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'We Won't Let Him': Efforts to Stop Trump Grow as Work Observed at 'Illegal and Immoral' Arch
"I will continue doing everything in my power to stop this illegal and reckless attempt to turn our nation's capital into a monument to Donald Trump," vowed Rep. Don Beyer.
Sep 25, 2026
While Americans are stressed about the economy and President Donald Trump's approval rating has hit a historic low, the second-term Republican is focused on vanity projects like his proposed 250-foot "Triumphal Arch," which opponents are trying to block.
The watchdog group Public Citizen is planning a protest and press conference for the morning of October 1 at Memorial Circle in Washington, DC. Speakers include Congressman Don Beyer (D-Va.), military veterans, and other critics of the "self-indulgent project" that lacks congressional approval—and which Trump is now trying to push as a national security project.
"Trump's planned construction is not only illegal," Public Citizen said in a Thursday statement, pointing to the lawsuit it filed on behalf of three Vietnam War veterans and an architectural historian. "It is an affront to American veterans and their families."
"The arch will sit on Memorial Circle along the Potomac River, impeding the symbolic line-of-sight between the Lincoln Memorial in DC and Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia, where hundreds of thousands of our nation's military members have been laid to rest," explained the group, which has secured from a federal judge temporary restrictions on work at the site.
Beyer—whose district includes Arlington National Cemetery—headed to the site on Thursday. He said in a statement that "after hearing from constituents who saw construction equipment at the site of Trump's proposed vanity arch, I drove down to Columbia Island to see for myself. When I arrived, I found workers operating heavy equipment who told me they were conducting archaeological work to evaluate the composition of the soil."
"When I asked whether this work was a precursor to construction of the arch, they said that they could not answer," the congressman continued. "The logical conclusion, however, is that the presence of this heavy equipment and additional surveyors is a clear indication that the Trump administration is preparing to move forward with construction. That would be deeply troubling. Trump's arch is illegal and immoral, and the administration is also under court order requiring 48 hours' notice before work proceeds."
"Yet, the administration appears to be pushing ahead with activity at the site even while it still has not done the basic work necessary to understand the consequences of this project," Beyer warned. "There has been no adequate assessment of the regional impacts of this 250-foot structure on public safety, vehicular traffic, air traffic, or historic sites, including the implications of Trump's latest ravings about using the arch as a base for drone and sniper operations."
Beyer, who also shared video of his visit to the site on social media, added that “Donald Trump and his administration are determined to find a way to push this project through by any means necessary, regardless of the law or the concerns of the people who live here, but my constituents have made their views abundantly clear: They do not want this project. Neither do I. I will continue doing everything in my power to stop this illegal and reckless attempt to turn our nation's capital into a monument to Donald Trump."
In May, Beyer and Dina Titus (D-Nev.)—who, as co-chair of the Congressional Humanities Caucus, led challenges to the administration's illegal attempts to fund the arch using the National Endowment for the Humanities budget—introduced the Arlington National Cemetery Viewshed Protection Act, which would explicitly prohibit construction of Trump's project.
"As President Trump strips away the necessary safety nets from Americans who are struggling to afford their basic needs like groceries and healthcare, he builds his unauthorized, grandiose Triumphal Arch. While destroying historical monuments and artifacts important to our American identity, he is erecting monuments to honor himself," Titus said at the time. "The American people deserve a leader who is responsibly using federal funding for critical government services, not for self-promotion."
After months of pushback over the project, Trump announced last Sunday that "at the strong request of the United States Military, and for National Security purposes, I have agreed to convert the magnificent Triumphal Arch, planned since the Civil War Era many years ago, at the Receptive Circle adjoining the Arlington Memorial Bridge, into a top grade Military Complex/Triumphal Arch, to house, store, and have the rapid ability to use large numbers of drones, plus Snipers, on both the roof and plaza areas, and additionally have and hold large quantities of sniper ammunition in storage."
"There will be no facility like this anywhere in the World," the president wrote on his Truth Social platform. "Out of the 59 top cities and Capitals, Washington, DC, IS THE ONLY ONE IN THE WORLD THAT DOES NOT HAVE A TRIUMPHAL ARCH, but it will now and, by far, the greatest of them all!"
The Hill reported Friday that analysts and lawmakers "are perplexed by President Trump’s surprise declaration," with Michael O'Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution think tank, telling the outlet that adding military elements to the arch "is not totally fictional or crazy—but also not optimal."
Whether or not the project include military components, "to build an arch on federal land (that is not in the White House complex), the administration needs to navigate a lot of bureaucracy," The Washington Post noted Thursday. "The administration has argued the arch doesn't need to abide by DC's height laws for buildings and that it doesn't need congressional authorization because Congress authorized something similar a century ago nearby."
However, the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation—whose members are picked by the president—has attempted to abide by Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act and related regulations, and consulted with local officials "to seek ways to avoid, minimize, or mitigate adverse effects to historic properties that would result from this undertaking."
ABC News highlighted that "the law says federal officials don't have to reach an agreement with state officials on mitigation of those harms, but they do have to try. Those consultations can then be unilaterally terminated if there's a failure for parties to meet in the middle."
The council's vice chair, Travis Voyles, on Thursday wrote to Tammy Stidman, associate regional director for lands and planning at the National Park Service, that "we are hereby terminating consultation," but the panel "will develop and transmit its final comments to the secretary of interior," aiming to deliver them by October 7.
According to the Post, "The administration is hoping to start construction by November."
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The USS Abraham Lincoln Is Coming Home—Congress Owes Its Crew the Truth
More than 4,000 veteran members of Common Defense and their families agree: This can never happen again, and the war against Iran needs to end.
Aug 26, 2026
The USS Abraham Lincoln is on its way home. This is welcome news after hearing of its abhorrent conditions. Yet, the situation lived by sailors and Marines aboard the carrier over the last nine months, the continued threats that troops still deployed in this unpopular war face, and the unpatriotic negligence both the president and members of his own party have demonstrated paint a grim, but unsurprising picture of how servicemembers are treated under this administration.
Donald Trump is the most hostile president to troops and veterans in modern American history. Look no further than his comments about the service members who have been at sea for more than 250 days—that they have not been deployed “nearly long enough”—or House Republicans parroting that line back to reporters. That’s how this administration treats its military members, and it should be a wake-up call for every American.
Yes, the USS Abraham Lincoln is on its way home, but with the USS George Washington replacing it, how many more troops must suffer until we end this forever war? That is why veterans of Common Defense, like myself, are demanding a full-scale congressional investigation into this case. More than 4,000 of our members and their families agree: This can never happen again, and the war against Iran needs to end.
