Today's News (2020/7/22) Fascism Edition
I've had to step back a bit the last few days. Might have to still further. We'll see if I can start sleeping decently again.
The biggest rhetorical phrase today is Trump and Barr talking about the Federal crackdown in Portland as an example of a "surge" in law enforcement.
You know, a surge. Like in Iraq.
He's not exactly subtle.
Except, of course, this one is at Americans - or, at least, Democrats, who they don't consider Americans - and in the US.
Here's some stories.
----- 1 -----
Trump Plans to Expand the Federal Invasion of American Cities
“You’ll see something rolled out this week,” the White House chief of staff says.
Dan Friedman
19 July 2020
https://www.motherjones.com/anti-racism-police-protest/2020/07/trump-border-patrol-cities-portland-chicago/
President Donald Trump plans to assert new authority this week to dispatch federal law enforcement agents to American cities to quell “unrest,” White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said Sunday on Fox News.
“Attorney General Barr is weighing in on that with [acting Homeland Security] Secretary [Chad] Wolf, and you’ll see something rolled out this week, as we start to go in and make sure that the communities-whether it’s Chicago or Portland or Milwaukee or someplace across the heartland of the country-we need to make sure their communities are safe,” Meadows said.
Trump’s critics say he is deploying armed federal officers to cities in an effort to help his reelection effort. The Trump campaign lent support to those claims Sunday by gleefully tweeting out Meadows’ comments.
----- 2 -----
Portland’s Pretext: Barr’s Long History Manipulating Law to Put Federal Forces on U.S. Streets
by Ryan Goodman and Danielle Schulkin
July 19, 2020
https://www.justsecurity.org/71512/portlands-pretext-barrs-long-history-manipulating-law-to-put-federal-forces-on-u-s-streets/
Attorney General Barr has been building his playbook for using federal forces against an unwilling state for decades. In an interview with the Miller Center in 2001, Barr explained his strategy for deploying federal troops to address unrest in the Virgin Islands after a major hurricane in 1989. At the time of the incident, Barr was an assistant attorney general and head of the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel. He boasted that during this time he found a way to deploy federal forces based on a legal justification that appears to now being played out in Portland:
Barr: We started quickly looking at the legal books. What authority do we have to go in there and start enforcing the law in St. Croix? We looked at some statutes, and we finally decided that without Presidential authority we could send down law enforcement people to defend the federal function. That is, we said, “People are interfering with the operation of our courts” and so on. I said, “We can send people down to defend the federal function, keep our courts open, and if they see any crime being committed in front of them, then, as law enforcement officers, they can make the arrest.” Our object was just to get federal law enforcement down there and play it by ear. Technically, we couldn’t send them down to-
Question: Did you consider interference with the mail as a basis?
Barr: Yes, we had a whole list of things like that, interference with the mail, interference with the courts. But basically we were claiming that there was breakdown, civil unrest that was interfering with the federal function. We found these old cases that said the federal government could go in there. This was without declaring martial law.
The White House’s true concern in 1989 was not to defend the federal function of courts - but to quell widespread looting and disorder across the Virgin Islands. Barr bragged in his 2001 interview that he had found a way to get the federal forces “down there and then play it by ear” without having to declare martial law.
As a side note: This was not the only time Barr boasted in the Miller Center interview about his ability to deploy military force by changing facts on the ground. The other example involved the president’s ability to use force abroad without congressional support.
----- 3 -----
Homeland Security sending 150 agents to Chicago this week: report
By Rebecca Klar - 07/20/20
https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/508120-homeland-security-sending-150-agents-to-chicago-this-week-report
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is planning to send 150 federal agents to Chicago this week, The Chicago Tribune reported Monday.
The Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agents are set to assist other federal law enforcement and Chicago police in crime-fighting efforts, the Tribune reported citing unnamed sources.
A specific plan on what the agents will be doing has not been made public, according to the Tribune. One city official told the newspaper that the city was aware of the plan but not any specifics.
The move would come as Democratic leaders have condemned the Trump administration for sending federal officials to Portland, Ore., where there have been reports of people being picked up by agents in unmarked vans.
Acting Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Ken Cuccinelli on Monday said the efforts in Portland could be extended to other cities if there are spikes in violent protests.
----- 4 -----
Dems' Sternly Worded Letter Won't Stop Fascism
Democrats issue press releases & letters that insist they want to stop Trump, and then those Dems continue to obediently help him. Now, Trump officials are boasting about plans to invade cities.
David Sirota
20 July 2020
https://sirota.substack.com/p/dems-sternly-worded-letter-wont-stop
Two weeks ago, the Associated Press reported that President Trump deployed unidentified agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to Portland, Ore., where they were filmed getting out of unmarked vehicles and abducting protesters off the street.
A few days later, House Democrats responded by obediently advancing an appropriations bill that funds the department -- with no apparent restrictions on such deployments.
“This bill as a whole will strengthen our security and keep Americans safe while upholding our American values of fairness and respect,” said Democratic House Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Nita Lowey, amid growing outrage at the situation in Oregon.
With congressional Democrats on their way to approving $50 billion for DHS, Trump administration officials are now boasting about their plans to replicate the Portland invasion in other cities. Those officials seem emboldened to ignore local Democratic opposition to the federal deployments.
“I don’t need invitations by state mayors or state governors to do our job -- we’re going to do that whether they like us there or not,” Acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf defiantly declared on Fox News this morning.
While it is true that the current Homeland Security funding bill has a few good things in it (it rejects funding for Trump’s border wall), the larger point is clear: Once again, while Democrats issue press releases telling America they really want to stop Trump, and while Democrats actually have a huge amount of power to do just that, they often refuse to use that power. They clearly expect nobody to mind the yawning gap between their #Resistance rhetoric and their lack of action -- even as the White House now openly threatens to ignore federal laws.
----- 5 -----
Mike Baker
twitter.com/ByMikeBaker
21 July 2020
https://twitter.com/ByMikeBaker/status/1285788849352798210
[THREAD]
Hello again from Portland.
