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Protests Expected to Continue Nationwide

Although L.A. was quiet yesterday, the protests against Donald Trump's immigration policies are spreading to other cities on account of the deployment of the Marines, probably in violation of the Posse Comitatus Act. That law bans the use of the U.S. Armed Forces for domestic law enforcement under normal circumstances. After the administration deployed the Marines to California, the spread of the protests was probably inevitable.

There were protest demonstrations yesterday in Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Eugene, Louisville, Memphis, New York City, Philadelphia, Raleigh, San Antonio, San Francisco, Seattle, and St. Louis, organized by different groups and under different banners.

The Marines in California did not interact with the protesters yesterday in Los Angeles. They were receiving training on what they should do and what powers they have. They may detain people, but not arrest them and must turn them over to the local police as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was in the Senate informing the senators that Trump's June 7 executive order federalizing the National Guard in California was a template for doing it in other states. If the protests continue to spread, Trump may order the National Guard federalized in many states and may end up fighting battles in many states at the same time. Since federalized Guard units will probably be called up against the will of the governor in all the blue states, Hegseth will be in charge. Needless to say, he is totally unprepared for this and if people are killed, this will be on Hegseth's plate.

If the protests are still going on Saturday, there could be battles in many places along with the planned "No Kings" demonstrations. And all this while tanks are rolling through (and tearing up) the streets of D.C. It will be a sight no one has ever seen in the U.S. before.

The National Guard has been called out many times by governors to quell demonstrations, but they are usually localized, not nationwide like they could be by Saturday. (V) clearly remembers taking this photo of lovely Berkeley when he was a grad student there in 1969. In April 1969, students took over an unused piece of university land, began planting flowers, shrubs, and trees, and called it People's Park. About 1,000 people became directly involved. Two weeks later the university called the local police to clear the park and ordered a fence built around it to keep everyone out. That led to protests, giving then-Gov. Ronald Reagan the excuse he needed to call up 2,700 National Guard troops to teach the dirty smelly hippies in Berkeley a lesson. Sound familiar? One person was killed and another permanently blinded when he took a direct hit in the face with birdshot.

National Guard occupying Berkeley, with a line of probably 20 soldiers forming a perimeter on the left side of the photo, and a handful of people standing around on the right side

Fifty-six years later, the university has started building a much-needed dorm on it.

Democratic politicians are in a bind here. While they may sympathize with the protesters, they probably understand that defending lawbreakers is not popular with the public, and people who have entered the country by just sneaking in have broken the immigration laws. In addition, sticking up for protesters against law enforcement is rarely a winning issue, especially if some of the protesters lit cars on fire or committed other illegal acts. But letting Trump dominate the news and hiding under their desks makes them look like cowards to many voters, especially young ones.

Trump has used images of burning cars, damaged property, and masked protesters carrying foreign flags to try to get public opinion on his side. Democrats don't know how to fight back except to give "process" arguments, like the president should not be bypassing the governor and deploying the Marines is illegal. To some people, these seem like minor technicalities, with the real issue being deporting criminals. Of course, Trump could overplay his hand and make small incidents into big crises and offend the public, but doing nothing and hoping that Trump makes a mistake is a weak hand.

It would be foolish to speculate what will happen if protests break out all over the country and merge with the planned "No Kings" demonstrations Saturday while tanks are rumbling through D.C. It depends on what Trump decides to do and how skillful Hegseth is at managing whatever orders Trump gives him. If things go south fast (especially if people are killed by the Guard or the Marines), it could become the defining moment of Trump v2.0. (V)

Abbott Deploys the National Guard in Texas

While there are unresolved issues about the conditions under which a president can federalize the National Guard, governors can deploy the Guard pretty much whenever they want to. So, Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) has decided he wants to. Protests are happening all over Texas (and elsewhere) and Abbott hates being upstaged by what is going on in California. After all, he was one of the first protesters about immigration, spending $148 million of Texas taxpayers' money to ship busloads of immigrants from Texas to Chicago, New York, D.C., and other blue cities. He never bothered to explain to his constituents how this improves their lives, though. It's probably obvious to them, although not to us.

There have been peaceful demonstrations in San Antonio and organizers have promised more. This is what Abbott wants to suppress by calling out the National Guard. In Austin as well, there were demonstrations in front of the state Capitol Monday and again yesterday. Local police used pepper spray and flash-bang grenades on the protesters and a dozen were arrested.

Two Democratic congressmen from Texas, Reps. Joaquin Castro and Greg Casar, denounced Abbott for his move. Their statement read, in part: "By needlessly deploying the National Guard, Gov. Abbott is escalating tensions rather than promoting safety and calm." (V)

Hegseth Testifies Before the Senate

Pete Hegseth's hearing before the Senate went about as well as any Fox entertainer's would, which is to say: pretty poorly. The senators had many questions and he had few answers. He is clearly in over his head and probably prays daily, if not hourly, that he will never have to make any tough decisions that could have visible consequences for which he would get the blame.

