Ever since Donald Trump orchestrated a federal takeover of Washington, D.C.’s law enforcement, complete with the National Guard being shipped in from at least three red states, defenders of the nation’s capital have painstakingly demonstrated this is a political stunt and is not about stopping crime.
Critics have noted that the troops and agents have been concentrated in low-crime tourist areas, mostly ignoring high-crime neighborhoods where they could actually help. City officials have pointed out the city’s crime rate was already at a 30-year low. Polls show that, far from feeling secure, most D.C. residents say Trump’s actions make them feel less safe. People are so afraid that local restaurants have reported a plummet in reservations, as frightened folks stay at home rather than deal with bored and angry law enforcement.
As usual, the White House’s response is to lie about all of this. Trump and his goons say restaurant traffic is up, which is hilariously false. Vice President J.D. Vance said, “Let’s free D.C. from lawlessness.” White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller had a screeching meltdown on camera, insisting only “stupid white hippies” are mad about the takeover, and declaring that Black people love him and the president for their actions. In reality, 80% of Black D.C. residents oppose the troop deployment. Fox News dutifully claims this is all about “crime” — ignoring that the agents sent onto the streets are mostly harassing ordinary people, while ignoring actual crime.
Don’t get me wrong: The MAGA base loves this so-called “crackdown.” But not because it’s making D.C. safe. They love that it’s making D.C. miserable. They appear to know the victims of this charade aren’t criminals, but ordinary people just trying to live their lives.
What’s a little unclear, however, is who this phony Republican talk about “crime” is for. It’s certainly not for liberals or even centrists, who appear to understand full well that Trump is trying to terrorize the innocent people of D.C., not to fight crime. But it’s not like the MAGA base cares about the “crime” non-issue either. Don’t get me wrong: The MAGA base loves this so-called “crackdown.” But not because it’s making D.C. safe. They love that it’s making D.C. miserable. They appear to know the victims of this charade aren’t criminals, but ordinary people just trying to live their lives. MAGA is getting sadistic joy out of terrorizing ordinary people whose only “crime” is living in a diverse, vibrant and majority Democratic city, instead of Cracker Barrel America.
Videos of the new law enforcement harassing or even beating innocent residents of D.C. have circulated heavily online, but it’s not just liberals who sharing them. Trump supporters love these videos, and, if anything, they are sharing them more than liberals. The right-wing Daily Wire shared a video of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents telling a woman that she’s fat, and it has nearly 250,000 likes on TikTok. Fox News posted a video of ICE agents tearing down an anti-Trump banner, and it now has nearly 5 million views, mostly from conservatives who are relishing this overt violation of basic First Amendment rights. Another MAGA influencer collected over 3.5 million views on a video of homeless people having their tents bulldozed. MAGA influencers also celebrated a video of federal agents yelling at a man for smoking on his patio, calling it “illicit activities” for people to be outside in their own neighborhoods.
It’s almost like this D.C. crackdown isn’t about “crime,” but about playing to the resentments of a bunch of suburban shut-ins who hate their fellow Americans who live in cities and do unfathomable things like leave their houses, walk down sidewalks and enjoy their neighborhoods. Anything but sitting inside all day watching Fox News is, I suppose, “illicit activities” that no red-blooded American should enjoy. Especially not if they’re doing it in a racially diverse city, as if talking to people who are different than you is okay. Not in Donald Trump’s America, it’s not!
What’s remarkable here is both red and blue America seem, for once, to agree on the facts: That this takeover is a power grab by Trump, the representative of incurious, racist America, and that its main purpose is to punish D.C. residents for being more cosmopolitan and liberal. The only dispute is over whether abusing people for perceived sophistication a good thing. Blue America feels it’s not a crime to be the kind of people who read books, listen to songs released after 1985 or eat something other than an overcooked hamburger on occasion. Red America is in full “lock ’em up” mode.