The "Wall of Moms" just arrived at the federal courthouse, and their numbers have grown substantially once again.
[EMBEDDED VIDEO THROUGHOUT]
"Hey hey, ho ho. These racist cops have got to go."
A popular chant this week: "Feds, go home!"
----- 6 -----
Trump Unleashes His Secret Police in Portland
In a dangerous authoritarian move, federal agents in camouflage and without badges are rounding up American citizens.
By Jeet Heer
July 17, 2020
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-secret-police-portland/
Donald Trump’s war on protesters is escalating, with reports emerging out of Portland, Ore., that federal law enforcement officers, wearing camouflage but without any other visible insignia, have been rounding up American citizens. On Thursday, Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) reported that “federal law enforcement officers have been using unmarked vehicles to drive around downtown Portland and detain protesters since at least July 14. Personal accounts and multiple videos posted online show the officers driving up to people, detaining individuals with no explanation of why they are being arrested, and driving off.”
OPB quotes one person who was arrested by these officers, although never charged. “I am basically tossed into the van,” Mark Pettibone told the broadcaster. “And I had my beanie pulled over my face so I couldn’t see and they held my hands over my head.” He was taken to a building that he later discovered was a federal courthouse. Only there was he read his Miranda rights, but he was never charged. After he asked for a lawyer, he was released. Videos are circulating on social media of similar detentions.
“It’s like stop and frisk meets Guantanamo Bay,” attorney Juan Chavez told OPB. He added that these detentions were not following any rules of probable cause. “It sounds more like abduction. It sounds like they’re kidnapping people off the streets.”
On the face of it, what these federal officers are doing is illegal and unconstitutional. It’s possible that they are acting under the 2011 National Defense Authorization Act, signed by Barack Obama, which legalized the detention of Americans suspected of being terrorists. If so, then the War on Terrorism has truly come home.
----- 7 -----
Nothing Can Justify the Attack on Portland
The question of whether these arrests are appropriate has a clear answer-at least in a nation that purports to live under the rule of law.
Quinta Jurecic and Benjamin Wittes
July 21, 2020
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/nothing-can-justify-attack-portland/614413/
The Trump administration has faced outrage since reports first surfaced of federal agents in unmarked vehicles picking up and detaining protesters in Portland, Oregon. Rather than backing down, though, President Trump appears to have decided to go all in: In a July 20 interview, he threatened to send “more federal law enforcement” to New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit, Baltimore, and Oakland-cities run by “liberal Democrats,” he asserted. The question of whether or not the administration has the legal authority to take such action will be fought out in legal challenges. But the question of whether or not these arrests are appropriate has a clear answer-at least in a nation that purports to live under the rule of law.
Asked on July 17 by an NPR reporter whether the reporting was true, Ken Cuccinelli, a senior Department of Homeland Security official, didn't seem troubled by the department's activities. Yes, he said, at least one person had been arrested in this fashion in Portland-though he wouldn’t say whether others had been as well, and if so how many. Cuccinelli added that this was how the Trump administration planned to respond to demonstrations at federal buildings and monuments elsewhere, too. “This is a posture we intend to continue not just in Portland, but in any of the facilities that we’re responsible for around the country,” he declared. And days later, he doubled down on CNN, insisting that the government had “intelligence about planned attacks on federal facilities” in Portland: “If we get the same kind of intelligence in other places … we would respond the same way.”
More by this writer
Reports of unidentified federal law-enforcement officials patrolling areas of Portland-and conducting arrests by scooping suspects up into vans-have generated a lot of anxiety. The Atlantic writer Anne Applebaum argued that the government’s actions amount to “performative authoritarianism.” Mary McCord, a lawyer who previously oversaw national-security issues at the Justice Department, warned The New York Times that manhandling Portland residents in this way “sends the message that these people are terrorists and need to be treated like terrorists.” And Oregon’s congressional delegation wrote a letter to the U.S. attorney general stating that the Portland arrests “are more reflective of tactics of a government led by a dictator, not from the government of our constitutional democratic republic.” Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler and Ron Wyden, the senior senator from Oregon, both decried the arrests as unconstitutional.
There will be time to sort out the legalities of the federal government’s actions. The attorney general of Oregon has filed suit against various federal agencies and officers involved in one arrest, arguing, “Ordinarily, a person ... who is confronted by anonymous men in military-type fatigues and ordered into an unmarked van can reasonably assume that he is being kidnapped and is the victim of a crime.” The American Civil Liberties Union has also sued the Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Marshals Service. The chairs of three House committees have requested an internal DHS investigation of the matter. Between these varied proceedings, the Trump administration will have to answer legal questions like whether it’s really okay for unidentified federal officers and agents to patrol streets, and whether an agency whose mission is to patrol the border is properly used without training for crowd control. The administration will also have to justify the propriety of the individual arrests both in any prosecutions of those detained and in any civil suits filed.
But let’s leave the legalities aside for now. Because whether the Trump administration has the technical legal authority to deploy this show of force in this particular matter does not answer the question of whether it should do so. The use of federal officers in this manner is corrosive of democratic culture, it makes for bad and ineffective law enforcement, and it’s likely physically dangerous both for the law-enforcement officers and for the protesters in question.
----- 8 -----
DHS Chief Says His Federal Agents Are ‘Proactively’ Arresting People In Portland
By Cristina Cabrera
July 22, 2020 8:05 a.m.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/dhs-chief-says-his-federal-agents-are-proactively-arresting-people-in-portland
Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Chad Wolf spun his unidentified federal agents’ random detainment of nonviolent anti-police brutality protesters in Portland, Oregon as some kind of pre-crime measure on Tuesday night.
“Because we don’t have that local support, that local law enforcement support, we are having to go out and proactively arrest individuals,” Wolf said during an interview on Fox News. “And we need to do that because we need to hold them accountable.”
He derided the “ridiculous” notion that federal law enforcement shouldn’t take over a city without local leaders’ permission.
