Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Bryce Covert

Monica Potts @monicapotts.bsky.social · 4h

The Trump admin is rushing implementation of new SNAP work requirements, almost guaranteeing people will get kicked off even if they're still eligible. Of course their goal is to kick people off anyway. newrepublic.com/article/2015...

The Trump Administration Is Rushing to Implement SNAP Cuts

The USDA is screwing the states by ordering them to implement SNAP work requirements practically overnight.

newrepublic.com

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 1h

Classic Trump: promises a big check to save WIC but the money has yet to materialize. So people are suffering.

Politico @politico.com · 5h

The shutdown is already impacting delivery of nutrition aid to low-income moms and babies.

Trump officials said tariff revenue would fund WIC until the government reopens, but the money hasn’t started flowing yet.

States left in the dark on food aid despite Trump’s promise of tariff funds

The shutdown is already interrupting benefits for low-income moms and babies — and agencies don’t know when the next check is coming.

www.politico.com

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 8h

The article leaves out Charlotte Burrows, who was chair of the EEOC before Trump fired her (something he doesn't have legal authority to do). The acting chair he picked in her place and the new commissioner he just got confirmed are both white.

An official portrait of Charlotte Burrows

An official portrait of Andrea Lucas, Trump's pick for acting EEOC chair

Brittany Panuccio, who was just confirmed as an EEOC commissioner after Trump selected her

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 9h

Trump has repeatedly fired Black government officials and replaced them with white men www.nytimes.com/2025/10/08/u...

Trump Fires Black Officials From an Overwhelmingly White Administration

www.nytimes.com

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Katie Prout @katieprout.bsky.social · 1d

At least 6 unhoused Chicagoans have been abducted by federal agents since September: 2 have been released, while the status of the remaining 4 is unknown. But the Chicago Coalition to End Homelessness is investigating reports of an additional 19 people disappeared.

chicagoreader.com/news/make-it...

Make It Make Sense: ICE targets Chicago’s homeless community

Plus: state and local leaders crack down on anti-ICE protesters and advocates ask the chief judge to keep ICE out of county courthouses.

chicagoreader.com

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 1d

Georgia's Medicaid work requirement increased neither Medicaid enrollment nor employment www.bmj.com/content/390/...

Insurance coverage and employment after Medicaid expansion with work requirements: quasi-experimental difference-in-differences study

Objective To understand how health insurance coverage and employment changed among working age adults with low incomes in Georgia, the first state to implement Medicaid expansion with work requirement...

www.bmj.com

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 1d

The EEOC under Trump: just three racial discrimination lawsuits, two of which claim "reverse discrimination" www.hrdive.com/news/eeoc-re...

EEOC’s last year marked by record-low litigation, shifting priorities

While few lawsuits raised eyebrows this year, a quorum on the horizon could bring a range of controversial complaints from the agency — including discrimination based on DEI programs.

www.hrdive.com

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 1d

The lede in this article is utterly devastating

Amanda Katz @katzish.bsky.social · 1d

Horrific reporting from the AP on the Myanmar families watching their kids starve to death from Trump and Musk’s aid cuts apnews.com/article/myan...

Starving children screaming for food as US aid cuts unleash devastation and death across Myanmar

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has repeatedly said “no one has died" because of his government’s decision to gut its foreign aid program.

apnews.com

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 1d

As pensions have disappeared, Americans are on the hook to find ways to create a comfortable retirement. Advisors who aren't required to act in their clients' best interests are preying on the opportunity, and Trump is likely to let them keep scamming retirees. inthesetimes.com/article/unle...

Unleashing Retirement Scammers

The Trump administration may reopen a loophole that allows investment brokers to enrich themselves at clients' expense.

inthesetimes.com

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 2d

Is it light enough for you to lift and carry? I would love an e-bike but have to get it up and down very steep basement stairs

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Sarah Lazare @sarahlazare.bsky.social · 2d

Yesterday I spoke to Brandon Lee from the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee rights. He said they are still trying to get in touch with people who were taken. “This is very much a case of DHS deliberately trying to disappear people. Why else would they do it in the middle of the night?”

