"Goon Squad." Trump tactic backfires.

Trump was too brazen. He forgot to be hypocritical.

     "I think it's an abuse of DHS. I mean really the president is trying to use DHS as his goon squad. That's really what's going on here."

             John Sandweg, former acting director of ICE

Trump's popularity is in a low spot. Trump needs to change the subject from the economy and the virus to a better one, one of urban anarchy and violence by Biden supporters out to destroy American heritage and values. Trump's story is secure within the media cocoon of Fox, talk radio, and Republican social media: Antifa is coming!  However, a different story is circulated everywhere outside that bubble.

Federal peacekeepers

It might have worked for Trump. He is running campaign ads premised on the story, so he still has hopes for it. Every media outlet looks for variety away from hospitals and graphs of case counts, and nurses saying they are exhausted. It is such a downer, and the story is essentially unchanged for four months. The protests were new, and scenes of street conflict are exactly what Breaking News! is designed for. Rowdy youth in Portland, Oregon, some of them with a political agenda associated with anti-fascism, were the perfect opponent for Trump. There are the exciting visuals with graffiti, people moving in the dark, a woman getting naked, a mayor being gassed and images of federal officers in tactical gear, looking menacing and ready for house to house urban warfare.

The problem for Trump is that a counter-story is too easy to observe and report. The Department of Homeland Security officers came in and operated exactly as Trump wanted--hard, brutal, dominating. That is what he told state Governors on the conference call and the public at Mount Rushmore: we need decisive force. Trump misread how it would look. People see federal officers dressed like this, firing tear gas and rubber bullets and they are interpreted as foreign aggressors.

The news stories and opinion pages from mainstream media are near universal in saying the federal officers were heavy handed, improper in summary arrests and releases, overly militaristic, and provocative. Trump made that interpretation easy by saying the quiet part out loud. He said he wanted to target Democratic cities. Of course it was political theater to create a story line and images for campaign ads. Trump was too brazen. He forgot the necessary fig leaves of hypocrisy. 

That is a problem. To be credible as a law-and-order president one needs to look like one seeks law and order.

People on the ground in Portland share with me their own observations. One of them is a couple in their early 40's, both with professional jobs, one a teacher, one a mechanical engineer, Greg and Katherine, who feel vulnerable enough in their careers to want to stay anonymous. They live in Portland and have children in Portland schools.  

Comment from two Gen X observers:

"The protesters aren’t the problem. It is the federal officers. They are making the situation much worse.

I was in downtown Portland a few days ago. It was very peaceful during the day. A few people were roaming around and there were even fewer homeless people about. The biggest difference I saw was boarded up windows and graffiti around the federal courthouse.

The feds are here to protect the building. It is concrete. That is not going to burn. Graffiti can be painted over. The feds are creating far more problems by being here. Taking away people’s civil rights is a far greater crime than graffiti.

The truth still remains: black and brown people are being disproportionately hurt and killed by law enforcement. As a result of the killing of George Floyd, a sense of urgency has been ignited to change systemic racism, for real.

Trump ignores this. He’s made it about “law and order”. He just wants the sound bites and theater for his election campaign. A city “out of control”, or rather just the graffiti, is just an excuse.  He doesn’t care about black and brown people or the people of Portland.

I have friends who went down to protest and joined the Wall of Moms. While they were there, one friend said it was scary because the feds were dressed for war and had their long arms. In the protest crowd, two young men who looked about 20 years old, were trying to get through to provoke the feds. The moms realized if those kids got through, then the feds might respond in force and thing would get ugly. This is when, to prevent the escalation, the moms linked arms together and created a wall to keep separate the protesters and the officers.

The vast majority of the protests are peaceful. The few provocateurs and the feds are riling things up and escalating the situation, and diverting the conversation from the original message."

A lot of these moms are suburban SW Portland mothers (read: the more affluent side of town) are joining together to fight what they see as injustice, both for black and brown people, and because the feds are in town stamping on people’s rights.