The war these carriers are supporting has already killed at least 18 US service members and wounded roughly 500 more, alongside thousands of Iranian civilians killed. As an Iraq veteran, I’ve come to understand the costs of war begin long before the first shot is fired. Diplomacy is what keeps the world safe, and certainly not bombs that pad shareholder value at the expense of service members, and military families, who have everything to lose.
If a foreign adversary starved its own troops, kept them at sea for nearly a year, and left them in cramped showers and broken toilets, how would Washington react?
The USS Lincoln is carrying 5,000 sailors and Marines, 5,000 souls who have touched communities far and wide throughout our nation. They’ve played in our little leagues, attended school dances, walked college campuses, and have full lives waiting for them at home. Whatever reason each of them had for raising their right hand, that oath reflects a rare kind of commitment—to a mission, and to a country they intend to keep giving back to. War is the price many military families pay, and veterans carry its scars, visible and invisible, long after they take off the uniform. It is time for this administration to uphold its end of that bargain.
Instead, this White House has gutted the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA); sent troops to a highly unpopular, illegal, unjust war; and used the military as a political prop. None of that improves troops’ or veterans’ lives. What would actually improve their lives? Ending the war, investigating what happened on the USS Lincoln, expanding the VA instead of hollowing it out, and making sure military and working families can actually thrive.
As the USS Lincoln returns home, it’s worth remembering what most Americans already sense: War doesn’t accomplish what makes a life worth living. It doesn’t keep your family safe, cover your healthcare, give you a good-paying job, or protect the freedoms our Constitution promises. That’s why most Americans oppose the war with Iran. Yet, we’re all paying for it—in a cost of living already at historic highs, in gas prices, and in the roughly $1,000 per household experts say Trump’s decision to go to war has cost every one of us. The more hawkish members of his party will argue that this is part of the mission: to spread freedom and to contain Iran’s power. So ask them if a foreign adversary starved its own troops, kept them at sea for nearly a year, and left them in cramped showers and broken toilets, how would Washington react? We already know the answer. These very politicians would be first in line, demanding that America intervene. What our service members experienced on the USS Lincoln is abysmal and should infuriate every single American whose tax dollars are funding Donald Trump’s war.
Let’s not forget this was a choice made by Donald Trump’s hostile administration and enabled by its congressional allies. Lawmakers must demand a full-scale investigation into what happened aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln so it never happens again. Veterans and military families see clearly how failed leaders and politicians who carry every whim of the president’s disastrous war put our troops in danger. We must demand an investigation now—and we won’t stop until this country ends its forever wars.
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DC Under Siege: One Year of Military Occupation
We don't need billions of dollars going toward policing our neighbors and Social Schedulingmilitarization of our streets to make our communities safer—we need housing, education, healthcare, and a commitment to climate justice for true national security.
Aug 12, 2026
One year ago, the Trump administration brought 800 National Guard troops to occupy the streets of Washington, DC, part of the "Safe and Beautiful Task Force." There are now approximately 5,000 troops from 15 states deployed here, with some officially moved in and set to stay through 2029.
This does not include the alphabet soup of law enforcement agencies swarming our neighborhoods across the city, from Immigration and Customs Enforcement to the FBI, Secret Service, Department of Homeland Security, Drug Enforcement Agency, Park Police, and more.
The National Guard can be found meandering around metro stations, museums, and grocery stores there for mere posture. Despite crime being down before they were deployed here. A new analysis from the Center for American Progress found the Guard deployment has not had a measurable impact on violent crime. They are not even trained in "civilian policing," and are unable to make actual arrests.
“This was never about reducing crime, especially not violent crime,” said Chandler Hall, who wrote the study. “This has been a show of force without any evidence to bear that it’s actually working."
"If my neighbors could experience military protection as something imposed upon them, what did civilians overseas think when American forces arrived in their communities?"
The cost of the Guard is estimated at $3 million a day, with some troops said to make close to $9,000 a month, including salary, lodging, and food per diem. It is hard to track the multi-year total in billions of dollars as the administration is far from transparent with the process.
The wasteful spending from the Department of War is unsurprising. Despite the Pentagon never passing an audit, the Department of War's proposed budget is record-breaking at $1.5 trillion for one year and does not include the recent billions for the Iran war and additional billions to Israel to further the genocide in Gaza and ongoing destruction in Lebanon.
Some of the reasoning for more troops in DC was for the Freedom 250 nationalism events, beginning with a UFC fight, State Fair, and Fourth of July festivities, all of which were disastrous, from cancellations, evacuations, and heat strokes to stage parts falling, nearly killing performers. The millions of dollars that went into these spectacles strained the local community. On July 4, my friend Nicky, a 71-year-old EMT, worked an 18-hour double shift for $27 an hour while constant military flyovers cost over $1.2 million.
Karen Degraphenreid, a veteran of the US Air Force as a Major of 10 years, got involved with Free DC when the military occupation in DC began. She describes her reflections from her time overseas to experiencing the guard takeover here at home.
"Washington is the only place in the country where more than 700,000 American citizens can have troops deployed to their streets by leaders they have no voting representation in choosing. We pay federal taxes, serve in the military, and fulfill every obligation of citizenship, yet Congress can override our local government and impose decisions that fundamentally reshape life in our city. That reality forced me to reconsider what 'protection' actually means," she said.
She continued:
Many of my neighbors never asked for soldiers outside their neighborhoods. Many openly opposed their presence. To them, the deployment did not feel like reassurance. It felt like a federal government exercising power over a city that has long been denied full democratic self-government.
And that realization led me to a question I had never seriously asked during my years in uniform.
If my neighbors could experience military protection as something imposed upon them, what did civilians overseas think when American forces arrived in their communities? When we said we were bringing security and stability, did they experience it as protection? Or did they see armed strangers exercising power over places that belonged to them?
Karen is also a member of Common Defense, which holds trainings for veterans to verbally confront the National Guard. Other veterans are speaking out to encourage their fellows and active-duty members to do the same. Groups like About Face have been welcoming anti-war veterans to become more organized for years, many of whom were deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq, and are actively opposed to the genocide in Gaza and the war on Iran.
At a press conference commemorating one year of the occupation, Luke Filomena, a registered nurse with National Nurses United, expressed the imperialist boomerang we are all witnessing
I’ve seen this administration and every administration prior instead choose to spend hundreds of billions, now trillions of dollars, yearly, to go toward countless amounts of death and destruction through endless imperialist wars overseas and the funding and arming of a genocide in Gaza. I’ve been forced to watch as hospitals filled with patients and fellow healthcare workers, as well as schools filled with children, are indiscriminately bombed in Gaza and in Iran, and as the US blockade of Cuba leaves hospitals without fuel and supplies to power lifesaving medical equipment and provide care for their patients.
