If Trump wins the election, US cities are at risk of military takeovers and mass deportations

theprogressivist @lemmy.world to politics @lemmy.world – 629 points – If Trump wins the election, US cities are at risk of military takeovers and mass deportations
theguardian.com

Senior Democrats in US cities are preparing to defend their communities in the event of Donald Trump’s 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 by Democrats 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 “sanctuary” cities.

He also aims to obliterate the progressive criminal justice policies of left-leaning prosecutors.

“In cities where there has been a complete breakdown of law and order … I will not hesitate to send in federal assets including the national guard until safety is restored,” Trump says in the campaign platform for his bid to become the 47th US president, Agenda47.

Trump provoked uproar earlier this week when he called for US armed forces to be deployed against his political rivals – “the enemy within” – 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.

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I feel like everyone forgot what happened last time.

People in unmarked vans with no identifying patches or badges, just fatigues, grabbing people off the streets at night in the northwest.

Even worse than the official fascists, the unofficial ones who were emboldened to act with impunity, riding into cities and inciting violence. Attempting to run Kamala's bus off the road in 2020 in Texas.

Dems run like they want to lose. Always conceding the arguments of the fascists. Touting the endorsement of monsters like Dick Cheney. The kinds of monsters who made the Republican party what it is today.

If "senior democrats" actually gave a shit about avoiding conflict in the US, they'd actually be fighting for universal voting rights and eliminating FPTP voting.

Mega donors don't want anti fascist rhetoric because it cuts into the profit margins

It's almost as if fascism and unbridled capitalism have some kind of a mutually beneficial relationship.

Weird.

Oh, I fuckin remember.

Honestly, if Trump somehow pulls out a win - and definitely, if he pulls out a win with some very clearly bullshit tactics involving GOP congressional leaders and the Tribunal of Six - I am completely serious when I say I expect an order of magnitude increase of political violence, up to and including a potential civil war. It’s that bad.

A civil war is the only thing that can pull the US out of a Trump win, because fascists never give up power by choice and no one is coming to save us

the french might seriously consider coming to save us a second time, if only to rub our noses in it for the rest of history. They'd probably make us rename the US to something demeeaning too, like Cretinland,

I wouldn’t be able to handle it if that happened. I’d die embarrassed

I think it's important to contextualize what a civil war in America nowadays would look like. It will be military vs police, national guard vs army, civilians vs government, etc. etc. Most Americans don't even have a shared history anymore, let alone present.

I’ve gone back and forth on what to do in the event of a Trump win. I’m honestly not sure what I should do at this point. Like yeah, I live here, and I want to defend the place I grew up in from fascists… but if the government just converts to fascism, I’m not sure there’s a way to save this place in it’s current incarnation. It’ll probably be Balkanized to one degree or another after a LOT of messy conflict. And the corollary there is that we won’t be backstopping global stability, like, at all any more, which will have a shitload of absolutely horrific effects in so, so many regions. And yeah - I get that a lot of countries resent American hegemony. As an American, we’ve done a pretty shit job of “defending democracy” (largely because authoritarian regimes are the more stable option for basing agreements). But at the same time, I can guaran-fucking-tee you that Russian and CCP hegemony will be worse.

I want to leave too, but let me ask you this...

Where are you going to go that is safe from a doomsday cult with access to enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world a few times over?

We can make a bigger difference here, keeping the fascists too busy trying to get and maintain complete control to let those apocalypse dogs off their doom chains.

Prep. Build community. To survive potential trying times. Keep your mouth shut when the fascists take power and figure out ways to erase your online presence.

Edit Addendum: Stock up on food and water. Stock up on vital medications, this of course is personalized to your needs. Saving up a bit of cash and maybe having a few ounces of silver coins probably wouldn't hurt. Gas generator or power station that can be charged with solar can be useful, lots of people like Jackery. Learn how to use a radio, baofengs are a great cheap start. Guns and ammunition if you trust yourself with it and aren't mentally ill. Training for firearms if you do get them.

