Henry Burke

rollingstone.comCrypto Won Big in 2024. AI Is Angling to Do the Same in 2026The AI industry appears to be working to influence the 2026 midterms by replicating how the cryptocurrency industry influenced the 2024 elections.

3 Dec 2025

When the Biden administration attempted to regulate crypto, billionaires like Marc Andreessen organized a $200 million+ effort to oust crypto opponents and elect industry allies. It worked. Now they’re trying the same thing, but to ensure AI goes completely unregulated. My piece for Rolling Stone:

21h

Big Tech's Dem-aligned org in Washington, Chamber of Progress is ostensibly all about "repairing" the relationship between Silicon Valley and Dems. But they're being funded by "Build American AI" the org which is spending millions backing imperiled Republican Senate candidates in crucial states

21h

When the National Republican Senatorial Committee put out a memo in Aug. begging for help in crucial races like OH, KS and WI, Build American AI leapt to the defense of Republicans. But Chamber of Progress is happy to cash their checks and work on their behalf despite ostensibly being proud Dems

patreon.com152: Who the Hell is Richard Hanania? feat. Christopher Mathias & Henry Burke | Posting Through ItFrom 2008 to 2012, Richard Hanania wrote under the name “Richard Hoste” for white nationalist websites, where he argued for forcibly sterili

21h

Was thrilled to join Posting Through It for a new installment on their great "Who the Hell is..." series. Got to talk about my least-liked substack influencer and how insane I've felt as more centrist pundits have helped promote his work

Jared Holt@jaredlholt.bsky.social

Who the Hell is Richard Hanania? We’re joined by @letsgomathias.bsky.social and @henryburke.bsky.social to retrace the career arc of a very strange “race realist” poster who’s convinced the rich and powerful that’s he’s some sort of “intellectual.” www.patreon.com/PostingThrou...

Henry Burke reposted

Jared Holt

@jaredlholt.bsky.social

Henry Burke reposted

revolvingdoorproject.substack.comWe Solved The Corruption Debate Before I Was Born. Don’t Bring It Back.The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act conclusively answered whether it’s okay for a company to participate in corruption when a government official expects them to. The answer was no.

With Democratic oversight around the corner, preemptive defenses of the corporations who enabled Trump's corruption are coming out, claiming the companies had no choice. But we decided that excuse didn't count all the way back in 1977. Why would we reverse course now? Writes @henryburke.bsky.social

nymag.comKirsten Gillibrand, Crypto’s Favorite DemocratKirsten Gillibrand says she set out to regulate crypto, Nate Weisberg reports. Now, she finds herself in an ethical morass.

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

New York Magazine@nymag.com

Kirsten Gillibrand says she set out to regulate crypto, Nate Weisberg reports. Now, she finds herself in an ethical morass.

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)

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

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!

cbsnews.comPhoto shows top Trump aide's daughter with pro-Russia politician in BosniaKatie Wiles is a partner at the political lobbying firm Continental Strategy. A spokesperson for the firm acknowledged to CBS News that Wiles had taken the trip to Republika Srpska but on business for...

Remarkable that this is the more competent Wiles daughter. The other failed a background check in the first Trump administration and was fired

Josh Marshall@joshtpm.bsky.social

Looks like everyone at the White House (or their families) were getting their beaks wet in Republika Srpska www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-...

Everyone's heard of pets-as-children but thanks to AI, Silicon Valley has developed something new: children-as-pets

npr.orgAfter bankruptcy, he was banned from sports betting sites. Then he discovered KalshiThe 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.

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.

Murshed Zaheed@murshedz.bsky.social

why is the California Democratic Party taking millions from Kalshi? WTAH - they don't need to take this gross gambling money. www.politico.com/newsletters/...

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

Henry Burke@henryburke.bsky.social

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

nbcnews.comCongressional staff planned official trip with luxury stops in Italy and France weeks before electionThe 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.

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.comJustice Alito pushes back on calls to sit out a major Supreme Court climate caseThe conservative justice has no financial conflict that would require him to recuse himself from the case, a court spokeswoman told NBC News.

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

dissentmagazine.orgDeath by Data Centers - Dissent MagazineI’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...

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

washingtonsun.comKyrsten Sinema’s Ex-Bodyguard Is Accused of a $200K Art-Destroying Rampage at Her HomeThe incident is the latest fallout surrounding Sinema’s relationship with her ex-bodyguard, who was married while working on her security detail.

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!

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!)

nytimes.comTrump Officials Eject 750,000 From Obamacare Markets, Claiming FraudVice President JD Vance said the measure would save the government $2.2 billion.

