PACT, Trump’s Stormtroopers

On July 1, 2020, Trump created, via executive order, a new law enforcement task force- Protecting American Communities Task Force (PACT), ostensibly to protect “our nation’s historic monuments, memorials, statues, and federal facilities,” according to the EO. This force is under the control of DHS’s Chad Wolf.

This would appear to be a natural, Trumpian extension of the same type of arbitrary force used in DC to make way for Donny’s biblical photo op. However, where the action in DC had a semi-plausible legal argument for the entire undertaking, the justification for PACT’s action’s in Portland are not only murky at best, if a legal justification is ever settled upon in its support, it would open a new, and terrifying, declaration of concentrated, unyielding federal power where none existed before.

As it stands, that terrifying power is one that is unchallenged and unidentifiable. It’s able to act with impunity, seize citizens, and detain them without declaration of authority to do so, or even declaration of a charge itself. PACT is able to use force as they see fit, and if their actions thus far are an indicator- wherever they see fit, despite the pretense of protecting federal property. We could go and map out exactly how far away from a federal facility were the people they detained without charge so far, but it doesn’t matter. That they were not on federal property is already clear despite any proximity. We could view again a man being shot in the head outside of a federal property in Portland and know the use of force was not only incommensurate, it wasn’t necessary at all despite proximity to federal property.

I believe this new force’s ability to operate with impunity outside of federal property partially hinges on the self-declared power in Trump’s EO.

“As a result, DHS created the PACT, which will conduct ongoing assessments of potential civil unrest or destruction and allocate resources to protect people and property. This may involve potential surge activity to ensure the continuing protection of critical locations.“

This self-declared power to operate outside of federal property without any declared rules of engagement or specified level of force, is joined to a cobbled together, bundle of statues, state by state, which highlights where this new Federal force *is* acting within state guidelines, and where they are not.

Who is going to do anything about it? This would be the domain of Congress to write and pass laws, but we all know that isn’t going to happen, thanks to the GOP controlled Senate. States’ rights only matter to the GOP if it assures a right to discriminate. First amendment rights only matter if it’s in support of the ability to lie without consequences, support of election interference, or to level the playing field between facts and propaganda. So, the House can have some hearings and declare they have strong feeling about the injustice of it all.

Oregon’s Attorney General has filed the first lawsuit on the grounds of detention without probable cause. I’m sure there will be more suits to follow from Oregon. The ACLU has also filed its first suit in reaction to PACT’s actions in Portland. Again, expect many suits from the ACLU.

We should also expect similar Stormtrooper tactics from PACT to be taken immediately in other states without the existence of any federal court order to the contrary. They are not going to stop in Portland, according to Acting Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Ken Cuccinelli.

“Well, we are – we welcome – the more investigations, the better. With as much lawbreaking is going on, we’re seeking to prosecute as many people as are breaking the law as it relates to federal jurisdiction. That’s not always happening with respect to local jurisdiction and local offenses. But, you know, 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.”

Outside of what should be Congress’ legislative actions to reign in this administration’s brazen creation of a new federal police force and commandeering and reshaping of disparate federal entities to that end, is the long list of individual state laws any of their activities have/would run afoul of. Best explained here.

It is clear, states like NY, California, Illinois, and Michigan might want to look into legal clarification of the scope of autonomy any federal forces have in their states now. Pronto. State’s AGs need to act now. If there are class actions they can form to get temporary orders, DO IT NOW.

It is also clear, the Trump administration feels as if they are winning no matter what. If they succeed in terrorizing citizens into not exercising their rights…that’s a win. If the Trump administration, through its newly formed PACT Stormtroopers, can instigate violent conflict, that is also a win. Ultimately, this staged undertaking, like the event in DC, is photo-op, red meat for the moronic cult and propaganda material for the Trump campaign. Nothing else.

Trump Admin: We Hate Immigrants (unless they are white)

Every Trump twitterstorm and every new, ill-informed policy initiative from the Trump administration, appears to be a smokescreen to distract from whatever fucked-up thing this administration did on the preceding day. Everything is a shiny bauble created to keep us focused on the devious, magical hands of the carnival barker Trump. Everything.

This includes the sudden, overwhelming need for a border wall, whose construction is needed right now to halt the advancing horde of drug-dealing rapists at the border. If we stay focused on this, perhaps the Democrat controlled House will not be able to advance any meaningful legislation and everyone’s gonna go ahead and forget all about the Mueller investigation. Right? Right.

