Charlie Kirk, one of America’s leading conservative activists and a close friend of President Donald Trump’s son Don Jr., has been murdered. We do not yet know who did it, or why. We do not know how the Trump administration will respond.

What we do know, however, is that there are good reasons to be afraid. 

When a prominent political figure is assassinated, the very foundations of democracy come under attack. Democratic politics is, at its heart, a system for containing political violence: a system for resolving the inevitable deep disagreements between citizens without anyone resorting to bloodshed. It works when all major factions believe that the others are committed to following the rules of the peaceful political game; when that belief erodes, it breaks down.

In the past, the American democratic consensus has been strong enough to survive assassination attempts. Some, like the murder of Martin Luther King Jr., tested its bonds but didn’t break them. Others, like the assassination of John F. Kennedy Jr., may actually have strengthened them by creating a sense of shared grief and solidarity.

But now the American political system is crumbling, and many of its tools for containing political violence lie shattered. This probably will not be the event to break America, but we have to consider the possibility that it may be.

Our democratic decline has progressed considerably in the past year.

The democratic compact today is undeniably weak. The two major parties and their supporters increasingly see each other not as partners, but existential threats to one another’s way of life. Political scientists Lilliana Mason and Nathan Kalmoe have shown that, while few Americans outright support political murder, a growing fringe in both parties have become open to using violence against their partisan enemies.

Under conditions of extreme polarization, when the guardrails of mutual democratic toleration are blown to bits, it is all too easy to see how things could spiral out of control. Leading right-wing figures are not only already prematurely blaming the attack on “the Democrat party,” but also calling for law enforcement crackdowns on liberals and leftists as a group. If Trump acts on these calls, it would further damage the democratic respect that stands between us and the abyss. Future rounds of political violence would become increasingly more likely. Violent breakdown of the democratic order would loom.

How likely is any of that? I’m not sure.

Think back to when Trump was shot on the campaign trail last summer. Nearly everything that I’ve just said about the fraying of the democratic order was true then, right down to top Trump allies immediately, and without evidence, blaming the left. Yet the assassination attempt did not inspire a wave of attacks, nor did it imperil the democratic process.

Something similar could happen this time around too. There may be neither copycat nor retaliatory attacks, and the Trump administration may not ultimately use this as a justification to crack down on its political enemies. This would fit a historical pattern: As the political scientist Dan Trombly points out, America has long had much lower levels of political violence than you’d expect given the prevalence of guns and deep partisan animosities.

But I also think it’s undeniable that our odds of something going wrong are worse now than they were last year.

This is partly because we’re dealing with an assassination — a horrific murder — rather than a near miss. It’s partly because we do not yet know the shooter’s identity: Had the Trump shooter been clearly politically motivated, 2024 could have gone much worse than it did. 

But it’s also because our democratic decline has progressed considerably in the past year.

It is undeniably true that Trump has undermined the nonpartisan structure of the American state, concentrating power in his own hands — including over law enforcement and the military. Democrats have, as result, become increasingly less confident that the democracy will survive his presidency — that they can trust Republicans to abide by the rules of the game. There has never, January 6 included, been a more dire moment for the modern American republic than the second Trump administration.

So I cannot be confident that things will turn out the way they did last summer. It is possible that they do. Under normal circumstances, I would be confident that they will.

But I cannot be. Our system is too decayed, too shot through with mutual distrust, to count on democratic faith to get us out of this one.

Scientists at several federal agencies are losing access to scientific literature published by Springer Nature, which produces the prestigious journal Nature among many other high-profile titles.

That's according to a report Monday by Nature's news team, which is also published by Springer Nature, but is editorially independent.

According to the news outlet, spokespeople for NASA and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) confirmed that agency scientists would no longer have access to Springer Nature journals. A USDA spokesperson said that it "has cancelled all contracts and subscriptions to Springer Nature. The journal [sic] is exorbitantly expensive and is not a good use of taxpayer funds." A government spending database also shows the Department of Energy (DOE) has dropped contracts with the publisher.

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The four people at the helm of America's space agency held a town hall meeting with employees Wednesday, fielding questions about downsizing, layoffs, and proposed budget cuts that threaten to undermine NASA's mission and prestige.

Janet Petro, NASA's acting administrator, addressed questions from an auditorium at NASA Headquarters in Washington. She was joined by Brian Hughes, the agency's chief of staff, a political appointee who was formerly a Florida-based consultant active in city politics and in Donald Trump's 2024 presidential campaign. Two other senior career managers, Vanessa Wyche and Casey Swails, were also on the stage.

