Escalation Without End

Trump Makes His Military Move Against America in the Most Dangerous Week of the Regime so Far

Most of us expected what is happening now shortly after Trump’s inauguration in January, and his Executive Orders dealing with immigration. With each passing week his words, and the actions of his Regime have become increasingly more incendiary and threatening, even when Federal Courts, including the Supreme Court have ruled against them. Rather than comply with court orders the Trump Regime has continued its actions, violating the due process rights of tens of thousands of people, including American citizens.

Now, ICE has increased its over the top militarized policing methods far beyond those that caused massive outcries in numerous states. Heavily armed, masked, ICE agents with ballistic helmets and vests have been terrorizing neighborhoods across the country, and last week began a massive operation in Los Angeles targeting stores and businesses where undocumented workers labored. Their actions provoked peaceful protests, which they fired at with tear gas and rubber bullets, in almost every case unprovoked. However, ICE kept on, and more protesters came out.

It wasn’t anything that the 9,000 plus officers of the Los Angeles Police Department, and 9,900 deputies of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department couldn’t handle if ICE had attempted to work with them, but that wasn’t the case. Instead of trying to work with State and local officials, Trump issued an order to mobilize 2,000 or more soldiers of the California Army National Guard under Title X, Section 12406, putting them directly under the command of the President, and stripping Governor Gavin Newsom of his authority over them. Trump did this without consulting or asking Newsom. The only other time this happened was in 1965 when President Lyndon Johnson Federalized units of the Alabama National Guard to protect civil rights protesters including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. In Selma, Alabama, a place where protesters frequently were assaulted by police officers under the orders of Governor George Wallace, and a belief that those officers would not protect protesters. The two situations have nothing in common.

In his memorandum to the Attorney General and Secretary of Defense, Trump said, “violent protests threaten the security of and significant damage to Federal immigration detention facilities and other Federal property. To the extent that protests or acts of violence directly inhibit the execution of the laws, they constitute a form of rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.” At that point there was no violence, nor any threat to Federal immigration facilities. In fact most of the violence was triggered by ICE agents. It was only when Trump ordered the mobilization of the California Guard against their fellow citizens, neighbors and friends, people who when all is said and done they will have to face. Then, Secretary Hegseth, threatened to send in Marines for Camp Pendleton.

Since yesterday the protests have gotten far larger, and in some cases more destructive and disruptive, but violence has not grown. In no case has there been the kind of attacks that Trump supporters used against Capitol Police, and Washington Metropolitan Police in their violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on 6 January 2001. There has been no insurrection in Los Angeles, and despite the tweets of Stephen Miller, and the statements of Tom Homan say. There is no attempt to overthrow the government of the United States, despite the insulting attempts of members of the Regime to justify their actions.

I believe that the Regime’s next move will be to provoke actual violence, in Los Angeles, or in other major cities in Blue States to justify declaring the Insurrection Act in order to use military force against Americans who oppose his policies, and his dictatorial ambitions. However, this is the moment that Trump, Miller, Homan, Noem, and Hegseth have been waiting. They have been salivating hoping that it would come, and the heavy handed military-like acts of ICE provoked the response of Angelinos are chumming the waters for them. Now they are going to keep escalating the situation.

The use of the United States military against its citizens, be they activated National Guardsmen, or active duty personnel will have a significant negative impact on our military. The activation of these Guardsmen will have a detrimental effect on local and state law enforcement as many of the guardsmen are law enforcement officers. If Hegseth deploys Marines it will have a detrimental impact on their readiness for war as it will disrupt their training and deployment cycles. Such actions completely destroy Hegseth’s arguments that he is creating a more “lethal military.”

Likewise, it will harm morale throughout the military. None of these soldiers or marines signed up to be deployed against their fellow Americans, nor did other American military personnel. Add to this that many of them have relatives and friends in danger of deportation as they are Mexican Americans. Watch reenlistment, retention, and recruiting rates crash.

We have to be prepared to peacefully protest and resist. That does not mean that Trump will not have Federal agents or troops not attack peaceful protesters, in fact today he did not rule it out. The fact that the Regime skipped over other measures such as calling in Federal Marshals or Federal Protective Service officers in favor of mobilizing the National Guard, and the Regimes refusal to coordinate actions in advance with State and local authorities show a lot of bad faith, as do their threats to arrest Governor Newsom and Mayor Bass. Likewise, when he was asked about deploying Federal troops in Los Angeles, Trump responded: “We’re gonna have troops everywhere. We’re not going to let this happen to our country. We’re not going to let our country be torn apart like it was under Biden.”

These moves are a pretext to further escalation and violence at the hand of Trump by Federal authorities.

The Regime is committed to total victory of its opponents, as well as to destroy any vestige of the Constitution and the rule of law. This is not going to end well. It will further divide and weaken the country in a world in which Trump’s actions are further destabilizing.