Let’s not fool ourselves into thinking this administration’s apparent hate of non-whites is a smokescreen. That shit is for real. It’s really happening.

If Donny had his way, every emigre to the US would be a Norwegian scientist (or a Swedish bikini model with an Einstein visa). Sadly, immigration from Europe has been on the decline since the fall of the Russian curtain. But Donny would be happy to know that at one time (1870-1910), Norway sent an astounding 1/4 of it’s working-age population to the US. Donny might not be happy to know they were among Norway’s poorest, least educated and didn’t speak a lick of English.

Currently, Norweigians are most likely to reply to Trump’s extended hand with a solid- thanks, but no thanks.

Donny and his crew would have us believe that they love all immigrants, so long as their immigration is obtained through proper procedure. All are welcome! It is also a desire of the Trump administration to offer further immigration possibilities via a “merit-based” program.

In truth, the Trump administration has done everything possible to obstruct non-whites from obtaining any form of access to the United States. The Muslim ban. Attempts to unravel family migration by limiting to the less family oriented (European) and excluding extended families (more likely African). The desire to end lottery visas, which are by definition diversity visas. The nonsense on the southern border. Even punishing well-educated Indians by making spouses of the super brainy H1-B visas unable to work themselves (despite their high education!) And the idea of merit-based visas are clearly Anglocentric visas by this administration’s guidelines.

Who are the largest portion of illegal immigrants in the US? Visa overstays. Who is the largest population of visa overstay? Canadians. Don’t see any sudden need from the Trump administration to fix that.

The administration’s desire is to forestall the coloring of America. To that end, they must draw down immigration of all forms as quickly and effectively as possible as the vast majority of people seeking entry into the US are non white.

For your reading pleasure, here is every activity I could recall that the Trump administration has enacted or proposed, to keep America white concerning immigration/visa issues. Some of these enactments are not specifically issues of color, but they all are intended to strike fear into the hearts of anyone seeking entry into the US. >

Ongoing. Rapidly chiseling down the amount of people allowed into the country via refugee status, to the smallest numbers possible. Currently, there is no refugee crisis in Europe.

Fiscal Year 2017 (Obama mandated numbers): 110,000 allotted, 53,701 accepted by Trump admin.
Fiscal Year 2018 (Trump numbers): 45,000 allotted, 22,491 accepted.
Fiscal Year 2019 guideline: 30,000 allotted. Now how many do you think are going to be accepted? Ya wanna guess around 20-15k? Me too. What do you think the 2020’s guideline is going to be?
The 2019 guideline is broken down by these regions: Africa 11,000; East Asia, 4000; Europe and Central Asia, 3000; Latin America and Caribbean 3,000; Near East and South Asia, 9,000.

This is supported by the Trump administration’s perpetual monkey-wrenching of the process of application for asylum via executive order, which, regardless of any future re-instatements, so disrupts the system that some parts are irrevocably broken. Outlined in my post on Trump’s executive orders.

Ongoing. The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) denied 37% more of all forms of immigration (travel documents, work permits, green cards, worker petitions, etc.) in 2018 to the previous year.

Enacted. The Muslim Travel Ban and all of it’s various incarnations.

Proposed by the Trump Administration: The “Public Charge” disqualifier- deny any path to citizenship for anyone whom has received benefits from any government assistance program including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, or food stamps); Medicaid, Section 8 (housing); Medicare Part D; Women, Infants, and Children (WIC); and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). This radical shift in policy could affect some 18 million non-citizens and 9 million children who are U.S. citizens.

Currently in court. H-4 visas disallow spouses of H1-B high tech visas from working. Overwhelmingly Indian women- majority professional degrees. No economic justification for this move. These types of arbitrary decisions are entirely created to punish immigrant families and could force high tech companies to move some operations overseas. Approximately 100,000 affected.

Enacted. Removal of Visas for same sex spouses of UN Diplomatic workers. On the grounds they are not legally married, when they cannot, in fact, get married in their country of origin because same sex marriages are not recognized. 105 families.

