH this week: It looks like the Trump administration is trying to replace key civil servant scientific leaders, the Institute Directors, with political hires. These directors control the NIH budget, tens of billions.
A bit of a video explainer here: 1/ 🧪
A bit of a video explainer here: 1/ 🧪
November 13, 2025 at 10:31 PM
A bad thing is unfolding at NIH this week: It looks like the Trump administration is trying to replace key civil servant scientific leaders, the Institute Directors, with political hires. These directors control the NIH budget, tens of billions.
A bit of a video explainer here: 1/ 🧪
A bit of a video explainer here: 1/ 🧪
Reposted by Tess
ICE is at the Waverly Giant, Baltimore friends. Beware.
November 12, 2025 at 8:07 PM
ICE is at the Waverly Giant, Baltimore friends. Beware.
Reposted by Tess
Flood the phones:
(202) 224-3121
Tell Chuck Schumer to grow a spine and hold the line…
There should be no deal that leaves working families behind.
(202) 224-3121
Tell Chuck Schumer to grow a spine and hold the line…
There should be no deal that leaves working families behind.
November 10, 2025 at 12:03 AM
Flood the phones:
(202) 224-3121
Tell Chuck Schumer to grow a spine and hold the line…
There should be no deal that leaves working families behind.
(202) 224-3121
Tell Chuck Schumer to grow a spine and hold the line…
There should be no deal that leaves working families behind.
Reposted by Tess
I had a run in with ICE snatching a man out of his car while walking my children to school this morning in NW DC
I asked a neighbor to continue walking my kids to school and I turned back to document and confront the ICE agents.
I am in contact with @dcmigrantmutualaid.org with the full video.
I asked a neighbor to continue walking my kids to school and I turned back to document and confront the ICE agents.
I am in contact with @dcmigrantmutualaid.org with the full video.
November 6, 2025 at 8:33 PM
I had a run in with ICE snatching a man out of his car while walking my children to school this morning in NW DC
I asked a neighbor to continue walking my kids to school and I turned back to document and confront the ICE agents.
I am in contact with @dcmigrantmutualaid.org with the full video.
I asked a neighbor to continue walking my kids to school and I turned back to document and confront the ICE agents.
I am in contact with @dcmigrantmutualaid.org with the full video.
Reposted by Tess
I'm here outside Speaker Johnson’s office because he is starving families and gutting health care to cover up the Epstein Files.
Change my mind.
Change my mind.
November 6, 2025 at 6:08 PM
I'm here outside Speaker Johnson’s office because he is starving families and gutting health care to cover up the Epstein Files.
Change my mind.
Change my mind.
Reposted by Tess
Great account of tonight's rally. Friends outside Chicago, we need you to know what's happening here, and we need you to know that we are fighting hard.
Tyler and I are out here at the rally where the crowd has about doubled since this first post. Easily 400+ people.
Group is chanting “no hate, no fear, everyone is welcome here.”
Group is chanting “no hate, no fear, everyone is welcome here.”
Here at Northcenter Town Square where 100-200 community members including families and young children are rallying after a teacher was taken by federal law enforcement from a local daycare this morning.
November 6, 2025 at 2:15 AM
Great account of tonight's rally. Friends outside Chicago, we need you to know what's happening here, and we need you to know that we are fighting hard.
Reposted by Tess
Tyler and I are out here at the rally where the crowd has about doubled since this first post. Easily 400+ people.
Group is chanting “no hate, no fear, everyone is welcome here.”
Group is chanting “no hate, no fear, everyone is welcome here.”
Here at Northcenter Town Square where 100-200 community members including families and young children are rallying after a teacher was taken by federal law enforcement from a local daycare this morning.
November 6, 2025 at 12:39 AM
Tyler and I are out here at the rally where the crowd has about doubled since this first post. Easily 400+ people.
Group is chanting “no hate, no fear, everyone is welcome here.”
Group is chanting “no hate, no fear, everyone is welcome here.”
Reposted by Tess
Easily several hundred people have packed into this plaza in Chicago's North Center tonight in response to ICE abducting a daycare worker early this morning.
This is a neighborhood that has largely been spared until now from the "Midway Blitz" terror campaign. But everyone knows someone affected.
This is a neighborhood that has largely been spared until now from the "Midway Blitz" terror campaign. But everyone knows someone affected.
November 6, 2025 at 12:48 AM
Easily several hundred people have packed into this plaza in Chicago's North Center tonight in response to ICE abducting a daycare worker early this morning.
This is a neighborhood that has largely been spared until now from the "Midway Blitz" terror campaign. But everyone knows someone affected.
This is a neighborhood that has largely been spared until now from the "Midway Blitz" terror campaign. But everyone knows someone affected.
