Erik Armstrong
brilliancecake.bsky.social
Erik Armstrong
@brilliancecake.bsky.social
Professor of English and writer. Words in Watershed Review, Solstice Literary Magazine, Composition Studies, UC Race and Equity Center. Dad and lover of nature.
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
Liam Ramos, a preschooler ICE detained the five-year-old Minnesota boy as he returned home from school and transported him to a detention center in Texas.
January 22, 2026 at 4:56 AM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
Chillingly, the whistleblower says that ICE trainers were directed (no paper trail?) to train all of ICE's new recruits that these administrative warrants authorize breaking into peoples' homes, even though DHS's own training materials still make clear that's illegal!
January 21, 2026 at 10:12 PM
This is a wild ride--literally 😱
I just woke up from a nap and somehow while I was asleep, everyone on the bus has figured out we are not going to the right place
January 20, 2026 at 11:47 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
Mamdani: "I am in support of abolishing ICE. What we see is an entity that has no interest in fulfilling its stated reason to exist. We're seeing a government agency that is supposed to be enforcing some kind of immigration law, but instead what it's doing is terrorizing people."
January 20, 2026 at 4:56 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
He goes on to describe one of his officers being stopped when she was off-duty solely because she's non-white, harassed by ICE goons who slapped her phone out of her hand as she tried to record, only to be let go when she finally revealed she was a cop.
Brooklyn Park police chief Mark Bruley: "We're hearing people being stopped with no cause & being demanded to show paperwork to determine if they're here legally. We started hearing from our police officers the same complaints. Every one of these individuals is a person of color... it has to stop"
January 20, 2026 at 5:53 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
January 19, 2026 at 8:04 PM
This man is an octogenarian child, and like a child, he will lash out at those who don't give into his demands.
January 19, 2026 at 8:08 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
this is what it has come to for Mexican restaurants in the Twin Cities
January 19, 2026 at 2:12 AM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
recorded this last week
Why Congress Needs to Treat ICE Like the Ku Klux Klan
YouTube video by Takes™ by Jamelle Bouie
youtu.be
January 19, 2026 at 1:11 AM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
Average Sunday show interview:

OFFICIAL: we are going to dip enemies of the state into acid vats

HOST: how will you pay for it?

OFFICIAL: tariffs

HOST: critics say tariffs don't generate acid vat money

OFFICIAL: tariffs have generated more money than has ever existed

HOST: thank u for ur time
January 18, 2026 at 3:53 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
I know it’s hard to have optimism right now, but if there’s one thing that is genuinely giving me hope it is seeing communities — hell, neighborhoods, even portions of cities — stand up in unison against tyranny in a way that is active, capable, savvy. It’s really powerful.
January 18, 2026 at 2:43 AM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
"It seems like every few years, you could write a whole new book on gravity."

James Riordon, author of "Crush: Close Encounters with Gravity," recommends his favorite books on this peculiar force—from the equations needed to understand it, to a funny book about what it's like to live without it:
Gravity
Since the 17th century, we've been aware that the force that causes apples to fall from a tree is the same force that holds the planets in the sky, but we still don't know everything there is to know…
fivebooks.com
January 17, 2026 at 10:40 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
As of Thursday, ICE-Gestapo was holding over 73,000 people in their concentration camps, a record amount in their disgraceful 23 year history.

They aren’t a law enforcement agency, they are a militarized terrorist organization that should have been disbanded long ago.
January 17, 2026 at 4:06 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
A massive "Hands off Greenland" protest is happening right now in Copenhagen to demonstrate against Trump's threats.

"The aim is to send a clear and unified message of respect for Greenland's democracy," organisers said.

“Respect for Greenland, respect for Greenlanders, respect for Denmark.”
January 17, 2026 at 3:52 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
Judge limits ICE’s crowd control tactics following Minneapolis shooting
Judge limits ICE’s crowd control tactics following Minneapolis shooting
The judge’s order prevents federal agents from arresting peaceful protesters.
dlvr.it
January 17, 2026 at 1:55 AM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
The actual story is that a family of American citizens trying to evacuate from a neighborhood that ICE had made unsafe, and then ICE tossed munitions into the car, causing three kids to be hospitalized and a six month old to stop breathing. DHS called the family “radical agitators”
January 16, 2026 at 5:16 PM
How's that adage go? "Every computer app is really an advertisement app," or something like that. Also, "organic answer" is a really dubious choice of words.
January 16, 2026 at 11:01 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
More than 550 people have contracted measles in Spartanburg County, S.C., in a fast-growing outbreak. Like a majority of U.S. counties, nonmedical exemptions to school vaccination are also rising. n.pr/4qW0N4X
Measles is spreading fast in S.C. Here's what it says about vaccine exemptions
More than 550 people have contracted measles in Spartanburg County, S.C., in a fast-growing outbreak. Like a majority of U.S. counties, nonmedical exemptions to school vaccination are also rising.
n.pr
January 16, 2026 at 9:14 PM
Reposted by Erik Armstrong
This is my friend Matt's Emmy from 2011 which I now proudly accept. Thank you all for this great honor.
January 16, 2026 at 8:52 PM