walterolson.bsky.social - Profile | ThreadSky | a Reddit-style client for Bluesky

The ONLY reason to send someone to Guantanamo is to violate the law and Constitution.

submitted 5 hours ago • 3 comments

You've probably heard this Thomas Jefferson quote at a Tea Party rally: "let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution" BUT DID YOU KNOW THE QUOTE WAS TALKING ABOUT PROTECTING IMMIGRANTS FROM THE TYRANNY OF DUE-PROCESS FREE DEPORTATIONS?

submitted 3 hours ago • 3 comments

Ten El Faro reporters left El Salvador as a precaution after publishing a series of interviews with gang members alleging long-standing ties between President Nayib Bukele and criminal groups. CPJ spoke with El Faro Editor-in-Chief Óscar Martínez on the toll of the persecution. cpj.org?p=484544

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

Aside from the problems Yale points out, the proposed endowment tax is shamelessly gerrymandered so as to hit institutions politically disliked by the Right while sparing (for now) similarly situated universities and foundations on whom it looks more fondly. /1

submitted 3 hours ago • 2 comments

NEW: The Trump admin has plans to send thousands of foreigners to Guantanamo beginning as early as this week, including citizens of close allies UK & France, with no intention of notifying their home governments in advance, per sources and documents

submitted 6 hours ago • 85 comments

YouGov poll, just out: "Should ICE agents be required to wear uniforms while making arrests?" Yes: 68% No: 18

submitted 11 hours ago • 130 comments

This was an account that just posted what was on the publicly available police scanner. You know, the thing that broadcasts through the air on regular radio waves

submitted 6 hours ago • 2 comments

Periodic reminder that every day is STFU Friday Also, sharing the location of cops in the public performance of their jobs is ironclad First Amendment-protected expression If you're concerned something you've said has you on the Government's radar, call your lawyer instead of posting through it

submitted 7 hours ago • 54 comments

Every day the authoritarianism grows worse - Christopher Rufo calling for the Trump administration to "dispatch unmarked vans to follow key agitators and snatch them from the streets while the media are not looking" christopherrufo.com/p/trump-shou...

submitted 15 hours ago • 155 comments

This is by far not the first openly partisan speech that Trump has given in front of troops. But it’s the first time they have applauded when he praises himself and criticizes opponents.

submitted 5 hours ago • 15 comments

I joined Twitter to follow this account about nine years ago. This is disturbing.

submitted 1 day ago • 95 comments

It is truly a 10-alarm fire that he's giving such a hatefully partisan speech in front of cheering uniformed troops.

submitted 6 hours ago • 113 comments

It's been cause for jubilation that law firms have won a string of court orders declaring unlawful Trump's grudge decrees against them. The problem comes once you grasp how hard it's going to be to enforce what judges were trying to do in those orders. Me at @theunpopulist.net

submitted 6 hours ago • 0 comments

"'He is declaring utterly bogus emergencies for the sake of trying to expand his power, undermine the Constitution and destroy civil liberties,' said @ilyasomin.bsky.social, a libertarian professor at Antonin Scalia Law School who [is] challenging some of Mr. Trump’s tariffs." @cato.org

submitted 6 hours ago • 3 comments

Walter Olson has done a great service by tracking Trump’s attacks on law firms and on the independence of our legal system. This issue is at risk of receding from our collective concern, and @walterolson.bsky.social implores us not to let that happen. He’s right. This is too important.

submitted 9 hours ago • 0 comments

For basically every Miller post/statement I have seen since, my immediate reaction has been, "yep, Terry Moran was correct."

submitted 9 hours ago • 1 comment

Doesn't even qualify this with references to ostensible violence and disorder, just says protest will be met with force. The authoritarianism is more open and brazen by the day.

submitted 9 hours ago • 14 comments

Last I checked, the First Amendment is still in effect, and if Congress cannot restrict the right to peaceably assemble, you can bet your ass the president cannot do so either by screeching from the Oval Office. Also, all the more reason to find your nearest #nokings event: www.nokings.org

submitted 10 hours ago • 1 comment

If you can’t use your military against your own citizens what’s the point of even having one?

submitted 9 hours ago • 2 comments

I propose a nondelegation challenge to Trump's massive new travel ban. I think the idea is sound, and likely the best available approach. But if others have better ideas, I am open to them! See linked post for details, and responses to possible objections: reason.com/volokh/2025/...

submitted 3 days ago • 0 comments

In response to popular demand, here is my reply to Harvard Prof. Jack Goldsmith's critique of the judicial rulings against Trump's IEEPA tariffs. OK, maybe it was just academic/social media demand. But I responded anyway: reason.com/volokh/2025/...

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

My reply to Prof. John Yoo's critique of ruling against Trump's tariffs. Interestingly, he and I actually agree on the bottom line! He admits the "Liberation Day" tariffs are illegal, but just doesn't like the court's reasoning. reason.com/volokh/2025/...

submitted 1 day ago • 1 comment

It’s not an either/or situation—to oppose Trump’s assault on the Constitution, we need both the courts and public action. @ilyasomin.bsky.social

submitted 1 day ago • 22 comments

I guess this means we’ll have to turn away Trump’s discontented Afrikaners. What’s that you say?

submitted 14 hours ago • 4 comments

In L.A., Trump is testing his ability to take control of the streets in states and cities that voted against him. That's a key objective for an intended national strongman who'd like to subordinate these lesser governments to his will in other areas too, such as elections. [@davidfrum.bsky.social]

submitted 15 hours ago • 5 comments

It's funny because they kept INSISTING they were only against illegal immigration. No, they're just against people like my wife.

submitted 17 hours ago • 17 comments

Philly local tv station reporting that a man allegedly posed as an ICE agent in order to rob a car repair business office. How many other criminals might be getting this idea right now, given that actual ICE agents are refusing to show IDs, warrants, badges?

submitted 1 day ago • 466 comments

LA produces all of your Made In The USA apparel and fabric. LA is the port for most of your goods and produce. LA makes and the USA takes, baby.

submitted 1 day ago • 128 comments

submitted 1 day ago • 16 comments

submitted 1 day ago • 14 comments

Brennan Center and Cato Institute filed a friend-of-the-court brief in a case challenging President Trump’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, amid military response to immigration protests:

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

I'm delighted to report that @cato.org today and six other organizations joined @aclu.org in a cross-ideological amicus brief asking the federal court in Massachusetts to rule unlawful the Trump administration's attempt to impose a federal "ideological diversity" regime on Harvard University. /1

submitted 1 day ago • 3 comments

The level of border police spending is already so extreme that it has swamped nearly all other criminal law enforcement priorities for the federal government. www.cato.org/blog/deporta...

submitted 1 day ago • 8 comments

University accreditors aren't subdivisions of the government and Washington can't simply command them to deny Columbia renewed accreditation, even if the Trump administration would like to pretend it can.

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

It’s going to be something when lawyers from the law firms that settled with Trump are told they are expected to contribute pro bono services to defend the cops who shot and tear gassed reporters and bystanders.

submitted 1 day ago • 1 comment

“If he were the Sentinel’s attorney, Calvert said, he would tell the agency ‘to go pound sand.’ “‘DCF can send all the cease and desist letters it wants, but the Sentinel isn’t obligated to follow any of them,’ he said. ‘This is really trying to silence any negative coverage before it comes out.’”

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments