Ed Walker
edwalker.bsky.social
Ed Walker
@edwalker.bsky.social
I read a lot of books, Some of them are interesting enough to write about at emptywheel.net. Retired lawyer. Currently essays by Doerfler and Moyn and Regime Change by Deneen.

Avatar: detail from Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Eden by Masaccio.
Pinned
There are three things you need to learn from your media engagements:
1. Am I or my family in danger?
2. How can I help people who are in danger?
3. Who is on my side?

Once you've answered those questions, you can safely sign out in order to protect your blood pressure and your sanity.
Reposted by Ed Walker
Please. Please.
Find SOME WAY to share this w/your “non-political” but GOP-leaning friends.
LET them call you a liar, or radical, or a hysterical feminist, or all the things they’ve called us PATRIOTS for decades now.
Their quiet campaign against women’s rights threatens everyone.
February 7, 2026 at 12:27 AM
Out shopping today, two different sales folk launched into anti-Trump rants, one after the mention of tariffs which are raising prices for their goods, and the other pretty much on their own.

I love Chicago!
February 7, 2026 at 3:32 AM
Reposted by Ed Walker
“Sanders, who rallied for his former adviser Mejia on the eve of the election, said Democrats are starting to realize that "not only is [AIPAC's] policy bad, but it's going to hurt me politically,'" and predicted candidates will start throwing the AIPAC spending back at them.”
‘It’s pissing people off’: Centrist Democrats are livid with AIPAC after primary fiasco — POLITICO
AIPAC spent $2 million attacking moderate-leaning Tom Malinowski in a House special election — and may have handed the race to progressive Analilia Mejia.
apple.news
February 6, 2026 at 11:49 PM
Do you vote in a contested Dem primary? AIPAC may be working against the progressive in the race. Read about it here.

Especially if you live in IL-2, IL-8, or IL-9.

Each has a candidate apparently supported by AIPAC.

prospect.org/2026/02/06/a...
AIPAC Coordinates Donors in Illinois House Primaries - The American Prospect
Three Democratic candidates are benefiting from dark-money super PACs, and they share hundreds of donors who have previously given to AIPAC.
prospect.org
February 7, 2026 at 12:01 AM
Do you vote in IL-8, Raja Krishnamoorthi's district?

Read about Melissa Bean's connections to AIPAC.

open.substack.com/pub/dropsite...
AIPAC Coordinates Donors in Illinois House Primaries
Three Democratic candidates are benefiting from dark-money super PACs, and they share hundreds of donors who have previously given to AIPAC and its subsidiaries.
open.substack.com
February 6, 2026 at 11:15 PM
Do you vote in IL-2, Robin Kelly's seat?

Read about Donna Miller's connections to AIPAC.

open.substack.com/pub/dropsite...
AIPAC Coordinates Donors in Illinois House Primaries
Three Democratic candidates are benefiting from dark-money super PACs, and they share hundreds of donors who have previously given to AIPAC and its subsidiaries.
open.substack.com
February 6, 2026 at 11:13 PM
Do you vote in IL-9, Jan Schachowsky's seat?

Read about Laura Fine's connections to AIPAC.

open.substack.com/pub/dropsite...
AIPAC Coordinates Donors in Illinois House Primaries
Three Democratic candidates are benefiting from dark-money super PACs, and they share hundreds of donors who have previously given to AIPAC and its subsidiaries.
open.substack.com
February 6, 2026 at 11:10 PM
Reposted by Ed Walker
The correct response would have been, "No, she should have complied."
February 5, 2026 at 8:32 PM
Reposted by Ed Walker
Jessie Diggins, Olympic cross-country skiing gold medalist, from the Twin Cities: “I want to make sure you know who I’m racing for…”
February 5, 2026 at 5:27 PM
Reposted by Ed Walker
After latest release country should move on to Epstein trials.
February 5, 2026 at 7:39 PM
Reposted by Ed Walker
DOJ is crushing career staff under leadership’s chaos.

Julie Le was pulled in to help carry an impossible load. Her pleas in federal court represent an entire DOJ stretched to the brink.