----- 9 -----
Five Points On The Federal Officers In Portland - And, Maybe Soon, A City Near You
By Matt Shuham
July 20, 2020
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/fivepoints/five-points-on-the-federal-officers-in-portland-and-maybe-soon-a-city-near-you
Anonymous federal forces are occupying Oregon’s largest city against the wishes of local officials. They’ve snatched people off the street and shoved them into unmarked cars, beaten peaceful demonstrators and filled Portland with the haze of tear gas.
And now, senior Trump administration figures are making noise about taking the Portland show on a national tour - a menacing and confusing display of federal force just months before Election Day.
Here’s what we know about the federal presence in Portland.
----- 10 -----
Thousands protest in downtown Portland Monday; federal officers again respond with force
Updated Jul 22, 2020; Posted Jul 20, 2020
https://www.oregonlive.com/news/2020/07/portland-protests-continue-for-54th-night-amid-controversy-surrounding-federal-officers-presence.html
Portland Protests continue for 54th night
By Ted Sickinger| The Oregonian/OregonLive and Alex Hardgrave | The Oregonian/OregonLive
Portland parent groups marched in droves to Monday night to join downtown protests in response to the repeated and nightly use of force by federal agents on demonstrators.
Portlanders first started protesting police violence against Black Americans in late May. It wasn’t until 31 days later that federal officers were first seen at the nightly demonstrations. In the weeks since, federal agents have used less-lethal munitions and gas on protesters numerous times.
Federal officers again set off gas and shot projectiles towards demonstrators gathered early Tuesday morning. The nearly hour-long confrontation began after midnight. Hundreds of people had packed into the courthouse entrance, and some people near the front line tore off plywood attached to the building. Federal officers responded in force.
Their actions have drawn scrutiny from Oregon officials and support from President Donald Trump. The president again praised federal law enforcement Monday, saying they were doing a fantastic job in Portland. Trump said he planned to replicate the response in other major U.S. cities led by Democratic mayors.
Monday night’s demonstrations started around 9 p.m. Two groups, called the Wall of Moms and PDXDadPod, marched from the riverfront to Justice Center. The jail is at the heart of nightly protests. Two federal buildings sit on either side of it.
Even before the parents’ groups arrived, more than 300 people had gathered near the downtown jail. Young Black community leaders used a megaphone to ask, “Whose lives matter?” Hundreds of people responded, “Black lives matter!”
The crowd roared when the parents’ march of several hundreds of people arrived just before 9 p.m. and joined the chant. Most were women wearing yellow shirts. One person held a sign that said, “Hey feds, you need to think about your sad choices - Mom.”
The mothers’ group also attended Sunday night’s demonstration, linking arms and standing at the front of a crowd. Some on Twitter called for the dads group to bring leaf blowers Monday in order to blow away tear gas federal officers have used often on protesters.
By 9:15 p.m., more than 1,000 people had gathered in the area. The crowds filled Southwest Third Avenue and the nearby park in front of the jail. Almost everyone wore masks. Some people stood on the steps of the jail and delivered speeches to rally the crowd. When one person asked how many mothers were in the crowd, several hundred people rose their hands.
Police at first stayed away from the crowd, which appeared to have grown beyond 2,000 people by 9:45 p.m. One speaker encouraged people to vote and told them how to register, drawing a wave of cheers. Another person explained how to react to tear gas and other uses of force: “Stay together. Stay tight. We do this every night.”
As the speeches continued, one person walked amid the crowd with a child’s pool full of hundreds of pig squeak toys. An older man used a projector to display “Fed Goons out of PDX” on the Justice Center. Just after 10 p.m., hundreds of people waved the lights on their phones as people sang, “We Shall Overcome.”
Some people milled past the federal courthouse next to the Justice Center, but by 10:15 p.m., nearly everyone remained gathered in city streets, parks or property.
Many people in the crowd began to march west on Madison Street past City Hall around 10:20 p.m. A line of women from the Wall of Moms linked arms and walked at the front.
As people marched, they chanted the names of Black Portlanders killed during interactions with police or under suspicious circumstances, including Jason Washington, who was shot and killed by Portland State police in 2018.
Hundreds of people remained near the Justice Center or in adjacent city parks.
The march eventually wrapped to a George Floyd memorial in front of a boarded-up Apple store next to the Pioneer Place mall. After a moment of silence and a brief series of speeches, people started to make their way back to the Justice Center.
Marchers returned around 11:15 p.m. A crowd began to grow outside the federal courthouse. The group of parents marched around the Justice Center, then returned to stand in front of it on Third Avenue. More than 1,000 people remained downtown.
Around 11:35 p.m., federal officers set off smoke devices near the courthouse toward protesters who were knocking on the building. Within minutes, hundreds of people had collected in front of the courthouse. Several women with the Wall of Moms made their way toward the front, where federal officers have often emerged to deploy tear gas or shoot less-lethal munitions toward protesters.
Together, people chanted, “Feds go home!”
By midnight, the front line of crowd had pressed up directly against the building. Some people pushed a few pieces of dismantled fencing next to the courthouse. A handful of people used their fists or other objects to knock on the plywood that covers the building’s doors and windows. Hundreds of people surrounded them.
The tension remained high at 12:20 a.m. Some people started to tear off the plywood and other materials nailed to the front of the building.
At 12:25 a.m., police threw out devices that emitted smoke and an orange substance into the air. Many people in the crowd started to walk or run away. Within three minutes, federal officers emerged from the building to force people away. Officers wearing camouflage and dark uniforms largely cleared the crowd away from the building and continued to shoot impact munitions toward demonstrators.
Although the crowd had cleared away within five minutes, federal officers remained on the streets past 1 a.m.
Some federal officers pressed north on Third Avenue beyond the courthouse and past Salmon Street. Others advanced west on Main Street. Officers formed lines to prevent people from returning to the courthouse area. The agents continued to intermittently set off devices that emitted gas, sound and smoke to clear people out.
The confrontation continued for more than 45 minutes. Smaller crowds of people started to edge back to the courthouse from two directions, and federal officers used force or gas to keep people away.