The senators peppered him with questions from all sides. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) asked about the war in Ukraine. In particular, he asked Hegseth which side he wanted to see win. Hegseth refused to answer. McConnell then said: "America's reputation is on the line. Will we defend democratic allies against authoritarian aggressors?" Hegseth didn't answer.

Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) scolded Hegseth for being unacceptably slow preparing the DoD budget. In fact, she is still waiting for some information. She also noted that the budget represented a decreased buying power compared to last year's budget, when inflation is taken into account. Again, he didn't have a proper answer.

And there were more. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) questioned him about Greenland. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) bashed him for cutting military medical research while spending $45 million for a big parade on Trump's birthday. Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) berated him for sending active-duty Marines to Los Angeles, saying that it undermines the readiness of the U.S. military. Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) wanted to know what it will cost to refurbish the royal jet the Qatari government gave Trump for use as Air Force One. Hegseth refused to answer Reed, who fired back: "Why can't it be revealed? This is the Appropriations Committee of the United States Senate. We appropriate the money that you will spend."

All in all, the hearing showed that Hegseth is simply not up to the job of being secretary of defense, just in case anyone didn't know. (V)

House Republicans Are Warning Thune about "Gimmicks"

In order for the Senate to use the budget reconciliation procedure to avoid a filibuster, the budget bill must not increase the federal deficit above the baseline after 10 years. The rub is what is used for the baseline. The 2017 tax cuts are set to expire next year. If they do, taxes will go up and the government will have more revenue. Senate Republicans want to use a kind of magic accounting that deviates from normal accounting to make sure they can get this year's tax cuts through without violating the reconciliation rules. Many House Republicans see this as a scam and haven't fallen for it.

In fact, 37 House members, led by Rep. Lloyd Smucker (R-PA), sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) warning him not to play games with them. They want the deficit to go down, or at least not go up when actual accounting rules are used. They don't want the deficit to grow and for that to be covered up by some magic accounting rules. But making the budget revenue-neutral would require either giving up some of Donald Trump's pet projects, like no tax on tips or overtime, or cutting Medicaid and other programs more deeply. What they don't want is what they call "budget gimmicks" that hide actual increases in the deficit by using shady accounting rules. Literally, they said: "Offsets must come from permanent reforms that make the budget more sustainable, not timing shifts or other budget gimmicks." They are on to the Senate's game and don't like it. Since the Senate bill will have to be approved by the House, the hardliners are threatening to vote "no" on the revised bill if the accounting used hides the real increase in the deficit. This could set off a confrontation between the chambers.

Among the signatories are Chair of the House Budget Committee Jodey Arrington (R-TX), Vice-chair of the House Republican Conference Blake Moore (R-UT) and Chair of the Freedom Caucus Andy Harris (R-MD). These are all hardliners.

Meanwhile, a number of senators want to make expensive changes of one kind or another—for example, not slashing Medicaid as much as the House did. Or not cutting SNAP (food stamps) as much as the House did. The SNAP program feeds more than 40 million Americans and some senators are loathe to cut it as drastically as the House did.

In short, the sausage is being made right now and, as is usually the case, it's not pretty. If the Senate does anything that explodes the deficit even more, the resulting bill may have a lot of trouble in the House. The senators have now been warned. (V)

Trump Renames the Army Bases Biden Changed

A number of U.S. military bases, especially in the South, were named after Confederate generals. Joe Biden decided that it was wrong to name military bases after people who actively waged war against the United States. There is no Fort Hitler or Fort Yamamoto. There was a Fort Pickett, named after Confederate Maj. Gen. George Pickett, famous for charging at Gettysburg. Biden ordered Fort Pickett renamed Fort Barfoot after Tech. Sgt. Van Barfoot, who received the medal of honor for heroism in Italy during WW II.

One of Donald Trump's guiding principles is that everything Biden did is wrong and needs to be reversed. So he decided to go back to the original fort names, just to spite Biden.

But Trump was apparently a little nervous about re-naming the forts after the Confederate generals, even though that is very much what (some of) his base wants. He'd open himself up to criticism along the lines of "of course an insurrectionist likes other insurrectionists," plus Congress passed a resolution back in 2020 calling for the renaming. While Trump could have shrugged off the former (as he often does with other such criticism) and while he could have dared Congress to take him to court (as he often does with... well, everything), he had his underlings look for other soldiers with the same last name as the dead Confederate general and then named the forts after those other soldiers. For example, Fort Barfoot (née Fort Pickett) will now be Fort Pickett again, only named after 1st Lt. Vernon Pickett, who received the Distinguished Service Cross for throwing grenades at machine gunners while pinned down by enemy fire during World War II. In a way, you can view this as TACO. Trump could have renamed Fort Barfoot after George Pickett again, but he didn't want to take the flak that would have accompanied that. So, he took the weaselly way out.