Full story

18 Sept

The Sean Duffy-led DOT has found their solution to high gas prices: unleashing dangerously sleep-deprived truckers onto the roads!

washingtonsun.comTrump Aides Are Prepping an AI Takeover of Government ServicesFormer 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.

17 Sept

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

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

Henry Burke@henryburke.bsky.social

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

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

nytimes.comInside the $440 Million Collapse of Guidepost MontessoriA man with a vision set out to revolutionize preschool. It became a $440 million fiasco.

The whole piece is really enraging and has some great other details

nytimes.comFor Fired DeSantis Campaign Staff Member, a Second Chance at State Dept. (Gift Article)The hiring of Nate Hochman, who lost his job amid an uproar over a video containing a Nazi symbol, underscores the administration’s willingness to overlook past transgressions.

7 Sept

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

Edward Wong@ewong.bsky.social

NEW: Nate Hochman was fired from the DeSantis campaign in 2023 after promoting a video with the Sonnenrad, a Nazi symbol embraced by white supremacists. He now works in Rubio's State Department, as deputy director of policy planning and chief speechwriter. Gift link: www.nytimes.com/2026/09/06/u...

4 Sept

The publication that employs Maggie Haberman wrote this without a shred of irony

25 Aug

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

Judd Legum@juddlegum.bsky.social

1. The billionaires fighting a billionaire tax in California have created an AI-slop ad that shows the tax’s supporters assaulting kids and stealing their stuff.

25 Aug

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.

Henry Burke@henryburke.bsky.social

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

bit.lyRoad Trip to NowhereTransportation Secretary Sean Duffy's reality show is an ungainly mix of corporate corruption and MAGA agitprop.

The Nation Magazine@thenation.com

By structuring so many of the stops in The Great American Road Trip around Duffy’s photo-ops, the show allows Duffy essentially to double dip–using DOT resources on the pretext that he’s performing his job duties before the TV cameras. https://bit.ly/4cXxuu2

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!

Henry Burke@henryburke.bsky.social

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:

bit.lyRoad Trip to NowhereTransportation Secretary Sean Duffy's reality show is an ungainly mix of corporate corruption and MAGA agitprop.

The Nation Magazine@thenation.com

The hijinks and scrapes that the Duffy family encounters in its new reality-TV show come across less like the fare on the Real Housewives franchise or The Jersey Shore than a CPAC breakout panel on wheels. https://bit.ly/4cXxuu2

View full thread

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

thenation.comRoad Trip to NowhereTransportation Secretary Sean Duffy's reality show is an ungainly mix of corporate corruption and MAGA agitprop.

Read my full review here:

bit.lyRoad Trip to NowhereTransportation Secretary Sean Duffy's reality show is an ungainly mix of corporate corruption and MAGA agitprop.

The Nation Magazine@thenation.com

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

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

Henry Burke reposted

thenation.comRoad Trip to NowhereTransportation Secretary Sean Duffy's reality show is an ungainly mix of corporate corruption and MAGA agitprop.

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

atg.wa.govJudge orders Kalshi cease numerous Washington operations | Washington StateA King County Superior Court judge issued a final order requiring KalshiEX (Kalshi) to cease many of its Washington operations after finding that Kalshi likely violated the Washington Gambling Act and...

14 Aug

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

Kathryn Tewson@kathryntewson.bsky.social

A King County Superior Court judge in Washington state has found that Kalshi’s trick of calling itself a “prediction market” doesn’t make it not gambling under the Washington Gambling Act, and has therefore ordered Kalshi to stop almost all activity within the state. Read more here:

Henry Burke reposted

The War on Cars

@thewaroncars.bsky.social

10 Aug

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...

Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com

Sean Duffy says his roadtrip reality show will come out in "maybe two weeks" 🙃

Henry Burke reposted

revolvingdoorproject.substack.comThe Insider Trading AdministrationInsider trading is no longer limited to Trump allies. A franchise of your own is now available – for a price

24 July

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:

Henry Burke reposted

axios.comScoop: Progressives scorch Gillibrand over cryptoThe blistering — and deeply personal — attack from three groups complicates already delicate negotiations over the CLARITY Act.

22 July

"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."

17 July

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"

17 July

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

17 July

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

30 June

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

30 June

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

30 June

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

washingtonpost.comAfter wins by democratic socialists, centrist Democrats unite to push backThirteen Democratic House members and candidates announced their support for an initiative that commits them to centrist principles.

26 June

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

The Washington Post@washingtonpost.com

Thirteen Democratic House members and candidates announced their support for a centrist initiative aimed at pushing back against the party’s tilt toward democratic socialism.