Most federal officers eventually retreated around 1:15 a.m. Several people returned near the courthouse, and a few people threw water bottles at the building. Federal officers used peepholes cut into the plywood to shoot less-lethal munitions toward people gathered.
Hundreds of people remained in the neighborhood past 2:15 a.m. Most of those gathered with the parents groups had left.
After Oregonian/OregonLive journalists left the scene, live video footage showed federal officers emerged again from the courthouse around 2:30 a.m. and again used different types of weapons to break up the crowd. Before that, a small fire had started on a piece of plywood near the front of the building.
After the air cleared, hundreds of people were still downtown. At about 2:25 a.m., some people lit a fire on a piece of plywood near a courthouse door that was extinguished by federal officers. Federal officers again emerged to break up the people who remained.
Portland police said their officers responded to the courthouse around 3 a.m. “to provide security” for firefighters responded to burning material next to the building. Police said around that same time, they received calls that windows were damaged at two downtown buildings, a jewelry store and City Hall.
An earlier Black Lives Matter protest also took place Monday evening in Southeast Portland to honor Shai-India Harris, an 18-year-old who was shot and killed in the area July 10. Harris was shot and killed near Lents Park, where people gathered.
Brooke Herbert, Beth Nakamura and Tom Hallman Jr. of The Oregonian/OregonLive contributed to this report.
----- 11 -----
Trump administration weighs a show of force in more cities
DHS and DOJ officials are making plans to deploy units to protect federal facilities.
By BETSY WOODRUFF SWAN, NATASHA BERTRAND and DANIEL LIPPMAN
07/21/2020
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/07/21/trump-federal-force-cities-377273
Portland may just be the beginning.
Federal law enforcement agencies are gearing up to expand their footprint nationwide in the coming weeks, despite concerns about the recent scenes of violence and chaos in Oregon.
Department of Homeland Security officials have considered deploying mobile field forces to protect federal property in cities around the country that experience unrest, two people familiar with the discussions told POLITICO. And the Department of Justice is planning to expand “Operation Legend,” a law enforcement initiative launched by Attorney General Bill Barr earlier this month to fight “the sudden surge of violent crime” in Kansas City, Mo.
DOJ plans to announce this week that the operation, which involves agents from the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration, will expand into more cities, a DOJ official told POLITICO. “We are seeing success in our Kansas City operation and have already arrested some wanted fugitives,” the DOJ official said.
The discussions have followed weeks of clashes between federal agents and protesters in Portland, which Trump on Monday called “worse than Afghanistan.” The president has vowed to use the power of the federal government to crush what his officials deem “violent anarchists,” wielding his authority to bolster the law-and-order theme he’s woven increasingly into his campaign messages.
----- 12 -----
Weijia Jiang
twitter.com/weijia
22 July 2020
https://twitter.com/weijia/status/1286029926102118400
The President just announced he's sending "hundreds of skilled law enforcement officials" to the city of Chicago, despite the mayor's demand for federal agents to stay out:
[QUOTED TWEET]
Mayor Lori Lightfoot
twitter.com/chicagosmayor
21 July 2020
https://twitter.com/chicagosmayor/status/1285711845844815872
Under no circumstances will I allow Donald Trump’s troops to come to Chicago and terrorize our residents.
----- 13 -----
President Trump Announces Deployment Of Federal Agents In Chicago As Part Of ‘Operation Legend’
By CBS 2 Chicago Staff
July 22, 2020
https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2020/07/22/president-trump-announces-deployment-of-federal-agents-in-chicago-as-part-of-operation-legend/
WASHINGTON (CBS/AP) - President Donald Trump and other officials on Wednesday formally announced the deployment of “hundreds” of federal agents to fight crime in Chicago as part of Operation Legend.
U.S. Attorney John R. Lausch Jr. joined President Trump and Attorney General William Barr to announce the initiative.
Officials described Operation Legend as “a sustained, systematic and coordinated law enforcement initiative in which federal law enforcement agencies work in conjunction with state and local law enforcement officials to fight violent crime.”
Using the same alarmist language that he has employed in the past to describe illegal immigration, President Trump painted Democrat-led cities as out of control and lashed out at the “radical left,” even though criminal justice experts say the increase in violence in some cities defies easy explanation.
“In recent weeks there has been a radical movement to defend, dismantle and dissolve our police department,” Trump said at a White House event, blaming the movement for “a shocking explosion of shootings, killings, murders and heinous crimes of violence.”
“This bloodshed must end,” he said. “This bloodshed will end.”
The decision to dispatch federal agents to American cities is playing out at a hyperpoliticized moment when Trump is trying to show that he stands with law enforcement and depict Democrats as weak on crime. With less than four months to go before Election Day, Trump has been serving up dire warnings that the violence would worsen if his Democratic rival Joe Biden is elected in November, as he tries to win over voters who could be swayed by that message.
----- 14 -----
ALT-immigration
Passport control
twitter.com/ALT_uscis
22 July 2020
https://twitter.com/ALT_uscis/status/1286191699136585729
#BREAKING
The #TrumpsGestapo gassed Mayor twitter.com/tedwheeler. Where do we go from here?
#PortlandProtests
[QUOTED TWEET]
Mike Baker
twitter.com/ByMikeBaker
22 July 2020
https://twitter.com/ByMikeBaker/status/1286186731763412993
Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler says the tear gas stings. Says egregious overreaction from feds. Calls it urban warfare.
[EMBEDDED VIDEO AT SECOND LINK]
Also posted to ソ-ラ-バ-ド-のおん;
comments at Dreamwidth. Please comment there.
The biggest rhetorical phrase today is Trump and Barr talking about the Federal crackdown in Portland as an example of a "surge" in law enforcement.
You know, a surge. Like in Iraq.
He's not exactly subtle.
Except, of course, this one is at Americans - or, at least, Democrats, who they don't consider Americans - and in the US.
Here's some stories.
