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Henry Burke

@henryburke.bsky.social
2K followers 1.2K following 522 posts

Senior Researcher @RevolvingDoorDC.bsky.social Opinions my own. Writing on Economic Hacks, Climate Finance, Crypto and corporate capture of the Executive Branch.

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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 13h
Some Democrats are making anti-corruption the centerpiece of their midterm messaging, and it looks to be working. The Democratic Senate Campaign Committee Chair has a... different perspective
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 12/10/2026
I think the funniest part of all of this is that he accidentally shows that for most of the state, the taxes and fees in CA are actually lower! The municipal tax from Berkeley is like half of the total CA taxes and fees. Without it (as would be the case in most of the state) CA is cheaper!
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 12/10/2026
The bridge toll is exempted because it applies not just to taxis/Ubers and because tolls for bridges are pretty common across the country. In fact, Texas actually derives significantly more income from toll roads than California does, he just happened not to use one on his TX trip while he did in CA
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 12/10/2026
Great example of the CA vs. TX debate: CA fees and taxes (excluding the bridge toll) amount to just $0.27 more than TX. But the fees are listed separately, which makes it look like more despite the overall cost being basically the same. Freakout about CA taxes ensues (from a literal billionaire)
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Remarkable that this is the more competent Wiles daughter. The other failed a background check in the first Trump administration and was fired
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Everyone's heard of pets-as-children but thanks to AI, Silicon Valley has developed something new: children-as-pets
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Taking campaign donations from Kalshi should be seen as what it really it is; reaching into the pockets of people struggling with gambling addiction to fill your campaign coffers.
npr.org
After bankruptcy, he was banned from sports betting sites. Then he discovered Kalshi
The dark side of the prediction market boom is becoming more clear: Experts say the sites have become go-to outlets for gambling addicts to relapse as the companies avoid state consumer protections.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
A response to the WSJ Editorial Board's whining that Alito recused from Suncor v. Boulder: don't be mad at watchdog groups for wanting ethics rules enforced. Be mad at Alito for prioritizing his investments over his ability to impartially do his job
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
While the average American family is being crushed by the weight of Trump's tariffs, Mike Johnson's staff used them as an excuse to plan a luxury European vacation on the taxpayer dime. Visits were to include: Champagne, a visit to the Ferrari factory in Bologna and visits to luxury brands in Milan
nbcnews.com
Congressional staff planned official trip with luxury stops in Italy and France weeks before election
The weeklong staff trip, including stops at a Ferrari factory and Champagne, was to be led by an aide to House Speaker Mike Johnson and was canceled after NBC News asked about the itinerary.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Also shoutout to those who doggedly pursued Alito's conflicts of interest here and forced him to finally address it, including my colleague @hannahstoryb.bsky.social
nbcnews.com
Justice Alito pushes back on calls to sit out a major Supreme Court climate case
The conservative justice has no financial conflict that would require him to recuse himself from the case, a court spokeswoman told NBC News.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
The WSJ Editorial Board is upset that Samuel Alito has recused from an upcoming case regarding climate change due to his investments in oil companies. Like all my favorite conservative opinions, the final paragraph completely undermines the entire argument they've cobbled together. Hilarious
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I encourage everyone to read this deeply moving and difficult piece on how data centers are the latest addition to the toxic miasma slowly poisoning the inhabitants of Louisiana's cancer alley. We don't need to allow this to take place
dissentmagazine.org
Death by Data Centers - Dissent Magazine
I’m an oncology nurse in Louisiana’s Cancer Alley. My patients and I breathe the same polluted air, and we can’t afford the toxic exposure from the gas-fired plants set to power the state’s proposed A...
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Kyrsten Sinema, whose 2025 financial disclosure listed a total assets of between $30-100k (all in retirement accounts) and student debt of between $15-50k is claiming that her ex-boyfriend destroyed $123,000 worth of artwork. Must have been a lucrative couple of years since leaving office!
washingtonsun.com
Kyrsten Sinema’s Ex-Bodyguard Is Accused of a $200K Art-Destroying Rampage at Her Home
The incident is the latest fallout surrounding Sinema’s relationship with her ex-bodyguard, who was married while working on her security detail.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Full story
nytimes.com
Trump Officials Eject 750,000 From Obamacare Markets, Claiming Fraud
Vice President JD Vance said the measure would save the government $2.2 billion.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Peak Trump administration fraud story. The Biden admin kicked brokers engaging in fraud out of the Obamacare markets. Because Republicans love white collar crime, they invited the fraudsters back. Now the Trump admin is claiming the markets are rife with fraud (that they themselves created!)
