Trump's 'America First' agenda expands to Make Argentina Great Again
Nick Anderson is a Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist.
Opinion
Seeing the National Guard on our streets is bad — but we must beware Trump's Plan B
I saw some of my former Naval War College colleagues at the recent No Kings rally in Providence. Given that National Guard troops and protestors had clashed in Los Angeles at an earlier June rally protesting ICE raids, we wondered whether we would see National Guard troops as we marched, where they would be from, and their mission? We didn’t. That doesn’t mean, however, that there is no need for concern about the future.
The National Guard is unique to the U.S. military given it is under the authority of both state governors and the federal government and has both a domestic and federal mission. Governors can call up the National Guard when states have a crisis, either a natural disaster or a human-made one. Federal authorities can call on the National Guard for overseas deployment and to enforce federal law.
President Dwight Eisenhower used both federalized National Guard units and regular U.S. Army units to enforce desegregation laws in Arkansas in 1957. But using military troops to intimidate citizens and support partisan politics, especially by bringing National Guard units from other states has never been, and should never be, part of its mission.
But that’s what is happening now.
A host of Democratic U.S. senators, led by Dick Durbin of Illinois, ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Jack Reed of Rhode Island, ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has called for an inquiry into the Trump administration’s recent domestic deployment of active-duty and National Guard troops to Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Portland, Oregon, and Memphis, Tennessee.
In an Oct. 17 letter to the Defense Department’s Inspector General, the senators challenge the legality of the domestic troop deployment and charge that it undermines military readiness and politicizes the nation’s military.
Ostensibly, the troops have been sent to cities “overrun” with crime. Yet data shows that has not been the case. Troops have been sent to largely Democratic-run cities in Democratic-led states.
The case for political theater being the real reason behind the deployment certainly was strengthened when largely Republican Mississippi sent troops to Washington D.C., even though crime in Mississippi cities like Jackson is higher than in D.C. Additionally, there is an even more dangerous purpose to the troop presence — that of normalizing the idea of troops on the streets, a key facet of authoritarian rule.
There are fundamental differences in training and mission between military troops and civilian law enforcement, with troop presence raising the potential for escalation and excessive force, and the erosion of both civil liberties and military readiness.
Troop deployments have hit some stumbling blocks. Judges, including those appointed by President Donald Trump, have in cases like Portland impeded administration attempts to send troops. Mayors and governors, including Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, have pushed back as well.
While the Trump administration has shown its willingness to ignore the law, it has also shown a significant ability to come up with a “Plan B.” In this case, Plan B, used by many past dictators, is likely the utilization of private military companies (PMC).
Countries have used these mercenary organizations to advance strategic goals abroad in many instances. Though the Wagner Group, fully funded by the Kremlin, was disbanded after a rebellion against the regular Russian military in 2023, Vladimir Putin continues to use PMCs to advance strategic goals in Ukraine and other regions of the world wrapped in a cloak of plausible deniability. Nigeria has used them internally to fight Boko Haram. The United States used Blackwater in Afghanistan in the early days after 9/11. Overall, the use of PMCs abroad is highly controversial as it involves complex tradeoffs between flexibility, expertise and need with considerable risks to accountability, ethics and long-term stability.
Domestically, the use of PMCs offer leaders facing unrest the advantage of creating and operating in legal “gray zones.” Leaders not confident of the loyalty of a country’s armed forces have resorted to these kinds of private armies. Adolf Hitler relied on his paramilitary storm troopers, or “brown shirts” to create and use violence and intimidation against Jews and perceived political opponents. Similarly, Benito Mussolini’s “black shirts,” Serbian paramilitaries, and PMCs in Muammar Gaddafi’s Libya served similar purposes.
President Donald Trump has said he is “open” to the idea of using PMCs to help deport undocumented immigrants. He has militarized Homeland Security agents to send to Portland, evidencing his willingness to circumvent legal challenges. And perhaps most glaringly, poorly qualified and trained masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are already terrorizing American cities.
At the No Kings rally in Providence my former colleagues and I did see a man in an unfamiliar uniform — with a gun and handcuffs — standing alone on the sidewalk along the march path. He wasn’t doing anything threatening, just watching. In the past, he might not have even been noticed.
But that day he was. Some people even waved to him. Protestors are not yet intimidated, but they are wary, and rightfully so.
Be aware, America. They have a Plan B.
- Joan Johnson-Freese of Newport is professor emeritus of national security affairs at the U.S. Naval War College and a Senior Fellow at Women in International Security. She earned a Ph.D. in international relations and affairs from Kent State University. She is an adjunct Government Department faculty member at Harvard Extension and Summer Schools, teaching courses on women, peace & security, grand strategy & U.S. national security and leadership. Her book, “Leadership in War & Peace: Masculine & Feminine,” was released in March 2025 from Routledge. Her website is joanjohnsonfreese.com.
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These key signs show resistance to Trump is becoming an irresistible uprising
The resistance is becoming an uprising.
Last Saturday, more than 7 million of us poured into the streets to reject Trump’s dictatorship. That’s more than 2 percent of the adult population of the United States.
Historical studies suggest that 3.5 percent of a population engaged in sustained nonviolent resistance can topple even the most brutal dictatorships — such as Chile under Pinochet and Serbia under Milosevic.
Which means we’re almost there.
Other evidence of the backlash is all around us. Seven of the nine universities Trump selected to join his extortion compact — offering preferential treatment for federal funds in exchange for a pledge to support his agenda — have rejected it.
Most major airports have refused to show Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s propaganda video attacking Democrats for the government shutdown.
Almost all of America’s news outlets have refused to sign Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s media loyalty oath.
Trump’s destruction of the East Wing of the White House (after promising he wouldn’t) and posting an AI video of himself sh------ on America is causing even loyal Trumpers to worry he’s losing his marbles.
I believe future generations will look back on this scourge and see not just what was destroyed but also what was born.
Even prior to Trump, American democracy was deeply flawed. The moneyed interests were drowning out everyone else. Inequality was reaching record levels. Corruption — legalized bribery through campaign contributions — was the norm. The bottom 90 percent were getting nowhere because the system was rigged against them.
Many of you are now sowing the seeds of fundamental reform.
Whether it’s demonstrating as you did last Saturday, appearing at Republican town halls, jamming the Capitol and White House switchboards, generating mountains of emails and letters, protecting the vulnerable in your communities, or going door-to-door for candidates like Zohran Mamdani, your activism is paying off.
The backlash against Trump is growing. His approval rating has sunk to a level not seen since Richard Nixon last sat in the White House, according to the latest Gallup poll, out last Wednesday.
These are terrible times — the worst I’ve lived through, and I’ve lived through some bad ones. (Remember 1968? Nixon’s enemies list? Anyone old enough to recall Joe McCarthy’s communist witch hunts?)
But as long as we are alive, as long as we are resolved, as long as we are taking action to stop the worst of this, as long as we are trying to make America and the world even a bit better — have no doubt: We will triumph.
- Robert Reich is a professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich.substack.com/.
- Robert Reich's new memoir, Coming Up Short, can be found wherever you buy books. You can also support local bookstores nationally by ordering the book at bookshop.org.
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One man can tell America what Republicans are trying to hide — and now he wants to do so
The mysterious Jack Smith is emerging from the shadows that keep him.
The one-time special counsel who was tasked at looking into the worst attack on our Capitol since the War of 1812, has lately indicated he has a reputation to protect, even if thanks to the feeble man who appointed him, his protection of the United States of America came far too late.
Brazen Republicans led by the foolish, loudmouth, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), have indicated they want a word with Smith, and this just might be the break millions of us have been waiting for.
Be careful what you ask for, Jimbo, because you might just get it.
Our justice system’s inability and/or refusal to jail the people who masterminded the violent attack on our country on Jan. 6, 2021, is the single greatest failure of the rule of law I have witnessed in my lifetime, and I am NOT done with it.
Read that again.
NOT DONE WITH IT.
So you’re damn right I want the whole story told about what went down that gruesome January day, and who was behind it. I want a damn accounting of all the days that led up to it.
