For much of the 1990s, Antoine Verglas was one of fashion’s most sought-after photographers, celebrated for his raw, natural-light portraits of supermodels including Cindy Crawford, Claudia Schiffer, Tyra Banks, Gisele Bündchen, Naomi Campbell, and Stephanie Seymour. His work appeared in Elle, Vogue, GQ, Esquire, Maxim, and Sports Illustrated, helping define the era’s sensual, off-duty aesthetic.
Verglas also played a central role in launching Melania Trump’s modeling career after she arrived in the United States from Slovenia, photographing her roughly a dozen times—including capturing her most iconic nude images, among them the British GQ spread shot aboard Donald Trump’s private plane.
What has received far less scrutiny is how Verglas remained embedded in Jeffrey Epstein’s world—long after Epstein’s 2008 conviction for solicitation of prostitution and solicitation of prostitution of a minor and his registration as a sex offender.
Verglas reveals just one degree of separation between Epstein and Melania and offers a window into the elite modeling ecosystem Epstein repeatedly exploited, where introductions became access points, visas became leverage, and young women moved through a world he had already learned how to control.
There really aren’t any degrees of separation between Epstein and Melania. She’s pictured with him dozens of times. They clearly knew each other. And she was close with their mutual friend:
Verglas didn’t just photograph Melania—he helped create the imagery that propelled her career: the 2000 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit shoot with an inflatable orca; Maximum Golf, where she reclines in a bathtub covered in golf balls. Verglas has said he heard about Melania from Paolo Zampolli, a longtime associate of both Epstein’s and Trump’s who was running ID Models in 1999, shortly before Melania began seeking to secure her permanent residency in the US and at the height of Epstein’s sex-trafficking operation. Verglas said he did not know Epstein at the time.
According to The Washington Post, Melania ultimately obtained an EB-1 “Einstein visa,” reserved for individuals with extraordinary ability. Verglas photographed her again in 2011 for Haute Living.
Just as a reminder, Donald Trump also had a “modeling agency” during that period. (This story in The Guardian tells the sordid tale. ) Here he is with some of his models. To coin a phrase, “they’re on the younger side.”
Erin In The Morning, an excellent Substack about trans issues had this today:
Nine years ago, the Boy Scouts of America announced that it would begin accepting transgender youth into the program. In 2018, it opened its doors to girls, and in 2024, it rebranded as Scouting America. Transgender scouts were welcomed to participate alongside peers matching their gender identity, and the organization built out initiatives to be inclusive to people of all identities and creeds. That all came to a crashing halt today, when Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that the organization would be dropping all diversity initiatives, putting more emphasis on faith, and forcibly outing and segregating transgender scouts from their peers—forcing them to only be acknowledged by their assigned sex at birth and segregating them from peers of their gender.
“After 2012, however, the Boy Scouts lost their way and a once great organization became gravely wounded. Diversity, equity, and inclusion, DEI, crept in. The name was changed to Scouting America. Girls were accepted. The focus on God as the ruler of the universe was watered down to include openness to humanism and earth-centered pagan religions… They even welcomed the destructive myth of gender fluidity and transgenderism to infiltrate their membership,” Hegseth said in a video posted to Twitter.
He then announced major changes at the organization, including new anti-transgender policies. “Scouting America has agreed to comply immediately with the provisions of executive order 14173. This includes reviewing and replacing politicized, divisive, and discriminatory language throughout the organization, programs, and all publications. No more DEI. Zero,” Hegseth said. “The Citizen in Society merit badge that encouraged scouts to explore diversity, equity, inclusion, and identity… that badge has been discontinued. Third, Scouting America will modify its policy to make clear that membership will be based solely on biological sex at birth and not gender identity. That means that the application, any application, will have only two sex designations, male and female, and the application must match the applicant’s birth certificate. Scouting will also make clear that biological boys and girls will not be allowed to occupy or share intimate spaces together, toilets, showers, tents, anywhere like that.”
He ended by saying that he wanted them to ban girls in the organization as well so that they will go back to turning boys into men.
I don’t know why Scouts are any of Hegseth’s business in the first place. Who the fuck does he think he is? And why in the world are they capitulating to him in a process that is going to hurt vulnerable, young kids? If I had a child of scouting age I would be forced to conclude that they are mean, nasty people and I wouldn’t want my kids involved with them.
I hope that everyone realizes that we are living through a period of rank, appalling bigotry that it will go down in history as one of the cruelest assaults on a small minority of powerless human beings who are hurting absolutely no one. It is utterly appalling.
BARTIROMO: Patriotism is spreading to on air broadcasts. Mr Chairman, you announced your Pledge America Campaign, encouraging broadcasters to air more pro-America content, such as starting each day with the Star Spangled Banner or Pledge of Allegiance. Tell us more
BARTIROMO: Patriotism is spreading to on air broadcasts. Mr Chairman, you announced your Pledge America Campaign, encouraging broadcasters to air more pro-America content, such as starting each day with the Star Spangled Banner or Pledge of Allegiance. Tell us more
FCC CHAIR BRENDAN CARR: We’re in the midst of a great revival. President Trump is truly the political colossus of our time
He has a 36% approval rating and is loathed by virtually everyone in the world.
Most Americans say that they can afford basic necessities like their current housing costs, groceries, utilities and gasoline. But large numbers across income levels also say larger expenses and the cost of things associated with an enjoyable life — including taking a weeklong vacation — are out of reach. Overall, 53 percent of adults say they have just enough money to maintain their standard of living, nearly identical to a year ago, while roughly half, or more, say that discretionary spending on going out to dinner, vacations and new cars is unaffordable.
The American dream is on life support.
Meanwhile Trump is spending billions on a ridiculous game of chicken with Iran that nobody understands and building monuments to himself.
Americans are unhappy with the way things are going in the country, and don’t feel particularly well represented by either major political party. In our new February Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll, 53% of U.S. adults say the Democratic Party is out of touch with the concerns of most Americans. An identical percentage — 53% — say the same about Republicans.
The problem, Morris says, is that out-of-touchness is not the kind conventional wisdom suggests:
Whether a party is “in touch” or “out of touch,” we found, is a product of more than just ideological perceptions. In our survey, U.S. adults call Democrats weak (48%), ineffective (47%), and out of touch — but also empathetic (54%) and principled (49%). They call Republicans extreme (60%), elitist (57%), and cruel (51%). Both parties have brand problems. But the kind of problem is fundamentally different from what most people are assuming — and that difference matters enormously for 2026.
They tested for this by asking respondents for an assessment of 10 adjectives. You can survey the results in the chart above.
Since 45 percent of Americans now identify as independents, I’m obsessed with turning out more friendlies. Morris addresses that:
Democrats’ brand among independents differs from their brand among all adults in one hugely important way: the “extreme” label fades significantly. Just 35% of independents call Democrats extreme, versus 42% of all adults. That 7-point drop suggests the people telling pollsters Democrats are “too extreme” are disproportionately Republicans. Among actual swing voters, “extreme” isn’t really a Democratic problem. The GOP, on the other hand, has a big problem with perceived extremism.
What is a Democratic problem is that 45% of independents say Democrats are weak, and 44% say ineffective — nearly identical to the national numbers. Contra the extremism drop-off, these traits aren’t sourced to partisan talking points. Just 23% of independents call Democrats tough, the second-lowest rating either party gets on any trait — surpassed only by the GOP’s 22% on empathy among independents.
Independents “see two flawed parties — one that’s full of cruel, elitist extremists, and one that’s weak and ineffective.” Conventional wisdom post-2024 suggests that Democrats moderate for 2026 and 2028, but survey data suggests that that “gets the problem exactly backwards.”
Morris gets into a wonky statistical analysis of whether Democrats moderating or looking stronger gets them more electoral bang for the buck. But the two are not unrelated. It turns out that improving the party’s perception of strength is a better bet for winning a vote versus its extremeness score. Improving the party’s perception as strong is also a better bet than a perception that it is moderating. But good luck with that.
But good luck with that. It will take sustained effort. Morris has a few modest proposals:
What are some things they could do? First, they should treat any newsworthy confrontation with the Trump administration as a campaign opportunity, rather than a risk. Democrats may need to rethink their strategy in and out of Congress to orient around toughness. Maybe that means holding up nominees, forcing procedural votes, shutting down the government, or even showing up at protests. Democratic leaders should adopt the mindset of doing whatever it takes to shift perceptions. The strategy of issuing carefully worded statements or rolling over on funding challenges is a big reason the party finds itself where it does today.
The root of this Democratic Party problem is cultural. As a friend suggests, Democrats are cowed as much by their own supporters as by the right. Step out of line, say the wrong thing using the wrong terminology, and you’re Saint Sebastian pierced by your own allies’ arrows. “But what will Republicans say” is another cringe from some party elders who flinch like abused spouses. Not a good look. I just saw the Dropkick Murphys on Sunday. Their loud, in-your-face advocacy for working people was bracing. Maybe try that.
I’m a field guy. I see a party of policy liberals and campaign conservatives. Party leaders are still operating in the 20th century. I hear it in person from state-level candidates. Their idea of taking their game to the next level is doing the same thing they’ve always done, the way they’ve always done it, just more of it. There is no outside-the-box thinking and no risk-taking even when same old, same old isn’t working. They don’t experiment or innovate. They’ll update their software but not rethink their strategy. They’re in a groove so deep that they can’t see over the top of it. Few recognize it.
Democrats cannot win with registered Democrats alone. Except the lists they assemble for turning out independents are consistently too narrow. Plus, their committed volunteers, God bless ’em, want to knock every door like Jehovah’s Witnesses for Democrats. That’s not exactly the right approach with independents that give both major parties the side-eye even if they lean left. Democrats don’t just need broader targeting. They need a strategy that’s not one-size-fits-all. If they expect to encourage friendly independents to vote, the doorstep pitch isn’t about asking independents to vote for Democrats. That’s perhaps too much of an ask. In areas where independents lean blue but vote too little, the challenge is getting them to vote at all. The ask should be to vote as an exercise of their own power over their futures. But that would require a nimbleness and flexibility most campaigns and local committees cannot muster.
Also, half the independents are under 45.
Do Democrats want to win badly enough to try something new?
Flock cameras came up last night over dinner with nonpolitical friends, so one assumes it’s a thing. Americans are becoming spooked by the spread of surveillance of the sort seen in Minority Report (2002) and Enemy of the State (1998).
The New Republic subhead reads: “From New York to Alabama to Arizona, everyday people are mounting a local resistance to the company’s mass surveillance. And sometimes, they take matters into their own hands.” People are taking to destroying Flock cameras. Someone a few weeks a go handed me the laminated flyer above that they’d pulled off a pole in West Asheville.
All told, Flock represents a staggeringly powerful—and profitable—mass surveillance system. Its ALPRs are used by over 1,000 businesses and roughly one-third of 18,000 law enforcement agencies in the United States, according to Holly Beilin, Flock’s senior director of communications. While Beilin wouldn’t provide the number of active Flock cameras in the U.S., the ACLU estimates there to be 90,000. Flock used ALPRs, along with other products like drones and gunshot detectors, to generate $285 million in revenue in 2024. Venture capital titans Andreessen Horowitz recently valued the company at $7.5 billion.
But growing in concert with Flock is an organized resistance movement which has notched more than a few wins. Its nexus is DeFlock.me, which hosts a crowdsourced map of ALPRs and warns readers that the cameras are “a serious risk to your privacy and civil liberties.” The website lists 15 local anti-Flock groups around the country, though its creator, Will Freeman, estimates there to be 30 in total. While many of these groups use “DeFlock” in their name, Freeman stressed that all operate independently of his site.
Yeah, it’s a thing.
Even if Flock’s cameras and tracking network do help solve some crimes, critics say it’s not worth the cost to our privacy—not to mention people’s Fourth Amendment rights. Police have been caught illegally using Flock data to locate a woman seeking abortion services, stalkandharass people, monitor protests, and aid ICE. “At minimum, this dragnet surveillance means warrantless tracking of everyone on the road,” the ACLU warned last year. “At worst, it means a digital police state wherein law enforcement officials … can track protesters, political opponents, immigrants, patients, and others not suspected of any crime and use the information to hurt them.” (Dan Haley, chief legal officer at Flock, responded that “Flock is used … millions of times a year, and the incidences of abuse are few and far between.” He added that all evidence of misuse is recorded in Flock’s software.)
That’s comforting, right?
ICYMI, 404 Media had this take on the “find your puppy” ad Ring sponsored during the Super Bowl:
At Sunday’s Super Bowl, Ring advertised “Search Party,” a cute, horrifyingly dystopian feature nominally designed to turn all of the Ring cameras in a neighborhood into a dragnet that uses AI to look for a lost dog: “One post of a dog’s photo in the Ring app starts outdoor cameras looking for a match,” Ring founder Jamie Siminoff said in the Super Bowl commercial. “Search Party from Ring uses AI to help families find lost dogs.” Onscreen, an AI-powered box forms around a missing dog: “Milo Match,” it says. “Since launch, more than a dog a day has been reunited with their family. Be a hero in your neighborhood with Search Party. Available to everyone for free right now.”
It does not take an imagination of any sort to envision this being tweaked to work against suspected criminals, undocumented immigrants, or others deemed ‘suspicious’ by people in the neighborhood. Many of these use cases are how Ring has been used by people on its dystopian “Neighbors” app for years. Ring rose to prominence as a piece of package theft prevention tech owned by Amazon and by forming partnerships with local police around the country, asking them to shill their doorbell cameras to people in their neighborhoods in return for a system that allowed police to request footage from individual users without a warrant.
Chris Gilliard, a privacy expert and author of the upcoming book Luxury Surveillance, told 404 Media these features and its Super Bowl ad are “a clumsy attempt by Ring to put a cuddly face on a rather dystopian reality: widespread networked surveillance by a company that has cozy relationships with law enforcement and other equally invasive surveillance companies.”
The U.S. aims to process 4,500 refugee applications from white South Africans per month, far above President Donald Trump’s stated refugee program cap, and is installing trailers on embassy property in Pretoria to support the effort, a U.S. contracting document said.
The new target, contained in a previously unreported document from the U.S. State Department dated January 27, signals a push to ramp up admissions from South Africa, while refugee applications from other areas have been severely curtailed.
It’s not like we don’t have enough homegrown racists already, I guess we have to bring in some more.
I think it’s the obviousness of it that’s so disheartening. This is really just trolling. And he knows that nothing will be done about it. He’s just telling over half the people in this country to go fuck themselves.
Boebert broke the rules by doing this but apparently that’s ok with the GOP majority. Clinton’s people made the logical request that if they are going to leak pictures they should allow the press in to report on the whole deposition. Naturally, the wingnuts said no.
There are literally hundreds of other people who should have been called before her but we know they just can’t resist a little Clinton bash. This is just what they do.
Meanwhile, Donald Trump is sitting in the White House declaring he was totally exonerated despite years and years of evidence that he is a misogynist, sexual abuser — and was best friends with Jeffrey Epstein for many years. (And it wasn’t because of their shared interest in investment strategies. He and Epstein were close solely because of their shared interest in sex with younger women. Epstein certainly didn’t seek him out for intellectual stimulation. )
The Democrats are demanding that the entire transcript be released within 24 hours and presumably the video will eventually be released as well. She released her opening statement this morning:
Nurul Amin Shah Alam, a nearly blind refugee from Burma who Border Patrol agents dropped off at a doughnut shop Thursday and left to find his way home, 5 miles away, has been found dead. City Hall spokesperson Ian Ott said Shah Alam, 56, was found by B District officers after they responded to a call for a dead body on the first block of Perry Street shortly after 8:30 p.m. Tuesday….
