A version of this story appeared in the What Matters of CNN. To get it in your reception box, register for free here.
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Donald Trump’s White House has a threatening message for anyone could even be perceived to be disagreeing with the president: no. Or else.
Even if he promised to put an end to what he considered as a “armament” of the Ministry of Justice, Trump treats people who do not agree with him more like “enemy from the insideHe spoke during the presidential campaign.
The president has crossed the unusual measure this week of the publication of official proclamations ordering Federal surveys People who worked in his first administration.
He demanded the free work of law firms that represented his perceived enemies, threatening to descent of judgesExpeating the demonstrators of the campus and much more.
The underlying message, for anyone who has not put all these things together, is that dissent will not be tolerated under Trump 2.0.
Chris Krebs supervised Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Cisa, during Trump’s first term and said that the election that Trump lost was free from fraud or falsification.
That’s exactly why Trump wants him to investigate. As Trump says in the proclamation, Krebs “has tried and without foundation denied the 2020 fake and stolen elections”. There is still no convincing evidence that the 2020 elections have been faked or stolen, but the effect on Krebs cybersecurity activities could be real. And the message to anyone who is currently working to guarantee American elections is undoubtedly: there will be consequences to cross the president, even when the president alleged an electoral fraud that does not exist.
The other individual Trump targeted with a proclamation is Miles Taylor, the former head of internal security who wrote, first, during Trump’s first term that there was a “resistance” among government officials working to make the president’s impact move.
Trump has not mentioned any specific law, one or the other man could have been violated, but he said in the oval office that he thinks that Taylor is guilty of betrayal.
“He uses all public and private means to try to attack these people, humiliate these people, bring them to come to kiss the ring,” said the chairman of the room judicial committee Jamie Raskin, in a video published on social networks.
Trump takes no chance with an effort of resistance during his second term. Its federal workers layoffs, the elimination of entire agencies and punitive fire should be a sufficient message.
Key officials, in particular, resigned in key moments rather than following the guidelines with which they disagreed.
In the oval office, when he signed these proclamations targeting Krebs and Taylor, Trump boasted that law firms who represented his opponents are now aligning to carry out free work on his behalf after threatening reprisals in decrees.
His assistant Stephen Miller said that companies have accepted nearly $ 700 million in free work for Trump to avoid punitive proclamations. Some law firms, especially Jenner & Blockcontinued Trump’s efforts to punish them. A judge said the ordinances were probably unconstitutional, but that many other companies fold the knee and agreed to do free work on behalf of Trump.
There are several other examples of Trump using the weight of the government to target people and the places it is opposed.
The administrator of the small businesses, Kelly Loeffler, announced the closure of several offices in the cities “which do not comply” to the efforts of the ice and move them elsewhere. The targeted cities are Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Denver, New York and Seattle.
HHS secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, did not mention the immigration policy when he announced in an editorial in New York Post that HHS would close half of its 10 regional offices. But targeted offices are a similar list: Boston, Chicago, New York, San Francisco and Seattle. Atlanta will keep its HHS regional office, as well as Kansas City, Dallas, Denver and Philadelphia.
Cornell and Northwestern have joined an increasing list of elite research universities that have had hundreds of millions, or even billions of dollars in frozen research grants. The administration demanded that schools end the diversity programs and criticized students’s protests against the war in Gaza.
To legal immigrants and students who have led campus demonstrations: we will expel you
CNN has identified hundreds of students whose visas have been dismissed, but the most notable example of a targeted demonstrator for the expulsion is Mahmoud Khalil, a permanent legal resident who has been detained in Louisiana for more than a month. A Immigration judge in Louisiana On Friday, Khalil can be expelled, although it probably does not happen immediately because there is also a current case in New Jersey. Khalil was arrested in New York, not in Louisiana, and CNN reported That defenders of immigrants’ rights fear that the administration to actually buy judges by moving detainees like Khalil from northeast to the south.
The House Republicans do not seem to have the votes, but Trump and Musk have publicly called to judges who make the decisions with which they disagree with be dismissed. Chief judge John Roberts has published a rare reprimand of this language. The Chamber had the votes this week to adopt a bill aimed at preventing judges from the district courts from issuing injunctions nationally against Trump’s policies, but it faces an uncertain future in the Senate.
The Supreme Court said this week that Trump’s administration was to facilitate the return of a father from Maryland that a lawyer for the Ministry of Justice admitted to the court was wrongly expelled. The lawyer who admitted was suspended, according to the Attorney General Pam Bondi.
“He shouldn’t have asserted him, if that’s what he was going to do,” she said on Fox News.
All this will have an effect across the country because people who do not agree with Trump have trouble understanding how to record their opposition.
Michael Williams of CNN went to a demonstration supporting immigrants in Dallas and heard an organizer say that the people who participate must be ready to be expelled.
“As organizers who feel obliged to protest to date, we must accept that we can be subject to suppression,” said Jaclyn McJunkin, an organizer and activist of immigration rights, to the group of around 50 people, According to Williams report. “It’s just something you need to kiss, ok?” Because if you don’t do it, then they win, right?