Bilan Trump: Je me suis battu pour vous (And for what we have in common, the heritage that we all share, a robust belief in free expression, free speech, and open debate and the movement we started is only just beginning, the belief that a nation must serve its citizens will not dwindle but instead only grow stronger by the day)

Il est dans votre intérêt qu’un seul homme meure pour le peuple et que la nation entière ne périsse pas. Caïphe (Jean 11: 50)

Louis doit mourir pour que la patrie vive. Robespierre

L’arbre de la liberté doit être revivifié de temps en temps par le sang des patriotes et des tyrans. Jefferson

Se poser la question de la fin du populisme est aussi absurde que se poser la question de la fin du peuple. Christophe Guilluy

In defeat, Donald Trump embodies the original role of the tragic protagonist in such a way as to teach us more about tragedy than we can learn from the usual readings of Shakespeare or Sophocles. (…) Aristotle defined tragedy as “an imitation of persons above the common level,” in Greek “better than ourselves” (beltionon hemas). But in Aristotle’s vocabulary, these are not merely relative terms. The tragic protagonist is not “better” because he is smarter or richer than the anonymous citizens watching the play, but because his role is central to the welfare of the state. He is in a position of sacred centrality, yet ontologically, merely a human being among others. Thus he is forced to function, as Barack Obama once put it, “above my pay grade,” solving transcendental problems on the fallible basis of individual intuition. If any modern political role fits the original description of a potential tragic protagonist, it is that of the American president, who combines the roles of monarch/head of state and parliamentary leader/prime minister, which remain separated in most other liberal democracies. Our republic has its roots in the Athenian agon, and it is no coincidence that its most agonistic recent moment has produced its most tragic political figure. No president in the entire history of the American republic has been so unsparingly vilified as Donald Trump, throughout the 2016 nomination process and campaign, and the nearly four years of his presidency. His tenure in office has been marked by an unprecedented degree of virulent hostility from all corners of the federal establishment, as well as from members of the public who, habituated since Reagan to Republican “derangement syndromes,” have surpassed themselves in his case. To have sustained a “Resistance” that began with his election and denied his legitimacy throughout his entire tenure in office, to have been impeached on trivial evidence after sustaining nearly three years of congressionally approved investigation on the absurd charge of “complicity” with Russia, while meeting with hostile silence from many in his own party who abstained from actual abuse, is far from the normal status of a political figure even in a pugnacious democracy. What then was the key to Trump’s anomalous success? As I have pointed out since the beginning, Trump was the sole candidate, other than the impressive but insufficiently political Dr. Ben Carson, who was truly invulnerable to “PC,” as victimary thinking was then called before it graduated to “wokeness.” This resistance has in fact been Trump’s most significant distinction, although neither his detractors nor his supporters tend to refer to it. It was not a product of theoretical reflection, but of his faithfulness to the attitudes which reigned in his youth—attitudes which I largely share. That the current “woke” generation is capable of tearing down or defacing statues of virtually all the great men of American history is viscerally offensive to both of us, yet none of Trump’s rivals for the nomination presented any real resistance to the perspective that anticipated these actions. Were we to seek an embodiment of our timeless model of the ideal president, wise and forbearing, Trump would hardly qualify. Trump is not a political thinker, but a man of action, and as his detractors in both camps never fail to insist, he is not afraid to exaggerate, to bluster, to repeat quite dubious ideas. Trump was able to beat out his many primary competitors and win the 2016 election because, more even than his ability to make “deals,” his show-business experience gave him supreme confidence in his “instincts,” whether as entertainer or president, for occupying the center of the stage. And these instincts, these political intuitions, were hostile to victimary thinking, not because Trump is obsessed with it, but simply because Trump is untouched by it. But what mattered in 2016 and still matters today has been Trump’s consistency in resisting the mimetic pressure that drives the respectable members of Charles Murray’s “Belmont” class to symbolically flagellate themselves in penance for their “white privilege”—all the while feathering the nests of the most privileged members of society, including themselves. No doubt there are more sophisticated ways than Trump’s of resisting the power of White Guilt. But its virtually total domination of the academic world and of those formed by it, such as the elementary school teachers whose antipatriotic lessons are diametrically opposed to the ones I learned in these classes, has made virtually the entire educated class incapable of firm resistance to this tendency, the product of our enforced “awokening” to the model of originary moral equality to the exclusion of all other social considerations. Only someone whose social instincts had been developed before the current constitution of the Belmont world could credibly oppose this configuration, and only someone with considerable personal—rather than institutional—resources would have the freedom to do so. At the start of his campaign in 2015, Trump’s chief source of popular visibility was his presence in the Reality TV show The Apprentice, highly popular among the “deplorable” lower-middle-class audience that would put him in office in the face of the open contempt of establishment politicians in his own party as well as the Democrats. After his 2016 election victory, many hoped that Trump’s bull-in-the-china-shop tweeting and expostulating would disappear, or at least diminish. And indeed, whenever he makes the effort, Trump has shown himself perfectly capable of delivering a cogent address in a perfectly dignified manner. Yet he has continued with the behavior that, even if effective as “trolling” in enraging his enemies, has done nothing to repair his estrangement from the Belmont class. I think for Trump this is a matter of principle, even if the principle is not articulated as a proposition. What makes it tragic is that, although this behavior may well have cost him reelection, it is inseparable from his sense of self. It seems clear that someone who had viewed these antics merely as a political stratagem would not have had the chutzpah to flaunt from the very beginning his disdain for victimary thinking in the face of the respectable majority. The grain of truth in the calumnious accusations of “white supremacy” and even “antisemitism” is that, alone among the politicians of his generation, Trump viscerally understood that the prior censorship exercised by White Guilt is the real culprit that must be cast out. Thus even when in 2016 Trump scandalously denounced US-born judge Gonzalo Curiel as a “Mexican” by way of attacking his impartiality in the matter of the “Wall,” his very sense that this did not damn him as indelibly “racist” affirmed in his own mind his frequently repeated contention that he “is the least racist person in the room.” And indeed, the one incidence of “racism” unceasingly cited by his political enemies has been his statement about “good people on both sides” at Charlottesville in reference to the removal of the statue of Robert E. Lee, as proof, despite his explicit statements to the contrary, of his endorsing neo-Nazis. Yet the fact remains that many of those unmoved by these spurious accusations have been put off by Trump’s “unpresidential” behavior. And so Trump lost an election that he might well have won, even in the face of the Covid19 pandemic. No one can claim to know what formula he should have followed. But what makes him a tragic figure is the fact that he would no longer have been Trump had he sought any other formula than just being Trump. (…) The tragic protagonist assumes leadership in a crisis in which he is obliged to make decisions that cannot be deduced from prior social norms. Once a human being comes to occupy the social center originally reserved for the sacred, he is tasked with a responsibility both necessary and impossible to fulfill en connaissance de cause. Hence every leader is potentially a tragic figure: Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown. But real-life and even legendary tragic figures are few. (…) Tragedy depends on crisis. And although, objectively speaking, the United States has traversed many far more serious crises—wars and economic depressions—we are currently witnessing the most serious breakdown of our political system since the Civil War, one that the current election, whatever its outcome, is most unlikely to fully resolve. Recently Michigan Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin gave an appreciation of Trump that should be heeded by the “respectable” members of both parties: (…) « Trump speaks to them, because he includes them. » Slotkin’s point is that, like old Harry Truman, but unlike today’s Democrats, Trump speaks to ordinary people. It might seem peculiar for the party that has always presumed to represent the “common man” to be accused by one of its own of “talking down” to its constituency, while the Republicans, supposedly the party of plutocracy, field a candidate whose refusal of a lofty register wins her esteem despite her presumed disagreement with his policies. But what Slotkin means by “talking down” is not so much affecting an intellectual (“wonky”) but a moral (“woke”) superiority. It is less treating people as stupid than as morally obtuse, un-woke. In a word, it is telling “deplorable” white voters to exhibit, to virtue-signal, their White Guilt. Which leads us back to our point of departure. As the only candidate in 2016 who was able to resist the victimary pressure that dominates the Left but also paralyses the Right, Trump rightly saw his candidacy as a mission, one figured by descending the escalator in Trump Tower (now faced by the “mural” of Black Lives Matter painted on the street). Trump had a mission and, Wall or no Wall, he has largely carried it out. Even if he fails to obtain a second term, his example will have a lasting effect on American politics. And I hope it will one day receive the historical respect it deserves. That the mediocre Biden was able to call Trump “clown,” “racist,” “worst president ever” demonstrates the tragic vulnerability of the latter’s denial of PC. And those on the Right who persist in seeing Trump as a vulgarian, judging him by what they call his “character” rather than his achievements, are if anything less excusable. It was Trump who revived the American economy, reduced unemployment to its long-term minimum, and raised the salaries of minorities despite their (diminishing!) fidelity to the Democrats. It is Trump who got rid of Soleimani and Al Baghdadi, moved the American Embassy to Jerusalem, and has begun building a coalition of Arab states along with Israel to counter Iran’s influence. If Trump still refuses to concede (…) this is but one more manifestation of the pertinacity without which he would never have been elected in the first place. May at least the members of his own party have the good grace to recognize that Trump achieved what none of them could have, and, whatever their own personal style, seek to learn from the healthy core of Trump’s “instincts.” Donald Trump saw more clearly than anyone the danger that Rep. Slotkin recognizes in the “woke” faith in resentment that has been building since the 1960s. A virus far more virulent than SARS-CoV-2, this victimary faith has infested our educational, informational, entertainment, and governmental institutions, and unless promptly and firmly checked, risks handing our hard-won democracy to the barbarians. Eric Gans

Le rejet de la légitimité de l’élection de Trump en 2016, par des moyens institutionnels, a préparé le rejet de la légitimité de l’élection de Biden en 2020. Jacob Siegel

Si Trump en est venu à être viscéralement convaincu d’avoir été spolié de l’élection, c’est que durant quatre ans, l’opposition démocrate s’est comportée comme s’il était un président illégitime, une marionnette du Kremlin qui aurait usurpé, par le biais d’une ténébreuse collusion russe, la victoire de Hillary Clinton (en 2019, cette dernière parlait encore d’avoir été «volée»). L’idée obsessionnelle d’une excommunication du «diable Trump», entretenue par le camp libéral, a alimenté la conviction du président d’alors d’être assiégé par un État profond prêt à tout pour l’écarter. Même chose pour ses partisans. (…) l’ensemble du camp démocrate, que seule la haine de Trump a jusqu’ici uni, acceptera-t-il le compromis vis-à-vis des vaincus? Rien n’est moins sûr. Car à côté du volcan trumpien, dont on a vu surgir une «rage blanche» extrémiste très inquiétante le 6 janvier avec force slogans antisémites et drapeaux confédérés que Biden a promis de combattre, bouillonne en Amérique le volcan de la rage identitariste de la gauche radicale, qui a embrasé le pays pendant près de huit mois l’été dernier au nom de la justice sociale et de la défense des minorités ; transformant des manifestations pacifiques de protestation contre des violences policières en entreprise de pillage et destruction du patrimoine architectural et littéraire de l’Amérique, au motif qu’il est entaché de «racisme systémique». «Cette aile gauche du Parti démocrate, qui rêve d’une détrumpification combattante, aura-t-elle gain de cause?», s’interroge Joshua Mitchell, qui observe avec inquiétude «la culture de l’annulation» prônée par les milieux progressistes se déployer depuis le 6 janvier. L’expulsion de Trump de Twitter et celle du réseau social conservateur Parler des plateformes américaines sont des signaux peu encourageants, de même que l’appel lancé par la revue Forbes aux corporations américaines pour qu’elles refusent d’embaucher d’anciens membres de l’Administration Trump, sous peine d’être blacklistées. (…) Le grand historien de la Grèce antique Victor Davis Hanson, qui a pris parti pour Trump contre les élites depuis quatre ans, met, quant à lui, en garde contre un acharnement sur le «cadavre politique» de l’ex-président, comparant l’idée d’une destitution post-présidentielle à l’acharnement d’Achille sur le corps mort d’Hector pendant la guerre de Troie. Poignardé et traîné derrière un char, celui qui n’était qu’un «vaincu fanfaron» allait devenir une figure mythique… Laure Mandeville

Il est toujours tentant de qualifier d’irrationnels ceux qui ne votent pas comme nous, en particulier si ce sont des étrangers. À leur contact, on se sentirait tellement sages, supérieurs. On ne ferait pas le moindre effort pour les écouter et les comprendre. Certains, même s’ils reconnaissent aux trumpistes une sorte de bon sens primitif, les jugent avec paternalisme et attribuent leurs opinions à une forme d’ignorance aussi crasse qu’autodestructrice : des pauvres types. Nous ferions bien de reconnaître au contraire, du moins hypothétiquement, que bon nombre des électeurs de Trump sont aussi intelligents, rationnels et idéalistes que nos voisins. Ni plus, ni moins. Ce qui les distingue, ce sont leurs objectifs et la conviction que le président Trump est le plus à même de les aider à les défendre. (…) Pendant les trois premières années du mandat de Trump, les revenus moyens des foyers sont passés de 63 000 à plus de 68 500 dollars par an, les salaires horaires des classes inférieures ont augmenté de 7 % au total et le chômage est descendu à des seuils jamais vus depuis les années 1960. Parallèlement, la croissance économique que Trump a stimulée par ses baisses d’impôts en 2018 n’a guère modifié les écarts de revenus entre les différentes catégories de population. Et les baisses de revenus ont été très également partagées, ce qui a évité qu’une catégorie ne se sente particulièrement lésée. Mais comment est-ce possible que l’électorat trumpiste n’ait pas tourné le dos à son champion avec la terrible récession provoquée par la pandémie dans le pays ? Une chose est sûre, après ce que nous avons vu dans nos pays, il ne serait pas très étonnant que les partisans de Trump finissent par faire valoir que la crise n’est pas la faute du gouvernement fédéral, ou qu’ils estiment que les gouvernements antérieurs sont coresponsables de la mauvaise gestion, au même titre que les autorités régionales et locales. Sans parler des puissances étrangères comme la Chine, qui a trop tardé à informer sur la gravité du coronavirus et des contaminations. (…) En 2018, Trump a réussi à renégocier l’Alena, le traité de libre-échange avec le Mexique et le Canada, et à arracher à ces deux pays de modestes concessions qui favorisent les géants américains de l’automobile et des produits laitiers. (…) Selon l’institut Pew Research Center, les Américains qui ont une opinion négative de la Chine ne sont plus 47 % comme en 2017, mais désormais 66 % en 2020, et ils s’inquiètent notamment de la puissance de ses multinationales d’innovation technologique. De plus, la moitié des Américains qualifie de “très grave” la disparition d’emplois, délocalisés, et le déficit commercial des États-Unis par rapport à la Chine. Eh bien, le déficit commercial des États-Unis avec la Chine s’est effondré de près de 20 % entre 2018 et 2019, et de presque 30 % pendant les quatre premiers mois de 2020. De plus, au pic de la guerre commerciale (de janvier 2018 à janvier 2020), 300 000 emplois dans l’industrie ont été créés aux États-Unis, et, ne l’oublions pas, le chômage est tombé à un niveau aussi bas que dans les années 1960. Et les salaires des plus pauvres ont nettement augmenté. Il ne sera pas difficile pour des millions d’Américains de faire, à tort, un lien entre la guerre commerciale et leur bonne fortune. (…) Enfin, Trump a non seulement nommé plus de 50 juges dans les cours d’appel du pays, mais il a aussi réussi à placer trois juges conservateurs (Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh et Amy Coney Barrett) à la Cour suprême. À partir de maintenant, que Joe Biden soit ou non vainqueur de la présidentielle, il faudra vivre avec la majorité conservatrice la plus écrasante qu’ait connue la plus haute juridiction depuis les années 1950. Et les électeurs républicains savent à qui exprimer leur gratitude dans les urnes. Gonzalo Toca (Esglobal, Madrid, 06/11/2020)

Il y avait là des voyous, c’est indéniable. Mais laissez-moi vous parler un peu de ces manifestants que je connais personnellement. Tous sont, sans exception, des Américains ordinaires et des individus honnêtes, qui n’ont pas participé à l’invasion du Capitole et jamais n’oseraient désobéir à un officier de police. Certains parmi eux, mais pas tous, jugent que l’élection a été volée. Ils se trompent, mais cela ne fait pas d’eux des suprémacistes blancs, des terroristes de l’intérieur, des extrémistes religieux – ils ne méritent aucun des noms d’oiseaux lancés depuis une semaine. Ceux que je connais personnellement sont aujourd’hui terrifiés à l’idée d’être identifiés sur les réseaux (par des gauchistes vengeurs qui diffuseraient leurs informations personnelles), voire licenciés si jamais leur participation à la manifestation à Washington venait à se savoir. Certains ne voient aucun problème à ce que les personnes ayant enfreint la loi [le 6 janvier] soient arrêtées et poursuivies en justice. Selon un sondage Reuters/Ipsos, seuls 9 % des Américains considèrent les émeutiers comme des “citoyens inquiets” et 5 % les tiennent pour des “patriotes”. Il y a dans les 90 % restants des millions d’électeurs de Trump. Certes, parmi ces millions de personnes ayant choisi le bulletin Trump, certains, nombreux peut-être, croient à des théories du complot et ne font pas confiance à leur gouvernement. Mais comment cela s’explique-t-il ? Cela aurait-il à voir avec le fait qu’ils entendent de grands médias déclarer fièrement qu’ils ne feront pas même l’effort d’être impartiaux dans leur couverture de Trump et ensuite alimenter, eux aussi, une théorie complotiste, selon laquelle le président serait un agent à la solde des Russes ? Faut-il s’étonner que les gens aillent puiser dans d’autres sources d’information, douteuses pour certaines ? Faut-il s’étonner que la méfiance envers l’État ait augmenté, quand les Américains ont découvert que de hauts responsables du FBI et du ministère de la Justice ont abusé de leurs pouvoirs de police pour interférer dans le résultat d’une élection puis saper la légitimité d’un président élu ? William McGurn

La première fraude provient de la manipulation des électeurs par les médias. Jamais on n’avait vu une telle collusion entre un candidat, d’une part et les grands médias et médias sociaux, d’autre part. On avait cru atteindre le summum en 2016 lorsque par exemple CNN transmettait à l’avance à Hillary Clinton les questions des débats. C’était en réalité bien peu de choses par rapport à 2020. Jamais les sondages commandités par les grands médias n’auront été truqués à ce point en faveur de Joe Biden. Jamais n’avait-on assisté à un tel degré de propagande anti-Trump et pro-Biden tout au long de la campagne. Tout ce qui était positif à propos de Trump et tout ce qui était négatif à propos de Biden aura été caché au public, alors que tout ce qui était négatif à propos de Trump et tout ce qui était positif à propos de Biden aura fait l’objet d’un matraquage médiatique. Sans parler de la fabrication purement et simplement d’histoires mensongères à n’en plus finir contre le président sortant et son entourage. Le point culminant est intervenu lorsque, le 14 octobre 2020, à deux semaines de l’élection, le New York Post révéla le scandale de la corruption de la famille Biden (« the Biden crime family » comme l’appelle Donald Trump). Facebook et Twitter bloquent alors immédiatement les comptes et les pages du quotidien, pour éviter la propagation. « Une erreur de jugement », admettra par la suite Jack Dorsey, le patron de Twitter, qui n’en pense sans doute pas un mot. Les autres médias enterrent l’affaire, s’assurant que le scandale reste confiné. Et pourtant, les preuves sont accablantes. Hunter Biden, le fils de Joe Biden, décrit en détail dans ses emails obtenus par le « New York Post » le modus operandi : 50 % des sommes collectées étaient reversées au « big guy ». Les sondages réalisés après l’élection dévoileront par la suite que 13 % des électeurs de Joe Biden n’auraient pas voté pour lui s’ils avaient été informés de l’existence du scandale en question. Ce qui représente plus de 10 millions de voix ! Quand on sait que Joe Biden a remporté l’élection in fine grâce à un peu moins de 50.000 voix d’avance dans trois États-clefs… (…) La deuxième fraude aura consisté pour la gauche américaine à contourner les lois électorales applicables aux bulletins par correspondance dans les principaux États-clefs, et ce, sous le prétexte de la crise du coronavirus. Par exemple en Géorgie, il a été décidé que les bulletins par correspondance, envoyés à toute la population, seraient pris en compte sans vérification appropriée de la signature des électeurs, alors que la loi est on ne peut plus claire à ce sujet : les bulletins par correspondance doivent, sous peine de nullité, faire l’objet de contrôles stricts. En pratique, cette « relaxation » des standards de contrôle a permis à n’importe qui (des morts, des mineurs, des prisonniers, des non-résidents, des étrangers…) d’envoyer des bulletins, sans grand risque de rejet du vote. Du reste, le taux de rejet des bulletins par correspondance est passé de 3,5 % en 2016 (ce qui correspondait à 90.000 votes) à 0,3 % en 2020, et ce, alors même que le nombre de bulletins par correspondance reçus en 2020 a été multiplié par 5 comparé à 2016. Autrement dit, des dizaines de milliers de bulletins par correspondance illégaux ont été comptabilisés cette année en Géorgie. Qui plus est, ces bulletins ont pu être déposés par les électeurs dans des boîtes (« drop boxes » financées par Mark Zuckerberg, le patron de Facebook), installées spécifiquement dans certains quartiers populaires des grandes villes de l’État afin d’éviter aux électeurs d’acquitter un timbre. Bien évidemment, la collecte des bulletins déposés dans ces boîtes n’a pas pu être supervisée par les assesseurs républicains… Une vidéo prise par des caméras de surveillance a fait sensation. Elle montre comment les employés de la ville d’Atlanta ont géré le dépouillement de ces bulletins dans le centre le plus important de la ville (State Farm Arena). A 23h le soir du 3 novembre, la presse et les assesseurs des deux partis, sous le prétexte d’une fuite d’eau empêchant la poursuite du dépouillement, sont priés de rentrer chez eux et de revenir le lendemain matin. Une fois la scène vidée de ses témoins gênants, quatre employés municipaux extirpent des dizaines de milliers de bulletins de quatre valises qui avaient été placées et cachées dans la salle le matin même, pour être scannés, à de multiples reprises, dans les machines. Au total, 24 000 bulletins comptabilisés en toute illégalité, comme attesté en direct sur le site du New York Times (real time tabulations). Joe Biden a finalement emporté l’État avec… 11 779 voix d’avance. En Pennsylvanie, la loi était claire. Les bulletins par correspondance ne pouvaient être acceptés que si l’électeur apposait sa signature sur l’enveloppe. Mais cette année, le gouverneur démocrate a autorisé les centres de dépouillement à comptabiliser les bulletins sans enveloppe (« naked ballots »), ouvrant ainsi la voie à de la fraude massive. On comprend mieux pourquoi les assesseurs républicains se sont vus barrer l’accès aux centres de dépouillement à Philadelphie, et ce, même en dépit d’injonction obtenues en référé auprès des juges locaux. Par ailleurs, la loi prévoyait que les bulletins par correspondance reçus par la poste après 20h le mardi 3 novembre étaient nuls et ne pouvaient être comptabilisés. Qu’à cela ne tienne, les bulletins collectés jusqu’au vendredi 6 novembre ont été pris en compte, y compris ceux reçus sans cachet de la poste sur l’enveloppe ! N’importe qui a donc pu voter en Pennsylvanie dans les jours qui ont suivi le jour de l’élection … On précisera que 75% des 630 000 bulletins par correspondance « magiques » reçus après le 3 novembre ont été en faveur de Joe Biden. Qui plus est, dans certains comtés en Pennsylvanie, plus de voix ont été comptabilisées que d’inscrits sur les listes électorales ayant voté – 205 000 plus précisément d’après un rapport du Sénat de Pennsylvanie du 29 décembre 2020 dénonçant ce phénomène de « over votes », c’est-à-dire de bulletins comptabilisés qui n’ont pas été imprimés par le gouvernement de la Pennsylvanie. Dans le Wisconsin, la loi prévoyait que seules les personnes bénéficiant du statut de personne confinée indéfiniment (typiquement des personnes grabataires) pouvaient voter par correspondance sans avoir à se déplacer au préalable au bureau de vote pour chercher un bulletin en montrant sa pièce d’identité (un bulletin leur est alors envoyé par la poste chez eux). Mais pour l’occasion, sur ordre du gouverneur (démocrate), le statut a été largement étendu, passant de 70.000 personnes environ aux élections précédentes à 200 000 cette année, en raison du coronavirus. 130 000 votes de plus que les années précédentes ont donc été comptabilisés sans contrôle d’identité à l’échelle de l’État (un peu comme si les bureaux de vote avaient accepté que 200 000 électeurs qui venaient en personne voter ne présentent pas leur pièce d’identité). Précisons que ces 200 000 bulletins furent largement favorables à Joe Biden, lequel a remporté l’État avec 20 682 voix. Les avocats de Donald Trump ont réuni plus de mille témoignages sous serment de personnes attestant d’irrégularités importantes constatées lors des élections du 3 novembre. Chacune de ces personnes risque 5 ans de prison si elle présente un témoignage mensonger. Ainsi, des assesseurs racontent comment ils ont été expulsés des centres de dépouillement du Michigan par la police locale, sous les applaudissements des employés municipaux en train de procéder au dépouillement, des conducteurs de camion expliquent qu’ils ont conduit des chargements de centaines de milliers de bulletins fraîchement imprimés de New York jusqu’en Pennsylvanie, des employés municipaux confirment qu’ils scannaient dans les machines des bulletins par correspondance qui n’avaient pas été pliés (c’est-à-dire qui ne sortaient pas d’enveloppes) ou encore confirment qu’on leur demandait de comptabiliser des bulletins par correspondance sans vérifier les signatures, des postiers révèlent que leur hiérarchie leur demandait d’anti-dater des bulletins par correspondance reçus hors délais, des « white hat hackers » témoignent qu’ils ont réussi à se connecter aux machines des bureaux de vote en Géorgie (dans le comté de Fulton à Atlanta), des électeurs racontent que, se rendant aux urnes pour voter, ils se sont entendus dire qu’ils avaient déjà voté et qu’ils pouvaient rentrer chez eux, etc. Par ailleurs, ces mêmes avocats ont réuni des études et témoignages d’experts en probabilités identifiant les anomalies statistiques du 3 novembre. Par exemple (…) Jamais un candidat républicain n’a perdu l’élection alors qu’il a emporté la Floride et l’Ohio (qui plus avec 5 points de plus qu’en 2016). « Les résultats sont aberrants et absurdes » martèlent les mathématiciens. « Les taux de participation supérieurs à 85 % sont impossibles. Les votes en provenance de bureaux de vote à plus de 75 % en faveur d’un candidat sont la marque d’une fraude » expliquent-ils. Surtout lorsque ces anomalies arithmétiques ne sont constatées que dans les grandes villes des six États-clefs, où Joe Biden a réalisé des scores époustouflants en comparaison aux scores inférieurs de Biden par rapport à Hillary Clinton observés dans les autres grands centres urbains du pays, à commencer par New York City ou Los Angeles… Ainsi, dans le comté de Fulton, à Atlanta en Géorgie, 161 bureaux de vote ont reporté entre 90 % et 100 % de votes en faveur de Joe Biden, totalisant 152 000 voix pour le candidat démocrate. Idem à Philadelphie ou 278 bureaux de vote (16 % des bureaux de la ville), ont reporté 97 % ou plus de voix pour Joe Biden, totalisant 100 200 voix pour Joe Biden contre 2.100 voix pour Donald Trump. Même à New York City, Donald Trump n’a pas été crédité de scores aussi déséquilibrés. Toujours en Pennsylvanie, dans l’un des bureaux de vote du comté d’Allegheny, en Pennsylvanie, 93 % des bulletins par correspondance furent en faveur de Joe Biden, ce qui n’est pas possible d’un point de vue statistique, Joe Biden recevant 23 000 voix contre 1300 pour Donald Trump. Dans le comté de Wayne, le plus important du Michigan, 71 bureaux de vote ont reporté plus de votes que d’inscrits sur les listes électorales, le gouverneur (démocrate) passant outre le refus du comté de certifier les résultats… Par ailleurs, les parlementaires locaux (républicains) d’Arizona, de Géorgie, du Nevada ou encore en Pennsylvanie, qui eux, ont pu enquêter et auditionner de nombreux témoins au cours des mois de novembre et décembre 2020, ont rédigé des rapports accablants contre leurs propres gouverneurs, attestant l’ampleur de la fraude dans leurs États respectifs. En parallèle, on rappellera que le Sénat à Washington DC a lui-même organisé le 16 décembre 2020 des auditions de témoins sur le thème des irrégularités de l’élection du 3 novembre, les avocats de Donald Trump ayant alors eu l’occasion de détailler d’innombrables irrégularités, notamment concernant l’Arizona, le Nevada et le Wisconsin. A l’issue des présentations, plusieurs sénateurs durent reconnaître que de sérieux doutes pesaient sur la légitimité de l’élection de Joe Biden. Mais en dépit de cette montagne de preuves, les juges du pays ont refusé d’écouter les multiples requêtes en annulation des résultats des élections des États concernés. Aucune enquête n’a été diligentée, aucune procédure de « discovery » n’a été intentée (forçant la partie défenderesse de transmettre des informations), aucune saisie de bulletins ou des scans des machines n’a été ordonnée par les juges. Les avocats démocrates bataillèrent furieusement en justice pour qu’aucun audit ne puisse être ordonné, la plupart des requêtes ayant été écartées pour des questions de procédure. Et lorsque les juges ont décidé d’entendre les affaires sur le fond, les débats furent bâclés. La cour suprême du Nevada a par exemple rendu son jugement après avoir accepté seulement 15 dépositions (par écrit, aucun témoin en personne), et a jugé sans enquête, sans délibération, après seulement 2 heures de plaidoirie un dossier constitué de 8 000 pages portant sur 130 000 votes contestés. En fait, les rares juges de différents États qui ont accepté d’écouter les affaires sur le fond ont rapidement conclu – par un raisonnement contestable – que le remède demandé (l’annulation de l’élection) était disproportionné, constatant que les électeurs avaient voté en bonne foi et que ce n’était pas de leur faute si les lois électorales étaient irrégulières… Ce refus du pouvoir judiciaire de s’immiscer dans le contrôle à posteriori des élections culmina lorsque, le 7 décembre 2020, la Cour suprême fut saisie par 18 États et 126 membres de la Chambre des représentants, lui demandant de constater l’illégalité des élections tenues en Arizona, dans le Michigan, en Pennsylvanie et dans le Wisconsin. Quelques jours après, ce fut le coup de grâce. La cour rejeta la requête, considérant que les plaignants n’avaient pas démontré leur intérêt à agir… La messe était dite. Les juges ont créé un précédent qui restera dans l’histoire : il est désormais possible au pouvoir exécutif des 50 États des États-Unis d’organiser des élections à portée fédérale en toute violation des lois électorales adoptées par les parlements de chacun de ces États. Et ce, en contradiction directe avec l’article II section 1 de la Constitution américaine, lequel confie aux seules législatures des États le soin de déterminer les règles du déroulement des élections. Joe Biden sera bien, le 20 janvier 2021, le 46ème président « miraculé » des États-Unis. Il peut compter sur l’appui des médias sociaux, qui veillent au grain. Les posts et vidéos qui évoquent la fraude électorale sont désormais évincés de Facebook et de Youtube, la contestation des résultats étant assimilée à de la sédition. Le compte Twitter de Donald Trump est bloqué, l’interdisant de communiquer avec ses 85 millions de followers. La purge est en cours. Comme l’écrivit l’homme politique anglais Edmund Burke à la fin du XVIII° siècle, « la seule chose nécessaire pour que le mal triomphe, c’est que les hommes du bien ne fassent rien ». En l’occurrence, rien n’a été fait et maintenant, il n’y a plus rien à faire. Anthony Lacoudre

Surtout, nous avons réaffirmé l’idée sacrée qu’en Amérique, le gouvernement répond au peuple. Notre lumière directrice, notre étoile du Nord, notre conviction inébranlable a été que nous sommes ici pour servir les nobles citoyens américains de tous les jours. Notre allégeance ne va pas aux intérêts spéciaux, aux sociétés ou aux entités mondiales; c’est pour nos enfants, nos citoyens et notre nation elle-même. Ma priorité absolue, ma préoccupation constante, a toujours été l’intérêt supérieur des travailleurs américains et des familles américaines. Je n’ai pas cherché le cours le plus facile; de loin, c’était en fait le plus difficile. Je n’ai pas cherché le chemin qui recevrait le moins de critiques. J’ai engagé les batailles les plus difficiles, les combats les plus durs, les choix les plus difficiles parce que c’est pour cela que vous m’avez élu. (…) Nous avons promu une culture où nos lois seraient respectées, nos héros honorés, notre histoire préservée et les citoyens respectueux des lois jamais méprisés (…) Aucune nation ne peut prospérer longtemps si elle perd la foi en ses propres valeurs, son histoire et ses héros, car ce sont là les sources mêmes de notre unité et de notre vitalité. (…) La clé de la grandeur nationale réside dans le maintien et la transmission de notre identité nationale commune. Cela signifie se concentrer sur ce que nous avons en commun: le patrimoine que nous partageons tous. Au centre de cet héritage se trouve également une solide croyance en la liberté d’expression, la liberté d’expression et le libre débat. Seul l’oubli de qui nous sommes et comment nous sommes arrivés où nous sommes que nous nous nous abandonnerons à la censure politique et à la mise sur liste noire en Amérique. Ce n’est même pas pensable. Mettre fin au débat libre et contradictoire viole nos valeurs fondamentales et nos traditions les plus durables. En Amérique, nous n’insistons pas sur la conformité absolue et n’imposons pas des orthodoxies rigides et une police de la pensée ou de la parole. Ce n’est tout simplement pas ce que nous faisons. L’Amérique n’est pas une nation timide d’âmes dociles qui ont besoin d’être protégées de ceux avec qui nous sommes en désaccord. Ce n’est pas qui nous sommes. Ce ne sera jamais qui nous sommes. (…) En repensant aux quatre dernières années, une image me vient à l’esprit au-dessus de toutes les autres. Chaque fois que je parcourais le parcours du cortège, il y avait des milliers et des milliers de personnes. Ils étaient sortis avec leurs familles pour pouvoir tenir et agiter  fièrement à notre passage notre grand drapeau américain. Cela n’a jamais manqué de m’émouvoir profondément. Je savais qu’ils ne venaient pas simplement me montrer leur soutien; ils venaient me montrer leur soutien et leur amour pour notre pays. C’est une république de fiers citoyens unis par notre conviction commune que l’Amérique est la plus grande nation de toute l’histoire. Nous sommes, et devons toujours être, une terre d’espoir, de lumière et de gloire pour le monde entier. C’est le précieux héritage que nous devons sauvegarder à chaque tournant. C’est exactement ce pourquoi j’ai oeuvré ces quatre dernières années, ça et rien d’autre. D’une grande salle de dirigeants musulmans à Riyad à une grande place de Polonais à Varsovie; d’un discours à l’Assemblée coréenne à la tribune de l’Assemblée générale des Nations Unies; et de la Cité Interdite de Pékin à l’ombre du Mont Rushmore, j’ai combattu pour vous, je me suis battu pour votre famille, je me suis battu pour notre pays. Par-dessus tout, je me suis battu pour l’Amérique et tout ce qu’elle représente – c’est-à-dire sûre, forte, fière et libre. Maintenant, alors que je me prépare à remettre le pouvoir à une nouvelle administration mercredi à midi, je veux que vous sachiez que le mouvement que nous avons lancé ne fait que commencer. Il n’y a jamais rien eu de tel. La conviction qu’une nation doit servir ses citoyens ne diminuera pas, mais ne fera au contraire que se renforcer de jour en jour. Président Trump

Le roi est mort, vive le roi !

