The specter of the Burr Conspiracy, the crackdown of the Bonus Expeditionary Army protest, the escalating crisis in Los Angeles, the looming Flag Day parade—and what we can do to safeguard democracy
It’s TUESDAY🎉Phew, this column is one for the ages👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻Finnegan is absolutely right; the LAPD needs to protect the PROTESTERS. And we all need to show up not only on Saturday at a No Kings rally (check Mobilize.us to find one) but wherever and whenever we see our rights being trampled. Let’s do this.
Thank you Greg for this historical explanation. It provides the context for us to see and understand what is happening in LA. Your writing, as usual, is clear and concise. It appears the angelinos understand the task but I worry that the Trump regime will pay some suckers to cause problems and then use that as an excuse to turn on the peaceful protesters.
So easy to do, and no way to counter. Repubs smell the blood of a violent victory, and as Kevin Robert’s said, less violence if the left allows the inevitable revolution.
Thanks, Judy. It's such a nothingburger, the actual size of the protests. Sending the Marines and the National Guard in for THIS is an abuse of power and a craven attempt to spin the narrative. They want so badly for our cities to be crime-infested riot centers, and it just ain't happening.
The little whiny ass TEMPORARY occupant of the whitehouse aka Cheeto Chump wants to replace President Biden’s Build Back Better with his deplorable tiny ugly Big Beautiful Bill. He’s no clever genius…instead the opposite, a stain on America…a king only when he sits on his faux gold toilet.
All he's doing now is sitting...I saw a photo from the UFC event that suggests he's wearing a catheter. Neither Musk not Trump can control their bladders, which seems symbolic somehow.
Truly symbolic. The pasty pissy pussy and crumbling cheeto appear to have lack of bladder control, among other issues. Not images of physical or mental health. Same for the aberration to the Kennedy family, sec’y shitfaced drunk, sec’y puppy killer and the ghoul himself aka cryptkiller.
Tremendous article thank you Greg. Historian Timothy Snyder has been warning about this for some time. Everyone needs to keep the 20 Rules of On Tyranny in mind. I am sharing your article around.
On a very personal note, i feel oddly relieved by what is happening. The public is informed and we are ready for this fight. This is organic. I believe trump will lose this war.
I liked Lawrence O’Donnell’s characterization of the cameras on LA as a squirrel to keep our eyes off everything from Trump’s stumbling up the steps to the dismantling of USAID. But obviously we’re in scary
times. We’re sitting on a powder keg because Trump’s determined to create enough chaos to justify imposing martial law.
He's right but also, I mean, sending the military in is as fascist as it's gotten so far. We can't not keep our attention there or ignore it. If we don't get martial law after Saturday I'll be pleasantly surprised.
It is concerning that the media has the public focused on potential potholes, exorbitant costs, and the size of the birthday boy's ego. I am concerned that they are missing the forest for the trees. I don't believe anyone has asked when the tanks that arrived by train are scheduled to be shipped back to Texas -- amiright?
Yikes. Yes, you are very right. Although, I mean, there's ample parking in DC for tanks, it shouldn't be a problem...
I wonder what his endgame is here. Thanks on the East Coast, check. What's he gonna do, send them through the Holland Tunnel?
(PS I am still good at parallel parking after having been forced to learn to do it when living in DC, because if I waited for a big enough spot, I'd STILL we driving around the block...)
"Ample parking" -- LOL! I really needed that laugh -- thank you! And thank you for recommending WHY NOW NEWS -- ya made my day! Hope you enjoyed the video....
Heather Cox Richardson is applauding this outstanding article. Well done.
Everything about our magnificent Constitution is more a gentleman's agreement than a rock solid governing document, Democracy demands flexibility. Sadly it takes shit for brains Stephen Miller behind the woefully inept orange imbecile to misinterpret its well meaning purpose and use it as a weapon to attack the very people it is meant to protect.
Fare thee well citizens, fight for our freedom from tyranny.
