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This is Defector, a new sports blog and media company. We made this place together, we own it together, we run it together. Without access, without favor, without discretion, and without interference.

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Defector

NYC: Come To Our WNBA Comedy Show On May 16

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Live Event


<p>charismatic megafauna (they/them)</p>


Typing

Sabrina Imbler

a headshot of fired CDC health communications manager Sarah Boim

Boim_Headshot

Politics

An Interview With A Fired CDC Health Communications Manager

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Albert Burneko

Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket carrying astronauts Aisha Bowe, Amanda Nguyễn, Kerianne Flynn, Gayle King, Katy Perry, and Lauren Sánchez, lifts off from Launch Site One north of Van Horn, Texas on April 14, 2025.

blue origin

Science

At What Point Has One Actually “Been To” Space?

A photo of Jules Reynolds, a fired USDA program coordinator, sitting near a valley of farmland

Jules 1

Interviews

An Interview With A Fired USDA Program Coordinator

People attend the 'Trans Day of Visibility Rally' hosted by the Christopher Street Project on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Someone holds up a sign saying "I WANT MORE TRANSSEXUAL FRIENDS LOVERS TEACHERS STUDENTS NEIGHBORS AUTHORS ARTISTS LEADERS LAWYERS PREACHERS & COMRADES.

Trans-Day-of-Visibility-Rally-Near-US-Capitol

What It Means To Fund Studies In Transition “Regret”

a photo of Tara Kerin, an infectious disease epidemiologist who lost her job as a result of the DOGE layoffs

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An Interview With An Epidemiologist Who Lost Her Job Because Of The DOGE Layoffs

<div>Paola Rosa-Aquino is a freelance journalist covering science, space and the environment. Born and raised in Puerto Rico, she now lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her canine co-worker Cece.</div>
<div></div>


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Paola Rosa-Aquino

Flames are seen after Starship's Super Heavy Booster splashed down for a water landing off the coast of, Texas, on its sixth flight test on November 19, 2024. SpaceX aborted an attempt to catch the first stage booster of its Starship megarocket in the "chopstick" arms of its launch tower, opting instead for an ocean splashdown, a live feed showed November 19. The hitch came as President-elect Donald Trump joined SpaceX chief Elon Musk at the company's Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas to watch the test flight, the latest sign of the budding bromance between the two billionaires. (Photo by CHANDAN KHANNA / AFP) (Photo by CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP via Getty Images)

US-SPACE-AEROSPACE-SPACEX-STARSHIP

We’re Littering The Earth With Space Trash

a photo of Veronica Correa, a fired EPA public affairs specialist, standing in snowy woods by a stream

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An Interview With A Fired EPA Public Affairs Specialist

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Kelsey McKinney

spiky piece of black glass that is actually a brain

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I Should Have Been The One To Discover The Glass Brain

A photo of Sara Hugentobler, a USFWS fish biologist, in the lab extracting DNA

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An Interview With A Fired USFWS Fish Biologist

a selfie of Sarah Cooley, the former director of NOAA's ocean acidification program, with an orange life vest on a river

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An Interview With A Fired NOAA Director

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Barry Petchesky

A giant of a moon appears before a giant of a planet undergoing seasonal changes in this natural color view of Titan and Saturn from NASA's Cassini spacecraft. (Photo by: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

A giant of a moon appears before a giant of a planet undergoing seasonal changes in this natural color view of Titan and Saturn from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft.

Saturn Has 274 Moons Now; Jupiter Is Crying Itself To Sleep; It Literally Cannot Believe It

a photo of Sabrina Valenti, formerly a budget analyst for NOAA. Sabrina has brown curly hair and is standing against a floral background.