En cette triste journée où 227 ans, presque jour pour jour,  après la France …

Fondant sa république sur le sacrifice rituel de son roi …

La moitié de l’Amérique et une bonne partie du monde …

S’apprêtent à célébrer la formidable parce qu’universelle puissance …

De l’expulsion réussie d’un bouc émissaire …

Devinez comment …

Entre propagande massive des médias et contournement des lois électorales …

Un candidat quasi-sénile ayant mené une campagne virtuelle depuis le sous-sol de sa maison loin des journalistes et de la population …

Et ayant survécu à des accusations d’agression sexuelle …

Comme à des soupçons d’extorsion en Ukraine et de trafic d’influence avec la Chine….

Tout en en apportant sa caution à des mois d’émeutes et de pillages …

Arrive-t-il à défaire – ironie tragique de l’affaire – le candidat de la loi et de l’ordre …

Pour se voir finalement investi… sous la même protection militaire digne d’un Etat policier ..

Que tout au long de l’année précédente il avait refusé…

Quand les grandes métropoles du pays étaient livrées aux flammes et au pillage des Black Lives Matter et antifas  ?

Remarks by President Trump In Farewell Address to the Nation

The White House

January 19, 2021

My fellow Americans: Four years ago, we launched a great national effort to rebuild our country, to renew its spirit, and to restore the allegiance of this government to its citizens. In short, we embarked on a mission to make America great again — for all Americans. As I conclude my term as the 45th President of the United States, I stand before you truly proud of what we have achieved together. We did what we came here to do — and so much more. This week, we inaugurate a new administration and pray for its success in keeping America safe and prosperous. We extend our best wishes, and we also want them to have luck — a very important word. I’d like to begin by thanking just a few of the amazing people who made our remarkable journey possible. (…) Most of all, I want to thank the American people. To serve as your President has been an honor beyond description. Thank you for this extraordinary privilege. And that’s what it is — a great privilege and a great honor. We must never forget that while Americans will always have our disagreements, we are a nation of incredible, decent, faithful, and peace-loving citizens who all want our country to thrive and flourish and be very, very successful and good. We are a truly magnificent nation. All Americans were horrified by the assault on our Capitol. Political violence is an attack on everything we cherish as Americans. It can never be tolerated. Now more than ever, we must unify around our shared values and rise above the partisan rancor, and forge our common destiny. Four years ago, I came to Washington as the only true outsider ever to win the presidency. I had not spent my career as a politician, but as a builder looking at open skylines and imagining infinite possibilities. I ran for President because I knew there were towering new summits for America just waiting to be scaled. I knew the potential for our nation was boundless as long as we put America first. So I left behind my former life and stepped into a very difficult arena, but an arena nevertheless, with all sorts of potential if properly done. America had given me so much, and I wanted to give something back. Together with millions of hardworking patriots across this land, we built the greatest political movement in the history of our country. We also built the greatest economy in the history of the world. It was about “America First” because we all wanted to make America great again. We restored the principle that a nation exists to serve its citizens. Our agenda was not about right or left, it wasn’t about Republican or Democrat, but about the good of a nation, and that means the whole nation. With the support and prayers of the American people, we achieved more than anyone thought possible. Nobody thought we could even come close. We passed the largest package of tax cuts and reforms in American history. We slashed more job-killing regulations than any administration had ever done before. We fixed our broken trade deals, withdrew from the horrible Trans-Pacific Partnership and the impossible Paris Climate Accord, renegotiated the one-sided South Korea deal, and we replaced NAFTA with the groundbreaking USMCA — that’s Mexico and Canada — a deal that’s worked out very, very well. Also, and very importantly, we imposed historic and monumental tariffs on China; made a great new deal with China. But before the ink was even dry, we and the whole world got hit with the China virus. Our trade relationship was rapidly changing, billions and billions of dollars were pouring into the U.S., but the virus forced us to go in a different direction. (…) We reignited America’s job creation and achieved record-low unemployment for African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, women — almost everyone. Incomes soared, wages boomed, the American Dream was restored, and millions were lifted from poverty in just a few short years. It was a miracle. The stock market set one record after another, with 148 stock market highs during this short period of time, and boosted the retirements and pensions of hardworking citizens all across our nation. 401(k)s are at a level they’ve never been at before. (…) When our nation was hit with the terrible pandemic, we produced not one, but two vaccines with record-breaking speed, and more will quickly follow. They said it couldn’t be done but we did it. They call it a “medical miracle,” and that’s what they’re calling it right now: a “medical miracle.” Another administration would have taken 3, 4, 5, maybe even up to 10 years to develop a vaccine. We did in nine months. We grieve for every life lost, and we pledge in their memory to wipe out this horrible pandemic once and for all. (…) We confirmed three new justices of the United States Supreme Court. We appointed nearly 300 federal judges to interpret our Constitution as written. For years, the American people pleaded with Washington to finally secure the nation’s borders. I am pleased to say we answered that plea and achieved the most secure border in U.S. history. (…) We proudly leave the next administration with the strongest and most robust border security measures ever put into place. This includes historic agreements with Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, along with more than 450 miles of powerful new wall. We restored American strength at home and American leadership abroad. The world respects us again. Please don’t lose that respect. We reclaimed our sovereignty by standing up for America at the United Nations and withdrawing from the one-sided global deals that never served our interests. And NATO countries are now paying hundreds of billions of dollars more than when I arrived just a few years ago. It was very unfair. We were paying the cost for the world. Now the world is helping us. And perhaps most importantly of all, with nearly $3 trillion, we fully rebuilt the American military — all made in the USA. We launched the first new branch of the United States Armed Forces in 75 years: the Space Force. And last spring, I stood at Kennedy Space Center in Florida and watched as American astronauts returned to space on American rockets for the first time in many, many years. We revitalized our alliances and rallied the nations of the world to stand up to China like never before. We obliterated the ISIS caliphate and ended the wretched life of its founder and leader, al Baghdadi. We stood up to the oppressive Iranian regime and killed the world’s top terrorist, Iranian butcher Qasem Soleimani. We recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. As a result of our bold diplomacy and principled realism, we achieved a series of historic peace deals in the Middle East. Nobody believed it could happen. The Abraham Accords opened the doors to a future of peace and harmony, not violence and bloodshed. It is the dawn of a new Middle East, and we are bringing our soldiers home. I am especially proud to be the first President in decades who has started no new wars. Above all, we have reasserted the sacred idea that, in America, the government answers to the people. Our guiding light, our North Star, our unwavering conviction has been that we are here to serve the noble everyday citizens of America. Our allegiance is not to the special interests, corporations, or global entities; it’s to our children, our citizens, and to our nation itself. As President, my top priority, my constant concern, has always been the best interests of American workers and American families. I did not seek the easiest course; by far, it was actually the most difficult. I did not seek the path that would get the least criticism. I took on the tough battles, the hardest fights, the most difficult choices because that’s what you elected me to do. Your needs were my first and last unyielding focus. This, I hope, will be our greatest legacy: Together, we put the American people back in charge of our country. We restored self-government. We restored the idea that in America no one is forgotten, because everyone matters and everyone has a voice. We fought for the principle that every citizen is entitled to equal dignity, equal treatment, and equal rights because we are all made equal by God. Everyone is entitled to be treated with respect, to have their voice heard, and to have their government listen. You are loyal to your country, and my administration was always loyal to you. (…) We promoted a culture where our laws would be upheld, our heroes honored, our history preserved, and law-abiding citizens are never taken for granted. (…) Now, as I leave the White House, I have been reflecting on the dangers that threaten the priceless inheritance we all share. As the world’s most powerful nation, America faces constant threats and challenges from abroad. But the greatest danger we face is a loss of confidence in ourselves, a loss of confidence in our national greatness. A nation is only as strong as its spirit. We are only as dynamic as our pride. We are only as vibrant as the faith that beats in the hearts of our people. No nation can long thrive that loses faith in its own values, history, and heroes, for these are the very sources of our unity and our vitality. What has always allowed America to prevail and triumph over the great challenges of the past has been an unyielding and unashamed conviction in the nobility of our country and its unique purpose in history. We must never lose this conviction. We must never forsake our belief in America. The key to national greatness lies in sustaining and instilling our shared national identity. That means focusing on what we have in common: the heritage that we all share. At the center of this heritage is also a robust belief in free expression, free speech, and open debate. Only if we forget who we are, and how we got here, could we ever allow political censorship and blacklisting to take place in America. It’s not even thinkable. Shutting down free and open debate violates our core values and most enduring traditions. In America, we don’t insist on absolute conformity or enforce rigid orthodoxies and punitive speech codes. We just don’t do that. America is not a timid nation of tame souls who need to be sheltered and protected from those with whom we disagree. That’s not who we are. It will never be who we are. For nearly 250 years, in the face of every challenge, Americans have always summoned our unmatched courage, confidence, and fierce independence. These are the miraculous traits that once led millions of everyday citizens to set out across a wild continent and carve out a new life in the great West. It was the same profound love of our God-given freedom that willed our soldiers into battle and our astronauts into space. As I think back on the past four years, one image rises in my mind above all others. Whenever I traveled all along the motorcade route, there were thousands and thousands of people. They came out with their families so that they could stand as we passed, and proudly wave our great American flag. It never failed to deeply move me. I knew that they did not just come out to show their support of me; they came out to show me their support and love for our country. This is a republic of proud citizens who are united by our common conviction that America is the greatest nation in all of history. We are, and must always be, a land of hope, of light, and of glory to all the world. This is the precious inheritance that we must safeguard at every single turn. For the past four years, I have worked to do just that. From a great hall of Muslim leaders in Riyadh to a great square of Polish people in Warsaw; from the floor of the Korean Assembly to the podium at the United Nations General Assembly; and from the Forbidden City in Beijing to the shadow of Mount Rushmore, I fought for you, I fought for your family, I fought for our country. Above all, I fought for America and all it stands for — and that is safe, strong, proud, and free. Now, as I prepare to hand power over to a new administration at noon on Wednesday, I want you to know that the movement we started is only just beginning. There’s never been anything like it. The belief that a nation must serve its citizens will not dwindle but instead only grow stronger by the day. As long as the American people hold in their hearts deep and devoted love of country, then there is nothing that this nation cannot achieve. Our communities will flourish. Our people will be prosperous. Our traditions will be cherished. Our faith will be strong. And our future will be brighter than ever before. I go from this majestic place with a loyal and joyful heart, an optimistic spirit, and a supreme confidence that for our country and for our children, the best is yet to come. Thank you, and farewell. God bless you. God bless the United States of America.

President Trump

Voir aussi:

L’élection miraculeuse de Joe Biden- – partie 1
Anthony Lacoudre
France Soir
19/01/2021

« I’m sorry you can’t believe in miracles. » Lance Armstrong

Mercredi 20 janvier, au pied du Capitole à Washington DC, Joe Biden prêtera serment, la main posée sur la Bible. Il sera intronisé comme le nouveau président des États-Unis, ayant battu le président sortant Donald Trump. Il pourra effectivement remercier Dieu car son élection relève tout simplement du miracle.

Comment a-t-il fait en effet pour obtenir plus de 81 millions de voix lors de l’élection du 3 novembre dernier, c’est-à-dire plus de voix que n’importe quel autre candidat l’ayant précédé dans l’histoire du pays, y compris Barack Obama ? Comment a-t-il fait pour obtenir 15 millions de voix de plus qu’Hillary Clinton en 2016 ?

Et cela après avoir mené une campagne virtuelle depuis le sous-sol de sa maison du Delaware, en évitant soigneusement les contacts avec les journalistes et avec la population ? Comment a-t-il pu survivre aux accusations d’agression sexuelle contre une fonctionnaire du Sénat et aux soupçons d’extorsion en Ukraine et de trafic d’influence, notamment avec des pays comme la Chine ? Comment a-t-il fait, au cours de cette campagne, pour surpasser ses errements, ses diverses gaffes, ses propos maladroits, incohérents, parfois franchement racistes ?

En réalité, son élection ne relève pas d’un miracle, elle relève de la fraude.

La propagande des médias

La première fraude provient de la manipulation des électeurs par les médias. Jamais on n’avait vu une telle collusion entre un candidat, d’une part et les grands médias et médias sociaux, d’autre part. On avait cru atteindre le summum en 2016 lorsque par exemple CNN transmettait à l’avance à Hillary Clinton les questions des débats. C’était en réalité bien peu de choses par rapport à 2020. Jamais les sondages commandités par les grands médias n’auront été truqués à ce point en faveur de Joe Biden. Jamais n’avait-on assisté à un tel degré de propagande anti-Trump et pro-Biden tout au long de la campagne. Tout ce qui était positif à propos de Trump et tout ce qui était négatif à propos de Biden aura été caché au public, alors que tout ce qui était négatif à propos de Trump et tout ce qui était positif à propos de Biden aura fait l’objet d’un matraquage médiatique. Sans parler de la fabrication purement et simplement d’histoires mensongères à n’en plus finir contre le président sortant et son entourage.

Le scandale de la « Biden crime family » étouffé

Le point culminant est intervenu lorsque, le 14 octobre 2020, à deux semaines de l’élection, le New York Post révéla le scandale de la corruption de la famille Biden (« the Biden crime family » comme l’appelle Donald Trump). Facebook et Twitter bloquent alors immédiatement les comptes et les pages du quotidien, pour éviter la propagation. « Une erreur de jugement », admettra par la suite Jack Dorsey, le patron de Twitter, qui n’en pense sans doute pas un mot.

Les autres médias enterrent l’affaire, s’assurant que le scandale reste confiné. Et pourtant, les preuves sont accablantes. Hunter Biden, le fils de Joe Biden, décrit en détail dans ses emails obtenus par le « New York Post » le modus operandi : 50 % des sommes collectées étaient reversées au « big guy ».

Les sondages réalisés après l’élection dévoileront par la suite que 13 % des électeurs de Joe Biden n’auraient pas voté pour lui s’ils avaient été informés de l’existence du scandale en question. Ce qui représente plus de 10 millions de voix ! Quand on sait que Joe Biden a remporté l’élection in fine grâce à un peu moins de 50.000 voix d’avance dans trois États-clefs…

Le contournement des lois électorales

La deuxième fraude aura consisté pour la gauche américaine à contourner les lois électorales applicables aux bulletins par correspondance dans les principaux États-clefs, et ce, sous le prétexte de la crise du coronavirus.

Par exemple en Géorgie, il a été décidé que les bulletins par correspondance, envoyés à toute la population, seraient pris en compte sans vérification appropriée de la signature des électeurs, alors que la loi est on ne peut plus claire à ce sujet : les bulletins par correspondance doivent, sous peine de nullité, faire l’objet de contrôles strictes. En pratique, cette « relaxation » des standards de contrôle a permis à n’importe qui (des morts, des mineurs, des prisonniers, des non-résidents, des étrangers…) d’envoyer des bulletins, sans grand risque de rejet du vote. Du reste, le taux de rejet des bulletins par correspondance est passé de 3,5 % en 2016 (ce qui correspondait à 90.000 votes) à 0,3 % en 2020, et ce, alors même que le nombre de bulletins par correspondance reçus en 2020 a été multiplié par 5 comparé à 2016. Autrement dit, des dizaines de milliers de bulletins par correspondance illégaux ont été comptabilisés cette année en Géorgie.

Qui plus est, ces bulletins ont pu être déposés par les électeurs dans des boîtes (« drop boxes » financées par Mark Zuckerberg, le patron de Facebook), installées spécifiquement dans certains quartiers populaires des grandes villes de l’État afin d’éviter aux électeurs d’acquitter un timbre. Bien évidemment, la collecte des bulletins déposés dans ces boîtes n’a pas pu être supervisée par les assesseurs républicains…

Une vidéo prise par des caméras de surveillance a fait sensation. Elle montre comment les employés de la ville d’Atlanta ont géré le dépouillement de ces bulletins dans le centre le plus important de la ville (State Farm Arena). A 23h le soir du 3 novembre, la presse et les assesseurs des deux partis, sous le prétexte d’une fuite d’eau empêchant la poursuite du dépouillement, sont priés de rentrer chez eux et de revenir le lendemain matin. Une fois la scène vidée de ses témoins gênants, quatre employés municipaux extirpent des dizaines de milliers de bulletins de quatre valises qui avaient été placées et cachées dans la salle le matin même, pour être scannés, à de multiples reprises, dans les machines. Au total, 24 000 bulletins comptabilisés en toute illégalité, comme attesté en direct sur le site du New York Times (real time tabulations). Joe Biden a finalement emporté l’État avec… 11 779 voix d’avance.

En Pennsylvanie, la loi était claire. Les bulletins par correspondance ne pouvaient être acceptés que si l’électeur apposait sa signature sur l’enveloppe. Mais cette année, le gouverneur démocrate a autorisé les centres de dépouillement à comptabiliser les bulletins sans enveloppe (« naked ballots »), ouvrant ainsi la voie à de la fraude massive. On comprend mieux pourquoi les assesseurs républicains se sont vus barrer l’accès aux centres de dépouillement à Philadelphie, et ce, même en dépit d’injonction obtenues en référé auprès des juges locaux.

Par ailleurs, la loi prévoyait que les bulletins par correspondance reçus par la poste après 20h le mardi 3 novembre étaient nuls et ne pouvaient être comptabilisés. Qu’à cela ne tienne, les bulletins collectés jusqu’au vendredi 6 novembre ont été pris en compte, y compris ceux reçus sans cachet de la poste sur l’enveloppe ! N’importe qui a donc pu voter en Pennsylvanie dans les jours qui ont suivi le jour de l’élection … On précisera que 75% des 630 000 bulletins par correspondance « magiques » reçus après le 3 novembre ont été en faveur de Joe Biden.

Qui plus est, dans certains comtés en Pennsylvanie, plus de voix ont été comptabilisées que d’inscrits sur les listes électorales ayant voté – 205 000 plus précisément d’après un rapport du Sénat de Pennsylvanie du 29 décembre 2020 dénonçant ce phénomène de « over votes », c’est-à-dire de bulletins comptabilisés qui n’ont pas été imprimés par le gouvernement de la Pennsylvanie.

Dans le Wisconsin, la loi prévoyait que seules les personnes bénéficiant du statut de personne confinée indéfiniment (typiquement des personnes grabataires) pouvaient voter par correspondance sans avoir à se déplacer au préalable au bureau de vote pour chercher un bulletin en montrant sa pièce d’identité (un bulletin leur est alors envoyé par la poste chez eux). Mais pour l’occasion, sur ordre du gouverneur (démocrate), le statut a été largement étendu, passant de 70.000 personnes environ aux élections précédentes à 200 000 cette année, en raison du coronavirus. 130 000 votes de plus que les années précédentes ont donc été comptabilisés sans contrôle d’identité à l’échelle de l’État (un peu comme si les bureaux de vote avaient accepté que 200 000 électeurs qui venaient en personne voter ne présentent pas leur pièce d’identité). Précisons que ces 200 000 bulletins furent largement favorables à Joe Biden, lequel a remporté l’État avec 20 682 voix.

Anthony Lacoudre est avocat à New York.

L’élection miraculeuse de Joe Biden – partie 2
Anthony Lacoudre
France Soir
19/01/2021

Des preuves de fraude accablantes

Les avocats de Donald Trump ont réuni plus de mille témoignages sous serment de personnes attestant d’irrégularités importantes constatées lors des élections du 3 novembre. Chacune de ces personnes risque 5 ans de prison si elle présente un témoignage mensonger.

Ainsi, des assesseurs racontent comment ils ont été expulsés des centres de dépouillement du Michigan par la police locale, sous les applaudissements des employés municipaux en train de procéder au dépouillement, des conducteurs de camion expliquent qu’ils ont conduit des chargements de centaines de milliers de bulletins fraîchement imprimés de New York jusqu’en Pennsylvanie, des employés municipaux confirment qu’ils scannaient dans les machines des bulletins par correspondance qui n’avaient pas été pliés (c’est-à-dire qui ne sortaient pas d’enveloppes) ou encore confirment qu’on leur demandait de comptabiliser des bulletins par correspondance sans vérifier les signatures, des postiers révèlent que leur hiérarchie leur demandait d’anti-dater des bulletins par correspondance reçus hors délais, des « white hat hackers » témoignent qu’ils ont réussi à se connecter aux machines des bureaux de vote en Géorgie (dans le comté de Fulton à Atlanta), des électeurs racontent que, se rendant aux urnes pour voter, ils se sont entendus dire qu’ils avaient déjà voté et qu’ils pouvaient rentrer chez eux, etc.

Par ailleurs, ces mêmes avocats ont réuni des études et témoignages d’experts en probabilités identifiant les anomalies statistiques du 3 novembre. Par exemple, dans l’histoire du pays, jamais six États n’ont interrompu en même temps leur dépouillement à partir de 23h le soir de l’élection. Jamais des pics d’enregistrement de voix par centaines de milliers en faveur d’un candidat en pleine nuit n’ont été constatés en l’espace de seulement quelques heures. Jamais un candidat républicain n’a perdu l’élection alors qu’il a emporté la Floride et l’Ohio (qui plus avec 5 points de plus qu’en 2016).

« Les résultats sont aberrants et absurdes » martèlent les mathématiciens. « Les taux de participation supérieurs à 85 % sont impossibles. Les votes en provenance de bureaux de vote à plus de 75 % en faveur d’un candidat sont la marque d’une fraude » expliquent-ils.

Surtout lorsque ces anomalies arithmétiques ne sont constatées que dans les grandes villes des six États-clefs, où Joe Biden a réalisé des scores époustouflants en comparaison aux scores inférieurs de Biden par rapport à Hillary Clinton observés dans les autres grands centres urbains du pays, à commencer par New York City ou Los Angeles…

Ainsi, dans le comté de Fulton, à Atlanta en Géorgie, 161 bureaux de vote ont reporté entre 90 % et 100 % de votes en faveur de Joe Biden, totalisant 152 000 voix pour le candidat démocrate. Idem à Philadelphie ou 278 bureaux de vote (16 % des bureaux de la ville), ont reporté 97 % ou plus de voix pour Joe Biden, totalisant 100 200 voix pour Joe Biden contre 2.100 voix pour Donald Trump. Même à New York City, Donald Trump n’a pas été crédité de scores aussi déséquilibrés.

Toujours en Pennsylvanie, dans l’un des bureaux de vote du comté d’Allegheny, en Pennsylvanie, 93 % des bulletins par correspondance furent en faveur de Joe Biden, ce qui n’est pas possible d’un point de vue statistique, Joe Biden recevant 23 000 voix contre 1300 pour Donald Trump. Dans le comté de Wayne, le plus important du Michigan, 71 bureaux de vote ont reporté plus de votes que d’inscrits sur les listes électorales, le gouverneur (démocrate) passant outre le refus du comté de certifier les résultats…

Par ailleurs, les parlementaires locaux (républicains) d’Arizona, de Géorgie, du Nevada ou encore en Pennsylvanie, qui eux, ont pu enquêter et auditionner de nombreux témoins au cours des mois de novembre et décembre 2020, ont rédigé des rapports accablants contre leurs propres gouverneurs, attestant l’ampleur de la fraude dans leurs États respectifs.

En parallèle, on rappellera que le Sénat à Washington DC a lui-même organisé le 16 décembre 2020 des auditions de témoins sur le thème des irrégularités de l’élection du 3 novembre, les avocats de Donald Trump ayant alors eu l’occasion de détailler d’innombrables irrégularités, notamment concernant l’Arizona, le Nevada et le Wisconsin. A l’issue des présentations, plusieurs sénateurs durent reconnaître que de sérieux doutes pesaient sur la légitimité de l’élection de Joe Biden.

La justice se dérobe

Mais en dépit de cette montagne de preuves, les juges du pays ont refusé d’écouter les multiples requêtes en annulation des résultats des élections des États concernés. Aucune enquête n’a été diligentée, aucune procédure de « discovery » n’a été intentée (forçant la partie défenderesse de transmettre des informations), aucune saisie de bulletins ou des scans des machines n’a été ordonnée par les juges. Les avocats démocrates bataillèrent furieusement en justice pour qu’aucun audit ne puisse être ordonné, la plupart des requêtes ayant été écartées pour des questions de procédure.

Et lorsque les juges ont décidé d’entendre les affaires sur le fond, les débats furent bâclés. La cour suprême du Nevada a par exemple rendu son jugement après avoir accepté seulement 15 dépositions (par écrit, aucun témoin en personne), et a jugé sans enquête, sans délibération, après seulement 2 heures de plaidoirie un dossier constitué de 8 000 pages portant sur 130 000 votes contestés. En fait, les rares juges de différents États qui ont accepté d’écouter les affaires sur le fond ont rapidement conclu – par un raisonnement contestable – que le remède demandé (l’annulation de l’élection) était disproportionné, constatant que les électeurs avaient voté en bonne foi et que ce n’était pas de leur faute si les lois électorales étaient irrégulières…

Ce refus du pouvoir judiciaire de s’immiscer dans le contrôle à posteriori des élections culmina lorsque, le 7 décembre 2020, la Cour suprême fut saisie par 18 États et 126 membres de la Chambre des représentants, lui demandant de constater l’illégalité des élections tenues en Arizona, dans le Michigan, en Pennsylvanie et dans le Wisconsin. Quelques jours après, ce fut le coup de grâce. La cour rejetta la requête, considérant que les plaignants n’avaient pas démontré leur intérêt à agir…

La messe était dite. Les juges ont créé un précédent qui restera dans l’histoire : il est désormais possible au pouvoir exécutif des 50 États des États-Unis d’organiser des élections à portée fédérale en toute violation des lois électorales adoptées par les parlements de chacun de ces États. Et ce, en contradiction directe avec l’article II section 1 de la Constitution américaine, lequel confie aux seules législatures des États le soin de déterminer les règles du déroulement des élections.

Joe Biden sera bien, le 20 janvier 2021, le 46ème président « miraculé » des États-Unis. Il peut compter sur l’appui des médias sociaux, qui veillent au grain. Les posts et vidéos qui évoquent la fraude électorale sont désormais évincés de Facebook et de Youtube, la contestation des résultats étant assimilée à de la sédition. Le compte Twitter de Donald Trump est bloqué, l’interdisant de communiquer avec ses 85 millions de followers. La purge est en cours.

Comme l’écrivit l’homme politique anglais Edmund Burke à la fin du XVIII° siècle,

« la seule chose nécessaire pour que le mal triomphe, c’est que les hommes du bien ne fassent rien ».

En l’occurrence, rien n’a été fait et maintenant, il n’y a plus rien à faire.

Anthony Lacoudre est avocat à New York.

Voir également:

Respectons les 74 millions d’électeurs de Trump, ils ne sont pas “pitoyables”
The Wall Street Journal
15/01/2021

Donald Trump est fini, mais son sort n’est plus une priorité, observe ce chroniqueur conservateur du Wall Street Journal. Si Biden veut guérir l’Amérique, il va devoir apaiser les partisans de son adversaire, qui ont le sentiment que le mépris et la haine dont leur candidat est l’objet les visent eux aussi.

Si Donald Trump avait envisagé un avenir politique, c’est bel et bien terminé. Il a largement contribué à l’hypothéquer lui-même lors de la campagne pour les sénatoriales en Géorgie, en faisant passer sa petite personne devant l’intérêt d’une majorité républicaine au Sénat. Ce qui a achevé de lui boucher toute perspective, c’est la foule de ses partisans qui, mercredi [6 janvier], ont envahi le Capitole et, ce faisant, fait plus de tort à leur favori qu’aucun de ses ennemis n’y était jamais parvenu.

Washington se perd en conjectures sur le niveau d’humiliation qui sera infligé au président sortant. Après le lancement [et le vote] d’une deuxième procédure de destitution contre lui, on évoque même un procès devant le Sénat après la fin de son mandat.

Mais pour qui est attaché à l’unité et à la guérison, le sort de Donald Trump n’est plus une priorité. Il y a plus grave : ce qui va advenir de cette moitié de l’Amérique qui l’a soutenu. Beaucoup sont tentés de mettre dans le même sac les 74 millions d’Américains qui ont voté Trump et les auteurs de l’attaque du Capitole, et de les considérer désormais tous inaptes à la vie civique.

Voyous et Américains ordinaires

Il y avait là des voyous, c’est indéniable. Mais laissez-moi vous parler un peu de ces manifestants que je connais personnellement. Tous sont, sans exception, des Américains ordinaires et des individus honnêtes, qui n’ont pas participé à l’invasion du Capitole et jamais n’oseraient désobéir à un officier de police.

Certains parmi eux, mais pas tous, jugent que l’élection a été volée. Ils se trompent, mais cela ne fait pas d’eux des suprémacistes blancs, des terroristes de l’intérieur, des extrémistes religieux – ils ne méritent aucun des noms d’oiseaux lancés depuis une semaine. Ceux que je connais personnellement sont aujourd’hui terrifiés à l’idée d’être identifiés sur les réseaux (par des gauchistes vengeurs qui diffuseraient leurs informations personnelles), voire licenciés si jamais leur participation à la manifestation à Washington venait à se savoir.

Certains ne voient aucun problème à ce que les personnes ayant enfreint la loi [le 6 janvier] soient arrêtées et poursuivies en justice. Selon un sondage Reuters/Ipsos, seuls 9 % des Américains considèrent les émeutiers comme des “citoyens inquiets” et 5 % les tiennent pour des “patriotes”. Il y a dans les 90 % restants des millions d’électeurs de Trump.

Certes, parmi ces millions de personnes ayant choisi le bulletin Trump, certains, nombreux peut-être, croient à des théories du complot et ne font pas confiance à leur gouvernement.

Mais comment cela s’explique-t-il ? Cela aurait-il à voir avec le fait qu’ils entendent de grands médias déclarer fièrement qu’ils ne feront pas même l’effort d’être impartiaux dans leur couverture de Trump et ensuite alimenter, eux aussi, une théorie complotiste, selon laquelle le président serait un agent à la solde des Russes ? Faut-il s’étonner que les gens aillent puiser dans d’autres sources d’information, douteuses pour certaines ?
Trump n’a aucun talent pour apaiser les passions

Faut-il s’étonner que la méfiance envers l’État ait augmenté, quand les Américains ont découvert que de hauts responsables du FBI et du ministère de la Justice ont abusé de leurs pouvoirs de police pour interférer dans le résultat d’une élection puis saper la légitimité d’un président élu ? [Selon un autre article du Wall Street Journal, un rapport du Sénat américain détaillant la vulnérabilité de la campagne Trump 2016 à l’espionnage russe a également trouvé des failles dans l’enquête menée par le FBI.]

Donald Trump n’a aucun talent pour apaiser les passions, d’ailleurs aujourd’hui en plein emballement, et dans tous les cas il sera incessamment hors jeu. Mais si Joe Biden entend être, comme il l’a dit, le président de tous les Américains, qu’ils aient ou non voté pour lui, il a du pain sur la planche. Il [aurait été] bien avisé, pour commencer, de demander aux démocrates d’annuler la procédure d’impeachment qui ne fera que jeter du sel sur la plaie, et de faire comprendre aux républicains anti-Trump que, par leur volonté de mettre sur liste noire quiconque a exercé des fonctions au sein de l’administration Trump, ils ne feront qu’accentuer la rancœur et la division.
À lire aussi Opinion. Présidentielle 2020 : “pourquoi je ne pardonne pas aux électeurs de Trump”

Pourquoi serait-ce à Joe Biden d’aller apaiser des partisans de Trump désenchantés ? pourrait-on demander. C’est que Biden sera [le 20 janvier] le chef de cette nation, et que c’est une promesse qu’il a déjà faite. Dans son discours de victoire, il a dit qu’il était temps de “cesser de traiter nos adversaires en ennemis”. Il a tout à fait raison – mais il faut de l’autorité pour que ces mots se concrétisent pour ces millions d’électeurs de Trump qui ont le sentiment, non sans raison, que la haine et le mépris dont leur candidat est l’objet les visent eux aussi.