"Over the past year, under the Trump regime, we’re now seeing the imperialist boomerang come back, with its sights locked on the Black, brown, and immigrant communities here in DC; those who I see each day at the bedside," Filomena explained.
It's one thing to be aware of connecting the dots, and it's another to act on it. DC has been public about its opposition to the military takeover of the city. When the occupation first launched, we disrupted Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth's photo op at Shake Shack in Union Station. A month later, Trump and almost his entire cabinet went out to dinner at a restaurant near the White House, and we disrupted it, chanting, "Free DC, Free Palestine, Trump is the Hitler of our time." We later drowned out a public appearance by Hegseth, Stephen Miller, and hundreds of National Guard at Malcolm X Park.
Opportunities to confront the administration are rarer than daily encounters with the Guard. The same week budget cuts to Supplemental and Nutrition Assistance Program were being discussed in Congress, I asked a group of troops, who often appear to be aimlessly wandering our neighborhoods in groups of four, if people in their communities would be hit by this. I've asked them if they know their neighbors and what services they could use and be funded versus them being deployed here to hang outside of a convenience store. When the forest fires created thick smoke across DC, I asked why they were here and not putting out the fires.
In these conversations, they almost always nod their head and reach for their pamphlet, telling me and others who confront them to contact their supervisor. They come from states from Mississippi to Michigan, and there have been state-by-state campaigns to get the Guard to go home. Many of them are here voluntarily, not simply "following orders" as we are led to believe.
While we have 800 military bases abroad, the war economy is inescapable for most people within the United States as well. The predatory trap the military-industrial complex has on young people of color or those in poverty means they are heavily recruited to join the various branches of the military. The increased amount of data centers across the country is also making the war economy ever more apparent.
But the state can't use the excuse of job creation anymore. The Climate and Communities Institute shows us that employment at military contractors has plummeted over the past three decades, from an estimated 3.2 million workers during the Reagan military-spending peak in the mid-1980s to 1.1 million workers in 2020. The drop occurred despite Pentagon budgets rising 22% over the same period (not accounting for inflation costs). The alternative is a care economy, a system of paid and unpaid labor, services, and relationships that support human health, well-being, and daily life, that moves away from dirty, violent jobs that rely on weapons manufacturers and the fossil fuel industry.
We cannot normalize troops on our streets. But we must address the roots that cause normalization. We've been taught to salute combat veterans for their service no matter their history; we're used to discounts for military personnel and TV shows and Hollywood movies glorifying lower-level cadets to high-ranking commanders. While militarized superheroes are a common staple in US popular culture, teachers are buying their own school supplies for their classrooms, social workers have overwhelming caseloads, EMTs are working overtime while underpaid, and many veterans are unhoused or waitlisted at the VA.
Washington, DC does not need occupation; it needs fair representation. We don't need billions of dollars going toward policing our neighbors and militarization of our streets to make our communities safer—we need housing, education, healthcare, and a commitment to climate justice for true national security. In the meantime, we have only seen our community grow stronger to protect each other—more trainings, skill sharing, documenting, court support, fundraising, and more. Every day we are supporting each other by radically building community through getting to know our neighbors more deeply in real life.
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An ICE Killing in Maine Shows Why Vets Need Vetting—And Not Just in Politics
Under current circumstances, no friends, family members, or employment counselors of young veterans should encourage them to answer the siren call of ICE—no matter how much they need a job.
Aug 12, 2026
The media spent a lot of time this summer examining whether a certain Maine oysterman and Marine veteran seeking federal employment should have been better vetted by those around him.
Even after Graham Platner abandoned his US Senate bid, his friends and foes argue about whether service-related conditions—which earned him a 100% disability rating from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)—contributed to past substance abuse, mental health problems, and aggression against intimate partners.
Now, in the same state, the spotlight has shifted to David Brouillette, a troubled Afghan war vet who might also have been better off harvesting oysters. Brouillette spent eight years in the US Army and state National Guard before getting hired for not one, but two federal jobs. Thanks to an ill-advised push to recruit more ex-military personnel for law enforcement roles, without proper background checks, he got to carry a gun again.
Last month, after serving as a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) police officer, a prison guard, and then joining the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Brouillette fatally shot Johan Sebastian Duran Guerrero, a young Colombian immigrant, during a traffic stop in Biddeford, Maine.
The Vet-to-Cop Pipeline
Thanks to Congress allocating $30 billion to create 10,000 more positions for that agency between 2025 and 2030—and job cuts at other federal departments, which often employ veterans—more ex-soldiers are getting hired into a paramilitary workforce, with insufficient screening, minimal training, and leaders who valorize brutality. Those who have already been cops go to the head of the line for signing bonuses as high as $50,000.
Brouillette is among the 200,000 veterans disproportionately represented in the nation’s nearly 1 million law enforcement jobs, ranging from local police departments to the fast-growing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
During a 10-year period, nearly one-third of more than 500 cops involved in a shooting incident were veterans.
For their own good and the welfare of all Americans, some of these vets should not trade one uniform for another. That’s because past military service not only produces Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD); it can also leave former service members with traumatic brain injuries that trigger aggressive and impulsive behavior.
In the case of Maine mass shooter Robert Card, a longtime Army Reserve grenade range instructor who never served in combat, that condition led to the slaughter of 18 neighbors at a bar and bowling alley in Lewiston, Maine, almost three years ago. Far more common is the rocky personal transition to civilian life typified by twice-divorced Brouillette, whose father and brother also served in the military.
Mental Health Issues
According to Brouillette’s first ex-wife, Ashley, he first became verbally and physically abusive after joining the military in 2007. His subsequent misbehavior, she told The New York Times, included choking her, slamming her to the floor, and pushing her against a wall. In 2012, such “threats and harassment were so persistent,” she fled the state to escape him. “He has mental health issues, he’s short-tempered, he’s reactive, [and] he should be in treatment,” she says.
Seven years later, his next ex-wife sought a restraining order against Brouillette after he “broke her door down, destroyed her belongings, and dumped her clothes over a bridge,” and spat in her face. In her court filing, she expressed fear about his stalking her by “coming to my home or sitting in the parking lot of my work.” So, as CNN found, a judge twice issued temporary orders requiring Brouillette to relinquish any firearms in 2019 and 2021.
To make matters worse, when Brouillette retrained to become a firefighter in 2021, a heavy I-beam fell on his head, inflicting serious damage. In a lawsuit over the accident, he confessed to having “impaired memory, cognitive deficits, headaches, vertigo, and high sensitivity.”