I want to know who was behind the attack on America, and I know for sure I am not alone.
Jan. 6, 2021, was the day we found out for sure that there isn’t a single terrible thing that white, male privilege can’t afford to buy in the United States of America. That’s the day we found out for sure, that there are millions of people who have it out for this country and what, and who, it is supposed to stand for.
This wasn’t a random deplorable act, it was far worse than that. It was the gruesome act of a racist, cultist political movement rooted in the notion of white power and spearheaded by an orange devil.
If we don’t know that for sure by now with troops in our streets, our White House being demolished, masked marauders sweeping innocent people away to God know where, and an entire party covering for an alleged child rapist, to hell with all of us.
We all watched the attack that terrible January afternoon. We know what we saw. Just as the orange devil knew what it is he saw through those empty, red eyes.
He loved it.
He loved it so much in fact, that while the attack was in full froth, he did nothing but sequester himself in front of a TV and spent three full hours rooting for its success.
We know this.
When it was finally clear America’s defenses would hold against his assault on Lady Liberty, he harrumphed in front of a camera on the White House lawn and told the enemies of America that he had invited to our Capitol to simply go home. Oh, and he told them that he loved them.
HE TOLD THEM THAT HE LOVED THEM.
Don’t you DARE tell us there should be no accounting for that terrible day — a day that followed a night which proved just how great America really could be, when Georgians went to the polls and voted a Black man and a Jewish man into office to give the Democrats control of the United States Senate.
Just 14 hours after freedom rang in Georgia, Trump and his Republicans’ attack on America commenced …
We will never forget this, even if that’s exactly what an entire corrupt, morally bankrupt political party would like us to do. They’d rather we didn’t learn from it, and that future generations are told some perverted version of the truth, instead of what really went down that day. Rewriting, or ignoring history has become just one of their their specialties. They ban books they don’t like, and the odious billionaires who foot their bills, have successfully bought off large chunks of our toothless, cowardice corporate media to protect us from the truth, instead of reporting it.
Truth is getting harder and harder to find these days, so it’s best we go with what we know, and believe what is right in front of our eyes.
So here’s some truth:
Trump and the people who stood up the violent attack on our country belong in jail for the rest of their miserable lives, and I swear to God I won’t stop typing that EVER.
Our government is now run by the people who attacked us, because I am telling you again: There isn’t a single terrible thing that white privilege can’t afford.
So how did this happen …
My contempt for Joe Biden’s worthless attorney general, Merrick Garland, has been wrapped in many hard words the past four years, so here’s a just a few more — and directly this time:
Justice delayed, is justice denied. Worse, you knew that, sport. You were timid in the face of horror. Completely adequate. Weak. So now you hide after failing to protect the one thing you were charged with protecting. And that’s just pathetic.
No, my friends, I don’t feel much better, either, but some things need saying. This has been an extraordinarily sad chapter in our history, and Garland was on the wrong side of it.
Thanks to his dithering, or worse, calculated, dereliction of duty, Jack Smith came along far too late, but he has a story to tell, and facts to let loose, and everybody in the world needs to hear them.
I’ll end with words I typed seven weeks after last year’s terrible election, and this time wrap them in steel:
I don’t much care how this report on January 6th is released, or leaked, or served up cold on a platter, just as long as we see it. We paid for the damn investigation, and have a right to see just how close we are to losing everything right now, because of the criminal incompetence of Attorney General Merrick Garland the past three-plus years, and the incomprehensible stupidity and recklessness of so many American voters just 52 short days ago.
Everybody who watched that heinous attack on our country has a right to know who and what was behind it. You don’t get to just quit, wash your hands of the whole damn thing, and go off into a comfortable retirement in the countryside made possible by taxpayer money, while the nation you roundly ignored slowly burns.
I cannot stop being angrier than hell about this, and for the life of me, can’t believe more people who profess to love this country aren’t every bit as furious as I am.
So let’s hear what you have to say, Jack Smith. The entire world is waiting …
- (D. Earl Stephens is the author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” and finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes. You can find all his work here.)
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No Kings didn't just oppose Trump — it had a clear warning for Dems
Recently, I talked about how the No Kings rally exposed the regime’s weakness. Donald Trump wants the common folk of America to surrender in advance, just like their betters did. But when more than 7 million said hell no, what did he do? Well, let’s just say it was profane.
Today, I want to talk about another kind of weakness that it revealed. Instead of the president and the Republicans, however, the No Kings rally exposed the weakness of certain centrist Democrats.
How so? First remember what centrism is. These days, it’s the capacity for a Democrat in a competitive district to accept as true the premise of the lies told about Democratic Party by Trump and the Republicans.
For instance, when it became conventional wisdom, as a result of all this lying, that Vice President Kamala Harris was defeated because she pushed too hard for trans rights, centrist Democrats accepted that as true, though it was false, in order to seem moderate by comparison.
This is what Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts aimed for when he invoked transgender girls in sports. Harris lost, he said, because his party spent “too much time trying not to offend anyone rather than being brutally honest … I have two little girls. I don’t want them getting run over on a playing field by a male or formerly male athlete, but as a Democrat I’m supposed to be afraid to say that.”
Centrists do this in order to portray themselves to independent voters as honest brokers whose primary concerns are above partisan politics. In reality, however, it’s conflict-avoidance. They don’t want to take the risk of fighting Republicans. So they fight their own side instead. They make the demands of advocates and reformers — known cynically as “the groups” — seem radical or impractical or beyond “what’s really important to the American people.” The result? Nothing changes.
What I’m describing is the normal for Democrats like Moulton. They believe that it earns them credibility and public trust. But norms can’t endure in the face of an ongoing constitutional crisis. The Trump regime isn’t just violating the rights of one or two marginal groups. It is violating the rights of all Americans, triggering a national reckoning that fueled the biggest one-day demonstration in American history.
More than anything else, No Kings was a necessary reaffirmation of bedrock democratic principles, because so few elites, including centrist Democrats, have been willing to affirm them. And if centrists choose to smear more than 7 million people the way they have smeared “the groups,” they risk discrediting themselves completely.
It may not be clear yet that centrism is fictional, but it will be.
In the case of Seth Moulton, perhaps sooner than he thinks.
Moulton is set to primary Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts. While he’s acting like trans rights are negotiable, Markey isn’t playing. At the No Kings rally in Boston, which drew 100,000 demonstrators, he declared trans rights to be human rights and the people there roared.
When Moulton got up to speak, they booed.
That was a bright line, according to Evan Urquhart. After writing extensively for The Atlantic, Vanity Fair and others, he set up Assigned Media in 2022 to report on transgender news. Evan was in Boston.
“The Democratic rank-and-file is disgusted by Trumpism,” he told me in the interview below. “They don't want to see Democrats who compromise and meet Trumpism halfway. They want to see fighters.”
JS: In a thread prior to the No Kings rally, you shared some wisdom about how to balance the evils facing the trans community with the joys found within it. You seemed to be addressing the old problem with hope: too much makes you naive, too little makes you nihilist.
EU: I've noticed that informed Americans in general, and especially trans people, are crying out for ways to push through the despair at seeing our country's rule of law collapse. Ideals that we may have thought were universal and unassailable, such as human rights or the worth and dignity of every person, are suddenly very much up for grabs.
It is, as you say, naive to imagine that good is simply going to triumph here. We've blown past most of the guard rails that were supposed to protect us, and no one is more keenly aware of that than trans people. The federal government officially defines us as not even existing, and they've hinted that they want to go further to define us as terrorists.
My thread is about finding ways to live with the reality that we are losing our rights and there's no clear floor, no knowing how much we will lose before this insanity ends, while also contributing to efforts to find that floor and begin pushing that floor back up again.
Ed Markey was at the No Kings rally in Boston. He said: "Here in Massachusetts we stand for what is right. We stand with trans people because trans rights are human rights.” That's in contrast to Seth Moulton, his primary challenger, who seems to think trans rights are negotiable. You were there. How are you feeling today?
Ever since November, when we learned Trump would be president, I've known that the trans community would be in a uniquely vulnerable position, because Trump's closing argument against Kamala Harris was that she was too trans-supportive.
