ICE is disappearing people.
-
Precedented, but not the same:
If ICE and CBP are basically the reincarnation of the KKK, it’s the KKK with a budget the size of Russia’s entire military.
Literally. In the literal sense of “literally.” The incoming ICE + CBP budget is ~$140 billion.[1] Russia’s military budget is ~$145 billion.[2]
(If I’m misreading these numbers, please correct me.)
[2] https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-hikes-national-defence-spending-by-23-2025-2024-09-30/
12/
Not just more of the same.
Note that this eye-popping graph only includes ICE, and not CBP, which saw a similar explosion.
How ICE grew to be the highest-funded U.S. law enforcement agency
ICE's budget hovered around $10 billion for years. But President Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress are taking the agency's funding to unprecedented levels.
NPR (www.npr.org)
13/
-
Precedented, but not the same:
If ICE and CBP are basically the reincarnation of the KKK, it’s the KKK with a budget the size of Russia’s entire military.
Literally. In the literal sense of “literally.” The incoming ICE + CBP budget is ~$140 billion.[1] Russia’s military budget is ~$145 billion.[2]
(If I’m misreading these numbers, please correct me.)
[2] https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-hikes-national-defence-spending-by-23-2025-2024-09-30/
12/
@inthehands It can also mean that felon trump was kept in a bubble.
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ICE is disappearing people.
This is a grim and difficult piece, but it is heartening to read it one particular way: the broader national and global conversation is finally, finally starting to pick up on what so many of us have been yelling for weeks and months: the Department of Homeland Security is acting as Trump’s secret police, a group of Brownshirts with a military-sized budget whose horrors extend far beyond two murders.
The Disappearances in Minnesota - emptywheel
Right now, all the focus is on competing videos of conflicts involving Alex Pretti and his murderers. But the bulk of kidnapping that proves this is a paramilitary occupation remains disappeared.
emptywheel (emptywheel.net)
1/
Re: disappearances
I guess a lot of us here are old enough to remember the 1980s, when US backed militias in Central America disappeared huge numbers of people
Which led to huge numbers of Central American refugees coming to the US
Which contributed to the development of a US economy that depends on these refugees
And a political party that gets elected by saying that the refugees are bad people and they will get rid of them, but is careful never to actually do that, because they are needed workers
And I don't know if it's happening yet, but people keep talking about how the so-called deportation camps are going to turn into work camps
-
Not just more of the same.
Note that this eye-popping graph only includes ICE, and not CBP, which saw a similar explosion.
How ICE grew to be the highest-funded U.S. law enforcement agency
ICE's budget hovered around $10 billion for years. But President Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress are taking the agency's funding to unprecedented levels.
NPR (www.npr.org)
13/
My neighbors definitely do not think this is more of the same. You don’t have to take my word for it. Look at how many Somali and Latin-American restaurants were thriving in November and now are closed, or getting almost no business if they are taking the risk of staying open. Look at how many kids are staying home from school — regardless of legal status, just because of the color of their family’s skin. Look at how many families are living in houses filled with dirty laundry because they won’t even take the risk of leaving the house to go to the laundromat.
My neighbors are living in •terror•.
If it’s more of the same, why did all of this suddenly change in the last two months?
14/
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My neighbors definitely do not think this is more of the same. You don’t have to take my word for it. Look at how many Somali and Latin-American restaurants were thriving in November and now are closed, or getting almost no business if they are taking the risk of staying open. Look at how many kids are staying home from school — regardless of legal status, just because of the color of their family’s skin. Look at how many families are living in houses filled with dirty laundry because they won’t even take the risk of leaving the house to go to the laundromat.
My neighbors are living in •terror•.
If it’s more of the same, why did all of this suddenly change in the last two months?
14/
All of what’s happening in Minneapolis is deeply rooted in US history. And in Minneapolis and St. Paul history specifically: Read about the Rondo neighborhood, for example. It’s no accident the the flagship lake in the City of Lakes was named after the vice president of the Confederacy until just a few years ago. Don’t get too excited about making saints of us all here.
It’s crucial for us to recognize that historical precedent. It’s also crucial for us to recognize the extreme new danger of the present moment.
15/
-
Precedented, but not the same:
If ICE and CBP are basically the reincarnation of the KKK, it’s the KKK with a budget the size of Russia’s entire military.
Literally. In the literal sense of “literally.” The incoming ICE + CBP budget is ~$140 billion.[1] Russia’s military budget is ~$145 billion.[2]
(If I’m misreading these numbers, please correct me.)
[2] https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-hikes-national-defence-spending-by-23-2025-2024-09-30/
12/
@inthehands n.b. the size of the military of a great power *that's shifted to a war economy as it fights the largest land war on the continent for 80 years*
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All of what’s happening in Minneapolis is deeply rooted in US history. And in Minneapolis and St. Paul history specifically: Read about the Rondo neighborhood, for example. It’s no accident the the flagship lake in the City of Lakes was named after the vice president of the Confederacy until just a few years ago. Don’t get too excited about making saints of us all here.