They tried to put a positive spin on the situation at NASA. Petro, Wyche, and Swails are civil servants, not Trump loyalists. None of them looked like they wanted to be there. The town hall was not publicized outside of NASA ahead of time, but live video of the event was available—unadvertised—on an obscure NASA streaming website. The video has since been removed.

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On June 3, a crowd drove federal agents out of Minneapolis following a raid on a taqueria. On June 4, people confronted US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents as they carried out raids in Chicago and Grand Rapids. On Friday, June 6, people in Los Angeles responded to an ICE raid, precipitating a full day of clashes that continue today. In the following firsthand report, participants describe how people came together to do their best to prevent federal agents from kidnapping people from their community.

Donald Trump’s “border czar,” Tom Homan, has announced that he will send the National Guard into Los Angeles in response. If the situation escalates elsewhere around the country, as well, it is thinkable that we could see a movement that picks up where the George Floyd uprising left off. Arguably, in sweeping up the president of the California chapter of the Service Employees International Union in their attacks on people in Los Angeles, ICE and the various federal agencies that are being reassigned to support them risk making more enemies just as this confrontation is getting underway.

Although the Trump administration has begun by attacking immigrants—both documented and undocumented—this is only the first step in their effort to establish an autocracy. They are targeting immigrants because they believe them to be the most vulnerable target, but their overarching goal is to accustom all of us to passivity in the face of brutal state violence, breaking the basic bonds of solidarity that ought to connect all human beings.

It must be clear to everyone—even the most milquetoast centrists—that the outcome of the conflict that is ramping up now will determine the prospects for every other target Trump has lined up in his sights, from Harvard University to those who simply wish to be able to afford groceries.

Incidentally, if it is possible that you will be in an environment in which chemical weapons are deployed, it is possible to extinguish tear gas canisters—read this short guide. You can find a wealth of similar information about how to stay safe in demonstrations here. To learn about other things you can do to stop ICE, start here.

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First Action, High Noon

On social media, the news spread that ICE was raiding several spots in downtown Los Angeles, Highland Park, and MacArthur Park. Agents had begun to raid a building in the flower district when a spontaneous mob trapped them inside. People blocked every side of the building, every single entrance, so the agents couldn’t get out. They had detained a lot of people in the building already and hadn’t expected a swarm of 50-100 Angelenos to trap them.

Apparently, they expected to be able to conduct a visible raid in downtown Los Angeles without a response from the neighborhood. They were wrong. Of the six or more locations that they raided, that one was in the area with the densest population, just blocks from skid row and a few steps from the Piñata district.

A large number of people were at the front entrance blocking ICE from leaving the building. Caught off guard by the crowd, the ICE agents were visibly trying to figure out how to evacuate. Family members of the detained were crying at the doors and the gates, wondering what was going to happen to their loved ones.

The federal government had declared war on Los Angeles.

ICE ordered in an armored truck with three dozen federal riot police and a fleet of vans in tow. The entrance they wanted to come into was the one being blocked by an SEIU sound truck and they began threatening to tow it. SEIU complied and moved their truck, even going so far as to use their sound system to yell “Get on the sidewalk!” at the crowd. Half of the people listened to them and half didn’t, but it was a small enough crowd that that made a significant difference. As a consequence, the armored truck and the vans were able to make it up to the gate.

Federal agents in riot gear began trying to push everyone out. The small group who had refused to leave continued to stand their ground, twisting their little riot shields and mocking them. The agents were visibly rattled by the resilience of this group that had somehow assembled within fifteen minutes. In a desperate push, the FBI agents began to throw tear gas canisters into the crowd. Everyone was screaming at the fascist mercenaries as they tried to push back the line. Amid the confusion, the agents managed to clear a path for the vans to enter through the gate.

The feds put the detained workers into the van and began to drive out. The crowd tried to stop them but the FBI escalated—snatching protesters and shooting pepper balls and rubber bullets at everyone. One of the vans sped up and struck the president of the California branch of the Service Employees International Union, injuring him. He was then arrested.

The crowd got more rowdy, lighting fireworks and throwing debris, water bottles, and cabbage at the mercenaries. The FBI responded with a barrage of flash-bang grenades and rubber bullets and more pepper balls.

While that fight continued, someone followed the ICE vans to the Burbank airport, where agents had reportedly claimed that they were bringing a “hockey team.” People have been attempting to track the flight and see where it went since.