Never mind that Harris didn't say one word in support of trans rights during her campaign. The conventional wisdom was always going to be that Democrats were punished for being too trans supportive.
So the struggle for my community has been participating in a movement for democracy led by Democrats who aren’t sure they want our community with them — or want to blame us for all their troubles.
Sen. Markey is a longstanding supporter of trans rights, and his primary challenger is Rep. Moulton, who was one of the early Democrats distancing himself from the trans community.
And what I think we're seeing, and saw so decisively with Markey being cheered in Boston for standing up for trans rights and Moulton being booed by that same crowd, is that the Democratic rank-and-file is disgusted by Trumpism. They don't want to see Democrats who compromise and meet Trumpism halfway. They want to see fighters.
Trans people are great fighters. Our activists are out there, unbowed, defiant in the face of all of this scapegoating and oppression, and I think that fighting spirit is resonating with many Americans.
In your thread, you hint at the importance of federalism — the decentralization of federal power and the sovereignty of the states — in protecting trans and human rights. You suggest that there could be a "soft secession with blue state protections growing more meaningful as federal power fades." Talk about that more please.
I think that the No Kings rallies showed that Americans are not willing to go quietly into dictatorship. Unfortunately, there are a lot of deep structural problems in the American system that Republicans are determined to exploit. The Supreme Court has become a partisan rubber stamp on the most lawless actions by the president. The government is currently shut down and House Speaker Mike Johnson doesn't even seem like he's trying to find a solution, to the point where you almost start to suspect Republicans would rather us not even have a legislative branch and just vest all power in the executive.
These are headwinds that national Democrats might be able to overcome with a strong enough midterms and a strong enough Democratic president in 2028, but even if a lot of things broke that way, it does not feel assured. So, what's the alternative?
If Trump is too weak and unpopular to turn all of America into a dictatorship, but Democrats are unable to restore constitutional governance, we could see a much stronger federalism, with blue states increasingly ignoring the federal government. It's a sad picture in a lot of ways, but trans people have got to be practical, and practically speaking, I'd rather live in a strong Massachusetts that can protect me, perhaps even a Massachusetts that has strong regional alliances with other New England states, than be forced out of the country.
You remind me of something I came back to often: that the crisis probably can't be overcome through elections alone, but through political change that starts with individual hearts and minds.
I think we do have deeply moral people and movements, but those movements are increasingly detached from any institutional power.
When I think about the concern people have about the fate of the Palestinian people, people halfway around the world that we've been indoctrinated to hate and look down on, I see a deep belief in the principle that where a child is born shouldn't determine whether they're able to grow up safely.
When this deep care and concern for others is treated as radical, idealistic, naive and impractical, what happens at first is that no action is taken to protect the children in harm’s way, but in the end the leaders and institutions who worked so hard to distance themselves from these movements wind up delegitimizing themselves.
In journalism, we're seeing this with the deepest values of our profession. Journalists are expected to hold powerful people accountable without fear or favor, and bring audiences the truth even when it might be risky or unpopular. That’s being treated in the same way, as naive, childish and something no one believes any more, in a time when news organizations have been defanged by billionaires.
And what happens at first is that you see a loss of hard-hitting, honest reporting, but what I think happens next is that those institutions lose their legitimacy, and independent reporters who are willing to carry the mantle of those deep values rush into the vacuum.
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What we talk about when we talk about being Antifa
I became a member of “Antifa” at five years old, at my auntie’s house watching The Sound of Music a hundred times over.
I wasn’t exactly sure what fascism meant, but I knew that the guys throwing up their arm in a Sieg Heil salute were terrifying, and that resistance to that salute was dangerous. Very dangerous. Chills ran down my spine each time I watched Captain von Trapp ripping up that Nazi flag, because I understood he was risking his life with that simple act of defiance.
In the fifth grade, I got the historical context and political analysis I was lacking when I was assigned to read The Diary of Anne Frank. A first-hand story from a girl my age, in real time — a girl who was ultimately found and killed by the same fascists I feared.
After that experience, I was “Antifa” all the way. It permanently shifted my perspective as I saw fascism always lurking in the shadows waiting to pounce. It is the dark side of human nature. Some people will always believe that they are better than other people, and justify murder and other heinous acts out of self-interest. I heard the phrase “never again” being used in reference to the Holocaust as a young girl. I promised myself that I would live by that promise.
Some 40 years later, I find myself living in the reality that brought Captain von Trapp to his breaking point. The fascists are taking over, and we are not responding accordingly!
People being abducted to other countries they may have never known; covering up a decades-long child sex trafficking ring to protect the aristocracy; firing public servants while destroying the institutions that make our society even marginally work. These are fascist moves — as is policing our language and our right to peacefully protest.
While there is little we feel we can do as individuals about what Immigration and Customs Enforcement or the Department of Justice are doing in our communities, we each can and must deny our consent to their insistence that we don’t use our words.
Words help clarify as a society what we stand for and who we are. Words are the first and most powerful tool that we have against tyranny and violence. If we can’t communicate clearly with each other about what is happening, about what we think, about what we might be able to do, then we will certainly lose.
Our federal government has scrubbed websites and other documents of words like “women”, “diversity”, “identity”, “race,” “climate,” and “science.” Giant publicly-funded projects like cancer research, food for children, and clean water are losing their funding because their grant reports include these words.
In recent days, President Donald Trump declared through executive order that “Antifa” — not an actual group, but an ideology that fascism is bad — is now a terrorist organization. Think about this. An ideology opposing fascism is deemed a threat to our country. Our words, our political beliefs are acts of terrorism.
“Never again” means each of us taking a stance. This starts with protecting and using our words. This, like Captain von Trapp’s destruction of the Nazi flag, are simple but powerful acts of resistance. Your words are a collaboration between your mind, your spirit, and your tongue.
You call the shots. Say the words: I am “Antifa.” Because we should all oppose fascism.
- Maria Perez is the cofounder of Democracy Rising, a national nonprofit working toward a more functional, representative democracy for all of us.
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If it walks like a fascist, talks like a fascist and jokes like a fascist, it's likely a…
For the last few weeks, Republican Party leadership has been carrying out a campaign to, essentially, classify the word “fascist” as hate speech against right-wingers. But while some Republicans shy away from the term, plenty of others, particularly among their base and their influencers, find it edgy and hip. Some have even begun to wear it as a badge of honor.
Most notably, last week, members of the Republican Youth — er, Young Republicans — were caught in a group chat declaring their love of Adolf Hitler and expressing fondness for his policy of mass extermination in gas chambers.
The incident caused some drama and led to some repercussions, but not as much as you might hope. Vice President JD Vance dismissed the story, saying, “Kids do stupid things, especially young boys … They tell edgy, offensive jokes. And I really don’t want us to grow up in a country where a kid telling a … very offensive, stupid joke is cause to ruin their lives.” By and large, that seems to be the tack most Republicans are taking, certainly from the top down.
Vance’s attempt to downplay the chats as just kids being edgy may work for some, but the truth is that many members of the chat were grown men well into their 30s, nearly Vance’s age, who occupied positions of political influence. Maybe they were joking, but it’s not clear where the irony or the punchlines were — and it’s a poor choice of comedic material if the party wants to shake the fascist label.
'Fascist' as hate speech
Ever since Donald Trump’s takeover of the GOP, Republicans have struggled with this fascist comparison. Actually, the left has used the term to describe far-right policies since long before Trump, but Trump’s Mussolini-like mannerisms, dictatorial ambitions, and cult of personality have made the term feel like a natural fit and brought it into more common use, especially in his second term.
After the assassination of Charlie Kirk in September, Republicans like Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) blamed the casual use of the word for inspiring Kirk’s murder and other acts of violence.
Johnson said: “Calling people Nazis and fascists is not helpful … There are some deranged people in society, and when they see leaders using that kind of language … it spurs them on to action. We have to recognize that reality and address it appropriately.”