New York Times headline that reads: "Trump Officials Eject 750,000 From Obamacare Markets, Claiming Fraud"Excerpt from said NY Times story reading "There is also evidence that some brokers illegally signed people up for coverage without their knowledge, though the number of such people is estimated to be substantially lower. During the Biden administration, health officials decertified around 200 brokers after learning they were engaged in such behavior. The Trump administration recertified those brokers last year."
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
The Sean Duffy-led DOT has found their solution to high gas prices: unleashing dangerously sleep-deprived truckers onto the roads!
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
The so-called "Department of Government Efficiency" killed the IRS free file program in 2025. Now, the DOGE kids are building a new AI-driven website to do the same thing as the program they killed. A really neat summation of "government efficiency" in the Trump administration
washingtonsun.com
Trump Aides Are Prepping an AI Takeover of Government Services
Former DOGE operatives are working on a website that could offer services like direct tax filing — similar to a Biden-era program the Trump administration killed.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Amazingly, the guy who founded this daycare-based Ponzi scheme has connections to abundance world, having served on the board of directors of Roots of Progress, an org funded by Patrick Collision and advised by Tyler Cowen. Roots of Progress claims 90% overlap with abundance
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
The whole piece is really enraging and has some great other details
nytimes.com
Inside the $440 Million Collapse of Guidepost Montessori
A man with a vision set out to revolutionize preschool. It became a $440 million fiasco.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
What happened when the bill came due and the walls came crashing down? What any self-respecting "founder" would do: Pivot to AI. There should be criminal charges for this, but of course, we don't punish "entrepreneurs" in this country. Even if their "innovation" is child neglect
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
An Ayn Rand acolyte was hired to run a school solely based on his affinity for libertarianism. Not satisfied with that, he grew it into a multi-national, private equity-fueled childcare Ponzi scheme, explicitly based on Uber's model. The result? Vast amounts of child neglect
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
How does a Nazi get a second chance? Well, Nate's brother Thomas is an influential abundance/AI guy with the Foundation for American Innovation, the org which basically wrote all of the Trump admin's AI policy. Maybe that helps, after all, their beliefs don't seem to diverge much
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
The publication that employs Maggie Haberman wrote this without a shred of irony
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
Yet another sign of our increasingly illiterate society. Republican attacks on bills being too long to read have gone from bills like the ACA (near 1,000 pages) down to a mere 32 pages
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
Interrupt the conversation to tell everyone you're getting married just so you can then explain to them that you're super frugal but the miracle of credit card points allowed you to book a honeymoon for free. Totally normal thing to do when having a conversation with people you just met.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Watch this clip from Sean Duffy's road trip reality show and you may ask "Why is a former Bravo reality show personality interrupting the conversation to talk about the benefits of credit card points?" It appears to be an promo for the show's sponsors, Chase Travel and credit card trade group EPC
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
I'd like to clarify something on the Sean Duffy's reality show and the discussion he has about Harvard corrupting young conservative women like his daughter. The discussion is entirely hypothetical. It takes place when she's applying to Harvard. As far as we know from the show, she never gets in!
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Read my full review here:
thenation.com
Road Trip to Nowhere
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's reality show is an ungainly mix of corporate corruption and MAGA agitprop.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
But more than anything, the show is just a dreadful hokey mess. The thing it resembles most is Sarah Palin's short-lives reality show from 2010. But even Palin had the smarts to wait until she had left government to try to launch her reality show career
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
This does not mean the show's ethics issues were fixed. While advertisers are somewhat less prominent in the first few episodes, it becomes increasingly prominent as the show goes on. There's several segments where Duffy seems to be more corporate spokesman than cabinet secretary
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
The first thing that stood out to me was how much of the footage from the trailer had simply... disappeared. Duffy meeting with Kid Rock? Gone. Meeting with country musician John Rich? Nope. The part where the family goes on a cruise ship to ride water slides? Missing entirely
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
I watched all six episodes of the Sean Duffy reality show so you don't have to. It's clear that after getting a negative reaction to the trailer, Duffy's team re-edited the show and left a bunch of footage on the cutting room floor. But that doesn't mean it's good. Thread:
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Reposted by Henry Burke
Revolving Door Project @revolvingdoordc.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Spoiler alert: the extra month and a half in edits did little to fix Sean Duffy's ethics disaster. In the show's six episode run, the Secretary of Transportation often appears to be more of a company spokesman than a government regulator. New from our @henryburke.bsky.social in @thenation.com
thenation.com
Road Trip to Nowhere
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's reality show is an ungainly mix of corporate corruption and MAGA agitprop.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
But isn't Selig's entire claim that the federal government has exclusive jurisdiction over prediction markets?