“L’État les a laissés tomber, l’économie les a laissés tomber”

Hillary Clinton n’avait pas dit autre chose lorsqu’elle avait, fort malheureusement, qualifié ces Américains de “pitoyables”. Ironie de l’histoire, dans ses propos, l’ancienne candidate démocrate ne rangeait dans sa “bande de pitoyables” que la moitié des partisans de Donald Trump.

L’autre moitié, avait-elle estimé, est faite de “gens qui ont le sentiment que l’État les a laissés tomber, que l’économie les a laissés tomber, que plus personne ne s’intéresse à eux, que plus personne ne se préoccupe de leur quotidien, ni de leur avenir.” Et d’ajouter :

Ces gens-là sont des gens que nous devons comprendre, dans leur raisonnement et dans leur ressenti.”

Hillary Clinton était prête à penser qu’au moins la moitié des supporters de Trump méritaient compréhension et empathie. Aujourd’hui, cela ferait d’elle une modérée.

William McGurn

All Donald Trump’s Deplorables

Even Hillary Clinton consigned only half of Trump supporters to her infamous ‘basket.’

William McGurn

The Wall Stret Journal

Jan. 11, 2021

Whatever political future Donald Trump might have envisioned for himself is now dead. He squandered a good chunk of it in the Georgia runoffs, when he made them all about himself instead of about keeping Republican control over the Senate. But it was finished off by the mob of his own supporters who stormed the Capitol this past Wednesday and inflicted more lasting damage on their man than anything his enemies ever managed.

At the moment, Washington is consumed with just how humiliating Mr. Trump’s exit will be—with a second impeachment, with the 25th Amendment invoked, with his resignation. There’s even talk of holding a Senate trial when he’s no longer president.

But for anyone who cares about unity and healing, the president’s fate is no longer the primary concern. More important is the future for the half of America that supported him. Because there is an effort to lump the 74 million Americans who voted for Mr. Trump with those who rampaged through the Capitol—thus rendering them unfit for polite society going forward.

There’s no denying the reality of the thugs. But let me tell you about the people I know who attended that rally. To a person, they are decent, ordinary Americans who didn’t enter the Capitol and wouldn’t dream of disobeying a police officer.

---

Some (but not all) believe the election was stolen. They’re mistaken, but that doesn’t make them white supremacists, domestic terrorists, religious extremists or any of the many noxious names they’ve been called. Those I know personally are now terrified that they will be doxed—meaning vengeful leftists will make their personal information public—and perhaps fired from their jobs if it gets out they were in Washington for the rally.

These are also people who have no problem with arresting and prosecuting those who did break the law that Wednesday. A Reuters/Ipsos poll reports that only 9% of Americans consider the rioters “concerned citizens” and 5% call them “patriots.” The remaining 90% includes millions of Trump voters.

True, those millions include some, perhaps many, who believe in conspiracy theories and don’t trust their government.

But where could that have come from? Might it have something to do with watching leading media outlets proudly declare they wouldn’t even try to be fair in reporting about Mr. Trump, and then go on to promote the conspiracy theory that the president was a Russian agent? Is it any surprise that people might then look to other sources of information, some of which are dubious? Or that distrust in government grew as people learned how leaders at the FBI and Justice Department abused their police powers to interfere in an election and then undermine an elected president?

Everywhere a Trump voter turns, he sees ostensibly apolitical organizations enlisting in the “resistance.” Here’s an email just sent to every kid in America applying to college through the Common App:

“We witnessed a deeply disturbing attack on democracy on Wednesday, when violent white supremacist insurrectionists stormed the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to undo a fair and legal election. The stark differences between how peaceful Black and brown protesters have been treated for years relative to Wednesday’s coup again call attention to the open wound of systemic racism.”

Mr. Trump’s power to cool passions, now running at a fever pitch, is almost nil, and in any event his time is running out. But if Joe Biden means what he says about being president for all Americans, including those who didn’t vote for him, he has work to do. A healthy start would be to ask his fellow Democrats to call off the impeachment that will only rub raw an open wound, or make clear to the anti-Trump Republicans in the Lincoln Project that their effort to blacklist anyone who served in the Trump administration is a prescription for more rancor and division.

Some ask: Why is it on Mr. Biden to soothe disenchanted Trump followers? The answer is because in a week he will be the nation’s leader—and he’s already promised as much. In his victory speech he said it was time to “stop treating our opponents as enemies.” He’s right, but it will take leadership to make these words real for millions of Trump voters who feel, with reason, that the hatred and contempt directed at Mr. Trump is also meant for them.

Hillary Clinton admitted this when she infamously labeled these voters “deplorables.” But funny thing about that: In her original remarks, she made clear she was consigning only half of Mr. Trump’s supporters to her “basket of deplorables.”

The other half, she said, are “people who feel that the government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures.” She went on to advise that “those are people we have to understand and empathize with as well.”

She was willing to consider at least half of Mr. Trump’s supporters worthy of understanding and empathy. Today, this would make Mrs. Clinton the moderate.

 

Cessons de mépriser les électeurs de Trump

Esglobal – Madrid

06/11/2020

Quel que soit le résultat final de l’élection, demandons-nous pourquoi des millions de sympathisants républicains sont restés fidèles au président sortant, écrit ce journaliste économique espagnol sur le site d’analyse des relations internationales Esglobal.Il est toujours tentant de qualifier d’irrationnels ceux qui ne votent pas comme nous, en particulier si ce sont des étrangers. À leur contact, on se sentirait tellement sages, supérieurs. On ne ferait pas le moindre effort pour les écouter et les comprendre.

Certains, même s’ils reconnaissent aux trumpistes une sorte de bon sens primitif, les jugent avec paternalisme et attribuent leurs opinions à une forme d’ignorance aussi crasse qu’autodestructrice : des pauvres types.

Nous ferions bien de reconnaître au contraire, du moins hypothétiquement, que bon nombre des électeurs de Trump sont aussi intelligents, rationnels et idéalistes que nos voisins. Ni plus, ni moins.

Ce qui les distingue, ce sont leurs objectifs et la conviction que le président Trump est le plus à même de les aider à les défendre.

Mais quels sont ces objectifs ? Et par quelles motivations (et demi-vérités) sont mus tant de millions de gens qui continuent à croire en Trump au bout de quatre ans ?

1) Économie et classe moyenne : mieux qu’en 2016 ?

Pendant les trois premières années du mandat de Trump, les revenus moyens des foyers sont passés de 63 000 à plus de 68 500 dollars par an, les salaires horaires des classes inférieures ont augmenté de 7 % au total et le chômage est descendu à des seuils jamais vus depuis les années 1960.

Parallèlement, la croissance économique que Trump a stimulée par ses baisses d’impôts en 2018 n’a guère modifié les écarts de revenus entre les différentes catégories de population. Et les baisses de revenus ont été très également partagées, ce qui a évité qu’une catégorie ne se sente particulièrement lésée.

Mais comment est-ce possible que l’électorat trumpiste n’ait pas tourné le dos à son champion avec la terrible récession provoquée par la pandémie dans le pays ?

Une chose est sûre, après ce que nous avons vu dans nos pays, il ne serait pas très étonnant que les partisans de Trump finissent par faire valoir que la crise n’est pas la faute du gouvernement fédéral, ou qu’ils estiment que les gouvernements antérieurs sont coresponsables de la mauvaise gestion, au même titre que les autorités régionales et locales.

Sans parler des puissances étrangères comme la Chine, qui a trop tardé à informer sur la gravité du coronavirus et des contaminations.

2) Donald, avons-nous gagné les guerres commerciales ?

En 2018, Trump a réussi à renégocier l’Alena, le traité de libre-échange avec le Mexique et le Canada, et à arracher à ces deux pays de modestes concessions qui favorisent les géants américains de l’automobile et des produits laitiers. Son électorat a pu y voir une victoire, mais ce n’était qu’une broutille. Il fallait qu’il s’en prenne à la Chine.

Selon l’institut Pew Research Center, les Américains qui ont une opinion négative de la Chine ne sont plus 47 % comme en 2017, mais désormais 66 % en 2020, et ils s’inquiètent notamment de la puissance de ses multinationales d’innovation technologique.

De plus, la moitié des Américains qualifie de “très grave” la disparition d’emplois, délocalisés, et le déficit commercial des États-Unis par rapport à la Chine.

Eh bien, le déficit commercial des États-Unis avec la Chine s’est effondré de près de 20 % entre 2018 et 2019, et de presque 30 % pendant les quatre premiers mois de 2020.

De plus, au pic de la guerre commerciale (de janvier 2018 à janvier 2020), 300 000 emplois dans l’industrie ont été créés aux États-Unis, et, ne l’oublions pas, le chômage est tombé à un niveau aussi bas que dans les années 1960. Et les salaires des plus pauvres ont nettement augmenté. Il ne sera pas difficile pour des millions d’Américains de faire, à tort, un lien entre la guerre commerciale et leur bonne fortune.

3) Nous, les Américains

Enfin, la défense de la supposée identité traditionnelle des États-Unis dont se réclame Trump est un sac de nœuds qui englobe des relations interraciales, la lutte contre l’immigration clandestine, l’élimination des impôts et de la bureaucratie (À bas le Léviathan !) et la promotion des valeurs conservatrices dans les tribunaux.

Trump a multiplié les détentions de migrants clandestins à la frontière avec le Mexique, au point qu’elles ont atteint en 2019 leur nombre le plus élevé depuis 2007.

Enfin, Trump a non seulement nommé plus de 50 juges dans les cours d’appel du pays, mais il a aussi réussi à placer trois juges conservateurs (Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh et Amy Coney Barrett) à la Cour suprême.

À partir de maintenant, que Joe Biden soit ou non vainqueur de la présidentielle, il faudra vivre avec la majorité conservatrice la plus écrasante qu’ait connue la plus haute juridiction depuis les années 1950. Et les électeurs républicains savent à qui exprimer leur gratitude dans les urnes.

https://www.courrierinternational.com/article/vu-despagne-cessons-de-mepriser-les-electeurs-de-trump

Voir enfin:

La défaite de Donald Trump signe-t-elle la fin du populisme?

ENQUÊTE – Le président sortant quitte la Maison-Blanche ce mercredi. Il aura été l’incarnation du «populisme», phénomène qui traverse la plupart des démocraties occidentales.

Alexandre Devecchio

Le Figaro

18/01/2021

Ce mercredi, Donald Trump quittera la Maison-Blanche. Selon les règles établies par le 20^e amendement de la Constitution américaine, à midi, son mandat prendra fin tandis que celui de Joe Biden commencera. Refusant de reconnaître sa défaite, Trump n’assistera pas à la prestation de serment de son successeur. Son bilan est certes moins mauvais que celui que ses adversaires dénoncent, mais l’envahissement récent du Capitole par ses sympathisants laisse une tache indélébile sur un mandat déjà scandé par les frasques et les polémiques.

Et pourtant, tout se passe comme si l’Amérique et le monde devaient encore être hantés longtemps par Donald Trump. Censuré par Twitter et Facebook, il est désormais en butte à la vindicte de Hollywood qui veut l’effacer: une pétition exige que son apparition dans le film Maman j’ai raté l’avion 2 soit supprimée (Trump a souvent été montré au cinéma comme un personnage positif, de M. Popper et ses pingouins, avec Jim Carrey, à Die Hard 3, avec Bruce Willis). Mais, au-delà du personnage de Donald Trump, c’est aussi l’avenir du trumpisme et plus largement du «populisme» à l’échelle mondiale qui est en jeu.

Il y a peu encore, beaucoup d’observateurs espéraient qu’une éventuelle défaite de Trump, qu’ils imaginaient large, marquerait le reflux de la vague de révolte qui déferle, élection après élection, depuis la victoire du Brexit en 2015. Celle-ci n’aurait été qu’une parenthèse avant un retour à la situation antérieure… Dans un roman dystopique paru quinze jours avant l’élection américaine du 3 novembre, l’écrivain écossais John Niven imaginait, au contraire, Ivanka Trump présidente en 2026! Si nous n’en sommes pas là, plus personne n’ose désormais pronostiquer une «normalisation» de la vie politique.

Le catalyseur et le réceptacle d’un malaise

«On aurait pu avoir le sentiment de la fin d’un cycle ou d’une page qui se tourne avec sa défaite, mais il faut prendre en compte la progression de Trump de 11 millions de voix entre 2016 et 2020, analyse le directeur général de la Fondation pour l’innovation politique, Dominique Reynié. Le camp trumpiste s’est élargi. Malgré la défaite, on est loin du schéma de l’effondrement.» Un point de vue que rejoint la chercheuse Chloé Morin, auteur d’un livre à paraître, intitulé Le Populisme au secours de la démocratie? (Gallimard): «La victoire de Biden n’est pas le résultat d’un triomphe idéologique car lorsqu’on enlève le facteur Trump, avec tout ce qu’il a d’irritant et qui a contribué à mobiliser les démocrates, on voit bien que le rapport de force est très équilibré. On peut même se dire qu’avec une personnalité moins exubérante il est probable que les républicains auraient gagné.»

Pour Laure Mandeville, grand reporter au Figaro et auteur d’un essai remarqué sur Trump, s’il reste une grosse interrogation sur son avenir personnel après «le point d’orgue chaotique du Capitole», le trumpisme, et de manière plus générale le populisme dans le monde, vont perdurer parce que la manière dont se termine cette présidence montre que les problèmes qui ont fait gagner Trump restent entiers. Elle prédit la survivance d’un certain nombre de thèmes majeurs mis en avant par Trump et qui devraient être récupérés par d’autres: «Le retour à la nation, la régulation de l’économie globalisée, la remise en cause du rôle de gendarme du monde des États-Unis, le rejet du politiquement correct…»

«C’est probablement la fin de Trump, certainement pas celle du trumpisme, en aucun cas celle du populisme», résume l’ancien ministre des Affaires étrangères, Hubert Védrine. Si le journaliste américain conservateur Christopher Caldwell concède qu’au niveau mondial «une bonne relation avec les États-Unis reste un atout, et qu’il sera plus difficile pour Marine Le Pen ou Marion Maréchal, ainsi que pour Matteo Salvini, Viktor Orban, et autres, de renforcer la confiance des électeurs dans les prochaines années», pour le géographe Christophe Guilluy, «se poser la question de la fin du populisme est aussi absurde que se poser la question de la fin du peuple».

Tous s’accordent en effet sur un point: le populisme n’est pas une maladie spontanée ou créée par Trump, mais une tentative de réponse à des maux bien réels dont souffrent les «déplorables», qu’ils portent une casquette rouge aux États-Unis ou un «gilet jaune» en France.

Le détachement croissant des «élites»

Le milliardaire new-yorkais, comme d’autres en Europe, a su capter ce malaise, en être le catalyseur et le réceptacle, mais celui-ci l’a précédé et le dépasse. Il est le fruit de quatre décennies de globalisation qui auront permis aux pays émergents de sortir de la pauvreté et même de prospérer, mais qui auront aussi vu le niveau de vie des classes populaires et moyennes occidentales stagner, voire décliner, tandis que leur mode de vie était bouleversé par l’immigration de masse et la montée en puissance du multiculturalisme comme «religion politique» (Mathieu Bock-Côté).

À ce double déclassement économique et culturel est venu s’ajouter un sentiment de dépossession démocratique. Déjà, en 1995, dans son chef-d’œuvre posthume, La Révolte des élites et la Trahison de la démocratie, le sociologue américain Christopher Lasch pointait le détachement croissant des «élites», toujours plus mobiles et hors-sol, des préoccupations de la majorité des gens ordinaires qu’elles étaient censées représenter.

25 ans plus tard, pour l’historien Éric Anceau, auteur des Élites françaises des Lumières au grand confinement, aux Éditions de l’Observatoire, la fracture démocratique entre les élites et le peuple n’a fait que s’accroître: «Les États-Unis étant le cœur du système globalisé, il n’est pas un hasard que la crise éclate là-bas, analyse-t-il, mais la construction d’une Union européenne technocratique et supranationale alimente aussi la défiance des peuples européens.»

Un constat partagé par Marcel Gauchet, qui déplore que les politiques menées par l’ensemble «des pays dit démocratiques» ne répondent plus aux vœux populaires massifs sur toute une série de questions: sécurité, immigration, mondialisation économique… «Si vous faites un référendum sur chacun de ces points, le résultat ne fait pas mystère et pourtant cela ne se traduit pas du tout, ou très peu, dans les politiques effectivement menées», explique-t-il. Et de voir dans le populisme, d’abord et avant tout, «une protestation contre des politiques antimajoritaires et une tentative pour les classes populaires de remettre le système démocratique au service de leurs besoins et de leurs aspirations».

La pandémie peut-elle rebattre les cartes en réhabilitant, au moins temporairement, une approche technocratique dite «raisonnable» de la politique? À court terme, comme semble l’indiquer la défaite de Trump, la crise sanitaire et la recherche de solutions consensuelles favorisent les dirigeants mesurés. Mais, à long terme, il est probable que la crise économique et sociale sur laquelle pourrait vraisemblablement déboucher la crise sanitaire exacerbera les fractures sur lesquelles prospèrent les populistes.

L’installation d’un chômage de masse, la multiplication des faillites d’entreprises, mais aussi de commerçants et d’artisans, l’ubérisation programmée du travail, y compris celui des cadres, devraient creuser les inégalités, accélérer la désagrégation de la classe moyenne ainsi que la défiance envers les dirigeants, les institutions et les corps intermédiaires.

Réconcilier les élites et les peuples

La crise du coronavirus, en révélant les failles de notre économie mondialisée, confirme une partie du diagnostic des populistes et légitime leur vision protectionniste. Les concepts d’État-nation, de contrôle des frontières, de souveraineté politique et économique, de relocalisation de la production, traditionnellement défendus par les «populistes», sont en train de revenir en grâce aux yeux de l’opinion, observe David Goodhart.

C’est pourquoi l’intellectuel britannique, dans son nouvel essai, La Tête, la Main et le Cœur (Les Arènes), plaide pour un «populisme décent» qui réconcilierait les élites et les peuples en prenant en compte à la fois les aspirations transnationales des premiers et celles, plus nationales et locales, des seconds. «C’est ce que tente de faire Boris Johnson en Grande-Bretagne en alliant une sorte de reconnaissance de la question nationale, en embrassant le Brexit, avec un virage à gauche spectaculaire pour le Parti conservateur sur les questions sociales», résume Laure Mandeville.

Le risque est que cette procédure d’impeachment acte l’idée que nous ne sommes plus dans le cadre d’un débat démocratiqu

Chloé Moirin, chercheuse

Le mot «réconciliation» a aussi été au cœur du discours de Joe Biden durant toute sa campagne. Reste que, comme le souligne Marcel Gauchet, «il ne suffit pas de prononcer le mot, il faudra incorporer dans les politiques les réponses aux aspirations dites populistes». D’autant que la procédure d’impeachment lancé contre Trump pourrait conforter l’idée que toute une partie du pays cherche à évacuer l’autre partie du débat public. «Le risque est que cette procédure acte l’idée que nous ne sommes plus dans le cadre d’un débat démocratique, mais dans un cadre où le droit, qui est censé être le garant des institutions, est instrumentalisé contre une partie de la population et de ses opinions.», confirme Chloé Moirin.

Pour tenter d’anticiper ce que pourrait être l’avenir des États-Unis, et plus largement du monde occidental, certains n’hésitent pas à puiser dans un passé très lointain. Ainsi de l’historien Raphael Doan, auteur de Quand Rome inventait le populisme, qui voit en Donald Trump le lointain héritier de Clodius, leader populiste connu pour ses frasques et ennemi juré de Cicéron. Lors de ses funérailles, en 52 avant J.-C., la foule incendia le Sénat, devenu pour une partie du peuple le symbole du pouvoir oligarchique. Un incident qui permit le retour revanchard de Cicéron, écarté par Clodius, en héraut du front républicain. Mais ce n’était que le début d’une longue guerre civile entre plébéiens et patriciens, populares et optimates, qui déchira Rome pendant vingt ans. Jusqu’à la victoire d’un certain Jules César…

COMPLEMENT:

La démocratie américaine dans les eaux dangereuses d’un temps révolutionnaire

ANALYSE – Après quatre ans de présidence Trump, l’Amérique tangue au-dessus d’un précipice. La politique est devenue une guerre de factions. Et des segments entiers du corps social semblent tentés par une forme de sécession mentale. Une situation volcanique qui laisse au nouveau président, Joe Biden, une bien faible marge de manœuvre pour rassembler le pays.

Laure Mandeville

Le Figaro

21 janvier 2021

L’Amérique est entrée dans les eaux dangereuses et incertaines d’un temps révolutionnaire. Cela fait en réalité des années que ce processus est engagé, mais ce n’est que maintenant, confrontés à des faits trop éclatants pour être sous-estimés, que nous commençons à en prendre toute la mesure. Le 6 janvier, une foule en furie, chauffée à blanc par un président Trump persuadé de s’être fait voler l’élection présidentielle, s’est lancée, telle un taureau devenu fou, à l’assaut du Congrès, saint des saints de la démocratie américaine, pour en forcer portes et fenêtres. Ce coup de force a-t-il commencé un peu par hasard, comme cela est souvent le cas dans les insurrections, quand soudain tout s’embrase pour un détail, comme le suggérait un récent article de notre correspondant à Washington Adrien Jaulmes? Ou des fauteurs de troubles avaient-ils préparé leur manœuvre et planifié de déclencher l’émeute? Avaient-ils des complicités avec certains policiers, qui ont semblé fraterniser avec la foule selon certaines vidéos? Il est encore trop tôt pour le dire et il appartiendra à la minutieuse enquête du FBI de déterminer la chaîne des événements de cette effrayante journée.

Plaidant pour la première hypothèse, moult images de l’émeute ont laissé voir des «insurgés touristes», se promenant comme en visite guidée dans la salle des illustres du Capitole, plus occupés à prendre des selfies de leur coup d’éclat qu’à fomenter un coup d’État ; clairement surpris pour certains, d’être arrivés jusque-là. «Cela n’avait rien d’organisé», pense le rédacteur en chef de la revue Tablet, Jacob Siegel, qui évoque «l’aspect carnavalesque» de l’épisode, mettant en scène des individus vêtus de peau de fourrure et casques cornus, ou en tenues treillis. Dans les débuts de la Révolution française ou la prise du palais d’Hiver à Saint-Pétersbourg en 1917, ce même peuple bruyant et sans bonnes manières, fit irruption dans le monde «d’en haut», un peu impressionné au début, puis s’enhardissant pour piller et emporter les meubles, comme ce fut le cas pour un insurgé parti avec le «trophée» du podium du «speaker» de la Chambre. Mais à côté de la «farce grinçante», on a vu poindre aussi le visage de la meute violente: cinq morts, des policiers tabassés par des milices paramilitaires, les cris horrifiants de «Pendez Mike Pence» (le vice-président) scandés par des manifestants, des journalistes pris à partie violemment. Une rage collective soudain avait surgi. Elle soufflait, gonflait, se répandait. «On vous hait!», hurlaient les émeutiers aux policiers qui tentaient de les calmer.

Depuis, un pays abasourdi et traumatisé, qui vient d’investir Joe Biden président lors d’une belle cérémonie sans fausses notes mais tenue dans une ambiance de citadelle assiégée, s’interroge. Que nous arrive-t-il? Quelle est la signification profonde de ce coup de force? Assiste-t-on seulement à la fin tragique et calamiteuse d’une présidence Trump qui restera marquée d’un sceau d’infamie? Ou sommes-nous les témoins ébahis du premier soubresaut d’une révolution qui a commencé bien avant et qui est très loin d’être terminée? L’arrivée d’un politique centriste, expérimenté et soucieux de rassembler, comme Joe Biden, permettra-t-elle d’apaiser les ravages de la tornade Trump et de l’empoignade hystérique entre camp républicain et camp démocrate qui a suivi son entrée à la présidence, ou une sortie de route de la démocratie américaine plus grave encore est-elle à craindre?

«On entre dans des eaux inconnues», juge Linda Feldmann, correspondante du Christian Science Monitor à la Maison-Blanche, qui parle d’un «grave avertissement». «Je pense qu’on pourrait notamment avoir des explosions de violence anarchiques locales dans des États de tradition de milice comme le Michigan, si on ne parvient pas à une réconciliation», ajoute-t-elle, très inquiète, évoquant un possible scénario «à la nord-irlandaise».

Dans le camp démocrate qui est en train de prendre les rênes du pays et dans la presse libérale [de gauche, NDLR] qui le soutient, la lecture la plus fréquente des événements du 6 janvier est que ce moment de violence était «programmé» depuis le début par la personnalité incontrôlable de Trump, son mépris des formalités de l’exercice du pouvoir, et son appel aux «pires instincts» racistes de l’Amérique dont il aurait réveillé les démons. C’est notamment la thèse de l’éditorialiste Michelle Goldberg, qui écrit dans le New York Times avoir attendu en vain, la prise de conscience du danger trumpien «depuis le premier jour» de sa présidence. Pour elle, et pour une grande partie du camp démocrate, le milliardaire restera le grand «Diable ex machina» qui porte l’entière responsabilité de la crise démocratique que traverse le pays, et dont tout le bilan est à jeter sans discernement dans les poubelles de l’Histoire. Beaucoup d’observateurs, notamment en France, s’alignent sur cette interprétation. «Son caractère était sa destinée, et est devenu la nôtre», résume Thomas Friedman, dans le New York Times de ce mercredi.

S’il y a du vrai dans cette critique du caractère trumpien et du rôle catastrophique qu’a joué son ego, le problème reste que faire porter à Trump la responsabilité totale de ce qui s’est passé revient à regarder l’arbre sans voir la forêt, et donc à semer les germes d’une future catastrophe, répliquent d’autres observateurs généralement conservateurs. Oui, Trump a une écrasante responsabilité dans la fin pitoyable de sa présidence, qui disqualifie un bilan pourtant non négligeable. Incapable d’accepter honorablement sa défaite, il a mis en péril le processus de la transition pacifique du pouvoir, point capital de l’exercice démocratique. Mais ses graves manquements ne doivent pas occulter ceux de ses adversaires politiques et l’enchaînement tragique que leur empoignade infernale a engendré. Car si Trump en est venu à être viscéralement convaincu d’avoir été spolié de l’élection, c’est que durant quatre ans, l’opposition démocrate s’est comportée comme s’il était un président illégitime, une marionnette du Kremlin qui aurait usurpé, par le biais d’une ténébreuse collusion russe, la victoire de Hillary Clinton (en 2019, cette dernière parlait encore d’avoir été «volée»). L’idée obsessionnelle d’une excommunication du «diable Trump», entretenue par le camp libéral, a alimenté la conviction du président d’alors d’être assiégé par un État profond prêt à tout pour l’écarter. Même chose pour ses partisans. «Le rejet de la légitimité de l’élection de Trump en 2016, par des moyens institutionnels, a préparé le le rejet de la légitimité de l’élection de Biden en 2020, même si ce second rejet s’est exprimé de manière volatile et violente, beaucoup plus dangereuse», affirme Jacob Siegel, rédacteur en chef à la revue d’idées new-yorkaise Tablet. Un avis que partage Andrew Michta, doyen du Centre George-C-Marshall Center, qui s’exprime à titre privé. Pour lui, la grande erreur des élites américaines a été de refuser de reconnaître que Trump était «le symptôme d’une crise bien plus large et plus ancienne». «Son élection était un avertissement envoyé par le peuple aux élites, qui n’en ont pas tenu compte».

La crise démocratique se noue en réalité bien plus tôt, explique Michta, quand dans l’ivresse du triomphe de la démocratie libérale et de la chute du mur de Berlin en 1989-1990, l’Amérique opte pour l’ouverture des frontières et une logique de dénationalisation qui laisse ses grandes entreprises «brader tous les bijoux de famille industriels» de l’Amérique vers la Chine. «Notre classe oligarchique et politique n’a jamais accepté d’être tenue responsable pour les décisions qu’elle avait prises alors, telle que la délocalisation de notre industrie, et le déclenchement de guerres sans fin, accuse-t-il. Elle a opté pour des choix politiques qui n’avaient jamais été vraiment choisis par la population, et qui ont mené au déclin de la classe moyenne, “demos” de la nation américaine et âme de son succès.» Pour Michta, «cet abandon en rase campagne des classes populaires et moyennes par les élites, est la vraie raison de la gigantesque colère qui a grandi sans discontinuer jusqu’à la propulsion de Trump à la présidence». Il a scellé la rupture de ban entre l’establishment et le pays profond. «Il y a eu d’autres signaux avant Trump, le dégoût de voir l’Administration Obama sauver Wall Street et abandonner les gens simples à leurs faillites immobilières notamment», renchérit le professeur de théorie politique Joshua Mitchell. Un dégoût qui a donné la révolte des Tea Party de 2010 et à gauche le mouvement Occupy Wall Street, puis finalement le trumpisme et le sandérisme. «Nous n’aurions pas eu Trump pour président, si les démocrates étaient restés le parti des classes populaires», confiait récemment le professeur Bernard Grofman, de l’université California Irvine au New York Times, soulignant que dans un tiers des comtés passés d’Obama à Trump en 2016, on avait eu une hausse des résidents étranglés par des prêts immobiliers intenables.

À cette catastrophe socio-économique s’est ajoutée la déconstruction de la culture nationale menée par les élites libérales sous l’influence des théories critiques françaises exportées par l’école de Michel Foucault, dit Michta. «Comme l’a bien montré Samuel Huntington dans son livre “Qui sommes-nous?”, l’Amérique n’est pas seulement une nation d’immigrants, elle s’est construite dans le creuset de la culture nationale britannique, qui s’est enrichie d’ajouts successifs.» En défaisant ce creuset, et en soumettant la société au rouleau compresseur d’une critique qui a miné peu à peu toutes les institutions dites bourgeoises, comme la famille ou l’Église, le camp progressiste a fragilisé les liens entre les citoyens, qui ne se sont plus sentis appartenir à la même famille, et ont vu de nouveaux damnés de la terre, les minorités, prendre leur place dans le cœur des démocrates. «S’il n’y a plus de frontières ni de nation, il devient beaucoup plus facile de regarder ceux qui ne sont pas d’accord avec nous comme des ennemis ou des déplorables dont le sort nous importe peu», renchérit le professeur de théorie politique Joshua Mitchell, parlant du danger de la «tribalisation» que font surgir les excès de l’idéologie globaliste et l’obsession de l’identité raciale ou sexuelle. «Nous sommes divisés désormais entre pays des côtes et pays du milieu, selon des lignes géographiques qui correspondent à des fractures politiques et culturelles profondes», s’inquiète Andrew Michta, le «milieu» s’accrochant à l’idée d’une culture traditionnelle américaine qu’il faut absolument «sauver» tandis que les côtes prônent la diversité identitaire et l’art de la tolérance comme culture de remplacement. «Les élites ne communiquent plus avec le demos», poursuit-il. L’intellectuel américain pense que «la chimiothérapie imposée par Trump pour soigner le mal, n’a fait que consommer la rupture».

Comme les événements du 6 janvier et la manière dont ils ont été vécus l’ont révélé, une sorte de sécession mentale et politique s’est en effet amorcée, comme si une gigantesque partie du corps social était en train de «prendre congé» de la démocratie. Quelque 73 % des électeurs républicains (soit environ 40 % de la population) estiment que Trump n’a fait que défendre le processus constitutionnel en insistant sur les fraudes, une conviction qui les amène à conclure à l’illégitimité de Biden. Un déni effrayant, qui en dit long sur l’ampleur de la crise de confiance auquel ce dernier va devoir faire face. «La tyrannie n’est rien d’autre que la démocratie se mettant en congé d’elle-même», mettait en garde le philosophe Alexis de Tocqueville pour souligner la fragilité de cette dernière.

Comment dans ces conditions renouer les fils de la conversation nationale et rassembler le pays autour de faits acceptés, cette vibrante promesse faite «avec toute son âme» par le nouveau président Joe Biden à ses compatriotes, dans son adresse inaugurale? David French, intellectuel conservateur chrétien qui a fait la guerre d’Irak, appelle à «utiliser la méthode de la contre-insurrection pour reconstruire», en séparant les «insurgés» de la population. L’idée serait de poursuivre et punir durement les fauteurs de troubles, mais de tendre la main aux dizaines de millions d’électeurs trumpistes, qui ont droit à leurs convictions. «Nous devons négocier un moyen de vivre ensemble qui ne signifie pas l’obligation de reddition de l’une des parties», affirme le politologue William Galston dans le Wall Street Journal, invitant Biden à méditer les conseils d’Abraham Lincoln sur «l’importance de l’opinion publique sans laquelle rien ne peut réussir», et qu’il faut donc selon lui aujourd’hui rallier en renonçant à toute chasse aux sorcières.

C’est au fond déjà la voie qu’a dessinée Joe Biden en appelant «à prendre un nouveau départ, tous ensemble» au premier jour de sa présidence. «Entendons-nous, regardons-nous, a-t-il exhorté mercredi. La politique n’a pas à être une fournaise brûlante qui détruit tout sur son passage! Les désaccords ne doivent pas mener à la désunion.» Parmi ses nouveaux ministres, dont le secrétaire d’État Anthony Blinken, ou la secrétaire au Trésor Janet Yellen, on sent bien le désir d’aller vers des actions susceptibles de susciter un consensus chez les républicains et les oubliés de la globalisation: Yellen a proposé un plan d’aide aux classes moyennes, Blinken veut marcher sur les traces de Trump sur le dossier de la confrontation avec la Chine et sur celui de la réindustrialisation de l’Amérique. Quelque 17 élus républicains de la Chambre ont fait savoir qu’ils voulaient «coopérer», après l’investiture.

