The Way To Beat Trump's Coup Attempt: Unity And Solidarity

Yesterday, the Trumpist Regime announced it will send more violent, provocative goons to occupy Portland. In response to widespread fury from the Democratic base that Pelosi and Hoyer do something about Trump's paramilitary forces invading American cities under the guise of the Department of Homeland Security, on Thursday Rep Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), who represents Portland, proposed an amendment to the budget funding the department which would restrict its ability to use the pretext of protecting federal property to prevent constitutionally protected publicly assemblies and free speech.

On his congressional site, Blumenauer wrote about the appropriations bill amendment:

In response to the Trump administration’s continued occupation of Portland, Oregon and the president’s threat to expand such operations to other cities, U.S. Reps. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) and Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR), along with Joaquin Castro (D-TX) and Chuy Garcia (D-IL), announced a new plan to block federal law enforcement officers from intervening in constitutionally protected protests across the country.

In recent weeks, the Trump administration has relied on a section of the United States Code to justify the use of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and other federal law enforcement officers to protect federal facilities. In practice, this has resulted in gross abuses of power toward protestors, including the nightly use of munitions and tear gas. Unidentifiable federal forces in unmarked vehicles have also grabbed protesters off the street in Portland.

On Thursday, the lawmakers filed three amendments to the Fiscal Year 2021 Homeland Security; Department of Defense; and Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies appropriations bills that would further reign-in the Trump administration’s federal law enforcement overreach. These appropriations bills would defund the ability of DHS, DOJ, and DOD to use the pretext of protecting federal property to prevent Americans from carrying out their rights to public assembly and freedom of opinion.

“Our citizens, our local officials, our Congressional delegation and our governor have all asked the Trump administration to stop the lawless occupation of Portland. We will not stand for these abuses of power any longer,” Blumenauer said. “Congress must defund these secret police forces before they wreak havoc and inflame tensions in other cities.”

“We will not let Trump or his administration get away with militarizing our streets,” Bonamici said. “He is using camo-clad federal officers without identification badges to terrorize protestors, violate First Amendment rights, and dramatically escalate tensions in Portland. We will use every tool we have to make sure these officers are removed from Portland, and we will work to prevent him or any other overbearing executive from trying this again here or in other cities.”

While these amendments would not interfere with the authority of the Federal Protective Service to secure federal property, they will ensure that no taxpayer resources can be used to police protestors, unless explicitly requested by local authorities.

If federal support is requested, the amendments would require that non-military law enforcement personnel wear uniforms clearly identifying their agency of affiliation, rather than any uniform resembling a military-style combat uniform worn by the Armed Forces.

Yesterday the L.A. Times' Melissa Etehad and Laura King reported that Trump’s deployment of dubiously legal gestapo-like goon squads to Portland and other U.S. cities has reignited protests this weekend against police brutality and racism-- likely exactly what Trump was aiming for. "[A] string of fresh demonstrations," they wrote, "erupted in other major cities from Seattle to Baltimore, with marchers expressing fury at the specter of heavily armed, unidentified federal officers on community streets and ongoing anger at their initial targets-- police brutality and racism. In Portland early Monday, federal agents in camouflage waded blocks beyond the federal courthouse that the Trump administration has said they are there to protect-- against the wishes of local and state officials-- and pushed back demonstrators who authorities said had breached a fence."

Demonstrations also broke out in cities including Louisville, Kentucky, Chicago, Los Angeles, Richmond, Virginia, and Austin, Texas, where a protest took a fatal turn. Austin police said they were investigating a shooting death on Saturday evening of a man taking part in a Black Lives Matter protest downtown. Police said the slain man, who was apparently armed with a rifle, was shot from inside a vehicle that drove close to the demonstrators. A suspect was detained, police spokeswoman Katrina Ratcliff said.