Long before he fired the shots that killed Guerrero, he had already worked among VA patients and staff in Maine, as part of an agency police force with its own troubled history of using excessive force. And then he moved on seamlessly to ICE last December, despite a checkered court record and non-military head injury that should have been disqualifying.
A Bad Career Choice
When we were researching an earlier book on veterans, two retired Army officers, both West Point grads, expressed deep concern about policing, of any kind, as a post-military career among veterans at risk for substance abuse and suicide because of PTSD, chronic pain, or traumatic brain injuries.
Daniel Sjursen, a much-decorated major who served in Afghanistan and Iraq, told us that, “when you leave the service, there’s no de-programming…They just load you up on meds, and then you go straight to the police academy.” Because “military-style of policing is based on the notion that high-crime areas should be treated like occupied countries, a guy can come back to Baltimore, Camden, or Detroit and function the same way we did when occupying Kabul or Baghdad.”
As his fellow officer, a Gulf War combat vet and military historian Andrew Bacevic noted, “To the extent that we’ve got a bunch of damaged young people, then maybe the last thing we want to do is put them in a job where they carry a gun in an environment that’s going to make things worse.”
So don’t hold your breath waiting for justice for Johan Sebastian Duran Guerrero. For the last 18 months, federal immigration agents have operated with far less public oversight and accountability than any local police department.
Even during Barack Obama’s administration, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) was not listening to such knowledgeable insiders. Instead, the DOJ provided local police departments around the country with tens of millions of dollars to fund veterans-only positions.
As noted in a 2017 report by the Marshall Project, “When Warriors Put On the Badge,” this combination of special funding and preferential hiring mandated by state or federal law has made it harder to “build police forces that resemble and understand diverse communities.” The new hires benefiting most have been disproportionately white, because 60% of all enlisted men and women are not people of color.
Inappropriate Use of Force
Under the first Trump administration, the DOJ had little interest in tracking the later job performance of recently hired veterans or how their military background might affect their behavior.
By that time, however, the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) had already raised concerns about “the integration of military personnel” into law enforcement. In their own 2009 hiring guide, the IACP noted that, in the case of returning combat veterans from Iraq or Afghanistan, their combat environment and their policing environments may appear surprisingly similar.”
As a result, prior military service in the Middle East “may cause returning officers to mistakenly blur the lines between military combat situations and civilian crime situations, resulting in inappropriate decisions and actions, particularly in the use of lethal force.”
Cosponsored by the DOJ’s Bureau of Justice Assistance, this IACP report also noted that vets who have PTSD and related “depression, anger, withdrawal, and family issues” may have “a low tolerance for civilian complaints” and greater propensity for the “inappropriate use of force.” Some police chiefs interviewed reported that veterans under their command had come back “ill prepared for the civilian world” because their PTSD left them with “exaggerated survival instincts.”
Officer-Involved Shootings
Researchers at the University of Texas School of Public Health found that Dallas Police Department officers with military experience used their guns while on duty more than non-veterans. During a 10-year period, nearly one-third of more than 500 cops involved in a shooting incident were veterans. Those who had been deployed overseas were nearly three times as likely to have fired their weapon; those who had not been deployed were still twice as likely to be involved in a shooting. This study, published in the Journal of Public Health, concluded that some veterans employed by the Dallas police department lacked “critical thinking skills” when confronted with “high stress scenarios.”
The Marshall Project reported similar findings after it studied use-of-force complaints and fatal police shootings in several cities. In Boston and Miami, officers with military experience generated more civilian complaints of excessive force. Nearly one-third of the Albuquerque officers involved in a total of 35 fatal shootings between January 2010 and April 2014 were veterans. One of the officers sued after killing an unarmed motorist was an Iraq War veteran whose PTSD caused flashbacks, nightmares, and blackouts. Nevertheless, as the Marshall Project discovered, he was “assigned to patrol a high-crime area of town known as ‘the War Zone.’”
“To ensure public safety and guarantee a stable, reliable, and productive workforce,” Marshall Project researchers cited the need for clear and consistent police department policies to “evaluate employees’ mental and physical fitness. Yet local police department screening practices, around the country, remain far from standardized or effective. Some agencies employ the use of administrative interviews and psychological evaluations to assess how veteran officers will perform the essential functions of their position, while other agencies revert to their department medical officer, or lack any policy at all.”
No Local Constraints
Whatever unhelpful contribution to militarized policing has been made by hiring too many post-9/11 vets, new and old cops in Dallas, Boston, Miami, and other cities at least walk the streets without masks on. They display badges with their names and, in most places, wear body cameras as well. If they screw up in a high-stress situation, they are subject to internal affairs investigations or civilian police review board questioning, particularly if an officer-involved shooting has occurred.
When an Army veteran named Derek Chauvin put George Floyd in a fatal choke hold six years ago in Minneapolis, he was even prosecuted and sentenced to a long prison term. When another military veteran named Jonathan Rose—a former machine gunner in Iraq deployed in the Twin Cities last winter as an ICE agent—fired on Renee Good, did he face any criminal charges for killing a gay non-immigrant mother of three? Not yet.
So don’t hold your breath waiting for justice for Johan Sebastian Duran Guerrero. For the last 18 months, federal immigration agents have operated with far less public oversight and accountability than any local police department. In the process, they have killed 23 people under circumstances that homicide detectives and local prosecutors have been blocked from properly investigating.
The Department of Homeland Security has just doubled down on its policy of not releasing the names of officers involved in these fatal encounters. Agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have been directed to stop investigating claims by those, like David Brouillette, who say they used lethal force in response to being endangered.
Under current circumstances, no friends, family members, or employment counselors of young veterans should encourage them to answer the siren call of ICE—no matter how much they need a job. As one former ICE official told the Boston Globe, ”We should all be concerned… that they have lowered standards, that they have rushed hiring, and they have made offers to people before their vetting is complete.”
Even if applicants from military backgrounds lack the self-confessed “cognitive deficits” of Brouillette, wearing camo again—while stopping traffic, knocking down doors, brandishing automatic weapons, and engaging in car chases—is not a healthy career choice, for them or us.
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Congress Hasn’t Authorized Trump’s Iran War—or Ended It
The House voted to halt unauthorized hostilities; the Senate blocked a final vote, leaving troops and civilians inside a war lawmakers refuse to own.
Jul 29, 2026
On July 23, the House of Representatives voted 214-208 to direct President Donald Trump to remove US forces from hostilities with Iran unless Congress authorizes them. Hours later, the Senate rejected a motion to bring a separate war powers resolution out of committee, 47-49.
The Senate did not authorize the war. It did not even vote on the resolution itself. It blocked the measure before senators had to answer the central question: Should the United States continue fighting a war Congress has never approved?