Not sure why we don't put the spotlight on that hideous Nazi and make his life a living hell. He's the sort of charisma vacuum that even MAGA doesn't take to.
Brilliant column, Greg! Right now, Los Angeles is showing everyone what democracy AND resistance looks like. Trump's Gestapo, aka ICE, has been doing these "raids" all over the country. Chicago police got some really bad press this week for even APPEARING to be assisting ICE a week ago. Immigrants got notices to appear for a "routine" immigrant check-in, and were then arrested and taken away by ICE. There was no check-in; ICE used Nazi tactics to fool the people following the law and showing up so they could make more Stephen Miller arrests.
This is an amazing and unprecedented time in history. We're at a point when any thinking person simply can't believe anything or anyone in the entire US government, about ANYTHING. Congress is filled with cowardly Republicans and feckless Democrats. The White House is occupied by an actual criminal. The Supreme Court has at least six idealogues that, even given the chance, will almost always vote against the People's interests. I don't know about the military, but I have always heard that they would NOT follow an illegal order and based on this outstanding column and the various Acts and laws we have in place, Marines going into Los Angeles would qualify as an illegal order. And Trump will get his military parade on Pennsylvania Avenue, just like the dictators around the world he so admires. And we continue to RESIST this fucking orange tyrant, and his fucking mindless followers because we have to, or we lose everything. AMAZING time in history!
Thanks, Steve. It is heartening to see people fighting back against the ICE Gestapo. Miller needs to be called out every time he goes out in public. Based on the reception Trump got at Fort Bragg, I'm not so sure about the grunts, but we'll see...certainly the officers know what they can and cannot do. Sending the Marines to LA to basically ogle women and sleep on the ground seems like not the best use of taxpayer money, other than this ridicullous parade, which I still can't believe is going to actually happen. What a sad joke.
BRAVO, Greg! Thanks for the history about the Insurrection Act. Alas, another white man’s wet dream…
MY family is worried about my participation on NO KINGS DAY this Saturday. But what’s the daughter of Holocaust victims supposed to do? Sit on my derrière and do nothing? Not a frigging chance! I have been telling people via email, Substack, and bluesky about this event, ad nauseam. It can’t stop there because we have to continue this fight against this Nazi regime. I want to remind everyone that they should not use “administration” regarding Trump. Please replace it with regime because that’s exactly what it is. WE THE PEOPLE are in control. Make certain your congressional reps know that!
There are protests on Saturday everywhere, even in small cities and towns. Folks don't have to go to NYC or bigger places to participate, I was pleased to see.
Finnegan's idea is tremendous. Because the protests are not really about ICE agents doing their lawful duty. It is about ICE agents acting UNLAWFULLY--not following the rules, not identifying themselves, not producing warrants, and just grabbing people off the street with some as before being hopscotched around the country to avoid due process. That seems to be the place where using that paragraph of the Insurrection Act falls down.
The warrant issue has flummoxed me. It is true that like any law enforcement personnel they can on occasion make warrantless arrests, but they still need probable cause--the arrestee committing a crime, say. Or even fleeing if he admits to not having documents (which he doesn't have to do, btw). But standing around a Home Depot parking lot is not a crime. Do we REALLLY believe that they knew just who would show up that day so they could nab them even with administrative warrants. Or is a warrant naming "any brown skinned person in the parking lot you think might be shifty" OK? And when they went into the garment factory, did they have JUDICIAL warrants, and for specific people? Or did they just grab anyone in sight.
If those taken show that they do have permission to be here--say awaiting an asylum hearing, are they letting him go?
What the National Guard (and LAPD) need to be doing is observing the arrests, checking for warrants, checking for ID. Making sure the rules are followed. (BTW, apparently of the 4000 national guard, per Newsom only 300 are active, and LAPD has had to spend resources protecting THEM. Though I'm not sure from what.