...The reignited protests-- and the response of authorities with tear gas and rubber bullets-- are the latest incendiary strain on a country still shaken by the May death of George Floyd by Minneapolis police and by generations of police brutality. After protests slowed down considerably in most cities-- except Portland, where they had continued unabated-- they reenergized over the weekend in the wake of President Trump’s move to send federal agents into cities in a strategy that critics say appears aimed at trying to shore up his flagging popularity ahead of the November election.

As Trump tweets all-caps messages about law and order, critics charge that the White House is making use of chaotic images of confrontations on the streets of Portland and elsewhere to whip up fears about a generalized breakdown of order-- mainly in progressive, Democratic-run cities.

The deployment, meanwhile, has instigated a new round of anger that centers on constitutional questions over federal authority and states’ rights. And it plays out amid a pandemic that is battering the economy and sending jobless rates spiraling upward. In some respects, it is reminiscent of the late 1960s, a time of gathering fury and frustration against the White House over the Vietnam War, civil rights and a sense of America drifting further from its ideals and vision of itself.

Over the weekend, Digby explained how Trump and Barr saw Portland-- a city with protests about on thing or another almost every day of the years-- "as an opportunity to use their federal paramilitaries to foment violence and create a backlash among white suburbanites... Everyone who thought Trump was some kind of peacenik had it so wrong. He loves war, he just doesn’t like foreign wars that were started by his predecessors. What he’s always wanted is a civil war. And so he’s trying to start one... I think we all knew on some level the moment they named the agency the Orwellian Department of Homeland Security, that we were building an internal police force. And if you build it, they will use it. They’re using it."

She continued that "Blue America has joined with Oregon SenatorsJeff Merkley and Ron Wyden and others in sponsoring a petition demanding that our government:

• require federal agents and the agency they work for to be clearly identifiable.
• prohibit the federal misuse of unmarked vehicles.
• prohibit federal agents from patrolling city streets, outside of federal property, unless invited to do so by local authorities.
• require agencies to disclose how many personnel have been deployed and for what mission when they’re sent into our cities.

On Sunday, Juan Cole's Informed Comment published a "Waging Nonviolence" essay by George Lakey, Understanding Trump’s game plan in Portland could be the key to preventing a coup in November. "The feds," wrote Lakey, "began to arrive June 27 and have ramped up in numbers since. The Washington Post reported that a curious 53-year-old Navy vet, Christopher David, approached a demonstration where he saw agents acting aggressively. He asked the officers to remember their oaths to protect the Constitution. They attacked him and broke his hand. Agents were assembled from Customs and Border Protection, Transportation Security Administration, Coast Guard, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE]. According to the New York Times, 'The tactical agents deployed by Homeland Security include officials from a group known as BORTAC, the Border Patrol’s equivalent of a SWAT team-- a highly trained group that normally is tasked with investigating drug smuggling organizations, as opposed to protesters in cities.' Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler called it 'an attack on our democracy.' That was before he was tear-gassed on the street in a demonstration. Oregon Attorney Gen. Ellen Rosenblum filed a lawsuit, seeking a restraining order. Gov. Kate Brown, who called Trump’s intervention 'a blatant abuse of power,' said that the protests were starting to ease before federal officers arrived. What might have prompted Trump to act? Why Portland? How might this choice be strategic for Trump, both to bolster his chance to win the election-- and perhaps to remain in office even if he doesn’t win? And what can activists do about it?" [Portland's suit was rejected by a federal judge.]

Trump’s earlier hopes to win based on a strong economy and conquest of the coronavirus have faded. He needs another emotional issue that responds to people’s need for security: public order. The narrative couldn’t be clearer. In new advertising and tweets Trump has argued that Biden “is a harbinger of chaos and destruction.” During a two-week period in July the Trump campaign spent nearly $14 million to air a television spot suggesting that police departments won’t respond to 911 calls if Biden is elected.

Trump’s team figures that a percentage of voters who might otherwise be ambivalent about him can be tipped toward supporting him by appealing to their anxiety. In the 1960s, when the nonviolent civil rights movement moved national public opinion sufficiently to pass two landmark U.S. civil rights acts, I watched a series of riots in Philadelphia and elsewhere, from 1965-66, break the movement’s momentum.

