What do the cities of Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Los Angeles, and Chicago have in common? They all have Democratic mayors — and they are all places where President Trump has sent in or promised to send in federal troops. This militarization of city streets, ostensibly to stop crime and rioting, represents an escalation of Trump’s authoritarian tendencies, and it signals a war on his own people.
The test case for federal boots on the ground in American cities was Los Angeles, where both the National Guard and Marines were deployed in June after protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests. This was not the first time Trump authorized the use of the National Guard in his two terms; troops were ordered to go to Washington, D.C. in the aftermath of the George Floyd protests in 2020. In the case of Los Angeles, the decision was made without the request of California’s governor Gavin Newsom and was declared illegal by a federal judge on Sept. 2.
More than simply flouting the law, however, Trump was throwing down the gauntlet: protests would be met with federal repression of the very people the government is supposed to protect. Although the troops were only supposed to protect ICE agents and government property, the recent ruling on Trump’s deployment noted that the National Guard had violated the Posse Comitatus Act, which states that members of the US Army cannot carry out law enforcement activity except in specific circumstances.
The federalization of Washington, D.C. in August was the next rung on Trump’s authoritarian ladder. Trump placed the District’s police and law enforcement under federal control and sent in the National Guard to combat “out of control” crime, even though violent crime in the city reached a 30-year low in 2024. This development means that our nation’s capital is being patrolled by soldiers, who were recently authorized to carry weapons, simply for the purpose of reducing a nonexistent crime wave. There was little reason for federal troops to be used and activated, and the unnecessary nature of the deployment should not be swept under the rug.
Baltimore and Chicago are the most recent cities to pass into Trump’s crosshairs. In threatening to send troops to those areas as well, Trump is laying bare the pattern of targeting Democratic-run cities, while using the myth of rampant crime to back it up. Should Trump follow through on these promises, he would have the green light to acting just as oppressive, perhaps more so, as he did in L.A. and Washington. The path has already been laid; while there was inflamed opposition to the military deployment in Los Angeles, and much consternation when the National Guard came to Washington D.C., the promised operations in Baltimore and Chicago will just be more incidents on the assembly line of controversies. Members of the military stationed in America’s cities is a twisted new normal. Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser confirmed this when she authorized the indefinite extension of cooperation with federal authorities on Sept. 2; while just five years ago she protested the use of the National Guard in the capital, now she has capitulated. This precedent is one Trump will be eager to extend; beyond the localized instances of Trump’s military deployment, he has also announced the creation of “specialized” National Guard units across the country to rapidly deal with potential crime in any city.
In Los Angeles and Washington D.C., we see the classic authoritarian promise of peace and security in exchange for the rights of the people. In the face of the L.A. protests, Trump and his allies played up sporadic riots and violence to justify military involvement, ignoring American laws and rights in the process. In Washington D.C., The Trump administration has claimed that the National Guard deployment has lowered crime significantly, supposedly giving the District’s residents more security to go about their lives. However, the military sent in caused many people, especially immigrants, to fear for their safety on the streets. ICE arrests in the Washington D.C. area have surged in the past few weeks since Trump’s takeover of the city.
The sounds of past authoritarian leaders echo in the words and actions of Trump; dictatorial societies have always relied on the support and use of the military to quell questioning of the regime, often using crime as an excuse to crack down on civil liberties. In Latin American countries such as Honduras and Guatemala, power-hungry leaders justified the loss of rights by touting their crime statistics — a tactic that current El Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, who Trump has worked with on deporting undocumented immigrants, has used to great effect. The issues of crime and violence are the cover with which Trump can achieve his undemocratic dreams.
Militarizing the country and sending in troops to American cities is a grave abnormality that cannot be ignored. When the guns of our own army are pointed at residents, we know that a war on America has begun — not from a foreign adversary, but from Trump and his administration themselves.