Author: Sky York Journal

Sky York Journal Judge Eric Tostrud, a Trump appointee, handed down an often contradictory ruling Monday night lifting his order requiring the preservation of evidence surrounding Customs and Border Protection agents’ killing of Alex Pretti last month.  On one hand, he acknowledged that statements from Trump officials absolving the agents of any culpability for the killing immediately after they shot Pretti are “troubling.”  “They reflect, not a genuine interest in learning the truth, but snap judgments informed by speculation and motivated by political partisanship,” he wrote.  But the connection between the administration’s stance on the fatal shooting, and its intentions…

Sky York Journal Coming off the heels of Attorney General Pam Bondi’s demand for access to Minnesota voter rolls and the state’s decisive refusal to comply with that demand, President Trump is now spreading conspiracy theories about the state and is again threatening to try to exert control over the nation’s election systems. Last month, Bondi attempted to tie the Trump administration’s months-long campaign to seize sensitive voter information from various states across the country, with the recent killing of a U.S. citizen Alex Pretti by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. In a letter to Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz following…

Sky York Journal Across the country, federal prosecutors are upgrading what would have been routine prosecutions into terrorism cases when they involve people President Trump has cast as his political enemies. It represents a dramatic departure from how the Justice Department has historically used the federal material support for terrorism statute. For decades, counterterrorism prosecutors have largely reserved the statute — 2339A — for the kinds of audacious plots that wreak real, lasting damage or whose ambition forms the stuff of movie screenplays. It’s been used in recent years to charge the leadership of Hamas over the Oct. 7 attacks, pursue…

Sky York Journal This story was originally published by Grist. Sign up for Grist’s weekly newsletter here. Kristi Noem faces intensifying public scrutiny over her leadership of the Department of Homeland Security. Criticism of the former South Dakota governor has focused on her handling of the killing of Alex Pretti by a federal immigration agent and her oversight of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA. The controversies have prompted calls from Democratic lawmakers — and a small but noteworthy group of Republicans — for her resignation or impeachment. The immediate flashpoint has been the January 24 killing of Pretti,…

Sky York Journal In the 104 minutes of the movie “Melania,” there are only two real hints of how dangerous our world and politics have become.  The supposed documentary on First Lady Melania Trump is largely set in the 20 days before her husband, President Donald Trump, returned to office for the second time last January. At one point, the couple are seen with staffers discussing grand plans for “a million” people to line the streets of Washington for the swearing-in ceremony. Staffers inform the family that they will ride in a motorcade along Pennsylvania Avenue and that, as per…

Sky York Journal President Trump is bringing back the most bizarre conspiracy theory for why he lost the 2020 election. It’s ItalyGate, which pins his loss to Joe Biden that year on an elaborate conspiracy in which Barack Obama and China teamed up to use Italian military satellites to zap the election away from him. Trump boosted the idea this week in a series of posts on Truth Social. In one, he posted a link to a QAnon-promoting X account which laid out the very entertaining theory in detail. The timing was propitious. Trump made the posts after FBI agents…

Sky York Journal On Thursday, a Michigan State Senate committee held a hearing on a package of bills that restrict federal immigration enforcement in the state, legislation that comes amid a nationwide outcry over immigration enforcement operations that have grown increasingly deadly. The three bills would make it a misdemeanor for law enforcement officers to wear masks, except in certain health-related circumstances; limit government agencies from sharing information with ICE; and outlaw immigration enforcement in “sensitive locations” like schools, places of worship, hospitals, women’s shelters, and courthouses. Michigan is home to a swirl of political, legislative, and immigration dynamics that…

Sky York Journal In October 2025, with Senate Republicans and Democrats unable to come to an agreement on the then-expiring Affordable Care Act (ACA) subsidies, the country plummeted into what later became the longest government shutdown in the history of the U.S. Just months later, we are on the cusp of another — this time partial — government shutdown as Democrats call for reforms to rein in ICE following the Saturday killing of Alex Pretti in the hands of federal agents in Minnesota.  This time, the dynamics around senators’ negotiations to avoid or, if it comes down to it, end…

Sky York Journal In Ward 10, the Minneapolis neighborhood where ICU nurse Alex Pretti was gunned down by federal agents, neighbors are turning to each other for everything from groceries to school dropoffs. “We have people who are, every single day, taking their vulnerable neighbors’ kids to school for them; taking them to work; taking them to do their laundry; bringing groceries to folks so they can be safe in their homes,” Aisha Chughtai, the Minneapolis council member representing Ward 10, told Talking Points Memo.  “This is the most Minnesotan thing I know. This is the most compassion-for-neighbors thing I…

Sky York Journal Secretaries of State across the country are denouncing Attorney General Pam Bondi’s recent demand for access to Minnesota voter rolls — an attempt to tie the Trump administration’s months-long crusade to obtain personal voter information from various states with the recent killing of 37-year-old U.S. citizen Alex Pretti by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. In a letter to Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz following Pretti’s killing by federal immigration officers, Bondi described the ways in which Walz could end the “chaos” in Minnesota and “restore the rule of law.” One of those things being, as outlined by Bondi,…