- Trump Plans to Expand the Federal Invasion of American Cities
- Portland’s Pretext: Barr’s Long History Manipulating Law to Put Federal Forces on U.S. Streets
- Homeland Security sending 150 agents to Chicago this week: report
- Dems' Sternly Worded Letter Won't Stop Fascism
- The "Wall of Moms" in Portland
- Trump Unleashes His Secret Police in Portland
- Nothing Can Justify the Attack on Portland
- DHS Chief Says His Federal Agents Are ‘Proactively’ Arresting People In Portland
- Five Points On The Federal Officers In Portland - And, Maybe Soon, A City Near You
- Thousands protest in downtown Portland Monday; federal officers again respond with force
- Trump administration weighs a show of force in more cities
- Trump sending Federal police troops to Chicago after Chicago Mayor refuses any interference
- President Trump Announces Deployment Of Federal Agents In Chicago As Part Of ‘Operation Legend’
- Federal military police gas Portland mayor Ted Wheeler
----- 1 -----
Trump Plans to Expand the Federal Invasion of American Cities
“You’ll see something rolled out this week,” the White House chief of staff says.
Dan Friedman
19 July 2020
https://www.motherjones.com/anti-racism-police-protest/2020/07/trump-border-patrol-cities-portland-chicago/
President Donald Trump plans to assert new authority this week to dispatch federal law enforcement agents to American cities to quell “unrest,” White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said Sunday on Fox News.
“Attorney General Barr is weighing in on that with [acting Homeland Security] Secretary [Chad] Wolf, and you’ll see something rolled out this week, as we start to go in and make sure that the communities-whether it’s Chicago or Portland or Milwaukee or someplace across the heartland of the country-we need to make sure their communities are safe,” Meadows said.
Trump’s critics say he is deploying armed federal officers to cities in an effort to help his reelection effort. The Trump campaign lent support to those claims Sunday by gleefully tweeting out Meadows’ comments.
----- 2 -----
Portland’s Pretext: Barr’s Long History Manipulating Law to Put Federal Forces on U.S. Streets
by Ryan Goodman and Danielle Schulkin
July 19, 2020
https://www.justsecurity.org/71512/portlands-pretext-barrs-long-history-manipulating-law-to-put-federal-forces-on-u-s-streets/
Attorney General Barr has been building his playbook for using federal forces against an unwilling state for decades. In an interview with the Miller Center in 2001, Barr explained his strategy for deploying federal troops to address unrest in the Virgin Islands after a major hurricane in 1989. At the time of the incident, Barr was an assistant attorney general and head of the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel. He boasted that during this time he found a way to deploy federal forces based on a legal justification that appears to now being played out in Portland:
Barr: We started quickly looking at the legal books. What authority do we have to go in there and start enforcing the law in St. Croix? We looked at some statutes, and we finally decided that without Presidential authority we could send down law enforcement people to defend the federal function. That is, we said, “People are interfering with the operation of our courts” and so on. I said, “We can send people down to defend the federal function, keep our courts open, and if they see any crime being committed in front of them, then, as law enforcement officers, they can make the arrest.” Our object was just to get federal law enforcement down there and play it by ear. Technically, we couldn’t send them down to-
Question: Did you consider interference with the mail as a basis?
Barr: Yes, we had a whole list of things like that, interference with the mail, interference with the courts. But basically we were claiming that there was breakdown, civil unrest that was interfering with the federal function. We found these old cases that said the federal government could go in there. This was without declaring martial law.
The White House’s true concern in 1989 was not to defend the federal function of courts - but to quell widespread looting and disorder across the Virgin Islands. Barr bragged in his 2001 interview that he had found a way to get the federal forces “down there and then play it by ear” without having to declare martial law.
As a side note: This was not the only time Barr boasted in the Miller Center interview about his ability to deploy military force by changing facts on the ground. The other example involved the president’s ability to use force abroad without congressional support.
----- 3 -----
Homeland Security sending 150 agents to Chicago this week: report
By Rebecca Klar - 07/20/20
https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/508120-homeland-security-sending-150-agents-to-chicago-this-week-report
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is planning to send 150 federal agents to Chicago this week, The Chicago Tribune reported Monday.
The Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agents are set to assist other federal law enforcement and Chicago police in crime-fighting efforts, the Tribune reported citing unnamed sources.
A specific plan on what the agents will be doing has not been made public, according to the Tribune. One city official told the newspaper that the city was aware of the plan but not any specifics.
The move would come as Democratic leaders have condemned the Trump administration for sending federal officials to Portland, Ore., where there have been reports of people being picked up by agents in unmarked vans.
Acting Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Ken Cuccinelli on Monday said the efforts in Portland could be extended to other cities if there are spikes in violent protests.
----- 4 -----
Dems' Sternly Worded Letter Won't Stop Fascism
Democrats issue press releases & letters that insist they want to stop Trump, and then those Dems continue to obediently help him. Now, Trump officials are boasting about plans to invade cities.
David Sirota
20 July 2020
https://sirota.substack.com/p/dems-sternly-worded-letter-wont-stop
Two weeks ago, the Associated Press reported that President Trump deployed unidentified agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to Portland, Ore., where they were filmed getting out of unmarked vehicles and abducting protesters off the street.
A few days later, House Democrats responded by obediently advancing an appropriations bill that funds the department -- with no apparent restrictions on such deployments.
“This bill as a whole will strengthen our security and keep Americans safe while upholding our American values of fairness and respect,” said Democratic House Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Nita Lowey, amid growing outrage at the situation in Oregon.
With congressional Democrats on their way to approving $50 billion for DHS, Trump administration officials are now boasting about their plans to replicate the Portland invasion in other cities. Those officials seem emboldened to ignore local Democratic opposition to the federal deployments.
“I don’t need invitations by state mayors or state governors to do our job -- we’re going to do that whether they like us there or not,” Acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf defiantly declared on Fox News this morning.
