Militarizing Mourning, Weaponizing Fear
By Ben Cable (Originally Posted on Substack Sep 11, 2025)
Podcast Available: Militarized Responses
Recent headlines, tragic though they may be, are being repurposed by the Trump Administration into political fodder. A horrific bus murder, the slaying of a DOGE individual in D.C., another high-profile campus killing… each becomes an opportunity to push for troop deployments, martial optics, and the erosion of civil liberties. Instead of empathy or justice, we’re served fear and militarism.
Image by freepik
The Deployment Engine
Los Angeles “Riot” Response
In June, after immigration raids sparked protests in L.A., falsely calling it a “riot, Trump federalized the California National Guard and dispatched over 4,000 Guard members plus 700 active-duty Marines, effectively the largest domestic deployment in decades without state approval. The move drew sharp criticism, with Governor Newsom suing and a federal judge eventually ruling the deployment violated the Posse Comitatus Act. However, implementation was temporarily delayed while the administration appealed.
Washington, D.C. Power Grab
In August, Trump declared a “public safety emergency” in D.C., deploying 800 National Guard troops and bringing the Metropolitan Police Department under federal control, actions that bypassed local authority. All this took place even as homicide rates had dwindled by 32% between 2023 and 2024, and continued falling in 2025. Critics called it unprecedented and politically opportunistic.
Expansion Playbook
Plans are afoot to extend similar military-style interventions to other Democratic-led cities such as Chicago, Baltimore, New York, Oakland, and New Orleans. Trump’s rhetoric is steeped in militarism; for Chicago, he even posted an AI-generated “Apocalypse Now” image and threatened “Department of War”-style intervention.
Local officials from Baltimore to Illinois have pushed back, stressing that violent crime has fallen sharply, and that these interventions are politically motivated and legally dubious.
Trump isn’t just seizing on tragedy, he’s manufacturing a political dragnet out of it, using blood and headlines as cover to go after his real targets: the press, Democratic-led cities, and Democratic leaders themselves. Every murder, every crime, every so-called “emergency” becomes less about justice for victims and more about branding opponents as complicit—turning journalists into “enemy propagandists,” mayors into “failed generals,” and lawmakers into “suspects.” It’s not law enforcement, it is vengeance dressed up in uniform, and the endgame isn’t safety, it’s silencing dissent.
Legal Backdrop: A Constitutional Flashpoint
- The Posse Comitatus Act broadly prohibits using the U.S. military in domestic law enforcement absent explicit authorization.
- The Insurrection Act (1807) allows federal troops to intervene in cases of rebellion or insurrection. Still, Trump notably avoids invoking it directly, opting instead for more obscure statutes like 10 U.S.C.§ 12406 and claims of inherent constitutional powers, likely to skirt scrutiny.
- D.C. is unique: as a federal district without a governor, it allows for exceptional federal action that wouldn’t be constitutional in most states. Legal experts warn that extending similar power to other jurisdictions risks serious violations of the 10th Amendment.
The Political Utility of Fear
Trump’s strategy is textbook: amplify tragedy, then offer “security” through militarized optics—troops in the streets, weapons brandished, authority centralized. His framing, “lawlessness,” “migrant invasion,” “chaos,” manufactures consent for a crackdown. Analysts warn that this pattern blurs the lines between military and civilian law enforcement and chips away at democratic norms.
Civil Resistance, Rights in Defense
Across the nation, from D.C.’s “We Are All D.C.” march to defiant protests in L.A., community groups, civil-rights advocates, and city leaders are mobilizing. They decry the loss of autonomy, the criminalization of dissent, and the normalization of military presence in U.S. cities.
Tragedy as a Smokescreen
These tragedies deserve justice, not political exploitation. But for Trump, each headline is a press conference and an opportunity to seize control. Each victim is turned into a vector for martial power. He isn’t solving grief, he’s spinning it into strategy. And unless citizens call him out, democracy will be the casualty.
Please share this article, call your representatives, and remind them they are guardians of your voice. If we surrender that, we aren’t just losing a policy debate—we’re forfeiting the very rule of law.
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