You hit it on the head. The unmarked vans, unbadged troops, people "disappearing"--those were their practice drills and how they'll do it. Uniformed troops will also be used in some situations (like the mass deportations), but the ones doing the daily dirty work against any demonstrators, specific political targets, etc. ("the enemy within") will be those incognito forces. 😧

Allowing direct sales from car manufacturers and cracking down on unregulated supplements would knee cap fascism immediately

This feels like it attacks the problem at the margins. How is this approach more effective than direct dilution of power and flattening of hierarchies?

This approach would be a step along the way to that goal. A good chunk of fascist support comes from people selling supplements or used cars (there was a recent It Could Happen Here ep discussing this). Those people have money, power, and outsized influence on politics from local to federal. Disrupting their profits disrupts and dilutes their power. If your goal is to disrupt fascism there must be concrete steps to doing that, and this would be one.

flattening of hierarchies?

Agreed, its time for the power in the US to be held by a triumverate of 3 individuals instead of in blockaded hierarchies. (Thats a lkttle history joke)

Correct, so maybe we could stop protesting Harris over Israel until AFTER the fucking election?

Just saying, we should probably stop the genocide coming for us before we try to stop the one not in our backyard? I mean it's going to be harder to get Israel to stop bombing Palestinian children and give humanitarian aide to said children while we're lined up for Trump's gas chambers

signed, a transgender woman who don't want to end up in a mass grave full of other AMAB individuals all of us wearing pink triangles!

Fucking right?! Hate is being preached from the pulpit every Sunday supporting this clown and the machine pulling his strings.

In many places in this country our queer brothers and sisters are in mortal danger. These people hate and demonize the different and the other. It's an old playbook, but, it sure does work.

If you don't think the machine would put our people in camps; you're wearing blinders and don't know your history. Lives depend on this election.

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signed, a transgender woman who don’t want to end up in a mass grave full of other AMAB individuals all of us wearing pink triangles!

Innocent gazans and Lebanese civilians dont want to end up in a mass grave either. If you wont stand up for civilization for them why should I or anyone else stand up for civiliation for you? If we are all being so calculated and tactical as you are, whats in it for me to save you? I'm not part of the trans community.

You dont even need to stand for justice-- just stand enough that we are neutral-- that we stop sending bombs,funding, and troops, and lending coverage in the UN. Do it for your own self respect and dignity, even.

Again, I'm not saying that it's okay to sacrifice Palestinians needlessly or that their lives are less important.

I'm saying to wait a god damn month for the election to be over before we start fighting the Democratic Party

Presidents do care about votes during an election. They dont care about sit ins and student protests. You're asking everyone to abandon any pushback of an active genocide. You are asking them to actively support it in fact. Why not pressure Harris to get her to pledge to stop it instead.

My one concern about her openly opposing the genocide in Gaza is that it would likely cause the electoral college to just hand the vote to Trump. That will be way worse for Palestinians overall. Don't forget Trump didn't win the popular vote in 2016.

Unfortunately there are too many people in the US government who are invested in supporting Israel, and it's not out of the realm of possibility that the electoral college is compromised like our supreme court is. Israel could be the make it or break it on that front.

Simple question: do you think voting in Trump again will make fighting for stopping the genocide in Gaza & Lebanon earlier or harder?

I think is she doesnt change her stand on it she has a good chance of losing.

That's a non answer. Do you think helping steer votes away from her and towards Trump helps or hurts your goal of ending the genocide?

I think it makes no difference whatsoever, when both are bought off by AIPAC money toward the same ends. But I do think there is only one that can conceivably be pressured to stop doing that, and only our every 4 year vote matters to them. Pushing on Trump is useless. This is your one chance to lift a finger to do the right thing with some pushback and demanding the shipments stop.

Innocent Americans don't want to suffer either.

Vote for orange arsewipe or his conservative enablers, Americans will suffer.

In the process of playing chicken with her to see who blinks first, yes, she might lose some votes. But she was going to lose some votes anyway because of the far right Israeli war, that she could win back that number and more if she alters her position to one that resonates with more Americans around the legends we tell ourselves about who we are. These are votes in key swing states that she could gain.

