curated news excerpts & citations
MPR: Joe Thompson, Minnesota’s top federal fraud prosecutor, quits over ICE shooting probe
Joe Thompson, the career U.S. Justice Department attorney best known for prosecuting social services fraud in Minnesota, has resigned along with other experienced attorneys at the Minnesota U.S. Attorney’s Office.
The move comes after top Justice Department officials pushed the Minnesota U.S. Attorney’s Office to investigate the widow of Renee Macklin Good, the person shot and killed last week by ICE agent Jonathan Ross, MPR News has learned.
Thompson, 47, also objected to the DOJ’s decision to exclude the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension from the investigation into the shooting and the department’s reluctance to investigate Ross, according to a person familiar with Thompson’s decision.
Veteran assistant U.S. attorneys Melinda Williams, Harry Jacobs, and Thomas Calhoun-Lopez also resigned.
(MPR more…)
404 Media: Police Unmask Millions of Surveillance Targets Because of Flock Redaction Error
Flock is going after a website called HaveIBeenFlocked.com that has collated public records files released by police.
Heather Cox Richardson: Letters from an American – January 13, 2026
Officials in the Trump administration insist its surges of federal agents into Democratic-led cities are necessary to round up undocumented immigrants, but the agents’ mission increasingly looks as if it is to frighten opponents of the administration into submission. But instead of submission, they appear to be sparking deeper and deeper opposition.
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Frum notes that ICE has lowered its standards to fit the deportation targets White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller has announced, lower standards that have increased the numbers of untrained and violent agents on the streets, but Frum attributes much of the violence of ICE to the fact that “its main purpose has become theatrical…. ICE is less a law-enforcement agency than it is a content creator.”
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Reality is crumbling the MAGA fantasy that their leaders could fix the United States if only they purged it of their opponents and stripped away the laws and governmental systems those opponents have created over decades.
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)
AP: Justice Department sees no basis for civil rights probe in Minnesota ICE shooting, official says
NBC: Immigration agents deploy tear gas, pepper spray in Minneapolis as confrontations with protesters grow
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Onion: DOJ Releases Jerome Powell Deepfake Nudes
WASHINGTON—Asserting that the images were “100% authentic,” the Justice Department released Monday what appeared to be deepfake nudes of Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell. “The American people deserve to know that the central bank is led by a total slut,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said of the photo, promising that more sexually explicit images of Powell were on the way.
(Onion more…)Hans Christensen: Grok Suspected Law-Breaking in EU Countries
Severe backlash for Elon Musk’s online chatbot Grok, developed by his xAI company. As he mostly refuses to make any serious constraints on content, within the law, he says, he challenges restrictions.
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Paul Krugman: Trump is Venezuelifying the United States
Cross him and his minions will try to destroy you — whoever you are
So federal prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation into Jerome Powell, the Federal Reserve chair. In his statement in response, Powell, to his credit, didn’t dignify the obviously spurious accusations by protesting his innocence. Instead, he went right to the heart of the matter:
This new threat is not about my testimony last June or about the renovation of the Federal Reserve buildings. It is not about Congress’s oversight role; the Fed through testimony and other public disclosures made every effort to keep Congress informed about the renovation project. Those are pretexts. The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the President.
This is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions—or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.
Indeed. Surely nobody at the now completely corrupt Department of Justice really believes that Powell has committed any crimes, other than the crime of not doing Donald Trump’s bidding. This is all about intimidation, not just of Powell, but of everyone at the Fed.
(Paul Krugman more…)
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Emily Atkin: Air pollution denial is now EPA policy
Dirty air may kill people, but Trump’s EPA won’t count the bodies.
Did you know? Air pollution regulations actually do more harm than good if you ignore all the lives they save.
(Emily Atkin more…)
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Your Local Epidemiologist: A brutal flu season, new dietary guidelines, and why cancer screenings are at risk
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Paul Waldman: One year in, Trump’s economy is a mess
He may have won on a promise to fix everything, but he’s only made it worse.
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Ellie Leonard: You Can’t Sue the Internet: Melania Trump, Epstein, and the Receipts
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Politico: Clintons defy subpoena to testify in Epstein investigation, risking being held in contempt
(Politico more…)
Margaret Chase Smith: Declaration of Conscience
NPR: January 6, 2021: A visual archive
Accountability Initiative ICE List
GriftMatrix
Trump Action Tracker
Timeline: Tracking the Trump Justice Department’s Anti-Voting Shift
Tracking the Lawsuits Against Trump’s Agenda
Trump Pardons Database
Project 2025 Tracker
DOGE Tracker
ProPublica: Elon Musk’s Demolition Crew
Wired: 6 Tools for Tracking the Trump Administration’s Attacks on Civil Liberties