It was also around this time that they began to escalate their campaign against “antifa,” characterizing it as a political organization and threatening to go after its organizers and funders. In truth, though, there is no formal group called antifa. Antifa is short for anti-fascism, and it exists only as an opposition to fascism. So Trump’s position of anti-anti-fascism, if you reduce the double negative, is simply fascism.
Maybe the most dramatic step so far in this anti-antifa campaign was Trump’s issuance of NSPM-7, a presidential memo that accuses people of using the word “fascist” as an excuse to “justify and encourage acts of violent revolution,” and further identifies “anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and anti-Christianity; support for the overthrow of the United States Government; extremism on migration, race, and gender; and hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality” as indicia of potential terroristic inclinations and activities.
One can only guess how the administration is defining these terms, but if their actions to date are anything to go by, simple compassion might, in fact, be regarded as an unlawful, anti-fascist, terrorist thoughtcrime, and anyone who holds such views can be subject to, at a minimum, investigation, surveillance, and harassment by law enforcement — all of which sounds like anti-anti-fascism, to be sure.
Fascism defined
At this point, it’s important to examine just what fascism is. The term has certainly been abused in America. For many, “fascist” has just become shorthand for “someone I don’t like,” or, more specifically, “someone who’s making me do something I don’t want to do.” To wit: Speed limits are fascism. No-smoking signs are fascism. Mask mandates during a pandemic are fascism. Taxes are fascism. And so on.
Alas, few historians would describe such basic laws or civic norms as fascism. While the word doesn’t have any one universally agreed upon definition, and even self-identified fascist societies differ in significant ways, there are a few hallmarks that distinguish fascism from other philosophies. The more of these qualities a government or a society has, the more fascistic it is:
- The merger of state and corporate power. Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, who coined the term fascist, said this was the philosophy’s most defining tenet.
- Authoritarian rule. Power concentrated in a leader with a devoted cult of personality, in whom people see a living embodiment of the nation.
- Police state. A militarized society, including citizen militias and police suppression of protests, speech, and other forms of dissent.
- Propaganda. Rampant propaganda that is rife with lies, conspiracy, and dehumanizing language.
- Censorship. Dissent or open disagreement with official narratives and state policies may be outlawed and punished violently.
- In-group vs. out-group. Hatred of “others,” especially immigrants, religious minorities, and the LGBTQ community, as well as any leftists and academics who support them.
- National and cultural mythology. Desire to preserve or attain “purity” of culture, language, or race and ethnicity, often through appeals to a mythical past.
- War. Jingoism and an aggressive foreign policy.
- Obsession with aesthetics. From architecture to attire, everything intends to give an air of magnificence, superiority, and national pride, no matter how superficial.
Any honest observer can see how much of the definition fits. Not all of it is unique to Trump, but he does tick more boxes than the average politician. Soon enough, though, simply pointing that out might land you in a heap of trouble. Unless, of course, Republicans shift gears and decide to embrace the term, as at least some of them are beginning to do.
Reclaiming fascism
Back in July, before Trump ratcheted up his campaign against antifa, Fox News comedian Greg Gutfeld went on a revealing rant about his feelings on the word Nazi and how it relates to him. Gutfeld said on his show:
“The criticism doesn’t matter to us when you call us Nazis. Nazi this and Nazi that … We need to learn from the Blacks. The way they were able to remove the power from the n-word by using it. So from now on it’s, ‘What up, my Nazi?’”
Gutfeld’s show is intended as a comedy, though you might not recognize it as one. Still, it’s a peculiar joke to make, and frightening to consider who it might resonate with. And this attitude on the right is being more openly embraced: that fascism is hip or edgy and that all the progress made on freedoms and rights for gays, trans people, minorities, and women needs to be rolled back. For instance:
- The successful far-right influencer Matt Walsh calls himself a “theocratic fascist.” While Walsh has claimed it’s an ironic label used to troll his critics, if you pay any attention to what he says and compare it to what a “theocratic fascist” might say, you’ll find he fits the term quite comfortably.
- Another growing voice on the right, especially among the young, is Nick Fuentes, simply an unapologetic, loud and proud neo-Nazi who has dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago.
- Trump’s recent nominee to lead the Office of Special Counsel, Paul Ingrassia, recently had his text messages leaked where he espoused racist attitudes and said, “I do have a Nazi streak in me from time to time, I will admit it.” Ingrassia’s nomination has since been pulled, a relatively rare rebuke from this administration of that kind of conduct.
- A cadre of right-wing influencers have also been trying to sanitize, justify, and even push for the return of chattel slavery. Chief among these is Joshua Haymes, a former pastor who counted among his congregation Secretary of War Pete Hegseth. Haymes recently said, “The institution of slavery is not inherently evil. It is not inherently evil to own another human being. It is very important that every Christian affirm what I just said.”
Republican influencers and the MAGA base are racing to the bottom, fast. It’s known as vice signaling: Each one trying to outdo the next in depravity to prove they are as un-woke and un-PC as possible, even if it reverts them back to plain-old KKK and neo-Nazi hatred and barbarism.
It’s hard to say what abuse, constitutional violation, or act of violence they won’t enthusiastically push for, as long as it’s coming from the right side and being inflicted on an enemy. These aren’t ideas we have to debate. This is fascism, and civilized society already won the argument against it in World War II.
Fascism in the USA
Sadly, fascism is probably appealing to a lot of Americans, even if most are still hesitant to embrace the term. It’s in our national DNA. Our Jim Crow laws and citizenship standards even provided a model for Hitler’s antisemitic campaigns. There have always been bigoted, violent people in this country, and they appreciate a ruler who reflects them. And just as they were in the 1930s, the giant industrialists who shape our politics and society are all too happy to ally themselves with fascist forces, because they know a repressive state can protect their own power from being challenged.
But there are also strains of anti-fascism in our DNA. My grandpa, a veteran of World War II, was antifa, as were many members of the Greatest Generation. And it’s heartening to see older folks and veterans declare themselves antifa, even in the face of Trump’s threats.
It should be a source of pride that we’ve overcome many of our bigotries and xenophobias. Despite all the loud fascist voices in right-wing media and social platforms, I still believe the vast majority of people believe in basic human rights for all. The No Kings protests on Oct. 18 were a good showing of this solidarity.
As this administration goes further off the deep end — deploying the military against American citizens; sending masked Immigration and Custom Enforcement agents to terrorize poor and immigrant communities; profiling, detaining, and abusing people, including American citizens, on mere suspicion of being “illegal;” and disappearing people with no trial to God-knows-where — it’s no accident that they have declared anti-fascism their greatest enemy.
Maybe those 38-year-old kids in the Young Republicans chat were just joking about gas chambers and loving Hitler. But given everything else this administration is doing and everything their propagandists are saying, it falls a bit too close for comfort to, “It’s funny because it’s true.”
- Kyle Schmidlin is a freelance writer who also runs the Third Rail News blog.
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Thanks to one man, Trump has successfully mounted a coup
“No political truth is of greater intrinsic value, or is stamped with the authority of more enlightened patrons of liberty: The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands … may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.”
—James Madison, Federalist 47
“All the powers of government, legislative, executive, and judiciary, result to the legislative body. The concentrating of these in the same hands, is precisely the definition of despotic government. An ELECTIVE DESPOTISM was not the government we fought for; but one ... in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among several bodies of magistracy, as that no one could transcend their legal limits, without being effectually checked and restrained by the others.” (emphasis Jefferson’s)
— Thomas Jefferson, commentary on Federalist 48
Speaker Mike Johnson, presumably on the orders of Donald Trump, has unconstitutionally shut down the House of Representatives for over a month. The result is that Trump can now do pretty much whatever he wants without restraint.
He’s effectively King of America, at least for the moment. No limits, no constraints, no oversight. It’s the coup that finally worked.
If there is any one principle the Founders of this nation agreed on, it was that the first and primary function of Congress is to prevent a president from seizing king-like powers. It’s repeated over and over throughout their writings and carved into the Constitution itself.