While it is true that the current Homeland Security funding bill has a few good things in it (it rejects funding for Trump’s border wall), the larger point is clear: Once again, while Democrats issue press releases telling America they really want to stop Trump, and while Democrats actually have a huge amount of power to do just that, they often refuse to use that power. They clearly expect nobody to mind the yawning gap between their #Resistance rhetoric and their lack of action -- even as the White House now openly threatens to ignore federal laws.
----- 5 -----
Mike Baker
twitter.com/ByMikeBaker
21 July 2020
https://twitter.com/ByMikeBaker/status/1285788849352798210
[THREAD]
Hello again from Portland.
The "Wall of Moms" just arrived at the federal courthouse, and their numbers have grown substantially once again.
[EMBEDDED VIDEO THROUGHOUT]
"Hey hey, ho ho. These racist cops have got to go."
A popular chant this week: "Feds, go home!"
----- 6 -----
Trump Unleashes His Secret Police in Portland
In a dangerous authoritarian move, federal agents in camouflage and without badges are rounding up American citizens.
By Jeet Heer
July 17, 2020
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-secret-police-portland/
Donald Trump’s war on protesters is escalating, with reports emerging out of Portland, Ore., that federal law enforcement officers, wearing camouflage but without any other visible insignia, have been rounding up American citizens. On Thursday, Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) reported that “federal law enforcement officers have been using unmarked vehicles to drive around downtown Portland and detain protesters since at least July 14. Personal accounts and multiple videos posted online show the officers driving up to people, detaining individuals with no explanation of why they are being arrested, and driving off.”
OPB quotes one person who was arrested by these officers, although never charged. “I am basically tossed into the van,” Mark Pettibone told the broadcaster. “And I had my beanie pulled over my face so I couldn’t see and they held my hands over my head.” He was taken to a building that he later discovered was a federal courthouse. Only there was he read his Miranda rights, but he was never charged. After he asked for a lawyer, he was released. Videos are circulating on social media of similar detentions.
“It’s like stop and frisk meets Guantanamo Bay,” attorney Juan Chavez told OPB. He added that these detentions were not following any rules of probable cause. “It sounds more like abduction. It sounds like they’re kidnapping people off the streets.”
On the face of it, what these federal officers are doing is illegal and unconstitutional. It’s possible that they are acting under the 2011 National Defense Authorization Act, signed by Barack Obama, which legalized the detention of Americans suspected of being terrorists. If so, then the War on Terrorism has truly come home.
----- 7 -----
Nothing Can Justify the Attack on Portland
The question of whether these arrests are appropriate has a clear answer-at least in a nation that purports to live under the rule of law.
Quinta Jurecic and Benjamin Wittes
July 21, 2020
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/nothing-can-justify-attack-portland/614413/
The Trump administration has faced outrage since reports first surfaced of federal agents in unmarked vehicles picking up and detaining protesters in Portland, Oregon. Rather than backing down, though, President Trump appears to have decided to go all in: In a July 20 interview, he threatened to send “more federal law enforcement” to New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit, Baltimore, and Oakland-cities run by “liberal Democrats,” he asserted. The question of whether or not the administration has the legal authority to take such action will be fought out in legal challenges. But the question of whether or not these arrests are appropriate has a clear answer-at least in a nation that purports to live under the rule of law.
Asked on July 17 by an NPR reporter whether the reporting was true, Ken Cuccinelli, a senior Department of Homeland Security official, didn't seem troubled by the department's activities. Yes, he said, at least one person had been arrested in this fashion in Portland-though he wouldn’t say whether others had been as well, and if so how many. Cuccinelli added that this was how the Trump administration planned to respond to demonstrations at federal buildings and monuments elsewhere, too. “This is a posture we intend to continue not just in Portland, but in any of the facilities that we’re responsible for around the country,” he declared. And days later, he doubled down on CNN, insisting that the government had “intelligence about planned attacks on federal facilities” in Portland: “If we get the same kind of intelligence in other places … we would respond the same way.”
More by this writer
Reports of unidentified federal law-enforcement officials patrolling areas of Portland-and conducting arrests by scooping suspects up into vans-have generated a lot of anxiety. The Atlantic writer Anne Applebaum argued that the government’s actions amount to “performative authoritarianism.” Mary McCord, a lawyer who previously oversaw national-security issues at the Justice Department, warned The New York Times that manhandling Portland residents in this way “sends the message that these people are terrorists and need to be treated like terrorists.” And Oregon’s congressional delegation wrote a letter to the U.S. attorney general stating that the Portland arrests “are more reflective of tactics of a government led by a dictator, not from the government of our constitutional democratic republic.” Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler and Ron Wyden, the senior senator from Oregon, both decried the arrests as unconstitutional.
There will be time to sort out the legalities of the federal government’s actions. The attorney general of Oregon has filed suit against various federal agencies and officers involved in one arrest, arguing, “Ordinarily, a person ... who is confronted by anonymous men in military-type fatigues and ordered into an unmarked van can reasonably assume that he is being kidnapped and is the victim of a crime.” The American Civil Liberties Union has also sued the Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Marshals Service. The chairs of three House committees have requested an internal DHS investigation of the matter. Between these varied proceedings, the Trump administration will have to answer legal questions like whether it’s really okay for unidentified federal officers and agents to patrol streets, and whether an agency whose mission is to patrol the border is properly used without training for crowd control. The administration will also have to justify the propriety of the individual arrests both in any prosecutions of those detained and in any civil suits filed.
But let’s leave the legalities aside for now. Because whether the Trump administration has the technical legal authority to deploy this show of force in this particular matter does not answer the question of whether it should do so. The use of federal officers in this manner is corrosive of democratic culture, it makes for bad and ineffective law enforcement, and it’s likely physically dangerous both for the law-enforcement officers and for the protesters in question.
----- 8 -----
DHS Chief Says His Federal Agents Are ‘Proactively’ Arresting People In Portland
By Cristina Cabrera
July 22, 2020 8:05 a.m.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/dhs-chief-says-his-federal-agents-are-proactively-arresting-people-in-portland
Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Chad Wolf spun his unidentified federal agents’ random detainment of nonviolent anti-police brutality protesters in Portland, Oregon as some kind of pre-crime measure on Tuesday night.
