Aaron engaged with two distinct but related stories on May 17. The first was Colorado Governor Jared Polis's decision to commute the sentence of Tina Peters, the election-denying county clerk convicted of a serious breach of public trust. Aaron amplified criticism of the move from multiple angles — both Jamelle Bouie's sharp take that Polis misjudged the politics badly, and a separate argument that white-collar and public corruption crimes in particular warrant severe punishment as deterrence. The Republican DA who prosecuted Peters also pushed back on the commutation, underscoring how broadly the decision was criticized. The underlying reporting comes from the New York Times.

The other thread running through Aaron's activity was AI and commencement speeches. He reposted commentary on the wave of college graduates booing AI-boosting speakers — including former Google CEO Eric Schmidt at the University of Arizona — with the observation that the industry's own messaging, centered on job displacement, amounts to a massive self-inflicted PR failure. A related repost noted that when a commencement speaker becomes the story instead of the graduates, university leadership has failed. 404 Media's coverage of the trend was part of what Aaron shared.

Rounding out the day were a couple of broader political reposts: one from Greg Sargent connecting Trump's use of settlement funds and tax enforcement as governing spoils to the broader trajectory of authoritarianism, and a more measured take on public sector unions — arguing that being pro-labor doesn't mean a politician acting as management must capitulate entirely in negotiations, only that they bargain in good faith.