DL Open Thread: Monday, Feb. 23, 2026
Anybody OK With ICE Building Concentration Camps? Without the ovens–so far:
A once sleepy rural town named Social Circle, Ga. — just over 40 miles east of Atlanta off Interstate 20 — has become the epicenter of the stealthy plan by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to rapidly create an American gulag archipelago of massive former warehouses adapted into detainment camps for arrested immigrants.
The plan to convert a newly built 1.2 million-square-foot warehouse into a concentration camp where as many as 8,500 humans — double the size of the current largest federal prison — would be housed for as long as 60 days (or likely more) has riled up both residents and public officials in a place where 75% voted for Donald Trump in 2024.
The frustrated city manager of Social Circle, which was offered no input as a cash-flush ICE recently bought the spec warehouse for a whopping $128 million, told the Guardian that he’s denying the feds’ request to turn on the public water as they race to open their detention camp there as early as April.
“I told them I’m not going to do it,” Eric Taylor said. “Not until they come and talk to me.”
But officials in the small town of just 5,000 also did something else that probably raised some hackles at Kristi Noem’s ultrasecretive Department of Homeland Security (DHS). They made public what few documents that DHS has so far been willing to share with Social Circle, including its blueprint for what the innards of an American gulag will look like.
Close to two-thirds of the massive, rectangular floor plan is divided into 80 squares separated by narrow corridors, each box with dozens of strike marks. The thousands of marks presumably represent bunk beds but what they truly signify is human beings.
Based on the most recent statistics, as many as 70% of these arrested and handcuffed immigrants will have committed no crime after entering the United States — day laborers, restaurant workers or Uber drivers now crammed into a prison camp unlike anything seen on U.S. soil since World War II’s immoral Japanese internment.
This banal blueprint for inhumanity is the embodiment of the notorious words last April from ICE’s acting director Todd Lyons, who said the Trump regime want to make deportation “like [Amazon] Prime, but with human beings.”
Yo, Chris, this is happening in America today. Can you please shove your fucking bipartisanship up your ass and, you know, at least express concern? Actually, the same goes for our entire delegation. Stop sending me breathless press releases about your latest bipartisan pieces of legislation when one of said bipartisan parties is not a political party at all, but a lawless oppressive force.
FBI Director Kash Patel is facing backlash for reportedly using an FBI jet to head to Italy where he spent the final days of the Winter Olympics watching hockey and, later, celebrating Team USA’s gold medal win over Canada on Sunday.
Patel, a hockey fan since his childhood, was spotted at the U.S. men’s semifinal game against Slovakia, and later at the final, where he was seen celebrating with Team USA center Dylan Larkin in the locker room after America’s overtime win.
A separate video, shared by ProPublica’s William Turton, appears to show Patel chugging a beer bottle before he throws his hands in the air and pounds a table with his fist.
Team USA’s Matthew Tkachuk is then seen draping his medal around Patel’s neck before he joins the winning hockey players in a sing-along to Toby Keith’s “Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue.”
Lest you be overly-critical, he was just searching for Savannah Guthrie’s mom.
Trump, In His Own Words. I can’t make this stuff up:
“The supreme court (will be using lower case letters for a while based on a complete lack of respect!) of the United States accidentally and unwittingly gave me, as President of the United States, far more powers and strength than I had prior to their ridiculous, dumb, and very internationally divisive ruling.
For one thing, I can use Licenses to do absolutely “terrible” things to foreign countries, especially those countries that have been RIPPING US OFF for many decades, but incomprehensibly, according to the ruling, can’t charge them a License fee – BUT ALL LICENSES CHARGE FEES, why can’t the United States do so? You do a license to get a fee! The opinion doesn’t explain that, but I know the answer! The court has also approved all other Tariffs, of which there are many, and they can all be used in a much more powerful and obnoxious way, with legal certainty, than the Tariffs as initially used.
Our incompetent supreme court did a great job for the wrong people, and for that they should be ashamed of themselves (but not the Great Three!).”
