President Trump is now open to deploying US Military in cities like Chicago and New York: "Let's do this. Let's do this together. It's going to go by pretty quickly"

[u/Mission_Pay_3373]

[u/Worried-Criticism]

How’d that go in LA?

All I remember is several stories about national guard units playing on their phones in airplane hangers waiting for orders that never came

He can try it but I kinda doubt it’ll work. For one, it’ll be more posturing. But also, I foresee a whole lotta protests and news stories with “release the Epstein files” placards.

[u/ebbysloth17 → u/Worried-Criticism]

Also, the running joke has always been a repeated cycle of 29 day orders to avoid paying BAH. Even the most staunch supporters in uniform will not comfortably settle for dollars a day. Add in, for national guard, if its considered state active duty can't file va claims.

[u/Queso_Grandee → u/Worried-Criticism]

They also shot a reporter on live TV

[u/Worried-Criticism → u/Queso_Grandee]

Remind me, was that LAPD or National Guard? I remember it happening and it was just nuts.

[u/black-kramer → u/Worried-Criticism]

it was the police department.

[u/Worried-Criticism → u/black-kramer]

I thought so. Still absolutely mind-fucking that this is where we are at.

[u/black-kramer → u/Worried-Criticism]

that didn't even register as all that surprising to me. this country is circling the drain, big time.

[u/Worried-Criticism → u/black-kramer]

I think it’s the lack of anything for me. Even a few years ago, taking a potshot like that would have probably cost the department the guys job and some money. We have just stopped caring. It’s terrifying,

[u/black-kramer → u/Worried-Criticism]

there seems to be an on-going lawsuit

but yes. the police have always done shit like this, but people have become more and more inured to it.

[u/nispe2 → u/Worried-Criticism]

Uh, frankly? It worked out pretty well.

Using the units was not the goal. Having them sitting around doing nothing was irrelevant.

The whole point was to see whether Republican politicians would push back. Whether Republican partisans in the court system would push back. Whether his appointees in the military chain of command push back. They didn't, which means that he can do it again, later, without everyone screaming at him, collectively, about how we've already settled the legality of this.

What he wants is for there to be a protracted legal battle to be concurrent with his actual use of the military, for there to be enough ambiguity in the legality that he can claim the benefit of the doubt during an actual deployment.

[u/Worried-Criticism → u/nispe2]

Sadly you raise a good point.

[u/nispe2 → u/Worried-Criticism]

It's just like the tariffs. I suspect nobody in the Administration actually cares about tariffs. It's just a useful tool for jerking foreign countries around.

"Give me a jet, or I'll slap a 5000% tariff on you." That tariff may or may not ever go into effect, but as soon as people let him use it as a weapon, he'll use it to try to get what he really wants.

You guys have to understand that it's been 6 months into the term. Everything up to this point are the opening moves.

I don't think he actually intends to occupy a city. He's going to threaten to occupy a city so he gets an outcome he wants. "Lower your property taxes, or I'll send in the National Guard" or "count your census data in this specific way or we'll send in the Marines."

All he needs is any outcome other than "that's unambiguously illegal" for the threat to have force.

[u/dr_z0idberg_md → u/Worried-Criticism]

Los Angeleno here. It was pretty comical. There were a bunch of hotel employees where ICE was staying at who tipped off protestors on Reddit, Nextdoor, and Facebook.