The Fascist Assault

In mid-July, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) resumed large-scale arrests and deportations in the interior of the U.S. These raids had been temporarily suspended because of the coronavirus pandemic. Since they resumed, ICE has rounded up more than 2,000 people—300 in Los Angeles alone—from their homes, workplaces, and other sites.

In the past week, ICE announced that it had just conducted “targeted enforcement operations” and arrested a total of 100 people in the Chicago and Mecklenburg County, North Carolina (Charlotte), areas. After the Chicago arrests, Tony Pham, a top ICE official, issued a statement that “The individuals arrested by ICE clearly pose a significant threat to public safety, yet Chicago-area sanctuary policies prevent law enforcement agencies from turning these criminals over to the federal government.” Pham released a similar statement for Mecklenburg County, where in 2018 a sheriff was elected whose campaign centered on a promise to limit his agency’s cooperation with ICE, as depicted in the Netflix documentary Immigration Nation.

This past week, the Washington Post reported that the Trump/Pence regime is preparing to intensify and expand these assaults as the scheduled November election nears. They plan an “immigration enforcement blitz ... known informally as the ‘sanctuary op’” beginning in early October. The Post reports that the plan for this “blitz,” which was released to them anonymously, will begin in California, and move on to Denver and Philadelphia—all sanctuary jurisdictions. In Philadelphia, ICE put up six billboards over the weekend to, in their words, “educate the public about the dangers of non-cooperation policies.” The report also said that Chad Wolf, acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, will probably travel to at least one of these locations as the arrests are underway, “to boost President Trump’s claims that leaders in those cities have failed to protect residents from dangerous criminals, two officials said.”

This regime fully intends to drive out millions of immigrants, whatever their legal status, and to prevent others from ever arriving in the U.S. It fully intends to steamroll its Democratic Party opponents who stand in the way of rapidly consolidating fascism. Brazen displays to impose its fascist will on “sanctuary cities,” and to arrest and deport immigrants accused of any minor infractions, are part of an escalating effort by the fascist regime to crush and suppress all opposition, including that within the ranks of the ruling class and its political representatives.

They are very far along in achieving these goals—and they must not be allowed to succeed.

This is horrifying. Truly disturbing. While the rest of us are trying to reignite our shared humanity and care for our neighbors and the most vulnerable among us, ICE is ripping us apart. https://t.co/z0SnOkYaEm #iceraids #familyseparation

— Nisha Anand (@NishaMAnand) March 17, 2020

Sources

ICE resumes nationwide arrests after pausing due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Baltimore Sun, September 14, 2020.

ICE preparing targeted arrests in ‘sanctuary cities’, amplifying president’s campaign theme, Washington Post, September 24, 2020.

ICE announces more targeted arrests of criminal aliens in Mecklenburg County, many shielded by North Carolina non-cooperation policies, ICE News Release, September 28, 2020.

Declined detainer update for Los Angeles County, ICE News Release, September 24, 2020.

What brought Neflix’s ‘Immigration Nation’ to Charlotte? Immigration raids and a new sheriff, Charlotte Observer, August 5, 2020.

Announcements of ICE Enforcement Actions, American Immigration Lawyers Association, September 28, 2020.

Philly and other sanctuary cities could be targets of ICE raids in coming weeks, Philly Voice, October 1, 2020.

ICE launches billboards in Pennsylvania featuring at-large public safety threats, ICE New Release, October 2, 2020

On August 25, Kyle Rittenhouse, a Trump supporter, grabbed his AR-15 and traveled to Kenosha, Wisconsin. People in Kenosha were courageously protesting the vicious assault on Jacob Blake, a 29-year-old Black man, shot seven times in the back by pigs. National Guard troops, police, and armed fascist militia prowled the streets of Kenosha. Not long after Rittenhouse got there, in a scene partially captured on video, he shot and killed two protesters, Anthony Huber and Joseph Rosenbaum, and seriously wounded another.

Within days, fascist-in-chief Trump defended Rittenhouse and his murderous actions.

August 25, 2020, Kyle Rittenhouse in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Photo: AP

This week, NBC News reported that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has ordered federal officials to comment sympathetically on Rittenhouse’s actions. NBC reported that in “internal DHS talking points,” officials questioned about Rittenhouse are directed to say he “took his rifle to the scene of the rioting to help defend small business owners.”

