For more than eight years now, Trump and the right wing media have whipped up fear over the supposed horrors of our lawless, crime-ridden cities plagued by raping, murdering, and pillaging, “illegal,” scary immigrants pouring across our borders, the “other” whom we should fear. It’s a powerful, frightening image that, for many believers, justifies extraordinary measures, actions that might, just maybe, sweep up a few relative innocents. After all, you can’t make an omelette without breaking some eggs. What could go wrong when you rob people accused of crimes of the opportunity to argue their innocence in front of a judge? What could go wrong when Stephen Miller and the “brownshirts” of ICE are given the green light by the Trump regime to apprehend and summarily deport people based on third party accusations and soccer tattoos? We’re finding out as chilling stories of disappearances, including local ones, are reported in media, which are, for now, still free.
The Trump regime is desperately avoiding the Constitutionally-assured right to due process of law in these deportations by flooding the zone with propaganda—effectively trying these cases in the court of curated public opinion rather than courts of law. The index case for this is that of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the man who a lawyer for the Trump regime admitted was mistakenly deported to El Salvador’s CECOT concentration camp.
Trump, who for decades has insisted that his personal judgment of guilt of accused people is flawless (see The Central Park 5), made a bid to convince his base that Abrego Garcia was so obviously a bad guy that he deserved deportation without any opportunity to appeal his innocence. On Facebook a photo appeared of Trump holding a framed photo of four knuckles tattooed with M,S,1, and 3. The photo was offered as conclusive evidence of Abrego Garcia’s gang membership and allegiance. How do we know that these were Abrego Garcia’s knuckles? Simple. We are asked to trust in the impeccable veracity of Donald Trump [sarcasm alert]. A microsecond’s reflection should set off alarm bells. A photograph like this fails every test of the rules of evidence in an impartial court of law. Such a photograph is blatant Trumpian propaganda.
The Trump regime is asking us to accept its unilateral judgment in the interest of expediency. This expedience-driven extrajudicial determination of guilt is the stuff of every dictator’s playbook. It is also the stuff of our own sordid history of lynchings, punishment often carried out by a whipped-up mob on a presumption of guilt without the benefit of a trial.
The visual of the alleged knuckles of Abrego Garcia made the rounds of social media. There it whipped up the Trumpian faithful into righteous umbrage that such an obviously guilty person as Abrego Garcia could be defended by anyone. Trump was confronted in an interview by ABC News’ Terry Moran. Moran insisted that the image was photoshopped. Characteristically, Trump doubled down, insisting that the image was 1) of Abrego Garcia’s knuckles and 2) that the image was not photoshopped. If you have the stomach for it, you can watch the section of the interview that deals with deportations on YouTube starting a 14:30. (The specific part concerning the photo begins at 16:40.) But really, the fundamental and chilling issue here is not the veracity of a photoshopped propaganda image of a man’s knuckles discussed in a TV interview. No, IT IS THE SUPERIMPOSITION OF A DICTATOR’S AND HIS FACILITATOR’S JUDGMENTS OVER THE RULE OF LAW.
I’m no fan of Joe Rogan’s intellect (see Trump, Rogan, and Lake Tulare), but even Joe Rogan broke rank with Trump and nailed the real issue. As written by Brian Linder [the punchline, as I see it, is at the bottom where I’ve bolded it]:
Actually, he [Rogan] didn’t just break rank, he issued a stark warning.
Rogan took the stance that deportation — such as the case with Abrego Garcia — without due process is an “over-correction.”
“So the over-correction is the lack of due process,” he said. “The over-correction is to round them all up, ship them to jail.”
Rogan then laid out a scenario to make his point.
“What if you are an enemy of, let’s not say any current president,” he said. “Let’s pretend we got a new president, totally new guy in 2028, and this is a common practice now of just rounding up gang members with no due process and shipping them to El Salvador. You’re a gang member. No I’m not. Prove it. What? I got to go to court. No. No due process.
“That is dangerous,” Rogan warned. “We got to be careful that we don’t become monsters while we’re fighting monsters.”
Hats off to the honest assessment of Joe Rogan.
Keep to the high ground,
Jerry