The war continued anyway.
That is the dangerous precedent now taking shape in Washington. The president can begin or expand military operations, and Congress is left trying to stop them after the bombs have fallen and retaliation has begun. If opponents cannot clear committees, procedural votes, narrow majorities, and a likely presidential veto, inertia does the work of authorization. No lawmaker has to cast a clear vote for the war, but troops and civilians must still live with the consequences.
The burden must fall on those who want the war to continue. They should have to explain, publicly and repeatedly, why more Americans and Iranians must die and what political outcome those deaths are supposed to achieve.
The conflict began on February 28, when the United States and Israel attacked Iran. Trump has since expanded direct US involvement without obtaining a congressional mandate. By July 22, the war had killed 18 US service members and injured hundreds more. The Pentagon put its cost at $37.5 billion, a figure that includes some anticipated expenses through September 30. A July Reuters/Ipsos poll found that 79% of Americans expected the conflict to drag on, while only 37% approved of the US strikes.
Iranian civilians have paid a far heavier price. The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency reported that by April 10, 1,701 civilians, including at least 254 children, had been killed since the war began. Iran’s Health Ministry said another 50 civilians were killed and 500 wounded during the renewed US strikes in July. An anti-war politics worthy of the name cannot ask Americans to care about their own soldiers while treating Iranian deaths as background noise.
For working-class families, the war is not an argument about executive theory. It arrives as an extended deployment, a flag-draped coffin, a long recovery from injury, higher fuel prices, and another demand that public money be redirected toward a conflict with no visible conclusion. The officials who refuse to define the mission do not bear those costs equally.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), who introduced the House resolution, said the war has “no clear mission, no strategy, no end goal.” The administration has moved among overlapping justifications: preventing a nuclear-armed Iran, retaliating for attacks, protecting US forces, and keeping commercial shipping open, as well as degrading Tehran’s regional military capabilities. Each objective can be used to justify another strike. None provides a measurable definition of victory or a credible route out.
Republican leaders argue that limiting Trump during active hostilities would weaken the United States and endanger deployed forces. The White House says the president needs flexibility to repel Iranian attacks and protect American personnel. It also argues that the House’s concurrent resolution lacks the force of law and warns that the measure could create “operational paralysis.”
A president must be able to protect troops from an immediate attack. That narrow defensive authority cannot become a blank check to define and prolong an entire war without Congress. Otherwise, each deployment creates the danger later invoked to expand it: US forces enter the conflict, Iran attacks them, and protecting them becomes the rationale for another round of strikes.
Sending troops into an open-ended conflict without a public mandate is not support. It is political abandonment.
Veterans have made that point more clearly than many lawmakers. After an earlier House war powers vote, Common Defense, a grassroots organization of veterans and military families, said that “veterans understand the costs of war better than most Americans” and called congressional action essential to giving the public a voice. Supporting troops requires more than praising their sacrifice after they die. It requires telling them what the mission is, what limits govern it, what success looks like, and when it ends.
The House vote showed that opposition to unauthorized war is not entirely partisan. All 210 Democrats present joined Republicans Thomas Massie (Ky.), Warren Davidson (Ohio), Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.), and Tom Barrett (Mich.). In the Senate, Republican Susan Collins (Maine) supported bringing the resolution forward, while Democratic Sen. John Fetterman (Pa.) voted with Republicans to block it.
But the larger story is institutional, not personal. Senators avoided a direct vote on whether to authorize or end the war. Procedural language cannot erase political responsibility. A senator who prevents Congress from considering restraint helps preserve the conditions under which the war continues.
The House resolution alone cannot stop the fighting. That makes Congress’ power over military funding the next real test. The White House has requested an $87.6 billion supplemental package, saying most of it would address urgent needs related to Operation Epic Fury. The request includes $67.1 billion for the Pentagon, with $21 billion of that amount designated for munitions. The Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates that about one-third of the entire package is driven by Iran war costs; the rest funds other administration priorities.
Lawmakers cannot credibly call a war unauthorized while financing its continuation without meaningful limits. Any new funding should prohibit offensive operations against Iran after a brief period for immediate force protection unless Congress passes a specific authorization. That authorization should define the enemy, mission, geographic scope, reporting requirements, and expiration date. Renewal should require another affirmative vote.
The burden must fall on those who want the war to continue. They should have to explain, publicly and repeatedly, why more Americans and Iranians must die and what political outcome those deaths are supposed to achieve.
Congressional authorization is not bureaucratic interference. It is the democratic process through which elected officials must tell the public why troops are being sent into danger. Trump owns the decision to wage and escalate this war. But lawmakers who block restraint, keep the money flowing, and refuse to demand a defined mission are not neutral observers. They are helping sustain a war they have never been willing to own.
Congress has not authorized Trump’s Iran war. Until lawmakers either define and limit the mission or stop paying for it, troops and civilians will remain trapped between a president claiming the power to continue and a legislature unwilling to take responsibility for ending it.
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'The Most Anti-Veteran President in History': VA Families Losing Homes After Trump Killed Loan Program
"It's a struggle. Especially with everything else being inflated in the country," said one US Army vet, "you know, with groceries, gas... I'm like, what the hell?"
Apr 02, 2026
Just as President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress were warned would happen, close to 100,000 US veterans are currently behind on their mortgage payments or are in the process of foreclosure as a result of the White House's decision to shut down a Department of Veterans Affairs program that helped people with VA-backed home loans when they were behind on their monthly payments.
As NPR reported Thursday, more than 10,000 have already lost their homes, nearly a year after the Trump administration abruptly did away with the VA Servicing Purchase (VASP) program.
The program was rolled out during the Biden administration, after the VA ended a pandemic-era assistance program that had allowed VA home loan borrowers to gradually pay back mortgage payments that they had needed to skip.
Under VASP, the VA purchases home loans that were in default from mortgage services and then modified the loans.
In March 2025, a representative from the Mortgage Bankers Association told the House Veterans Affairs Committee that widespread foreclosures would result if the VASP program—which Republicans in Congress said had been created by former President Joe Biden for "political purposes... to undercut the VA Home Loan program—was not protected.
Despite the warning, the VASP program was halted two months later.
Nearly a year after the program's end, the VA is still developing a replacement to help veterans—many of whom are struggling to afford essentials just like the majority of other Americans as the cost of living crisis intensifies with rising fuel prices due to Trump's war on Iran.
Sources in the mortgage industry told NPR that many of the vets who have lost their homes so far had enough disability benefits or other income to avoid foreclosure, had the VASP program remained in operation.