...But why target Oregon for this intervention?

Portland is known nationally for having some activists who try to defend themselves against police violence in a violent way. By sending in federal agents who will escalate violent tactics, there seemed a good chance of getting video footage for Trump’s election campaign, proclaiming him as “the law and order candidate.” With luck they would get vivid pictures at the site of federal buildings that give the feds their protective justification for being there.

A long-time white anti-racist activist and conflict studies professor at Portland State University, Tom Hastings, told me another reason why Portland is an obvious choice for Trump’s team: Oregon’s electoral votes were already certain to go to Biden. It doesn’t matter for November’s election that Oregon’s major elected officials are protesting the federal intervention. Hastings also pointed out that the cities on Trump’s list for more interventions have Democratic mayors.

One key to a winning strategy is to figure out what the opponent’s strategy is and refuse to be manipulated-- in Portland and in the other cities on Trump’s target list.

Federal intervention in Portland has turned the previous hundreds of late-night protesters into thousands. Nonviolent tactics include dancing, a “Wall of Moms,” and orange-clad dads with leaf-blowers, who blow away tear gas.

Other activists have escalated violent tactics in response to the escalation by the feds. According to the New York Times, some of the protesters used lasers while federal officers fired projectiles into the crowd. Court papers claim that a Molotov cocktail was thrown and one protester was charged with hitting an officer with a hammer, while the Times reported multiple efforts by some protesters to set alight the wood on the façade of the federal courthouse. The fire attempt of course reinforces Trump’s dubious claim that the feds need to be there to protect federal property.

Activists everywhere can learn from the major shift in tactics made this year by looking at the national response to the May 25 police killing in Minneapolis of George Floyd. Our spontaneous reactions expressed grief and anger in multiple ways.

The mass media (as usual) gave most headlines to the rioting. That meant, as historical research has shown, the impact of the movement could have set back the struggle for racial justice. However, from the start, the vast majority of people were protesting nonviolently. The more fact-based mass media caught up with that quickly. The rioting quickly ebbed, and the image of the movement shifted to one that fairly consistent uses nonviolent action.

When police in some locations continued to act out violently against the peaceable demonstrators, they only proved the point demonstrators were making. Their brutality displayed on nightly TV boomeranged against them, and more people joined the protests.

Almost all activists found far more effective ways to escalate than using fire and projectiles: They escalated the contrast between their behavior and that of the police.

By channeling rage and grief into nonviolent tactics, the Black Lives Matter surge sustained itself, grew exponentially, introduced new people to the streets and a national conversation about racial injustice. It continues to chalk up a series of limited victories. Bigger victories await even more focused nonviolent campaigning.

Any effective strategizing-- Trump’s or ours-- includes a back-up plan, and my guess is that the Trump team has one. If Portland activists refuse to play into Trump’s hand by adopting a nonviolent discipline, Trump has a list of other places to try. Trump can hope that in Chicago or Oakland activists might not see how much he wants them to fall for his ploy.

When announcing to the media his list of targeted cities, Trump revealed how important this narrative is to him. His next statement was that if Joe Biden is elected, “the whole country would go to hell. And we’re not going to let it go to hell.”

Although Trump would undoubtedly claim voting fraud because of mailed-in ballots, the emotionally more impactful narrative would be “hell” in the form of violent chaos in the streets happening in real time following the vote. He has plenty of armed Trump loyalists ready to do their part. While the courts wrangle about voting fraud, the chaos can serve as Trump’s immediate rationale for staying in the White House in January.

The “violent chaos” narrative is Trump’s growing emphasis, and I think it’s linked to his hope that police will give a break to Trump-followers in the streets. On July 19 on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace, Trump said again that he would not agree ahead of time to obey the results of the election. But then he added, “Biden wants to defund the police.” As I mentioned, his campaign is already investing millions in TV ads attacking Biden’s capacity to support the public’s basic need for safety and security.