Mais l’ensemble du camp démocrate, que seule la haine de Trump a jusqu’ici uni, acceptera-t-il le compromis vis-à-vis des vaincus? Rien n’est moins sûr. Car à côté du volcan trumpien, dont on a vu surgir une «rage blanche» extrémiste très inquiétante le 6 janvier avec force slogans antisémites et drapeaux confédérés que Biden a promis de combattre, bouillonne en Amérique le volcan de la rage identitariste de la gauche radicale, qui a embrasé le pays pendant près de huit mois l’été dernier au nom de la justice sociale et de la défense des minorités ; transformant des manifestations pacifiques de protestation contre des violences policières en entreprise de pillage et destruction du patrimoine architectural et littéraire de l’Amérique, au motif qu’il est entaché de «racisme systémique». «Cette aile gauche du Parti démocrate, qui rêve d’une détrumpification combattante, aura-t-elle gain de cause?», s’interroge Joshua Mitchell, qui observe avec inquiétude «la culture de l’annulation» prônée par les milieux progressistes se déployer depuis le 6 janvier. L’expulsion de Trump de Twitter et celle du réseau social conservateur Parler des plateformes américaines sont des signaux peu encourageants, de même que l’appel lancé par la revue Forbes aux corporations américaines pour qu’elles refusent d’embaucher d’anciens membres de l’Administration Trump, sous peine d’être blacklistées. «Jusqu’où ira la purge?» insiste Mitchell, qui s’inquiète des deux rages identitaires qui soufflent de la gauche et de la droite, et de la manière dont elles se nourrissent l’une l’autre. Pour lui, une seule issue: retourner à la «politique des compétences», loin des passions identitaires et des logiques de factions, pour recréer «ces compromis patients et imparfaits entre citoyens» qui avaient tant émerveillé Tocqueville.

Le grand historien de la Grèce antique Victor Davis Hanson, qui a pris parti pour Trump contre les élites depuis quatre ans, met, quant à lui, en garde contre un acharnement sur le «cadavre politique» de l’ex-président, comparant l’idée d’une destitution post-présidentielle à l’acharnement d’Achille sur le corps mort d’Hector pendant la guerre de Troie. Poignardé et traîné derrière un char, celui qui n’était qu’un «vaincu fanfaron» allait devenir une figure mythique…

Intrusion au Capitole: Attention, une insurrection peut en cacher une autre ! (What selective outrage when behind the unanimous blaming of president Trump for the Capitol rally’s excesses, our short-memoried media and commentators conveniently forget four long years of nothing less than a generalized insurrection against the president himself ?)

(Urooj Rahman, one of the two Brooklyn lawyers who torched an NYPD cruiser in Brooklyn using a Bud Light bottle stuffed with a rag as a Molotov cocktail, complete with Palestinian keffyeh, May 30, 2020)

 

Le ministre, pour cacher sa lettre, avait eu recours à l’expédient le plus ingénieux du monde, le plus large, qui était de ne pas même essayer de la cacher. Edgar Poe (La lettre volée)

Ce que nous voulons, c’est la liberté par tous les moyens, la justice par tous les moyens et  l’égalité par tous les moyens. Malcolm X (1964)

Les émeutes sont destructrices, dangereuses et effrayantes, mais peuvent conduire à d’importantes réformes sociales. Vox.com

That people would take action into their own hands and try to take over the [US] Capitol and potentially commit violent acts is a natural outcome of this sort of behavior. It’s an example of the best of American traditions, and one cannot say that of this riot that has been spurred by the president of the United States. Robert Kraig (Citizen Action of Wisconsin Executive Director)

Le Capitole envahi chaque jour par des milliers de personnes, 100.000 protestataires pendant les week-ends… C’est incroyable pour notre État, on n’avait jamais rien vu de pareil, en tout cas pas depuis l’époque des droits civiques ou du Vietnam. Scott

Le gouverneur a été élu, pourquoi ne pas le laisser travailler, les élections, cela a un sens. Policier du Capitole du Wisconsin (2011)

On n’est pas en Europe ici, et les syndicats n’ont cessé de perdre de leur influence, ce qui rend le phénomène d’autant plus impressionnant. (…) Le spectacle a été surréaliste, on a tout vu ici, même un chameau sous la rotonde. Jason Stein (The Sentinel)

Pour moi, il s’agit de casser la machine électorale du Parti démocrate. John Vander Meer (ex-conseiller d’un élu de gauche)

Quand on a tracé des lignes aussi intransigeantes, on se demande quelle peut être la sortie de crise, c’est comme la guerre de Corée ! Scott Becher (stratège républicain)

Ce mouvement a indéniablement redynamisé la base démocrate. Ce qui se profile, c’est un discours de guerre de classe pour 2012, avec d’un côté les démocrates dénonçant Wall Street et les intérêts spéciaux, de l’autre les républicains fustigeant les syndicats. (…) Cela en dit long sur le fonctionnement politique général de notre pays. Nous ne cessons de recommencer les batailles du passé. Chaque nouvel élu se sent investi d’un mandat idéologique, alors que les gens veulent seulement que les partis s’allient pour résoudre les problèmes profonds qui se posent. Adam Schrager (journaliste de télévision local)

De l’intérieur de l’imposante bâtisse du Parlement de cet État politiquement crucial dans l’Amérique du Midwest, que se disputent régulièrement démocrates et républicains, parvient le bruit assourdissant de tam-tam africains sur lesquels des manifestants tapent en cadence. (…) Depuis trois semaines, le Wisconsin vit en état de guerre politique et de paralysie législative. L’homme qui a déclenché la tempête est le nouveau gouverneur républicain, Scott Walker, un brun et fringant conservateur, fils de prêcheur baptiste soutenu par les Tea Party, qui se voit comme un «nouveau Reagan», investi d’une mission historique de rééquilibrage des finances publiques. Dopé par sa victoire en novembre, avec quelque 52% des suffrages (les républicains ont également pris les deux Chambres du Congrès local), il a tenté de faire passer en force une loi d’ajustement budgétaire qui coupe dans le vif des avantages accordés aux employés du secteur public. Invoquant la nécessité de partager l’effort budgétaire, le projet Walker prévoit de forcer les fonctionnaires à payer de leur poche 12,6% de leurs primes d’assurance-maladie, alors qu’ils cotisent à hauteur de 6% – et les salariés du privé de 29%. Ils devraient aussi contribuer pour leurs retraites à hauteur de 5,6% (zéro aujourd’hui). » La mesure n’aurait sans doute pas ému grand monde, dans une Amérique qui affectionne peu l’État-providence, les fonctionnaires comme les syndicats et comprend l’urgence de combler ses trous budgétaires, évalués par le gouverneur pour le seul Wisconsin à 137 millions de dollars cette année – 3,6 milliards pour les deux prochaines. Mais, en décidant de priver carrément les fonctionnaires locaux de leurs droits de négociation collectifs, le gouverneur a franchi une ligne rouge. (…) Les coupes sombres prévues dans le budget de l’éducation (834 millions de dollars), point sensible dans un État qui se vante d’avoir des universités publiques créatrices d’activité économique à haute valeur ajoutée, ont décuplé les inquiétudes, de même que l’annonce par le gouverneur de la vente des 37 centrales productrices d’électricité à des intérêts privés, décision qui fait craindre des licenciements massifs. La gauche a lu aussi avec effroi dans cette volonté de casser les syndicats, l’amorce d’une offensive républicaine destinée à priver le parti d’Obama de l’un de ses plus puissants contributeurs à un an de la présidentielle. (…) Résultat, le projet Walker est devenu l’étincelle qui a embrasé le Wisconsin, suscitant une protestation qui a débouché sur une occupation pacifique du Parlement. Des pancartes notant que «l’éducation qui est l’avenir de nos enfants» tapissent les murs. Des milliers de post-it multicolores signés par les manifestants ont été collés sur les lourdes portes de bois du bâtiment. À l’intérieur, sous la Coupole, des happenings tenant autant du cirque que du combat politique, ont ameuté enseignants, pompiers et étudiants, ainsi que des centaines d’ex-activistes chevelus et barbus, qui semblent tout droit sortis de manifestations contre la guerre au Vietnam. (…) Bonnet de laine sur la tête, enveloppée dans son manteau car il ne fait pas chaud sur la couverture qui lui tient lieu de QG, Sarah rêve d’une douche. Cette étudiante en médecine, qui est là «par solidarité avec ses professeurs», et parce qu’elle craint «un effondrement économique de l’État si on touche aux universités», a passé six jours et six nuits au pied d’un pilier de marbre vert. Elle montre les matelas, les réserves de pommes, d’oranges et de céréales offertes par des bénévoles. Il y a même un «coin calme» réservé aux enfants des protestataires. «Chacun a ses raisons d’être là», dit Sarah. Elle salue les policiers, qui gardent patiemment les lieux, des boules Quies dans les oreilles à cause du tam-tam. (…) Le projet de Walker a été voté à la Chambre des représentants du Wisconsin, mais les sénateurs démocrates, invoquant le caractère «exceptionnel» de la situation, ont fui vers l’Illinois pour empêcher un vote au Sénat. Furieux, le gouverneur a menacé de lancer la police à leurs trousses, initié un blocage du versement de leurs salaires et annoncé le compte à rebours pour 12.000 licenciements dans le secteur public si la loi ne passe pas. Son pari est que les mouvements ne sont qu’un baroud d’honneur des syndicats minoritaires et que la majorité silencieuse le soutient. De leur côté, les élus démocrates invoquent de récents sondages pour «souligner la légitimité de la politique de la chaise vide». Selon une enquête de l’Institut Rasmussen, près de 57% de la population de l’État seraient hostiles à la politique de Walker concernant les droits de négociation collectifs, alors qu’il est soutenu sur les augmentations des contributions à la santé et aux retraites. Résultat, l’impasse est totale. Les élus démocrates ont indiqué leur volonté de revenir à Madison, mais il est difficile de passer à l’acte sans avoir l’impression de capituler. «Quand on a tracé des lignes aussi intransigeantes, on se demande quelle peut être la sortie de crise, c’est comme la guerre de Corée!», note le stratège républicain Scott Becher. Il dit ne jamais avoir vu une telle division, malgré la tradition de combat social du Wisconsin, un État manufacturier pionnier dans la promotion des droits syndicaux. De Madison à Washington, les observateurs se demandent si la bataille du Wisconsin va faire «tache d’huile», au-delà de la victoire probable du gouverneur à court terme. Certains prédisent que son courage politique lui vaudra au minimum une place de vice-président sur un ticket républicain. D’autres pensent au contraire qu’il surestime sa «main» et qu’il sera «révoqué» d’ici à un an, selon une procédure lancée par les démocrates visant à rassembler les signatures de 25% des votants, pour convoquer une nouvelle élection… Des révoltes sociales très comparables ont en tout cas éclaté dans l’Ohio et l’Indiana, mettant leurs gouverneurs républicains sur la défensive. Le conflit intéresse aussi les gouverneurs du Texas, Rick Perry, et du New Jersey, Chris Christie, qui se sont bien gardés, malgré leurs promesses de rigueur budgétaire, de toucher aux conventions collectives du secteur public. «Ce mouvement a indéniablement redynamisé la base démocrate», note Adam Schrager, journaliste de télévision local, qui se demande si la bataille du Wisconsin pourrait avoir le même «effet boule de neige» que la bataille de la santé a eu pour la mobilisation des Tea Party. «Ce qui se profile, c’est un discours de guerre de classe pour 2012, avec d’un côté les démocrates dénonçant Wall Street et les intérêts spéciaux, de l’autre les républicains fustigeant les syndicats.» Conscient de l’importance de l’affrontement, mais soucieux de ne pas se mêler d’un combat dont l’issue reste incertaine, le président Obama est resté relativement discret. «Le président a d’autres chats à fouetter, il doit gérer les révoltes du Middle-East (Moyen-Orient). Nous nous occuperons du Midwest», dit Céleste en agitant le poing. Le journaliste Adam Schrager s’inquiète, quant à lui, de cette ambiance guerrière. Il a été stupéfait qu’un seul élu, le républicain Dale Schultz – «le seul adulte de toute cette histoire» – ait proposé un compromis. «Cela en dit long sur le fonctionnement politique général de notre pays, dit le reporter frustré. Nous ne cessons de recommencer les batailles du passé. Chaque nouvel élu se sent investi d’un mandat idéologique, alors que les gens veulent seulement que les partis s’allient pour résoudre les problèmes profonds qui se posent. » Laure Mandeville (08.03.2011)

No place is hotter than Wisconsin. The leaders there have done everything possible to maximize conflict. Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican, demanded cuts only from people in the other party. The public sector unions and their allies immediately flew into a rage, comparing Walker to Hitler, Mussolini and Mubarak. Walker’s critics are amusingly Orwellian. They liken the crowd in Madison to the ones in Tunisia and claim to be fighting for democracy. Whatever you might say about Walker, he and the Republican majorities in Wisconsin were elected, and they are doing exactly what they told voters they would do. It’s the Democratic minority that is thwarting the majority will by fleeing to Illinois. It’s the left that has suddenly embraced extralegal obstructionism. (…) Everybody now seems to agree that Governor Walker was right to ask state workers to pay more for their benefits. Even if he gets everything he asks for, Wisconsin state workers would still be contributing less to their benefits than the average state worker nationwide and would be contributing far, far less than private sector workers. The more difficult question is whether Walker was right to try to water down Wisconsin’s collective bargaining agreements. Even if you acknowledge the importance of unions in representing middle-class interests, there are strong arguments on Walker’s side. In Wisconsin and elsewhere, state-union relations are structurally out of whack. That’s because public sector unions and private sector unions are very different creatures. Private sector unions push against the interests of shareholders and management; public sector unions push against the interests of taxpayers. Private sector union members know that their employers could go out of business, so they have an incentive to mitigate their demands; public sector union members work for state monopolies and have no such interest. (…) Most important, public sector unions help choose those they negotiate with. Through gigantic campaign contributions and overall clout, they have enormous influence over who gets elected to bargain with them, especially in state and local races. As a result of these imbalanced incentive structures, states with public sector unions tend to run into fiscal crises. David Brooks

Is it the same as people in the Middle East overthrowing years of dictatorship?  Or is that just the last story you saw on the news? (…) Do you see what’s happening here?!  The Wisconsin union protest is the bizarro Tea Party!  Jon Stewart

C’est une inspiration pour nous que cette énergie et ce militantisme des nombreux jeunes militants et défenseurs de l’environnement qui ouvrent la voie pour la crise climatique, qui menace la santé, la sécurité économique et l’avenir de toutes nos communautés. Nous nous félicitons de la présence de ces militants. Nancy Pelosi (novembre 2018)

Hundreds of young protesters stormed Capitol Hill on Monday, taking over the offices of three House Democratic leaders to call for an immediate climate change plan. The activists with the Sunrise Movement, a group that’s pushing House Democrats to create a special committee next year focused entirely on climate change initiatives, engaged in three sit-ins inside the offices of the likely next Speaker, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif), as well as incoming Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), who is in line to chair the House Rules Committee. Most of the protesters, who ranged in age from their teens to their late 20s, were eventually pushed out by Capitol Police after threat of arrest. Officers did arrest 138 protesters on charges of blocking hallways, Capitol Police said. The protests are the second wave organized by the Sunrise Movement to disrupt the Capitol since the midterm elections. The Hill

Tout a commencé par “un sit-in dans les bureaux de la (future) présidente démocrate de la Chambre des représentants, Nancy Pelosi, en novembre 2018, six jours seulement après la victoire des démocrates aux élections de mi-mandat”, à l’issue desquelles ils ont regagné la majorité à la Chambre des représentants, rapporte le magazine californien Mother Jones. Quelque “150 militants”, peu convaincus par les belles paroles des nouveaux élus démocrates sur la nécessité de faire avancer la législation en matière de lutte contre le changement climatique, se sont alors mobilisés pour les contraindre “à respecter leurs promesses”. Ce sit-in “serait passé relativement inaperçu sans la présence de la jeune députée de New York Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez venu prêter main-forte aux activistes”, note le magazine californien. Mais la couverture médiatique s’est alors emballée. Si le mouvement Sunrise ne s’est fait connaître du grand public qu’à la fin de l’année 2018, “ses racines sont plus profondes”, poursuit Mother Jones. Dès 2014, ses fondateurs ont en effet commencé à participer, à New York, aux séances d’un organisme baptisé “Momentum” créé par deux frères, Mark et Paul Engler, coauteurs du livre This Is an Uprising. How Nonviolent Revolt Is Shaping the Twenty-First Century [“Ceci est un soulèvement. Comment la révolte non violente définit le XXIe siècle”, non traduit]. Leur credo ? S’inspirer de l’histoire moderne des mouvements de résistance et de désobéissance civile, “depuis la lutte pour les droits civiques de Martin Luther King au mouvement Occupy Wall Street, en passant par les soulèvements des printemps arabes”, pour créer de nouvelles formes de mobilisation plus durables et efficaces selon deux piliers stratégiques : le principe de “l’escalade” et celui de “l’absorption” avec pour objectif de recruter de nouveaux membres à chaque nouvelle action. La journaliste du magazine Mother Jones confie avoir été sceptique, dans un premier temps, face à l’enthousiasme juvénile et jargonnant des militants du mouvement Sunrise, capables de “citer dans une même phrase le pasteur Martin Luther King, la célèbre militante africaine-américaine Ella Baker ou l’universitaire engagé Charles Payne”. Elle relève également que la directrice exécutive du mouvement, Varshini Prakash, “n’est âgée que de 26 ans”. Mais force est de reconnaître, ajoute la journaliste, que “depuis ses débuts le mouvement a remporté un succès certain : lors d’actions ciblées, de débrayages lycéens à travers tout le pays et de grandes manifestations” (notamment au moment des marches pour le climat qui se sont déroulées dans de nombreux pays à la fin du mois de janvier 2019) et peut se targuer aujourd’hui de “rassembler plus de 15 000 membres dans quelque 200 sections disséminées dans le pays”… Courrier international (2018)

Vendredi soir, des agents des Services secrets ont précipité le président américain Donald Trump dans un bunker de la Maison Blanche alors que des centaines de manifestants se rassemblaient devant le manoir exécutif, certains d’entre eux jetant des pierres et tirant sur les barricades de la police. Trump a passé près d’une heure dans le bunker, qui a été conçu pour être utilisé dans des situations d’urgence telles que des attaques terroristes, selon un républicain proche de la Maison Blanche qui n’était pas autorisé à discuter publiquement de questions privées et a parlé sous couvert d’anonymat. (…) La décision abrupte des agents a souligné l’humeur agitée à l’intérieur de la Maison Blanche, où les chants des manifestants à Lafayette Park ont ​​pu être entendus tout le week-end et les agents des services secrets et les forces de l’ordre ont eu du mal à contenir la foule. Les manifestations de vendredi ont été déclenchées par la mort de George Floyd, un homme noir décédé après avoir été coincé au cou par un policier blanc de Minneapolis. Les manifestations à Washington sont devenues violentes et ont semblé surprendre les officiers. Ils ont déclenché l’une des alertes les plus élevées sur le complexe de la Maison Blanche depuis les attentats du 11 septembre 2001. (…)  Le déménagement du président dans le bunker a été signalé pour la première fois par le New York Times. Le président et sa famille ont été ébranlés par la taille et le venin de la foule, selon le républicain. Il n’était pas immédiatement clair si la première dame Melania Trump et le fils de 14 ans du couple, Barron, avaient rejoint le président dans le bunker. Le protocole des services secrets aurait exigé que toutes les personnes sous la protection de l’agence soient dans l’abri souterrain. France 24 (1er juin 2020!

Beyond being unnecessary, using our military to quell protests across the country would also be unwise. This is not the mission our armed forces signed up for: They signed up to fight our nation’s enemies and to secure — not infringe upon — the rights and freedoms of their fellow Americans. In addition, putting our servicemen and women in the middle of politically charged domestic unrest risks undermining the apolitical nature of the military that is so essential to our democracy. It also risks diminishing Americans’ trust in our military — and thus America’s security — for years to come. As defense leaders who share a deep commitment to the Constitution, to freedom and justice for all Americans, and to the extraordinary men and women who volunteer to serve and protect our nation, we call on the president to immediately end his plans to send active-duty military personnel into cities as agents of law enforcement, or to employ them r any another military or police forces in ways that undermine the constitutional rights of Americans. The members of our military are always ready to serve in our nation’s defense. But they must never be used to violate the rights of those they are sworn to protect. Leon E. Panetta, Chuck Hagel, Ashton B. Carter (and 86 former defense officials)

As former American ambassadors, generals and admirals, and senior federal officials, we are alarmed by calls from the President and some political leaders for the use of U.S. military personnel to end legitimate protests in cities and towns across America. (…) Cities and neighborhoods in which Americans are assembling peacefully, speaking freely, and seeking redress of their grievances are not “battlespaces.” Federal, state, and local officials must never seek to “dominate” those exercising their First Amendment rights. Rather they have a responsibility to ensure that peaceful protest can take place safely as well as to protect those taking part. We condemn all criminal acts against persons and property, but cannot agree that responding to these acts is beyond the capabilities of local and state authorities. Our military is composed of and represents all of America. Misuse of the military for political purposes would weaken the fabric of our democracy, denigrate those who serve in uniform to protect and defend the Constitution, and undermine our nation’s strength abroad. There is no role for the U.S. military in dealing with American citizens exercising their constitutional right to free speech, however uncomfortable that speech may be for some. We are concerned about the use of U.S. military assets to intimidate and break up peaceful protestors in Washington, D.C. (…) The stationing of D.C. Air National Guard troops in full battle armor on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial is inflammatory and risks sullying the reputation of our men and women in uniform in the eyes of their fellow Americans and of the world.Declaring peaceful protestors “thugs” and “terrorists” and falsely seeking to divide Americans into those who support “law and order” and those who do not will not end the demonstrations. The deployment of military forces against American citizens exercising their constitutional rights will not heal the divides in our society. We urge the President and state and local governments to focus their efforts on uniting the country and supporting reforms to ensure equal police treatment of all citizens, regardless of race or ethnicity. Ultimately, the issues that have driven the protests cannot be addressed by our military. They must be resolved through political processes. Former US generals, admirals and national security officials

Si au combat, ils apportent un couteau, on apporte un pistolet ! Barack Obama

Oui, je suis scandalisée. Oui, j’ai songé à de nombreuses reprises à faire exploser la Maison Blanche. Mais je sais que cela ne changera rien. Madonna (23.01.2017)

Il est temps de tuer le président. Monisha Rajesh (journaliste britannique, 08.11.2016)

Trump c’est le candidat qui redonne aux Américains l’espoir, l’espoir qu’il soit assassiné avant son investiture. Pablo Mira (chroniqueur français, France Inter, 15.11.2016)

Je sais que tout le monde ici marchera bientôt vers le Capitole, pour pacifiquement et patriotiquement faire entendre vos voix. Président Trump (06.01.2021)

Je pense qu’il est également essentiel de comprendre que, comme je l’ai dit aux candidats qui sont venus me voir, vous pouvez mener la meilleure campagne, vous pouvez même devenir le candidat et vous pouvez vous faire voler l’élection. Hillary Clinton (06.05. 2019)

Souvenez-vous, Joe et Kamala peuvent remporter 3 millions de voix et perdre quand même. Alors, croyez-moi. Nous avons besoin d’un nombre de voix tellement écrasant que Trump ne pourra pas nous subtiliser ou nous voler la victoire. Hillary Clinton (20.08.2020)

Trump sait qu’il est un président illégitime. Hillary Clinton (29.09.2019)

Notre élection a été détournée. Ca ne fait aucun doute. Le Congrès a un devoir de protéger notre démocratie et de s’en tenir aux faits. Nancy Pelosi (16.05. 2017)

Si vous le pouvez, envoyez votre contribution au @MNFreedomFund pour aider à payer la caution de ceux qui manifestent sur le terrain dans le Minnesota. Kamala Harris (01.06.2020)

Je ne considère pas le président-élu comme un président légitime. Je pense que les Russes ont aidé cet homme à se faire élire. Et ils ont contribué à détruire la candidature d’Hillary Clinton. John Lewis (héros des droits civiques, représentant démocrate, Géorgie, 13.01. 2017)

Nous allons destituer ce fils de pute ! Rashida Tlaib (députée palestino-américaine, 04.01.2019)

Je veux vous dire, Gorsuch; je veux vous dire, Kavanaugh. Vous avez déchainé la tempête. Et vous en paierez le prix. Vous ne saurez pas ce qui vous a frappé si vous prenez ces terribles décisions. Charles Schumer (Senate Minority Leader, D-N.Y., 04.03.2020)

Je n’aurais pas dû utiliser les mots que j’ai utilisés hier. Ils ne sont pas sortis comme je l’avais prévu. Je viens de Brooklyn. On utilise des mots forts. Charles Schumer

Ce matin, le sénateur Schumer s’est exprimé lors d’un rassemblement devant la Cour suprême alors qu’une affaire était débattue à l’intérieur. Le sénateur Schumer a cité deux membres de la Cour par leur nom et a dit qu’il voulait leur dire: «Vous avez déchainé la tempête, et vous en paierez le prix. Vous ne saurez pas ce qui vous a frappé si vous prenez ces terribles décisions. Les juges savent que la critique fait partie de leur fonction, mais les déclarations menaçantes de ce genre de la part des plus hauts niveaux de gouvernement ne sont pas seulement inappropriées, elles sont dangereuses. Tous les membres de la Cour continueront à faire leur travail, sans crainte ni faveur, d’où qu’elles viennent. Chief Justice John G. Roberts (March 4, 2020)

This is as much about public outcry and organizing and mobilizing and applying pressure so that this GOP-led Senate and these governors that continue to carry water for this administration, putting the American people in harm’s way, turning a deaf ear to the needs of our families and our communities — hold them accountable. Make the phone calls, send the emails, show up. You know, there needs to be unrest in the streets for as long as there’s unrest in our lives. U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley (Aug; 18, 2020)

They’re not going to stop. This is a movement, I’m telling you, they’re not going to stop, and everyone beware because they’re not going to stop before Election Day in November, and they’re not going to stop after Election Day. And everyone should take note of that, on both levels, that they’re not going to let up, and they should not, and we should not. Kamala Harris (June 18, 2020)

You think we’re rallying now? You ain’t seen nothing yet. Already you have members of your Cabinet that are being booed out of restaurants … protesters taking up at their house saying ‘no peace, no sleep.’ If you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them and you tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif., June 23, 2018)

I have no sympathy for these people that are in this administration who know it is wrong what they’re doing … but they tend to not want to confront this president. Cabinet members who defend him are “not going to be able to go to a restaurant, stop at a gas station, shop at a department store. The people are going to turn on them, they’re going to protest, they’re going to absolutely harass them until they decide that they’re going to tell the president: ’No … this is wrong, this is unconscionable; we can’t keep doing this to children.’ Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif., June 24, 2018)

This was act of the administration. They had been planning this for a while. As a mother of five children, grandmother of nine, I’m sure any parents here, mother or father, knows that this is barbaric. This is not what America is. But this is the policy of the Trump administration. (…) When we had a hearing on a subject related to this, asylum-seeker refugees (…) the American (…) Association of Evangelicals (…) testified that asylum refugees (…) they called it the crown jewel of America’s humanitarianism. (…) And in order to do away with that crown jewel, they’re doing away with children being with their moms. (…) I just don’t even know why there aren’t uprisings all over the country. And maybe there will be, when people realize that this is a policy that they defend. Nancy Pelosi (House Speaker, D-Calif., June 14, 2018)

Si ça avait été des militants Black Lives Matter hier, ils auraient été traités très différemment. Joe Biden

Nous pouvons arrêter le fascisme. (…) Je pense juste que COVID est un don de Dieu à la gauche. C’est une chose terrible à dire. Je veux dire, je pense que c’était une chose très difficile à nous envoyer, mais cela a déchiré le pansement sur qui il est et ce qu’il représente et ce qui est fait aux gens ordinaires et aux travailleurs dans ce pays. Nous pouvons le voir maintenant, les gens qui ne pouvaient pas le voir avant, vous savez, ils le voient maintenant et nous avons une chance d’exploiter cette colère et de faire une différence. Alors, je me sens tellement bénie d’être en vie en ce moment. Jane Fonda

Bordel, restez chez vous. Corona se propage, cette merde n’est pas une blague. Ce n’est pas le moment de travailler ou de trainer. La façon dont vous pouvez vous battre est simple, mes amis, restez à la maison. Maintenant, techniquement, je ne suis pas médecin. Mais les enculés écoutent quand je lis un poème. Alors me voici, Sam Fucking Jackson, je t’implore : garde ton cul à la maison. Si vous voulez que les choses reviennent à la normale, ne paniquez pas. Utilisez simplement votre dôme. Lavez-vous les mains, arrêtez de toucher votre visage et restez à la maison. Samuel L. Johnson

Avec plus de 100.000 Américains décédés ces derniers mois et la réponse honteuse et vide de nos dirigeants, j’en ai vraiment ras le cul. Ces vies méritent mieux que d’être de simples statistiques dérangeantes pour la campagne de réélection de notre président. C’est une disgrâce nationale. Au lieu de célébrer les joies de l’été aujourd’hui, nous constatons les conséquences de la pandémie et son coût pour notre nation. Nous comptabiliserons ce que nous avons perdu, prierons pour les personnes décédées et les familles qu’elles laissent derrière elles. Donc si vous êtes prêts pour un requiem rock ‘n’ roll, restez à l’écoute. Je vais commencer par en envoyer un à l’homme assis au bureau du Resolute. Avec tout le respect, monsieur, montrez un tant soit peu de considération à vos citoyens et à votre pays. Mettez ce foutu masque. Bruce Springsteen

They do not deserve a prison sentence for conduct that occurred in the heat of the moment on one of the most heated nights in modern American history. Paul Shechtman (Urooj Rahman’s lawyer)

D’une certaine manière, Trump avait raison. Il y avait un complot dans les coulisses, qui a à la fois mis fin aux manifestations et coordonné la résistance des PDG. Les deux surprises sont le résultat d’une alliance informelle entre des militants de gauche et des titans du monde des affaires. (…) [C’était] une cabale bien financée de personnes puissantes, issues de différents secteurs et idéologies, travaillant ensemble dans les coulisses pour influencer les perceptions, changer les règles et les lois, diriger la couverture médiatique et contrôler le flux d’informations. Ils ne truquaient pas l’élection; ils la fortifiaient. (…) En fin de compte, près de la moitié des électeurs ont voté par correspondance en 2020, pratiquement une révolution dans la façon dont les gens votent. Environ un quart ont voté tôt en personne. Seul un quart des électeurs ont voté de manière traditionnelle: en personne le jour du scrutin. (…) La philanthropie privée est entrée en lice. Un assortiment de fondations a contribué des dizaines de millions de dollars en financement de l’administration électorale. L’initiative Chan Zuckerberg a apporté 300 millions de dollars (…) Le soulèvement pour la justice raciale déclenché par l’assassinat de George Floyd en mai n’était pas avant tout un mouvement politique. Les organisateurs qui ont contribué à sa direction voulaient tirer parti de son élan pour les élections sans lui permettre d’être coopté par les politiciens. Nombre de ces organisateurs faisaient partie du réseau de Podhorzer, des militants des États du champ de bataille qui s’est associé à la Democracy Defence Coalition pour des organisations ayant des rôles de premier plan dans le Mouvement pour les vies noires. (…) Le soulèvement de l’été avait montré que le pouvoir du peuple pouvait avoir un impact énorme. Les militants ont commencé à se préparer à reprendre les manifestations si Trump tentait de voler les élections. «Les Américains prévoient des manifestations généralisées si Trump interfère avec les élections», annonçait Reuters en octobre, l’une des nombreuses nouvelles de ce genre. Plus de 150 groupes de gauche, de la Marche des femmes au Sierra Club en passant par Colour of Change, de Democrats.com aux Socialistes démocrates d’Amérique, ont rejoint la coalition «Protégez les résultats». Le site Web du groupe, aujourd’hui disparu, contenait une carte répertoriant 400 manifestations postélectorales prévues, qui devaient être activées par SMS dès le 4 novembre. (…) Fox News a surpris tout le monde en appelant l’Arizona pour Biden. La campagne de sensibilisation du public avait fonctionné: les présentateurs de télévision se mettaient en quatre pour conseiller la prudence et encadrer le décompte des voix avec précision. Time

November 3rd. After You Vote, Hit the Streets For months, Donald Trump and his enablers have waged an attack on the democratic process. They’re mobilizing an army of thugs to intimidate voters at the polls, they’re trying to limit access to early voting, and they even tried to dismantle the US Postal Service. During this triple crisis—the COVID-19 pandemic, the recession, and the crisis of police violence and institutional racism—the stakes are simply too high to sit at home and watch the results play out. On November 3rd, after you vote, volunteer at the polls or do get out the vote, come to Black Lives Matter Plaza. Thousands of us are planning to come together to defend democracy and ensure that Trump isn’t able to steal the 2020 Presidential Election. We’re going to start this next phase of the election cycle in the streets. We’ll have GoGo bands, salsa dancers, artists, cultural workers, and much more. We’ll also be watching the election results coming in on big screens. Votes will still be coming in, so this will (probably) not be the time we need to create disruption to stop a coup – yet. But we’ll be in a good place to respond to whatever might happen. This has been a really long and dark era so we’re going to be together to process our feelings of hope, anger, fear and exhaustion as a community.   Regardless of the results, election-night programming will probably wrap up around midnight so we can be energized and ready to hit the streets again on the 4th. Shutdown DC