NPR interviewed Leann Ledford, whose husband, a Marine veteran who served in Afghanistan, has a brain injury, experiences seizures, and suffers post-traumatic stress disorder. The family is one of tens of thousands who learned in October 2022 that the Biden administration had ended the earlier pandemic-era program and that they would have to pay a year's worth of back payments in one lump sum.
The Ledfords were also one of many veteran families who were unable to enroll in VASP before Trump abruptly shut it down.
Ledford told NPR that with her husband's $3,971 monthly disability check, they could have afforded mortgage payments under the VASP program.
Army veteran Jon Henry was also unable to enroll in VASP before it was shut down, and was forced to take a modified loan with payments that are $380 more per month than his original mortgage.
"It's a struggle," Henry told NPR. "Especially with everything else being inflated in the country, you know, with groceries, gas … I'm like, what the hell?"
NPR's reporting led Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), an Iraq War veteran, to denounced Trump as "the most anti-veteran president in history."
When Trump's new VA home loan assistance program is up and running—which isn't expected to happen for several more months, veterans will be able to move their missed payments to the back of their loan term. But in the current draft of the plan, reported NPR, "the VA is telling mortgage companies that if a new, modified loan at a higher interest rate only raises a veteran's monthly payment by up to 15%, they must place vets into that more costly loan."
"So a veteran with a $2,000 monthly mortgage payment could still be pushed into a modified loan that raises their payment by up to $300 a month. And they wouldn't be given the option of moving their missed payments to the back of their loan and keeping their original, lower-cost mortgage," reported the outlet.
Pete Mills of the Mortgage Bankers Association told the VA last month that under Trump's plan, "as drafted, veterans will continue to have worse options than similarly situated non-veterans."
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'Oh Come on,' Says Senate Democrat After Jake Tapper Plays Voting-Against-the-Troops Card
"The American people don't want this war," said Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut. "Virtually nothing good happened from sending thousands of Americans to die in Iraq in the 2000s and if we don't learn that lesson then shame on every single one of us."
Mar 08, 2026
Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut offered immediate push back on Sunday when CNN anchorJake Tapper said a vote against an expected $50 billion request by President Donald Trump to fund his attack on Iran would be seen as "voting against the troops."
"Oh come on," said Murphy, incredulous. "I mean, the American people don't want this war. They don't want this war—they have seen what happens when American troops go into places like Iraq, places like Afghanistan. Ultimately we get a lot of people killed, we waste a lot of dollars. The one thing the people of the American people have been clear about is that they don't want the United States dragged into another long-term war in the Middle East."
Polling has shown that Murphy is correct, with only one out of four people—a mere 25%—in a Reuters/Ipsos poll released last week showing any kind of support for Trump's war of choice against Iran.
"If you support the troops," said Murphy, "then you should vote against this war so that we get our troops out of harm's way. Virtually nothing good happened from sending thousands of Americans to die in Iraq in the 2000s and if we don't learn that lesson then shame on every single one of us."
TAPPER: "You have said you're a 'hell no' on funding the war. We have seen this movie before. We know that vote will be cast as - especially if you run for higher office - you voting against the troops."
MURPHY: "Oh come on I mean, the American people don't want this war." pic.twitter.com/lTB5isM8I7
— State of the Union (@CNNSOTU) March 8, 2026
Trump has yet to make the formal request for the $50 billion in funding, but estimates for just one week of fighting have put the cost of the military operations thus far at something close to $1billion per day.
Murphy has said he is a "hell no" on any additional funding and other members of the Democratic caucus have echoed that message.
"Trump is already spending $1 BILLION PER DAY on his illegal regime change war of choice in Iran," said Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) on Thursday. "Now, he's going to ask Congress to give him up to $50 BILLION MORE. My vote: hell NO."
"We could be lowering the cost of health care, but instead Trump is spending BILLIONS on his reckless war with Iran," said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) on Thursday. "Trump is blowing YOUR taxpayer dollars on war and causing gas prices to spike while he's at it."
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The War That Killed My Father Is Starting Again in Iran
The parallels between Vietnam and the Iran conflict aren’t just echoes—they’re a playbook. And every institution meant to stop it from repeating has failed.
Mar 06, 2026
The Army got 20 years of my father’s life including two tours in Vietnam. In return, it gave him nightmares he never named and cancers connected to his service. He wouldn’t talk about what happened over there—not even when I asked.
He came home and spent decades fighting a war nobody could see. The PTSD was severe and completely untreated. In those years, nobody used the term. They just called men like my father “difficult” or “distant.” My mother raised five daughters alongside him, absorbing the weight of his trauma so we all carried pieces of it with us.
He finally found some peace later in life. Then a prostate cancer diagnosis—a disease appearing on the US Department of Veteran Affair’s official list of conditions presumed to be caused by Agent Orange. He won the fight. Then leukemia reared its ugly head, and, at 66, the war finally finished what it started decades earlier.
My mother and my four sisters endured his suffering as our own for his entire life while the country sending him to war simply moved on.
The question before this country is whether it is willing to do this again—to commit another generation to a war with no defined objectives, no exit strategy, and no congressional authorization.
I have spent 25 years as an educator, teaching young people to recognize patterns and think critically about the world around them. I am watching a pattern unfold right now, and I am compelled to speak about it.
On February 28, the United States and Israel launched a massive military campaign against Iran—Operation Epic Fury. In six days, the conflict has killed at least 1,230 people in Iran—including over 150 schoolgirls killed in a single strike on an elementary school—and six American service members. The defense Secretary declared “America is winning” and said the operation was in its early days, promising more to come.
The scale is staggering. Iran has launched more than 500 ballistic missiles and 2,000 drones in retaliation. Israeli and American strikes have hit residential neighborhoods, hospitals, and a UNESCO World Heritage site in Tehran. The World Health Organization has documented 13 attacks on Iranian health infrastructure. Iran’s internet has been blacked out for over 100 hours, cutting 88 million people off from the outside world.
And the conflict is metastasizing daily. A US submarine sank an Iranian warship off Sri Lanka—the first torpedo fired at an enemy vessel since World War II. NATO forces shot down an Iranian missile heading toward Turkey—the first time in this conflict a missile has threatened a NATO member. Drones struck Azerbaijan. Qatar is evacuating residents near the US Embassy. An Iranian drone strike shut down Qatar’s liquefied natural gas exports, triggering a potential energy crisis from India to Italy. The Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed.
The same week, American forces began combat operations in Ecuador—the latest step in a hemisphere-wide military expansion including the capture of Venezuela’s president and strikes on alleged drug boats killing over 150 people.
None of it was authorized by Congress.
The parallels to Vietnam are not abstract. They are specific and structural.