Here are the other six forts that Trump has ordered renamed:

If a Democrat is elected president in 2028, will he or she rename all the forts again? Will renaming forts (and, for that matter, boats) be something every new president does? Probably not. Some of Trump's picks were a little far-fetched, but all of them had distinguished military careers. Trump probably didn't have much against Biden's honorees, he just wanted to erase Biden's marks. The intellectual model here is a squirrel marking its territory by spraying urine over that of the squirrel whose territory it previously was. (V)

Judge Rules that Palestinian Activist Cannot Be Held in Prison

Donald Trump clearly doesn't like pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil, so he had him arrested and imprisoned on the grounds that he is somehow compromising foreign policy. Khalil sued. Now U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz, a Joe Biden appointee, ruled that Khalil is no threat to U.S. foreign policy and must be released. However, the ruling does not go into effect until Friday to give the government time to appeal for an emergency stay. This is yet another case in which judges have ruled that the arbitrary and capricious actions Trump is taking cannot stand.

However, federal officials may have discovered an escape hatch. They claim Khalil completed his green card application inaccurately, which could result in the green card being revoked, thus subjecting Khalil to deportation. They claim that he failed to list some organizations of which he was a member. That aspect of the case was not addressed by the judge.

Khalil took part in pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University, where he is a graduate student. Since taking part in a peaceful demonstration is protected by the First Amendment, the Trump administration had to come up with some other basis on which to arrest him. They decided that threatening the country's foreign policy sounded like a good idea, but the judge didn't buy it.

Additionally, the judge suggested that the law used to arrest Khalil may itself be unconstitutional.

This ruling is a major victory for green-card-holding activists of all stripes who want to protest something the government is doing that they don't like. If it stands up, the government will not be able to arrest them on bogus charges that they are interfering with U.S. foreign policy, which is such a broad accusation as to be completely meaningless. (V)

Is Plain Old Garden-Variety Corruption Alive and Well?

With all the momentous law-breaking going on in the nation's capital, like violations of habeas corpus and the Posse Comitatus Act, and so much more, there has been barely any attention paid to normal, everyday corruption not involving the Constitution or national security. But it's still there.

Specifically, another young female intern at NOTUS scored a scoop when she discovered a filing by Pete Hegseth (yes, THAT Pete Hegseth), stating that on March 24, nine days before Donald Trump announced the tariffs on countries and penguins, he (Hegseth) sold off 29 blocks of stock he owned, including Amazon, Apple, Walmart and other companies whose stock would nosedive on April 2.

What made Hegseth suddenly decide to sell so much stock? Could he have known about the impending tariffs and then traded based on that knowledge? That is called insider trading and is one of the SEC's little no-no's. Did the stock fairy visit him on March 24 and give him a tip? Is he clairvoyant? Maybe he didn't know anything specific and just had a gut feeling that Trump was going to do something that would freak out the stock market.

Still, Delaney Marsco, ethics director of the Campaign Legal Center, said: "An appearance of wrongdoing, an appearance of insider trading, or the appearance that people are more focused on their stock portfolio than working on behalf of the American public is just as bad as if a violation actually occurred, because our system relies on the public being able to trust our leaders and trust in the system."

If Hegseth had wanted to avoid the appearance of unethical and perhaps illegal trading, he could easily have put all his stocks into a blind trust upon being confirmed by the Senate and let the trustee manage them without him knowing what he actually owned. For some reason, he didn't do that. Wonder why? (V)

Republicans Are Trying to Kill the CFPB Using the Reconciliation Bill

The banks have always hated the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau because it polices them and can issue financial regulations making it harder for them to fleece customers. It can also enforce consumer financial laws. Many Republicans take donations from banks and thus also hate the CFPB. They would love for it to disappear. They now have an idea how to go about it under the radar.

When the agency was created, the sponsors did not want it to be funded by an annual appropriation from Congress, for fear that a hostile Republican-controlled Congress might decide not to fund it one fine year. Instead, the bureau was allowed to draw funds directly from the Fed, up to a maximum of 12% of the Fed's operating budget. The Senate Banking Committee, led by Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), has now thought of a workaround. The Committee's contribution to the reconciliation bill now being cooked up would simply change the "12" in the law to "0." So then the CFPB could draw up to 0% of the Fed's budget. Since most of its funding comes from the Fed, that would effectively terminate the Bureau. The House took a stab at that as well, but the bill it passed simply changed the 12% to 5%, which would still allow the bureau to function somewhat.

