Serving a Clown With a Fake Crown

What kind of "government" tear gasses children while its weak leader excitedly accepts a fake gold crown from a foreign country? Not one as powerful as it thinks it is.

A clown all year round, not just on Halloween. (Photo by Vuk Valcic/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

A functioning democratic government depends on public servants who—hello—serve the public. Instead, we are saddled with Trump sycophants focused on performing acts of cruelty to prove how tough they are.

Never mind upholding the rule of law, not when they want their audience of one to recognize their willingness to stoke fear and intimidation in immigrant communities. Never mind the collateral damage done to American citizens who are defending friends and neighbors or just happen to be around when masked federal agents go on the attack.

The depraved Trump regime wants us to become accustomed to the idea of military troops and militarized federal agents occupying our cities. The over-arching goal is to silence dissent and consolidate power by stoking fear and convincing supporters that its primary mission is rooting out criminal migrants and taking down perceived enemies on the left.

In recent days, Greg Bovino, a senior official with U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), has become the latest performer to take center stage. Determined to show his boss that he’s up to the task of brutalizing Chicago, Bovino has been strutting through the streets, clad in military gear with a gun on his hip, even personally tossing a tear gas canister at civilians.

Bovino’s the shameless guy who ran the CBP operation in Los Angeles this summer. That included sending in armored vehicles and agents on horseback to disrupt a children’s summer camp in the city’s MacArthur Park. When told by city officials to stop the ugly stunts, Bovino responded, “The federal government is not leaving L.A….you better get used to us now because this is going to be normal very soon.”

He’s brought that same hostile attitude to Chicago to strengthen his position in the federal police state hierarchy. After U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis told him he needed to return to court daily to update her about his operations—an order the Trump regime swiftly appealed, winning a stay from an Illinois appeals court—Bovino pledged to up the ante.

“We’re going hard,” Bovino told NewsNation. “We’re going to turn and burn as we always say here at Operation Midway Blitz…and we’re going to apprehend even more illegal aliens, bad people and bad things here on the streets of Chicago.”

Let’s be clear: This is not normal. This is far from the way public servants should treat people—that is, providing due process and acting respectfully. But these goons have been told otherwise.

Take the federal agent who aimed a gun at an American citizen peacefully protesting in Chicago and said “Bang, bang...you’re dead, liberal.”

Do you think Bovino or anyone of his superiors reprimanded him? Quite the contrary.

This was the arrogant response from a Department of Homeland Security about the subsequent court filing: “As soon as [the agent] left the courthouse, he was immediately on an operation to remove violent criminals from the streets of Illinois.”

What kind of “government” tear gasses its citizens and threatens to shoot them just to show off its power? What kind of “government” needs to be convinced by a governor to not tear gas in streets where children are trick-or-treating “so they can spend Halloween weekend without fear” and “not be robbed of their innocence”?

And what kind of ruling party is ready to let nearly 42 million Americans go hungry tomorrow as part of its political game?

Is it that hard to see that the man who dresses up every day in orange pancake makeup and a contoured swirl of dyed hair to hide his balding head is not a reliable guide? That a man like this is not just a clown, he beclowns the whole country on the global stage?

We already saw this deranged White House occupant trying to convince soldiers in Japan—men and women who are serving their country and the Constitution—that they may be needed to stop the carnage in American streets. This came during this week’s Asian tour in which he’s trying to prove he’s a great dealmaker—by making new trade deals to fix the problems he himself has caused with foolish tariff policies.

Just a day later, minutes before meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, the weak and malignant Trump was dangerously posting on social media that America needed to begin nuclear testing again, presumably to show how powerful he is by flexing the country’s massive arsenal of weapons that can destroy the world. (While he claimed that other countries are doing this, China’s last nuclear weapon test was in 1996 and Russia’s last confirmed test was in 1990.)

South Korea’s leaders have grasped what it takes to work with this extreme narcissist: They gifted him a fake gold crown and served him a dinner that included “mini beef patties with ketchup.” The cognitively declining Trump was easily flattered, responding to the crown like this: “I’d like to wear it right now.”

It is laughable, but also deeply tragic. Gone are the days when democratic leaders around the world could count on American friendship and support; now it’s all about placing bribes and employing flattery at the gaudy altar of Trump. There is so much work ahead to repair the shattered trust, the poisoned values and the broken systems.

That includes holding this regime accountable for its lawlessness, something which Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker has called for and taken concrete steps to make it happen.

Last week he established the Illinois Accountability Commission to hold hearings and gather testimony from community members, subject matter experts, local officials, journalists, faith leaders and organizations. State residents are encouraged to detail actions by ICE and other federal agents now.

“We have a duty to ensure that the truth is preserved so the public can know what their elected and appointed officials have done,” Pritzker said. “It is imperative that none of the impropriety, brutality and harassment perpetrated upon our people goes unnoticed…There will come a time when people of good faith are empowered to uphold the law.”

It’s the kind of documenting and collecting of information that we need all across our country—in preparation for the day when we can hold this America-hating mistake and his obedient henchmen accountable for their dirty deeds and ensure they never again get near the levers of power.

Yet for that day to come, we need to fight back now. Every day we are reminded that this desperately unfit man will pursue every trick to avoid accountability and the judgement of both a public that increasingly rejects him and experts who clearly see his incompetence.

Trump may try to pretend that he knows what he’s doing, but his actions expose his obvious weakness and fear of real knowledge. Several days ago, all six members of the U.S. Commission on Fine Arts were fired. This panel is comprised of architects, planners and design experts—knowledgable federal employees who would have been responsible for advising on Trump’s atrocious ballroom and his proposal for a new arch near the Lincoln Memorial.

A White House official said new commission members would be chosen who are “more aligned with President Trump’s America First Policies.” In other words, selecting sycophants who will do whatever Trump wants.

We must stand up, speak out, engage in public protest and be willing to withhold our money and labor from businesses that strengthen the regime’s power. Change requires millions of citizens committing themselves to bringing this dark chapter to an end by refusing to tolerate this regime’s assault on our people and the Constitution.

We can prove that their victory is not inevitable. Imagine how sweet their defeat will be.

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