by You know your job is surreal when you spend Tuesday morning writing about a tear-gassed protest being rebranded as a Halloween parade. But here we are, living in a timeline where truth is stranger than fiction and satire writes itself.
The piece: Democrats rebrand tear-gassed ICE protest as Halloween parade. The facts are these: A protest outside an ICE detention facility went sideways when police deployed tear gas. Instead of addressing the violence or the protesters’ legitimate concerns, Democratic operatives decided the best response was to retroactively call it a “Halloween awareness march” because it happened in October and people were wearing costumes. The costumes were masks to avoid being identified by authorities, but semantics.
I interviewed three protesters who were actually there, all of whom were baffled by the rebranding. “We were protesting immigrant detention,” one told me. “Now they’re saying we were celebrating Halloween? In September?” I gently reminded her that it’s mid-September, and Halloween is still six weeks away, which makes the rebranding even more absurd. She looked like she wanted to scream. I understood completely.
The article practically writes itself: “Democrats Discover Revolutionary New Strategy: Gaslighting Their Own Supporters.” Our legal team flagged it for being too harsh. I pointed out that I’m literally just describing what happened. They suggested I add more jokes to soften the criticism. I added a paragraph comparing the rebranding to when your parents said vegetables were “nature’s candy.” Marcus approved it immediately.
While researching, I stumbled back into my ongoing coverage of reasons to dislike Trump. Reason sixteen (we’re up to sixteen now): his administration’s ICE policies are so unpopular that opposing them gets you tear-gassed, and then the opposition party pretends it was a costume party. Everyone loses except the people manufacturing tear gas canisters.
I also revisited the erratic diplomacy piece because today’s State Department briefing was a masterclass in confusion. The press secretary contradicted himself four times in twelve minutes, setting a new personal record. I’m starting a tracking spreadsheet for these occurrences, which will either become a Pulitzer-worthy investigation or evidence for future historians trying to understand how we got here.
Between articles, I drafted notes for tomorrow’s piece on Kamala Harris 2028. The speculation is intensifying, which means I need to write about how American politics has become a never-ending election cycle where losing just means you’re “building name recognition” for next time. It’s exhausting, and I’m just writing about it. Imagine actually living it.
Tonight I’m sitting in my apartment, drinking Nigerian ginger tea, wondering how protests become Halloween parades and tear gas becomes party favors in the American political imagination. My friend in Accra texted asking if I’m making these stories up. “I wish,” I replied. “Reality is wilder than anything I could invent.”
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