That loss of votes either way is on her and the cadre of scumbag consultants doing tactical spreadsheets based on issue support, weighing if they can keep that sweet sweet AIPAC money. You are just playing her and netenyahus game and you cant even see it that you have multiple peoples hands up your rear using you as a sock puppet. You allow that because you are utterly terrified, and that part is understandable.

People said the same of Biden but protesting him got us Harris.

Biden had a catastrophically low approval rating and was doomed to lose even before the medical stuff came to light. He had far lower numbers than any dem in the past 80 years at that point in the cycle. If you want to pretend "whining" got us Harris instead of Bidens poor choices, thats fine, but the math tells a different story.

If you want to pretend “whining” got us Harris instead of Bidens poor choices

The people "whining" are criticizing those same poor choices.

Yea sounds great. Just accept genocide of the Palestinians and stop complaining about our paychecks funding war crimes and genocide every month. After all, it’s just genocide, right?

I agree, I don’t mind it happening to people over there as long as it doesn’t happen to me. It’s just genocide.

I'm not saying any amount of genocide is acceptable, I'm saying we need to wait for the gun to not also be pointed at our own heads before we try to play the hero.

"Let's whinge and moan about a problem that will only get worse if Trump is elected, which whinging and moaning about against Harris prior to the election will help achieve!"

truly astonishing foresight

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No not ''at risk''. This is his NUMBER ONE policy promise. He's running on this. Explicitly. Why are we pretending it's not?

Because last time his number one policy promise was to build a wall and have Mexico pay for it. And his number two promise was an alternative to Obamacare.

He's not so great at following through with his promises. That's the only thing non-MAGAs have going for them: he's pretty incompetent.

Doesn't need to be competent in order to say "hey, go kill some people who make you feel uncomfortable, we give you tacit approval and you'll be the new Kyle Rittenhouse"

So, ghettoes. And not the US ghettoes of the 60s and 70s, but the German ghettoes of the 30s and 40s.

Do we have any idea of what military heads are thinking about that? Are they enthusiastic, mixed, or ready to oppose their commander in chief?

Active duty isn't allowed to talk politics, but so far, some retired generals spoke out against Trump and endorsed Harris.

Some high ranked thoughts could be inadvertently leaked to the press, though.

mass deportations of undocumented people

I feel like this is something that won't 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 wouldn't want their cash cows disrupted.

On the other hand, I didn't think they would really do anything much about abortion either, since that's 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 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 they've unleashed until it's too late.

I think it's the threat that is the point. Maybe the efforts won't reach the critical "mass deportations" but the purpose is to make migrants scared.

Oh that's actually the easiest part. We are very very good at logistics in the US. The hard part about deportation in the past has been the red tape, like court hearings and moving people around to different agencies depending on their exact case details.

They don't want to deal with any of that. They want the Proud Boys to grab your non English speakers and put them into a short term camp. There will be no checking of papers for naturalization or anything like that. If you're not white and you can't speak English well they'll take you, and they will ignore any lawyer, court, or law enforcement orders to stop. From the camp you'll be put on a chartered flight to wherever they think you're from with a "Do Not Return" note on your travel documents.

The truly scary part is what happens when they find out other countries won't just accept American citizens. But they're imagining Operation Wetback, not anything from the Bush or Reagan era.

They'll replace illegal immigrants with prison labor. Just as cheap, maybe even cheaper. And if there's ever a shortage, just make pot illegal again.

You do not execute orders that aren't moral. The US Military is not like the Russians. Although, I wouldn't depend completely on that.

I don't believe anyone is perfectly immune from propaganda but I don't even know if you need propaganda to get people to follow orders. All you need is someone to give the order. There isn't any Morality In following orders. That's why they're called soldiers

Not just propaganda, but threats against them or their job. I'd be willing to bet that they wouldn't threaten their families, I couldn't imagine that turning out well.

Stanfrod prison experiment proved pretty amply that people will follow orders and adopt other peoples sadism as their own when directed to do so by an authority figure. Nurembourg was largely a propoganda show.

Tell the 200 or so military that were found guilty there.