Sarah Lazare @sarahlazare.bsky.social · 2d

"Days later, neighbors are still searching for the missing."

Federal Agents Storm South Shore Building, Detaining Families and Children

Families were woken by flashbangs and helicopters as hundreds of federal agents raided their homes. Days later, neighbors are still searching for the missing.

southsideweekly.com

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Sarah Lazare @sarahlazare.bsky.social · 3d

There is a class component to federal agents' crackdowns. They're abducting day laborers, street vendors, domestic workers, textile workers en masse. They're not going after big employers/people in Trump's corporate milieu.

How ICE Terror Campaigns Are Used to Discipline Labor

While Chicago sees a surge of ICE detentions, workers are facing retaliation as immigrants when they advocate for their rights.

prospect.org

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 6d

Food banks were already stretched, and then the Trump administration canceled the delivery of 94 million pounds of food. And then Republicans passed the largest SNAP cut ever. projects.propublica.org/trump-food-c...

Trump Canceled 94 Million Pounds of Food Aid. Here’s What Never Arrived.

ProPublica obtained records from the Department of Agriculture that detail the millions of pounds of food, down to the number of eggs, that never reached food banks because of the administration’s cut...

projects.propublica.org

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 6d

"Full-day kindergarten expansions were responsible for as much as 24 percent of the growth in employment of mothers with kindergartenaged children"

chloe gibbs @chloergibbs.bsky.social · 6d

🙌 🙌 So happy to see this project come to fruition and this paper officially forthcoming at AEJ: Policy -- in part because I care so much about the question and am proud of how we answered it, and in part because I got to work with superstar coauthors Jocelyn Wikle and Riley Wilson, who are the best.

AEA Journals @aeajournals.bsky.social · 6d

Forthcoming in AEJ: Economic Policy: "A Matter of Time? Measuring Effects of Public Schooling Expansions on Families" by Chloe R. Gibbs, Jocelyn Wikle, and Riley Wilson. www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=...

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 6d

Really important segment on where we are. "Masked secret police profiling people and now targeting entire apartment buildings, making everyone prove they're not guilty of something." Including, it should be noted, US citizens.

Chris Hayes @chrislhayes.bsky.social · 6d

youtu.be/vOXOWAhFz0A

‘F--- them kids’: ICE agents drag children out of bed, ransack Chicago building

YouTube video by MSNBC

youtu.be

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 6d

Interesting that the EEOC is keeping the “radical left Democrats” thing off its website

Screenshot of eeoc.gov that says “Due to a lapse in appropriations, the EEOC’s offices are temporarily closed”

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Anjali Enjeti @anjalienjeti.bsky.social · 7d

My god.

“Watson said she saw agents dragging residents, including kids, out of the building without any clothes on and into U-Haul vans. Kids were separated from their mothers…’It was heartbreaking to watch…seeing kids coming out buck naked and taken from their mothers, it was horrible.’”

Massive immigration raid on Chicago apartment building leaves residents reeling: 'I feel defeated'

The Department of Homeland Security said federal agents with Border Patrol, the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives arrested 37 people in the raid.

chicago.suntimes.com

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Pam Herd @pamherd.bsky.social · 8d

States are facing catastrophic SNAP cuts from the Big Beautiful Bill--North Carolina is saying they may shutter their SNAP program. The Bill cuts the budget to administer SNAP, charges states billions for making administrative mistakes, all while adding even more admin complexity to the program.

Eligibility guidelines are complicated—and especially so now with new work requirements. Beneficiaries’ incomes and work patterns are also complicated—their employment is unstable and often intermittent given how low-wage labor markets function. Moreover, their expenses, like childcare costs, are highly variable, but also critical to determining eligibility and benefit levels. The interaction, inevitably, leads to mistakes. Importantly, error rates also include procedural mistakes—like a missing form—even if the benefit is correct.