BTW The Insurrection Act also contains this little section:
"Whenever the President considers it necessary to use the militia or the armed forces under this chapter, he shall, by proclamation, immediately order the insurgents to disperse and retire peaceably to their abodes within a limited time. Pretty sure 10 minutes won't cut it for limited time, given the prior uses. Gavin, with his admonitions about staying peaceful, has to let the people of CA KNOW the consequences of not dispersing. And if any ICE or National Guard or other should PREVENT such dispersing (those "perimeters" they are setting up) I'd argue use of the act is voided.
The ICE Gestapo are just that, a Gestapo. Trump wants people to believe that Obama and Biden just sat around, opened the borders, and let the murderers and rapists have their way, but the truth is, undocumented criminals have always been arrested and deported. This bizarre crackdown now is stupid on so many levels: it's illegal, for reasons you state; it destroys any truth in the USG; it makes it so anyone here legally or not would be crazy to even attempt to play ball; and if it really does round up, deport, and scare off everyone, it will be disastrous for the economy, in CA and therefore the rest of the country. That's the plan, of course, Kremlin approved. It's all so crazy. I still can't believe we're in this timeline.
Yeah. I have a SF book/movie thought where Biden decides Bibi HAS crossed a red line, stops arming Israel, Kamala supports this, Kamala WINS, and the world is a different place. (That's way too simplistic as blame, of course. It's an exercise in cause in fact, not proximate cause. I guess one way to describe "cause in fact" is "necessary but not sufficient.--one of many causes funneling into an event)
Follow the connection between ICE raids, Medicaid cuts in the Republican budget and the upcoming protests on June 14th on NO KINGS DAY with this map.
Track ICE raids. Save your Medicaid. Join NO KINGS DAY protests: Mapping the resistance
https://thedemlabs.org/2025/06/09/ice-raids-medicaid-cuts-join-no-kings-day-protests-resistance-map/
Thanks, Deepak. Great work!
It’s TUESDAY🎉Phew, this column is one for the ages👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻Finnegan is absolutely right; the LAPD needs to protect the PROTESTERS. And we all need to show up not only on Saturday at a No Kings rally (check Mobilize.us to find one) but wherever and whenever we see our rights being trampled. Let’s do this.
The rallies are everywhere, even in smaller cities and towns.
INDEED! He’s quite the unifier😉
Thank you Greg for this historical explanation. It provides the context for us to see and understand what is happening in LA. Your writing, as usual, is clear and concise. It appears the angelinos understand the task but I worry that the Trump regime will pay some suckers to cause problems and then use that as an excuse to turn on the peaceful protesters.
So easy to do, and no way to counter. Repubs smell the blood of a violent victory, and as Kevin Robert’s said, less violence if the left allows the inevitable revolution.
I haven't heard as much from that schmuck lately, I wonder if he's enjoying the death of democracy.
You can be sure he is conjuring evil with every breath
Thanks, Judy. It's such a nothingburger, the actual size of the protests. Sending the Marines and the National Guard in for THIS is an abuse of power and a craven attempt to spin the narrative. They want so badly for our cities to be crime-infested riot centers, and it just ain't happening.
The little whiny ass TEMPORARY occupant of the whitehouse aka Cheeto Chump wants to replace President Biden’s Build Back Better with his deplorable tiny ugly Big Beautiful Bill. He’s no clever genius…instead the opposite, a stain on America…a king only when he sits on his faux gold toilet.
All he's doing now is sitting...I saw a photo from the UFC event that suggests he's wearing a catheter. Neither Musk not Trump can control their bladders, which seems symbolic somehow.
Truly symbolic. The pasty pissy pussy and crumbling cheeto appear to have lack of bladder control, among other issues. Not images of physical or mental health. Same for the aberration to the Kennedy family, sec’y shitfaced drunk, sec’y puppy killer and the ghoul himself aka cryptkiller.
Tremendous article thank you Greg. Historian Timothy Snyder has been warning about this for some time. Everyone needs to keep the 20 Rules of On Tyranny in mind. I am sharing your article around.
Thanks, Sara!
On a very personal note, i feel oddly relieved by what is happening. The public is informed and we are ready for this fight. This is organic. I believe trump will lose this war.
