(Dobbs) Minneapolis Mayor to ICE: “Get the fuck out of Minneapolis.”If Trump and his toadies want to see real terrorists, all they have to do is look in the mirror.
I can barely keep up. Sometimes, I can’t keep up at all. The unceasing stream of perversity, confrontational perversity coming out of the Trump White House has become almost impossible to catalog. Because of it, the shooting death of a woman in her car by an officer of ICE yesterday in Minneapolis probably was bound to happen. I look back at what I have written this week alone, so far. The vindictive assault on the reputation and rank of Senator Mark Kelly, a patriotic American hero, who publicly and properly quoted the Uniform Code of Military Justice and advised our men and women in uniform, “No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution.” The assault on Venezuela and the arrest of its president, who might be knee deep in drugs but the whole operation was carried out without the required consultation with Congress, and arguably was illegal under international law, and it was staged under false pretenses to the American people, since the real target was oil. And the menacing warnings of a military assault on Greenland, which never hurt anybody, but which could be existential to the whole NATO alliance. As a managing director of the Eurasia Group characterized the threat, “It could be far greater than Russia invading Ukraine because Russia is an adversary. Now, it’s the guarantor of European security undermining European security.” And yet yesterday, while all of those stories still are active volcanoes, some dreadful new stories came along to fan new flames in our nation transformed by Donald Trump. One was about a rally on Tuesday, then a march to the U.S. Capitol. It was January 6th, the fifth anniversary of Donald Trump’s insurrection. I still can’t believe that Americans like these in this Associated Press photo would be gullible enough to buy into the Trump narrative of what happened that day, rather than the true narrative. As if what happened there was something to be proud of, as if it was something quintessentially American. It wasn’t. It was totally un-American, and Trump was the ringleader. But compared to the latest out of the White House, their rally was child’s play. Trump’s people debuted a new website that brazenly rewrites history. It begins with a proud reminder of President Trump’s deplorable pardons of virtually all the insurrectionists in the aftermath of January 6th. It calls them “unfairly targeted overcharged, and used as political examples,” simply for “exercising their First Amendment rights.” It blames the police officers who tried to defend the Capitol and themselves on January 6th for having “turned a peaceful demonstration into chaos.” With all the television footage and still photos documenting the violent acts of the rioters, it’s as if they’re asking us, “Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?” In one section, it displays photos of nine rioters it says died during or because of the riot, but never even a mention, let alone a photo, of the five officers who were dead within days, or the more than 140 who were assaulted and injured with everything from stun guns to bear spray to hockey sticks to a flagpole and, for one officer, with his own baton. The website twists the truth so tight, it states, “Zero law enforcement officers lost their lives.” By the way, it took about a day for Donald Trump’s name to be plastered on the face of the Kennedy Center. But a plaque honoring police officers who defended democracy that day five years ago, authorized by Congress to be displayed in the Capitol, hasn’t yet been hung and can’t even be found. The website lays out a timeline of the day and makes these other assertions: • “President Trump invites patriotic Americans to Washington, DC on January 6 for a peaceful and historic protest against certifying the stolen 2020 election.” • “Following the President’s speech, the massive crowd peacefully marches down Constitution Avenue to the Capitol to protest the certification of the fraudulent election. The march is orderly and spirited, with flags, signs, and chants supporting President Trump.” • “Capitol Police aggressively fire tear gas, flash bangs, and rubber munitions into crowds of peaceful protesters, injuring many and deliberately escalating tensions.” • “As events unfold, President Trump repeatedly calls for peace, tweeting support for law enforcement and releasing a video telling supporters ‘go home in peace.’” • “2020 is considered the greatest election theft in U.S. history, with widespread fraud deliberately ignored by courts, officials and the media.” • “Hundreds were held as political prisoners for years in harsh conditions, denied speedy trials, and given lengthy sentences in what is considered an unprecedented and diabolical weaponization of federal law enforcement against Trump supporters.” Maryland congressman Jamie Raskin, who led the prosecution in Trump’s second impeachment trial, called the whole thing an “Orwellian project of forgetting.” But all of this— the rally, the website, the unabridged whitewash of one of modern America’s most horrible days— got lost in the headlines from overseas. And so did this, even though it’s the most important headline of the day for