It was originally supposed to have tried more like 15000, but yes, ultimately a low couple hundred were tried, and then the rest were just dropped. Theres interesting history there, and it functioned more like propoganda than justice.

But the constitution forbids the US military from operating within the borders of the US! Surely that'll stop him from ever being able to do this! Right? Right?????

It also forbids warrantless search and seizure of property and the president from receiving financial gifts from foreign governments. The courts have been filled with people who don't care.

Congress didn't care either. There were multiple constitutional violations that Trump committed while he was in office, but Pelosi never went for those. She went for small bullshit stuff that would result in what we got.

Possibly? One might be able to make the case for the National Guard, but maybe the average person won't know/care about the difference when interacting with armed people in uniform.

Aside from that, I've noticed other Lemmings bring up the fact that the Armed Forces in general are sworn to uphold the US Constitution. As an organization, they may disregard orders that are in conflict with this. Of course, that comes down to interpretation of any individual in command, so despite loud protest to the contrary I personally wouldn't rely on that.

As an organization, they may disregard orders that are in conflict with this. Of course, that comes down to interpretation of any individual in command, so despite loud protest to the contrary I personally wouldn't rely on that.

This is going to make me throw up a little, but I think the command leadership in recent years has really turned a heel on political alignment. And - hurk - I feel like they would do the honorable thing. You're not wrong though, obviously the military attracts right wing shit heads who believe what they want. So I would imagine that there would be a breakdown of the command at lower levels in scant instances; but brigade, division, corps, and post commanders usually follow rigorous and strict guidelines. Values are a big deal. But brainworm has been feeding on dumb dumbs and it doesn't appear to be starving any time soon.

Yeah, everyone has their own interpretation of the Constitution these days. They'll "uphold" whatever version of the Constitution their own interpretation allows.

To be fair the constitution is deeply flawed and needed to evolve a lot more than it has to keep up with the progression of society. It needs to evolve or die, and with our current batch of compromised and etheically empty politicians I wouldnt trust them to alter it.

The paper won't stop him but the officer corps isn't going to obey those orders without him converting it first. A process that historically takes years to complete and leaves a military a shadow of it's former self.

Not according to change is made by the DOD last month to 5240.01. It allows US military action on US soil, including lethal force.

A military takeover of the cities would last about 20minutes, if that, it's against the HOA rules.

What happens when the wealthy home owners see their property values drop, because the army is on every corner, they'll start calling their political reps.

This is a childish fantasy, the highest real estate values are in cities, the wealthiest people have homes in cities. It is a fantasy of the Republic base, that tends not to live in large urban centers.

You know he means the downtown core, not the suburban white people who likely voted for him. But I gave you an upvote for the hilarity of an HOA council member telling the Proud Boys they aren't allowed to setup there.

HOA President "Look, your presence is against the HOA By-laws. We're going to have to fine you."

Oh, I'm sure they could deploy in a way that has acceptable optics for those folks. They would see a strong violent force there to enforce their interests over those pesky desperate poors.

US military personnel pledge an oath to protect the US Constitution from foreign and domestic enemies and that includes the Commander-in-Chief.

Did you guys watch that "documentary" Civil War?

So much suffering. That was so avoidable. I like that the point of movie isn't which ideology wins. It's that America isn't immune, any civil war will be a very dirty affair that causes massive amounts of suffering so nobody should be rooting for that path.

I guess he's seen the episode of deep space nine and thought it would be a good idea...

I think the information is good, but they really need to actually talk about military leaders. It's basically known that the military should not be operating within the US borders, with the exception of national guard, and that with strict limits. We know, because military leaders have told us, that they have discussed what they would do if Trump gave unconstitutional orders. But we don't know the details, and we don't know who has decided what. Of course it's difficult for people to go public with hypothetical responses to that kind of blatant abuse of Presidential power. But it's still something that needs to be mentioned.

