Stuart Schrader
@stschrader1.bsky.social
Author of Blue Power: How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves (@basicbooksgroup.bsky.social, 2026) and Badges Without Borders: How Global Counterinsurgency Transformed Policing (@ucpress.bsky.social, 2019)
Fascinating reporting, complete with a very eloquent and insightful quotation from yours truly
Prism@prismreports.org · 2d ago“What the hell is going on in Tacoma that would necessitate this?” Detective involved in WA's 2009 alleged Army spying scandal attended Israeli police training. In Part 1 of “The ASTI Files,” @glentalk.bsky.social uncovers new details of US law enforcement & emergency personnel training in Israel.
"A critical history of the police union movement, tracing how it emerged as a profoundly anti-democratic institution." Sandeep reviews Stuart Schrader 's new book 'Blue Power' on the emergence of police unions as firewalls against accountability.
A Union Apart - Sandeep Dhaliwal - Inquest
Stuart Schrader’s ‘Blue Power’ illuminates the history of how police unions coalesced as tools for guaranteeing preferential treatment and protection from accountability.
inquest.org
This piece is so good, really worth reading if you care at all about jazz, new york, or police violence
n+1@nplusonemag.com · last mo.“‘It was a who’s who on Rikers Island,’ Jackie McLean said. While Elmo Hope was in the band, he was joined by a young saxophone player named Sonny Rollins.” New online: an excerpt from Colin Asher's THE MIDNIGHT SPECIAL, out now from @wwnorton.com. www.nplusonemag.com/online-only/...
ICE kidnapped a colleague at Johns Hopkins.
Project Salt Box@projectsaltbox.com · 6d agoWhen ICE tells you they’re targeting the worst of the worst, this is what they mean. ICE arrested Ameaka at BWI airport, and immediately moved her out of state to a GEO facility in Louisiana. www.thebanner.com/community/lo...
Come for the analysis of enshittification as the ruling ethos of our time, stay for the counter-example of the Tour de France, the greatest sporting event in the world.
Hamilton Nolan@hamiltonnolan.bsky.social · last wk.It is kind of amazing that we have settled on a version of capitalism that leads us into a trash can due to a decision not to price in the public costs of private profits. www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/enshittifi...
Today, @nhold.bsky.social explains why calls for mandatory retirement are mistaken, and what this mistake indicates about the character of elite academic circles, including the law and political economy movement.
What Rolls Downhill
Recent calls for mandatory retirement in academia are a reminder that class and other social hierarchies are something like mountains with increasingly dense fog toward their peaks: the higher up one…
lpeproject.org
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Prison Journalism Project@prisonjournalism.bsky.social · last wk.News: Our summer campaign concludes tomorrow at midnight, which means time is rapidly running out to take advantage of the $15K matching funds provided by generous donors. Thanks to an additional $5K gift from a generous donor, every donation will now be tripled until those funds are exhausted.
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Prison Journalism Project@prisonjournalism.bsky.social · 2w agoAs many of you already know, we rely on individual donors to provide incarcerated writers with tools and resources to produce impactful stories. We have less than $7,800 left to raise to reach our goal. Any donation amount helps!
We invite you to read and listen to Stuart Schrader’s archival primer to Blue Power, his fascinating new history on the formation of police unions and their impact on national and local politics in the second half of the twentieth century. Read more here abusablepast.org/the-badge-me...
Two new mid-summer publications this week: 1) a review of Chasing Bandits, a fine book about US imperial violence across the decades, considering theoretical and methodological questions of writing about targeted state violence, via H-Diplo: issforum.org/reviews/revi...
Jervis Forum Review 189: Schrader on Neagle, Chasing Bandits
H-Diplo | Robert Jervis International Security Studies Forum Review 189 Michael E. Neagle, Chasing Bandits: America’s Long War on Terror. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2025. ISBN…
issforum.org
"We found that at least 150 institutions of higher ed... are using Flock’s surveillance network.. many campus police departments have facilitated immigration related investigations, even when they are located in sanctuary states and are legally prohibited from doing so" by @torinmonahan.bsky.social
Flock on campus: university police as appendages of a national policing apparatus
Dangerous new forms of networked surveillance are gaining traction with police departments across the United States. One popular example is Flock Safety’s Automated License Plate Recognition (ALPR)...
doi.org
Looks like Mark Lamb finally won a primary. He has been credibly accused of sexual misconduct -- a swinger lifestyle and sexting with women he later threatened -- but he is also MAGA, "constitutional sheriff," and an election conspiracy theory. He also has a track record of financial grifting.
Taniel@taniel.bsky.social · 2w agoMark Lamb is probably heading to Congress. The MAGA figure and former sheriff survived allegations that he was sending unwanted sex messages and won the GOP primary for a red House seat. Bolts profiled him in 2023 when he was running for the Senate: boltsmag.org/arizona-sher...
Really great piece in Defector on @stschrader1.bsky.social 's BLUE POWER and how cop unions rendered themselves impervious to democracy (gift link): defector.com/how-cops-con...