“Because we don’t have that local support, that local law enforcement support, we are having to go out and proactively arrest individuals,” Wolf said during an interview on Fox News. “And we need to do that because we need to hold them accountable.”
He derided the “ridiculous” notion that federal law enforcement shouldn’t take over a city without local leaders’ permission.
----- 9 -----
Five Points On The Federal Officers In Portland - And, Maybe Soon, A City Near You
By Matt Shuham
July 20, 2020
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/fivepoints/five-points-on-the-federal-officers-in-portland-and-maybe-soon-a-city-near-you
Anonymous federal forces are occupying Oregon’s largest city against the wishes of local officials. They’ve snatched people off the street and shoved them into unmarked cars, beaten peaceful demonstrators and filled Portland with the haze of tear gas.
And now, senior Trump administration figures are making noise about taking the Portland show on a national tour - a menacing and confusing display of federal force just months before Election Day.
Here’s what we know about the federal presence in Portland.
----- 10 -----
Thousands protest in downtown Portland Monday; federal officers again respond with force
Updated Jul 22, 2020; Posted Jul 20, 2020
https://www.oregonlive.com/news/2020/07/portland-protests-continue-for-54th-night-amid-controversy-surrounding-federal-officers-presence.html
Portland Protests continue for 54th night
By Ted Sickinger| The Oregonian/OregonLive and Alex Hardgrave | The Oregonian/OregonLive
Portland parent groups marched in droves to Monday night to join downtown protests in response to the repeated and nightly use of force by federal agents on demonstrators.
Portlanders first started protesting police violence against Black Americans in late May. It wasn’t until 31 days later that federal officers were first seen at the nightly demonstrations. In the weeks since, federal agents have used less-lethal munitions and gas on protesters numerous times.
Federal officers again set off gas and shot projectiles towards demonstrators gathered early Tuesday morning. The nearly hour-long confrontation began after midnight. Hundreds of people had packed into the courthouse entrance, and some people near the front line tore off plywood attached to the building. Federal officers responded in force.
Their actions have drawn scrutiny from Oregon officials and support from President Donald Trump. The president again praised federal law enforcement Monday, saying they were doing a fantastic job in Portland. Trump said he planned to replicate the response in other major U.S. cities led by Democratic mayors.
Monday night’s demonstrations started around 9 p.m. Two groups, called the Wall of Moms and PDXDadPod, marched from the riverfront to Justice Center. The jail is at the heart of nightly protests. Two federal buildings sit on either side of it.
Even before the parents’ groups arrived, more than 300 people had gathered near the downtown jail. Young Black community leaders used a megaphone to ask, “Whose lives matter?” Hundreds of people responded, “Black lives matter!”
The crowd roared when the parents’ march of several hundreds of people arrived just before 9 p.m. and joined the chant. Most were women wearing yellow shirts. One person held a sign that said, “Hey feds, you need to think about your sad choices - Mom.”
The mothers’ group also attended Sunday night’s demonstration, linking arms and standing at the front of a crowd. Some on Twitter called for the dads group to bring leaf blowers Monday in order to blow away tear gas federal officers have used often on protesters.
By 9:15 p.m., more than 1,000 people had gathered in the area. The crowds filled Southwest Third Avenue and the nearby park in front of the jail. Almost everyone wore masks. Some people stood on the steps of the jail and delivered speeches to rally the crowd. When one person asked how many mothers were in the crowd, several hundred people rose their hands.
Police at first stayed away from the crowd, which appeared to have grown beyond 2,000 people by 9:45 p.m. One speaker encouraged people to vote and told them how to register, drawing a wave of cheers. Another person explained how to react to tear gas and other uses of force: “Stay together. Stay tight. We do this every night.”
As the speeches continued, one person walked amid the crowd with a child’s pool full of hundreds of pig squeak toys. An older man used a projector to display “Fed Goons out of PDX” on the Justice Center. Just after 10 p.m., hundreds of people waved the lights on their phones as people sang, “We Shall Overcome.”
Some people milled past the federal courthouse next to the Justice Center, but by 10:15 p.m., nearly everyone remained gathered in city streets, parks or property.
Many people in the crowd began to march west on Madison Street past City Hall around 10:20 p.m. A line of women from the Wall of Moms linked arms and walked at the front.
As people marched, they chanted the names of Black Portlanders killed during interactions with police or under suspicious circumstances, including Jason Washington, who was shot and killed by Portland State police in 2018.
Hundreds of people remained near the Justice Center or in adjacent city parks.
The march eventually wrapped to a George Floyd memorial in front of a boarded-up Apple store next to the Pioneer Place mall. After a moment of silence and a brief series of speeches, people started to make their way back to the Justice Center.
Marchers returned around 11:15 p.m. A crowd began to grow outside the federal courthouse. The group of parents marched around the Justice Center, then returned to stand in front of it on Third Avenue. More than 1,000 people remained downtown.
Around 11:35 p.m., federal officers set off smoke devices near the courthouse toward protesters who were knocking on the building. Within minutes, hundreds of people had collected in front of the courthouse. Several women with the Wall of Moms made their way toward the front, where federal officers have often emerged to deploy tear gas or shoot less-lethal munitions toward protesters.
Together, people chanted, “Feds go home!”
By midnight, the front line of crowd had pressed up directly against the building. Some people pushed a few pieces of dismantled fencing next to the courthouse. A handful of people used their fists or other objects to knock on the plywood that covers the building’s doors and windows. Hundreds of people surrounded them.
The tension remained high at 12:20 a.m. Some people started to tear off the plywood and other materials nailed to the front of the building.
At 12:25 a.m., police threw out devices that emitted smoke and an orange substance into the air. Many people in the crowd started to walk or run away. Within three minutes, federal officers emerged from the building to force people away. Officers wearing camouflage and dark uniforms largely cleared the crowd away from the building and continued to shoot impact munitions toward demonstrators.
Although the crowd had cleared away within five minutes, federal officers remained on the streets past 1 a.m.