I wish he and repubs considered that a possibility.
Thanks for saying this, Suzanne. It's true, people ARE out there fighting back -- even if the media and the politicians are not.
Excellent essay Greg. Thank you as always.
Thanks, John!
Spreading the word. Newsom is on all kinds of social media.
Moment of truth for Governor Haircut. He's gotta win this.
Very good and timely. Thanks. Solidarity grows.
Thanks, Randall. Solidarity!
I liked Lawrence O’Donnell’s characterization of the cameras on LA as a squirrel to keep our eyes off everything from Trump’s stumbling up the steps to the dismantling of USAID. But obviously we’re in scary
times. We’re sitting on a powder keg because Trump’s determined to create enough chaos to justify imposing martial law.
He's right but also, I mean, sending the military in is as fascist as it's gotten so far. We can't not keep our attention there or ignore it. If we don't get martial law after Saturday I'll be pleasantly surprised.
It is concerning that the media has the public focused on potential potholes, exorbitant costs, and the size of the birthday boy's ego. I am concerned that they are missing the forest for the trees. I don't believe anyone has asked when the tanks that arrived by train are scheduled to be shipped back to Texas -- amiright?
Yikes. Yes, you are very right. Although, I mean, there's ample parking in DC for tanks, it shouldn't be a problem...
I wonder what his endgame is here. Thanks on the East Coast, check. What's he gonna do, send them through the Holland Tunnel?
(PS I am still good at parallel parking after having been forced to learn to do it when living in DC, because if I waited for a big enough spot, I'd STILL we driving around the block...)
"Ample parking" -- LOL! I really needed that laugh -- thank you! And thank you for recommending WHY NOW NEWS -- ya made my day! Hope you enjoyed the video....
Heather Cox Richardson is applauding this outstanding article. Well done.
Everything about our magnificent Constitution is more a gentleman's agreement than a rock solid governing document, Democracy demands flexibility. Sadly it takes shit for brains Stephen Miller behind the woefully inept orange imbecile to misinterpret its well meaning purpose and use it as a weapon to attack the very people it is meant to protect.
Fare thee well citizens, fight for our freedom from tyranny.
Thanks, Old Man.
Not sure why we don't put the spotlight on that hideous Nazi and make his life a living hell. He's the sort of charisma vacuum that even MAGA doesn't take to.
Brilliant column, Greg! Right now, Los Angeles is showing everyone what democracy AND resistance looks like. Trump's Gestapo, aka ICE, has been doing these "raids" all over the country. Chicago police got some really bad press this week for even APPEARING to be assisting ICE a week ago. Immigrants got notices to appear for a "routine" immigrant check-in, and were then arrested and taken away by ICE. There was no check-in; ICE used Nazi tactics to fool the people following the law and showing up so they could make more Stephen Miller arrests.
This is an amazing and unprecedented time in history. We're at a point when any thinking person simply can't believe anything or anyone in the entire US government, about ANYTHING. Congress is filled with cowardly Republicans and feckless Democrats. The White House is occupied by an actual criminal. The Supreme Court has at least six idealogues that, even given the chance, will almost always vote against the People's interests. I don't know about the military, but I have always heard that they would NOT follow an illegal order and based on this outstanding column and the various Acts and laws we have in place, Marines going into Los Angeles would qualify as an illegal order. And Trump will get his military parade on Pennsylvania Avenue, just like the dictators around the world he so admires. And we continue to RESIST this fucking orange tyrant, and his fucking mindless followers because we have to, or we lose everything. AMAZING time in history!
Thanks, Steve. It is heartening to see people fighting back against the ICE Gestapo. Miller needs to be called out every time he goes out in public. Based on the reception Trump got at Fort Bragg, I'm not so sure about the grunts, but we'll see...certainly the officers know what they can and cannot do. Sending the Marines to LA to basically ogle women and sleep on the ground seems like not the best use of taxpayer money, other than this ridicullous parade, which I still can't believe is going to actually happen. What a sad joke.