The other detainees were taken to the MDC* (Metro Detention Center) which triggered an action to be called for a couple hours later.

MDC is where hundreds of detainees from the raids are still currently being held. It was also the site of the 2017 abolish ICE encampment which lasted for 60 days.

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Second Action, 4 pm

People started amassing at the Metropolitan Detention Center. A press conference took place involving Union Del Barrio, the SEIU, and the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles. Peace policing caused fights between the paid activists and the crowd. The activists ended up leaving and the crowd stayed—tagging everything, smashing windows, breaking things, and being ungovernable. Someone had brought a sledgehammer and was breaking the concrete pillars so that people could use the pieces as projectiles to throw at the police. Someone used a swivel chair as a barricade; another person showed up in a dinosaur suit.

The feds were scrambling, throwing everything they could back at the crowd. People were tear-gassed several times, but were neutralizing the effect by putting ice and water on the canisters as well as traffic cones like they did in Chile. Some people were also throwing the canisters back to the Department of Homeland Security agents that were responsible for them. The crowd was extremely lively and brave. Some right-wing internet streamers tried to get into the area, but they were spotted and promptly dealt with.

DHS couldn’t control the situation. The feds were overwhelmed and begged the Los Angeles Police Department to come save them. Despite LA mayor Karen Bass saying she was “appalled” about the presence of ICE in Los Angeles, the LAPD still showed up in large numbers. A low-flying helicopter was telling people that they would be arrested and issuing dispersal orders as LAPD pushed people away from the building over the next four to five hours. Everyone left covered in pepper ball dust and tear gas.

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Third Action, 10 pm

A message circulated to the effect that ICE was spotted staging for a raid in Chinatown. (Later, it turned out that they were planning to hold that parking lot for a press conference for Thomas Homan, Trump’s “Border Czar,” at 7 am the following morning—a press conference that was apparently cancelled.)

Hundreds of people started trickling in, strobing flashlights in the eyes of the federal agents and yelling chants and insults at the riot line.

Even though people had been at actions all day, the energy was high, attracting passersby and random Dodgers fans to join in. The crowd took the street and blocked the entrances once again as things started getting rowdy. This time, LAPD wasn’t present, so the federal agents prepared to try to push the people out themselves.

Participants in the crowd tagged the armored ICE vehicle and begin jumping up and down on it while an LRAD was blaring. Someone tagged “FUCK ICE” and spray painted the cameras on a Waymo self-driving car. No organizations were present except a strong contingent from the Los Angeles Tenants Union, who were present for every action in the course of the day.

The federal agents decided that the parking lot was too difficult to hold and began to retreat. The crowd seized the opportunity to block them off, throwing fireworks and rocks, bottles, and, somehow, ceramic plates. The FBI threw a few flash-bang grenades and tear gas canisters in response, but the spirits of those standing up to them remained high.

People began to smash the windows on the feds’ cars. At that point, ICE decided to leave, and a celebration began in the street. More fireworks were set off in a jubilant atmosphere. People partied momentarily before drifting home, heartened by a small victory after a horrifying and dehumanizing day in the so-called United States.

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You might suspect that a one-line bill about Bigfoot that bears the number "666" is a joke, but AB-666 is apparently a serious offering from California Assemblymember Chris Rogers. Rogers represents a California district known for its Bigfoot sightings (or "sightings," depending on your persuasion—many of these have been faked), and he wants to make Bigfoot the "official cryptid" of the state.

His bill notes that California already has many official symbols, including the golden poppy (official flower), the California redwood (official tree), the word "Eureka" (official motto), the red-legged frog (official amphibian), the grizzly bear (official animal), swing dancing (official dance), and the saber-toothed cat (official fossil). The state has so many of these that there are separate categories for freshwater fish (golden trout) and marine fish (garibaldi). So why not, Rogers wants to know, "designate Bigfoot as the official state cryptid"?

That's... pretty much the bill, which was introduced this week and already has Bigfoot advocates excited. SFGate talked to Matt Moneymaker, who it describes as "a longtime Bigfoot researcher and former star of the Animal Planet series Finding Bigfoot," about the bill. Moneymaker loves it, noting that he has personally “had a face-to-face encounter one time, after which I was absolutely sure they existed because I had one about 20 feet in front of me, growling at me.”

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Sources tell WIRED that the ability of DOGE’s Marko Elez to alter code controlling trillions in federal spending was rescinded days after US Treasury and White House officials said it didn’t exist.