Ho-kay. His word salad has understandably confused, well, the entire world:
Adding to the confusion, there’s also uncertainty whether the new 15% tariffs are legal.
That’s because Trump is using section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, which gives the president the power to impose surcharges and import restrictions to tackle international payments problems.
But some experts are questioning how the US can have a balance-of-payments problems in an era of floating exchange rates.
Gita Gopinath, the former first deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund, declared yesterday that the US does not have a fundamental international payments problem:
“A balance of payments (BoP) problem arises when a country loses market access or is close to losing market access. As long as there is plenty of demand for US debt and equities, which is the case, the US does not have a ‘payments’ problem. It can finance its trade deficits easily.”
Yep, back to the courts.
You Need More Evidence Of Trump’s Insanity? I’ll give it to you anyway:
U.S. President Donald Trump said he would deploy a hospital ship to Greenland, alleging that many people there are sick and not receiving care, even though both of the U.S. Navy’s hospital ships are currently docked at a shipyard in Alabama.
Trump’s announcement prompted a defense on Sunday of Denmark and Greenland’s health care system from their leaders, and it was the latest point of friction with the American leader who has frequently talked about seizing the massive Arctic territory.
“It’s a no thank you from here,” said Greenlandic Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen.
Trump’s social media post about a hospital ship came after Denmark’s military said its arctic command forces on Saturday evacuated a crew member of a U.S. submarine off the coast of Greenland for urgent medical treatment.
Trump, in a post on his Truth Social platform on Saturday night, referred to his special envoy for Greenland and said, “Working with the fantastic Governor of Louisiana, Jeff Landry, we are going to send a great hospital boat to Greenland to take care of the many people who are sick, and not being taken care of there. It’s on the way!!!”
Well, it’s not. But…:
Nielsen said it wasn’t necessary.
The Pentagon referred questions about the status of the U.S. Navy’s two hospital ships, the USNS Mercy and USNS Comfort, to the White House. The White House did not immediately respond to repeated requests for more information.
Both ships are currently at a shipyard in Mobile, Ala., according to social media posts from the shipyard, which also posted photos of them next to each other.
When asked about the status of the ships and the president’s post, the Navy referred questions to the White House.
In other words, ‘No comment’ because we don’t want to piss him off.
What do you want to talk about? (Yes, you can talk about the snow.)
When the hospital ships are ready, send them to Mar-a-Lago first. Resident needs urgent care. Put him on board, then drop him off in Greenland.
A Federal Judge in West Virginia made a template ruling that all legal adversaries across the country can use for unconstitutional, statuary and inhumane treatment of ice-boarderpatrol snatching of people illegal, u s citizens of the highways. Furthermore, a NJ Federal Judge gave a similar legal template of the same. I fully believe 47 ice’s snatch & grab game is at it’s end thank goodness.
I tried to post the WVa decision earlier today but my comment did not post.
https://www.wvsd.uscourts.gov/sites/wvsd/files/opinions/2_26-cv-00066_Goodwin2-19-26.pdf
Its a strong introduction to a ruling that finds masked, anonymous federal agents violate the 4th amendment.
“Antiseptic judicial rhetoric cannot do justice to what is happening. Across the interior of the United States, agents of the federal government—masked, anonymous, armed with military weapons, operating from unmarked vehicles, acting without warrants of any kind—are seizing
persons for civil immigration violations and imprisoning them without any semblance of due process. The systematic character of this practice and its deliberate elimination of every structural feature that distinguishes constitutional authority from raw force place it beyond the reach of
ordinary legal description. It is an assault on the constitutional order. It is what the Fourth Amendment was written to prevent. It is what the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment forbid.”
Thanks. Sometimes, for reasons I don’t understand, the ‘calculus’ places longer responses in moderation.
I meant to post that myself. I’m glad you did.
46th president would say it’s a big bad word deal. Judge Goodwin handed down Highlands Hippie posted it. Great backup. I got info from the Midas Touch. Thank you so much.