Enacted. Ending Temporary Protection Status granted primarily to 6 nations. These aren’t recognized refugees, they are people determined to be in danger if returned to their nation of origin. If you’ve ever worked in the restaurant industry, you are fully aware of who these people are as you’ve seen their work permits and had a goddamn heart attack once or twice a year waiting to see if their TPS is renewed. Hardest working people I know. 740,000 people estimated affected. Deportations underway. Current numbers-

Ongoing. Complete disruption of the asylum process from the Southern border. Whereas this administration states that they are full supporters of people legally entering the country, their actions with the asylum application process shows exactly the opposite desire in no uncertain terms. Bullet points on their efforts to dismantle the process for seeking asylum are so vast, that I need to make another page just to list them all.

This includes the administration’s efforts to forcibly backlog and clusterfuck legal ports of entry and attempt to declare any otherwise illegal entry as an immediate revocation of the ability to ever apply for asylum, thereby banning asylum claims entirely. Don’t fucking tell me that was not part and parcel of a manufactured crisis.

Proposed. Deportation of any Vietnamese non-citizen convicted of committing any crime. This of course was already a possibility but now it is to include those that came before 1995. Those Vietnamese were here before normalized relationships between US-Vietnam and would include those whom would be viewed as enemies of the state of Vietnam and treated as such despite a previous accord between the US and Vietnam that no such deportation would occur.

Ongoing. The administration’s threats or failed enactments whose goals are to instill fear, disrupt or break the processes of obtaining visas or various paths to citizenship, and terrorize individuals and communities:

Threat to alter the 14th amendment regarding birthright citizenship.
Allowing Military Accessions Vital to National Interest (MAVNI) fast track to citizenship to lapse creating uncertainty. 500 enlisted military removed form the US.
Creation of a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) task force to reexamine all previous greencard applications in search of any discrepancies with the intent of pursuing denaturalization for certain cases and stripping naturalized citizens of their status.
Repeated threats to end family-based migration (referred to as chain migration.)
repeated threats to end the visa lottery.
Executive Orders monkey-wrenching all processes and procedures regardless of which or how people are re-instated or when order is restored.
Fear and uncertainty in DACA status.
Child separation at the border for the sole purpose of absolutely terrifying would be asylum seekers.
Backing up, metering, and just generally clusterfucking legal ports of entry with the sole purpose of manufacturing a crisis with the hope that violence breaks out. I wrote about this here- https://100percenttrue.wordpress.com/2018/11/13/asylum-executive-order-a-prelude-to-violence/
Attempts to rig the 2020 census to both instill fear in all immigrants, legal or otherwise, and create ways in which to under-fund and under-represent states with more progressive immigration policies.
Multiple enactments by the DOJ to speed-up, set quotas for, limit continuances, and rapidly discharge immigration court judge’s dockets for hearing all applications at the expense of due process.
Use of ICE as stormtroopers to terrorize the immigrant populace (legal or otherwise) and their friends, communities, and those that house or employ them.
Stripping Hispanic Americans of their US passports that were born near the US-Mexico border- http://fortune.com/2018/08/30/trump-administration-passports-immigration/
Donny Trump’s continual demonization of immigrants as drug-dealing, rapist, gang members from his position as “president”.

Chief Justice Roberts Proclaims the Judiciary is Independent, and we are uneasy

It is not entirely unheard of for Supreme Court Justices to wade into politics, it is merely very rare. Chief Justice John Roberts had proclaimed in 2014, in a more generalized fashion, that political divide and partisanship is making it difficult for the legislative branch to effectively do its job. That’s a direct punch and also entirely accurate.

Also, we should be recall Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s judgement of Donald Trump when he was the nominee for the GOP in 2016:

“He is a faker,” she said of the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, going point by point, as if presenting a legal brief. “He has no consistency about him. He says whatever comes into his head at the moment. He really has an ego. … How has he gotten away with not turning over his tax returns? The press seems to be very gentle with him on that.”

Ouchie.

Yesterday Chief Justice Roberts released a statement via the Supreme Courts relations in regards to an inquiry by the Associated Press as to whether the court has an opinion of Donny’s assertion that the 9th Circuit was a liberal activist circuit in halting Donny’s idiot, Executive Order regarding Asylum.

I’m pointing out several things here. 1. This was not a spur-of-the-moment statement from Roberts that he just blurted out when someone shoved a microphone in his face. It was considered and allowed to be released. There was an inquiry from the AP that generated the response. 2. This is the entire statement. Most anywhere you see this quote broken into two parts, with the segue, “He went on to say…”, as if there must have been more to it. There wasn’t.

-Short and to the point without any further embellishment. We must realize, it surely was considered whether or not to even respond at all and then reasoned how little could be said and still make the courts beliefs known.