Hi former soldier here, I can offer some educated insight on this. What's likely to happen in the very short term of such an order is the Joint Chiefs refuse it. Trump replaces them and the next set refuses it. This will happen a few more times before he gets someone willing to tell him yes, but they know the military under them isn't going to respond. If Trump insists on this path he will likely try to directly order smaller units to do what he wants. Any unit that does will find it's leaders immediately relieved of command by their superiors. If some small unit does find it's way out into the public it's likely a general will order the military police to go round them up on charges of deserting their post.

It will be very messy and Authoritarians hate messy. Much more likely is they give the Proud Boys and the KKK uniforms and guns and call them soldiers, along with any federal agents he can recruit again. The actual military is going to be very resistant to shooting at Americans. We've spent the last 20 years sweating, bleeding, and even dying to protect Americans. Orders to go after Americans en masse, (instead of single Americans overseas on very good evidence they're working with enemy militants), will require a complete change in ideology and essentially invalidates 20 years of effort on the part of the current force. I've seen guys refuse to moderate uniform standards for a command mandated fun event over this exact issue. ("My friends died wearing this uniform, I'll be damned if I disrespect it like that") I highly doubt Trump will change that in any kind of short order.

Sounds like the evolution of all that would take years anyway... so it's just a matter if he leaves office ever if elected again.

The scary part to me is when he inevitably goes around the military again. In his last term he used federal agents to do what the military would not with BLM protesters.

Sounds like he's promoting firing up civil war tbh. How much of that could he get away with before people aggressively fight back? Or at least I hope we'd aggressively fight back

Hey if the military takes over my town they're going to be upset. As well they should be.

If Trump loses the elections, US cities at risk of stochastic violence and domestic terrorism. It's not like Harris winning would suddenly make half the country go, "my bad, you're right."

The rest of the world at this point:

Yeah fine, fucking whatever.

With the current info on Undecideds, it's lining up mostly with what I guessed based on what we knew about the locked in voters barring another polling disaster rendering all the data moot. Around 60% of the recent undecideds have broke for Harris, but the bulk of Undecideds who committed earlier broke for Trump (52-48) which is a larger number. These two average out to basically 50-50 on the whole. Undecideds went massively for Trump both previous elections so I don't foresee Harris breaking 50%ish, that's already a big gain.

This is relevant because the final locked in scores at the rate things are trending are going to be something like 47.5 - 49 give or take a half a point by election day. Not all of the 3-4 points left are going to either them, at least one, maybe 2 are going for Third Parties, which unlike in past years are way more left leaning than normal thanks mostly to RFK Jr and Libertarian infighting. Harris is trending in the right direction, but that 3rd party shift absorbs some of that. A final 50/50 call between what's left leaves maybe a 2 point difference final result depending on exactly how well third parties do. 48-50 or so. That's a Hilary Clinton sized margin between Popular Vote and EC. Not a death sentence, this thing is cyclical, sometimes it favors one party or another (Democrats had a EC advantage in 2004 and 2008 and probably 2012) and sometimes it's stronger. The effect is supposed to be much less this year, a Biden level margin of 4 points or even a 3 point lead is a safe Kamala win. Not so much 2 points, that's up in the margins.

If the polling is right, this is a dead heat election where Wisconsin and Michigan are going blue, Arizona Georgia and North Carolina going red, and Nevada and Pennsylvania are too close to call.

And with the changes the DOD just made to 5240.01 on September 27 allowing US military action on US soil including up to lethal force, Trump will be allowed to.

Drop me possibly be the first one to use it, but the groundwork is being laid under Democrats.

I can imagine the various branches of the US military getting into slap fights over who gets to oppress whom.

Oh, get a grip. Just add this to the list of many things Trump has said he would do that he never did. You guys do know he says stuff like this all the time just to play to his base, right? Well, nothing drives clicks like declaring that democracy will end.

I wonder if you remember what happened on January 6th. A violent attempted insurrection, encouraged and orchestrated by Donald Trump. He is the kind of person that would do exactly what he says he wants to do. Do you want to repeat January 6th, so that you can be reminded of exactly what happened?

That's an incredibly stupid, naive and wreckless stance to take. You're just going to wildly gamble on that? And the thing is, the only things he skipped doing something he said he'd do, was the "good" stuff he promised.