Concerned about the possibility of unrest on Election Day, or in the days that follow, businesses in some areas of D.C. are boarding their windows. Officials are advising shop owners to sign up for crime alerts and to keep their insurance information handy. D.C. police have limited leave for officers starting this weekend to ensure adequate staffing, and the District spent $100,000 on less-lethal munitions and chemical irritants for riot control to replenish a stockpile depleted by clashes over the summer. As a turbulent election season draws to a close, authorities across the country worry frustration may spill onto the streets, and officials are watching for disturbances at the polls or protests in their communities. That tension is heightened in the nation’s capital, where the White House and other symbols of government regularly draw demonstrators. “It is widely believed that there will be civil unrest after the November election regardless of who wins,” D.C. Police Chief Peter Newsham told lawmakers this month. “It is also believed that there is a strong chance of unrest when Washington, D.C., hosts the inauguration in January.” (…) Officials have not recommended that shop owners board up their buildings, according to a resource guide for businesses distributed by city leaders this week. Some small-business owners are heeding their guidance, focused on bolstering sales as winter approaches. Others are boarding anyway, and concrete barriers were being installed outside the U.S. Chamber of Commerce building across from Lafayette Square. “We do not have any intelligence on planned activity to suggest the need to board up; however, we remain vigilant,” John Falcicchio, the deputy mayor for planning and economic development, said in a statement. “We understand the difficult position building owners and operating businesses are in, and we call upon all who participate in First Amendment activities to denounce violence and report it immediately should it occur.” Officials say they are concerned that a politically polarized electorate coupled with divisive rhetoric and President Trump questioning the integrity of the election could create flash points in the District and elsewhere. Newsham said several groups have applied for demonstration permits starting Sunday and for days after the election. The National Park Service is considering permit applications from several organizations with various views on the election. Shutdown DC is planning weeks’ worth of demonstrations around the White House and Black Lives Plaza starting Tuesday. “After you vote, hit the streets,” the group posted on its website. (…) The District endured months of sustained demonstrations after the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, which targeted areas outside the White House but also impacted the downtown business district and neighborhoods such as Georgetown, Adams Morgan and Shaw. The demonstrations were mostly peaceful, but outbreaks of violence — much of it attributed to agitators more intent on destruction than protest — resulted in hundreds of arrests after nights of fires, looted stores and clashes with police. D.C. police said that on May 30 and May 31, the two most volatile days, 204 businesses were burglarized and 216 properties were damaged. The Washington Post

The Manhattan real estate world is a world unto its own. The competition is very fierce, you’re dealing with many, many clever people. I think it was Tom Klingenstein who said he always thought Trump was Jewish because he fit in so well with the real-estatenicks in Manhattan, most of whom were, and are, Jewish. (…) He had the qualities that all those guys had in common, and you might have thought, other things being equal, that he was one of them. And in a certain sense he was, but not entirely. I know a few of those guys and they’re actually very impressive. You have to get permits, and you have to deal with the mob, and you have to know how to handle workers who are very recalcitrant, many of whom are thuggish. You’re in a battlefield there, so you have to know how to operate politically as well as in a managerial capacity, and how to sweet talk and also how to curse. It’s not an easy field to master.(…) I think Trump has, in that sense, the common touch. That’s one of the things—it may be the main thing—that explains his political success. It doesn’t explain his success in general, but his political success, yes. (…) Trump fights back. The people who say: “Oh, he shouldn’t lower himself,” “He should ignore this,” and “Why is he demeaning himself by arguing with some dopey reporter?” I think on the contrary—if you hit him, he hits back; and he is an equal opportunity counter puncher. It doesn’t matter who you are. (…) when he first appeared on the scene (…) I said to my wife: “This guy is Buchanan without the anti-Semitism,” because he was a protectionist, a nativist, and an isolationist. And those were the three pillars of Pat Buchanan’s political philosophy. How did I know he wasn’t an anti-Semite? I don’t know—I just knew. And he certainly wasn’t and isn’t, and I don’t think he’s a racist or any of those things. (…) however, I began to be bothered by the hatred that was building up against Trump from my soon to be new set of ex-friends. It really disgusted me. I just thought it had no objective correlative. You could think that he was unfit for office—I could understand that—but my ex-friends’ revulsion was always accompanied by attacks on the people who supported him. They called them dishonorable, or opportunists, or cowards—and this was done by people like Bret Stephens, Bill Kristol, and various others. And I took offense at that. So that inclined me to what I then became: anti-anti-Trump. By the time he finally won the nomination, I was sliding into a pro-Trump position, which has grown stronger and more passionate as time has gone on. On the question of his isolationism, he doesn’t seem to give a damn. He hires John Bolton and Mike Pompeo who, from my point of view, as a neoconservative (I call myself a “paleo-neoconservative” because I’ve been one for so long), couldn’t be better. And that’s true of many of his other cabinet appointments. He has a much better cabinet than Ronald Reagan had, and Reagan is the sacred figure in Republican hagiography. Trump is able to do that because, not only is he not dogmatic, he doesn’t operate on the basis of fixed principles. Now some people can think that’s a defect—I don’t think it’s a defect in a politician at a high level. I remember thinking to myself once on the issue of his embrace of tariffs, and some of my friends were very angry. I said to myself for the first time, “Was thou shalt not have tariffs inscribed on the tablets that Moses brought down from Sinai? Maybe Trump has something on this issue, in this particular”—and then I discovered to my total amazement that there are a hundred tariffs (I think that’s right) against America from all over the world. So the idea that we’re living in a free trade paradise was itself wrong, and in any case, there was no reason to latch onto it as a sacred dogma. And that was true of immigration. I was always pro-immigration because I’m the child of immigrants. (…) So I was very reluctant to join in Trump’s skepticism about the virtues of immigration. (…) We weren’t arguing about illegal immigration. We were arguing about immigration. (…) What has changed my mind about immigration now—even legal immigration—is that our culture has weakened to the point where it’s no longer attractive enough for people to want to assimilate to, and we don’t insist that they do assimilate. (…) as I watched the appointments he was making even at the beginning, I was astonished. And he couldn’t have been doing this by accident. So that everything he was doing by way of policy as president, belied the impression he had given to me of a Buchananite. He was the opposite of a Buchananite in practice. The fact is he was a new phenomenon. And I still to this day haven’t quite figured out how he reconciled all of this in his own head. Maybe because, as I said earlier, he was not dogmatic about things. He did what he had to do to get things done. (…) he had something—he had instincts. And he knew, from my point of view, who the good guys were. Now, he made some mistakes, for example, with Secretary of State Tillerson, but so did Reagan. I used to point out to people that it took Lincoln three years to find the right generals to fight the civil war, so what did you expect from George W. Bush? In Trump’s case, most of his appointments were very good and they’ve gotten better as time’s gone on. And even the thing that I held almost sacred, and still do really, which is the need for American action abroad—interventionism—which he still says he’s against. I mean, he wants to pull out all our troops from Syria and I think it was probably Bolton who talked him out of doing it all in one stroke. Even concerning interventionism, I began to rethink. I found my mind opening to possibilities that hadn’t been there before. And in this case it was a matter of acknowledging changing circumstances rather than philosophical or theoretical changes. (…)[Trump] was against what he called stupid wars or unnecessary wars. But I think that, again, he’s willing to be flexible under certain circumstances. I think that if we were hit by any of those people, he would respond with a hydrogen bomb. (…) some of [my ex-friends] have gone so far as to make me wonder whether they’ve lost their minds altogether. I didn’t object to their opposition to Trump. There was a case to be made, and they made it—okay. Of course, they had no reasonable alternative. A couple of them voted for Hillary, which I think would have been far worse for the country than anything Trump could have done. But, basically, I think we’re all in a state of confusion as to what’s going on. Tom Klingenstein has made a brilliant effort to explain it, in terms that haven’t really been used before. He says that our domestic politics has erupted into a kind of war between patriotism and multiculturalism, and he draws out the implications of that war very well. I might put it in different terms—love of America versus hatred of America. But it’s the same idea. We find ourselves in a domestic, or civil, war almost. (…) The long march through the institutions, as the Maoists called it, was more successful than I would have anticipated. The anti-Americanism became so powerful that there was virtually nothing to stop it. Even back then I once said, and it’s truer now: this country is like a warrior tribe which sends all its children to a pacifist monk to be educated. And after a while—it took 20 or 40 years—but little by little it turned out that Antonio Gramsci—the Communist theoretician who said that the culture is where the power is, not the economy—turned out to be right; and little by little the anti-Americanism made its way all the way down to kindergarten, practically. And there was no effective counterattack. (…) The crack I make these days is that the Left thinks that the Constitution is unconstitutional. When Barack Obama said, “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming this country,” well it wasn’t five days, but he was for once telling the truth. He knew what he was doing. I’ve always said that Obama, from his own point of view, was a very successful president. (…) Far from being a failure, within the constraints of what is still the democratic political system, he had done about as much as you possibly could to transform the country into something like a social democracy. The term “social democrat,” however, used to be an honorable one. It designated people on the Left who were anti-Communist, who believed in democracy, but who thought that certain socialist measures could make the world more equitable. Now it’s become a euphemism for something that is hard to distinguish from Communism. And I would say the same thing about anti-Zionism. (…) two years or so after the Six Day War (…) anti-Semitism has migrated from the Right, which was its traditional home, to the Left, where it is getting a more and more hospitable reception. (…) Today, anti-Semitism, under the cover of anti-Zionism, has established itself much more firmly in the Democratic Party than I could ever have predicted, which is beyond appalling. The Democrats were unable to pass a House resolution condemning anti-Semitism, for example, which is confirmation of the Gramscian victory. I think they are anti-American—that’s what I would call them. They’ve become anti-American. (…) some of them say they’re pro-socialism, but most of them don’t know what they’re talking about. They ought to visit a British hospital or a Canadian hospital once in a while to see what Medicare for All comes down to. They don’t know what they’re for. I mean, the interesting thing about this whole leftist movement that started in the ’60s is how different it is from the Left of the ’30s. The Left of the ’30s had a positive alternative in mind—what they thought was positive—namely, the Soviet Union. So America was bad; Soviet Union, good. Turn America into the Soviet Union and everything is fine. The Left of the ’60s knew that the Soviet Union was flawed because its crimes that had been exposed, so they never had a well-defined alternative. One day it was Castro, the next day Mao, the next day Zimbabwe, I mean, they kept shifting—as long as it wasn’t America. Their real passion was to destroy America and the assumption was that anything that came out of those ruins would be better than the existing evil. That was the mentality—there was never an alternative and there still isn’t. (…) Things have gone so haywire, [Bernie Sanders] was able to revive the totally discredited idea of socialism, and others were so ignorant that they picked it up. As for attitudes toward America, I believe that Howard Zinn’s relentlessly anti-American People’s History of the United States sells something like 130,000 copies a year, and it’s a main text for the study of American History in the high schools and in grade schools. So, we have miseducated a whole generation, two generations by now, about almost everything. (…) The only way I know out of this is to fight it intellectually, which sounds weak. But the fact that Trump was elected is a kind of miracle. I now believe he’s an unworthy vessel chosen by God to save us from the evil on the Left. And he’s not the first unworthy vessel chosen by God. There was King David who was very bad—I mean he had a guy murdered so he could sleep with his wife, among other things. And then there was King Solomon who was considered virtuous enough—more than his father—to build the temple, and then desecrated it with pagan altars; but he was nevertheless considered a great ancestor. So there are precedents for these unworthy vessels, and Trump, with all his vices, has the necessary virtues and strength to fight the fight that needs to be fought. And if he doesn’t win in 2020, I would despair of the future. I have 13 grandchildren and 12 great grandchildren, and they are hostages to fortune. So I don’t have the luxury of not caring what’s going to happen after I’m gone. (…) His virtues are the virtues of the street kids of Brooklyn. You don’t back away from a fight and you fight to win. That’s one of the things that the Americans who love him, love him for—that he’s willing to fight, not willing but eager to fight. And that’s the main virtue and all the rest stem from, as Klingenstein says, his love of America. I mean, Trump loves America. He thinks it’s great or could be made great again. Eric Holder, former attorney general, said, “When was it ever great?” And Michelle Obama says that the first time she was ever proud of her country was when Obama won. (…) Mainly they think [Trump]’s unfit to be president for all the obvious reasons—that he disgraces the office. I mean, I would say Bill Clinton disgraced the office. I was in England at Cambridge University when Harry Truman was president, and there were Americans there who were ashamed of the fact that somebody like Harry Truman was president. (…) [A haberdasher] and no college degree. And, of course, Andrew Jackson encountered some of that animosity. There’s snobbery in it and there’s genuine, you might say, aesthetic revulsion. It’s more than disagreements about policy, because the fact of the matter is they have few grounds for disagreement about policy. I mean, I’ve known Bill Kristol all his life, and I like him. But I must say I’m shocked by his saying that if it comes to the deep state versus Trump, he’ll take the deep state. You know, I was raised to believe that the last thing in the world you defend is your own, and I am proud to have overcome that education. I think the first thing in the world you defend is your own, especially when it’s under siege both from without and within. So the conservative elite has allowed its worst features—its sense of superiority—to overcome its intellectual powers, let’s put it that way. I don’t know how else to explain this. (…) I often quote and I have always believed in Bill Buckley’s notorious declaration that he would rather be governed by the first 2,000 names in the Boston telephone book than by the faculty of Harvard University. That’s what I call intelligent populism. And Trump is Exhibit A of the truth of that proposition. Norman Podhoretz (2019)

Securing national borders seems pretty orthodox. In an age of anti-Western terrorism, placing temporary holds on would-be immigrants from war-torn zones until they can be vetted is hardly radical. Expecting “sanctuary cities” to follow federal laws rather than embrace the nullification strategies of the secessionist Old Confederacy is a return to the laws of the Constitution. Using the term “radical Islamic terror” in place of “workplace violence” or “man-caused disasters” is sensible, not subversive. Insisting that NATO members meet their long-ignored defense-spending obligations is not provocative but overdue. Assuming that both the European Union and the United Nations are imploding is empirical, not unhinged. Questioning the secret side agreements of the Iran deal or failed Russian reset is facing reality. Making the Environmental Protection Agency follow laws rather than make laws is the way it always was supposed to be. Unapologetically siding with Israel, the only free and democratic country in the Middle East, used to be standard U.S. policy until Obama was elected. (…) Expecting the media to report the news rather than massage it to fit progressive agendas makes sense. In the past, proclaiming Obama a “sort of god” or the smartest man ever to enter the presidency was not normal journalistic practice. (…) Half the country is having a hard time adjusting to Trumpism, confusing Trump’s often unorthodox and grating style with his otherwise practical and mostly centrist agenda. In sum, Trump seems a revolutionary, but that is only because he is loudly undoing a revolution. Victor Davis Hanson

What makes such men and women both tragic and heroic is their knowledge that the natural expression of their personas can lead only to their own destruction or ostracism from an advancing civilization that they seek to protect. And yet they willingly accept the challenge to be of service . . . Yet for a variety of reasons, both personal and civic, their characters not only should not be altered, but could not be, even if the tragic hero wished to change . . . In the classical tragic sense, Trump likely will end in one of two fashions, both not particularly good: either spectacular but unacknowledged accomplishments followed by ostracism . . . or, less likely, a single term due to the eventual embarrassment of his beneficiaries. Victor Davis Hanson

Trump’s own uncouthness was in its own manner contextualized by his supporters as a long overdue pushback to the elite disdain and indeed hatred shown them. (…) Trumpism was the idea that there were no longer taboo subjects. Everything was open for negotiation; nothing was sacred. Victor Davis Hanson

The very idea that Donald Trump could, even in a perverse way, be heroic may appall half the country. Nonetheless, one way of understanding both Trump’s personal excesses and his accomplishments is that his not being traditionally presidential may have been valuable in bringing long-overdue changes in foreign and domestic policy. Tragic heroes, as they have been portrayed from Sophocles’ plays (e.g., Ajax, Antigone, Oedipus Rex, Philoctetes) to the modern western film, are not intrinsically noble. Much less are they likeable. Certainly, they can often be obnoxious and petty, if not dangerous, especially to those around them. These mercurial sorts never end well — and on occasion neither do those in their vicinity. Oedipus was rudely narcissistic, Hombre’s John Russell (Paul Newman) arrogant and off-putting. Tragic heroes are loners, both by preference and because of society’s understandable unease with them. Ajax’s soliloquies about a rigged system and the lack of recognition accorded his undeniable accomplishments are Trumpian to the core — something akin to the sensational rumors that at night Trump is holed up alone, petulant, brooding, eating fast food, and watching Fox News shows. Outlaw leader Pike Bishop (William Holden), in director Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch, is a killer whose final gory sacrifice results in the slaughter of the toxic General Mapache and his corrupt local Federales. A foreboding Ethan Edwards (John Wayne), of John Ford’s classic 1956 film The Searchers, alone can track down his kidnapped niece. But his methods and his recent past as a Confederate renegade make him suspect and largely unfit for a civilizing frontier after the expiration of his transitory usefulness. These characters are not the sorts that we would associate with Bob Dole, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, or Mitt Romney. The tragic hero’s change of fortune — often from good to bad, as Aristotle reminds us — is due to an innate flaw (hamartia), or at least in some cases an intrinsic and usually uncivilized trait that can be of service to the community, albeit usually expressed fully only at the expense of the hero’s own fortune. The problem for civilization is that the creation of those skill sets often brings with it past baggage of lawlessness and comfortability with violence. Trump’s cunning and mercurialness, honed in Manhattan real estate, global salesmanship, reality TV, and wheeler-dealer investments, may have earned him ostracism from polite Washington society. But these talents also may for a time be suited for dealing with many of the outlaws of the global frontier. (…) So what makes such men and women both tragic and heroic is their full knowledge that the natural expression of their personas can lead only to their own destruction or ostracism. Yet for a variety of reasons, both personal and civic, their characters not only should not be altered but could not be, even if the tragic hero wished to change, given his megalomania and Manichean views of the human experience. Clint Eastwood’s Inspector “Dirty” Harry Callahan cannot serve as the official face of the San Francisco police department. But Dirty Harry alone has the skills and ruthlessness to ensure that the mass murderer Scorpio will never harm the innocent again. So, in the finale, he taunts and then shoots the psychopathic Scorpio, ending both their careers, and walks off — after throwing his inspector’s badge into the water. Marshal Will Kane (Gary Cooper) of High Noon did about the same thing, but only after gunning down (with the help of his wife) four killers whom the law-abiding but temporizing elders of Hadleyville proved utterly incapable of stopping. (…) In other words, tragic heroes are often simply too volatile to continue in polite society. In George Stevens’s classic 1953 western Shane, even the reforming and soft-spoken gunslinger Shane (Alan Ladd) understands his own dilemma all too well: He alone possesses the violent skills necessary to free the homesteaders from the insidious threats of hired guns and murderous cattle barons. (And how he got those skills worries those he plans to help.) Yet by the time of his final resort to lethal violence, Shane has sacrificed all prior chances of reform and claims on reentering the civilized world of the stable “sodbuster” community. (…) Trump could not cease tweeting, not cease his rallies, not cease his feuding, and not cease his nonstop motion and unbridled speech if he wished to. It is his brand, and such overbearing made Trump, for good or evil, what he is — and will likely eventually banish him from establishment Washington, whether after or during his elected term. His raucousness can be managed, perhaps mitigated for a time — thus the effective tenure of his sober cabinet choices and his chief of staff, the ex–Marine general, no-nonsense John Kelly — but not eliminated. His blunt views cannot really thrive, and indeed can scarcely survive, in the nuance, complexity, and ambiguity of Washington. Trump is not a mannered Mitt Romney, who would never have left the Paris climate agreement. He is not a veteran who knew the whiz of real bullets and remains a Washington icon, such as John McCain, who would never have moved the American embassy to Jerusalem. Marco Rubio or Jeb Bush certainly would never have waded into no-win controversies such as the take-a-knee NFL debacle and unvetted immigration from suspect countries in the Middle East and Africa, or called to account sanctuary cities that thwarted federal law. Our modern Agamemnon, Speaker Paul Ryan, is too circumspect to get caught up with Trump’s wall or a mini-trade war with China. Trump does not seem to care whether he is acting “presidential.” The word — as he admits — is foreign to him. He does not worry whether his furious tweets, his revolving-door firing and hiring, and his rally counterpunches reveal a lack of stature or are becoming an embarrassing window into his own insecurities and apprehensions as a Beltway media world closes in upon him in the manner that, as the trapped western hero felt, the shrinking landscape was increasingly without options in the new 20th century. The real moral question is not whether the gunslinger Trump could or should become civilized (again, defined in our context as becoming normalized as “presidential”) but whether he could be of service at the opportune time and right place for his country, crude as he is. After all, despite their decency, in extremis did the frontier farmers have a solution without Shane, or the Mexican peasants a realistic alternative to the Magnificent Seven, or the town elders a viable plan without Will Kane? Perhaps we could not withstand the fire and smoke of a series of Trump presidencies, but given the direction of the country over the last 16 years, half the population, the proverbial townspeople of the western, wanted some outsider, even with a dubious past, to ride in and do things that most normal politicians not only would not but could not do — before exiting stage left or riding off into the sunset, to the relief of most and the regrets of a few. The best and the brightest résumés of the Bush and Obama administrations had doubled the national debt — twice. Three prior presidents had helped to empower North Korea, now with nuclear-tipped missiles pointing at the West Coast. Supposedly refined and sophisticated diplomats of the last quarter century, who would never utter the name “Rocket Man” or stoop to call Kim Jong-un “short and fat,” nonetheless had gone through the “agreed framework,” “six-party talks,” and “strategic patience,” in which three administrations gave Pyongyang quite massive aid to behave and either not to proliferate or at least to denuclearize. And it was all a failure, and a deadly one at that. For all of Obama’s sophisticated discourse about “spread the wealth around” and “You didn’t build that,” quantitative easing, zero interest rates, massive new regulations, the stimulus, and shovel-ready, government-inspired jobs, he could not achieve 3 percent annualized economic growth. Half the country, the more desperate half, believed that the remedy for a government in which the IRS, the FBI, the DOJ, and the NSA were weaponized, often in partisan fashion and without worry about the civil liberties of American citizens, was not more temporizing technicians but a pariah who cleaned house and moved on. Certainly Obama was not willing to have a showdown with the Chinese over their widely acknowledged cheating and coerced expropriation of U.S. technology, with the NATO allies over their chronic welching on prior defense commitments, with the North Koreans after they achieved the capability of hitting U.S. West Coast cities, or with the European Union over its mostly empty climate-change accords. Moving on, sometimes fatally so, is the tragic hero’s operative exit. Antigone certainly makes her point about the absurdity of small men’s sexism and moral emptiness in such an uncompromising way that her own doom is assured. Tom Doniphon (John Wayne), in John Ford’s The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, unheroically kills the thuggish Liberty Valance, births the career of Ranse Stoddard and his marriage to Doniphon’s girlfriend, and thereby ensures civilization is Shinbone’s frontier future. His service done, he burns down his house and degenerates from feared rancher to alcoholic outcast. (…) He knows that few appreciate that the tragic heroes in their midst are either tragic or heroic — until they are safely gone and what they have done in time can be attributed to someone else. Worse, he knows that the tragic hero’s existence is solitary and without the nourishing networks and affirmation of the peasant’s agrarian life. (…) By his very excesses Trump has already lost, but in his losing he might alone be able to end some things that long ago should have been ended. Victor Davis Hanson

That is how human nature is. (…) if you talk to people in the military, the diplomatic corps, the academic world, and, just to take one example, China, they will tell you in the last two years they have had an awakening. They feel that Chinese military superiority is now to deny help to America’s allies. They believe that the trade deficit is unsustainable. They will tell you all of that, and you are almost listening to Donald Trump in 2015, but they won’t mention the word “Trump,” because to do so would contaminate that argument. What I am getting at is he looked at the world empirically. (…) he said, “This is what’s wrong, and this is what we would have to do to address this problem.” And he said it in such a way—whether he wanted to say it in that way or whether he was forced to say it in that way, I don’t know—but he said it in such a way that was designed to grab attention, to be polarizing, to get through bureaucratic doublespeak. So now he succeeded, but if I were to ask anybody at Stanford University, or anybody that I know is a four-star general or a diplomat, “What caused your sudden change about China?,” they would not say Donald Trump, and yet we know who it was. [Like a hero out of Greek myth] as long as we understand the word “hero.” Americans don’t know what that word means. They think it means you live happily ever after or you are selfless. Whether it is Achilles or Sophocles’s Ajax or Antigone, they can act out of insecurity, they can act out of impatience—they can act out of all sorts of motives that are less than what we say in America are heroic. But the point that they are making is, I see a skill that I have. I see a problem. I want to solve that problem, and I want to solve that problem so much that the ensuing reaction to that solution may not necessarily be good for me. And they accept that. (…) I tried to use as many examples as I could of the classic Western, whether it was “Shane” or “High Noon” or “The Magnificent Seven.” They all are the same—the community doesn’t have the skills or doesn’t have the willpower or doesn’t want to stoop to the corrective method to solve the existential problem, whether it is cattle barons or banditos. So they bring in an outsider, and immediately they start to be uneasy because he is uncouth—his skills, his attitude—and then he solves the problem, and they declare to him, whether it is Gary Cooper in “High Noon” or Alan Ladd in “Shane,” “I think it’s better you leave. We don’t need you anymore. We feel dirty that we ever had to call you in.” I think that is what is awaiting Trump. (…) I think Trump really did think that there were certain problems and he had particular skills that he could solve. Maybe in a naïve fashion. But I think he understood, for all the emoluments-clause hysteria, that he wasn’t going to make a lot of money from it or be liked for it. (…) I look at everything empirically. I know what the left said, and the media said, but I ask myself, “What actually happened?” There are a billion Muslims in the world, and he has, I think, six countries who were not able to substantiate that their passports were vetted. [Trump’s final travel plan limits or prevents travel from seven countries.] We didn’t even, in the final calibration, base it on religion. I think we have two countries that are not predominantly Muslim. (…) As far as separation, I remember very carefully that the whole child separation was started during Barack Obama. (…) It was unapologetically said this came from Obama and we are going to continue to practice deterrence. As someone who lives in a community that is ninety per cent Hispanic, probably forty per cent undocumented, I can tell you that it’s a very different world from what people are talking about in Washington. I have had people knock on my door and ask me where the ob-gyn lives, because they got her name in Oaxaca. And the woman in the car is six months pregnant and living across the border and given the name of a nice doctor in Selma, California, that will deliver the baby. (…) It has happened once, but I know people who come from Mexico with the names of doctors and clinics in Fresno County where they know they will get, for free, twenty to thirty thousand dollars of medical care and an anchor baby. I know that’s supposed to be an uncouth thing to say. (…) As I am talking right now, I have a guy, a U.S. citizen, tiling my kitchen, and he does not like the idea that people hire people illegally for twelve dollars an hour in cash, when he should be getting eighteen, nineteen, twenty dollars. But, when you make these arguments, they are just brushed aside by the left or the media, by saying, oh, these are anecdotal or racist or stereotype. (…) [Trump saying there were good people on both sides] was very clumsy (…) But there wasn’t a monolithic white racist protest movement. There were collections of people. Some of them were just out there because maybe they are deluded and maybe they are not. I don’t know what their hearts are like, but they did not want statues torn down or defaced. (…) You can argue that what was O.K. in 2010 suddenly was racist in 2017. But, in today’s polarized climate, Trump should have said, “While both groups are demonstrating, we can’t have a group on any side that identifies by race.” He should have said that. He just said there were good people on both sides. It was clumsy. (…) I was trying to look at Trump in classical terms, so words like eirôneia, or irony—how could it be that the Republican Party supposedly was empathetic, but a millionaire, a billionaire Manhattanite started using terms I had never heard Romney or McCain or Paul Ryan say? He started saying “our.” Our miners. And then, on the left, every time Hillary Clinton went before a Southern audience, she started speaking in a Southern accent. And Barack Obama, I think you would agree, when he gets before an inner-city audience, he suddenly sounded as if he spoke in a black patois. When Trump went to any of these groups, he had the same tie, the same suit, the same accent. What people thought was that, whatever he is, he is authentic. (…) I read a great deal about the Mar-a-Lago project, and I was shocked that the people who opposed that on cultural and social grounds were largely anti-Semitic. Trump had already announced that he was not going to discriminate against Jews and Mexicans and other people. He said, “I want wealthy people.” I went to Palm Beach and talked to wealthy Jewish donors and Cubans, and they said the same thing to me—“He likes rich people. He doesn’t care what you look like.” (…) I don’t know what the driving force was, but I found that he was indifferent. And I think the same thing is true of blacks and Hispanics. (…)  [using birtherism as a way of discrediting Obama]  was absurd. I think it was demonstrable that Obama was born in the United States. The only ambiguity was that two things gave rise to the conspiracy theorists. One was—and I think this is a hundred-per-cent accurate—an advertising group that worked in concert with his publisher put on a booklet that Obama was born in Kenya. That gave third-world cachet to “Dreams from My Father.” And he didn’t look at it or didn’t change it. [In 1991, four years before Obama’s first book was published, his literary agency incorrectly stated on a client list that Obama was born in Kenya.] And he left as a young kid and went to Indonesia and applied when he came back as a Fulbright Fellow, and I don’t know if this is substantiated or just rumor, but he probably was given dual citizenship. [The claim that Obama was a Fulbright Fellow from Indonesia, and therefore had Indonesian citizenship, originated in a hoax e-mail, from April 1, 2009, and has been discredited.] (…) What I am getting at is, here you have a guy named Barack Obama, who grew up in Hawaii, and there were indications in his past that there was ambiguity. (…) I think Trump was doing what Trump does, which is trying to sensationalize it. I don’t think it was racial. I think it was political. (…) I mean carefully calibrated in a political sense. That’s my point. Not that it was careful in the sense of being humane or sympathetic. By that I mean, there were elements in Ted Cruz’s personality that offended people. And he got Ted Cruz really angry, and Ted Cruz doesn’t come across well. (…) if you go back and look at the worst tweets, they are retaliatory. What he does is he waits like a coiled cobra until people attack him, and then he attacks them in a much cruder, blunter fashion. And he has an uncanny ability to pick people that have attacked him, whether it’s Rosie O’Donnell, Megyn Kelly—there were elements in all those people’s careers that were starting to bother people, and Trump sensed that out. I don’t think he would have gotten away with taking on other people that were completely beloved. Colin Kaepernick. People were getting tired of him, so he took him on. All that stuff was calibrated. Trump was replying and understood public sympathy would be at least fifty-fifty, if not in his favor. Victor Davis Hanson

C’est là que se noue la double insécurité économique et culturelle. Face au démantèlement de l’Etat-providence, à la volonté de privatiser, les classes populaires mettent en avant leur demande de préserver le bien commun comme les services publics. Face à la dérégulation, la dénationalisation, elles réclament un cadre national, plus sûr moyen de défendre le bien commun. Face à l’injonction de l’hypermobilité, à laquelle elles n’ont de toute façon pas accès, elles ont inventé un monde populaire sédentaire, ce qui se traduit également par une économie plus durable. Face à la constitution d’un monde où s’impose l’indistinction culturelle, elles aspirent à la préservation d’un capital culturel protecteur. Souverainisme, protectionnisme, préservation des services publics, sensibilité aux inégalités, régulation des flux migratoires, sont autant de thématiques qui, de Tel-Aviv à Alger, de Detroit à Milan, dessinent un commun des classes populaires dans le monde. Ce soft power des classes populaires fait parfois sortir de leurs gonds les parangons de la mondialisation heureuse. Hillary Clinton en sait quelque chose. Elle n’a non seulement pas compris la demande de protection des classes populaires de la Rust Belt, mais, en plus, elle les a traités de « déplorables ». Qui veut être traité de déplorable ou, de ce côté-ci de l’Atlantique, de Dupont Lajoie ? L’appartenance à la classe moyenne n’est pas seulement définie par un seuil de revenus ou un travail d’entomologiste des populations de l’Insee. C’est aussi et avant tout un sentiment de porter les valeurs majoritaires et d’être dans la roue des classes dominantes du point de vue culturel et économique. Placées au centre de l’échiquier, ces catégories étaient des références culturelles pour les classes dominantes, comme pour les nouveaux arrivants, les classes populaires immigrées. En trente ans, les classes moyennes sont passées du modèle à suivre, l’American ou l’European way of life, au statut de losers. Il y a mieux comme référents pour servir de modèle d’assimilation. Qui veut ressembler à un plouc, un déplorable… ? Personne. Pas même les nouveaux arrivants. L’ostracisation des classes populaires par la classe dominante occidentale, pensée pour discréditer toute contestation du modèle économique mondialisé – être contre, c’est ne pas être sérieux – a, en outre, largement participé à l’effondrement des modèles d’intégration et in fine à la paranoïa identitaire. L’asociété s’est ainsi imposée partout : crise de la représentation politique, citadéllisation de la bourgeoisie, communautarisation. Qui peut dès lors s’étonner que nos systèmes d’organisation politique, la démocratie, soient en danger ? Christophe Guilluy

En 2016, Hillary Clinton traitait les électeurs de son opposant républicain, c’est-à-dire l’ancienne classe moyenne américaine déclassée, de « déplorables ». Au-delà du mépris de classe que sous-tend une expression qui rappelle celle de l’ancien président français François Hollande qui traitait de « sans-dents » les ouvriers ou employés précarisés, ces insultes (d’autant plus symboliques qu’elles étaient de la gauche) illustrent un long processus d’ostracisation d’une classe moyenne devenue inutile. (…) Depuis des décennies, la représentation d’une classe moyenne triomphante laisse peu à peu la place à des représentations toujours plus négatives des catégories populaires et l’ensemble du monde d’en haut participe à cette entreprise. Le monde du cinéma, de la télévision, de la presse et de l’université se charge efficacement de ce travail de déconstruction pour produire en seulement quelques décennies la figure répulsive de catégories populaires inadaptées, racistes et souvent proches de la débilité. (…) Des rednecks dégénérés du film « Deliverance » au beauf raciste de Dupont Lajoie, la figure du « déplorable » s’est imposée dès les années 1970 dans le cinéma. La télévision n’est pas en reste. En France, les années 1980 seront marquées par l’émergence de Canal +, quintessence de ll’idéologie libérale-libertaire dominante. (…) De la série « Les Deschiens », à la marionnette débilitante de Johnny Hallyday des Guignols de l’info, c’est en réalité toute la production audiovisuelle qui donne libre cours à son mépris de classe. Christophe Guilluy

