Anastacia 😷💜

She/her👱🏻‍♀️, Mom 👨‍👩‍👧Wife, Musician🎼, Weather nerd ⛈🌪🤓, Lover of nature 🌿, Long Covid warrior, fighter for equality, love, & kindness🌈

[ProPublica @propublica]

Trump has destroyed federal guardrails meant to ensure secure and fair elections.

Some fear his actions are aimed at making sure the upcoming midterms go his way.
https://t.co/OtJZwaFnKX

[Joel Montfort @jmontforttx]

In the 1950s and 60's, screwworm was devastating in Texas, costing billions ( adjusted for inflation) annually. In 1935, 180K livestock were lost to the fly. 50% of deer fawns died, and the fly decimated deer populations. We have to get on top of this urgently.

[Miles Taylor @MilesTaylorUSA]

Yesterday Donald Trump tripled the size of his personal political army inside the government. Illegally. And almost no one noticed.

Here's what happened:

He signed an order converting ~8,000 of the most senior career officials in government into employees he can fire for any reason, or no reason at all.

These aren't rando's. They're the directors, chiefs of staff, and the people who write the rules or decide who gets federal money, i.e. the lieutenants right below his political appointees.

Until yesterday, they answered to the law. Now they answer to him.

A president normally gets ~4,000 political appointees. People he can bring into government and fire at will. I was one of them at DHS. You serve at his pleasure, full stop -- so if you're gonna speak truth to power, you're prepared to quit (or get fired if he doesn't like it).

The rest of the federal government is PROTECTED from firing if they tell the truth.

But Trump just stripped those protections. Adding 8,000 more people to his personal army. Overnight. Without asking Congress.

With the stroke of a pen, those people now serve at the pleasure of the president. They're "his" people, whether they like it or not.

And the chilling effect is real. An official who can be fired this afternoon for "subversion of presidential directives" (the order's own words) doesn't need to be hand-picked to know what's expected of him or her.

The threat does all the work.

By the way, this order is illegal. The law only lets Trump reclassify jobs when "necessary" in exceptional circumstances. And this blows an 8,000-person hole in the merit hiring / firing system created by Congress.

Without permission, Trump has created a whole new category of stormtroopers inside the Executive Branch.

If this doesn't get challenged in court, you're going to see the U.S. government become a very different place.

Here's the full story: https://t.co/mJzrvzhxGR

[Meriwether Farms @MeriwetherFarms]

We have been warning the public on New World Screwworm for over a year now (some much longer than us)

We even had our account on X suspended for a month when we showed a picture of what an infection looks like in a human, shortly before there was a human case confirmed in the US last August

The Secretary of Agriculture continued to assure the public that the Screwworm situation was “under control” and continued to ignore concerns and requests from producers and elected officials from her home state of Texas

This is not something to no longer downplay or brush off

The Agricultural industry is already entering into hellish conditions this summer because of drought and rising fuel and input prices, compounded now with an outbreak of flesh eating maggots

We need serious and dedicated leadership on this

We need a whole of government approach

We need states next to Texas and Mexico to be able access the resources and funding to combat this pest as they will be caught completely off guard when it reaches their states

We have asked before months ago but are asking again for President Trump to declare a National Emergency Declaration TODAY!

Thank you for your attention to this matter

[Marco Foster @MarcoFoster_]

Mary Trump: “Don’t waste our time running as a Democrat if you are not running on Supreme Court reform. And I don’t mean reform around the edges. I mean you’re gonna add 4-6 seats immediately. You’re going to implement term limits. You’re going to put in an ethics criteria and you’re going to make sure many of these most egregious decisions are undone”

[Ashish K. Jha @ashishkjha]

We had eliminated measles and are about to lose our measles eradication status

We had eradicated screwworm but its making its way back

Keeping these scourges at bay requires active surveillance and action

[The Lincoln Project @ProjectLincoln]

Agriculture Sec @BrookeLRollins in November: "We have screwworm under control south of the border. Beef prices will come down by spring 2026"

Beef prices continue to rise, and screwworm is now in the US.

[Niall Stanage @NiallStanage]

Astounding times.

[Texas Observer @TexasObserver]

At least two of Texas’ new superintendent appointees have connections to the controversial Colorado-based charter network Third Future Schools, which is expanding around the state as districts turn campuses over to the nonprofit. https://t.co/ied4LEECnx

[The Bulwark @BulwarkOnline]

Bari Weiss and the rest of MAGA never wanted to end “cancel culture.” They wanted to control it.
https://t.co/Xc4ha2iVx3

[Politics UK @PolitlcsUK]

🚨 NEW: British schoolboy Alexander Browder has become the first child sanctioned by Russia after exposing illegal crypto deals used to bypass sanctions

"I am going to be wearing it as a badge of honour. It shows me that I touched a nerve - I am looking in the right places"

[The Tennessee Holler @TheTNHoller]

Wild that there isn’t more coverage of this protest of jared and Ivanka’s luxury resort deal in Albania

[Bill Madden @maddenifico]

Do not watch CBS News.

Do not watch 60 Minutes.

Do not normalize what CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss is attempting to get away with.

[GOP Ls @GOP__Ls]

🚨 Private prison exec David Venturella saw his profits climb 700% after Trump gave his group $520 million in taxpayer dollars.

He now leads ICE.

[Michael @TheMG3D]

Shut them all down, we can live without AI data centers we can’t live without clean water.

[ProPublica @propublica]

After receiving a request from Peter Navarro, the Pentagon rushed to approve a deal to lend $620 million to a company linked to Donald Trump Jr.

Now, lawmakers are demanding answers from the White House.

https://t.co/d5cwxt7OO0

[Headquarters @HQNewsNow]

The New World Screwworm, a grave parasitic threat, has just been detected in US cattle for the first time since it was eradicated in 1966.

The parasite's revival comes after Trump and DOGE slashed funding for Screwworm monitoring programs.

[Financial Times @FT]

Senior official from Germany’s AfD meets top Kremlin associates https://t.co/BpkrF5PKEf

[Financial Times @FT]

Elon Musk shifts social media focus from SpaceX to UK far-right politics https://t.co/qCuxvnx9rp

[Eyepatch Man @eyepatch_man]

Bezrukov stole the identity of a 🇨🇦 boy (Donald Healthfield) who died in infancy. He lived in 🇺🇸 as an illegal spy/sleeper agent for a decade. This is the likes of whom Candace Owens is rubbing elbows with at SPIEF.

When I said SPIEF was a rogues' gallery, I wasn't exaggerating.