Vietnam began with the Gulf of Tonkin incident—an alleged attack later investigation revealed never happened, built on intelligence deliberately distorted. The justification for the Iran campaign has followed a strikingly similar pattern. The administration pointed to nuclear weapons and ballistic missile threats, but US intelligence assessments contradicted those claims, projecting Iran could not develop such capabilities before 2035. The United Nation’s nuclear watchdog confirmed Iran was not days or weeks from having atomic weapons. Within days, the official rationale cycled through nuclear concerns, protest crackdowns, “imminent threats,” and finally open regime change.
Vietnam escalated through incremental steps, each framed as a necessary response to the last. What began with 900 military advisers in 1960 had swelled to more than 500,000 ground troops by 1968. The Iran trajectory mirrors this arc—economic sanctions gave way to Houthi strikes, then a targeted air campaign in 2025, and now a war spanning multiple continents and drawing in NATO for the first time. Senior officials have left the door open to ground forces.
Vietnam had the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution—passed with only two dissenting votes—handing the president unchecked authority. Iran has something arguably worse: no authorization at all. The War Powers Resolution, the very law Congress created in 1973 because of Vietnam, was voted down in the Senate on March 4 by a margin of 47 to 53. The eighth time Congress has refused to assert its constitutional war authority since June. The tool exists. The will to use it does not.
And perhaps the most damning parallel: Just 72 hours before the strikes began, Iran’s top diplomat declared a deal to avert war was within grasp. Oman’s foreign minister confirmed Iran had agreed to never stockpile enriched uranium and accept full international verification. Talks were still happening in Geneva when the first missiles hit. Diplomacy didn’t fail. It was abandoned.
There is one more parallel Americans must reckon with. Iran is not a country poised to collapse under bombardment and accept a government designed in Washington. It is a nation of 88 million people with a civilization stretching back millennia. It survived the Mongol Empire, the British Empire, a US-backed coup in 1953, and an eight-year war with Iraq in which the world armed its enemy. Modern history does not contain a single instance of Western military force successfully transforming a Middle Eastern nation into a stable democracy. Iraq took 20 years and failed. Afghanistan took 20 years and failed. Libya collapsed into chaos. What reason is there to believe Iran will be different?
My father was sent to fight a war lasting two decades, killing 58,000 Americans and over 2 million Vietnamese, achieving nothing it promised. The dying didn’t stop when the war ended—veterans kept falling for decades to Agent Orange cancers and untreated trauma. Their families carried the cost in silence. My family carried it in silence.
The question before this country is whether it is willing to do this again—to commit another generation to a war with no defined objectives, no exit strategy, and no congressional authorization. The institutions supposed to prevent this—Congress, the War Powers Resolution, the constitutional separation of powers—have each failed in turn.
My father’s stories are gone. He took them with him. But the political machinery sending him to Vietnam is running again, and it is not too late to shut it down. It requires only the people who swore to uphold the Constitution actually doing so—and the rest of us demanding it.
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The VA is Ripping Away Abortion Care for Veterans... Again
This isn’t just a rollback. It’s a deliberate erasure of rights that we fought for in the wake of deeply personal and collective loss.
Jan 25, 2026
In 2022, my wife and I lost our first child. We named them June. They were deeply wanted and fiercely loved. In one fateful appointment, our entire worlds changed. We learned that June had a severe fetal bladder abnormality and was unable to produce amniotic fluid. Without it, their lungs would never develop. They would not survive.
We made the impossible decision to end the pregnancy—an act of compassion, love, and medical necessity.
At the time, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) had a total ban on abortion care and counseling.
No exceptions for rape. No exceptions for incest. Not even to save a veteran’s life.
Veterans and our families deserve futures built on compassion, justice, and love—not fear.
After our loss, the only way I felt I could keep breathing was to turn that grief into meaning. I shared our story with lawmakers to help reverse this dangerous policy so that veterans and their families could turn to the VA—no matter the circumstance or where they lived. That fall, the VA finally took steps to reverse the ban, signaling a long-overdue shift toward care, autonomy, and dignity.
But that progress was short-lived.
The VA just finalized a new abortion ban policy that, once again, excludes exceptions for rape or incest and offers only vague assurances that it will intervene if our lives are at risk. They initially implemented this enormous change in secret without telling veterans or their families.
In effect, it returns the VA to what was once the most extreme abortion ban in the country—an outright prohibition on care and counseling that applies to every VA facility nationwide, regardless of state law.
This isn’t just a rollback. It’s a deliberate erasure of rights that we fought for in the wake of deeply personal and collective loss.
And it is not happening in isolation. The same administration driving this ban is also working diligently to eliminate gender-affirming care, defund programs for minority and underrepresented veterans, and strip inclusive language and data collection from federal policy. The message is unmistakable: Some veterans count. Others don’t.
Veterans are not a monolith. We are a diverse community—LGBTQIA+, people of color, disabled, parents, caregivers, survivors, and yes, women too. Our community exists at every intersection of identity and experience, and our families serve alongside us. Our care cannot be conditional. Our humanity is not negotiable.
Policy is never just about one issue. It is intersectional—because our lives are intersectional.
Reproductive care cannot be separated from gender-affirming care, from disability access and mental health, from racial justice, or maternal health. Our needs don’t exist in silos, and neither do we. When one right is taken away, the loss reverberates across all the others.
I’ve seen what’s possible when we refuse to stay silent—how lived experience can reshape policy and expand care that has never existed before. And I know exactly what is at stake when care is denied. Pregnancy can change on a dime.
June’s life, though brief, transformed mine. Through their memory, I found purpose. I found a voice. And in their honor, I will continue working to ensure that no veteran or family ever has to face what we faced alone.
We should be building systems rooted in care, equity, and truth. We should be honoring the fullness of who veterans are, how we serve, and how we build our families. Instead, our fundamental rights are being stripped away—one policy memo at a time—and once again, we are being asked to fight for the right to make personal decisions about our health, our futures, and our families.
I will not allow June’s legacy to become another casualty of politics. Their life will be a call to care.
This moment demands more than endurance. It demands action.
The policies we pass—within the VA and beyond—shape the futures of veterans and the people who love us. Had my wife not been able to access critical care in her time of need—had we not been given the chance to make the most compassionate choice amid impossible circumstances—we might never have known the joy of raising our child today, a joy born from grief and shaped by love.
Veterans and our families deserve futures built on compassion, justice, and love—not fear.
Because in the end, we are all only human.
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Vets in Labor Are Standing Up to Trump
Veterans in the labor movement have played a frontline role resisting Trump administration attempts to cut government jobs and services and strip federal workers of their collective bargaining rights.