Can you get this column to Gavin Newsom, Greg, or just the part about the Shield Doctrine? Or to the mayor of LA?
Or if any of your readers knows someone who knows someone who... could send the Shield part of the column so that hopefully it reaches Newsom?
The Shield Doctrine makes so much sense. This would be real resistance.
Thanks, Lincoln. My guess is, the original column already made its way there.
BRAVO, Greg! Thanks for the history about the Insurrection Act. Alas, another white man’s wet dream…
MY family is worried about my participation on NO KINGS DAY this Saturday. But what’s the daughter of Holocaust victims supposed to do? Sit on my derrière and do nothing? Not a frigging chance! I have been telling people via email, Substack, and bluesky about this event, ad nauseam. It can’t stop there because we have to continue this fight against this Nazi regime. I want to remind everyone that they should not use “administration” regarding Trump. Please replace it with regime because that’s exactly what it is. WE THE PEOPLE are in control. Make certain your congressional reps know that!
Thanks, Marlene.
There are protests on Saturday everywhere, even in small cities and towns. Folks don't have to go to NYC or bigger places to participate, I was pleased to see.
To borrow the sitting prez’s famous phrase “It’s going to be wild!”
Had no idea about the Burr Connection.
Finnegan's idea is tremendous. Because the protests are not really about ICE agents doing their lawful duty. It is about ICE agents acting UNLAWFULLY--not following the rules, not identifying themselves, not producing warrants, and just grabbing people off the street with some as before being hopscotched around the country to avoid due process. That seems to be the place where using that paragraph of the Insurrection Act falls down.
The warrant issue has flummoxed me. It is true that like any law enforcement personnel they can on occasion make warrantless arrests, but they still need probable cause--the arrestee committing a crime, say. Or even fleeing if he admits to not having documents (which he doesn't have to do, btw). But standing around a Home Depot parking lot is not a crime. Do we REALLLY believe that they knew just who would show up that day so they could nab them even with administrative warrants. Or is a warrant naming "any brown skinned person in the parking lot you think might be shifty" OK? And when they went into the garment factory, did they have JUDICIAL warrants, and for specific people? Or did they just grab anyone in sight.
If those taken show that they do have permission to be here--say awaiting an asylum hearing, are they letting him go?
What the National Guard (and LAPD) need to be doing is observing the arrests, checking for warrants, checking for ID. Making sure the rules are followed. (BTW, apparently of the 4000 national guard, per Newsom only 300 are active, and LAPD has had to spend resources protecting THEM. Though I'm not sure from what.
BTW The Insurrection Act also contains this little section:
"Whenever the President considers it necessary to use the militia or the armed forces under this chapter, he shall, by proclamation, immediately order the insurgents to disperse and retire peaceably to their abodes within a limited time. Pretty sure 10 minutes won't cut it for limited time, given the prior uses. Gavin, with his admonitions about staying peaceful, has to let the people of CA KNOW the consequences of not dispersing. And if any ICE or National Guard or other should PREVENT such dispersing (those "perimeters" they are setting up) I'd argue use of the act is voided.
The ICE Gestapo are just that, a Gestapo. Trump wants people to believe that Obama and Biden just sat around, opened the borders, and let the murderers and rapists have their way, but the truth is, undocumented criminals have always been arrested and deported. This bizarre crackdown now is stupid on so many levels: it's illegal, for reasons you state; it destroys any truth in the USG; it makes it so anyone here legally or not would be crazy to even attempt to play ball; and if it really does round up, deport, and scare off everyone, it will be disastrous for the economy, in CA and therefore the rest of the country. That's the plan, of course, Kremlin approved. It's all so crazy. I still can't believe we're in this timeline.
Yeah. I have a SF book/movie thought where Biden decides Bibi HAS crossed a red line, stops arming Israel, Kamala supports this, Kamala WINS, and the world is a different place. (That's way too simplistic as blame, of course. It's an exercise in cause in fact, not proximate cause. I guess one way to describe "cause in fact" is "necessary but not sufficient.--one of many causes funneling into an event)