poor families in five states: “Trump administration freezes child care funds for 5 Democratic-led states.” As The Washington Post reported it, “The Trump administration is freezing billions of dollars in child care grants and family assistance in five Democratic-led states, in a move expected to affect hundreds of thousands of low-income households, citing what it says are concerns around potential fraud.” Note the political part: five Democrat-led states. As if in states led by Republicans, there is no fraud. These are five states that voted against Trump in the last election, five states led by Democratic governors who have defied Trump. Just last week, consistent with the decorum we expect from him, Trump called one of them, Colorado’s Jared Polis, a “scumbag” and wrote on his website, may he “rot in hell.” Now Trump is striking the match. The Department of Health and Human Services announced the $10 billion freeze with a statement that reeked of double-talk: “Families who rely on child care and family assistance programs deserve confidence that these resources are used lawfully and for their intended purpose.” So instead, it is giving them zip. Without child care, poor parents can’t go to work and without going to work, they can’t feed and house their families. Silly them for their poor judgment to live in Democrat-led states. But the department shows no pity, calling it “our commitment to program integrity, fiscal responsibility and compliance with federal requirements.” Then finally, that shooting death yesterday in Minneapolis. This is how the Department of Homeland Security described it. Having sent some 2,000 federal agents into the city to execute the “largest immigration operation ever,” DHS claimed that during “targeted operations,” one of the “violent rioters weaponized her vehicle, attempting to run over our law enforcement officers in an attempt to kill them.” It absolved the agent who killed the driver, saying, “An ICE officer, fearing for his life, the lives of his fellow law enforcement and the safety of the public, fired defensive shots.” He shot her, right through the windshield. But Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey saw bystander video of the incident and the mayor could not have been more angry or more blunt: “They are already trying to spin this as an action of self defense. Having seen the video myself, I wanna tell everybody directly, that is bullshit.” It is. Watch the video yourself by clicking on this link. When ICE agents approach the woman’s car, she drives away. It looks like no one was directly in front of her— if anyone had been, they’d have been run over instead of shooting into the car. It looks like no one faced mortal danger. Not the agent at her side window, not the one who fired from the front. The driver didn’t “weaponize” the car, the officer did not need to fire “defensive shots.” But Renee Nicole Good, 37 years old, the mother of a six-year-old, and an American citizen, not a migrant, is dead. Leave a comment Maybe this is what comes when ICE recruits agents who “show an interest in guns and tactical gear,” who “listen to patriotic podcasts,” even who “have attended UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) fights,” imploring them on social media to do their “sacred duty” and “defend the homeland.” Yesterday they defended it against one woman in an SUV. After calling out ICE’s knowingly shameful lie, the mayor didn’t stop there. His message to ICE? “Get the fuck out of Minneapolis.” Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem called what led to the killing “an act of domestic terrorism.” She doesn’t even know what the word means. Different federal agencies have slightly different definitions, but they all say essentially the same thing: terrorism is violence against non-combatants— translation: civilians— for social or political gain. ISIS does terrorism. Al Qaeda does terrorism. Boko Haram does terrorism. It’s unlikely that the woman who died yesterday in her car in Minneapolis did terrorism. But Trump and his cronies like Noem throw the word around like confetti. Even though, if they want to see real terrorists, all they have to do is look in the mirror. Share Upgrade to paid Over more than five decades Greg Dobbs has been a correspondent for two television networks including ABC News, a political columnist for The Denver Post and syndicated columnist for Scripps newspapers, a moderator on Rocky Mountain PBS, and author of two books, including one about the life of a foreign correspondent called “Life in the Wrong Lane.” He also co-authored a book about the seminal year for baby boomers, called “1969: Are You Still Listening?” He has covered presidencies, politics, and the U.S. space program at home, and wars, natural disasters, and other crises around the globe, from Afghanistan to South Africa, from Iran to Egypt, from the Soviet Union to Saudi Arabia, from Nicaragua to Namibia, from Vietnam to Venezuela, from Libya to Liberia, from Panama to Poland. Dobbs has won three Emmys, the Distinguished Service Award from the Society of Professional Journalists, and as a 39-year resident of Colorado, a place in the Denver Press Club Hall of Fame. He also has been a consultant for the Counterterrorism Education Learning Lab. You can learn more at GregDobbs.net |