Ariel Kennan
@arielmai.bsky.social
Building @axiom.org Ask me about service design, public benefits, product, digital identity, Rules as Code, and civic tech / gov tech. 📍NYC
A note of gratitude — to this team and to everyone who came out to support us during launch week. Onwards!
The Axiom Foundation@axiom.org · 6d agoWatch the briefing, review the slides, and browse the photos from our celebration, hosted by @publicpolicylab.bsky.social at their Brooklyn studio. You asked sharp questions and cheered us on. Thank you. — Max, Ariel, and Pavel
Ariel Kennan is our July Public Interest Technologist of the Month! A decade in government service design, now turning benefit law into open code, the Axiom Foundation is launching this week. beta.nyc/newsletter-2... #CivicTech
Every calculator, eligibility system, and policy tool translates the law from prose into something a machine can run. Most do it from scratch, differently, and out of public view. Same law, different answers, no way to check.
The Axiom Foundation is live. The rules that decide who gets food assistance, health coverage, or a tax credit have lived in closed code nobody could check. As of Tuesday, they're open: cited, computable, verified. axiom.org/blog/axiom-l...
Jumaane Williams choked up as he told little Black boys they deserve to be loved. Zohran spoke of a constituent who said the campaign had made room for softness in people’s hearts. Three generations sang “Over the Rainbow” and “Bread and Roses.” Another politics is possible—and it’s here. ❤️
Love for this city and its people. What a beautiful celebration to start the year, and a new era. “To those who insist that the era of big government is over, hear me when I say this: No longer will City Hall hesitate to use its power to improve New Yorkers’ lives.” Watch the whole speech.
2 MILLION VOTES: NYC! All before 9 p.m. More of our election coverage can be found here at thecity.nyc
Food is a basic human need. How we respond in this moment will define whether we care for our neighbors—or allow millions to go hungry. A group of civic tech nonprofits is issuing a statement on recent SNAP disruptions. Read here: beeckcenter.georgetown.edu/statement-on...
This month’s Digital Benefits in the News starts with journalism telling the stories of those impacted by the federal shutdown disruption in SNAP and WIC. Thank you to our community for all their work. ➡️ Read our full newsletter here beeckcenter.org/4nrSKuq
Digital Benefits in the News
Sharing the latest stories across public benefits programs and digital service delivery
beeckcenter.org
Millions of Americans enrolled in HuskyHealth, BadgerCare, TennCare, KanCare or other confusingly-named state health insurance programs might not even know they're the ones about to be kicked off of Medicaid. www.mediamatters.org/health-care/...
Many states' Medicaid programs have a different name, but local reporting is connecting the dots on One Big Beautiful Bill's massive cuts
On May 22, House Republicans passed their budget reconciliation omnibus — the so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” — which would cut hundreds of billions of dollars from Medicaid, among other spendi...
mediamatters.org
Hey New York, tomorrow starts early voting AND it's the last day to register to vote ahead of the primary! Register here: www.vote.nyc/page/registe...
Register to Vote | NYC Board of Elections
You can register to vote online, in-person, or by mail.
vote.nyc
We are excited to be back at #CfASummit and to be part of a community building a people-centered, digitally-enabled government for all. @codeforamerica.org
NEW: i spoke with several young AmeriCorps volunteers around the country who were abruptly pulled off projects building homes, readying forests for wildfire season, and working at food banks Tuesday afternoon. they are now on their way home thanks to DOGE cuts —
DOGE Cuts Pull AmeriCorps Volunteers Off of Disaster Relief Jobs
The youth volunteers who were working on projects ranging from rebuilding homes destroyed in storms to distributing supplies for hurricane recovery were suddenly pulled from service. Why? DOGE cuts.
wired.com
The Trump Administration has made a shocking claim: that it can declare living people dead to cut off their access to government benefits and the broader U.S. financial system. Thread on my colleagues’ new blog 🧵 www.cbpp.org/blog/trump-a...
Trump and DOGE Claim Power to Falsely List Living Persons as Dead in Social Security Records | Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
The Trump Administration has made a shocking claim: that it can declare living people dead to cut off their access to government benefits and the broader U.S. financial system. According to reporting....
cbpp.org
NEW from me: A whistleblower says DOGE may have taken sensitive labor data...and then someone posted a threatening letter to his door. www.npr.org/2025/04/15/n...
A whistleblower's disclosure details how DOGE may have taken sensitive labor data
A whistleblower tells Congress and NPR that DOGE may have taken sensitive labor data and hid its tracks. "None of that ... information should ever leave the agency," said a former NLRB official.
npr.org
MATHIEU VAN DER POEL (ALPECIN-DECEUNINCK) WINS PARIS-ROUBAIX FOR A THIRD CONSECUTIVE YEAR 🪨🪨🪨
During the pandemic the Labor Department suggested states create "pseudo records" to track unemployment fraud while protecting identity theft victims -- basically, records of real fraud tied to make-believe people. This week DOGE discovered those make-believe people. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/12/u...
Musk’s Latest Fraud Finding Isn’t What It Seems
His team found cases of seemingly fake people receiving unemployment benefits. But that fake data exists for a reason.
nytimes.com
SCOOP: Trump admin overrode objections from Social Security staff to label ~6,000 living immigrants dead. A senior exec who objected was escorted out of the building, and earlier warnings were ignored. The immigrants include 13, 14 & 16yos who staff didn't find criminal records for: wapo.st/3RKSQQt
Trump administration overrode Social Security staff to list immigrants as dead
A senior executive who objected was marched out of his office and put on leave, while earlier warnings about the agency’s deaths database were ignored.
wapo.st
Nothing about this sounds efficient…
Dan Diamond@ddiamond.bsky.social · last yr.Scoop: DOGE now controls how grant opportunities get posted across government. DOGE engineer removed users’ permissions to post to Grants-dot-gov without telling them. Now requests flow thru DOGE-controlled mailbox. with @carolynyjohnson.bsky.social + @hannahnatanson.bsky.social
Proud to see my colleague @jenphillips.bsky.social with @aimstettner.bsky.social & @micheleevermore.bsky.social in the @nytimes.com setting the record straight on UI fraud claims, how fed gov & states worked to balance security & access, and the capacity states need. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/12/u...
Musk’s Latest Fraud Finding Isn’t What It Seems
His team found cases of seemingly fake people receiving unemployment benefits. But that fake data exists for a reason.
nytimes.com
❗ The Trump Administration is planning to falsify government records to declare alive people dead. This triggers a nightmare, cutting them off from benefits, banks, credit, insurance. If they can do it to one group, they can do it to anyone--in error or in malice www.nytimes.com/2025/04/10/u...
Pressuring Migrants to ‘Self-Deport,’ White House Moves to Cancel Social Security Numbers (Gift Article)
By placing migrants in Social Security’s “death master file,” the Trump administration is seeking to cut off their access to credit cards, bank accounts and other financial services.
nytimes.com
Alternative headline: Acting Head of IRS Resigns Rather Than Break the Law
Reuters@reuters.com · last yr.The acting head of the Internal Revenue Service plans to resign, the Treasury Department said, a move that comes after the agency struck a controversial deal to share tax data on undocumented immigrants with federal agents reut.rs/3REmczY