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
A decent chance that Trump's CFTC Chair, a stooge of the prediction markets industry, will *order* Kalshi to continue operating in Washington State despite this order. They've already done that elsewhere
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Reposted by Henry Burke
The War on Cars @thewaroncars.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Nobody could see this coming... except for everybody. We had @henryburke.bsky.social from @prospect.org on back in May to talk about "Sean Duffy's Great American Road Grift" for a bonus episode. www.patreon.com/thewaroncars...
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Reposted by Henry Burke
Revolving Door Project @revolvingdoordc.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Insider trading has become the go-to form of corruption for the Trump admin. Even easier than collecting a bribe with more plausible deniability, everyone seems to have made a buck trading on non-public info. Now the president wants to sell an insider trading franchise to Wall Street:
revolvingdoorproject.substack.com
The Insider Trading Administration
Insider trading is no longer limited to Trump allies. A franchise of your own is now available – for a price
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Reposted by Henry Burke
Revolving Door Project @revolvingdoordc.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
"The groups argue that Gillibrand's son's involvement in the crypto industry leaves Democrats vulnerable to the very charge they are trying to level against President Trump."
axios.com
Scoop: Progressives scorch Gillibrand over crypto
The blistering — and deeply personal — attack from three groups complicates already delicate negotiations over the CLARITY Act.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
They generously chose a headshot that Google's ai system says is at least 10 years old. I guess more recent photos of Thiel aren't as conducive to the rosy picture Axel Springer wants to paint
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
Unmentioned in the announcement praising Palantir for making democracy "resilient" is that Thiel himself doesn't believe in democracy, saying "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible." Thankfully Thiel won't be alone at the event. It will also feature "journalist" Bari Weiss
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
Politico's parent company, Axel Springer, is awarding Peter Thiel with their "2026 Axel Springer Award." The announcement claims that Thiel has been "attacked and vilified" and that Palantir, the surveillance firm he co-founded "is crucial to the resilience of democracies"
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour sees gambling on his app as the cure to Instagram addiction. Seems kind of like trying to treat a caffeine addiction by taking up cocaine but I guess I shouldn't be surprised when a coke dealer sees some merit in that idea
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
The senators he's discussing are lame ducks. They're retiring. They're no longer accountable to voters. But they are still accountable to the oligarchs who can promise them cushy corporate gigs or threaten to bar them from the corrupt post-government jobs they're expecting. It's all about money
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
Stephen Miller lets it slip: "they all have a life they want after the Senate... corporate boards they want to be a part of" Withholding lucrative jobs is how Trump and the oligarchs keep their grip on power. This would be called corruption anywhere else Video credit @acyn.bsky.social on X
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
I would like to congratulate everyone who fell for this family's scheme, you've now got Democrats going on Fox & Friends to criticize the party. It may be bad for other Democrats, but at least this college kid's resume is going to look good!
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
Centrists are so excited to punch left that they're missing that this is clearly a grift. It's run by a college sophomore whose only experience is seemingly driving his car a lot and sinecure at WelcomePAC, a job his dad (WelcomePAC's Director of Electoral Programs & Finance Chair) secured for him
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
Perfect example of how revolvers legitimize a scam industry: Kalshi's head of enforcement and CPM are touting Prelogar's work for the Kalshi as proof the Democratic Party supports prediction markets. Maybe it's time we rethink the appointment of people willing to sell out the party like this
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
The endgame with the deceptive claims and the hiring of revolvers is simple; stave off any attempts to crackdown on the industry. 42 State AGs are suing about prediction markets. The only way the industry can survive is by buying enough influence in DC to grind things to a halt.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
The Coalition for Prediction Markets, for whom Biden's SG is doing legal work, has a habit of publishing far fetched claims on their website. I reached out to ask them how they arrived at these numbers back in May but did not receive a response.
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Henry Burke @henryburke.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
Other revolving hires by the industry in recent months include former Obama campaign manager Stephanie Kutter and Trump's policy communications director. I'd be remiss to not include Donald Trump Jr. who has a board position and investments with both Kalshi and Polymarket. He's profited handsomely
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