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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3h

Big drop in the number of "southbound migrants" (mainly Venezuelan people who'd given up on coming to the United States after Trump unlawfully banned asylum) who Colombia's government has detected coming from Panama.

www.migracioncolombia.gov.co/publicacione...

FLUJO NORTE–SUR
DETECCIONES POR MES 2025

286
1.599
2.914 2.793 2.654
2.101 2.075
1.775
655

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3h

Here's what Border Patrol apprehensions at the U.S.-Mexico border look like since Trump took office.

U.S.-Mexico Border Patrol Apprehensions During the Trump Administration

Apprehensions
February 8353
March 7180
April 8377
May 8725
June 6068
July 4596
August 6321
September (preliminary) 8382

Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 5h

Though a historically low number, this means Border Patrol apprehended about 8,380 people in September, up from 6,068 in June, 4,596 in July, and 6,321 in August.

A 33% increase August-Sept, and an 82% increase July-Sept.

(The August 31 running total was 229,183.)

From www.dhs.gov/news/2025/10...

Southwest Border Apprehensions: 237,565 — the lowest fiscal year total in 55 years, compared to 201,780 in Fiscal Year 1970, and 87 percent below the average of the last four fiscal years which was 1.86 million.
Most encounters happened under the previous administration: 172,026 apprehensions — 72 percent of the total — occurred during the under the Biden Administration during the first 111 days of the fiscal year. Over the next 254 days, this administration recorded 65,539 apprehensions, accounting for just 27 percent of the year’s total.
Nationwide Encounters: 26,000 — down from 26,191 in August 2025 and 89 percent lower than the monthly average under the last administration.
Southwest Border Daily Average Apprehensions: 279 per day in September — fewer in an entire day now than in just two hours under the last administration, and 95 percent lower than the last administration’s daily average of 5,110 from February 2021 through December 2024.

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 1d

For less than what Florida and Indiana are charging US taxpayers to detain migrants in miserable conditions, you can book rooms tonight in decent hotels in central Washington DC.

From @nickmiroff.bsky.social at @theatlantic.com: www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...

Those rates are significantly lower than the amounts DHS appears to be paying through its most recent contracts at state-run facilities. The commissioner of the Indiana Department of Corrections told state lawmakers last month that DHS will pay $291 a day at the “Speedway Slammer,” while guaranteeing that the facility has a minimum of 450 detainees. The average cost of a bed inside the tents at “Alligator Alcatraz” is $245 a day, records show.

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 1d

Not a day goes by anymore without a fresh “appears to contradict the government’s allegation” story from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

There was a kid in my 6th grade who lied as often and as badly as DHS does; everyone left him alone, though, because he had a tough situation at home.

Chicago Sun-Times @chicago.suntimes.com · 1d

Body-camera video appears to contradict the government’s claim that Marimar Martinez, 30, drove toward officers before one of them opened fire at her late Saturday morning in Brighton Park, her attorney claimed.
trib.al/9Sxu9IN

Attorney for woman shot by Border Patrol claims officer said 'Do something b-----' before shooting

Body-camera video appears to contradict the government's claim that Marimar Martinez, 30, drove toward officers before one of them opened fire at her late Saturday morning in Brighton Park, her attorney claimed. A judge ordered Martinez and a co-defendant released pending trial.

trib.al

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 1d

You’ve got to treat it like they’re dipping their big toe in the water, and turn the heat on “max high” now to make sure they never jump all the way in

1

Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 2d

I'm in New York tomorrow. Come hear a great panel and say "hi" if you're around tomorrow afternoon. (365 Fifth Avenue)

The
Fentanyl Crisis
Tuesday, October 7 - 3 PM
Room 9207
The Graduate Center, CUNY RSVP at bildner@gc.cuny.edu
Speakers
Jonathan D. Rosen
New Jersey City University
Adam Isacson
Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA)
Moderator: Enrique Desmond Arias
Baruch College & The Graduate Center, CUNY

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 2d

This is bad. We've seen at the border—while Biden was still president (and his administration did nothing)—what the Texas National Guard does to peaceful crowds and defenseless migrants.

This, and much more, is from us in September 2024: www.wola.org/analysis/sol...

Hope Border Institute, an El Paso-based Catholic organization that maintains a health clinic in Ciudad Juárez, reported the following treatments of Operation Lone Star-related injuries in May and June 2024:
Eight people, including three children, with razor wire and concertina wire cuts.
25 people, mostly men, injured by pepper and gas balls and rubber bullets shot by the Texas National Guard.
Two mothers and two children with intense psychological and emotional trauma after being separated from other family members at the Texas razor wire line.
In February 2024, journalists reported Texas National Guard soldiers pushing migrants, including a woman with a baby, back across the Mexican border near El Paso while shouting profanities. When journalists recorded the incidents, guards changed their behavior but pointed lasers at journalists and their equipment.
In a video published on October 3, 2023 by Al Jazeera, a Texas National Guard member in El Paso was seen standing over a prone man struggling to pass under concertina wire. The guard member taunted and abused the man, saying, “I have no mercy, animals” and stomping on the man’s hands.
In July 2023 CBS News published an email from a Texas State trooper to his superiors in Eagle Pass, detailing several disturbing situations including the trooper finding a group of migrants, including children and nursing babies, camped along the U.S.-Mexico fence line and his shift officer ordered them to “push the people back into the water to go to Mexico.” The email describes many migrants injured by the concertina wire, a woman suffering a miscarriage while tangled in the wire, and Texas troops’ denial of water to migrants, including children, in 100-degree heat.

