Trump Floats The Insurrection Act

Left Paris this morning, still on my flight. I am listening to a book called 1861 by Jay Winik, and its fascinating. We think things are chaotic now, but they were equally chaotic then. Over the past year, I have been immersing myself in history books about Reconstruction— I am finding many similarities to now. If you like reading history, I recommend the book 1861, and any by Heather Cox Richardson, as Reconstruction is her specialty. It helps with context as to what is going on now. As usual, I give you some US news that I saw today that I think is worth being aware of. There’s so much, and obviously I don’t get it all, but it’s something.

Below is a good explanatory video from the NY Times of what Trump is doing with the National Guard, choosing where a crisis is and sending in troops. Historically unprecidented. Watch journalist Helene Cooper’s explanation here.

The military is to protect all Americans, not as a tool to go after those who disagree with Trump. President Johnson deployed the National Guard to protect civil rights protestors during a time of real civil unrest in the 1960’s, and of course there are other examples. Trump’s own appointed judges keep stopping him from sending troops into cities. But today, Trump said he would consider using the Insurrection Act to deploy the military if courts keep preventing him from deploying the National Guard.

“….if I had to enact it, I’d do it, if people were being killed and courts were holding us up, or governors or mayors were holding us up.”

“You look at what’s happening with Portland over the years, it’s a burning hell hole,” Trump added. “And then you have a judge that lost her way that tries to pretend that there’s no problem.”

I read up on the Insurrection Act on Wikipedia, and do not see any recourse or system that can stop him if he decides to do this. He can simply declare an emergency, when in fact there is none.

It seems clear that Trump will not negotiate an end to the government shutdown. This is because he, as guided by the architect of Project 2025, will use this time to further dismantle our government. During the 2024 election, Trump disavowed any connection to Project 2025, a radical Christian Right agenda for the country that was designed by Russell Vought. “Democrat Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM, Vought recommends to be cut, and whether or not those cuts will be temporary or permanent. I can’t believe the Radical Left Democrats gave me this unprecedented opportunity,” Trump posted on social media.

Speaker Johnson simply lies and says, Republicans are working “around the clock” to fix health care; health care is the central basis of the shutdown. He has closed down Congress until Oct 14th. Trump of course also lies about health care, “We want to fix it so it works. It’s not working. Obamacare has been a disaster for the people. So we want to have it fixed so it works.”

Simply not true. It has been working. What we know is that this will hit Americans hard, and his base will take notice.

Epstein files update: Johnson has still not sworn in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, whose vote will be the deciding vote to release the Epstein FIles. Congress is still in recess, at his direction.

Today, Attorney General Pam Bondi is testifying in a combatative hearing in the Senate. She went on the attack and refused to answer questions.

You can read updates here, but the NY Times characterizes it clearly:

“Bondi’s calculated bombast on Tuesday, punctuated by her partisan and personal attacks on Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats, reflects a coordinated effort across the Trump administration to flip potentially damaging moments of public accountability into opportunities to savage political opponents. Oversight hearings have always had elements of political theater. But the approach taken by Bondi, and previously by F.B.I. director Kash Patel, has been different than that taken by any of their predecessors, characterized by a contemptuous refusal to cursorily address inconvenient questions and the use of prepared attacks against Democrats to change the subject and drown out criticism.”

Finally, I just learned that Trump may try to deny back pay to Federal workers. He wakes up in the morning and thinks “what can I do now that is really mean?”

Thanks for being here, see you tomorrow! Happy Tuesday, everybody. I am very grateful that you are here.