That historical reality notwithstanding, “King” Donald has decided, all by himself, to demolish a large chunk of The People’s White House and replace it with a replica of Vladimir Putin’s Winter Palace’s Grand Throne Room so he can entertain billionaires with large, high-dollar fundraisers at the taxpayers’ expense without having to travel all the way to Mar-a-Largo.
He didn’t bother to get permission from the National Trust for Historic Preservation, nor did he submit plans for what people are now calling the “Epstein Ballroom” to the National Capital Planning Commission as any other historic building in D.C. would do. Loopholes in the law apparently allowed him to do this, however, because previous generations of lawmakers never imagined a president would be so insane as to one day demolish parts of the White House without consulting Congress or the people, so they saw no need to forbid it.
Which leaves only Congress as the single agency that could have thwarted Trump’s imperial plans. As any Constitutional scholar will tell you — as would Declaration of Independence author Thomas Jefferson or Father of the Constitution James Madison — that’s at the foundation of their job.
Congress is supposed to have oversight over the president, to constrain him with laws, budgets, and hearings, and keep his behavior within the law. Like they did when Richard Nixon was bugging the Democratic National Committee, or when Bill Clinton tried covering up his affair, or George W. Bush engaged in illegal torture after lying us into two wars.
They should be demanding answers about Trump’s lawless “murders” (quoting Colombia’s president) of people in the Caribbean, his imposing tariffs in violation of Article I of the Constitution, or his ICE agency’s brutality and illegal warantless arrests.
But to do that — even to have prevented his unilateral tearing down part of the White House — the House of Representatives would have to convene oversight hearings and create such a public uproar that Trump would back down, and there’s a real possibility that could have happened, particularly as Republicans like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Rep. Thomas Massey (R-KY) are starting to stand up to Trump.
The only problem is that Congress is on vacation. Apparently because Trump ordered it: we all know that if he wanted the House open, it would be open today.
Johnson has shut down the House by sending everybody home and then dragging out the recess. The growing concern is that he’s doing this at Trump’s demand in order to eliminate congressional oversight and thus enhance his now-near-dictatorial power.
Johnson has kept the chamber in indefinite recess during a government shutdown — the first Speaker in history to do so — while refusing to hold even pro forma sessions, seat a duly elected member (Adelita Grijalva, of Arizona), or allow continuing resolutions to reach the floor.
This is against the law — the supreme law — of the land. There is no joint resolution with the Senate allowing for a recess longer than three days, nor has the Senate passed such a standalone resolution. Article I, §5, cl.4 of the Constitution reads:
“Neither House, during the Session of Congress, shall, without the Consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any other Place than that in which the two Houses shall be sitting.”
Congress didn’t even suspend its functioning for weeks like this during the Civil War or WWII; it’s literally never happened before.
So why would Johnson take this unprecedented step? What’s the emergency that’s greater than the War of 1812, WWI, 9/11, or any other crisis?
One possible answer is that it’s all about increasing Trump’s power as potentate, so he can do whatever he wants — like demolishing part of the White House — with no criticism or examination, no hearings or testimony, no experts or historians, from the House of Representatives.
By halting committee work, freezing discharge petitions through this naked (and unconstitutional) calendar manipulation, and withholding any date for Congress to reconvene, Johnson — obviously fulfilling Trump’s demand — has placed the entire legislative branch into a political form of suspended animation.
Why does Trump want this? Why does he care about the House of Representatives enough to put Mike Johnson in this difficult, illegal situation? This threat to Johnson’s legacy as Speaker?
The House, which only “exists” as a functional body when formally in session (normal or pro forma), has been rendered incapable of introducing bills, issuing subpoenas, or performing any oversight whatsoever of the executive branch, from Trump to Stephen Miller to Russell Vought, Kristi Noem, Pam Bondi, Kash Patel, or anybody else.
And even if the Senate were to step in and “legalize” Johnson’s recess, his dragging it out this long or longer would still have the same impact on weakening what’s left of our democracy and handing more and more uncountable power to Trump.
What Johnson has pulled off is a “procedural” coup: he (with Trump) now controls whether Congress exists at all. His keeping the House in recess concentrates extraordinary power in the Speaker’s office and, by extension, in Trump, whose directives Johnson slavishly follows.
With the calendar erased and committees paralyzed, transparency and accountability over the executive and judicial branches has disappeared; the public can’t track missed votes, can’t demand action, and federal agencies like Vought’s CBO and Noem’s ICE can operate entirely unchecked.
Border Czar Tom Homan suddenly has no oversight. Whatsoever. Ditto for Bondi, Noem, FCC Chair Brendan Carr, Patel, Miller, etc.
They can do whatever they damn well please, particularly since they appear to believe they’ll get pardoned if they get caught breaking the law.
Furthermore, the longer this paralysis continues, the more it normalizes an unbalanced government in which the president acts without legislative restraint.
If this continues, or Johnson falls into a pattern of repeatedly recessing Congress whenever Trump requires him to, Trump might as well declare himself king.
Without the House, even the Senate can’t act in a meaningful way; the Constitution requires that all legislation involving money — including any laws or resolutions that may tie Trump’s hands (since virtually all actions must be paid for) — must originate in the House. (Article 7, Clause 1: “All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives…”)
Without ever proclaiming it out loud, Mike Johnson has accomplished what open insurrection never could: the methodical, bureaucratic nullification of Congress itself, eliminating its ability to perform oversight over Trump.
All without even a peep or notice from the mainstream press, who are instead fixated on the government shutdown, seemingly thinking it’s the same thing as, or part of, the House recess.
If Johnson doesn’t back down, or if he does temporarily but this becomes a regular thing, our republic will have been really and truly turned into a kingdom — complete with a massive new throne room — before our very eyes.
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These shocking Trump orders are nothing short of murder
Donald Trump has ordered more deadly bombings of small fishing boats, killing everyone onboard, including an incident off the coast of Colombia. That was the ninth US attack against alleged drug dealers in international waters, just since September.
Another strike was announced on Friday, bringing the number of people Trump calls “narco-terrorists” to have perished in these attacks up to 43.
Trump previously told Fox News, “We take them out,” and later joked about how people, most of them desperately poor, are now afraid to fish along certain coastlines.
Without releasing credible evidence, Trump claims the victims’ vessels were “stacked up with bags of white powder that’s mostly fentanyl and other drugs, too.”
Trump says they were “smuggling a deadly weapon poisoning Americans,” on behalf of various “terrorist organizations.”
Trump is calling the victims terrorists so that he can treat them as enemy combatants in a war that does not exist, just as he is doing at home. Domestically, we know Trump calls groups who oppose him politically “domestic terrorists.” We know he fabricated a domestic terrorist organization he calls “Antifa” to sell his plan for violence. We also know his administration is lying about peaceful protestors threatening ICE agents in order to justify ICE brutality, and that ICE refuses to wear body cams without a court order.
Trump’s firehose of lies about domestic ‘terrorists’ won’t help his claims about ‘terrorists’ on the high seas.
Is Trump confusing South America with China and Mexico?
Colombian President Gustavo Petro has credibly accused Trump of murder. In response, instead of offering legal justification, Trump said he was cutting off foreign aid to Colombia, seemingly confusing that nation with Democratic-run states from whom he is also illegally withholding funds.
Bragging about the killings, Trump falsely claimed that every exploded shipping vessel “saves 25,000 American lives.”
In the factual world, about 100,000 Americans die each year from drug overdoses, mostly by fentanyl, which does not come from Venezuela, Colombia or any South American country.
The fentanyl killing Americans comes from labs in Mexico and China. Given his difficulty with geography, Trump may not know the difference. At any rate, South America produces marijuana and cocaine, not fentanyl. Most of the killing fentanyl is smuggled into the country by US citizens, over land.
Legal arguments don’t hold water
The White House claims the strikes are a matter of self-defense. To get there, Trump “determined” that drug cartels like Tren de Aragua are “terrorists.” But officials say Tren de Aragua is not operating in the shipping routes under attack, and that the route Trump and Hegseth are targeting carries cocaine and marijuana to Europe and Africa, not the US.