The DHS talking points were described by one former official as “unprecedented.” They take a friendly tone towards an accused killer, instructing officials to tell reporters that “Kyle was seen being chased and attacked by rioters before allegedly shooting three of them, killing two.” The “talking points” are completely in sync with false claims by Rittenhouse’s lawyer and Trump that the killer acted in “self-defense.” Actually, a widely seen video of protesters chasing Rittenhouse was taken after he had allegedly killed one man, and protesters were trying to disarm Rittenhouse.

Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, protesters killed by Trump-supporting militia gunman in Kenosha. Trump defended the killer, falsely claiming he was acting in "self-defense" and attacking the protesters as "violent." Credit: @TKarmen7

Rittenhouse has been charged with five felonies, including first-degree intentional homicide and first-degree reckless homicide. But to white supremacists across the country, he has become a hero for his deadly actions. When his mother and his lawyer appeared at an event of the Waukesha, Wisconsin, Republican Party, they were brought onstage and received a standing ovation. A Christian crowd-funding site in Atlanta has raised over $500,000 for him, and “Free Kyle” T-shirts appeared at a Trump rally in New Hampshire.

Whipping his fascist mobs into frenzied outbursts of racist chants and threats has been a Trump hallmark since his first campaign. Beginning this spring, Trump’s endorsements of armed fascist militias and individuals have become more and more open. He called on fascist militias to “LIBERATE Michigan” and other states; he cheered on a caravan of trucks carrying armed militia members hurling paintballs and pepper spray as they drove into protesters in Portland, Oregon, as “GREAT PATRIOTS”; this week he told the fascist group known as “Proud Boys” to “stand back and stand by.”

The Trump/Pence regime has marshalled the repressive powers of the government to try to crush protests, as it did in cities such as Portland and Washington, DC. They’ve also encouraged fascist goons like Rittenhouse to attack protesters and basically tell them the government has their back. They are aiming to pervert or steal the election to keep Trump in office as Führer. They must be stopped. Answer the call from Refuse Fascism, join in mass, nonviolent protests, day after day, that started on October 3 and continuing until the fascist regime is driven out.

Tongass National Forest, 2004, Alaska. Wikimedia Commons.

A few months after Trump assumed power, he appointed Sonny Perdue to head the Department of Agriculture (USDA). Trump pushed Perdue to open up millions of acres of wilderness in Alaska’s Tongass National Forest to mining, energy, and logging projects. The Tongass is the largest National Forest in the U.S., and one of the largest temperate rain forests in the world.

This month, the USDA released an “environmental impact statement” that provides a “full exemption” to about 55 percent of the Tongass’ irreplaceable vastness from the “Roadless Rule,” a policy that since 2001 had prohibited “development” in 58 million acres of U.S. forests, including over nine million acres in the Tongass. The policy is expected to take effect at the end of October.

Nature photographer John Land Le Coq described the Tongass as a wilderness of “lush and dramatic landscapes, fjords, glaciers, and old growth Sitka spruce, cedar, and hemlock trees that grow many hundreds of years old and nourish vast networks of streams and rivers incubating five salmon species, steelhead and trout.” It is one of the planet’s largest remaining “carbon sinks”—natural areas that store carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and are crucial in soaking up some greenhouse gas emissions. The Tongass stores about the equivalent of eight percent of the carbon stored in all the forests of the lower 48 U.S. states. Climate scientists have pointed out that logging in the Tongass “would release harmful amounts of greenhouse gases back into the atmosphere at a time when the warming planet is already fueling deadly wildfires, storms and heat waves.”

The Tongass is also the traditional home to the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian people. An essay published in the Anchorage Daily News opposing development in the Tongass said, “We are diverse peoples, but if there is one thread that unites the tribes and people of Southeast Alaska, it is our relationship and connection to our sacred places known today as the Tongass. Our health and well-being, identity and worldview are intricately woven into the fabric that is our homeland.”

Perdue is one of several Christian fascists in Trump’s cabinet. Along with them, he is a regular participant in Bible meetings of Capitol Ministries, and thinks unrestrained ravaging of the earth is a mandate from God. When he was named by Trump to head the USDA, Perdue’s son, Jim Perdue, a Baptist minister, told a Southern Baptist website that the “president is calling him to serve. But most importantly, he feels like God is calling him to serve.” A sense of how he understands that “service” is expressed in a quote from the head of Capitol Ministries: “In God’s hierarchy of creation man is atop and is to rule over all of creation and subdue it (Genesis 1:25 & 28).”

