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NextGov/FCW – “At least 15 government oversight websites were down — and with them, access to watchdog reports and required hotline and whistleblower links — as of Wednesday evening. That’s not due to the federal shutdown that began at midnight; it’s a deliberate move by the White House, whose Office of Management and Budget is …
Wired – no paywall: “On Wednesday, the first day of the US government shutdown, employees at the Department of Education (DOE) set their automatic out-of-office email responses to inform recipients that they would be unable to respond until after the shutdown. Hours later, many DOE employees realized their response message had been altered to contain …
Democracy Forward: “The United States is in an existential fight for democracy. With so much on the line for millions of people, the Supreme Court remains a decisive arena. The new term begins on Monday, October 6, and will determine the role of this Court on attempts at unchecked power. The authoritarian threats from the Trump-Vance …
The New York Times Gift Article: “The White House on [October 1, 2025] sent letters to nine of the nation’s top public and private universities, urging campus leaders to pledge support for President Trump’s political agenda to help ensure access to federal research funds. The letters came attached to a 10-page “compact” that serves as …
PEN America – The Normalization of Book Banning: “In 2025, book censorship in the United States is rampant and common. Never before in the life of any living American have so many books been systematically removed from school libraries across the country. Never before have so many states passed laws or regulations to facilitate the …
404 Media: Documents show that ICE has gone back on its decision to not use location data remotely harvested from peoples’ phones. “The database is updated every day with billions of pieces of location data. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has bought access to a surveillance tool that is updated every day with billions of …
Politico: “The Energy Department has added “climate change,” “green” and “decarbonization” to its growing “list of words to avoid” at its Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, according to an email issued Friday and obtained by POLITICO. The words on the DOE list are at the heart of EERE’s mission: It is the government’s …
CNBC: “Google long touted the need for factually accurate information on its platforms, but a letter submitted to Congress this week demonstrates how the tech company is shifting to prioritize “free expression.” The company’s YouTube division on Tuesday said it will soon allow accounts that were previously banned for spreading misinformation related to Covid-19 and …
The New York Times Gift Article: “Journalists have long shaped history through scrutiny of the military. Now the Defense Department plans to cut off access for reporters who publish even unclassified information without official approval. These days, in covering traditional conflicts like the one in Ukraine, or the new battlefields of space and cyberspace, or …
Wired – no paywall – “In August, months after Elon Musk left the federal government, the director of the Office of Personnel Management offered the first hard estimate of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency’s impact on the civil service. The government would likely end 2025 with about 300,000 fewer employees than it had at …
A LA Times review of the Trump administration’s settlement proposal to UCLA lays out sweeping demands on numerous aspects of campus life. The government has fined UCLA nearly $1.2 billion to settle allegations of civil rights violations. Hiring, admissions and the definitions of gender are among the areas the Department of Justice seeks to change. …
EFF: “This is the first installment in a blog series documenting EFF’s findings from the Stop Censoring Abortion campaign. You can read additional posts here. We’ve been hearing that social media platforms are censoring abortion-related content, even when no law requires them to do so. Now, we’ve got the receipts. For months, EFF has been investigating …
