Deployment of National Guard in LA is another step toward martial law

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Deployment of National Guard in LA is another step toward martial law

This past weekend, Donald Trump wielded his dictatorial hammer once again when he deployed the National Guard to LA to allegedly “protect” Immigration Control Enforcement (ICE) officers from protestors who were protesting his immigration policies, but the reality is that he is merely taking the next step toward an eventual declaration of martial law and the suspension of the Constitution.

Taking only 24 hours to make the call, and without any input from California officials, Trump sent 2000 National Guard troops to LA as a down payment for launching future dictatorial actions (via LA Times):

It took less than 24 hours of isolated protests in Los Angeles County for Trump, more aggressive than ever in his use of executive power, to issue a historic order.

“The federal government will step in and solve the problem,” he said on social media Saturday night, issuing executive action not seen since civil unrest gripped the nation in the 1960s.

It was the latest expression of a president unleashed from conventional parameters on his power, unconcerned with states’ rights or the proportionality of his actions. And the targeting of a Democratic city in a Democratic state was, according to the vice president, an intentional ploy to make a political lesson out of Los Angeles.

The pace of the escalation, and the federal government’s unwillingness to defer to cooperative local law enforcement authorities, raise questions about the administration’s intentions as it responds to protesters. (Emphasis mine)

In his memo deploying the National Guard, Trump threatened to have the Pentagon to deploy active-duty military to Los Angeles when he wrote that “the Secretary of Defense may employ any other members of the regular Armed Forces as necessary to augment and support the protection of Federal functions and property in any number determined appropriate in his discretion.” Yesterday, after roughly 48 hours of being “on high alert,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth did his master’s bidding when he mobilized nearly 1000 marines to LA to “support” the National Guard with their police actions.

Ironically, JD Vance called the anti-ICE protesters “insurrectionists” — ironic because that word is forbidden to be used when discussing the thousands of rioters who invaded the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 — and the word has been repeatedly and intentionally used by MAGA leadership, including Stephen Miller (Trump’s chief advisor on immigration). In this case, using the word “insurrectionists” could be used by Trump to build his case for invoking the Insurrection Act, an action that would enable him to suspend the Posse Comitatus Act, an 1878 law that prohibits the use of the military as law enforcement in state and local matters, and declare martial law.

The plan to declare martial law and a suspend the Constitution began with Trump’s Inauguration Day executive order declaring a national emergency on the southern border, an order requiring Secretary of Defense (Pete Hegseth) and Secretary of Homeland Security (Kristi Noem) to provide a joint report updating conditions at the border along with their recommendations on whether invoking the Insurrection Act might be necessary.

“Within 90 days of the date of this proclamation, the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of Homeland Security shall submit a joint report to the President about the conditions at the southern border of the United States and any recommendations regarding additional actions that may be necessary to obtain complete operational control of the southern border, including whether to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807.”

Back in April, Trump sent out a memo announcing that he would be giving the military control of “federal land” along the border — a deceptive ploy to hide the fact that the land they will control is only a 60-foot-wide strip of land known as the Roosevelt Reservation which exists on the America side of the border in California, Arizona, and Texas. In other words, Trump essentially turned this narrow strip of land into a military base. (via defenseone.com):

The memo directs the Interior Department to allow the Defense Department to have jurisdiction over portions of federal land known as the Roosevelt Reservation, excluding any Native American reservations.

By creating a military buffer zone that stretches across the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona, California and New Mexico, it means any migrant crossing into the United States would be trespassing on a military base, therefore allowing active-duty troops to hold them until U.S. Border Patrol agents arrive.

National and military experts have raised concerns that giving control over the land to the military could violate the Posse Comitatus Act, an 1878 law that generally prohibits the military from being used in domestic law enforcement.

The Friday memo instructs its “phased” implementation within 45 days and says it could be expanded over time. The memo is directed at the secretaries of the departments of Defense, Interior, Agriculture and Homeland Security. (Emphasis mine)

Expanded over time? Of course, it will expand over time to include areas of the country that have nothing to do with securing the border — as we are witnessing in real time in LA.

Once enacted, the Insurrection Act of 1807 will empower Trump to deploy the U.S. military and National Guard to suppress insurrections or domestic violence. And as we saw on January 6, 2020, the criteria concerning what constitutes an insurrection or domestic violence is open to interpretation.

But invoking the Insurrection Act is insufficient on its own, so Trump will need to take steps that enable him to use the military as his personal police force in all 50 states. This is when Trump will “expand” his power by declaring martial law. When that happens, he will be free to use of the military domestically across the whole nation.

Out of necessity, declaring martial law will also result in the suspension of the Constitution. Say goodbye to liberty and a further erosion of rights, such as freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and the right to due process. Additionally, military commanders will replace civilian authorities (local police) and courts would be replaced by military tribunals.

Some of the other steps taken by Trump in the name of immigration control and in defiance of the Constitution include:

Despite denials by Trump’s inner circle and the talking heads that comprise the faux conservative media, Trump himself revealed during the 2024 election that he would use the military as part of the Project 2025 agenda.

Project 2025 is a 900-page blueprint laying out Trump’s first 180 days, and the overall theme of the document is an expansion of presidential power that leads to the creation of a police state capable of completely destroying liberty in America by massively expanding and centralizing executive power in a way that can only be described as tyranny.

Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts — the architect behind Project 2025 and a current member of the Trump administration — prophesied in a New York Times Magazine interview the events we are now witnessing:

  • Trump will successfully reshape government by using the military to enforce his deportation scheme and use his “national emergency” declaration to build massive new detention camps to hold illegals indefinitely.

While illegal immigration is a problem, Trump’s use of the National Guard and the military in this fashion can only be described as a police state tactic as we learned from Trump’s “border czar” and the former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Tom Homan. In an appearance on FOX News shortly after the November 2024 election, Homan reiterated his intention to “take the handcuffs off ICE” and ramp up arrests but noted that he will need more resources (such as the Department of Defense) to carry it out and said there are “a lot of what-ifs.”

“So, I’ve been asked a thousand times, how many people can you remove the first year? Well, how many agents do I have?” he said. “Can we bring rehired agents back; the ones that are retired bring them back and rehire them. How many buses do I have? How much money do I have for airplanes? Right? Can DOD assist? Because DOD can take a lot off our plate. There’s a lot of what ifs …” (Emphasis mine)

Using the military to “secure” the border and invoking the Insurrection Act are inevitable under Donald Trump, but his deployment of the National Guard to LA is simply another step toward martial law.

 

David Leach is the owner of the Strident Conservative and the author of The New Axis of Evil: Exposing the Bipartisan War on Liberty. He holds people of every political stripe accountable for their failure to uphold conservative values, and he promotes those values instead of political parties.

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