Legal experts on the use of armed force say Trump’s campaign is illegal because the military is not permitted to target civilians who are not directly participating in hostilities. Key legal instruments prohibiting extrajudicial killings and murder include the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), the Geneva Conventions of 1949, the Statute of the International Criminal Court, and customary international humanitarian law. The Trump administration has not publicly offered a legal theory that comports with any of these laws.
Instead, the White House has argued that the attacks fall under the law of armed conflict (LOAC), which limits methods of warfare and sets out legally required protections for noncombatants and civilians during conflict. The US is in no such conflict; we are not under attack in the US or anywhere else, and Congress has declared no war.
Designating drug cartels as “terrorist organizations” is also factually suspect. Drug cartels exist for profit; all purveyors of illicit drugs are in the business to make money. In contrast, “terrorists” by definition are motivated by ideological goals often involving politics or religion—not profit. Even if they were terrorists, international law would only allow the executive branch to respond through legal methods like freezing assets, trials and imprisonment.
Hegseth and others will face court martial
Trump and Hegseth’s legal arguments have been universally rejected by military legal experts including former lawyers in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, who have condemned the attacks as unlawful under both domestic and international law. Nevertheless, Hegseth has stated enthusiastically that the military will continue these executions.
In February, Hegseth fired the JAGs whose job was to assess the legality of military actions. He may have deliberately done so to engage in illegal conduct and later claim a “mistake of law” defense, but that maneuver won’t save him. In US Servicemembers’ Exposure to Criminal Liability for Lethal Strikes on Narcoterrorists, Just Security lays it out under the Manual for Courts-Martial, and Article 118 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), concluding in the Venezuela strikes that:
Despite the clear absence of an “imminent threat of death or serious injury” or “grave threat to life,” the U.S. Coast Guard did not interdict the alleged criminal narcotrafficking in the way this conduct has been historically (and recently) approached.
These suspected criminals were not arrested, prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced through a regular course of criminal procedure and neutral adjudication in a court. They were killed extrajudicially for conduct that could not be plausibly labeled a military attack, use of force, or even threat of imminent harm to anyone in the United States or any other nation, and despite the opportunity and ability to use less-than-lethal force to stop the boats.
An extrajudicial killing, premeditated and without justification or excuse and without the legal authority tied to an armed conflict, is properly called “murder.” And murder is still a crime for those in uniform who executed the strike even if their targets are dangerous criminals, and even if servicemembers were commanded to do so by their superiors, including the President of the United States.
Under this analysis, “every officer in the chain of command who … directed downward the initial order from the President or Secretary of Defense” would likely fall within the meaning of traditional accomplice liability, and could be charged for murder under Article 118.
Even if a corrupt Supreme Court gave Trump criminal immunity for murder (an unsettled question), someone should let Hegseth know that immunity does not extend to him, or to other service members piloting the drones or firing the missiles under orders that are obviously illegal.
- Sabrina Haake is a columnist and 25+ year federal trial attorney specializing in 1st and 14th A defense. Her Substack, The Haake Take, is free.
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Dictators and kings build monumental architecture to buttress their egos. Sound familiar?
By R. Grant Gilmore III, Director, Historic Preservation and Community Planning Program, College of Charleston
From ancient Egypt to Washington, D.C., rulers have long used architecture and associated stories to project power, control memory and shape national identity. As 17th-century French statesman Jean-Baptiste Colbert observed:
“In the absence of brilliant deeds of war, nothing proclaims the greatness and spirit of princes more than building works.”
Today, the Trump administration is mobilizing heritage and architecture as tools of ideology and control. In U.S. historic preservation, “heritage” is the shared, living inheritance of places, objects, practices and stories — often plural and contested — that communities value and preserve. America’s architectural heritage is as diverse as the people who created, inhabited and continue to care for it.
As an archaeologist with three decades of practice, I read environments designed by humans. Enduring modifications to these places, especially to buildings and monuments, carry power and speak across generations.
In his first term as president, and even more so today, Donald Trump has pushed to an extreme legacy-building through architecture and heritage policy. He is remaking the White House physically and metaphorically in his image, consistent with his long record of putting his name on buildings as a developer.
In December 2020, Trump issued an executive order declaring classical and traditional architectural styles the “preferred” design for new federal buildings. The order derided Brutalist and modernist structures as inconsistent with national values.
Now, Trump is seeking to roll back inclusive historical narratives at U.S. parks and monuments. And he is reviving sanitized myths about America’s history of slavery, misogyny and Manifest Destiny, for use in museums, textbooks and public schools.
Yet artifacts don’t lie. And it is the archaeologist’s task to recover these legacies as truthfully as possible, since how the past is remembered shapes the choices a nation makes about its future.
Architecture as political power and legacy
Dictators, tyrants and kings build monumental architecture to buttress their own egos, which is called authoritarian monumentalism. They also seek to build the national ego — another word for nationalism.
Social psychologists have found that the awe we experience when we encounter something vast diminishes the “individual self,” making viewers feel respect and attachment to creators of awesome architecture. Authoritarian monumentalism often exploits this phenomenon. For example, in France, King Louis XIV expanded the Palace of Versailles and renovated its gardens in the mid-1600s to evoke perceptions of royal grandeur and territorial power in visitors.
Many leaders throughout history have built “temples to power” while erasing or overshadowing the memory of their predecessors — a practice known as damnatio memoriae, or condemnation to oblivion.
In the ancient world, the Sumerians, Babylonians, Egyptians, Romans, Chinese dynasties, Mayans and Incas all left behind architecture that still commands awe in the form of monuments to gods, rulers and communities. These monuments conveyed power and often served as instruments of physical and psychological control.
In the 19th century, Napoleon fused conquest with heritage. Expeditions to Egypt and Rome, and the building of Parisian monuments — the Arc de Triomphe and the Vendôme Column, both modeled on Roman precedents — reinforced his legitimacy.
Albert Speer’s and Hermann Giesler’s monumental neoclassical designs in Nazi Germany, such as the party rally grounds in Nuremberg, were intended to overwhelm the individual and glorify the regime. And Josef Stalin’s Soviet Union suppressed avant-garde experimentation in favor of monumental “socialist realist” architecture, projecting permanence and centralized power.
Now, Trump has proposed building his own triumphal arch in Arlington, Virginia, just across the Potomac River from the Lincoln Memorial, as a symbol to mark the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
An American alternative
Born of Enlightenment ideals of John Locke, Voltaire and Adam Smith, the American Revolution rejected the European idea of monarchs as semi-divine rulers. Instead, leaders were expected to serve the citizenry.
That philosophy took architectural form in the Federal style, which was dominant from about 1785 to 1830. This clear, democratic architectural language was distinct from Europe’s ornate traditions, and recognizably American.
Its key features were Palladian proportions — measurements rooted in classical Roman architecture — and an emphasis on balance, simplicity and patriotic motifs.
James Hoban’s White House and Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello embodied this style. Interiors featured lighter construction, symmetrical lines, and motifs such as eagles, urns and bellflowers. They rejected the opulent rococo styles associated with monarchy.
Americans also recognized preservation’s political force. In 1816, the city of Philadelphia bought Independence Hall, which was constructed in 1753 and was where the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were debated and signed, to keep it from being demolished. Today the building is a U.S. National Park and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Early preservationists saved George Washington’s home, Mount Vernon, Jefferson’s Monticello, and other landmarks, tying democracy’s endurance to the built environment.
Architecture, memory and Trump
In remaking the White House and prescribing the style and content of many federal sites, Trump is targeting not just buildings but the stories they tell.
By challenging narratives that depart from white, Anglo-Saxon origin myths, Trump is using his power to roll back decades of work toward creating a more inclusive national history.
- YouTube www.youtube.com
These actions ignore the fact that America’s strength lies in its identity as a nation of immigrants. The Trump administration has singled out the Smithsonian Institution — the world’s largest museum, founded “for the increase and diffusion of knowledge — for ideological reshaping. Trump also is pushing to restore recently removed Confederate monuments, helping to revive "Lost Cause” mythology about the Civil War.
