Whose America? Domestic military occupation and a nation on the brink
In Donald Trump’s mind, this is His America, not ours. Where other commanders-in-chief have understood that they were entrusted with protecting this great republic, its people, and the Constitution that binds us, the current inhabitant of the Oval Office sees our nation as his own personal plaything, to be coated in cheap gold leaf and shared only with his enablers. While his carelessness is nothing new for those of us who have watched this administration casually destroy time-honored institutions since January, recent months have seen a new escalation in this administration’s efforts to occupy our cities.
In the administration’s occupation of Washington, D.C., it has claimed that it was cracking down on “crime,” despite violent crime being at a 30-year low and the disapproval of the vast majority of D.C. residents. As ICE sets up traffic stops within the city and food delivery drivers are detained, it is clear that the real crime in the administration’s eyes is the existence of people who don’t belong in Donald Trump’s vision of America. Trump’s specific focus on the banishment of unhoused people from Washington, D.C., appears to have been spurred by his seeing unhoused people on his way from the White House to the golf course for some of his many taxpayer-funded golf games. There is no room for immigrants or poor people in Trump’s America.
Beyond the administration’s limited view of who deserves to live here at all, it seeks to subjugate those who demand greater ownership in the nation than Trump is willing to let them have. When met with resistance from Illinois Gov. Pritzker to the potential occupation of Chicago, the current inhabitant of the Oval Office lashed out that as the president, he has “the right to do anything that [he] want[s],” in brazen disregard for our constitutional rights and liberties. We also cannot separate Trump’s attempts to occupy our cities from his longstanding racism, whether it takes the form of spending over thirty years insisting upon the guilt of five wrongfully convicted men of color, his ongoing efforts to oust Black public servants from positions of seniority, or seeking to dominate cities like Los Angeles or Washington, D.C., that have longstanding Latino and Black communities. Trump’s fear of those different from him, combined with his belief that this cannot be Their America, continue to animate many of his assaults on the liberties of We The People.
The administration, its thirst for tyranny unslaked by the occupations of Washington, D.C., and LA, has set its sights on expanding its baleful domination to Chicago and our own city of Boston. Boston’s Mayor Michelle Wu has continued to stand up to the administration, defy its mass deportation goals, and voice her support for the Boston Trust Act. The act limits Boston law enforcement’s interactions with federal immigration enforcement, so that our immigrant communities feel safer cooperating with criminal investigations. True to form, the administration has responded to Boston’s defiance by threatening an immigration surge in Boston and hinting at a federal takeover of our own South Station, threatening us with potential harassment from ICE as we enter and exit the city on trains and buses.
At the core of the administration’s current and proposed domestic military occupations is one of our nation’s most enduring questions: whose America is this? Our founding documents laid out contracts among “We the People” at a time when “People” really just meant white men. Over centuries of effort, from protests to the bloodshed of the Civil War, we have worked toward a vision where “We the People” encompasses all who live, work, and dream within our nation. As a despicable despot attempts to obliterate the progress that we have made and turn a say in our nation’s future into a favor to be withheld at his pleasure, now is the time to recommit to standing up for our liberties and resisting attempts to divide and conquer us.
We can resist the administration’s domestic military occupation plans in our streets, our statehouse, and our neighborhoods:
Stand against the administration's occupation of Washington, D.C.! If you or anyone you know can get to D.C. on Saturday, Sept. 6th, join the march to take back D.C.
D.C. residents are also asking the rest of the nation to contact our members of Congress on their behalf to support Rep. Raskin and Sen. Van Hollen’s termination resolution and oppose any measures to extend the D.C. occupation.
Urge Gov. Healey, your mayor or town government, and other state and local leaders to continue pushing back against the administration's efforts to occupy our streets and our train stations.
Promote statements from generals and veterans to inspire any National Guard members deployed in domestic occupation to remember their oath to serve their Constitution and communities.
Call your state legislators to urge them to support the Safe Communities Act, which limits coordination between ICE and our state and local criminal justice system, helping keep us all safer by letting our judges and law enforcement focus on public safety instead of the administration’s mass deportation goals.
As we work to prevent occupation of our communities, we can also prepare for the worst by working with organizers and frontline communities to come up with plans for mutual aid and community safety, as is happening in other cities like Chicago.
Beyond these efforts, to truly enact the vision that this nation belongs to us all, we must work towards safety in a way that respects the presence of everyone in our communities. We can reduce crime by treating it as a public health crisis, as has been done successfully in Baltimore, and by addressing homelessness through housing-first programs like those under attack from the administration. Tyranny can seduce us by offering strongmen to save us from the often-difficult work of democracy, but it is only by committing to solving our problems together that we can ensure that this remains Our America.
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