This is now an official statement from the Supreme Court to the Executive Branch. It wasn’t intended to be such, but it is. The necessity for this to be stated should make us uneasy. We absolutely do not want the Supreme Court wading into politics. We do not want this to be necessary. We certainly do not want to look to the Supreme Court for guidance of our legislative and executive branches via press statements.

Where our Supreme Court is supposed to offer guidance, is in its constitutionally focused decisions and its supporting opinions therein. Both the majority and minority opinions, where offered. That is where the court is free to wax poetic in support and defense of it’s wisdom in plurality and dissent.

Personally, I am happy Roberts issued such a statement. It kinda draws a line in the sand, doesn’t it? It was not intended to be a declaration of war but it is the opening salvo just the same, is it not? Trump has repeatedly demonized the courts for any decision that does not align with his stupidity. He is successfully diminishing the legislative branch, the judiciary and the fourth estate as “enemies of the people,” and the cult fucking loves it. They eat that shit up.

Do individuals within the Supreme Court have bias one way or the other in their political beliefs? Of course they do. Are they selected for their likelihood to lean towards more conservative or more liberal opinions? Of course they are. Our wish is their predilections are set aside in the name of what is reasonable, what is just, and what is necessary within the framework of the constitution and judicial provenance.

It is unfortunate that this official Supreme Court statement is necessary. It is necessary. Let us hope when normalcy returns, that each branch of the government can also find it’s way back to normalcy.

Asylum Executive Order, a Prelude to Violence

Perhaps you heard, during the initial “caravan” of marauders approaching the US border with evil intent, an unknown amount of the travelers were stopped at the points of entry and told there simply wasn’t any more space. I mean, border patrol dudes literally standing at the apex of a bridge between Mexico and the US, and saying, “Nah man. We’re all filled up. You can’t apply for asylum at this point of entry today.”

Initially the DHS denied any such “metering,” or slowing down and regulating the flow of people to the border existed. After strenuous argument by immigration attorneys and journalists, DHS and border Patrol admitted they were doing it. Do you think Kirstjen Neilson, or any border patrol agent in the field, wouldn’t be able to tell you what would happen next? Of course people tried to enter illegally after they were pushed away from what they were supposed to be doing all along. And at the time, that was exactly what the Trump administration wanted. They wanted to make these people potentially guilty of a chargeable offense. Honestly, that was in many circumstances totally okie-dokie with asylum seekers, because that offense did not preclude one from applying for asylum…

Until Donny wrote his proclamation that illegally entering the US made it impossible to apply for asylum.

So, when I read this passage in Donny’s new executive order, I scratch my head and wonder why now all of a sudden, the DHS and Border Patrol is going to take the exact opposite approach, when surely they would love to be able to charge everyone with illegally entering the US:

“I am tailoring the suspension to channel these aliens to ports of entry, so that, if they enter the United States, they do so in an orderly and controlled manner instead of unlawfully. Under this suspension, aliens entering through the southern border, even those without proper documentation, may, consistent with this proclamation, avail themselves of our asylum system, provided that they properly present themselves for inspection at a port of entry. In anticipation of a large group of aliens arriving in the coming weeks…”

“In anticipation of”…so that’s the new super scary caravan Donny is talking about. “Channel these aliens…” Do you think there’s friendly Mexican forest gnomes scattered hither and yon throughout Mexico, dancing around in conical caps, and joyfully pointing weary travelers in the correct direction with a merry twinkle in their eye?

Fuck no.

What there will be is Border Patrol agents on the US side, no longer taking people into custody and hearing out their asylum claims, they’ll be pushing people back into the water and saying, “Nah man, you gotta go around. Go down the river about 100 miles and apply at a point of entry.”

What this administration would like is the largest amount of asylum seekers possible, backed up on a bridge being harassed from both the Mexican and US border patrols. Penned in like criminals and exposed to the elements. Neither here nor there, just stuck in limbo waiting.

Like these people on the bridge at Paso Del Norte. They’re just stuck in front of an invisible line five feet away, where they cannot apply for asylum, because, “We’re all filled up.” Now put several thousand people in this position on key points of entry. Each day, the Mexican side can come up and kick these people off the bridge for loitering, and they do. Now get back in the imaginary line.

What do you think is going to happen under these circumstances? Do you think these people aren’t going to realize that they are being fucked with?

Multiply these pictures by 1000. What do you think is going to happen?