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 2d

I've never been to Portland, but this makes me want to move there

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 2d

Noted Vietnam War hero donald j trump, who was 19 when LBJ escalated US involvement:

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 2d

Trump: "The problem with Vietnam, we, you know, we stopped fighting to win. We would've won easy. We would've won Afghanistan easy. We would've won every war easy. But we got politically correct. 'Oh, let's take it easy.' We're not politically correct anymore, just so you understand."

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 2d

Yes, this video is funny because these agents seem to have had less training than the characters in "Clerks."

No, this video is not funny because the Border Patrol guy's forearm is digging into that man's windpipe for a long time.

Cristian Farias @cristianfarias.com · 2d

This video of Chicagoans intervening to save a man from being abducted off the streets by ICE is making the rounds on Instagram.

Community action works.

Source: www.instagram.com/reel/DPZL2AL...

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 2d

Imagine being so deep into your weird online world that “let’s make the U.S. judicial system more like El Salvador’s” sounds like some kind of genius talking point

Elon Musk @elonmusk
X.com
Essential
• Eric Daugherty • @EricLDaugh • 1d We need to Bukele our court system.
WATCH how quickly this country is fixed.
Nayib Bukele v @nayibbukele
If you don't impeach the corrupt judges, you CANNOT fix the country.
They will form a cartel (a judicial dictatorship) and block all reforms, protecting the systemic corruption that put them in their seats.
8:51 PM • 10/4/25 • 5.2M Views
2.5K
22 19K
114K
2K

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

Since August, our taxes have paid for 2 to 4 private contractor guards to keep 1 car wash employee with "severe leg injuries" from escaping his hospital bed.

On or about August 27, 2025, CBP transferred custody of Petitioner to ICE. See Pet.
¶ 48. He remains detained at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center under the supervision of ICE,
which has contracted with Spectrum Detention Services (“Spectrum”) to provide guards.
See Santiago Decl. ¶ 8; Pet. ¶ 48.
Since that date, two to four uniformed guards—either Spectrum employees or ICE
agents—have been continuously stationed in Petitioner’s hospital room, monitoring him at
all times, including while he sleeps, eats, uses the restroom, or receives medical care. See
Santiago Decl. ¶¶ 9–10.

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

Remember that Border Patrol Facebook group controversy back in 2019? Seems pretty darn quaint now, doesn’t it.

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

This old town just hasn’t been the same since the ass clown factory shut down

Anna Bower @annabower.bsky.social · 3d

Among other things, it remains extremely weird that the [checks notes] director of the FBI uses phrases like “ass clown factory” in public statements posted on his official account

FBI Director Kash Patel * ®
@FBIDirectorKash
X.com
BREAKING: MSNBC still an ass clown factory of disinformation. Same circus animals that slobbered all over perp walks of Stone, Navarro, Bannon...
MSNBC has no facts and no audience
In this @fbi, follow the chain of command or get relieved.
& Barb McQuade @ @BarbMcQuade • 15h
DOJ policy prohibits "perp walks," in which arrestees are paraded before the cameras.

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

Rights defenders at the US-Mexico border tried for years to warn about Border Patrol's abusive culture. We built a database of abuses (borderoversight.org/event) and several reports. Maybe 2 dozen national Democrats were responsive; the politics were tricky. We couldn't keep that work funded.

Now:

Daniel Connerton @lordnad.bsky.social · 3d

@govpritzker.illinois.gov

37 and Kedzie, East Garfield, Illinois.

This is assault.

15 110 210

Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

lol one too many Tarantino movies

Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

10 U.S.C. 12406 again, despite Judge Breyer's ruling in CA? Insurrection Act still seems unlikely.

9

Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

If the freaked-out driver pulls the car forward and the agent shoots the driver, well, the driver's foot is still on the gas, the agent still gets run over. What do they teach at that academy?

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

You're so behind the times. Empathy is a sin now, don't you know.

Can empathy lead to sin? Some conservative Christians argue it can

Some voices on the Christian right are arguing the virtue of empathy has become a vice. Those Christians claim empathy can manipulate people into accepting what they see as sins, like abortion access ...

apnews.com

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

Human rights concerns aside—waving a loaded gun at someone while running at them, while they're at the wheel of a vehicle you've positioned yourself directly in front of?

Freak out the driver like that, there's a non-trivial probability they run you over. That agent is a danger to himself. Stupid.

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

So the government is shut down because of… the Hippocratic Oath?

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 4d

Leavitt: "When an illegal alien goes to the emergency room, who's paying for it? The American taxpayer."

9 8 39

Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

A horrible military role and a real threat to what's left of democracy; however, until their culture deteriorates further, soldiers will be less reckless and violence-prone than DHS.

1

Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 3d

"On Saturday afternoon, the crowd at the scene was growing," the Sun-Times reports.

Very tense. Let's see how DHS's "masters of de-escalatory crowd control" keep this from getting out of hand and prevent further harm and injury.

(I fear they view their mission as the opposite: to fan the flames.)

unraveled @unraveledpress.com · 3d

ICE reportedly opened fire on rapid responders on the southwest side this afternoon.

There are *very few* details on this available at this time. Treat all rumors with caution until verified.

This Sun-Times article cites a DHS statement that should be treated, as always, with extreme skepticism:

Shooting involving federal agents in Brighton Park under investigation

According to the Department of Homeland Security, a woman allegedly "boxed in" federal authorities, who opened fire.

chicago.suntimes.com

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Adam Isacson @adamisacson.com · 4d

Excellent work, David, you’re getting to them.

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