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Yes, the National Guard is already in the streets of Washington, D.C., and count on one thing: thats surely only the beginning. Donald Trump declared a public safety emergency there (think martial law) while announcing a historic action to rescue our nations capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor and worse. No matter that crime in that city only recently sank to a 30-year low. Now, just imagine what hes likely to do if, for instance, Zohran Mamdani were to win the mayoral race in New York City in November. The National Guard in the streets? Count on it! The Marines, too, as in Los Angeles only recently? I wouldnt be faintly surprised.
And for that matter, President Trump may not care to wait for those election results. Hes already muttering about sending the National Guard to liberal northern cities like New York and Chicago. As Robert Reich recently suggested at his Substack, Washington and whatever follows could be little more than trial runs for the full-scale military occupation of the United States. Who cares that the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 specifically prevents a president from using the U.S. military as his own personal domestic police force? After all, President Trump is already preparing more and worse. As he said recently, Were not going to lose our cities over this. This will go further. Were starting very strongly with D.C., and were going to clean it up real quick. Were going to take back our capital. And then well look at other cities also. But other cities are studying what were doing.
Indeed, who isnt? And in that context, let TomDispatch regular Andrea Mazzarino explore the grim subject of the violence that MAGA leaders are likely to commit against whoever crosses, as she puts it, their ravenous path. Tom
The Bully in Donald Trumps Bully Pulpit
How MAGA Uses Violence to Consolidate Power
President Trump, his cabinet, and those who have profited from his rise seem to revel in public displays of cruelty. Take former Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) head Elon Musk, holding a chainsaw at a televised event to celebrate the firing of civil servants. Or Trumps White House sharing a video featuring Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers marching handcuffed immigrants onto a deportation flight, with Jess Glynnes musical hit Hold My Hand playing in the background. Or how about ICE allowing right-wing TV host Dr. Phil to film its sweeping immigration raids for public consumption? And dont forget those federal agents tackling California Senator Alex Padilla to the floor (and handcuffing him!) when he asked a question at a Department of Homeland Security press conference. Or what about during the first Trump presidential campaign, when the then-candidate boasted that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue in New York City and he wouldnt lose a voter?
Violent imagery helped launch this made-for-TV president on his journey into the Oval Office. Now, hes using it to govern with fear.
As journalist Adam Serwer put it, Cruelty is the point. Physical attacks and threats serve both to dehumanize vulnerable Americans (especially people of color) and to suggest what could happen to individuals who speak out against the wealth gaps and other problems of our times.
The underbelly of MAGA malice is, of course, greed. Compare the scenes Ive just mentioned to the president welcoming to his inauguration not public figures who had done positive things for the welfare of Americans, but billionaires who made seven-figure donations to that very event. At the Oval Office, he also loves to host those who have presented him with shiny baubles like Apple CEO Tim Cook, who had given him a gold trophy with his companys logo on it. (Even then, Trump used the occasion to mock his visitors slight frame.)
Or consider Vice President JD Vance, who got the U.S. military to raise the level of a river so he could take a birthday boat trip on it. And that, tellingly, was only weeks after a real flood in Texas had killed more than 100 people, while the administration slow-walked aid in response to the disaster. And dont forget that the president spent about $45 million taxpayer dollars on a military parade on his birthday in Washington, the very city in which hes decried the homeless population as unsightly (and has now sent the National Guard into its streets). Those same funds could have paid for a significant amount of housing for hundreds of people in that same city.
Americas leadership has come unmoored from the values of equality and self-determination outlined in this countrys founding documents. They would prefer to display a let-them-eat-cake America that today boasts more than 800 billionaires (compared with around 60 in 1990), one where the average hourly wage has risen just 20% over the past 35 years less than half what working people need to afford basic necessities like housing, food, and healthcare.
Mind you, Donald Trump is anything but solely responsible for creating such steep inequalities. However, hes shown us how little he cares to make things right by cutting spending on health insurance, schools, farm subsidies, and so much more, while attacking the working poor and those who stand up for them.
American Carnage
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