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An Interview With A Fired NOAA Budget Analyst

a photo of Kaesee Bourne, a former fish and wildlife biologist at the USFWS, holding a shovel in front of a wetland

kaesee bourne

An Interview With A Fired USFWS Biologist

Dennis M. Hogan

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS - FEBRUARY 19: People including researchers from Chicago area universities gather on the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) campus to voice concerns about the potential loss of federal funding for medical research on February 19, 2025 in Chicago, Illinois. The researchers are worried about the future of their projects as the Trump administration cuts grant funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

uchicago-getty-image

The NIH Cuts Are Part Of An All-Out War On Higher Education

<p>Becky Ferreira is a science reporter based in Ithaca, N.Y. She writes <a href="https://www.404media.co/author/becky/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.404media.co/author/becky/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1740083778769000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3_mk31dNhas5lklZb38a6k">The Abstract</a>, a weekly science column for 404 Media. Her book <em>First Contact</em>, about the search for alien life, will be out in fall 2025.</p>


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Becky Ferreira

pet rat

Which Pests Shall Inherit The Earth?

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Giri Nathan

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Life's Rich Pageant

A Stinky Pilgrimage To The Corpse Flower, With Notes Of Rat, Sweat, And Cheese

Man Eating Soft Ice Cream on Cone with Clear Plastic Spoon

Everything I Would Eat With The Spoon Inside My Brain

<p>Staff Writer</p>
<p>Find me on Signal @DefectorChris.09</p>


Profile Pic

Chris Thompson

The plasma cannon fires a bolt of plasma.

Plasma Cannon

I Would Think Nothing Of Being Shot In The Chest With This Plasma Cannon

ROBLEDO DE CHAVELA, MADRID, SPAIN - 2020/08/19: A meteor crossing the night sky over the Milky way and a large antenna of the Madrid Deep Space Communications Complex of NASA and JPL, used for for tracking vehicles and spacecraft as well as for radioastronomy research. (Photo by Marcos del Mazo/LightRocket via Getty Images)

A meteor crossing the night sky over the Milky way and a

What To Know About The Newest Asteroid That Probably Won’t Obliterate You


<p>Investigations Editor. You can contact her at diana@defector.com or dfmoskovitz@protonmail.com. She&#8217;s also on Signal @dmoskovitz.99</p>


DFM New Headshot

Diana Moskovitz

An aerial view of a street in the Eaton fire. The entire street is burned and decimated. It looks like a bomb went off. A sole person walks down the empty steet.

Eaton Fire aerial view

Journalismism

We Need A New Deal To Save Local Journalism

A fire fighting helicopter drops water as the Palisades fire grows near the Mandeville Canyon neighborhood and Encino, California, on January 11, 2025. The Palisades Fire, the largest of the Los Angeles fires, spread toward previously untouched neighborhoods January 11, forcing new evacuations and dimming hopes that the disaster was coming under control. Across the city, at least 11 people have died as multiple fires have ripped through residential areas since January 7, razing thousands of homes in destruction that US President Joe Biden likened to a "war scene." (Photo by Patrick T. Fallon / AFP) (Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images)

US-WEATHER-FIRE

Climate

The Future Of West Coast Wildfire Is Whiplash

A wide-angle view of the total eclipse of the Moon of November 8, 2022, with the red Moon at right amid the stars of the northern winter sky and Milky Way, plus with bright red Mars at top. Above and left of the Moon is the blue Pleiades star cluster, while below it and to the left is the larger Hyades cluster with reddish Aldebaran in Taurus. The stars of Orion are left of centre, including reddish Betelgeuse, while at far left are the two Dog Stars: Procyon, at top, in Canis Minor, and Sirius, at bottom, in Canis Major. So this is a gathering of many red stars, planets and the rare red Moon. I shot the frames for this scene beginning at 3:50 am MST, 10 minutes before mid-totality during this 1h25m-long total eclipse. . (Photo by: Alan Dyer/VW Pics/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Red Moon in the Winter Sky (Nov. 8, 2022)

Life Lessons

Look Up!

Germanic warrior taking stimulants imagined by Stanislav(Stanisław) Kontny,

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History

Veni, Vidi, Snorti: I Came, I Saw, I Did A Bump

A gif of a green fruit that looks like a cucumber shooting out many small wet seeds.

ColorCucumber4

The Secret Lives Of Squirting Cucumbers

WASHINGTON, DC - May 23: Laura Helmuth of The Washington Post via Getty Images poses for a portrait on Tuesday May 23, 2017 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Matt McClain/The Washington Post via Getty Images)