Étant donné l’état de fragilisation sociale de la classe moyenne majoritaire française, tout est possible. Sur les plans géographique, culturel et social, il existe bien des points communs entre les situations françaises et américaines, à commencer par le déclassement de la classe moyenne. C’est « l’Amérique périphérique » qui a voté Trump, celle des territoires désindustrialisés et ruraux qui est aussi celle des ouvriers, employés, travailleurs indépendants ou paysans. Ceux qui étaient hier au cœur de la machine économique en sont aujourd’hui bannis. Le parallèle avec la situation américaine existe aussi sur le plan culturel, nous avons adopté un modèle économique mondialisé. Fort logiquement, nous devons affronter les conséquences de ce modèle économique mondialisé : l’ouvrier – hier à gauche –, le paysan – hier à droite –, l’employé – à gauche et à droite – ont aujourd’hui une perception commune des effets de la mondialisation et rompent avec ceux qui n’ont pas su les protéger. La France est en train de devenir une société américaine, il n’y a aucune raison pour que l’on échappe aux effets indésirables du modèle. (…) Dans l’ensemble des pays développés, le modèle mondialisé produit la même contestation. Elle émane des mêmes territoires (Amérique périphérique, France périphérique, Angleterre périphérique… ) et de catégories qui constituaient hier la classe moyenne, largement perdue de vue par le monde d’en haut. (…) la perception que des catégories dominantes – journalistes en tête – ont des classes populaires se réduit à leur champ de vision immédiat. Je m’explique : ce qui reste aujourd’hui de classes populaires dans les grandes métropoles sont les classes populaires immigrées qui vivent dans les banlieues c’est-à-dire les minorités : en France elles sont issues de l’immigration maghrébine et africaine, aux États-Unis plutôt blacks et latinos. Les classes supérieures, qui sont les seules à pouvoir vivre au cœur des grandes métropoles, là où se concentrent aussi les minorités, n’ont comme perception du pauvre que ces quartiers ethnicisés, les ghettos et banlieues… Tout le reste a disparu des représentations. Aujourd’hui, 59 % des ménages pauvres, 60 % des chômeurs et 66 % des classes populaires vivent dans la « France périphérique », celle des petites villes, des villes moyennes et des espaces ruraux. (…) Faire passer les classes moyennes et populaires pour « réactionnaires », « fascisées », « pétinisées » est très pratique. Cela permet d’éviter de se poser des questions cruciales. Lorsque l’on diagnostique quelqu’un comme fasciste, la priorité devient de le rééduquer, pas de s’interroger sur l’organisation économique du territoire où il vit. L’antifascisme est une arme de classe. Pasolini expliquait déjà dans ses Écrits corsaires que depuis que la gauche a adopté l’économie de marché, il ne lui reste qu’une chose à faire pour garder sa posture de gauche : lutter contre un fascisme qui n’existe pas. C’est exactement ce qui est en train de se passer. (…) Il y a un mépris de classe presque inconscient véhiculé par les médias, le cinéma, les politiques, c’est énorme. On l’a vu pour l’élection de Trump comme pour le Brexit, seule une opinion est présentée comme bonne ou souhaitable. On disait que gagner une élection sans relais politique ou médiatique était impossible, Trump nous a prouvé qu’au contraire, c’était faux. Ce qui compte, c’est la réalité des gens depuis leur point de vue à eux. Nous sommes à un moment très particulier de désaffiliation politique et culturel des classes populaires, c’est vrai dans la France périphérique, mais aussi dans les banlieues où les milieux populaires cherchent à préserver ce qui leur reste : un capital social et culturel protecteur qui permet l’entraide et le lien social. Cette volonté explique les logiques séparatistes au sein même des milieux modestes. Une dynamique, qui n’interdit pas la cohabitation, et qui répond à la volonté de ne pas devenir minoritaire. (…) La bourgeoisie d’aujourd’hui a bien compris qu’il était inutile de s’opposer frontalement au peuple. C’est là qu’intervient le « brouillage de classe », un phénomène, qui permet de ne pas avoir à assumer sa position. Entretenue du bobo à Steve Jobs, l’idéologie du cool encourage l’ouverture et la diversité, en apparence. Le discours de l’ouverture à l’autre permet de maintenir la bourgeoisie dans une posture de supériorité morale sans remettre en cause sa position de classe (ce qui permet au bobo qui contourne la carte scolaire, et qui a donc la même demande de mise à distance de l’autre que le prolétaire qui vote FN, de condamner le rejet de l’autre). Le discours de bienveillance avec les minorités offre ainsi une caution sociale à la nouvelle bourgeoisie qui n’est en réalité ni diverse ni ouverte : les milieux sociaux qui prônent le plus d’ouverture à l’autre font parallèlement preuve d’un grégarisme social et d’un entre-soi inégalé. (…) Nous, terre des lumières et patrie des droits de l’homme, avons choisi le modèle libéral mondialisé sans ses effets sociétaux : multiculturalisme et renforcement des communautarismes. Or, en la matière, nous n’avons pas fait mieux que les autres pays. (…) Le FN n’est pas le bon indicateur, les gens n’attendent pas les discours politiques ou les analyses d’en haut pour se déterminer. Les classes populaires font un diagnostic des effets de plusieurs décennies d’adaptation aux normes de l’économie mondiale et utilisent des candidats ou des référendums, ce fut le cas en 2005, pour l’exprimer. Christophe Guilluy

A chaque fois, la grogne vient de territoires qui sont moins productifs économiquement, où le chômage est très implanté. Ce sont des territoires ruraux, des petites et moyennes villes souvent éloignées des grandes métropoles : ce que j’appelle la « France périphérique ». Ce sont des lieux où vivent les classes moyennes, les ouvriers, les petits salariés, les indépendants, les retraités. Cette majorité de la population subit depuis 20 à 30 ans une recomposition économique qui les a desservis. (…) La colère de ces populations vient de beaucoup plus loin. Cela fait des années que ces catégories de Français ne sont plus intégrées politiquement et économiquement. Il y a eu la fermeture progressive des usines puis la crise du monde rural. Pour eux, le retour à l’emploi est très compliqué. En plus, ils ont subi la désertification médicale et le départ des services publics. Idem pour les commerces qui quittent les petites villes. Tout cela s’est cristallisé autour de la question centrale du pouvoir d’achat. Mais le mouvement des Gilets jaunes est une conséquence de tout cela mis bout à bout. (…) le ressentiment est gigantesque. Ce qui est certain c’est que les problèmes sont désormais sur la table. Et si la contestation des Gilets jaunes ne perdure pas dans le temps, un autre mouvement émergera de ces territoires un peu plus tard, car rien n’aura été réglé. (…) Le monde d’en haut ne parle plus au monde d’en bas. Et le monde d’en bas n’écoute plus le monde d’en haut. Les élites sont rassemblées géographiquement dans des métropoles où il y a du travail et de l’argent. Elles continuent de s’adresser à une classe moyenne et à une réalité sociale qui n’existent plus. C’est un boulevard pour les extrêmes… (…) Ils s’adaptent à la demande, comme toujours ! (…) Les réponses apportées par le gouvernement sont à côté de la plaque. Les gens ne demandent pas des solutions techniques pour financer un nouveau véhicule. Ils attendent des réponses de fond où on leur explique quelle place ils ont dans ce pays. De nombreux élus locaux ont des projets pour relancer leur territoire, mais ils n’ont pas d’argent pour les mettre en place. Il faut se retrousser les manches pour développer ces régions, partir du peuple plutôt que de booster en permanence les premiers de cordée. Christophe Guilluy

Je dis depuis quinze ans qu’il y a un éléphant malade (la classe moyenne) dans le magasin de porcelaine (l’Occident) et qu’on m’explique qu’il n’y a pas d’éléphant. Les « gilets jaunes » correspondent effectivement à la sociologie et à la géographie de la France périphérique que j’observe depuis des années. Ouvriers, employés ou petits indépendants, ils ont du mal à boucler leurs fins de mois. Socialement précarisées, ces catégories modestes vivent dans les territoires (villes, moyennes ou petites, campagnes) qui créent le moins d’emplois. Ces déclassés illustrent un mouvement enraciné sur le temps long : la fin de la classe moyenne dont ils formaient hier encore le socle. (…) Du paysan historiquement de droite à l’ouvrier historiquement de gauche, les « gilets jaunes » constatent que le modèle mondialisé ne les intègre plus. Ils roulent en diesel parce qu’on leur a dit de le faire, mais se font traiter de pollueurs par les élites des grandes métropoles. Alors que le monde d’en haut réaffirme sans cesse son identité culturelle (la ville mondialisée, le bio, le vivre-ensemble…), les « gilets jaunes » n’entendent pas se plier au modèle économique et culturel qui les exclut. (…) Plus que l’exclusion des plus modestes, c’est d’abord la sécession du monde d’en haut qui a joué. La rupture entre le haut et le bas de la société se creuse à mesure que les élites ostracisent le peuple. Macron a beau avoir fait le bon diagnostic quand il a déclaré : « Je n’ai pas réussi à réconcilier le peuple français avec ses dirigeants », son camp s’est empressé de traiter les « gilets jaunes » de racistes, d’antisémites et d’homophobes. Ça ne favorise pas la réconciliation ! Pourtant majoritaire, puisqu’elle constitue 60 % de la population, la France périphérique est rejetée par le monde d’en haut qui ne se reconnaît plus dans son propre peuple. L’importance du mouvement et surtout du soutien de l’opinion (huit Français sur dix) révèle l’isolement du monde d’en haut et des représentations sociales et territoriales totalement erronées. Ce divorce soulève un véritable problème démocratique, car les classes moyennes ont toujours été le référent culturel de la classe dirigeante. (…) Certes, il y a des manifestants de droite, de gauche, d’extrême droite et d’extrême gauche qui structurent assez mal leurs discours. Mais tous souhaitent la même chose : du travail et la préservation de ce qu’ils sont. La question du respect est fondamentale, mais le pouvoir y répond par l’insulte ! (…) Tout est possible. Il y a un tel déficit d’offre politique qu’un leader populiste pourrait surgir aussi vite que Macron a émergé. La demande existe. Dans le reste du monde, les populistes réussissent en adaptant leur idéologie à la demande. Il y a quelques années, Salvini défendait des positions sécessionnistes, libérales et racistes en s’attaquant aux Italiens du Sud. Aujourd’hui ministre, il se fait acclamer à Naples, devient étatiste, prône l’unité italienne et vote un budget quasiment de gauche. Quant à Trump, c’est un membre de l’hyperélite new-yorkaise qui a écouté les demandes de l’Amérique périphérique. Ces leaders ne se disent pas qu’il faut rééduquer le peuple. Au contraire, ce sont les demandes de la base qui leur indiquent la voie à suivre. Ainsi, un Mouvement 5 étoiles pourra émerger en France s’il répond aux demandes populaires de régulation (économique, migratoire). (…) Dans tous les pays occidentaux, la classe moyenne est en train d’exploser par le bas. Cette évolution a démarré dans les années 1970-1980 par la crise du monde ouvrier, avec les restructurations industrielles, puis a touché les paysans, les employés du secteur tertiaire, et enfin des territoires ruraux et des villes moyennes. Si on met bout à bout toutes ces catégories, cela touche le cœur de la société. Sur les décombres des classes moyennes telles qu’elles existaient pendant les Trente Glorieuses, les nouvelles classes populaires – ouvriers, employés, paysans, petits commerçants – forment partout l’immense majorité de la population. (…) Maintenant que la classe moyenne a explosé, deux grandes catégories sociales s’affrontent avec comme arrière-plan un nouveau modèle économique de polarisation de l’emploi. D’un côté, les catégories supérieures – 20 à 25 % de la population –, qui occupent des emplois extrêmement qualifiés et hyper intégrés, se concentrent dans les métropoles. De l’autre, une grosse masse de précaires dont les salaires ne suivent pas, vit dans des zones périphériques. Même dans une région riche comme la Bavière, l’électorat AfD recoupe une sociologie et une géographie plutôt populaires réparties dans des petites villes, des villes moyennes et des zones rurales. (…) La classe moyenne n’est absolument pas une catégorie ethnique. Dans mon dernier livre, je critique l’ethnicisation du concept qui, contrairement à ce qu’on croit, est venue de l’intelligentsia de gauche. Depuis quelques années, il y a un glissement sémantique : quand certains parlent des banlieues ou de la politique de la ville, ils désignent les populations issues de l’immigration récente, et quand ils évoquent la « classe moyenne », ils veulent dire « Blancs ». C’est une bêtise. La classe moyenne est le produit d’une intégration économique et culturelle qui a fonctionné pour les Antillais ainsi que pour les premières vagues d’immigration maghrébine qui en épousaient les valeurs, quelle que fût leur origine ou leur religion. Faut-il le rappeler, les DOM-TOM font partie de la France périphérique. Dans ces territoires, les demandes de régulation (économique et migratoire) émanent des mêmes catégories. Cette dynamique est aujourd’hui cassée car le modèle occidental n’intègre plus ces catégories, ni économiquement, ni socialement, ni culturellement. Même dans des régions du monde prospères comme la Scandinavie, les petites gens sont fragilisées culturellement. Cette explosion des classes moyennes entraîne la crise des valeurs culturelles qu’elles portaient, donc des systèmes d’assimilation. (…) Si les classes moyennes, socle populaire du monde d’en haut, ne sont plus les référents culturels de celui-ci, qui ne cesse de les décrire comme des déplorables, elles ne peuvent plus mécaniquement être celles à qui ont envie de ressembler les immigrés. Hier, un immigré qui débarquait s’assimilait mécaniquement en voulant ressembler au Français moyen. De même, l’American way of life était porté par l’ouvrier américain à qui l’immigré avait envie de ressembler. Dès lors que les milieux modestes sont fragilisés et perçus comme des perdants, ils perdent leur capacité d’attractivité. C’est un choc psychologique gigantesque. Cerise sur le gâteau, l’intelligentsia vomit ces gens, à l’image d’Hillary Clinton qui traitait les électeurs de Trump de « déplorables ». Personne n’a envie de ressembler à un déplorable ! (…) La dynamique populiste joue sur deux ressorts à la fois : l’insécurité sociale et l’insécurité culturelle. L’insécurité culturelle sans l’insécurité économique et sociale, cela donne l’électorat Fillon, qui a logiquement voté Macron au second tour : il n’a aucun intérêt à renverser le modèle dont il bénéficie. On l’a vu avec l’élection de Trump, aucun vote populiste n’émerge sans la conjonction de fragilités identitaire et sociale. Il est donc vain de se demander si c’est l’une ou l’autre de ces composantes qui joue. Raison pour laquelle les débats sur la prétendue influence d’Éric Zemmour sont idiots. Zemmour exprime un mouvement réel de la société, qui explique qu’avec 11 millions d’électeurs pour Marine Le Pen, le Front national ait battu son record absolu de voix au second tour en 2017. Malgré tout, la redistribution reste très forte et les protégés sont nombreux. Emmanuel Macron n’a pas seulement été élu par le monde d’en haut. Il a aussi été largement soutenu par les protégés, c’est-à-dire les retraités – notamment de la classe moyenne – et les fonctionnaires. Là est le paradoxe français : ce qui reste de l’État providence protège le monde d’en haut… (…) Cela explique son effondrement dans les sondages. Ceci dit, le niveau de pension reste relativement correct et ne pousse pas les retraités français à renverser la table, même ceux qui estiment qu’il y a des problèmes avec l’immigration. Mais cela pourrait changer aux États-Unis et en Grande-Bretagne, l’État providence étant fragilisé depuis les années 1980, les retraités ne craignent pas de bousculer le système. Ils ont voté pour le Brexit parce qu’ils n’ont rien à perdre. Si demain le gouvernement fragilise les retraités français, ils ne cautionneront pas éternellement le système. En détricotant tous les filets sociaux, comme la redistribution en faveur des retraités, on prend de très gros risques pour la suite des opérations. (…) Et ce n’est d’ailleurs pas un hasard si le gouvernement a fait marche arrière sur la CSG. La pension de retraite médiane en France tourne autour de 1 000, 1 100 euros par mois ! En dessous de 1 000 euros par mois, cela commence à être très compliqué. La majorité des retraités sont issus des catégories populaires. Et ils sont les seuls, au sein de celles-ci, à n’avoir pas majoritairement basculé dans l’abstention ou dans le vote populiste. Le jour où eux aussi basculeront, le choc sera comparable au Brexit. Regardez aussi la rapidité avec laquelle les populistes ont gagné en Italie. (…) Qu’on le veuille ou non, le mouvement est là et il suffit d’attendre. Partout en Occident, il y a une très forte demande de régulation : économique, sociale, migratoire. Pour toute réponse à cette demande populaire, on la traite de fasciste – je suis bien placé pour le savoir. Le résultat de cette stratégie de diversion, c’est que la fracture entre l’élite et les classes supérieures, d’une part, et le peuple d’autre part, ne cesse de se creuser. Jamais dans l’histoire ces deux mondes n’avaient été aussi étrangers l’un à l’autre. (…) Ce monde d’en haut ne tient pas seulement avec le 1 % ou les hyper riches, mais avec des catégories supérieures et une technostructure – les énarques, mais aussi les technocrates territoriaux issus de l’INET. Ses membres viennent tous des mêmes milieux et partagent exactement la même vision de la société. À l’inverse, quand je me balade en France, je rencontre des élus de gauche ou de droite qui partagent mon diagnostic. Et qui se désolent de voir qu’au sommet de leur parti, domine le modèle mondialisé structuré autour des métropoles. (…) Quand la pensée est vraiment en décalage avec le réel, les tentatives de déni et de diabolisation ne marchent plus. Cependant, avec toute la volonté politique du monde, sans l’appui de la technostructure, aucun changement n’est possible. La même question se pose dans les territoires : comment initier des politiques différentes avec la même technostructure ? Peu importe qui est maire de Paris ou Bordeaux, ces villes créent de la richesse grâce au libre jeu du marché. En revanche, il faut être sacrément doué pour sortir Guéret ou Vierzon de l’impasse. (…) Actuellement, on traite la France périphérique à coups de subventions. On redistribue un peu, beaucoup, passionnément, de façon à ce que les gens puissent remplir leur caddie au supermarché. On est arrivé au bout de ce modèle, notamment parce que l’État et les ménages sont surendettés. Mais lorsque des élus locaux et des entreprises privées se réunissent autour d’une table pour impulser un projet économique, cela réussit. Je pense par exemple à la relance des couteaux de Laguiole, dans l’Aveyron. (…) Comme le démontre l’exemple de Laguiole, on ne peut plus penser l’organisation territoriale uniquement à travers une volonté imposée d’en haut par les pouvoirs publics. C’est du bas vers le haut qu’il faut penser ces territoires. Dans des départements ruraux comme la Nièvre, les élus réclament la compétence économique pour initier des projets. Les présidents de conseils départementaux connaissent parfaitement leur territoire, les entreprises qui marchent et la raison de leur succès, la ville où il y a des pauvres et des chômeurs. Ils sont souples, inventifs, pragmatiques et ont à leur disposition des fonctionnaires départementaux issus du cru. Mais les hauts fonctionnaires qui forment l’administration régionale ou étatique cherchent à leur retirer de plus en plus de compétences économiques. Quoique majoritaire, la France des territoires n’existe pas politiquement. Les élus locaux sont marginalisés au sein de leurs partis, contrairement aux élus des grandes villes. Tout doit donc commencer par un rééquilibrage démocratique. Christophe Guilluy

Most astonishing is to see those involved in this violence not waving Antifa flags but, instead, Trump and MAGA banners. It’s only Jan. 6, but the 2021 Nobel Prizes for Unforced Errors and a Suicidal Leap from the Moral High Ground go to the pro-Trump protesters marauding through the halls of The People’s House. It would be bad enough if the acts of terrorism now being perpetrated by this mob were underway while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., banged her gavel and shut down any objections to Electoral College votes that many of my fellow Trump fans believe are tainted by ballot irregularities. On the contrary, 180 degrees, the House and Senate were debating Republican objections to Arizona’s Electoral College votes. Sen. Ted Cruz R-Texas, was making his case to his colleagues, with his usual eloquence. Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., head of the Freedom Caucus, rose to state his concerns about his own state’s Electoral College votes. He even presented something that should not have existed: A stack of voter registrations that were recorded after the Grand Canyon State’s statutory deadline. This is precisely the sort of evidence that the president’s supporters have wanted for weeks to be aired in public. Thus, the sheer mind-blowing stupidity of the buffoons who stormed the Capitol. They attacked Congress exactly as it was doing precisely what these people wanted done. This would be akin to Antifa breaking through the windows of the Capitol just as a Democratic U.S. Senate voted on final passage of Vermont socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders’ « Medicare-for-all » legislation. (…) In an astonishing act of self-sabotage, these idiots now have made it enormously difficult for those of us who admire President Trump for his enormous domestic and international policy victories. Instead, any discussion of the highest median household income in American history, the lowest poverty rate ever, the complete liquidation of ISIS, and two COVID-19 vaccines in nine months will be answered with, « Oh, you mean the boob whose people assaulted the U.S. Capitol? » These un-American anarchists have performed an enormous disservice to President Trump, the America First movement, the more than 74 million voters who cast our ballots for him in November, and our beloved United States of America. (…) President Trump did the right thing Wednesday afternoon. He issued a video statement from the White House via Twitter and told his overzealous backers to beat it. They should heed his words at once: « I know how you feel. But go home and go home in peace. » Deroy Murdock

SUITE A UNE MANIFESTATION MAJORITAIREMENT PACIFIQUE, UN GROUPUSCULE VANDALISE UN POSTE DE POLICE ET INCENDIE UN PALAIS DE JUSTICE. NBC news

Troisième nuit de pillage suite à une troisième nuit de manifestation majoritairement pacifique. The Wisconsin State Journal

Trump’s effort to label what is happening in major cities as ‘riots’ speaks at least somewhat to his desperation, politically speaking. Chris Cillizza (CNN)

It’s mostly a protest that is not, generally speaking, unruly. There is a deep sense of grievance and complaint here, and that is the thing. That when you discount people who are doing things to public property that they shouldn’t be doing, it does have to be understood that this city has got, for the last several years, an issue with police, and it’s got a real sense of the deep sense of grievance of inequality. Ali Velshi  (MSNBC, Minneapolis, May 29, 2020)

The entire journalistic frame of ‘objectivity’ and political neutrality is structured around white supremacy. E. Alex Jung (New York magazine)

From large metro areas like Chicago and Minneapolis/St. Paul, to small and mid-sized cities like Fort Wayne, Indiana, and Green Bay, Wisconsin, the number of boarded up, damaged or destroyed buildings I have personally observed—commercial, civic, and residential—is staggering. Michael Tracey

Joe Biden claims he wants to take Trump behind the gym and beat him up. Senator Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) jokes that she would like to go into an elevator with him and see Trump never come out alive. Robert De Niro has exhausted the ways in which he dreams of punching Trump out and the intonations in which he yells to audiences, “F—k Trump!” The humanists and social justice warriors of Hollywood, from Madonna to Johnny Depp, cannot agree whether their elected president should be beheaded, blown up, stabbed, shot, or incinerated. All the Democratic would-be presidential nominees agree that Trump is the worst something-or-other in history—from human being to mere president. Former subordinates like Anthony Scaramucci, Omarosa, and Michael Cohen insist that he is a racist, a sexist, a crook, a bully, or mentally deranged—and they all support their firsthand appraisals on the basis they eagerly worked for him and were unceremoniously fired by him. The so-called deep state detests him. An anonymous op-ed writer in the September 5, 2018 New York Times bragged about the bureaucracy’s successful efforts to ignore Trump’s legal mandates—a sort of more methodical version of the comical Rosenstein-McCabe attempt to stage a palace coup and remove Trump, or the Democrats efforts to invoke the 25th Amendment and declare Trump crazy, bolstered by an array of Ivy League psychiatrists who had neither met nor examined him. Decorated retired U.S. Navy Admiral William McRaven wrote another New York Times op-ed blasting Trump and fretting that it is time for a new person in the Oval Office—Republican, Democrat or independent—“the sooner, the better.” One wonders what McRaven meant with the adverb “sooner,” given that an election is scheduled in about a year and even retired officers are subject to the code of military justice not to attack, despite perceived taunts, their current commander-in-chief, much less wink and nod about his apparent removal (in what way?) from office. Do we really want a county in which retired admirals and intelligence officials publicly damn the current commander in chief over policy differences and advocate his removal, “the sooner the better”? The House Democrats simply want him impeached first, and later will fill in the blanks with the necessary high crimes and misdemeanors. Victor Davis Hanson

When I use the word looting, I mean the mass expropriation of property, mass shoplifting during a moment of upheaval or riot. That’s the thing I’m defending. I’m not defending any situation in which property is stolen by force. It’s not a home invasion either. It’s about a certain kind of action that’s taken during protests and riots. (…) « Rioting » generally refers to any moment of mass unrest or upheaval. Riots are a space in which a mass of people has produced a situation in which the general laws that govern society no longer function, and people can act in different ways in the street and in public. I’d say that rioting is a broader category in which looting appears as a tactic. Often, looting is more common among movements that are coming from below. It tends to be an attack on a business, a commercial space, maybe a government building — taking those things that would otherwise be commodified and controlled and sharing them for free. (…) It does a number of important things. It gets people what they need for free immediately, which means that they are capable of living and reproducing their lives without having to rely on jobs or a wage — which, during COVID times, is widely unreliable or, particularly in these communities is often not available, or it comes at great risk. That’s looting’s most basic tactical power as a political mode of action. It also attacks the very way in which food and things are distributed. It attacks the idea of property, and it attacks the idea that in order for someone to have a roof over their head or have a meal ticket, they have to work for a boss, in order to buy things that people just like them somewhere else in the world had to make under the same conditions. It points to the way in which that’s unjust. And the reason that the world is organized that way, obviously, is for the profit of the people who own the stores and the factories. So you get to the heart of that property relation, and demonstrate that without police and without state oppression, we can have things for free. Importantly, I think especially when it’s in the context of a Black uprising like the one we’re living through now, it also attacks the history of whiteness and white supremacy. The very basis of property in the U.S. is derived through whiteness and through Black oppression, through the history of slavery and settler domination of the country. Looting strikes at the heart of property, of whiteness and of the police. It gets to the very root of the way those three things are interconnected. And also it provides people with an imaginative sense of freedom and pleasure and helps them imagine a world that could be. And I think that’s a part of it that doesn’t really get talked about — that riots and looting are experienced as sort of joyous and liberatory. (…) One of the ([myths] that’s been very powerful, that’s both been used by Donald Trump and Democrats, has been the outside agitator myth, that the people doing the riots are coming from the outside. This is a classic. This one goes back to slavery, when plantation owners would claim that it was Freedmen and Yankees coming South and giving the enslaved these crazy ideas — that they were real human beings — and that’s why they revolted. Another trope that’s very common is that looters and rioters are not part of the protest, and they’re not part of the movement. That has to do with the history of protesters trying to appear respectable and politically legible as a movement, and not wanting to be too frightening or threatening. Another one is that looters are just acting as consumers: Why are they taking flat-screen TVs instead of rice and beans? Like, if they were just surviving, it’d be one thing, but they’re taking liquor. All these tropes come down to claiming that the rioters and the looters don’t know what they’re doing. They’re acting, you know, in a disorganized way, maybe an « animalistic » way. But the history of the movement for liberation in America is full of looters and rioters. They’ve always been a part of our movement. (…) The popular understanding of the civil rights movement is that it was successful when it was nonviolent and less successful when it was focused on Black power. It’s a myth that we get taught over and over again from the first moment we learn about the civil rights movement: that it was a nonviolent movement, and that that’s what matters about it. And it’s just not true. Nonviolence emerged in the ’50s and ’60s during the civil rights movement, [in part] as a way to appeal to Northern liberals. When it did work, like with the lunch counter sit-ins, it worked because Northern liberals could flatter themselves that racism was a Southern condition. This was also in the context of the Cold War and a mass anticolonial revolt going on all over Africa, Southeast Asia and Latin America. Suddenly all these new independent nations had just won liberation from Europe, and the U.S. had to compete with the Soviet Union for influence over them. So it was really in the U.S.’ interests to not be the country of Jim Crow, segregation and fascism, because they had to appeal to all these new Black and brown nations all over the world. Those two things combined to make nonviolence a relatively effective tactic. Even under those conditions, Freedom Riders and student protesters were often protected by armed guards. We remember the Birmingham struggle of ’63, with the famous photos of Bull Connor releasing the police dogs and fire hoses on teenagers, as nonviolent. But that actually turned into the first urban riot in the movement. Kids got up, threw rocks and smashed police cars and storefront windows in that combat. There was fear that that kind of rioting would spread. That created the pressure for Robert F. Kennedy to write the civil rights bill and force JFK to sign it. But there’s also another factor, which is anti-Blackness and contempt for poor people who want to live a better life, which looting immediately provides. One thing about looting is it freaks people out. But in terms of potential crimes that people can commit against the state, it’s basically nonviolent. You’re mass shoplifting. Most stores are insured; it’s just hurting insurance companies on some level. It’s just money. It’s just property. It’s not actually hurting any people. (…) People who made that argument for Minneapolis weren’t suddenly celebrating the looters in Chicago, who drove down to the richest part of Chicago, the Magnificent Mile, and attacked places like Tesla and Gucci — because it’s not really about that. It’s a convenient way of positioning yourself as though you are sympathetic. But looters and rioters don’t attack private homes. They don’t attack community centers. In Minneapolis, there was a small independent bookstore that was untouched. All the blocks around it were basically looted or even leveled, burned down. And that store just remained untouched through weeks of rioting. To say you’re attacking your own community is to say to rioters, you don’t know what you’re doing. But I disagree. I think people know. They might have worked in those shops. They might have shopped and been followed around by security guards or by the owner. You know, one of the causes of the L.A. riots was a Korean small-business owner [killing] 15-year-old Latasha Harlins, who had come in to buy orange juice. And that was a family-owned, immigrant-owned business where anti-Blackness and white supremacist violence was being perpetrated. (…) When it comes to small business, family-owned business or locally owned business, they are no more likely to provide worker protections. They are no more likely to have to provide good stuff for the community than big businesses. It’s actually a Republican myth that has, over the last 20 years, really crawled into even leftist discourse: that the small-business owner must be respected, that the small-business owner creates jobs and is part of the community. But that’s actually a right-wing myth. A business being attacked in the community is ultimately about attacking like modes of oppression that exist in the community. It is true and possible that there are instances historically when businesses have refused to reopen or to come back. But that is a part of the inequity of the society, that people live in places where there is only one place where they can get access to something [like food or medicine]. That question assumes well, what if you’re in a food desert? But the food desert is already an incredibly unjust situation. There’s this real tendency to try and blame people for fighting back, for revealing the inequity of the injustice that’s already been formed by the time that they’re fighting. (…) There’s a reason that Trump has embraced the « white anarchist » line so intensely. It does a double service: It both creates a boogeyman around which you can stir up fear and potential repression, and it also totally erases the Black folks who are at the core of the protests. It makes invisible the Black people who are rising up and who are initiating this movement, who are at its core and its center, and who are doing its most important and valuable organizing and its most dangerous fighting. (…) Obviously, we object to violence on some level. But it’s an incredibly broad category. As you pointed out, it can mean both breaking a window, lighting a dumpster on fire, or it can mean the police murdering Tamir Rice. That word is not strategically helpful. The word that can mean both those things cannot be guiding me morally. There’s actually a police tactic for this, called controlled management. Police say, « We support peaceful, nonviolent protesters. We are out here to protect them and to protect them from the people who are being violent. » That’s a police strategy to divide the movement. So a nonviolent protest organizer will tell the police their march route. Police will stop traffic for them. So you’ve got a dozen heavily armed men standing here watching you march. That doesn’t make me feel safe. What about that is nonviolent? Activists themselves are doing no violence, but there is so much potential violence all around them. Ultimately, what nonviolence ends up meaning is that the activist doesn’t do anything that makes them feel violent. And I think getting free is messier than that. We have to be willing to do things that scare us and that we wouldn’t do in normal, « peaceful » times, because we need to get free. Vicky Osterweil

What happened was certainly not an attempted coup d’état (…) Given all these exclusions, only one description remains: a venting of accumulated resentments. Those who voted for President Trump saw his electoral victory denied in 2016 by numerous loud voices calling for “resistance” as if the president-elect were an invading foreign army. These voices were eagerly relayed and magnified by mass media, emphatically including pro-Trump media. Then they saw his victory sullied by constantly repeated accusations of collusion with Russia from chairmen of intelligence committees and ex-intelligence chiefs who habitually accused Mr. Trump of being Vladimir Putin’s agent, claiming they had secret information, which, alas, they could not disclose. They deplored Mr. Trump’s “subservience” to Mr. Putin weekly for four years while refusing to entertain the possibility that in a confrontation with China, it might be a good idea to overlook Mr. Putin’s sins, as Nixon embraced Mao to counter the Soviet Union. (…) Overwrought talk of a coup attempt or an insurrectional threat seems to induce a pleasurable shiver in some people. But on Wall Street the market was supremely unimpressed: Stocks went up, because investors know it will all be over in two weeks. Edward Luttwark

