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In the United States, the People Rule, Not Wannabe King Trump
The “No Kings” protests, led by Indivisible, represent no disrespect to the Army. They are all about telling President Trump, who wants to be a king, that he isn’t one and never will be.
Jun 14, 2025
This week President Donald Trump sent the National Guard and Marines to Los Angeles to control what he preposterously called a “violent occupation.”
Sending U.S. troops to act against citizens exercising their right to free speech is a chilling betrayal of American democracy. The rebellion Trump claims to be fighting is simply nonexistent.
In fact, reporters and on-site observers have documented that the protests in Los Angeles—and those spreading now to other cities—are, for the most part, nonviolent. The violence that has occurred was likely intensified by the arrival of the military.
This spectacle is looking less like a tribute to our military and more like a pageant to honor “Dear Leader.”
Late Thursday, a federal court ruled that Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in California was illegal and unconstitutional and ordered Trump to relinquish control of the California National Guard back to Governor Gavin Newsom. That ruling has been temporarily blocked by an Appeals Court and the deployment will be allowed to continue at least into next week.
Also on Thursday, In another show of authoritarian force, Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) was forcibly removed and handcuffed after identifying himself and attempting to ask a question of Secretary Kristi Noem at her Homeland Security press conference in Los Angeles.
Trump’s disgraceful, authoritarian move in Los Angeles over the past few days is the first, but likely not the last, effort by Trump to use the country’s military against its own citizens.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told Congress on Tuesday that Trump is already prepared to send the National Guard and Reserves into other cities as part of Trump’s effort to, in Hegseth’s words, “secure [the] homeland.”
Using a fig-leaf justification, Trump is steamrolling over the spirit, if not the letter, of the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878. This act restricts the military from being used in domestic law enforcement within the United States.
New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman got it right when she said that Trump “wants to demonstrate absolute power.”
As historian Timothy Snyder puts it: “Tyranny is terror management.”
That is what we are seeing in myriad actions by Trump and his cronies over the past four months and especially now as he works to stoke fear without regard for constitutional rights or the rule of law.
In an address given at Fort Bragg on Tuesday, Trump absurdly (and falsely) claimed that the Los Angeles protesters were part of a “foreign invasion” and that Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass “paid troublemakers, agitators, and insurrectionists [in a] willful attempt to nullify federal law and aid the occupation of the city by criminal invaders.”
(Trump’s words must always be considered in the context of the more than 30,000 false and misleading statements he reportedly made in his first term. His serial falsehoods continue to grow in his second term.)
Trump doesn’t even try to hide his desire to have the absolute powers of a king and seems to revel in being the Commander in Chief.
Trump is staging a military parade on Saturday that’s expected to cost taxpayers $45 million. The parade is ostensibly to celebrate the Army’s birthday, but Saturday also just happens to be Trump’s 79th birthday as well. This spectacle is looking less like a tribute to our military and more like a pageant to honor “Dear Leader.”
And, in true “Dear Leader” fashion, Trump has warned that protesters at his birthday party “will be met with very big force.”
Peaceful protest is a fundamental First Amendment right, a constitutional right apparently alien to the president. This threat is yet one more attempt by Trump to intimidate and spread fear.
Protesters, however, won’t be in Washington, D.C. Instead, more than 2,000 protests around the country on Saturday will bring hundreds of thousands of Americans together to stand up against Trump and his authoritarian regime.
The “No Kings” protests, led by Indivisible, represent no disrespect to the Army. They are all about telling President Trump, who wants to be a king, that he isn’t one and never will be.
Those protesters are not alone. Some 70% of U.S. veterans oppose Trump’s vainglorious use of the military to celebrate his birthday. Last week in Washington, D.C., thousands of veterans protested the drastic cuts to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the programs that support those who served.
They have good reason to wonder why Trump can afford a $45 million birthday parade and $134 million to send the military into Los Angeles for a political stunt, when funding for the VA and other core programs that benefit veterans are on the chopping block.
The VA has indicated that department staff will be cut by 15%, comprising some 72,000 employees, many of them veterans.
Veterans will also be seriously affected by proposed cuts to Medicaid and food programs in the pending reconciliation bill. One out of four veterans, according to 2023 data, lived in a household receiving food assistance or health coverage from Medicaid.
In the United States, the people rule.
As President Lincoln reminded us in his Gettysburg Address, we are a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.” Trump isn’t going to change that no matter how hard he tries.
This was adapted from a piece that appeared in Wertheimer’s Political Report, a weekly Democracy 21 newsletter. Read this week’s and recent newsletters here. And, subscribe for free here to receive your copy each week via email.
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Citing Ethnic Cleansing, US Army Major Resigns Over Israel's Assault on Gaza
"As the descendant of European Jews, I was raised in a particularly unforgiving moral environment when it came to the topic of bearing responsibility for ethnic cleansing," wrote Maj. Harrison Mann.
May 13, 2024
An American Army officer on Monday described months of being increasingly disturbed by the images and news of Israel's U.S.-backed bombardment of Gaza, which culminated in his public resignation from his position at the Defense Intelligence Agency to avoid further complicity in Israel's "ethnic cleansing" of Palestinians.
Army Maj. Harrison Mann published his resignation letter on LinkedIn, saying he had distributed it internally on April 16 to announce his resignation from the agency.
As an officer at the DIA, Mann said, he has been unable to escape the fact that his place of work "directly executes policy" for the Biden administration, including its "nearly unqualified support for the government of Israel, which has enabled and empowered the killing and starving of tens and thousands of innocent Palestinians."
"My work here—however administrative or marginal it appeared—unquestionably contributed to that support," wrote Mann.
He described wrestling with the question of whether he could continue working at the DIA, reasoning with himself that, "I don't make policy and it's not my place to question it."
