"What kind of monsters grab children and take them outside without clothes? Who does that? What kind of governmental entity permits its agents to abuse American citizens and non-citizens without the slightest concern for their rights, their well-being, indeed their basic humanity?"

~ Steven Beschloss

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/23

americaamerica.news/p/got-a-mi…

"To put those numbers into perspective, our current rating of 54 puts the U.S. below experts’ ratings of democracy in Mexico and Poland; the projected rating of 47 puts the U.S. on par with experts’ current rating of Israel and in the neighborhood of experts’ 2022 ratings of Brazil and the Philippines."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/22

"But in response to Trump’s authoritarian rhetoric and actions after taking office, the experts’ rating (the green line in the chart below) fell to 55 in February and to 54 in September. Experts also now project that the U.S. rating will drop further to 47 by 2027."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/21

"Between the first Bright Line Watch survey in 2017 and 2024, which notably included Trump’s first term, the experts had rated the U.S. generally in the high 60s on a scale from zero (complete dictatorship) to one hundred (perfect democracy). As recently as the 2024 election, experts had given the U.S. a rating of 67."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/20

"This week, a new A 'Bright Line Watch' survey of over 700 leading American political scientists found that their rating of the U.S. as a functioning liberal democracy fell precipitously since Trump took office in January."

~ Robert P. Jones

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/19

whitetoolong.net/p/all-the-bri…

"Such public spectacles are designed to send a message that 'we are all-powerful, we can humiliate and harm you' and terrorize the population. …

Chicago was a teaching moment for police and other state security forces nationally: they are being told by White House shadow chief Stephen Miller and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth that they are now 'unleashed' and their hands 'untied.'"

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #fascism #MaskedThugs #RussellVought #Project2025
/18

"The Chicago assault reminded me of Pinochet’s attacks on neighborhoods inhabited by poor people, and more generally of the treatment the junta gave to 'enemies of the state' of all social classes. Not only were they arrested, but their books and other possessions were thrown into the street, and objectionable books were burned by Chilean soldiers."

~ Ruth Ben-Ghiat

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #fascism #MaskedThugs #RussellVought #Project2025
/17

lucid.substack.com/p/war-on-am…

"Living in America today is like being in a permanent state of whiplash."

~ Alexandra Hall Hall

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025 #WhiteChristianNationalism
/16

bylinesupplement.com/p/the-mad…

Isabela Dias interviewed neighbors of Russell Vought outside DC. One neighbor, who asked not to be named, "said many in the neighborhood find Vought’s policies and actions 'abhorrent.'

'He takes food and health care from the neediest and tries to, in his words, traumatize people—then he calls himself a Christian,' the neighbor said. 'Pretty despicable.'"

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025 #WhiteChristianNationalism
/15

motherjones.com/politics/2025/…

"USAID, gone. Department of Education, basically done. Medicaid, $1 trillion worth of cuts. Last month, Vaught said he didn't believe the Government Accountability Office, Congress's watchdog, should exist. He's also an open white Christian nationalist."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025 #WhiteChristianNationalism
/14

"Quote, before joining the first Trump administration, Russell Vought was the vice president of Heritage Action for America, a sister organization to the Heritage Foundation, which published Project 2025.

He advocated for deep cuts to Medicaid, the Education Department, and USAID, all of which the Trump administration began executing this year."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/13

"There's two shadow presidents. The shadow president is Stephen Miller and Russell Vought. Russell Vaught is the head of OMB. And Russell Vought, let me read you something I read yesterday while I was co-hosting Mary Trump's show."

~ Wajahat Ali

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/12

thelefthook.substack.com/p/pro…

"The story of 2024 is this: Trump had a plan to destroy US government called Project 2025, which had, literally, not a typo, 4% approval. He lied constantly and said he wouldn't do it.

Then he entered office and immediately implemented AN EVEN MORE EXTREME VERSION OF IT."

~ Will Stancil quoted by Greg Dworkin

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/11

dailykos.com/stories/2025/10/4…

"Gov. Pritzker has told everyone to record & narrate what they see w/ICE. Request names and badge # on camera, even if they refuse."

TikTok user moonwater35 brilliantly subverts the TikTok brand to deliver a clear, right-on-target message about how Trump and ICE are now targeting Black citizens (in big Democratic cities, especially), and what we can do to push back against this.

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/10

instagram.com/reel/DPXdrGtjYrI…

"Tren de Aragua is the latest conjuring phrase that makes all constitutional safeguards disappear like magic."

~ Charles Pierce

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/9

esquire.com/news-politics/poli…

"ICE and other policing units–the Border Patrol, the FBI, and the ATF--are now acting as now an army of sorts, stormtrooper outfits, helicopter raids, big guns, and all, as the dystopian attack on an apartment building in Chicago Tuesday showed."

~ Rebecca Solnit

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/7

meditationsinanemergency.com/t…

"The agents were armed and masked and wearing military-style clothing and gear, including helmets, bulletproof vests, boots, gloves, and were carrying pepper spray and other crowd-control materials. …

This isn’t a slippery slope to fascism. We’re already there."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/6

"Many people were held for as long as four and five hours wearing nothing but nightclothes. Several people, including adults and children, were 'detained,' at least initially, while naked. They were made to sit on the ground on the street outside the building.

None of the agents identified themselves."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/5

"The federal agents, were said to have been from the U.S. Border Patrol, the FBI, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Armed agents rappelled from a Blackhawk helicopter as it hovered above the roof of the apartment building during the raid.

Thirty-seven people were arrested. The entire population of the building was 'detained' in plastic handcuffs for hours as the raid took place."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/4

Lucian K. Truscott, who's a direct descendant of President Thomas Jefferson, the primary author of the Declaration of Independence, writes,

"This is what we must guard against.

Late on Tuesday, in the middle of the night, more than 300 federal agents conducted what appears to have been an immigration raid on a Chicago apartment complex."

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/3

luciantruscott.substack.com/p/…

"We’re not hovering on the brink, we’re not in danger of becoming, we’re not sleepwalking into—we are in a fully fascist America."

~ Stephanie G. Wilson

#Trump #ICE #StephenMiller #Chicago #violence #MaskedThugs #fascism #RussellVought #Project2025
/1

freedomoverfascism.us/p/anti-f…