If you are at DOJ and need mental health support, reach out. www.thejusticeconnection.org/mental-healt...
Mental Health Resources for DOJ Workers - Justice Connection
Justice Connection offers DOJ employees free mental health resources compiled by former DOJ clinicians. Access our list of providers, tools, and classes.
www.thejusticeconnection.org
February 5, 2026 at 4:15 PM
🧵
Le's supervisor is also resigning, probably for the same reasons: ICE does not comply with court orders, doesn't communicate with its lawyers, and refuses to change.

The logical explanation is that the abuse of detainees, described at the hearing by Kira Kelley, is official policy.
You might ask if she deserves our sympathy seeing as she was a cog in the deportation machine. That is a fair question. But here is the twist. She wasn't cracking because she hated the immigrants. She was cracking because her own client refused to follow the law.
February 5, 2026 at 6:48 PM
The US: where measles is punishment for the crime of being the child of ICE detainees.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
Calls to shut down Texas ICE facility for children grow amid measles outbreak
At least two cases confirmed at detention center for children and their parents in Texas
www.theguardian.com
February 5, 2026 at 5:34 PM
@schumer.senate.gov Read the transcript linked in the substack post below. This is how ICE operates.

Tell me a common sense solution other than abolishing this mob operation.
This by @chrisgeidner.bsky.social is terrific reporting. The govenment, from Noem on down, is violating the law and ignoring Court orders. District Court are trying to stop it, but the Trump-fluffing six on SCOTUS make it impossible.

open.substack.com/pub/chrisgei...
February 5, 2026 at 5:20 PM
This by @chrisgeidner.bsky.social is terrific reporting. The govenment, from Noem on down, is violating the law and ignoring Court orders. District Court are trying to stop it, but the Trump-fluffing six on SCOTUS make it impossible.

open.substack.com/pub/chrisgei...
February 5, 2026 at 5:00 PM
🧵
I agree 💯
I just read the declaration that Kira Kelley asked J. Blackwell to consider.
This immigrant describes being
-unlawfully arrested
-taken from one overcrowded & filthy prison to another over 19 days
-held incommunicado
& ICE never telling him a court ordered his release

He describes an American gulag
February 5, 2026 at 4:58 PM
Reposted by Ed Walker
Shout out to Kira Kelley for an absolute banger soliloquy on the horrific shit the government is doing.
February 4, 2026 at 10:09 PM
Reposted by Ed Walker
Morality is about us as human beings responsible for our own decisions. Law is sterile in comparison. It only has meaning when it's connected to a sense of fairness and justice, and at the deepest level, to morality.

emptywheel.net/morality-is-...
February 5, 2026 at 4:31 AM
Morality is about us as human beings responsible for our own decisions. Law is sterile in comparison. It only has meaning when it's connected to a sense of fairness and justice, and at the deepest level, to morality.

emptywheel.net/morality-is-...
February 5, 2026 at 4:31 AM
Reposted by Ed Walker
NEW: A rupture between DOJ and ICE has emerged in Minnesota, where overwhelmed prosecutors keep dropping the ball — and saying ICE won't return their messages.

The crisis has had real-world consequences for migrants illegally detained

w/ @joshgerstein.bsky.social

www.politico.com/news/2026/02...
February 4, 2026 at 8:27 PM
@schumer.senate.gov the only common-sense reform is abolishing this goon mob.

Anything less leaves us in Chicago at risk of violence.
Chuck Schumer: "When these ICE thugs just keep beating and beating and beating a woman who is pushed to the floor, that's unamerican. So Democrats have common sense tough objectives to rein in ICE. There's gotta be oversight and a right to sue them."
February 4, 2026 at 10:02 PM
Every site I click on requires me to close a Not-a-Popup window begging me for money or to sign up for newsletters or something.

I hate it.
February 4, 2026 at 9:55 PM
No one has ever asked me why I left Tennessee.

I feel bad for a few of the people I left behind, though.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
Tennessee to test Stephen Miller’s plan of enlisting states for immigration enforcement
Bills mandate ICE cooperation, school status checks and criminalize information release, testing constitutional lines
www.theguardian.com
February 4, 2026 at 6:13 PM
Has anyone asked Mike Johnson, our Holy Speaker, whether he supports Trump's efforts to rig the 2026 mid-term elections?

There's a lot of reporting on this: here's one from The Atlantic.

Adding, David Brooks will both-sides this later. www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/...
Trump’s New Threats to American Elections
The reasons to worry about election integrity are becoming more urgent.
www.theatlantic.com
February 4, 2026 at 3:37 PM