In late August, when riots erupted in Kenosha, Wisconsin, CNN featured a reporter standing in front of a burning car lot above a chyron that read: “Fiery but mostly peaceful protests after police shooting.” The use of the chyron was striking in its peculiar earnestness, considering that the words “mostly peaceful protest” had long since become a bitter in-joke for right-leaning social media. Indeed, from the moment the first protests began in late May, mainstream media outlets have downplayed or ignored instances of violence or destructive looting. On May 29, MSNBC’s Ali Velshi was reporting from Minneapolis in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd when he insisted he was seeing “mostly a protest” that “is not, generally speaking, unruly” despite the fact that he was literally standing in front of a burning building at the time. Yet Velshi was hesitant to ascribe blame to the arsonists and looters. “There is a deep sense of grievance and complaint here, and that is the thing,” he explained. “That when you discount people who are doing things to public property that they shouldn’t be doing, it does have to be understood that this city has got, for the last several years, an issue with police, and it’s got a real sense of the deep sense of grievance of inequality.” Reporters such as the New York Times’ Julie Bosman openly struggled to describe what happened in places like Kenosha by using words like “riots” or “violence.” “And there was also unrest. There were trucks that were burned. There were fires that were set,” Bosman said, relying on the passive voice in an appearance on The Daily, the Times’ podcast. “People were throwing things at the police. It was a really tense scene.” So tense, in fact, that the next night, when protestors clashed with volunteer militia members and a 17-year-old named Kyle Rittenhouse shot three of them, killing two, Bosman wasn’t there to cover it. “It felt like the situation was a little out of control. So I decided to get in my car and leave,” she explained. Why would a Times journalist need to flee from a “mostly peaceful” protest? A few days after his network’s “mostly peaceful” chryron, CNN’s Chris Cillizza tweeted, “Trump’s effort to label what is happening in major cities as ‘riots’ speaks at least somewhat to his desperation, politically speaking.” Cillizza then linked to a CNN story whose featured image was a police officer in riot gear standing in front of a burning building in Kenosha. In July, NBC’s local television station in Oakland featured a headline that read: “Group Breaks Off of Mostly Peaceful Protest, Vandalizes Police Station, Sets Courthouse on Fire.” On June 3, the Wisconsin State Journal in Madison actually ran this headline: “Third night of looting follows third night of mostly peaceful protest.” Despite the media’s strenuous effort to downplay their existence, the destructive riots and looting this summer were easily found by anyone willing to look. Six weeks into the summer’s protests, independent journalist Michael Tracey drove across the country documenting them. As he wrote in the UK digital magazine, Unherd: “From large metro areas like Chicago and Minneapolis/St. Paul, to small and mid-sized cities like Fort Wayne, Indiana, and Green Bay, Wisconsin, the number of boarded up, damaged or destroyed buildings I have personally observed—commercial, civic, and residential—is staggering.” Andy Ngo and other nonmainstream types have spent months documenting the destruction in cities like Portland and Seattle. And yet, the “peaceful protest” mantra has remained ubiquitous. Moreover, when media outlets did acknowledge protest-related violence, they often implied that it was instigated by the members of law enforcement sent to respond to it. In a roundup about protests on a single day in early June, for example, the New York Times featured headlines such as “Police crack down after curfew in the Bronx” and “Police use tear gas to break up protest in Atlanta.” Later that month, the New York Times featured a tweet thread with video of protests in Seattle that included images of police in tactical gear and the statement: “Officers dressed for violence sometimes invite it.” Some journalists sought not to deny that violence was happening, but to engage in whataboutism regarding its effects. GQ correspondent Julia Ioffe tweeted, “So in case you’re keeping track, being very frustrated by the continual and unpunished killing of Black people by police that you decide to burn and loot—bad. If you’re so frustrated by some protesters burn and loot that you decide to kill some of them—totally understandable.” Reporters invested in the “mostly peaceful” narrative mocked people who were concerned about increases in violent crime and civil unrest. In September, CNN correspondent Josh Campbell tweeted a bucolic scene from a park in Portland and wrote, “Good morning from wonderful Portland, where the city is not under siege and buildings are not burning to the ground. I also ate my breakfast burrito outside today and so far haven’t been attacked by shadowy gangs of Antifa commandos.” At that point, nearby parts of the city had been effectively under siege by antifa and Black Lives Matter rioters for months, and a protestor had recently shot and killed a Trump supporter in cold blood. Paul Krugman of the New York Times joined in, tweeting, “I went for a belated NYC run this morning, and am sorry to report that I saw very few black-clad anarchists. Also, the city is not yet in flames…claims of urban anarchy are almost entirely fantasy.” Worse, journalists committed to the “mostly peaceful” narrative have targeted fellow journalists who don’t fall into line with the messaging. The most outrageous example came when the Intercept’s Lee Fang was denounced on social media as a racist by fellow staffer Akela Lacy after he reported on communities of color negatively affected by the rioting and looting. Lacey described Fang’s reporting as “continuing to push racist narratives” when Fang allowed a black resident of a looted neighborhood to raise concerns about the damage. Fang was forced to apologize. The journalists who attempt to explain away or justify the violence that erupted during some protests do so because they believe the cause is righteous. As E. Alex Jung of New York magazine argued, “the entire journalistic frame of ‘objectivity’ and political neutrality is structured around white supremacy.” How can a good journalist do anything but promote a narrative sympathetic to protestors supposedly fighting it? Needless to say, such justifications and excuse-making would never happen if pro-life or pro–Second Amendment protestors turned to looting and violence. The problem with such ideologically motivated narratives is that, once crafted, they require strenuous effort and often outrageous contortions to maintain. Ultimately, they have the effect of legitimizing extremism and lawlessness, which undermine whatever cause the majority of protestors who don’t partake in violence are promoting. It’s also offensive to those who must suffer the costs of the destruction. One assessment by the Andersen Economic Group of just one week of rioting and looting in major cities (from May 29 to June 3) placed the costs of the destruction at $400 million, an estimate that did not include the costs to state and local governments or the damage done in smaller cities and towns. Social scientists swooped in to try and save the day for the “mostly peaceful” argument. A report by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, issued in September in partnership with Princeton University’s Bridging Divides Initiative, concluded that 93 percent of the summer’s protests were peaceful. The ACLED had made its agenda clear in June, when it issued a statement of solidarity with the same protests its report purports to analyze and called for “systemic and peaceful change.” Nonetheless, the report cannot suppress the facts it gathered; by the researchers’ own estimates, there were more than 500 violent riots related to Black Lives Matter gatherings across the country this summer. But at least the others were “mostly peaceful.” Christine Rosen

This was not an organic and spontaneous expression of rage. It was a planned, organized, and orchestrated attack on the U.S. government. The rioters were in constant communication with one another. They targeted specific members of government with violence. And as police later learned, the plotters were armed with improvised explosive devices and Molotov cocktails, which were strategically stationed around Washington D.C.—including at both the Republican and Democratic National Committee offices. The collection of violent nihilists who descended on the Capitol building had no coherent political program beyond violence and mayhem. They are no one’s constituency, and they deserve to be treated like the contemptible political orphans they are. But we have not done that. Cretins and fools who fear nothing as much as they do a comprehensive theory of events that indicts anyone other than their political adversaries will reject this notion, but prominent actors from both parties—yes, both sides—have for years found the mob a useful tool. And because of that recklessness, what happened yesterday could be just a sign of what is to come. (…) Democrats, too, countenanced their share of violence. Just as Trump declined to condemn those who committed violence in his name in 2016, Democrats looked the other way as vicious counter-demonstrators descended on Trump-campaign events, assaulting peaceable rally-goers and vandalizing the surrounding property. Democratic lawmakers and their allies in media heaped praise on the conglomeration of malcontents calling itself Antifa merely because it nominally claimed to be “fighting fascism.” And as city after city was engulfed by riots last summer, Democrats declined to condemn the excesses to which demonstrators appealed in the name of racial justice. Indeed, when the chaos in American streets was addressed at all, it was framed as a wholly righteous and unblemished demand for historical rectitude. And while Democrats looked the other way, left-leaning media embraced the utility of street violence. “Riots are destructive, dangerous, and scary,” Vox.com observed, “but can lead to serious social reforms.” In an unusually soft interview with NPR, author Vicky Osterweil insisted that “looting is a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society.” As COMMENTARY‘s Christine Rosen observed at the time, excusing the violence as though it was an anomaly and not a consistent feature of these demonstrations became a media fixation. “Group Breaks Off of Mostly Peaceful Protest, Vandalizes Police Station, Sets Courthouse on Fire,” read one NBC News headline. “Third night of looting follows third night of mostly peaceful protest,” asserted another from the Wisconsin State Journal. To even call what municipal police routinely deemed riots “riots” was, in the estimation of CNN’s Chris Cillizza, an act of “desperation” by embattled Republicans. If anyone wants to know how we arrived at this lamentable time in American history, the place to look for answers is in the mirror. Violence does not happen in a vacuum. One side’s menace feeds off the other’s and justifies its own actions based on those of its opponents. You cannot excise one but not the other⁠—both must be anathematized. This shameful past does not have to be a portent of a violent and unstable future, but that will be our fate if responsible politicians continue to see disturbed and impressionable people as a weapon to be harnessed and directed at their domestic political opponents. If cynical politicians continue to lie to their constituents, feeding them comforting fictions about how the country’s institutions are tainted and arrayed against their interests, we will endure more insurrections, more violence, and more instability. And that will have profound consequences. As I wrote in my book, published two years ago this month, condemning political violence in whatever form it takes isn’t evasive. It’s consistent. Anything less is a corruption of the sort that “eats away at the foundations of a healthy society. And one day, when the rot has been ignored for so long that no one believes it can be expunged, another mob will come along. And that time, the republic’s weakened edifice may not withstand the pressure.” Let January 6 be a wake-up call. Orphan your violent. Noah Rothman

Ces objections sont essentielles car elles vont inscrire dans l’histoire le fait que l’élection présidentielle de 2020 a été entachée d’irrégularités, de fraudes, et de manipulations, et que Biden n’est pas forcément le président « légitime » ! Le  6 janvier,  le résultat du vote du Collège électoral sera présenté devant une session extraordinaire du Congrès (les deux chambres réunies) présidée par le vice-président Mike Pence. Quiconque conteste le résultat peut profiter de la circonstance pour présenter une objection. Celle-ci peut porter sur le vote d’un seul « grand électeur », ou sur celui de tout un Etat, ou sur l’ensemble des votes. Une objection doit être soumise par écrit et être soutenue par au moins un élu de chaque chambre. A ce jour  plusieurs Représentants et au moins un Sénateur (Josh Hawley, Républicain du Missouri) ont annoncé qu’ils soulèveraient une ou plusieurs objections, notamment concernant le résultat de la Pennsylvanie. Cela obligera les élus à se retirer pour débattre et à voter sur l’objection. Il faudrait alors un vote majoritaire dans chaque chambre pour invalider le vote du Collège électoral et renvoyer l’élection présidentielle devant la Chambre des Représentants. Ce cas de figure est hautement improbable parce que les Démocrates ont la majorité des voix à la Chambre et parce que plusieurs Sénateurs Républicains désapprouvent des objections envisagées. Celles-ci risquent donc plutôt d’être rejetées par les deux chambres… Il n’empêche! Pour l’histoire, et pour leur devenir immédiat,  les Républicains doivent clairement affirmer, et ce devant le monde entier, que les Démocrates ont triché lors du scrutin présidentiel. De telles tricheries doivent être condamnées et éliminées. L’avenir de la Démocratie américaine en dépend.  (…) Autant que ces irrégularités, qui ne sont souvent que de simples manipulations politiques, l’autre scandale post-électoral aux Etats-Unis, est l’omerta décidée par les principaux médias américains sur le sujet. L’ensemble de la classe médiatique bien-pensante a nié leur existence et a refusé catégoriquement d’accorder la moindre attention aux multiples témoignages et preuves de leur réalité. Un silence, à  l’unanimité quasi-soviétique, qui en dit long sur le délabrement des médias et le délitement de la liberté d’expression aux Etats-Unis. (…) Dans au moins six Etats – l’Arizona, la Géorgie,  le Michigan, le Nevada,  la Pennsylvanie,  le Wisconsin – qui sont tous des Etats « décisifs », c’est-à-dire des Etats où le résultat s’annonçait serré et incertain, des irrégularités multiples ont eu lieu. Donald Trump et ses avocats en ont révélé certaines. Peter Navarro, conseiller du président sur le commerce, a publié un rapport récapitulant l’ensemble de ces fraudes. Justement parce que les médias s’évertuaient à les nier. Concrètement  Peter Navarro distingue cinq types de fraudes : Bulletins frauduleux, décomptes et dépouillements frauduleux, violation des règles de procédure, violations du principe d’égalité devant le vote, erreurs provenant des machines de vote. Et il ajoute une  mention spéciale pour ce qu’il appelle des «anomalies statistiques ».  (…)  Biden l’a emporté alors que les Démocrates ont été battus dans toutes les autres élections. Les Démocrates ont perdu quinze sièges à la Chambre des Représentants.  Ils ont échoué à reprendre la majorité au Sénat ne gagnant qu’un seul siège au lieu de six ou sept escomptés. Ils ont perdu chez les gouverneurs. Ils ont perdu dans la bataille pour remporter les législatures de certains Etats qu’ils avaient pourtant spécifiquement ciblés, comme le Texas,  et où ils avaient dépensé des sommes sans précédent… Une telle réalité implique que des électeurs ont voté pour Biden comme président et pour les candidats républicains à tous les autres postes. C’est à la fois peu vraisemblable et totalement contre nature. Surtout vue la popularité de Donald Trump au sein du camp Républicain. Ce qui est plus probable est que des millions de bulletins n’ont comporté qu’un seul vote, celui pour président, laissant tous les autres postes à élire en blanc. Cela est possible et même parfaitement légal, mais cela éveille inévitablement des soupçons car un bulletin coché pour la seule case du président est la configuration classique d’un faux bulletin… Biden a également gagné en défiant l’histoire et les traditions. Ainsi, il existe aux Etats-Unis des comtés où celui des deux candidats qui l’emporte s’avère être toujours le vainqueur final. On les appelle des « comtés baromètres » (bellwhether counties) parce qu’ils illustrent la tendance. Ils votent systématiquement pour le vainqueur. Au cours des quarante dernières années, dix-neuf comtés ont ainsi toujours correctement prédit le vainqueur, Donald Trump a remporté dix-huit d’entre eux ! Etrange ! L’histoire montre également qu’un président arrive difficilement à être élu s’il ne remporte pas certains Etats, du fait de leur importance démographique. La Floride et l’Ohio sont de ces Etats. Tous deux ont été remportés par Trump. Tous les candidats Républicains qui ont remporté l’Ohio ont été élus. Sauf Trump en 2020. Depuis 1960 -au passage la dernière élection pour laquelle la quasi-certitude de fraudes existe également- aucun président n’a été élu en perdant à la fois en Floride, dans l’Ohio et dans l’Iowa, sauf Joe Biden en 2020. De toute l’histoire des Etats-Unis Biden est le second président après John Kennedy, à connaître ce cas de figure. (…) Biden a donc bénéficié d’une mobilisation extraordinaire. De fait la participation a battu des records en 2020. Dans le Minnesota, où Biden l’a emporté 52% contre 45%, le taux de participation a dépassé 80%. Du jamais vu. Dans le Wisconsin il a été de 76% en moyenne et de 95% dans certains comtés. Cela signifie que dans ces endroits quasiment toutes les personnes en droit de voter l’ont fait. Les dix Etats avec la participation électorale la plus forte ont tous été remportés par Joe Biden. Comme si cette participation s’accompagnait inévitablement d’un surcroit de votes en sa faveur… Il ne s’agit là que d’anomalies statistiques. Ce sont des chiffres surprenants qui incitent à s’interroger mais ne constituent pas des preuves de fraudes. Il en va autrement d’un certain nombre d’incidents, détaillés par Peter Navarro dans son rapport. En voici un florilège. -Dans le Nevada des tribus indiennes se sont vu offrir des cartes de crédit et divers cadeaux en échange de leur vote. La pratique est évidemment illégale, même au Nevada. -Un employé des postes a témoigné sous serment (donc sous peine de dix ans de prison en cas de parjure) avoir transporté des bulletins de votes déjà remplis de l’Etat de New York à l’Etat de Pennsylvanie. Façon classique de bourrer les urnes.  Son chargement contenait 288 000 bulletins. Soit quatre fois l’écart de voix séparant Joe Biden de Donald Trump en Pennsylvanie. -En Pennsylvanie et en Géorgie des personnes âgées ou handicapées ont découvert en allant voter en personne le 3 novembre que quelqu’un avait usurpé leur identité pour voter à leur place par courrier. Elles n’ont pas été autorisées à voter et c’est le vote de l’usurpateur qui a été compté. -Dans le Wisconsin 130 000 bulletins de votes ont été acceptés sans vérification d’identité. C’est cinq fois plus que l’écart de voix en faveur de Biden dans cet Etat. -En Géorgie, vingt mille électeurs ayant indiqué avoir déménagé dans un autre Etat, ont néanmoins voté en Géorgie. -En Pennsylvanie huit mille votes proviennent de personnes décédées. -En Pennsylvanie les bulletins de vote reçus par correspondance ont été acceptés et comptabilisés en l’absence de l’enveloppe permettant de vérifier la signature et d’identifier l’électeur. Cela a été fait à la demande du secrétaire d’Etat, alors que c’est la législature des Etats qui est supposée établir la loi électorale. Cette seule infraction pourrait justifier d’invalider le résultat de cet Etat. -Dans le Wisconsin la commission électorale fit installer cinq cents boites à lettres afin de réceptionner des bulletins de vote par correspondance. Alors même que la pratique (appelée « ballot harvesting ») est interdite par la loi du Wisconsin. Dès lors l’ensemble des bulletins recueillis dans ces boites à lettres auraient dû être invalidé, ce qui n’a pas été lé cas. -Dans le Wisconsin des bulletins par correspondance ont été livrés au central de dépouillement avec l’enveloppe extérieure déjà ouverte, indiquant que ces bulletins avaient pu faire l’objet d’une manipulation. -Dans le Wisconsin cent mille bulletins de vote reçus au-delà de la date limite ont été antidatés pour être comptabilisés, en violation des règles électorales. -En Géorgie trois cent mille personnes ont été autorisées à voter en personne alors qu’elles avaient demandé un bulletin de vote par correspondance. -En Pennsylvanie les bulletins de vote ont été acceptés jusqu’à trois jours après la date limite de vote. En violation de la loi de l’Etat et d’une décision de la Cour Suprême des Etats-Unis. -Toujours en Pennsylvanie des personnes non inscrites sur les listes électorales ont été autorisées à voter en utilisant une autre identité, sur les conseils de juristes mobilisés par les autorités électorales. -Toujours en Pennsylvanie, 4 500 bulletins reçus par correspondance et improprement remplis ont été corrigés par les employés électoraux. Cette pratique est illégale et ces bulletins auraient dû être invalidés. -La présence de militants, portant des T-Shirts « Black Lives Matter » ou d’autres affiliations démocrates a été observée aux abords de centres de vote et jusque  dans les centres de dépouillement. Cela constitue une forme d’intimidation interdite par la loi américaine. (…) Quoi qu’en disent les Démocrates et leurs alliés dans les médias, les problèmes de l’élection présidentielle 2020 sont liés dans 99% des cas au vote par correspondance. Celui-ci a été massivement étendu et a effectivement ouvert la porte à des manipulations massives et des fraudes destinées à favoriser Joe Biden et les Démocrates. C’est le cas concernant le processus de vérification des signatures. Dans certains Etats, dont le Nevada et la Géorgie, les réglages des machines destinées à vérifier les signatures ont été abaissés de manière à ne rejeter quasiment aucun bulletin. Rien de techniquement illégal, mais une volonté évidente d’enregistrer le maximum de votes, légaux et valides ou pas. Dans le seul comté de Clark au Nevada, bastion favorable à Biden, 130 000 bulletins supplémentaires ont pu être validés soit près de trois fois l’écart des voix en faveur de Biden.  Même chose en Géorgie. Le taux d’invalidation des votes a été de 0,3% en 2020 contre 6% en 2016 et les années précédentes. Alors même que la quantité de votes par correspondance était annoncée comme particulièrement élevée du fait de la pandémie, les autorités ont décidé de baisser la garde, ouvrant la porte à de massives fraudes potentielles. Il ne sert malheureusement à rien de se lamenter sur le lait renversé. L’élection a eu lieu, Biden a été déclaré vainqueur, les Démocrates ont réussi leur coup. A défaut d’inverser le résultat, les objections qui seront soulevées devant le Congrès serviront à affirmer haut et fort qu’ils ont été pris en flagrant délit et que si l’expérience démocratique américaine veut se poursuivre ils doivent être empêchés de récidiver. Gérald Olivier

Les manifestations et les émeutes qui ont suivi la mort de George Floyd ont largement débordé la question raciale et les brutalités policières. Elles constituent une insurrection organisée contre Donald Trump. Alors que le calme revient dans les rues des métropoles américaines, désormais patrouillées par des soldats de la Garde Nationale, il devient clair que les violences des derniers jours ne peuvent être réduites à des simples émeutes raciales comme le pays a pu en connaître. Les Etats-Unis ne viennent pas de vivre une flambée de violence communautaire. Le pays vient d’être confronté à une insurrection populaire. Le mouvement est parti de la mort de George Floyd. Mais celle-ci ne fut qu’un prétexte.  Très vite les protestations sont sorties de ce cadre et la violence s’est propagée à travers le territoire américain en prenant une ampleur sans précédent. La mort de George Floyd n’avait pas grand-chose à voir avec les pillages observés à New York, Atlanta, Nashville, Los Angeles et ailleurs, six jours plus tard, pas plus qu’avec les actes de vandalisme perpétrées la même nuit à Washington D.C., la capitale américaine.  Dans ces actes de haine et d’anarchie se mêlaient la colère sauvage de certains Américains contre le système en général et le président Trump en particulier, et les actions ciblées de groupes radicaux motivés par une idéologie anti-capitaliste et libertaire, et cherchant à abattre la civilisation américaine par le chaos. Ensemble ces deux forces ont tenté de renverser le pouvoir. Ces journées et surtout ces nuits ont constitué l’insurrection la plus étendue et la plus menaçante aux Etats-Unis depuis 1968, quand la démocratie américaine avait été ébranlée par la conjonction de trois mouvements : une révolte estudiantine, l’opposition à la guerre du Vietnam,  et la radicalisation de la communauté noire. (…) Par leur ampleur les émeutes des derniers jours rappellent les émeutes raciales des années 1965-1968. Jamais en plus de cinquante les Etats-Unis n’avaient connu pareille destruction. Toutefois elles en diffèrent par leur nature et par leurs objectifs. Cela se voit dans le déroulé des événements. Les choses se sont passées en deux temps. Premier temps : la diffusion de la vidéo de l’arrestation de George Floyd. Les images d’un policier blanc un genou sur le cou d’un homme noir, menotté, à plat ventre et qui se plaint de ne pouvoir respirer, allant même jusqu’à gémir « vous êtes en train de me tuer »,  provoquent une colère généralisée, au sein de la communauté noire et bien au-delà. Toute l’Amérique est choquée par ce qu’elle voit. Le président Trump en tête, qui se dit révolté par les images. Il appelle la famille Floyd au téléphone pour leur dire son dégoût devant de tels actes et leur présenter ses condoléances personnelles et celles de la nation. Le monde politique dans son ensemble est également sous le choc. De même que les forces de police des différentes métropoles qui ne se reconnaissent pas dans le geste de leur collègue. Aussi quand les Noirs de Minneapolis descendent dans la rue pour crier leur colère, tout le monde trouve cela justifier. Sur instruction du maire de Minneapolis les forces de l’ordre restent en retrait. Il faut laisser la colère s’exprimer, ne pas l’attiser par une présence policière hostile, puisque l’incident qui vient de tout déclencher est une brutalité policière. Mais la colère ne retombe pas. Au contraire. Elle s’amplifie et se nourrit d’elle-même. Quelques voitures sont brûlées des magasins incendiés. Le lendemain soir quand des manifestants se dirigent vers le commissariat du quartier, le maire donne l’ordre de l’évacuer. Mauvaise décision sans doute. Les manifestants envahissent les lieus et saccagent tout, puis mettent le feu au bâtiment.  La manifestation vient de basculer. C’est le début des émeutes. Cela va durer toute la nuit et les nuits suivantes. Le lendemain le gouverneur de l’Etat du Minnesota essaye ramener la sérénité. Il appelle au calme, au sens civique, souligne que les commerces dévastés appartiennent à des membres des minorités, des noirs, des hispaniques, des coréens, etc. Mais il est trop tard. Les émeutiers ont compris quelque chose de fondamental. Vues les circonstances- le meurtre d’un noir par un policier blanc – la police est en position de faiblesse et c’est le moment d’en profiter. C’est alors que commence le deuxième temps des émeutes. Nous sommes vendredi, quatre jours après la mort de George Floyd.  Les professionnels de la contestation urbaine se sont mobilisés. Deux organisations vont être particulièrement actives, Black Lives Matter et les Antifas. Black Lives Matter (BLM, dont le nom signifie “les vies de Noirs comptent ») est une organisation internationale pour la promotion des droits humains et la protection des minorités, ethniques ou sexuelles. BLM fut fondé en 2013 par trois femmes noires:  Alicia Garza, Opal Tometi et Patrisse Cullors. Le mouvement revendique une lutte internationale contre « la suprématie blanche » et prône une société alternative, anti-capitaliste.  et non patriarcale. Le mouvement « Antifa » (pour « anti-fasciste ») est une mouvance internationale d’extrême gauche qui affirme lutter contre les suprémacistes blancs et toutes les tendances « fascisantes » au sein de la société. Ses membres s’habillent tout de noir, avec casques et foulards pour ne pas être reconnus, d’où leur surnom de « black bloc ». Ils abordent les manifestations publiques comme des opportunités de guerilla urbaine. L’organisation n’a ni chef, ni structure, mais peut mobiliser ses membres par les réseaux sociaux, y compris par des communications cryptées. Ses membres maitrisent à la fois les tactiques de guerilla, les techniques de combat individuel, les technologies de l’information, et les principes de la désinformation. La destruction de la civilisation capitaliste et de ses symboles est sa raison d’être, la violence et la terreur, son mode opératoire. Vendredi, c’est aussi le début du week-end. En ces temps de confinement (pour cause de pandémie de coronavirus), beaucoup de jeunes urbains sont encore plus désœuvrés et plus sur les nerfs que d’habitude. Ils vont aller se défouler, passer leur colère, et se refaire une garde-robe à l’œil, au passage. Confiants qu’ils ne craignent pas grand-chose d’une police qui a reçu l’ordre de laisser faire. Le gouverneur du Minnesota, qui la veille déclarait comprendre les manifestants, affirme à présent que «de mauvais acteurs » se sont glissés parmi les protestataires. De fait les images des différentes émeutes dans le pays présentent tantôt des adolescents en T-Shirts ou capuches affairés à briser des vitrines à coup de skateboard et tantôt des individus casqués, vêtus de noirs, et armés de marteaux qui ciblent les véhicules de police pour en tabasser les occupants et les incendier. (…) A Los Angeles, ville tentaculaire s’il en est, les émeutiers se déplacent sur des dizaines de kilomètres, loin des quartiers populaires jusqu’à West Hollywood ou Beverly Hills, pour aller dévaliser les boutiques de luxe de la fameuse Rodeo Drive. Quand les émeutiers ne s’en prennent pas aux commerces, ils attaquent les bâtiments publics et ceux qui les protègent. A Saint Louis un policier noir de 38 ans est tué, sous l’œil des caméras ! Quatre autres sont blessés par balles. A Las Vegas un autre policier reçoit une balle, en pleine tête. A Oakland, en Californie, deux policiers noirs postés devant le palais de justice, sont visés par balle, l’un meurt, l’autre est hospitalisé. A New York les pillages se prolongent jusqu’à lundi. Le grand magasin Macy’s de la 34^e rue est pris d’assaut. Une enseigne Rolex est dévalisée par des dizaines d’individus cagoulés. Une boutique Nike est mise à sac. Des femmes sont agressées. Officiellement il n’y pas eu de plaintes pour viols, mais la situation tourne à l’anarchie. La police est absente ou passive. Par endroit quelques manifestants, souvent Noirs, tentent de raisonner les casseurs et d’arrêter les pillages. En vain… Le gouverneur de l’Etat, Andrew Cuomo, un Démocrate, souligne que les voyous qui ont envahi les rues de la ville « ne peuvent masquer la  nature de leurs actes en se drapant dans une indignation vertueuse justifiée par le meurtre de George Floyd. » Il s’en prend au maire Bill De Blasio, Démocrate aussi, pour ne pas avoir mobilisé suffisamment de forces de police, alors que la ville dispose de 38 000 agents. Comment aurait-il pu le faire ? Sa propre fille, âgée de 25 ans, avait été arrêtée la veille parmi les émeutiers. A l’annonce de son arrestation De Blasio avait affirmé : « je suis fier d’elle ». Quand les élites et représentants de l’autorité prennent le parti des émeutiers, on n’a plus à faire à une simple manifestation mais bien à une insurrection généralisée. A travers le pays, célébrités et intellectuels se relaient sur les antennes pour trouver des excuses aux manifestants. Certains mettent en place un fond de soutiens pour payer la caution des casseurs arrêtés. George Floyd est oublié. Pour tous, le responsable du désordre s’appelle Donald Trump, c’est lui qu’il faut virer. On retrouve le même discours dans la bouche de journalistes qui s’emploient à jeter de l’huile sur le feu. CNN prend le parti des casseurs. Ses reporters dénoncent « la dictature » Trump, et soutiennent « ceux qui se battent pour leurs droits ». Mais de quels droits s’agit-il ? La foule déchainée ne présente aucune revendication. Son seul but est de détruire et de renverser le pouvoir. A Washington les manifestants mettent le feu à l’église épiscopale Saint John, un des monuments historiques de la ville, située juste à côté de la Maison Blanche. On l’appelle « l’église des présidents », car depuis sa construction en 1812, tous, ou presque, y ont prié. Au contraire de la Maison Blanche elle ne bénéficiait d’aucune protection particulière. A travers sa destruction c’est bien le pouvoir exécutif qui est visé. (…) La personne de Donald Trump dérange toujours autant. Président depuis janvier 2017 et pour encore huit mois au moins, il est toujours détesté par la bourgeoisie socio-libérale, par une partie de la jeunesse, et par les élites médiatiques et l’establishment Démocrate. Loin de laisser les institutions démocratiques américaines jouer leur rôle, les plus radicaux de ces opposants ont pris prétexte de la mort de George Floyd, pour tenter de le renverser. Après la tentative de coup d’Etat institutionnel qu’a constitué l’enquête sur une « collusion avec la Russie », après la mascarade politique que fut la procédure de destitution menée contre lui, après le désastre économique infligé par le confinement en réponse à la pandémie de coronavirus, les « anti-Trumps » ont tenté de le faire tomber par la plus vieille des méthodes, une insurrection populaire. Gérald Olivier

Attention, une insurrection peut en cacher une autre !

Fuites organisées du faux dossier Steele sur la prétendue « collusion russe » (douches dorées avec prostituées dans un hôtel de Moscou, via CIA, FBI et élus comme John McCain), appels à la destitution (nov 2016); appels à l’assassinat (Madonna, jan. 2017); appels à la « Résistance »; mouvement « Pas mon président »; fuites incessantes du Deep state; multiplication des livres y compris anonymes dénonçant le président; tentative de coup d’Etat institutionnel (enquête sur la fausse accusation de « collusion avec la Russie », déchirement du discours présidentiel par la présidente démocrate de la Chambre des représentants, mascarade politique de la  procédure de destitution; instrumentalisation, via le confinement et le désastre économique concommitent, de la lutte contre la pandémie de coronavirus; véritable insurrection populaire suite à la mort de George Floyd (plus grave campagne d’émeutes depuis 50 ans à travers tout le pays, départ de feu de l’église des présidents, tentative d’intrusion dans le périmétre de la Maison blanche, avocats arrêtés pour avoir lancé et distribué des cocktails molotov contre la police), matraquage médiatique anti-Trump; censure des informations défavorables à Joe Biden (accusations de harcèlement sexuel et de corruption de sa famille); multiplication des sondages surévaluant systématiquement l’opposition au président sortant; dévoiement de l’élection présidentielle (véritable crime parfait via un tsunami de 100 millions de bulletins par correspondance et la relaxation de toutes les vérifications d’identité, signatures, dates, etc.); menaces de nouvelles émeutes post-élection  …

Au lendemain des dérives et de l’intrusion du Capitole qui ont suivi le dernier « Rassemblement pour Sauver l’Amérique » des partisans du président Trump …

Suite au dévoiement que l’on sait de l’élection présidentielle du 3 novembre …

Où sous prétexte d’épidémie et contre les législatures locales, on a contourné non seulement toutes les règles pour inonder les pays avec plus de 100 millions de bulletins postaux …

Mais on est arrivé dans certains états ou comtés décisifs à des taux de participation jusqu’à 95% …

Et, quand jusqu’à 17 états n’exigent pas de pièces d’identité pour voter, des taux d’invalidation des bulletins passant de 6 à 0, 3% !

