Senior Democrats in US cities are preparing to defend their communities in the event ofĀ Donald TrumpāsĀ return to the White House after the former president has repeated threats that he would use presidential powers to seize control of major urban centers.
Trump has proposed deploying the military inside major cities largely run byĀ DemocratsĀ to deal with protesters or to crush criminal gangs. He has threatened to dispatch large numbers of federal immigration agents to carry out mass deportations of undocumented people in so-called āsanctuaryā cities.
He also aims to obliterate the progressive criminal justice policies of left-leaning prosecutors.
āIn cities where there has been a complete breakdown of law and order ā¦ I will not hesitate to send in federal assets including the national guard until safety is restored,ā Trump says in the campaign platform for his bid to become the 47th US president,Ā Agenda47.
TrumpĀ provoked uproarĀ earlier this week when he called for US armed forces to be deployed against his political rivals ā āthe enemy withinā ā on election day next month. But his plans to use national guard troops and military personnel as a means to attack those he sees as his opponents go much wider than that, spanning entire cities with Democratic leadership.
I feel like this is something that wonāt really happen. Despite conservative rhetoric and posturing about closed borders, the reality is that major parts of our economy - like agriculture, meat packing, restaurants and construction - are utterly dependent on undocumented immigrant labor. Mass deportations would be insanely difficult to actually achieve, and would cause enormous economic upheaval, what with the fact that fucking food and housing are apparently important to people. Not to say that conservatives would really give a shit about that, but the people hiring all these undocumented workers and exploiting their cheap labor are generally conservative and wouldnāt want their cash cows disrupted.
On the other hand, I didnāt think they would really do anything much about abortion either, since thatās such a major thing to fire their base up about. I should probably never underestimate their willingness to destroy the whole country in order to hurt what passes for the Left here.
I think we should take them at their word. They are insane enough to do a wide variety of terrible things and ruin the country. As far as their rich backers go, everyone thinks they can control the monster theyāve unleashed until itās too late.
I think itās the threat that is the point. Maybe the efforts wonāt reach the critical āmass deportationsā but the purpose is to make migrants scared.