Without minimizing the horrors the current administration will continue to wreak, and the need to keep fighting them on every front--man, it's good to feel my country understood the assignment last night. We're better than these ghouls, and we will defeat them.
November 5, 2025 at 1:32 PM
Without minimizing the horrors the current administration will continue to wreak, and the need to keep fighting them on every front--man, it's good to feel my country understood the assignment last night. We're better than these ghouls, and we will defeat them.
Reposted by Tess
This person took this when they called the race
November 5, 2025 at 6:07 AM
This person took this when they called the race
Reposted by Tess
This is such a loss. Teen Vogue's reporting has put many "news" mags' to shame for years now. And this--"there are no longer any Black women working at Teen Vogue"--is chilling.
thank you for all the support; the statement from our union is now live here with some more reporting.
now that this is public I can confirm that the majority of today’s layoffs were women of color. there are no longer any Black women working at Teen Vogue.
now that this is public I can confirm that the majority of today’s layoffs were women of color. there are no longer any Black women working at Teen Vogue.
November 4, 2025 at 1:39 AM
This is such a loss. Teen Vogue's reporting has put many "news" mags' to shame for years now. And this--"there are no longer any Black women working at Teen Vogue"--is chilling.
Reposted by Tess
It's all hands on deck. I am shamelessly asking, one more time, for reposts and signal boost as this bird glides toward a landing in a few hours. It's gonna be a beautiful book, and there aren't going to be very many available afterwards!
www.kickstarter.com/projects/tom...
www.kickstarter.com/projects/tom...
Our Long National Nightmare by Tom Tomorrow
Relive the trauma of the last five years through the cartoons of Herblock Award winner and Pulitzer nominee Tom Tomorrow.
www.kickstarter.com
October 30, 2025 at 1:21 PM
It's all hands on deck. I am shamelessly asking, one more time, for reposts and signal boost as this bird glides toward a landing in a few hours. It's gonna be a beautiful book, and there aren't going to be very many available afterwards!
www.kickstarter.com/projects/tom...
www.kickstarter.com/projects/tom...
Reposted by Tess
Yesterday we talked a little bit about SNAP ending and how everyone who can, should give back to their communities. I'm going to spend a little time today talking about what to give.
October 28, 2025 at 12:53 PM
Yesterday we talked a little bit about SNAP ending and how everyone who can, should give back to their communities. I'm going to spend a little time today talking about what to give.
Reposted by Tess
ok who did this? ☹️
October 22, 2025 at 9:52 PM
ok who did this? ☹️
Reposted by Tess
The Democrats need to get a hell of a lot of cameras on the White House and plaster the photos everywhere. It's not just the brazen symbol of a megalomaniac destroying national heritage; it's happening during a government shutdown when ordinary people aren't getting paid. Make every American see it.
October 20, 2025 at 7:23 PM
The Democrats need to get a hell of a lot of cameras on the White House and plaster the photos everywhere. It's not just the brazen symbol of a megalomaniac destroying national heritage; it's happening during a government shutdown when ordinary people aren't getting paid. Make every American see it.
Reposted by Tess
white house has joined bluesky
click here to block all official us government accounts instantly
bsky.app/profile/did:...
click here to block all official us government accounts instantly
bsky.app/profile/did:...
October 17, 2025 at 10:08 PM
white house has joined bluesky
click here to block all official us government accounts instantly
bsky.app/profile/did:...
click here to block all official us government accounts instantly
bsky.app/profile/did:...
Reposted by Tess
Signs made for tomorrow.
Because every season is spooky season!
Because every season is spooky season!
October 17, 2025 at 11:41 PM
Signs made for tomorrow.
Because every season is spooky season!
Because every season is spooky season!
Reposted by Tess
this is an incredibly ominous beginning to a future with a largely carved out federal emergency response system
NEW: There’s a disaster unfolding in Alaska right now. And no major network is covering it.
The remnants of Typhoon Halong battered western Alaska overnight. Homes, with people in them, have literally been swept into the Bering Strait.
At least 20 are missing. No comment from any federal agency.
The remnants of Typhoon Halong battered western Alaska overnight. Homes, with people in them, have literally been swept into the Bering Strait.
At least 20 are missing. No comment from any federal agency.
October 13, 2025 at 11:06 PM
this is an incredibly ominous beginning to a future with a largely carved out federal emergency response system
Reposted by Tess
Abolish ICE.
If you work for ICE, quit right now.
If you work for ICE, quit right now.
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...
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
October 13, 2025 at 10:30 PM
Abolish ICE.
If you work for ICE, quit right now.
If you work for ICE, quit right now.