Even the Smithsonian has become wrapped up in Trump’s D.C. takeover, which is further proof that the president’s actions aren’t geared toward stopping crime. Last week, Trump whined on Truth Social that the museum has exhibitions on “how bad Slavery was” and features “Nothing about Success, nothing about Brightness, nothing about the Future.” As anyone who has toured any of the Smithsonian museums knows, this is a lie — and it casts even more doubt that Trump himself has ever visited outside of a staged photo-op in 2017. (They have Dorothy’s ruby red slippers at the Smithsonian! And dinosaurs and spaceships!) But in the context of all this nonsense about “fighting crime,” his post was a telling remark.
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Who feels unsafe seeing an exhibition about slavery at a history museum? We all know the answer: Racist white Americans who don’t like being reminded of how horrible and degrading slavery actually was. The article released by the White House on Thursday, which numerated all the president’s grievances with the Smithsonian, feels like touring the museums with your crappy MAGA uncle who can’t even read the Ann Coulter books his wife dutifully buys him at Christmas. It’s just a lot of griping about any exhibit acknowledging that people other than straight white men did stuff, or hinting at history being more nuanced than 5-year-old’s picture book. Wah! They have portraits of non-white people on display! Wah! There’s an exhibit acknowledging LGBTQ history! Wah! There’s a photo of a non-white person in a wheelchair! Why won’t someone call the cops?
D.C. is a real city full of people. It’s not Patriot Disneyland for people who are mad they can’t find the Applebee’s among all the Ethiopian joints. That’s the “crime” Trump is so mad about, which is why he’s also pushing for $2 billion to “have this place beautified” — a terrifying proposition for anyone who has witnessed his love of plastering everything with cheap gold paint.
This dynamic is beautifully illustrated by the divide in responses to the city’s Hoagie Hero — decorated veteran and (now former) Justice Department employee Sean Dunn, who threw a Subway sandwich at some ICE officers. The video of the incident went viral because of how silly and harmless the sandwich toss was. Dunn was in cargo shorts and a pink polo, and he ran off in a goofy way, suggesting there was some alcohol consumption involved in his choice to waste a perfectly good sandwich in this manner. Most people laughed at the video, even as they felt sorry for Dunn, who was arrested and fired by Attorney General Pam Bondi. No one surely can take being grazed by bread as a “crime,” right? To many Washington residents, Dunn has become a local hero, with Banksy-style art depicting his action being plastered around the city.
Trump’s allies predictably hit the ceiling, acting like Dunn committed murder-by-baguette. (For the record, Subway’s bread is too soft.) He’s been charged with felony assault, and MAGA audiences erupted in joy. But what was so telling is that neither MAGA leaders nor the movement’s followers pretended to believe that sandwich-throwing is a serious threat. No, they want to lock Dunn up because they resent his perceived status — and folk popularity — as an urbane liberal.
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“He thought it was funny,” sneered Jeanine Pirro, the Fox News host-turned U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia. “Well, he doesn’t think it’s funny today.” One gets the strong impression the “crime” he’s being charged for is laughing at the mayo-eaters. Comments on Pirro’s post from MAGA followers reinforced this impression, as they griped about “overprivileged, spoiled people” and begged her to arrest other liberals for saying stuff they don’t like online. “I’ve only been to DC once and swore I would never go back. Even on the tour bus, I was scared,” one posted, unaware that this says more about her than about Washington. Right-wing media did not bother to pretend to think Dunn is a criminal. Instead they smeared him as a “far-left weirdo” and called his sandwich “taxpayer-funded,” apparently because he bought it with a salary he earned as a government employee.
In my most recent episode of “Standing Room Only,” guest Lux Alptraum offered this insight about the MAGA mindset: “They are so mad that liberals don’t like them.” This sadism, she said, felt like an act of “revenge.” It’s not a coincidence that, in the midst of all this, White House communications director Steven Cheung had a lengthy online fit because Jack White of the White Stripes stated the obvious: That Trump’s taste is tacky. No amount of protest-too-much screeching from Cheung, which included calling White “washed-up,” can conceal that of course the rock god is far, far cooler than Cheung could ever hope to be in a million years.
The talk of “crime” is even more threadbare than the usual right-wing pretexts. Scratch even a millimeter below the surface and it reveals itself as the most childish of culture war resentments: Unimaginative people lashing out a big city because it’s overflowing with all sorts of diversity and novelty they are too fearful to deal with. So instead of getting therapy, they turn to fascism.
