By J. Patrick Coolican | Editor-in-chief
Good morning, Reformers,
You should have received our second quarter fundraising appeal this morning. Chip in, especially with a recurring donation, if you can.
Concession workers at Target Field will strike this evening. Max Nesterak will be on the scene. If you see him, do your best to explain baseball to him.
Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan and U.S. Rep. Angie Craig, who are battling for the DFL nomination for U.S. Senate, kinda sorta debated Friday on TPT Almanac, and it got a bit chippy. Watch, via MPR.
The two candidates each have a liability. Craig was an immigration and border hawk who voted for the Laken Riley Act. Democratic primary voters, many of them volunteers for the anti-ICE resistance, aren’t about it. Flanagan is attached to Gov. Tim Walz, like it or not, and his numbers have been dragged down in recent months, likely due to unending news of fraud that’s beset our safety net programs.
To the news:
Over two tons of fish ready to be hauled away after a fishing tournament, brought to an organic soil company and made into fertilizer. (Photo by Frank Bures/Minnesota Reformer)
By Frank Bures
Great piece about new developments in what we know about some of our most common and oldest native fish species. Only recently have scientists and policymakers discovered their importance after decades of lumping them in with the dreaded invasive species, carp.
Buffalo and carp are separated by 50 million years of evolution. We’ve also learned that in some waterways, bigmouth buffalo have not successfully reproduced for more than 80 years. The individuals in those waters were born in the 1920s, 1930s or as late as the 1950s. But almost none after that.
No one knows why. This is because there’s been no funding for, or even much interest in, researching “rough fish.” Instead, it was considered good practice to wipe them out to make room for more desirable species like walleye, bass and pike.
By Ariana Figueroa
When the overhead lights turn off at the Farmville Detention Center in Virginia, it not only means that night has arrived for Aliaksei Scharbachenia, but that panic attacks will soon follow.
The attacks, which started after his detention began last August, he said, have only grown worse, stemming from the fear that he will be returned to his country of Belarus and face persecution due to his opposition to the authoritarian government.
“With the panic attacks, I was able to take care of myself before,” he said in Russian. “But now it’s kind of getting worse, so I really need some medication, which will help me.”
As the Trump administration increases the scale of its immigrant detention program, now up to 68,000 immigrants in custody, reports have surfaced of inhumane conditions and inadequate medical care at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities like the one housing Scharbachenia.
IN OTHER NEWS
How an addictive gas station drug found allies in the Trump cabinet | New York Times gift link
Tulsi Gabbard, her guru and the mysterious messages that helped shape her political career | Washington Post gift link
What if it all came out | Scary New York magazine story about digital privacy
OH BY THE WAY
I was at a fundraiser Saturday night for Park Square Theater, the scrappy little theater in downtown St. Paul that also puts on wonderful camps and other youth programming, and I’m told they raised 40% more than they’d budgeted for.
Last night my 9-year-old son and I went to the Lynx game. Sadly, they lost, no thanks to some questionable calls, but it was a raucous crowd and a fun environment on Pride Night.
We have our problems in Minnesota, but we also have a remarkable well of social capital and resilient civil society institutions, and it’s good to appreciate them once in a while.
Song of the day is this quicker-than-usual “They Love Each Other,” Grateful Dead playing in Oklahoma City, October 1973. H/T M.D.
Have a great day all! JPC
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