He’s now saying it out loud — blurring the line between his so-called “war” on alleged foreign drug smugglers and his war on the “enemy within” the United States. Both now involve the deployment of the U.S. military. Neither requires proof of wrongdoing.
That was his message yesterday when Trump told American troops in Japan that he would send “more than the National Guard” into cities to enforce his crackdowns on crime and immigration:
“We have cities that are troubled, we can’t have cities that are troubled. And we’re sending in our National Guard, and if we need more than the National Guard, we’ll send more than the National Guard, because we’re going to have safe cities … . We’re not going to have people killed in our cities. And whether people like that or not, that’s what we’re doing.”
In the same speech, Trump defended U.S. military strikes against suspected drug smugglers — more than a dozen on vessels from South America that have killed 57 people so far, without evidence they were actually smuggling drugs. (Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on Tuesday that the military had carried out three more strikes on Monday.)
Trump repeatedly condemned Joe Biden. He told the troops that the 2020 election had been rigged. He savaged Democratic governors who have resisted the military in their cities.
“People don’t care if we send in our military, our National Guard,” Trump told the troops. “They just want to be safe.”
Trump also called out the “fake news media,” and encouraged the troops to deride journalists.
This was the third politically-charged speech Trump has made to members of the U.S. armed forces within the month — following his late-September address to the military’s top brass and his self-described “rally” of U.S. Navy sailors in Virginia the following week.
Trump’s speech yesterday to American troops — seeking to justify the use of lethal force against anyone suspected of acting illegally, domestic or foreign — is his clearest statement yet about what’s really motivating him and his lapdogs.
He’s not seeking to stop drug smuggling, nor to overthrow Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, nor to display the military might of America to world leaders, nor to extrude undocumented immigrants from the United States, nor rid the U.S. of alleged criminals.
These are all pretexts. His real goal is quite different.
In the short term, it is to intimidate Democratic mayors and governors and potential Democratic voters in order to suppress Democratic turnout in next fall’s midterm elections.
His long-term goal — shared by his sycophants Hegseth, Stephen Miller, Russell Vought, JD Vance, Kristi Noem, and Pam Bondi — is to turn America into a police state.
I don’t think it an exaggeration to say that Trump envisions himself as commander-in-chief of a domestic military force that would target alleged criminals (but not the white-collar sort), rid the nation of undocumented people, and remake America into a white, straight, male, Christian nation.
The good news is he’s now starting to say some of this in the open — directly to active-duty troops. He’s openly readying them for the role he wants them to play.
Essentially, he’s daring the top brass of the military to stop him. For now, they won’t. They’re worried and bewildered. He’s their commander-in-chief but they have an overriding responsibility to the nation to uphold democratic institutions, including the Constitution.
He’s also daring the rest of us to stop him — in the courts, in the now-defunct Congress, in the now-shuttered government. Also to stop him with our votes, our unwavering determination, and our nonviolent resistance.
Every American who shares the values for which American troops have been fighting and dying for almost 250 years, should join us on the side of democracy and against Trump’s emerging police state.
- 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.
