Donald Trump has been at war for the past three and a half years as President of the United States.  The verbal assaults on American governance began in his inauguration speech (“American Carnage”) in January 2017, and ever since there has been a political assault on the Department of Justice and the justice system itself; the intelligence community; the departments and agencies of government that deal with science and reason; and the international world order that Democratic and Republican administrations have supported since the Second World War.  His recent attacks on the nation’s Inspector Generals has compromised the government’s ability to conduct oversight and accountability; Trump’s attacks on the treaties and accords of arms control and disarmament have weakened our national security; his pardon of a war criminal who was convicted by the U.S. military undermined the Pentagon’s command and control for unconscionable conduct.

 

But Trump’s statements and actions in the wake of the killing of George Floyd have raised Trump’s war on democracy and governance to a new and dangerous level that could create greater violence in the United States.

• In a teleconference with the nation’s governors, Trump increasingly described the crisis as a “war,” and urged them to “use the military.”  He told the governors “You have to dominate.  If you don’t dominate, you’re wasting your time.  They’re going to run over you.  You’re going to look like a bunch of jerks.”  With the exception of Illinois Governor J. B. Pritzker, most of the governors pandered to the President.  Republican Governor of Maryland Larry Hogan stated he “couldn’t agree more with what you just said.”
• When Maine Governor Janet Mills tried to convince Trump to cancel a trip to Maine for “security reasons,” he told his advisers “She tried to talk me out of it and I think she probably talked me into it.”  He tellingly added “She just doesn’t understand me very well.”
• Secretary of Defense Mark Esper spoke briefly to the governors and told them “We need to dominate the battlespace,” a bizarre statement by the very official who is supposed to maintain civilian control of the military.  Esper said that the “sooner you mass…the quicker this dissipates and we can get back to normal.”  Esper, Attorney General William Barr, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are Trump loyalists who can be counted on to support the worst of Trump’s statements and actions.
• After spending several hours in a White House bunker on Friday night, Trump decided to deploy a “palace guard” for his own protection, including active-duty military police; National Guard troops from several states; the U.S. Park Police; the Drug Enforcement Agency; and a variety of law enforcement agencies.  Even the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team was brought into Washington to “assist” local police.  Trump described the arrival of the National Guard in Minneapolis as “domination” and a “beautiful thing to watch.”
• Trump announced that he had placed the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley “in charge” of managing the unrest.  The Pentagon had no comment on this statement, and referred all questions for comment to the White House. Pentagon lawyers presumably recognize that Trump’s actions could ultimately violate the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act that prevents use of the military in domestic law enforcement unless there is an act of Congress.
• He said that he would “activate” Attorney General Bill Barr “very strongly,” which was his most bizarre statement.  No one in the White House or the Department of Justice could explain this assignment for Barr.  Over the past year, Barr has been weakening efforts of the Department of Justice to scrutinize shortcomings in police departments, such as the notorious one in Baltimore.

 

Spoiling for a Fight

Trump told the governors they should make no concessions to the protesters. He encouraged them to throw caution to the winds.  “You’re allowed to fight back,” he said.  

“When someone is throwing a rock, that’s like shooting a gun.  You have to do retribution in my opinion.”  

Several days earlier, he repeated the warning of a white segregationist police chief, “When the looting starts, the shooting starts.”  In the Rose Garden of the White House on Monday, June 1, he gratuitously invoked the importance of the Second Amendment.  Trump’s framed all of his comments for his base, particularly the white supremacists who favor use of force.  His blasphemous pose holding a bible in front of the St. John’s Episcopal Church had fascist imagery. The fact that excessive military force involving tear gas, rubber bullets, and flash-bangs was used against a peaceful demonstration in front of the church in order to allow Trump’s photo-op marked a display of fascism and not mere imagery.  The video of this force has created an apocalyptic horror that has gone viral throughout the world.

As Benjamin Franklin left the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787, an anxious citizen asked, “Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?”  With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”  We are about to find out in the next several months whether Donald Trump is a comet across the sky or someone who changed this nation forever.