There is another point I want to note about what has happened over the last 48 hours. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) is a pretty forward-leaning lawmaker. But on a show this morning he said something very clear: “We cannot fund a Department of Homeland Security that is murdering American citizens.” That’s clear, succinct and accurate. Those are the stakes. DHS is being used as a domestic terror force to deprive American citizens of their liberties. Yes, they’re killing American citizens. But that’s with the goal of terrorizing the larger population and depriving it of its liberties.
Pam Bondi sent the state a letter offering to withdraw ICE agents if the state will turn over welfare rolls, voter rolls and end sanctuary policies. So the administration will withdraw its marauding gangs in exchange for state leaders surrendering citizens’ right to local self-government.
But note also that Gov. Tim Walz is now explicitly asking the citizens of Minnesota to document what he calls ICE’s “atrocities” for the purposes of eventual prosecution. Compile evidence now, force accountability with prosecution later. This is the same basic approach, albeit by different means, that we’re trying to encourage with the DOJ-in-Exile project.
My point here is that the White House’s escalation is pushing state leaders to adopt the posture they should already have had: resolute defenses of state sovereignty and local self-government; properly identifying ICE as a lawless presidential secret police and terror force’ and putting the state explicitly on the record demanding and committing to criminal accountability for the agents now menacing the state. Meanwhile the verdict of public opinion gets more and more clear. Even Nate Silver, who’s spent the last couple years in a kind of anti-anti-Trump mindset is saying what can no longer be ignored: the public is resolutely rejecting this reign of lawless, terrorizing behavior which not only leads to ICE murders of American citizens but also cheers it.