Capitalists and many of their political representatives, Republican and Democrat, have been pushing to “open up” the Tongass to rapacious exploitation for years. Trump and his regime have pushed this into overdrive. Here in a “clearcut” section of the Tongass National Forest, destruction has begun.

Capitalists and many of their political representatives, Republican and Democrat, have been pushing to “open up” the Tongass to rapacious exploitation for years. Trump and his regime have pushed this into overdrive. Their drive to plunder and exploit the Tongass will scar a unique jewel of unmatched beauty. It will inflict further violence on the lives of Native peoples. It will accelerate the catastrophic environmental destruction of the planet and all things that live on it.

As Bob Avakian has written, among its many other crimes the Trump/Pence regime is “... defying the science of climate change, attacking the science of evolution, and repudiating the scientific method overall...” The need to drive it from power is of the utmost urgency for humanity and the whole planet.

Sources

Trump Administration Releases Plan to Open Tongass Forest to Logging, New York Times, September 24, 2020.

USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue Aims to ‘Lead as Jesus Would’, Christian Broadcast Network, May 23, 2018.

What is a Carbon Sink?, Live Science, December 23, 2012.

Respect Alaska tribes’ rights on the Tongass question, Anchorage Daily News, October 18, 2019.

Why To Love This Place, Alaska Wilderness League.

Keep the Tongass Roadless, Fish Pond USA.

The Trump Administration Moves to Open Alaska’s Tongass National Forest to Logging, Inside Climate News, September 26, 2020.

In Florida, an amendment restored voting rights to ex-felons. Here, a young woman, who lost her right to vote after a felony conviction for driving with a suspended license in 2011, registers to vote in the coming election. Photo: AP

Michael Bloomberg, a former Democratic Party presidential candidate, along with John Legend, MTV, the Miami Dolphins, and others, helped lead an effort that raised about $20 million to pay court fines for 32,000 Florida felons who have completed their prison time and registered to vote. They did this after a federal court in September upheld a Florida law that requires released felons to pay all their remaining fines and court fees before they can vote (see “Florida Moves to Deny Voting Rights to Hundreds of Thousands of People Convicted of Felonies”). On September 23, Florida’s attorney general called for the FBI and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to begin investigations into whether Bloomberg’s effort included “potential violations of election laws.”

The head of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC), which directs the program funded by Bloomberg’s efforts, made clear that the money would enable people to vote for the candidates they choose. But Matt Goetz, a rabid fascist congressman from Florida, snarled on Fox News that the “Bloomberg team” is raising money “specifically targeting African-Americans because they believe in Florida, African-Americans will vote 90-95% for Joe Biden.” A lawyer who served in the Obama White House tweeted that Florida's governor is going “full Jim Crow” in the state's attempt to prevent thousands of people from voting.

The battle over who can vote in Florida, considered a key “swing state” in presidential elections, is a concentrated expression of all-out efforts by the Trump/Pence regime and the white supremacist Republican Party to suppress the votes of Black and Latino people across the country. As the Associated Press wrote, “...the (Trump) campaign and its GOP allies are going to new lengths to contest election procedures county-by-county across battleground states.” These efforts are intended to maximize confusion and frustration about the election, create doubts about whatever outcome emerges, and through that to delegitimize any result that isn’t a Trump victory—as a central component of the fascist drive to consolidate power.

Sources

Mike Bloomberg raises $16 million to allow former felons to vote in Florida, Washington Post, September 22, 2020.

In big states, tiny counties, Trump attacking voting rules, Associated Press, October 2, 2020.

‘Going Full Jim Crow’: Attorneys Hammer Florida AG for Criminally Investigating Bloomberg’s Payment of Ex-Felons’ Fines, Law and Crime, September 23, 2020.

Florida Attorney General Asks FBI To Investigate Bloomberg For Elections Fraud, WUSF Public Media, September 24, 2020.

Trump says he will send law enforcement, US attorneys to polls in November to prevent fraud, The Hill, August 20, 2020.

Bloomberg, others rack up $20M to register Florida felons after time served, Politico, September 22, 2020.