Homicide detectives, Ott said, “are investigating the circumstances and timeframe of events leading up to his death, following his release from custody.”
Ott said the cause of death was determined by the medical examiner to be “health related in nature,” ruling out death by exposure and homicide.
[..]
Shah Alam, a Rohingya refugee, had been missing since February 19. He was released that afternoon from custody at the Erie County Holding Center after posting bail. In response to an immigration detainer that had been placed on him, the Erie County Sheriff’s Office contacted U.S. Border Patrol prior to his release, according to spokesperson Christopher Horvatits. Benjamin Macaluso, a Legal Aid Bureau attorney representing Shah Alam, said Border Patrol agents picked him up at the Holding Center at 4:39 p.m. Thursday.
Shah Alam was released on bail, Macaluso said, after he had agreed to a plea deal with the Erie County District Attorney’s office. Shah Alam’s guilty plea to charges of trespassing and possession of a weapon — a curtain rod he used as a walking stick — allowed him to “clear” the detainer and avoid detention by ICE or another immigration agency, Macaluso said.
After taking custody of Shah Alam, Border Patrol agents dropped him off at a Tim Hortons on Niagara Street in the Black Rock neighborhood, Macaluso said, shortly after 8 p.m. Shah Alam and his family live in the Broadway-Fillmore neighborhood on the East Side, according to Fazal.
A spokesperson for Border Patrol, in a statement Wednesday evening, said after agents determined Shah Alam was not supposed to be in their custody, they “offered him a courtesy ride, which he chose to accept to a coffee shop.” That Tim Hortons, the spokesperson said, was “determined to be a warm, safe location near his last known address, rather than be released directly from the Border Patrol station.”
“He showed no signs of distress, mobility issues, or disabilities requiring special assistance,” the spokesperson said in the statement. Agents, however, did not notify Macaluso or Shah Alam’s family of his release to the coffee shop. Macaluso previously told Investigative Post he expected Shah Alam to be taken to the ICE detention center in Batavia and that his client would be released from there. Instead, Macaluso and Shah Alam’s family spent Friday through Sunday searching for him. Macaluso opened a missing persons case with Buffalo police on Sunday, he said.
This is only part of the horror of this story:
Shah Alam had been in the Erie County Holding Center since February 2025 after being arrested by Buffalo police. On February 15 last year, he had been out for a walk in his neighborhood and had been using a curtain rod he purchased as a walking stick.
Nearly blind and with no ability to speak English, Shah Alam got lost and ended up on the porch of a woman’s home as she was letting her dog out, according to Macaluso. Shah Alam is completely blind in one eye and can only see with blurry vision for several feet in the other, according to Macaluso.
The woman called police, Macaluso said. When Shah Alam did not follow police commands to drop his curtain rod, they Tasered and beat him, then arrested him, Macaluso said. The officers suffered minor injuries in the scuffle, he said.
Shah Alam was charged with offenses including assault, trespassing and possession of a weapon. Macaluso said Shah Alam’s family opted to not bail him out of the Holding Center for fear he would end up detained by ICE out of state. The plea deal reached recently allowed Shah Alam to be released on bail without ICE detention, Macaluso said.
He was a disabled man who could not understand English. And they threw him in jail for a whole year on trumped up charges of assault with a weapon (a curtain rod) and the released him to the CPB which somehow determined that this man who cannot see or speak English wanted to be dropped off at a coffee shop. And he died.
It really is survival of the fittest in this country these days. If you’re at all vulnerable — a child, sick, old, a foreigner, forget it.
