Because Trump Says

Fascist Crimes at Home & Imperialist Crime Abroad

Both at home and abroad, the United States government under the malignant rule of the deranged fascist lunatic Donald Trump is committing terrible crimes whose “justifications” amount to little more than Because Trump Says.

Because Trump Says Citizen Protest is Criminal Rebellion

Why are their federalized National Guard troops and even active-duty troops repressing the constitutional rights of public assembly and free speech Los Angeles?

Because the fascist gangster Trump says. Because Trump has absurdly called protests of his racist immigration raids in four square miles of a five hundred square mile city “a rebellion against the authority of the United States government.”

Trump’s assertion had and has no basis in fact, making his military occupation of Los Angeles unconstitutional, as U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer ruled two weeks ago.

But so what? A three-judge panel from the United States’ 9th Circuit of Appeals subsequently ruled that the troops can stay out of supine deference to Trump’s preposterous judgement.

The ruling says Trump can send in the troops to crush protests in the name of preventing a rebellion against the US government regardless of whether or not there is actually a rebellion against the US government.

Basically, the panel ruled “Because Trump Says. If Trump says 2+2 = 5, then so be it!”

So what if Trump is a fascist maniac and pathological liar?

Let’s dig into this case a bit more. The three-judge ruling is no small thing. It is a green light for de facto martial law across all the states within the 9^th District’s jurisdiction: Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington.

We know from Trump’s recent rhetoric that the threat applies mainly to California, Hawaii, Oregon, and Washington because they are “blue states.” Mein Trumpf has made it clear that his militarized domestic terror is aimed at states and cities under Democratic Party control. Recall that Trump’s sociopathic and fascist “homeland security” secretary Kristi Noem announced that the troops are in Los Angeles to “liberate” that city and California from “socialist” rule. And that Trump has said that California’s governor Gavin Newsom should be arrested simply “because he ran for governor.”

There is a dark historical irony in Trump sending in troops to crush a supposed insurrection. Donald “Take Down the Metal Detectors” Trump instigated an insurrectionist rebellion against the US government — a fascist coup attempt on January 6, 2021. He sparked a mass violent assault on the US Capitol, a putsch attempt he wanted armed with military assault weapons. As president, he let this bloody neo-Confederate attack rage for hours until he realized it would not succeed in canceling his 2020 election loss. Trump’s first action as re-elected president was to pardon and grant clemency to more than 1500 January 6 criminals, including the nation’s top two paramilitary fascist leaders.

The government of California can take its legal challenge to Trump’s troop deployment in the streets of Los Angeles to the full Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and/or to the US Supreme Court. A distinctly possible judgement in support of the Trump regime’s position on the part of the Trump-crafted Supreme Court would open the whole country – with “blue” state and urban America targeted first and foremost – up to de facto martial law.

Because Trump Says.

“Distinctly possible” may understate the threat. Trump’s high Court last year placed him literally above the law, granting him forever immunity from prosecution for any crime bearing the imprimatur of “official presidential duties.” It has unconstitutionally reimposed the female enslavement of forced motherhood in numerous states. It just this evening allowed the Trump administration to “deport” (try render) migrants to countries other than their own, pausing a federal judge’s ruling that they must first be given a chance to show that they would face the risk of torture there.

“Vibes” Trumping Facts and Law in the Reckless Bombing of Iran

Turning overseas, Trump’s bombing of Iran two nights ago is monumentally illegal under international law. After the bombing, he said that the goal was to “stop to the nuclear threat posed by the world’s number one state sponsor of terror.”

Trump’s Christian white nationalist Defense Secretary offered this “justification”: “The president authorized a precision operation to neutralize the threats to our national interest posed by the Iranian nuclear program and the collective self-defense of our troops and our ally Israel.”

But Iran posed and poses no imminent threat – nuclear or otherwise – to the United States, its “allies” (imperial client states), or collective humanity. The United States, the funder and equipper of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, has long been and remains by far and away the world’s “number one state sponsor of terror” – a bloody imperial superpower power that has killed tens of millions of innocent people the world over during the last eight decades.

Three months ago, Trump's Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard told Congress that the U.S. intelligence community "continues to assess that Iran is NOT building a nuclear weapon." Even though Trump recently trashed Gabbard’s testimony (“I don’t care what she says”), two administration officials have divulged that Trump’s bombings have NOT been informed by any new U.S. intelligence. “There is no intel," said one of the officials: "nothing new…the intelligence assessments have not really changed from what they were before."

No new facts. Just Because Trump Says.

There’s nothing new about the US attacking other nations on false claims of grave, weapons-related threats those nations supposedly pose to the US and “the international community.” An obvious example is the Bush43 administration’s criminal regime change invasion of Iraq in 2003.

What’s different now is the deranged lunatic Trump’s brazen disinterest in trying to make a serious public case for his wild shift from claiming to be interested in resuming (the) negotiations with Iran (that he trashed) to joining the fascist Israel state’s criminal war on a sovereign state – this while citing “God” in defense of his crime. As Andrew Perez and Asawin Suebsaeng write in Rolling Stone:

“Trump's attacks on Iran constitute an act of war - and could set off a new, long-term conflict with potential to grow into something much larger. Unlike a previous time an American president preemptively initiated a war in the Middle East, when George W. Bush plunged America into a disastrous war in Iraq, he and his team spent roughly a year building a case of lies and propaganda to sell to a public that was already broadly supportive of post-9/11 military action…The second Trump administration skipped the pretense, opting to speed-run the U.S. into conflict, at a time when public polling shows that the idea of war with Iran is spectacularly unpopular with the American people…. Across the federal government, senior officials and policymakers aren't pretending that Trump's claims of an imminent nuclear threat are built on anything but vibes, whether intentionally manufactured or not.”

Top Congressional Democrats were not even briefed on Trump’s reckless action, which could help spark a wider regional and even global conflict (Iran’s foreign minister is meeting today with Russia’s nuclear strongman Vladimir Putin).

Terrible Precedents Set Because “God” and the fascist ogres Netanyahu and Trump Say

Stop and reflect on the terrible message Trump’s bombing of Iran sends to the world. As the Australian law professor Donald Rothwell writes:

“The overarching concern is these strikes can set a precedent. Other states can use this interpretation of the right of self-defense to launch anticipatory or preemptive strikes against other nations any time they want. If this practice is allowed to go unchecked and is not subject to widespread condemnation, it can be seen by the international community as an endorsement – that this type of conduct is legitimate. There are many states acquiring conventional weapons that could be seen to pose a potential threat to their neighbors or other states. And there are several states considering the acquisition of nuclear weapons. One example is Japan, where there has been some debate about nuclear weapons as a deterrence to future possible threats from China. So, how might Japan’s actions be seen by its neighbors – namely China and North Korea? And how might these countries respond in light of the precedent that’s been set by the US and Israel?”

Trump must go now. The notion of leaving this fascist gangster with his finger on the nuclear button and threatening to light the world on fire until 2026, 2027, 2028 and/or beyond that is sheer madness.