Trump’s 2020 order declaring classical and traditional architectural styles the preferred design for government buildings echoed authoritarian leaders like Adolf Hitler and Stalin, whose governments sought to dictate aesthetics as expressions of ideology. The American Institute of Architects publicly opposed the order, warning that it imposed ideological restrictions on design.
Trump’s second administration has advanced this agenda by adopting many recommendations in the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 blueprint. Notably, Project 2025 calls for repealing the 1906 Antiquities Act — which empowers presidents to quickly designate national monuments on federal land — and for shrinking many existing monuments. Such rollbacks would undercut the framework that has safeguarded places like Devils Tower in Wyoming and Muir Woods in California for over a century.
Trump’s new ballroom is a distinct departure from the core values embodied in the White House’s Federal style. Although many commentators have described it as rococo, it is more aligned with the overwrought and opulent styles of the Gilded Age — a time in American history, from about 1875 through 1895, with many parallels to the present.
In ordering its construction, Trump has ignored long-standing consultation and review procedures that are central to historic preservation. The demolition of the East Wing may have ignored processes required by law at one of the most important U.S. historic sites. It’s the latest illustration of his unilateral and unaccountable methods for getting what he wants.
Instruments of memory and identity
When leaders push selective histories and undercut inclusive ones, they turn heritage into a tool for controlling public memory. This collective understanding and interpretation of the past underpins a healthy democracy. It sustains a shared civic identity, ensures accountability for past wrongs and supports rights and participation.
Heritage politics in the Trump era seeks to redefine America’s story and determine who gets to speak. Attacks on so-called “woke” history seek to erase complex truths about slavery, inequality and exclusion that are essential to democratic accountability.
Architecture and heritage are never just bricks and mortar. They are instruments of memory, identity and power.
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These Trump court cases offer a clear roadmap to authoritarian rule
President Donald Trump’s ICE raids in American cities are not simply efforts to deport undocumented immigrants or battle crime. In addition to creating fear and desensitizing law-abiding citizens to a military presence on American streets, Trump wanted to pick a fight.
And he has.
Specifically, Trump wanted a legal fight that he could take to the conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court. If it accepts his justification for “federalizing” the National Guard over a state governor’s objections, he’ll have unrestrained power to deploy the military on American soil any time, any place, and for any reason.
The implications are staggering. Fear has gripped neighborhoods where armed troops patrol the streets as something akin to an occupying force. During the 2026 midterm elections, deployments would be a powerful voter suppression tool.
Trump’s argument
In the cases challenging Trump’s National Guard deployments in Los Angeles, Portland, and Chicago, his lawyers have argued that the courts have no power to review the President’s decisions. His claimed factual basis is not subject to challenge. His decision is final. His authority is absolute.
Trump bases his argument on language in an 1827 case involving Jacob Mott, a state militiaman. Mott refused to report for duty when President James Madison called up the New York militia during the War of 1812. The Supreme Court ruled that Mott had no right to dispute the president’s judgment.
Extrapolating the language of that case involving a subordinate militiaman during a time of war to foreclose all judicial review of the factual basis for Trump’s deployments is a stretch. But one appellate court judge in the ongoing ICE cases has embraced Trump’s position.
California
In June, Trump mobilized the National Guard over the objections of Gov. Gavin Newsom. The president invoked the statute authorizing him to “federalize” the Guard, which permits such action only if:
(1) theUnited States, or any of the Commonwealths or possessions, is invaded or is in danger of invasion by a foreign nation;
(2) there is a rebellion or danger of a rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States; or
(3) the President is unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States.” (10 U.S.C. Sec. 12406)
Trump claimed that the factual circumstances entitled him to invoke subsections (2) and (3).
The trial court granted Newsom’s request for a temporary restraining order, and the Trump administration appealed. Trump’s primary argument was that he had unrestrained discretion to make the required statutory determinations (i.e., whether there was a rebellion, danger or rebellion, or inability with regular forces to execute federal law). Whatever he decided should be the beginning and the end of the inquiry. Actual facts contradicting his claims were out of bounds. Judges couldn’t scrutinize his justifications. No one could.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (including two Trump appointees on the three-judge panel) rejected Trump’s argument. The court ruled that the president’s power is not absolute, but he is entitled to “a great level of deference” in making the required factual determinations.
Portland
When Trump deployed troops in Portland, Oregon, the city and the state sued to block him, and he made the same argument. Federal District Court Judge Karin Immergut — a Trump appointee — followed the appellate court’s earlier California decision and rejected it.
Judge Immergut’s 31-page opinion set forth her factual findings and legal conclusions. She outlined the evidence that rebutted Trump’s claimed “facts.” The court acknowledged that “the President is certainly entitled ‘a great level of deference’... But ’a great level of deference’ is not equivalent to ignoring the facts on the ground… The President’s determination was simply untethered to the facts.”
Judge Immergut granted the motion to prevent the deployment.
Reversed on appeal
Under well-settled law, Judge Immergut’s ruling could be reversed on appeal only if it was an “abuse of discretion” — which it wasn’t. The appellate court had to accept her factual findings as true, unless they were “clearly erroneous” — which they weren’t.
But in a two-to-one vote, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed Judge Immergut’s ruling. Rather than respect the trial court’s detailed factual findings, the Trump-appointed majority discarded them in favor of its own characterization of the record.
Ironically, the court concluded, “[T]he district court erred by placing too much weight on statements the President made on social media.”
Judge Ryan Nelson — one of two judges comprising the majority that reversed Judge Immergut — accepted Trump’s primary argument. In his concurring opinion Judge Nelson wrote that “the President’s decision in this area is absolute.”
Facts and evidence don’t matter. Everyone has to take Trump at his word — a remarkable empowerment of a serial liar.
The dissenting opinion of Judge Susan Graber, a Clinton appointee, returned to the facts:
Given Portland protesters’ well-known penchant for wearing chicken suits, inflatable frog costumes, or nothing at all when expressing their disagreement with the methods employed by ICE, observers may be tempted to view the majority’s ruling, which accepts the government’s characterization of Portland as a war zone, as merely absurd.
But today’s decision is not merely absurd. It erodes core constitutional principles, including sovereign States’ control over their States’ militias and the people’s First Amendment rights to assemble and to object to the government’s policies and actions.
Judge Graber pleaded for additional scrutiny of the majority’s errant decision:
By design of the Founders, the judicial branch stands apart. We rule on facts, not on supposition or conjecture, and certainly not on fabrication or propaganda. I urge my colleagues on this court to act swiftly to vacate the majority’s order before the illegal deployment of troops under false pretenses can occur.
That process — a request for en banc review by 11 randomly-selected judges in the Ninth Circuit — is underway.
Chicago
Meanwhile, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed unanimously a trial judge’s order blocking Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in Chicago. As in Los Angeles and Portland, Trump argued that the courts had no role in reviewing his factual determinations. The court — including a George H. W. Bush appointee, a George W. Bush appointee, and an Obama appointee — rejected Trump’s argument.
Unlike the majority in the Portland appeal, the court accepted the lower court’s factual findings and applied them:
Political opposition is not rebellion. A protest does not become a rebellion merely because the protestors advocate for myriad legal or policy changes, are well organized, call for significant changes to the structure of the US government, use civil disobedience as a form of protest, or exercise their Second Amendment right to carry firearms as the law currently allows.
Nor did the activity surrounding the ICE facility render federal officers incapable of executing the laws of the United States.
Trump has appealed to the Supreme Court, where the conservative majority has a track record of giving him anything he wants.
As of Sept. 22, he had won 21 cases on the Court’s “shadow docket” where little or no reasoning accompanied quick decisions granted on a “preliminary” basis (even though the impact often is profound and enduring).
His administration had lost only two, with two others pending. Two were withdrawn and was one dismissed.
In asking the Supreme Court to intervene, Trump’s lawyers called the Seventh Circuit’s ruling part of a “disturbing and recurring pattern” that “improperly impinges on the President’s authority and needlessly endangers federal personnel and property.”
None of that is true. The only “disturbing and recurring pattern” is Trump’s false assertions to justify deploying the military on American soil. And now he wants to prevent anyone challenging him — ever.