But all is not lost for the CFPB. Reconciliation bills may only contain elements that increase or decrease federal spending or revenues, and the CFPB is not funded through the budget. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), whose idea the Bureau was, has said if that provision is included in the final bill, she will ask the Senate Parliamentarian to make a ruling whether it is allowed in a reconciliation bill. If the Parliamentarian rules that it is not, it will have to be struck, as John Thune has said he will not take a vote to overrule the Parliamentarian. (V)

President Sentenced to Prison

The president in question here is the former president of Argentina, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who ruled over the South American country from 2007 to 2015. She was convicted of corruption in 2022 when a court found her guilty of fraud. She directed millions of dollars of taxpayer money to a friend's company. She has also been indicted on other charges involving corruption. She is currently the leader of the main opposition party, the Justicialist Party. Argentina's top court just upheld her conviction.

Fernández de Kirchner might escape prison because she is 72 and under Argentinian law, people over 70 usually get to serve prison sentences under house arrest. Her lawyer is requesting that.

She is a self-identified leftist and Peronist and enjoys considerable popularity among Argentinians. Nevertheless, she was put on trial, convicted, and lost all her appeals after serving in office.

This could be an omen, but it is doubtful that Donald Trump will get the message. If a Democrat is elected president in 2028, the AG could take a good hard look at Trump's record and decide that he committed one or more crimes not covered by his immunity and indict him for them. Any argument that no country ever prosecutes a former president would be tough to make if Fernández de Kirchner goes to prison (or even gets house arrest). Of course, she isn't the first former president of some country to be convicted of crimes (here is a long long list of them), but this one is in a democratic country in the Western Hemisphere and the conviction is during Trump's term. Let it be a warning. (V)

Never Forget: Seldom Disappointed

Today's memory comes to us from T.B. in Winston-Salem, NC:

One of my very favorite novelists is the legendary Tony Hillerman. He was probably also my dad's favorite novelist. When World War II started, both Hillerman and Dad enlisted in the Army, and both were recruited into the Army Specialized Training Program (ASTP), which sent PFCs to land-grant colleges to be trained as officers, scientists, doctors, pilots, and engineers. Dad was interested in flying, and the Army sent him to Iowa State Teachers College to be trained as an airman.

In 1943, after the bloody invasions of Sicily and Italy, the Army found that it needed more bodies to throw at the enemy. Both dad and Hillerman were sent to combat divisions. As dad described his personal experience, one day a high-ranking officer came to address his group and told the men that they were the best and brightest ever to serve in the U.S. Army, the cream of the crop, and that therefore they would have choices. When dad got up to the table, the choices were rifle, mortar, or machine gun. As if the coincidence could not be more clear, both dad and Tony Hillerman chose 81mm mortars. Hillerman was sent to the 103rd Infantry Division in Europe. Dad was sent to the 97th Infantry Division, which was initially sent to California for amphibious training with a view toward the eventual invasion of the Japanese home islands. After the Battle of the Bulge, the 97th was almost immediately shipped off to Europe, where they fought in the reduction of the Ruhr Pocket, which had been bypassed and surrounded by forces heading toward Berlin.

My Dad's squad consisted mostly of guys who had been snatched out of ASTP. He described one of them as the most brilliant man he had ever met. On the heavy mortars, Dad and the buddy he worked with had to hit nine targets in volleys of three, at increasing distances ahead of the infantry. Dad said that he and his partner were the only pair who could have all nine shells in the air at the same time. "One other pair of guys tried to duplicate this, but they accidentally dropped one of their rounds on top of the previous one, which was still on its way out of the tube."

In 1945, Hillerman was badly wounded in Europe. Not long thereafter, right after V-E Day, dad's division, the 97th, was shipped back to the U.S. and sent to Seattle to board troop ships for the invasion of Japan. Japan had already surrendered by the time they got there, but the 97th remained in Japan for several months to serve in the army of occupation. Ironically, Dad's best friend was killed in Japan when, in a Christmas Eve snowstorm, he fell off a bridge on the way back to their barracks in the middle of the night.

Dad and Tony Hillerman were discharged from the Army within six months of each other. Hillerman became a journalist and eventually wound up in New Mexico. Starting in 1970, he wrote 18 novels about the Navajo Tribal Police Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn and his deputy, Jim Chee. The novels all have twisty plots that never turn out the way one might have expected, and are full of descriptions of the Four Corners area and Native American culture.

Dad and Hillerman were roughly the same age. Dad died in 2006, and Hillerman in 2008, both of respiratory issues. Hillerman has a daughter, Anne Hillerman, who has written ten sequels to the Leaphorn-Chee mysteries. She and I are roughly the same age. Her style is strikingly similar to her father's.

In 2001, Tony Hillerman published a memoir of his life, entitled Seldom Disappointed. In explaining his choice of title, he wrote, "'Blessed are those who expect little,' Mama would say. 'They are seldom disappointed.'"

Thank you, T.B. (Z)


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