It’s crucial for us to recognize that historical precedent. It’s also crucial for us to recognize the extreme new danger of the present moment.
15/
The KKK but with a budget the size of Russia’s military. Running mass detention camps.
Think about that for a minute.
Think about what it could mean, what it •already is•:
Into the abyss
The correct response to Dachau was not better training for the guards.
Degenerate Art (degenerateart.beehiiv.com)
16/
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My neighbors definitely do not think this is more of the same. You don’t have to take my word for it. Look at how many Somali and Latin-American restaurants were thriving in November and now are closed, or getting almost no business if they are taking the risk of staying open. Look at how many kids are staying home from school — regardless of legal status, just because of the color of their family’s skin. Look at how many families are living in houses filled with dirty laundry because they won’t even take the risk of leaving the house to go to the laundromat.
My neighbors are living in •terror•.
If it’s more of the same, why did all of this suddenly change in the last two months?
14/
@inthehands for me, it's kind of... The Republicans & authoritarian leaning people in US govt have been preparing for this, laying the tracks etc, since W at least. And now they're running the trains. And so many people want to act like Trump is just the sole mover & actor doing this rather than admitting the complicity of those that laid the tracks (multiple decades of federal governments) and are running the train (current congress).
It's not that it's the same, it's just the expected extension of existing policy. Like first they pass the Patriot Act and it takes a while to normalize, but for the last decade you can expect your communications to be read by the government, and now the devices inspected during govt interactions and not long after you can be arrested for just trying to have secrets on your phone. -
The KKK but with a budget the size of Russia’s military. Running mass detention camps.
Think about that for a minute.
Think about what it could mean, what it •already is•:
Into the abyss
The correct response to Dachau was not better training for the guards.
Degenerate Art (degenerateart.beehiiv.com)
16/
All of this is why I get uncomfortable with a certain kind of focus on the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, and the mistaken narrative that focus can create.
Don’t get me wrong: we •should• focus on those murders. We should mourn them. Alex was one of the nurses who cared for my father-in-law when he was in intensive care at the VA. My wife remembers how gentle he was, what a good listener. They were my neighbors. Please remember them both.
17/
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All of this is why I get uncomfortable with a certain kind of focus on the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, and the mistaken narrative that focus can create.
Don’t get me wrong: we •should• focus on those murders. We should mourn them. Alex was one of the nurses who cared for my father-in-law when he was in intensive care at the VA. My wife remembers how gentle he was, what a good listener. They were my neighbors. Please remember them both.
17/
Please remember them. Remember them, and then remember what they died for: fighting a much larger danger. Remember what they were fighting, •see• it, and •act•.
Do not let their deaths be in vain by making their deaths the only thing you see.
/end
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The KKK but with a budget the size of Russia’s military. Running mass detention camps.
Think about that for a minute.
Think about what it could mean, what it •already is•:
Into the abyss
The correct response to Dachau was not better training for the guards.
Degenerate Art (degenerateart.beehiiv.com)
16/
@inthehands
From the wonderful post https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/into-the-abyss you cited:
"…nobody sane now thinks the answer to abuses at Dachau was to give the guards more training.""…the U.S. is currently holding three times as many people in immigrant detention as were detained in the Nazi concentration camp system in spring 1939—six years into the Third Reich and just before the start of World War II."
-
@inthehands
From the wonderful post https://degenerateart.beehiiv.com/p/into-the-abyss you cited:
"…nobody sane now thinks the answer to abuses at Dachau was to give the guards more training.""…the U.S. is currently holding three times as many people in immigrant detention as were detained in the Nazi concentration camp system in spring 1939—six years into the Third Reich and just before the start of World War II."
@inthehands
"…we need to do more than stop the construction of additional facilities, more than just get ICE agents to behave more politely. We need to dismantle the current system and remove the possibility for it to exist again. In my opinion, that is what “Abolish ICE” should mean." -
Please remember them. Remember them, and then remember what they died for: fighting a much larger danger. Remember what they were fighting, •see• it, and •act•.
Do not let their deaths be in vain by making their deaths the only thing you see.
/end
@inthehands Well said! #iceout
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@inthehands Well said! #iceout
@Pollinators @inthehands
I will emphasize some of your points when I call my Senators. -
ICE is disappearing people.
This is a grim and difficult piece, but it is heartening to read it one particular way: the broader national and global conversation is finally, finally starting to pick up on what so many of us have been yelling for weeks and months: the Department of Homeland Security is acting as Trump’s secret police, a group of Brownshirts with a military-sized budget whose horrors extend far beyond two murders.