- Steven J. Harper is an attorney, adjunct professor at Northwestern University Law School, and author of several books, including Crossing Hoffa — A Teamster's Story and The Lawyer Bubble — A Profession in Crisis. He has been a regular columnist for Moyers on Democracy, Dan Rather's News and Guts, and The American Lawyer. Follow him at https://thelawyerbubble.com.
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These insane ICE weapons buys reveal something truly sinister about Trump's intentions
Back in February, the thinking public scratched its collective head as Elon Musk and DOGE took a chainsaw to agencies that serve the public. Federal agencies created to protect public health, serve veterans, advance education, maintain infrastructure, keep the public informed, and protect the safety of air and water were largely dismantled. Even before the government shutdown, those agencies were either closed or not functioning, operating with skeleton crews.
This month, the reason for the mass destruction crystallized: Trump and Russell Vought, architect of authoritarian cookbook Project 2025, stripped federal service budgets in order to move those dollars to another ledger, the one that funds federal agencies that control, police and punish the public. Those budgets have exploded, none more than that of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Analysis of government procurement data first reported by Popular Information shows a 700 percent increase in weapons spending by ICE this year. From January to October 2024, ICE spent under $10 million on weapons. For the same period ending this month, that amount jumped to more than $71 million.
Even more alarming than the amount is what ICE spent it on. Public data from the Federal Procurement Data System (FPDS) show that ICE procured chemical weapons, “guided missile warheads” and other explosive components. (Note: Wired reports some confusion over how the purchase was categorized and concludes that ICE “probably” didn’t purchase guided missile components, but the entry on the procurement system says they did.)
WTF does ICE want with such weapons?
Americans who watch something other than Fox News’ curated reality show have already seen videos of masked ICE agents engaging in wildly disproportionate violence against members of the media and public. Over the past few weeks, federal officers shot a woman five times in Chicago, killed a man during an arrest attempt in the suburbs, and shot a priest in the head with a pepper ball, knocking him to the ground, even as he was holding his arms up in prayer.
If shooting, body slamming, and menacing members of the public at close range wasn’t enough, now ICE will have access to even more chemical weapons. ICE has already lobbed chemical irritants like tear gas, pepper spray, HC smoke grenades, and pepper balls at peaceful protesters just to create the appearance of chaos for right-wing consumption; it is unclear what an unhinged and vengeful president might order them to do with nerve agent-adjacent chemicals.
Purchasing guided missile components for ICE would be equally astounding. A “guided missile” is any missile that uses a guidance system to steer toward a target. Such missiles can destroy a target with conventional, chemical, or biological warheads. “Guided” just means the missile can navigate and adjust its flight path to a chosen target along the way, using technologies like GPS and terrain mapping.
Since Kristi Noem keeps repeating false claims that ICE only engages in brutality when agents feel threatened, query what legitimate need those agents could possibly have to strike a person, car or building that’s miles away.
A toddler with the nuclear codes
Trump, who openly fantasizes about shitting on and destroying half the county, even as he literally destroys the White House like he owns it, probably thinks he could nuke California and get away with it. Never mind that California has the world’s fourth-largest economy, contributing $81 billion more to the federal government than it receives — long-term, mid-term and even immediate consequences are not accessible to Trump’s pre-frontal cortex.
ICE is also building a public surveillance system that would make Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping salivate. The “crowd control” surveillance system features iris scanners that photograph and record facial measurements. The system includes phone hacking and tracking, and facial recognition tools loading data into AI.
ICE has partnered with Palantir Technologies, a software company co-founded by JD Vance’s BFF and anti-democracy mentor, Peter Thiel. Palantir plans to use artificial intelligence and data mining to identify, track, and deport suspected noncitizens, collecting data on US citizens along the way. According to Business Insider, ICE is paying Palantir $30 million for the platform; Palantir was slated to deliver a prototype of the ImmigrationOS platform in September.
Keep in mind that Trump has increased spending on deadly weapons for ICE by over 700 percent, yet ICE continues to claim it can’t afford bodycams for its masked agents.
Judd Legum at Popular Information sums it up: “If the immigration enforcement apparatus of the United States were its own national military, it would be the 13th-most heavily funded in the world. This puts it higher than the national militaries of Poland, Italy, Australia, Canada, Turkey, and Spain — and just below Israel.”
Trump is building a police state to keep himself in power
Stephen Miller recently told assembled law enforcement officers in Memphis, Tennessee, that they should now consider themselves “unleashed.” Addressing a “crime task force” comprised of ICE, local police, the FBI, U.S. Marshals, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Miller encouraged them to go forward and “police aggressively,” concluding his talk with praise for their anticipated ruthlessness.
It’s the same unhinged directive for “unrestrained lethality” Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth delivered to military generals at Quantico last month.
It’s all of a piece: deploying the military against US citizens, pitting red states against blue, and arming masked ICE agents with sophisticated tools of war signal that Trump is building his own domestic paramilitary force to try to remain in power past 2028.
We have to admit this reality before we can prepare to meet it.
- Sabrina Haake is a columnist and 25+ year federal trial attorney specializing in 1st and 14th A defense. Her Substack, The Haake Take, is free.
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Could Trump order the military to kill Americans? It might be closer than you think
The United States is now executing people on the high seas whom Trump calls “enemy combatants.” He’s doing so without a declaration of war, without input from Congress, and without any findings that they pose a threat to the United States.
At this moment, Secretary of Defense (or Secretary of War, as Trump prefers) Pete Hegseth is positioning warships, including an aircraft carrier, and planes, in waters off Latin America.
Hegseth has already bombed 10 boats, eight of them in the Caribbean and two others this week in the eastern Pacific.
So far, the death toll is 43.
Neither Trump nor Hegseth has offered any evidence to support their claims that the vessels have been smuggling drugs to the United States or were “operated by” Tren de Aragua, a group that Trump has designated as a terrorist organization.
It is illegal, under domestic and international law, to deliberately target civilians who are not directly participating in hostilities — even if they are suspected criminals.
Before Trump, the United States dealt with suspected maritime drug smuggling by using the Coast Guard, sometimes assisted by the Navy. If the suspicions proved accurate, the boat’s crews were arrested. They might then stand trial. The penalty for being convicted of drug trafficking was time in prison.
Now, Trump is summarily executing people suspected of being drug dealers, without any proof.
Trump claims that the attacks are are not murder because he has “determined” that the boats are smuggling drugs, that they are being run by drug cartels, that drug trafficking by cartels constitutes an armed attack on the United States, and that the United States is now engaged in a formal armed conflict with the cartels.
As a result, he reasons, the boat crews are “enemy combatants” and can be executed.
Every step in this so-called logic is questionable.
It’s also dangerous. What if Trump “determines” that anyone he dislikes — immigrants, Democrats, student protesters — is an “enemy combatant?”
He has already referred to the “enemy within” the United States — in characterizing domestic political opponents, including government officials, critics, activists, and protesters.
In his Sept. 30 speech to U.S. military’s top brass, Trump discussed using the military against this so-called “enemy from within.”
Trump has sent troops into Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, and Chicago — over the objections of mayors and governors. He plans to send more troops into more cities. He claims he’s doing it to deal with crime or to protect ICE agents or to protect ICE facilities. Again, the evidence is flimsy or non-existent.
ICE now holds 59,762 people in detention. Some of those detained have been American citizens. ICE made a mass arrest of 15 New York State elected officials. It has arrested members of Congress, active-duty firefighters, a child it accused of being a convicted adult in the MS-13 gang, a disabled military veteran, and a United States marshal — all of whom were shown to be U.S. citizens wrongfully held by ICE.
Trump’s Justice Department is now prosecuting people whom Trump has ordered it to prosecute — people who have tried to hold him legally accountable, such as New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI director James Comey.
Put it all together. How close are we to Trump ordering the execution of Americans he considers opponents?
- Robert Reich is a professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich.substack.com/.
- Robert Reich's new memoir, Coming Up Short, can be found wherever you buy books. You can also support local bookstores nationally by ordering the book at bookshop.org.
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