As I said in my original post without completely explaining how I came to this conclusion- the important part of Donny’s Executive Order isn’t that it could withstand legal challenge (because it won’t), it only needs to stand long enough for someone to get shot. The important part is to prove these are all violent criminals.

By forcibly amassing large groups of asylum seekers and thousands of law enforcement on both sides of the border, into a weeks long standoff in very tight quarters, this is a carefully orchestrated crisis in the making.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/02/us/officials-dismiss-shooting-rock-throwing-migrants-trump-invs/index.html

Update 11/22. The Order has already been halted by a federal judge, however, the stage is being set nonetheless.

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2018/11/21/white-house-approves-use-of-force-some-law-enforcement-roles-for-border-troops/

April 18, 2018

Meanwhile…

Trump sends off another ideological, low fact, executive order. “The Executive Order Reducing Poverty in America by Promoting Opportunity and Economic Mobility.” Another in a long series of orders, directing other people and their agencies to figure out exactly what the hell it is that Donny wants. Let’s be clear from the start, this order is not about reducing poverty through intelligent use of our welfare systems, it’s about reducing Fed payouts. there are a few suggestions in this document on how to handle citizens in need of support, like: “get married” and “empower churches to take care of poor people,” but mostly the thrust of this document is we should reduce and privatize where we can and simultaneously remove our government from these types of social activities where ever possible.

Paul Ryan is set to leave as the Speaker of the House but has made it clear he wants to try and take a couple more stabs at “Entitlements” before he leaves. I mean come on, there’s no sense in handing out piles of cash to the already crazy rich and destroying any sense of fiscal responsibility in the latest budget, if he’s not also gonna try to take more from the poor and the elderly and destroy healthcare too. Where some people benefit, surely there must be some people handy to pay. Someone has to suffer, right?

Never mind that those “entitlements” are ours. We paid for them, we continue to pay for them. That 2.9 trillion dollar surplus sitting in Social Security is our money. Ours. That shouldn’t stop a balanced budget agreement from passing…but it did, because there are still enough people in Congress that are neither deranged ideologues nor incapable of understanding how a budget works.

“In order to balance the budget every year, Congress would be forced to make draconian cuts to Medicare Part B, Medicaid and other programs that seniors depend upon. Medicare and Medicaid cannot sustain cuts (other than common sense cost-saving measures) without hurting beneficiaries. Period. At a time when seniors’ out of pocket health care costs are rising, the BBA puts the health and financial security of Medicare’s 58.5 million beneficiaries and Medicaid’s 72.3 million at risk.

Equally serious is the BBA’s potential impact on Social Security. Under the BBA, if federal expenditures exceed revenues, the government would be forbidden from paying benefits from the Social Security trust fund reserves – even though the trust fund is self-financed by workers’ payroll contributions and unrelated to general revenues. Ditto for reserves in the Medicare Part A trust fund. Benefits would then have to be slashed in order to keep the federal budget in balance, something seniors on fixed incomes could ill afford.”

Meanwhile…

If the people like the Koch Brother have their way, we’ll just have ourselves a little Constitutional Convention, ostensibly to write a balanced budget framework into the constitution. But, we know how Constitutional Conventions work because we had one, once before. In 1787 when our delegates met to “fix up” the Articles of Confederation. When that was over, they rewrote the rules of the Constitutional Convention, threw away the Articles of Confederation, and gave us something truly spectacular instead. The US Constitution.

Those were some hardcore dudes. Using every ounce of their formidable intellect to come up with the most important document in, well..probably the history of forever. There was a lot of argument and consideration between the federalists and anti-federalists and they came up with some ideal compromises. We have to think, when the compromises for slavery were considered, they had to know, in the back of their minds…we might be compromising here, but maybe we’re dead wrong altogether. This might not go well.

The delegates that penned the Constitution, were dudes like this:

Our current delegates, look like this:

There’s nothing to stop a run-away convention once it has started. You want to trust these clowns to have a stab at our Constitution and fix ‘er up real good?

There are currently 28 States who have sided for a Constitutional Convention. Only six more total are needed. There are four States set to vote on the issue now. If it happens, there is no going back. Maybe we could have some cool anti-immigration amendments or a removal of the separation of church and state or an amendment to make abortion illegal. Anything could happen.

https://newrepublic.com/minutes/127299/texas-governor-greg-abbott-wants-constitutional-convention-give-states-power-nullify-supreme-court

Anything.