The Disappearances in Minnesota - emptywheel
Right now, all the focus is on competing videos of conflicts involving Alex Pretti and his murderers. But the bulk of kidnapping that proves this is a paramilitary occupation remains disappeared.
emptywheel (emptywheel.net)
1/
@inthehands just what #campofsaints Steven Miller
-
Not just more of the same.
Note that this eye-popping graph only includes ICE, and not CBP, which saw a similar explosion.
How ICE grew to be the highest-funded U.S. law enforcement agency
ICE's budget hovered around $10 billion for years. But President Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress are taking the agency's funding to unprecedented levels.
NPR (www.npr.org)
13/
That's a graph of the funding of Trump's personal army. Welcome to fascism.
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That's a graph of the funding of Trump's personal army. Welcome to fascism.
Theoretically, if they got rid of all the immigrants, I wonder what they would do with all the money?
I guess they would just return it and the budget would shrink and everybody would go home.
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It was the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti that punctured the bubble of the comfortable and launched Minneapolis to the top of international news. I understand why that is: the whiteness of the victims combined with unbelievably damning, stomach-churning video were something that a whole lot of people who’d been tuned out simply could not ignore. And those murders alone are so horrific that either one •should• be sufficient to pop the bubble of comfort — but they’re just the tip of an iceberg here.
2/
Just the tip of the iceberg was enough to sink the Titanic.
-
@inthehands for me, it's kind of... The Republicans & authoritarian leaning people in US govt have been preparing for this, laying the tracks etc, since W at least. And now they're running the trains. And so many people want to act like Trump is just the sole mover & actor doing this rather than admitting the complicity of those that laid the tracks (multiple decades of federal governments) and are running the train (current congress).
It's not that it's the same, it's just the expected extension of existing policy. Like first they pass the Patriot Act and it takes a while to normalize, but for the last decade you can expect your communications to be read by the government, and now the devices inspected during govt interactions and not long after you can be arrested for just trying to have secrets on your phone.When I look at the Republican budget, I see the anti-democracy billionaire bigots, foreign & domestic, who ran interference for Trump's ilk for decades to achieve this apotheosis for a #MadKing.
GOP budgets reward their rich fascist donors. Only.
We know the names of some of those funding democracy backsliding, but not all.
Go after the money:
Citizens United, courtesy Koch's ownership of a corrupt SCOTUS lets anyone, literally anyone, buy an ...
1/
-
When I look at the Republican budget, I see the anti-democracy billionaire bigots, foreign & domestic, who ran interference for Trump's ilk for decades to achieve this apotheosis for a #MadKing.
GOP budgets reward their rich fascist donors. Only.
We know the names of some of those funding democracy backsliding, but not all.
Go after the money:
Citizens United, courtesy Koch's ownership of a corrupt SCOTUS lets anyone, literally anyone, buy an ...
1/
2/
....American election, from the fossil fuel industry to oligarchs in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, UK, Brazil, China, Russia, and OPEC.
Koch Network & the consequences of Citizens United.
These folks never explain how removing women's civil rights is going to reduce the price of gas.
David Koch’s Most Significant Legacy Is the Election of Donald Trump
Efforts made by Koch, largely ignored by the mainstream press, primed key states to elect a GOP president. Trump was simply the beneficiary.
The Intercept (theintercept.com)
Dark Money: Jane Mayer on How the Koch Bros. & Billionaire Allies Funded the Rise of the Far Right
Democrats and Republicans are expected to spend about $1 billion getting their 2016 nominee elected. There’s a third group that will spend almost as much. It’s not a political party, and it doesn’t have any candidates. It’s the right-wing political network backed by the billionaire Koch brothers, Charles and David Koch, expected to spend nearly $900 million in 2016. The Kochs’ 2016 plans come as part of an effort to funnel hundreds of millions of dollars to conservative candidates and causes
Democracy Now! (www.democracynow.org)
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/20/us/politics/koch-network-2024-election-trump.html
:quality(75)/https%3A%2F%2Fassets.lareviewofbooks.org%2Fuploads%2F202004tervo_cover.jpg)
New Grassroots Resistance People: Talking to Theda Skocpol and Caroline Tervo | Los Angeles Review of Books
Andy Fitch talks with Theda Skocpol and Caroline Tervo about polarization, effective organizing, and their book "Upending American Politics."
Los Angeles Review of Books (lareviewofbooks.org)
No Cost for Extremism - The American Prospect
Why the GOP hasn't (yet) paid for its march to the right.
The American Prospect (prospect.org)
Inside the Koch-Backed Effort to Block the Largest Election-Reform Bill in Half a Century
Jane Mayer writes about a leaked conference call in which leaders of dark-money groups and an aide to Mitch McConnell expressed frustration with the popularity of election-reform legislation—even among Republican voters.
The New Yorker (www.newyorker.com)