Even a man as reckless as Trump likely knows that initiating a Constitutional crisis is an unusually chancy operation. He needs preparation even to have a chance of success. By “success” I mean at least making a deal in which he and his family would avoid the parade of lawsuits that await him when he is no longer in office.

I see him and his team taking a number of steps to prepare. Right now in Portland he’s trying out the narrative that justifies a refusal to exit.

Chaos is good for him. For years he’s been preparing his base to produce an armed force of “irregulars” that can generate chaos. Armed men are showing up in places of political tension and conspicuously being allowed to remain there by local police. Examples include April 30 in Lansing, Michigan, June 2 in Philadelphia and July 20 at the Utah State Capitol.

Trump also needs the legitimacy of a governmental force at his command. On his home ground in Washington, D.C. he experimented with soldiers in combat gear and military helicoptors attacking peaceful demonstrators to clear the way for a photo-op.

That test didn’t work out well. The demonstrators didn’t turn to violence to give him justification, so the media revealed a military behaving disgracefully. Trump received enormous push-back from military leaders. They clearly vetoed further use of the their forces for his own political purposes.

Still wanting the availability of loyal government guns, in Portland he’s testing civilian federal armed agencies that represent governmental legitimacy. Chad Wolf, the acting head of Homeland Security underlined his loyalty when he visited Portland on July 16. How that works out is yet to be seen.

Since Trump does believe in the art of the deal, if a take-over doesn’t work he needs also political enablers with some credibility who will step in to arrange a compromise that protects Trump and his family when they leave. He’s in good shape there. Republican leaders have plenty of practice enabling Trump’s corruption and presumably will be available for this service in the midst of a crisis that’s not turning his way.

...When Germans overthrew would-be dictator Wolfgang Kapp in 1920, they used a defensive strategy. It wasn’t easy. World War I left Germany intensely polarized, much more than the United States is now. The right wing saw an opportunity to try a coup d’etat, backed by some of the armed forces.

Germany’s center read the attempt as an attack on the integrity and security of the system, and responded to the left when it called for a general strike. Along with ordinary people staying home, governmental civil servants failed to show up for work.

Kapp found empty offices, with no one to type out a manifesto saying he was the new ruler of Germany. He needed to bring his daughter to the capitol the next day to do the typing!

Even an economically battered, partly destroyed, and politically divided Germany found so many leaders and ordinary people linked to that sense of integrity and security of the whole system that within a week the coup was defeated by nonviolent defense.

...The United States is a polarized country. The path of least resistance is for each pole to become obsessed by the other: The right wing wastes time learning about and despising us, and vice versa. That’s the trap.

The way out is to pay attention to the center, which especially in defense scenarios, is the prize. Learn about centrists, make friends with them, discuss your points of agreement and disagreement. Your growth as an activist is guaranteed.

Our own fear may urge us to “look good” to our comrades, perhaps by doubling down on whatever campaign we’re now involved with. Our campaigns (for racial justice, immigrant justice, stopping a pipeline, etc.) are in one sense addressing sub-systems. That’s good, because in ordinary times the sub-system offers concrete gains when we win.

However, if my analysis is correct, in this situation what’s in play is the national system as a whole, which will make it more critical for a moment-- and also will make the center available in a new way.

Remind your friends that because the center is easily alarmed by disorder and especially violence, its willingness to defend the whole depends partly on the degree to which it sees “our side” as nonviolent and “the threat” as violent. Because the overwhelming majority of Portlanders have been demonstrating for Black Lives Matter in nonviolent ways, elected officials are mobilizing against Trump’s intervention. If the majority had been violent, Trump’s intervention would be welcomed by the center.

Reduced to bare bones, our three-point plan in this political moment may be: stand with the community as a whole, communicate the power of strategic nonviolent action, and then-- as Hardesty reminds us-- as soon as Trump is really out, we can return to our disagreements and our struggle for revolutionary change!