"However, at some point it became difficult to defend the outcomes of this particular policy," Mann wrote. "At some point—whatever the justification—you're either advancing a policy that advances the mass starvation of children, or you're not."
At the time Mann sent his letter to his colleagues, Israel was conducting airstrikes and preparing its ground invasion of Rafah, the southern Gaza city that over 1 million Palestinians have been forcibly displaced to since October.
Israel has continued to block aid to Gaza even after saying in early April it would open a crossing and a port, and has now pushed the enclave into what the United Nations World Food Program chief said earlier this month was a "full-blown famine." Dozens of people have died of starvation. At least 35,091 people who have been killed in Israel's military assault—two-thirds of those killed have been women and children, despite Israel's claim it is targeting Hamas fighters.
Mann wrote that as the bombardment dragged on and U.S. President Joe Biden's defense and funding of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) continued, his mind turned to his European Jewish relatives.
"As the descendant of European Jews, I was raised in a particularly unforgiving moral environment when it came to the topic of bearing responsibility for ethnic cleansing—my grandfather refused to ever purchase products manufactured in Germany—where the paramount importance of 'never again' and the inadequacy of 'just following orders' were oft repeated," wrote Mann. "But I also have hope that my grandfather would afford me some grace; that he would still be proud of me for stepping away from this war, however belatedly."
Mann publicized his letter about six weeks after foreign affairs officer Annelle Sheline resigned from her position at the U.S. State Department, saying her work in the human rights realm in the Middle East had become "impossible" in light of Biden's material and political support for Israel's assault on Gaza.
Education Department official Tariq Habash, a Palestinian American, also resigned in protest earlier this year, and a top official who oversaw arms transfers at the State Department, Josh Paul, stepped down in October, citing the Biden administration's decision to send more arms to Israel as the war began.
In February, U.S. Air Force member Aaron Bushnell died after self-immolating in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., having said he was engaging "in an extreme act of protest" to avoid being complicit in genocide.
On LinkedIn, Mann wrote Monday that he "received an unexpected outpouring of support" when he distributed his letter internally, and appeared to address other federal employees who may be questioning their complicity in Biden's policies.
"I am sharing [the letter] now in the hope that you too will discover you are not alone, you are not voiceless, and you are not powerless," wrote Mann.
Feds United for Peace, which includes employees across 30 federal agencies who have advocated for a cease-fire in Gaza, called Mann's letter "incredibly significant."
The New York Timesreported that it is not known "whether other military officers have resigned in protest of U.S. foreign policy" since the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October and the IDF's deadly retaliation, "but the resignation of an active-duty officer in protest of U.S. foreign policy is likely uncommon—especially one in which the officer makes public the reasons for doing so."
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100+ Musical Acts Boycott SXSW Over US Army, Defense Contractor Ties
"That the organizers of SXSW have taken the decision to mix the arts with the military and weapons contractors is unforgivable," said one band from Northern Ireland.
Mar 14, 2024
More than 100 musical acts have pulled out of the music and cultural festival South by Southwest in protest of the event's close ties to the U.S. Army and numerous defense contractors which have displayed exhibits at the week-long gathering, with one hip hop trio from Northern Ireland saying they would face a "significant financial impact" due to the decision.
The financial loss, said the Belfast-based band Kneecap, "isn't an iota of hardship when compared with the [unimaginable] suffering being inflicted every minute of every day on the people of Gaza."
The Austin For Palestine Coalition (AFPC) has been campaigning in the Texas state capital for several weeks to push bands and speakers to boycott the festival, which is commonly known as SXSW and has been based in Austin since 1987.
Out of at least 105 performers that had announced they are boycotting this year's event as of Wednesday, 60 were from the United Kingdom. All 12 Irish bands that had been scheduled to participate have canceled their appearances.
"That the organizers of SXSW have taken the decision to mix the arts with the military and weapons contractors is unforgivable," said Kneecap in a statement posted to social media. "That they have done so as we witness a genocide facilitated by the U.S. military and its contractors is depraved."
The U.S. is the largest international financial backer of the IDF, providing Israel with nearly $4 billion per year. The Biden administration has also approved numerous weapons sales to Israel since the current escalation began in response to a Hamas-led attack on the country on October 7.
The American musician Ella Williams, also known as Squirrel Flower, noted in her announcement that the International Court of Justice said in January that Israel is "plausibly" committing genocide in Gaza.
"A music festival should not include war profiteers," said Williams. "I refuse to be complicit in this and [withdraw] my art and labor in protest."
AFPC condemned the Army's sponsorship of SXSW as well as festival organizers' decision to welcome defense contractors including RTX, also known as Raytheon; Collins Aerospace; and BAE Systems as participants.
RTX and Collins Aerospace, its subsidiary, make missiles, bombs, and aircraft components that are used by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), which has killed at least 31,341 Palestinians in Gaza since beginning its U.S.-backed bombardment of the enclave in October.
Rania Batrice, a Palestinian American progressive advocate, also announced Wednesday that she was canceling a speaking engagement at the festival.
"As a Palestinian and a human," said Batrice, "I cannot be part of such a callous convening that platforms and celebrates an entity like RTX, which has caused so much death and destruction, and is now complicit in the genocide of my people—including far too many children."
As the boycott grew, SXSW organizers this week defended the contractors, which have participated as exhibitors and sponsored events at the festival, as "leaders in emerging technologies" who "bring forward ideas that shape our world."
They added that "the situation in the Middle East is tragic" and said the festival supports "human rights for all"—a response AFPC called "empty" and "performative."
"These empty words touting 'justice' did not do a great job hiding the fact that SXSW IS forcing musicians to be in bed with warmongers," said the group.
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