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Michael Sainato @msainato.bsky.social · 8d

US Department of Labor walks back funding freeze for DOL’s Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP) after a class action lawsuit was filed

Crucial Lifeline for Tens of Thousands of Older Americans Saved

Complaint Forces Reversal of Trump-Vance Administration’s Unlawful Funding Freeze for Vital Senior Employment Program

Massachusetts - Following a class action complaint, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has announced it will reverse course and release funds for national nonprofit organizations to execute DOL’s Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP) - a more than 60-year old program that provides employment opportunities and job training to older Americans who need a lifeline to get back into the workforce. In response to an arbitrary funding freeze by the Trump-Vance administration, Democracy Forward and Jacobson Lawyers Group PLLC filed a lawsuit — Jones et al v. Department of Labor et al – that sought to restore more than $300 million in grants.

“This is a huge win for seniors in need and yet another demonstration that, in many cases, when the American people fight back against this administration, it backs down,” said Skye Perryman, President and CEO of Democracy Forward. “Tens of thousands of older Americans were put in jeopardy by the funding freeze on this vital program. Thanks to our brave clients and the work of the Democracy Forward team, we have protected everyone who relies on the Senior Community Service and Employment Program.”

“The government took these steps only because the brave participants of the SCSEP program refused to stand silently to the side," said Lynn Eisenberg, partner at Jacobson Lawyers Group. "Because of their suit, tens of thousands of seniors across the country can once again make a living while serving their communities."

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 8d

Glad to see that completely unqualified and outright dangerous people can still be derailed from political appointments www.nytimes.com/2025/09/30/b...

White House Pulls Pick to Lead Labor Data Agency

www.nytimes.com

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 9d

Interesting stuff going on on the HUD main page

A pop up screen on hud.gov saying “The Radical Left are going to shut down the government and inflict massive pain on the American people unless they get their $1.5 trillion wish list of demands.”

A bright red splash at the top of hud.gov with the same message

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Marcia Brown @marciabrown.bsky.social · 10d

A government shutdown is looming.

If it happens, the nation’s top nutrition program for low-income moms and babies will run out of $$ within days.

Story for @politico.com w/ Rachel Shin

subscriber.politicopro.com/article/2025...

POLITICO Pro: Shutdown would impact nutrition benefits for moms, babies within days

A signature program that serves millions of people may run out of money in one week. The White House says it could be even faster than that.

subscriber.politicopro.com

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

David Dayen @ddayen.bsky.social · 10d

This is from Steve Womack, Republican appropriator, on whether Democrats should help negotiate a budget solution:
"Why would you do that if you know that whatever you negotiate is going to be subject to the knife pulled out by Russ Vought?"
The *Republicans* have figured this out!

Vought’s crusade upends the shutdown fight

It was only a matter of time before Russ Vought shook up the shutdown fight.

www.politico.com

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Zach Parolin @zparolin.bsky.social · 10d

New WP: We study how minimum wage increases affect poverty and food hardship in the U.S from 1981-2019. Different from recent work, we study the Supplemental Poverty Measure + two measures of food hardship, factor in cost-of-living differences, and more. www.iza.org/publications...

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Reposted by Bryce Covert

Louise Seamster @louiseseamster.bsky.social · 10d

This is an important investigation and the context I’d add as a sociologist is how hard-to-use these programs already are for many—from years-long waiting lines for section 8 or housing, to lack of landlords willing to rent to Section 8 households, and ongoing loss of public housing units

ProPublica @propublica.org · 10d

NEW: Some 4 million people in the U.S. could lose federal housing assistance under new plans from the Trump administration, say experts who reviewed drafts of two unpublished rules obtained by ProPublica.

By @jessecoburn.bsky.social

Millions Could Lose Housing Aid Under Trump Plan

Drafts of unpublished rules obtained by ProPublica detail plans that would open the door to full-time work requirements, two-year limits on living in federally supported housing and stripping aid from...

www.propublica.org

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