Some federal officers pressed north on Third Avenue beyond the courthouse and past Salmon Street. Others advanced west on Main Street. Officers formed lines to prevent people from returning to the courthouse area. The agents continued to intermittently set off devices that emitted gas, sound and smoke to clear people out.
The confrontation continued for more than 45 minutes. Smaller crowds of people started to edge back to the courthouse from two directions, and federal officers used force or gas to keep people away.
Most federal officers eventually retreated around 1:15 a.m. Several people returned near the courthouse, and a few people threw water bottles at the building. Federal officers used peepholes cut into the plywood to shoot less-lethal munitions toward people gathered.
Hundreds of people remained in the neighborhood past 2:15 a.m. Most of those gathered with the parents groups had left.
After Oregonian/OregonLive journalists left the scene, live video footage showed federal officers emerged again from the courthouse around 2:30 a.m. and again used different types of weapons to break up the crowd. Before that, a small fire had started on a piece of plywood near the front of the building.
After the air cleared, hundreds of people were still downtown. At about 2:25 a.m., some people lit a fire on a piece of plywood near a courthouse door that was extinguished by federal officers. Federal officers again emerged to break up the people who remained.
Portland police said their officers responded to the courthouse around 3 a.m. “to provide security” for firefighters responded to burning material next to the building. Police said around that same time, they received calls that windows were damaged at two downtown buildings, a jewelry store and City Hall.
An earlier Black Lives Matter protest also took place Monday evening in Southeast Portland to honor Shai-India Harris, an 18-year-old who was shot and killed in the area July 10. Harris was shot and killed near Lents Park, where people gathered.
Brooke Herbert, Beth Nakamura and Tom Hallman Jr. of The Oregonian/OregonLive contributed to this report.
----- 11 -----
Trump administration weighs a show of force in more cities
DHS and DOJ officials are making plans to deploy units to protect federal facilities.
By BETSY WOODRUFF SWAN, NATASHA BERTRAND and DANIEL LIPPMAN
07/21/2020
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/07/21/trump-federal-force-cities-377273
Portland may just be the beginning.
Federal law enforcement agencies are gearing up to expand their footprint nationwide in the coming weeks, despite concerns about the recent scenes of violence and chaos in Oregon.
Department of Homeland Security officials have considered deploying mobile field forces to protect federal property in cities around the country that experience unrest, two people familiar with the discussions told POLITICO. And the Department of Justice is planning to expand “Operation Legend,” a law enforcement initiative launched by Attorney General Bill Barr earlier this month to fight “the sudden surge of violent crime” in Kansas City, Mo.
DOJ plans to announce this week that the operation, which involves agents from the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration, will expand into more cities, a DOJ official told POLITICO. “We are seeing success in our Kansas City operation and have already arrested some wanted fugitives,” the DOJ official said.
The discussions have followed weeks of clashes between federal agents and protesters in Portland, which Trump on Monday called “worse than Afghanistan.” The president has vowed to use the power of the federal government to crush what his officials deem “violent anarchists,” wielding his authority to bolster the law-and-order theme he’s woven increasingly into his campaign messages.
----- 12 -----
Weijia Jiang
twitter.com/weijia
22 July 2020
https://twitter.com/weijia/status/1286029926102118400
The President just announced he's sending "hundreds of skilled law enforcement officials" to the city of Chicago, despite the mayor's demand for federal agents to stay out:
[QUOTED TWEET]
Mayor Lori Lightfoot
twitter.com/chicagosmayor
21 July 2020
https://twitter.com/chicagosmayor/status/1285711845844815872
Under no circumstances will I allow Donald Trump’s troops to come to Chicago and terrorize our residents.
----- 13 -----
President Trump Announces Deployment Of Federal Agents In Chicago As Part Of ‘Operation Legend’
By CBS 2 Chicago Staff
July 22, 2020
https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2020/07/22/president-trump-announces-deployment-of-federal-agents-in-chicago-as-part-of-operation-legend/
WASHINGTON (CBS/AP) - President Donald Trump and other officials on Wednesday formally announced the deployment of “hundreds” of federal agents to fight crime in Chicago as part of Operation Legend.
U.S. Attorney John R. Lausch Jr. joined President Trump and Attorney General William Barr to announce the initiative.
Officials described Operation Legend as “a sustained, systematic and coordinated law enforcement initiative in which federal law enforcement agencies work in conjunction with state and local law enforcement officials to fight violent crime.”
Using the same alarmist language that he has employed in the past to describe illegal immigration, President Trump painted Democrat-led cities as out of control and lashed out at the “radical left,” even though criminal justice experts say the increase in violence in some cities defies easy explanation.
“In recent weeks there has been a radical movement to defend, dismantle and dissolve our police department,” Trump said at a White House event, blaming the movement for “a shocking explosion of shootings, killings, murders and heinous crimes of violence.”
“This bloodshed must end,” he said. “This bloodshed will end.”
The decision to dispatch federal agents to American cities is playing out at a hyperpoliticized moment when Trump is trying to show that he stands with law enforcement and depict Democrats as weak on crime. With less than four months to go before Election Day, Trump has been serving up dire warnings that the violence would worsen if his Democratic rival Joe Biden is elected in November, as he tries to win over voters who could be swayed by that message.
----- 14 -----
ALT-immigration
Passport control
twitter.com/ALT_uscis
22 July 2020
https://twitter.com/ALT_uscis/status/1286191699136585729
#BREAKING
The #TrumpsGestapo gassed Mayor twitter.com/tedwheeler. Where do we go from here?
#PortlandProtests
[QUOTED TWEET]
Mike Baker
twitter.com/ByMikeBaker
22 July 2020
https://twitter.com/ByMikeBaker/status/1286186731763412993
Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler says the tear gas stings. Says egregious overreaction from feds. Calls it urban warfare.
[EMBEDDED VIDEO AT SECOND LINK]
Also posted to ソ-ラ-バ-ド-のおん;
comments at Dreamwidth. Please comment there.