Trumps plan to send the US military against the recent protests met with resistance from various quarters. (too much too soon)
So Trump is taking another step towards a dictatorship in the US by deploying Federal agents to two federal buildings in the downtown area of Portland, that are adjacent to the local courthouse, where the nightly protests have been focused.
The spearhead of the federal attack is BORTAC, the SWAT-style force deployed by Customs and Border Protection, even though Portland is 400 miles from the nearest US border. Besides BORTAC, forces were provided by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Transportation Security Administration, the US Marshal’s Service, the Coast Guard, and the Federal Protective Service, which guards federal buildings.
Last week, he urged acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad Wolf to intervene in Portland. Wolf visited the city on July 16 to oversee the provocative attacks and made statements denouncing “violent anarchists,” accusing local officials of “fostering an environment that continues to breed this type of lawlessness.”
The American Civil Liberties Union has filed suit in Oregon against the DHS and the Marshal’s Service for “indiscriminately using tear gas, rubber bullets and acoustic weapons.” An ACLU spokesman said, “Usually when we see people in unmarked cars forcibly grab someone off the street, we call it kidnapping. The actions of the militarized federal officers are flat-out unconstitutional."
With his administration in deepening political crisis, brought on by its gross negligence and willful malpractice in the coronavirus pandemic, the sudden increase in unemployment to Depression levels, and mass protests against police violence that followed the murder of George Floyd, Trump is increasingly driven to resort to the most desperate and antidemocratic measures.
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/07/20/pers-j20.html