How Cops Consolidated So Much Power Over Local Governments | Defector
Even before his historic election as New York City’s mayor in November 2025, democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani had reportedly begun searching for “common ground” with the city’s rank-and-file police...
defector.com
New interview I did with Amna Akbar in @jewishcurrents.bsky.social was just published. It's a bit of a synthesis on the how we got here and the current conditions on immigration. Always great to be in convo w/Amna & wonderful to work w/Aparna Gopalan at JC on this. jewishcurrents.org/unbuild-the-...
Unbuild the Cages
Silky Shah maps the vulnerabilities of the deportation machine.
jewishcurrents.org
How cops consolidated so much power over local governments: defector.com/how-cops-con...
How Cops Consolidated So Much Power Over Local Governments | Defector
Even before his historic election as New York City’s mayor in November 2025, democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani had reportedly begun searching for “common ground” with the city’s rank-and-file…
defector.com
Out of nowhere, Jonas Vingegaard crashed out of the Tour de France. A lot of people are assigning blame and trying to figure out why, when really, it's very simple: the unavoidable cruelty of professional cycling. defector.com/jonas-vingeg...
Jonas Vingegaard Felled Yet Again By The Cruelty Of His Sport | Defector
ÉVIAN-LES-BAINS, France — Exactly 84 minutes after Jonas Vingegaard spiked his right collarbone into a curb and limped into an ambulance and out of the Tour de France, the assembled press watched him ...
defector.com
Decided to look at the classes taught at West Virginia University ’s Washington Center for Civics, Culture and Statesmanship (the one with one enrolled student) and it turns out it’s teaching classes on the wonders of fascism
I wrote about what looks very much like a formal US plan to institutionalize a global network of concentration camps.
Little Gitmos everywhere
The White House explores entrenching U.S. concentration camps worldwide.
degenerateart.beehiiv.com
Don't let copaganda fool you — police violence is not tied to their safety. In 2025, the vast majority of killings began with police responding to suspected non-violent offenses or cases where no crime was reported.
This interview/conversation was SO GOOD.
Patrick "Inverted Vibe Curve" Blanchfield@patblanchfield.bsky.social · last mo.How are police unions different from other unions? What are the politics of police institutions, internally, and in relation to one another? And why do cops have so much power? grateful to @stschrader1.bsky.social for joining us on @unhappinesspod.bsky.social www.patreon.com/OrdinaryUnha...
How are police unions different from other unions? What are the politics of police institutions, internally, and in relation to one another? And why do cops have so much power? grateful to @stschrader1.bsky.social for joining us on @unhappinesspod.bsky.social www.patreon.com/OrdinaryUnha...
Episode 150: Cops in Our Heads feat. Stuart Schrader | Ordinary Unhappiness
Abby and Patrick welcome historian Stuart Schrader for a conversation about the history, ideology, and politics of contemporary American pol
patreon.com
🚨NEW EPISODE🚨 The institutions of modern American policing are far younger than the USA itself. Yet the police now seem ubiquitous - and their self-interested exercise of political power is undeniable. The brilliant @stschrader1.bsky.social helps us understand why. www.patreon.com/OrdinaryUnha...
Episode 150: Cops in Our Heads feat. Stuart Schrader | Ordinary Unhappiness
Abby and Patrick welcome historian Stuart Schrader for a conversation about the history, ideology, and politics of contemporary American pol
patreon.com
Please consider ordering my new book BLUE POWER from @redemmas.org today, to support legal defense for Prairieland and Minneapolis defendants. redemmas.org/titles/48838...
Blue Power: How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves
Buy from Red Emma's, a worker-owned radical bookstore
redemmas.org
Red Emma’s@redemmas.org · last mo.July 4th is nothing to celebrate. 20% of all book sales today, in the store and online, will be donated to the legal support funds for the Prairieland defendants and the Minneapolis 15. Bookstore and cafe open until 4pm today, come through if you are feeling unpatriotic!
We made a podcast about the Tour de France, from the perspective of cycling fans who are historians. It is meant as an introduction to this race and to the sport. Hope you will check out Historians on Two Wheels as the race commences today!
Charles Petersen@cpetersen.bsky.social · last mo.I finally did it: I made a podcast. The Tour de France starts tomorrow. As the most historical of sports, what you need is three historians (myself, @stschrader1.bsky.social, @theotherjude.bsky.social) chatting about why 2026 is the year to get into cycling. www.patreon.com/historianson...
The Left(s) should get onboard with a massive expansion of public libraries across the country over the next 25 years. This is an affirmative project.
"What is particularly obnoxious about the moral case against the Weather Underground is the implication that their limited recourse to violence constituted some unique and inconceivable evil, that Bernardine Dohrn and Bill Ayers crossed lines unimaginable to Henry Kissinger."
Ashwini Vasanthakumar@ashwinivasantha.bsky.social · last mo.A review essay for grown-ups on political violence and the political violence we normalise and even celebrate. Like the best review essays, it might be better than its source material.
Some very smart observations from the very smart Michael Kinnucan in this week’s New York City primaries. (thread, all quotes from him)