Jan 24, 2026
The US is home to 17 million military veterans. About 1.3 million of them currently work in union jobs, with women and people of color making up the fastest-growing cohorts. Veterans are more likely to join a union than non-veterans, according to the AFL-CIO. In half a dozen states, 25% or more of all actively employed veterans belong to unions.
In the heyday of industrial unionism in the decades following World War II, hundreds of thousands of former soldiers could be found on the front lines of labor struggles in auto, steel, meatpacking, electrical equipment manufacturing, mining, trucking, and the telephone industry. Many World War II vets became militant stewards, local union officers, and, in some cases, well-known union reformers in the United Mine Workers and Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers.
The late labor organizer and author Jane McAlevey argued that the post-war union movement better understood the “strategic value” of veterans than organized labor does today. In her own advice to unions about contract campaign planning, she recommended enlisting former service members whose past “experience with discipline, military formation, and overcoming fear and adversity” could be employed on picket lines and strike committees.
In addition, the high social standing of military veterans in many blue-collar communities can be a valuable PR asset when “bargaining for the public good” or trying to general greater public support for any legislative or political campaign.
A D-Day Rally In DC
The wisdom of that advice has been confirmed repeatedly by the front-line role that veterans in the labor movement have played in resisting Trump administration attempts to cut government jobs and services and strip federal workers of their collective bargaining rights. At agencies like the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), more than 100,000 former service members have been adversely affected by these right-wing Republican attacks.
In response, the AFL-CIO’s Union Veterans Council brought thousands of protestors to a June 6 rally on the Mall in Washington, DC, where they heard speakers including now retired United Mine Workers President Cecil Roberts, a Vietnam veteran.
"We served our country, and now they’re breaking their promise to take care of us. We can’t accept that.”
With local turnout help from the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), National Nurses United, and the Federal Unionist Network (FUN), other anti-Trump activists participated in 225 simultaneous actions around the country, including in red states like Alaska, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Idaho, Kansas, and Kentucky. Some “watch parties,” organized for real-time viewing of the DC event, were held in local union halls to highlight the labor-vet overlap.
James Jones, a FUN member and Gulf War veteran from Boone, North Carolina, traveled all the way to DC on the 81st anniversary of D-Day because he wanted Congress to understand the importance of VA services to veterans like himself.
Jones now works for the National Park Service and belongs to AFGE. He’s urging all his friends who are vets, fellow VA patients, and federal workers to start “going to rallies, and join these groups that are really fighting back. The government needs to keep the promise it made to veterans. We served our country, and now they’re breaking their promise to take care of us. We can’t accept that.”
VA Not for Sale
Private-sector union activists have also been rallying their fellow veterans, inside and outside the labor movement.
Communications Workers Local 6215 Executive vice-president David Marshall, a former Marine, has joined rank-and-file lobbying in Washington, DC against Trump’s cuts in VA staffing and services, calling them “a betrayal of a promise to care for us.”
Marshall is a member of Common Defense, the progressive veterans’ group. Common Defense’s “VA Not for Sale” campaign is fighting the privatization of veterans’ healthcare, which many fear will destroy what Marshall calls the “sense of community and solidarity” that VA patients experience when they get in-house treatment, as opposed to the costly and less effective out-sourced care favored by President Trump. “Regular hospitals don’t understand PTSD or anything else about conditions specifically related to military service,” he says.
An AT&T technician in Dallas, Marshall was also a fiery and effective speaker at that city’s big “No Kings Day” rally last June, when he explained why he and other veterans in labor are opposing MAGA extremism, political and state violence, and related threats to democracy.
“We’ve seen peaceful protestors met with riot gear, and we’ve heard the threats to deploy active-duty Marines against American citizens,” he told a crowd of 10,000. “Let me be clear: Using the military to silence dissent is not strength; it’s tyranny. And no one knows that better than those who have worn the uniform.”
Veterans for Social Change
Marshall is a third-generation union member born and raised in southern West Virginia. His father and grandfather were coal miners; his grandmother Molly Marshall was active in the Black Lung Association that helped propel disabled World War II veteran Arnold Miller into the presidency of the UMW in 1972. During his own 25-year career as a CWA member, Marshall has served on his union’s safety committee, as a delegate to the national convention, and now as an officer of his local.
Marshall belongs to CWA’s Minority Caucus, the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, and the NAACP. Along with Britni Cuington, a Local 6215 steward and Air Force vet, he attended a founding meeting of Common Defense’s Black Veterans Caucus at the Highlander Center in Tennessee.
“We have to stay in lock-step with them and show everyone following the Constitution that we have their back.”
Both Marshall and Cuington have since lobbied against the redistricting scheme concocted by Texas Republicans to secure more House seats in the 2026 midterm elections. Testifying at a public hearing on behalf of the Texas AFL-CIO, Cuington pointed out that “minority veterans already face barriers to access to the services, benefits, and economic opportunities we have earned.” She condemned the state’s new districts as racial gerrymandering in disguise that will disenfranchise “veteran heavy, working class neighborhoods.”
In his role as a CWA organizer, Marshall has signed up 30 Common Defense field organizers around the country—almost all fellow vets—as new members of his local. He’s now helping them negotiate their first staff union contract. In addition, Marshall encourages former service members in other bargaining units to participate in the union’s Veterans for Social Change program, which has done joint Veterans Organizing Institute training with CWA.
One fellow leader of that network is Keturah Johnson, a speaker at the 2024 Labor Notes conference. After her military service, she got a job at Piedmont Airlines in 2013 as a ramp agent, and then became a flight attendant. A decade later, she became the first queer woman of color and combat veteran to serve as international vice president of the 50,000-member Association of Flight Attendants-CWA.
A National Guard Casualty
One CWA member, 24-year-old Andrew Wolfe, a Frontier lineman in Martinsburg, West Virginia, was seriously wounded in late November after being sent as part of the National Guard deployment to Washington, DC. A fellow Guard member was killed. (Their assailant was a mentally ill, CIA-trained former death squad member from Afghanistan, relocated to the US after the collapse of the US-backed government there in 2021.)
According to Marshall, “it’s shameful that they were ever put in that position”—by a Republican governor going along with Trump’s federalization of guard units for domestic policing purposes. “It’s all political theater,” he says. “They were just props, just standing around, with no real mission.”
Along with Common Defense, Marshall praises the six fellow veterans in Congress whose recent video statement reminding active duty service members of their “duty not to follow illegal orders” led President Trump to call them “traitors” guilty of “seditious behavior, punishable by death.”
“We have to stay in lock-step with them and show everyone following the Constitution that we have their back,” Marshall says.
This piece was first published by Labor Notes.
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