Comment ne pas voir non seulement l’incroyable indignation sélective …

De médias et commentateurs, Joe Biden et Kamala Harris compris …

Qui sans compter leur célébration d’une action similaire, il y a dix ans mais des syndicats cette fois, au capitole du Wisconsin pour bloquer un projet de loi du « Moubarak du midwest », le gouverneur républicain Scott Walker, dûment voté à la Chambre des représentants de l’Etat …

Ou il y a deux ans au Capitole de Washington même avec l’invasion du bureau et avec la bénédiction de Nancy Pelosi par une centaine de militants du climat …

Dénoncent à qui mieux mieux et à l’unanimité le président Trump pour les excès – retour de bâton, comme avec les Brexiters anglais ou les gilets jaunes français, de décennies de mépris généralisé – il y a deux jours, du rassemblement du Capitole …

Après avoir fermé les yeux mais, à l’image de ces deux avocats arrêtés à New York pour lancement et disribution de coctails molotov contre la police, activement encouragé ces quatre dernières années …

Comme « outil puissant pour provoquer un changement réel et durable dans la société » …

Via, y compris celles annoncées en cas de victoire de Trump, les agressions les plus graves des contre-manifestants BLM et antifas contre les partisans pacifiques des rassemblements pro-Trump …

Vandalisant et brûlant au passage des quartiers entiers de centre-villes américains …

Privant du coup de supermarchés comme de protection policière…

Les populations principalement minoritaires et les plus démunies …

Qu’ils prétendaient défendre …

Mais derrière tout ça avec le journaliste franco-américain Gérald Olivier …

Comme l’a confirmé après les appels, dès son élection, à la destitution et à l’assassinat …

Et du début à la fin, la délégitimation permanente de sa présidence …

La tentative d’intrusion, après un départ de feu dans la fameuse « église des présidents » toute proche, dedits opposants dans le périmètre de la Maison blanche …

Ayant forcé en juin dernier et pour la première fois depuis le 11 septembre 2001 …

Les services de protection rapprochée du président à faire descendre celui-ci dans son bunker souterrain …

Rien de moins, quand anciens généraux et admiraux compris …

« Les élites et représentants de l’autorité prennent le parti des émeutiers » …

Qu’une insurrection généralisée contre l’exécutif lui-même ?

Décryptages » Etats-Unis : Trump face à l’insurrection

Gérald Olivier

Atlantico

05 juin 2020

Les manifestations et les émeutes qui ont suivi la mort de George Floyd ont largement débordé la question raciale et les brutalités policières. Elles constituent une insurrection organisée contre Donald Trump.

Alors que le calme revient dans les rues des métropoles américaines, désormais patrouillées par des soldats de la Garde Nationale, il devient clair que les violences des derniers jours ne peuvent être réduites à des simples émeutes raciales comme le pays a pu en connaître. Les Etats-Unis ne viennent pas de vivre une flambée de violence communautaire. Le pays vient d’être confronté à une insurrection populaire.

Le mouvement est parti de la mort de George Floyd. Mais celle-ci ne fut qu’un prétexte.  Très vite les protestations sont sorties de ce cadre et la violence s’est propagée à travers le territoire américain en prenant une ampleur sans précédent. La mort de George Floyd n’avait pas grand-chose à voir avec les pillages observés à New York, Atlanta, Nashville, Los Angeles et ailleurs, six jours plus tard, pas plus qu’avec les actes de vandalisme perpétrées la même nuit à Washington D.C., la capitale américaine.  Dans ces actes de haine et d’anarchie se mêlaient la colère sauvage de certains Américains contre le système en général et le président Trump en particulier, et les actions ciblées de groupes radicaux motivés par une idéologie anti-capitaliste et libertaire, et cherchant à abattre la civilisation américaine par le chaos. Ensemble ces deux forces ont tenté de renverser le pouvoir. Ces journées et surtout ces nuits ont constitué l’insurrection la plus étendue et la plus menaçante aux Etats-Unis depuis 1968, quand la démocratie américaine avait été ébranlée par la conjonction de trois mouvements : une révolte estudiantine, l’opposition à la guerre du Vietnam,  et la radicalisation de la communauté noire.

Les émeutes raciales, ou ethniques, sont un phénomène ancien et récurrent de l’histoire américaine. Au XIXe siècle les batailles rangées contre des communautés irlandaises, italiennes, catholiques, juives, chinoises ou autres étaient fréquentes. Toutes les décennies depuis l’abolition de l’esclavage et l’émancipation des esclaves (1865) ont connu des incidents de violence collective impliquant la minorité noire. La plupart du temps, les Noirs n’étaient pas les instigateurs de ces émeutes, mais les victimes.  Parce qu’ils concurrençaient les derniers immigrants, les plus pauvres, sur le marché du travail, et parce que le racisme, qui s’appelait alors « préjugé de race », était profondément ancré dans les mentalités.

Après la Seconde Guerre Mondiale, la déségrégation forcée dans le Sud, couplée aux revendications de la communauté noire pour la reconnaissance de leurs droits civiques – à savoir que les droits des citoyens noirs américains ne soient plus seulement des mots écrits dans la Constitution mais deviennent des réalités concrètes dans la vie quotidienne – engendra deux décennies de fortes tensions avec des éruptions de violence régulières. Les années 1960 virent les ghettos s’embraser chaque été en 1965, 1966, 1967, et 1968 après l’assassinat de Martin Luther King, faisant à chaque fois des dizaines, voire des centaines de tués.

Ces émeutes étaient véritablement des émeutes raciales. Elles mettaient face à face une communauté homogène, les Noirs (flanqués de quelques étudiants et intellectuels blancs, mais très minoritaires) face à la police ou face à la majorité blanche. Elles se déroulaient dans un contexte politique, économique et social, particulier avec des aspirations réelles – le « I have a Dream » de Martin Luther King – et des revendications concrètes – la fin de la ségrégation dans les transports, de la discrimination à l’embauche, ou au logement, etc. Elles exprimaient la colère d’une communauté face à la lenteur, ou au refus, des changements politiques.

Par leur ampleur les émeutes des derniers jours rappellent les émeutes raciales des années 1965-1968. Jamais en plus de cinquante les Etats-Unis n’avaient connu pareille destruction.  Toutefois elles en diffèrent par leur nature et par leurs objectifs. Cela se voit dans le déroulé des événements. Les choses se sont passées en deux temps.

Premier temps : la diffusion de la vidéo de l’arrestation de George Floyd. Les images d’un policier blanc un genou sur le cou d’un homme noir, menotté, à plat ventre et qui se plaint de ne pouvoir respirer, allant même jusqu’à gémir « vous êtes en train de me tuer »,  provoquent une colère généralisée, au sein de la communauté noire et bien au-delà. Toute l’Amérique est choquée par ce qu’elle voit. Le président Trump en tête, qui se dit révolté par les images. Il appelle la famille Floyd au téléphone pour leur dire son dégoût devant de tels actes et leur présenter ses condoléances personnelles et celles de la nation. Le monde politique dans son ensemble est également sous le choc. De même que les forces de police des différentes métropoles qui ne se reconnaissent pas dans le geste de leur collègue.

Aussi quand les Noirs de Minneapolis descendent dans la rue pour crier leur colère, tout le monde trouve cela justifier. Sur instruction du maire de Minneapolis les forces de l’ordre restent en retrait. Il faut laisser la colère s’exprimer, ne pas l’attiser par une présence policière hostile, puisque l’incident qui vient de tout déclencher est une brutalité policière. Mais la colère ne retombe pas. Au contraire. Elle s’amplifie et se nourrit d’elle-même. Quelques voitures sont brûlées des magasins incendiés. Le lendemain soir quand des manifestants se dirigent vers le commissariat du quartier, le maire donne l’ordre de l’évacuer. Mauvaise décision sans doute. Les manifestants envahissent les lieus et saccagent tout, puis mettent le feu au bâtiment.  La manifestation vient de basculer. C’est le début des émeutes. Cela va durer toute la nuit et les nuits suivantes.

Le lendemain le gouverneur de l’Etat du Minnesota essaye ramener la sérénité. Il appelle au calme, au sens civique, souligne que les commerces dévastés appartiennent à des membres des minorités, des noirs, des hispaniques, des coréens, etc. Mais il est trop tard. Les émeutiers ont compris quelque chose de fondamental. Vues les circonstances- le meurtre d’un noir par un policier blanc – la police est en position de faiblesse et c’est le moment d’en profiter.

C’est alors que commence le deuxième temps des émeutes. Nous sommes vendredi, quatre jours après la mort de George Floyd.  Les professionnels de la contestation urbaine se sont mobilisés. Deux organisations vont être particulièrement actives, Black Lives Matter et les Antifas.

Black Lives Matter (BLM, dont le nom signifie “les vies de Noirs comptent ») est une organisation internationale pour la promotion des droits humains et la protection des minorités, ethniques ou sexuelles. BLM fut fondé en 2013 par trois femmes noires:  Alicia Garza, Opal Tometi et Patrisse Cullors. Le mouvement revendique une lutte internationale contre « la suprématie blanche » et prône une société alternative, anti-capitaliste.  et non patriarcale.

Le mouvement « Antifa » (pour « anti-fasciste ») est une mouvance internationale d’extrême gauche qui affirme lutter contre les suprémacistes blancs et toutes les tendances « fascisantes » au sein de la société. Ses membres s’habillent tout de noir, avec casques et foulards pour ne pas être reconnus, d’où leur surnom de « black bloc ». Ils abordent les manifestations publiques comme des opportunités de guerilla urbaine. L’organisation n’a ni chef, ni structure, mais peut mobiliser ses membres par les réseaux sociaux, y compris par des communications cryptées. Ses membres maitrisent à la fois les tactiques de guerilla, les techniques de combat individuel, les technologies de l’information, et les principes de la désinformation. La destruction de la civilisation capitaliste et de ses symboles est sa raison d’être, la violence et la terreur, son mode opératoire.

Vendredi, c’est aussi le début du week-end. En ces temps de confinement (pour cause de pandémie de coronavirus), beaucoup de jeunes urbains sont encore plus désœuvrés et plus sur les nerfs que d’habitude. Ils vont aller se défouler, passer leur colère, et se refaire une garde-robe à l’œil, au passage. Confiants qu’ils ne craignent pas grand-chose d’une police qui a reçu l’ordre de laisser faire.

Le chaos peut commencer.

Le gouverneur du Minnesota, qui la veille déclarait comprendre les manifestants, affirme à présent que «de mauvais acteurs » se sont glissés parmi les protestataires. De fait les images des différentes émeutes dans le pays présentent tantôt des adolescents en T-Shirts ou capuches affairés à briser des vitrines à coup de skateboard et tantôt des individus casqués, vêtus de noirs, et armés de marteaux qui ciblent les véhicules de police pour en tabasser les occupants et les incendier.

Le garde des sceaux (Attorney General) William Barr intervient pour dénoncer la présence des « antifas » parmi les manifestants. Il souligne que passer les limites d’un Etat, pour aller semer la destruction dans un autre est un crime fédéral. Signifiant que les personnes dans cette situation s’exposent à des sanctions plus sévères.

A Los Angeles, ville tentaculaire s’il en est, les émeutiers se déplacent sur des dizaines de kilomètres, loin des quartiers populaires jusqu’à West Hollywood ou Beverly Hills, pour aller dévaliser les boutiques de luxe de la fameuse Rodeo Drive.

Quand les émeutiers ne s’en prennent pas aux commerces, ils attaquent les bâtiments publics et ceux qui les protègent. A Saint Louis un policier noir de 38 ans est tué, sous l’œil des caméras ! Quatre autres sont blessés par balles. A Las Vegas un autre policier reçoit une balle, en pleine tête. A Oakland, en Californie, deux policiers noirs postés devant le palais de justice, sont visés par balle, l’un meurt, l’autre est hospitalisé.

A New York les pillages se prolongent jusqu’à lundi. Le grand magasin Macy’s de la 34^e rue est pris d’assaut. Une enseigne Rolex est dévalisée par des dizaines d’individus cagoulés. Une boutique Nike est mise à sac. Des femmes sont agressées. Officiellement il n’y pas eu de plaintes pour viols, mais la situation tourne à l’anarchie. La police est absente ou passive. Par endroit quelques manifestants, souvent Noirs, tentent de raisonner les casseurs et d’arrêter les pillages. En vain… Le gouverneur de l’Etat, Andrew Cuomo, un Démocrate, souligne que les voyous qui ont envahi les rues de la ville « ne peuvent masquer la  nature de leurs actes en se drapant dans une indignation vertueuse justifiée par le meurtre de George Floyd. » Il s’en prend au maire Bill De Blasio, Démocrate aussi, pour ne pas avoir mobilisé suffisamment de forces de police, alors que la ville dispose de 38 000 agents. Comment aurait-il pu le faire ? Sa propre fille, âgée de 25 ans, avait été arrêtée la veille parmi les émeutiers. A l’annonce de son arrestation De Blasio avait affirmé : « je suis fier d’elle ».

Quand les élites et représentants de l’autorité prennent le parti des émeutiers, on n’a plus à faire à une simple manifestation mais bien à une insurrection généralisée.

A travers le pays, célébrités et intellectuels se relaient sur les antennes pour trouver des excuses aux manifestants. Certains mettent en place un fond de soutiens pour payer la caution des casseurs arrêtés. George Floyd est oublié. Pour tous, le responsable du désordre s’appelle Donald Trump, c’est lui qu’il faut virer.

On retrouve le même discours dans la bouche de journalistes qui s’emploient à jeter de l’huile sur le feu. CNN prend le parti des casseurs. Ses reporters dénoncent « la dictature » Trump, et soutiennent « ceux qui se battent pour leurs droits ».

Mais de quels droits s’agit-il ? La foule déchainée ne présente aucune revendication. Son seul but est de détruire et de renverser le pouvoir. A Washington les manifestants mettent le feu à l’église épiscopale Saint John, un des monuments historiques de la ville, située juste à côté de la Maison Blanche. On l’appelle « l’église des présidents », car depuis sa construction en 1812, tous, ou presque, y ont prié. Au contraire de la Maison Blanche elle ne bénéficiait d’aucune protection particulière. A travers sa destruction c’est bien le pouvoir exécutif qui est visé.

Le président Donald Trump s’est exprimé plusieurs fois pour condamner les violences. Il demande aux gouverneurs d’utiliser tous les moyens à leur disposition pour rétablir l’ordre, et si nécessaire de déployer la Garde Nationale, ainsi qu’ils ont l’autorité pour le faire afin de ramener le calme. Et s’ils ne le font pas, c’est lui-même qui s’en chargera ainsi que la loi l’y autorise. Mettant cette menace à exécution il déploie les patrouilles des Douanes et Frontières (Customs and Border Patrol) dans les rues de la capitale, Washington D.C. Ses agents sont sous l’autorité du Département de la Sécurité Intérieure, et sont près de quarante mille à travers le pays.

Cette affirmation d’autorité a permis de ramener un calme relatif. Pour combien de temps ?

La personne de Donald Trump dérange toujours autant. Président depuis janvier 2017 et pour encore huit mois au moins, il est toujours détesté par la bourgeoisie socio-libérale, par une partie de la jeunesse, et par les élites médiatiques et l’establishment Démocrate. Loin de laisser les institutions démocratiques américaines jouer leur rôle, les plus radicaux de ces opposants ont pris prétexte de la mort de George Floyd, pour tenter de le renverser. Après la tentative de coup d’Etat institutionnel qu’a constitué l’enquête sur une « collusion avec la Russie », après la mascarade politique que fut la procédure de destitution menée contre lui, après le désastre économique infligé par le confinement en réponse à la pandémie de coronavirus, les « anti-Trumps » ont tenté de le faire tomber par la plus vieille des méthodes, une insurrection populaire.

Il ne faut pas s’y tromper. Il existe bien un problème racial aux Etats-Unis. Il existe bien aussi des cas de brutalité policière. Mais les émeutes des derniers jours ne relevaient pas de ces problèmes et n’ont contribué  en rien à les résoudre.

Voir aussi:

Présidentielle USA 2020: Les fraudes prouvées, pour l’histoire

Gérald Olivier

2 janvier 2021

Il y aura donc des objections lors de la proclamation des résultats de l’élection présidentielle le 6 janvier prochain. Ooops, ! Tant pis pour tous ceux qui nous disent depuis des semaines que c’est fini, qu’il faut circuler, qu’il n’y a rien à voir… Ces objections ne seront cependant pas suffisantes pour changer le résultat présumé. A savoir Joe Biden, président élu depuis le 14 décembre, sera confirmé dans son élection et la transition se poursuivra en vue de son investiture le 20 janvier.

Mais ces objections sont essentielles car elles vont inscrire dans l’histoire le fait que l’élection présidentielle de 2020 a été entachée d’irrégularités, de fraudes, et de manipulations, et que Biden n’est pas forcément le président « légitime » !

Le 6 janvier, le résultat du vote du Collège électoral sera présenté devant une session extraordinaire du Congrès (les deux chambres réunies) présidée par le vice-président Mike Pence. Quiconque conteste le résultat peut profiter de la circonstance pour présenter une objection. Celle-ci peut porter sur le vote d’un seul « grand électeur », ou sur celui de tout un Etat, ou sur l’ensemble des votes. Une objection doit être soumise par écrit et être soutenue par au moins un élu de chaque chambre. A ce jour plusieurs Représentants et au moins un Sénateur (Josh Hawley, Républicain du Missouri) ont annoncé qu’ils soulèveraient une ou plusieurs objections, notamment concernant le résultat de la Pennsylvanie. Cela obligera les élus à se retirer pour débattre et à voter sur l’objection. Il faudrait alors un vote majoritaire dans chaque chambre pour invalider le vote du Collège électoral et renvoyer l’élection présidentielle devant la Chambre des Représentants. Ce cas de figure est hautement improbable parce que les Démocrates ont la majorité des voix à la Chambre et parce que plusieurs Sénateurs Républicains désapprouvent des objections envisagées. Celles-ci risquent donc plutôt d’être rejetées par les deux chambres…

Il n’empêche! Pour l’histoire, et pour leur devenir immédiat, les Républicains doivent clairement affirmer, et ce devant le monde entier, que les Démocrates ont triché lors du scrutin présidentiel. De telles tricheries doivent être condamnées et éliminées. L’avenir de la Démocratie américaine en dépend.

Il ne fait aucun doute que l’élection présidentielle américaine du 3 novembre 2020 a donné lieu à de multiples manipulations et que le score de Joe Biden a été artificiellement gonflé, tandis que celui de Donald Trump était limité autant que possible. Le Sénateur Rand Paul a dénoncé ces fraudes à la tribune. Parmi les électeurs américains, 62% des Républicains se disent convaincus qu’il y a eu fraude, tout comme 28% des Indépendants et 17% des Démocrates. Le doute n’est pas limité au seul camp Trump.

Autant que ces irrégularités, qui ne sont souvent que de simples manipulations politiques, l’autre scandale post-électoral aux Etats-Unis, est l’omerta décidée par les principaux médias américains sur le sujet. L’ensemble de la classe médiatique bien-pensante a nié leur existence et a refusé catégoriquement d’accorder la moindre attention aux multiples témoignages et preuves de leur réalité. Un silence, à l’unanimité quasi-soviétique, qui en dit long sur le délabrement des médias et le délitement de la liberté d’expression aux Etats-Unis. Mais c’est un autre sujet…

Pour l’heure le fait capital est que ces irrégularités vont enfin être prises en compte et ne pourront plus être balayées d’un simple revers de la main.

Dans au moins six Etats -l’Arizona, la Géorgie, , le Michigan , le Nevada, la Pennsylvanie, le Wisconsin- qui sont tous des Etats « décisifs », c’est-à-dire des Etats où le résultat s’annonçait serré et incertain, des irrégularités multiples ont eu lieu. Donald Trump et ses avocats en ont révélé certaines. Peter Navarro, conseiller du président sur le commerce, a publié un rapport récapitulant l’ensemble de ces fraudes. Justement parce que les médias s’évertuaient à les nier.

Concrètement  Peter Navarro distingue cinq types de fraudes :

Bulletins frauduleux, décomptes et dépouillements frauduleux, violation des règles de procédure, violations du principe d’égalité devant le vote, erreurs provenant des machines de vote.

Et il ajoute une mention spéciale pour ce qu’il appelle des «anomalies statistiques ». Car avant même d’envisager de possibles irrégularités, il y a dans le détail du vote du 3 novembre des incohérences et des contradictions, bref des éléments qui ne collent pas,

Première anomalie le total des votes favorables à Joe Biden. Il dépasse 81 millions. Un record historique. C’est 12 millions de plus que Barack Obama en 2008. Alors même qu’Obama avait rassemblé largement au-delà du camp Démocrate et attiré des millions de nouveaux électeurs aux urnes. Surtout pour parvenir à son total de 69 millions de voix à l’époque, Obama avait remporté 873 comtés (équivalents des circonscriptions).

Cette fois Biden n’est arrivé en tête que dans 477 comtés. Moitié moins qu’Obama. Pour réunir douze millions de suffrages supplémentaires tout en gagnant dans deux fois moins de comtés il a fallu que Biden l’emporte avec beaucoup, beaucoup, beaucoup d’avance là où il a gagné. Car 81 millions de voix dans 477 comtés cela impose d’avoir remporté des zones très peuplées et d’y avoir vraiment fait le plein de votes… En comparaison Donald Trump a gagné dans 2 496 comtés, soit 85% du territoire américain ! Certes ce n’est pas le nombre, mais la population, des comtés qui importe. Mais à l’évidence l’Amérique profonde penche pour Trump.

La victoire de Biden s’accompagne d’une incohérence majeure. Biden l’a emporté alors que les Démocrates ont été battus dans toutes les autres élections. Les Démocrates ont perdu quinze sièges à la Chambre des Représentants. Ils ont échoué à reprendre la majorité au Sénat ne gagnant qu’un seul siège au lieu de six ou sept escomptés. Ils ont perdu chez les gouverneurs. Ils ont perdu dans la bataille pour remporter les législatures de certains Etats qu’ils avaient pourtant spécifiquement ciblés, comme le Texas, et où ils avaient dépensé des sommes sans précédent… Une telle réalité implique que des électeurs ont voté pour Biden comme président et pour les candidats républicains à tous les autres postes. C’est à la fois peu vraisemblable et totalement contre nature. Surtout vue la popularité de Donald Trump au sein du camp Républicain. Ce qui est plus probable est que des millions de bulletins n’ont comporté qu’un seul vote, celui pour président, laissant tous les autres postes à élire en blanc. Cela est possible et même parfaitement légal, mais cela éveille inévitablement des soupçons car un bulletin coché pour la seule case du président est la configuration classique d’un faux bulletin…

Biden a également gagné en défiant l’histoire et les traditions. Ainsi, il existe aux Etats-Unis des comtés où celui des deux candidats qui l’emporte s’avère être toujours le vainqueur final. On les appelle des « comtés baromètres » (bellwhether counties) parce qu’ils illustrent la tendance. Ils votent systématiquement pour le vainqueur. Au cours des quarante dernières années, dix-neuf comtés ont ainsi toujours correctement prédit le vainqueur, Donald Trump a remporté dix-huit d’entre eux ! Etrange !

L’histoire montre également qu’un président arrive difficilement à être élu s’il ne remporte pas certains Etats, du fait de leur importance démographique. La Floride et l’Ohio sont de ces Etats. Tous deux ont été remportés par Trump. Tous les candidats Républicains qui ont remporté l’Ohio ont été élus. Sauf Trump en 2020.

Depuis 1960 -au passage la dernière élection pour laquelle la quasi-certitude de fraudes existe également- aucun président n’a été élu en perdant à la fois en Floride, dans l’Ohio et dans l’Iowa, sauf Joe Biden en 2020. De toute l’histoire des Etats-Unis Biden est le second président après John Kennedy, à connaître ce cas de figure.

On constate aussi des contradictions dans le comportement des électeurs. Ainsi à travers le pays Donald Trump a gagné des voix par rapport à 2016 auprès des minorités, en particulier les Hispaniques et les Noirs. Il a remporté par endroits jusqu’à 26% du vote des hommes noirs, ce qui est exceptionnel pour un candidat républicain aux Etats-Unis. Mais ces gains sont invisibles dans certaines grandes métropoles à très forte population noire, comme Milwaukee (Wisconsin), Detroit (Michigan), Philadelphie (Pennsylvanie) ou Atlanta (Géorgie). Dans ces villes-là, sans avoir perdu de voix en nombre par rapport à 2016, Trump réalise un score très faible, parce que celui de Biden est extraordinairement élevé. Biden a même écrasé le score de Barack Obama dans ces métropoles, alors qu’ Obama était Noir et que son score était déjà un record historique…!

Biden a donc bénéficié d’une mobilisation extraordinaire. De fait la participation a battu des records en 2020. Dans le Minnesota, où Biden l’a emporté 52% contre 45%, le taux de participation a dépassé 80%. Du jamais vu. Dans le Wisconsin il a été de 76% en moyenne et de 95% dans certains comtés. Cela signifie que dans ces endroits quasiment toutes les personnes en droit de voter l’ont fait. Les dix Etats avec la participation électorale la plus forte ont tous été remportés par Joe Biden. Comme si cette participation s’accompagnait inévitablement d’un surcroit de votes en sa faveur…

Il ne s’agit là que d’anomalies statistiques. Ce sont des chiffres surprenants qui incitent à s’interroger mais ne constituent pas des preuves de fraudes. Il en va autrement d’un certain nombre d’incidents, détaillés par Peter Navarro dans son rapport. En voici un florilège.

-Dans le Nevada des tribus indiennes se sont vu offrir des cartes de crédit et divers cadeaux en échange de leur vote. La pratique est évidemment illégale, même au Nevada.

-Un employé des postes a témoigné sous serment (donc sous peine de dix ans de prison en cas de parjure) avoir transporté des bulletins de votes déjà remplis de l’Etat de New York à l’Etat de Pennsylvanie. Façon classique de bourrer les urnes. Son chargement contenait 288 000 bulletins. Soit quatre fois l’écart de voix séparant Joe Biden de Donald Trump en Pennsylvanie.

-En Pennsylvanie et en Géorgie des personnes âgées ou handicapées ont découvert en allant voter en personne le 3 novembre que quelqu’un avait usurpé leur identité pour voter à leur place par courrier. Elles n’ont pas été autorisées à voter et c’est le vote de l’usurpateur qui a été compté.

-Dans le Wisconsin 130 000 bulletins de votes ont été acceptés sans vérification d’identité. C’est cinq fois plus que l’écart de voix en faveur de Biden dans cet Etat.

-En Géorgie, vingt mille électeurs ayant indiqué avoir déménagé dans un autre Etat, ont néanmoins voté en Géorgie.

-En Pennsylvanie huit mille votes proviennent de personnes décédées.

-En Pennsylvanie les bulletins de vote reçus par correspondance ont été acceptés et comptabilisés en l’absence de l’enveloppe permettant de vérifier la signature et d’identifier l’électeur. Cela a été fait à la demande du secrétaire d’Etat, alors que c’est la législature des Etats qui est supposée établir la loi électorale. Cette seule infraction pourrait justifier d’invalider le résultat de cet Etat.

-Dans le Wisconsin la commission électorale fit installer cinq cents boites à lettres afin de réceptionner des bulletins de vote par correspondance. Alors même que la pratique (appelée « ballot harvesting ») est interdite par la loi du Wisconsin. Dès lors l’ensemble des bulletins recueillis dans ces boites à lettres auraient dû être invalidé, ce qui n’a pas été lé cas.

-Dans le Wisconsin des bulletins par correspondance ont été livrés au central de dépouillement avec l’enveloppe extérieure déjà ouverte, indiquant que ces bulletins avaient pu faire l’objet d’une manipulation.

-Dans le Wisconsin cent mille bulletins de vote reçus au-delà de la date limite ont été antidatés pour être comptabilisés, en violation des règles électorales.

-En Géorgie trois cent mille personnes ont été autorisées à voter en personne alors qu’elles avaient demandé un bulletin de vote par correspondance.

-En Pennsylvanie les bulletins de vote ont été acceptés jusqu’à trois jours après la date limite de vote. En violation de la loi de l’Etat et d’une décision de la Cour Suprême des Etats-Unis.

-Toujours en Pennsylvanie des personnes non inscrites sur les listes électorales ont été autorisées à voter en utilisant une autre identité, sur les conseils de juristes mobilisés par les autorités électorales.

-Toujours en Pennsylvanie, 4 500 bulletins reçus par correspondance et improprement remplis ont été corrigés par les employés électoraux. Cette pratique est illégale et ces bulletins auraient dû être invalidés.

-La présence de militants, portant des T-Shirts « Black Lives Matter » ou d’autres affiliations démocrates a été observée aux abords de centres de vote et jusque dans les centres de dépouillement. Cela constitue une forme d’intimidation interdite par la loi américaine.

Et il y a les fameux « pics » de voix favorables à Joe Biden !

Qu’une machine attribue des votes à un candidat par erreur peut arriver. Par contre que ces erreurs aillent toujours dans le même sens, en l’occurrence en faveur du candidat démocrate, pose un vrai problème de crédibilité du dépouillement. Or c’est ce qui s’est passé dans les Etats décisifs dans la nuit du 3 au 4. En Géorgie, à 1h30 du matin, alors que le décompte était officiellement suspendu, Biden a vu son total augmenté de plus de cent mille voix. Dans le Wisconsin, Biden a reçu cent quarante-trois mille voix à 4h du matin, contre zéro à Trump. Dans le Michigan même chose 6h30 le matin du 4 novembre, avec cette fois 147 000 vois de plus pour Joe Biden.

Comment expliquer ces poussées soudaines, en faveur d’un candidat, toujours le même ? Outre l’erreur humaine ou technique, l’explication la plus simple est celle d’un bourrage des urnes. D’ailleurs l’Amérique entière a été le témoin d’un potentiel bourrage des urnes grâce aux images d’une vidéo de surveillance placée dans un centre de dépouillement en Géorgie. On peut y voir quatre employés sortir des valises de dessous une table et comptabiliser ces bulletins après que les observateurs ont été renvoyés sous prétexte que le dépouillement était suspendu pour la nuit. Ce décompte a coïncidé avec une vive poussée des votes en faveur de Joe Biden !

En elle-même la vidéo ne prouve pas qu’il y a eu fraude ! On ne sait pas d’où venaient les valises de bulletins et il n’est pas illégal de décompter les bulletins sans la présence d’observateurs, celle-ci est simplement recommandée pour éviter les contestations. Mais cette vidéo suscite suffisamment de questions pour justifier une enquête. Or il n’en a rien été. Elle a été honteusement ignorée par les médias et par les autorités. Comme s’il ne fallait surtout pas que l’on sache ce qu’il en était vraiment. Alors, qu’au contraire, il aurait été essentiel de démystifier la vidéo pour rétablir la crédibilité du système. C’est l’inverse qui s’est produit.

Enfin il faut évoquer les problèmes liés aux machines de vote. Les sociétés Dominion et Smartmatic qui fournissent à la fois les machines et les logiciels ont été gravement mises en cause. Dans le Michigan, une machine a attribué par erreur six mille voix destinées à Donald Trump à son adversaire Joe Biden. Officiellement l’erreur a été découverte et corrigée, mais l’examen des machines a révélé un taux d’erreur de 68%. Ce qui est ahurissant, sachant que la commission électorale fédérale ne tolère qu’un taux d’erreur de 0,0008% pour valider l’utilisation d’une machine ! Combien d’erreurs similaires ont ainsi pu se produire sans être détectées… ?

Quoi qu’en disent les Démocrates et leurs alliées dans les médias, les problèmes de l’élection présidentielle 2020 sont liés dans 99% des cas au vote par correspondance. Celui-ci a été massivement étendu et a effectivement ouvert la porte à des manipulations massives et des fraudes destinées à favoriser Joe Biden et les Démocrates.

C’est le cas concernant le processus de vérification des signatures. Dans certains Etats, dont le Nevada et la Géorgie, les réglages des machines destinées à vérifier les signatures ont été abaissés de manière à ne rejeter quasiment aucun bulletin. Rien de techniquement illégal, mais une volonté évidente d’enregistrer le maximum de votes, légaux et valides ou pas.

Dans le seul comté de Clark au Nevada, bastion favorable à Biden, 130 000 bulletins supplémentaires ont pu être validés soit près de trois fois l’écart des voix en faveur de Biden. Même chose en Géorgie. Le taux d’invalidation des votes a été de 0,3% en 2020 contre 6% en 2016 et les années précédentes. Alors même que la quantité de votes par correspondance était annoncée comme particulièrement élevée du fait de la pandémie, les autorités ont décidé de baisser la garde, ouvrant la porte à de massives fraudes potentielles.

Il ne sert malheureusement à rien de se lamenter sur le lait renversé. L’élection a eu lieu, Biden a été déclaré vainqueur, les Démocrates ont réussi leur coup. A défaut d’inverser le résultat, les objections qui seront soulevées devant le Congrès serviront à affirmer haut et fort qu’ils ont été pris en flagrant délit et que si l’expérience démocratique américaine veut se poursuivre ils doivent être empêchés de récidiver. Et ce dès le scrutin sénatorial de Géorgie, le 5 janvier 2021.

Voir également:

Des manifestants accusés d’avoir jeté des cocktails Molotov sur des véhicules de la police de New York risquent la prison à vie

Lorenz Duchamps

Epoch times

16 juin 2020

Trois personnes accusées d’être impliquées dans deux attaques distinctes au cocktail Molotov sur des véhicules de police du Département de police de la ville de New York (NYPD) pourraient être condamnées à perpétuité si elles sont reconnues coupables de toutes les accusations.

Les suspects identifiés sont Samantha Shader, 27 ans, de Catskill, et deux avocats de Brooklyn, Colinford Mattis, 31 ans, et Urooj Rahman, 32 ans, selon un communiqué de presse du bureau du procureur du district Est de New York.

« Un peu plus d’une semaine après leur arrestation, Samantha Shader, Colinford Mattis et Urooj Rahman ont été inculpés de sept chefs d’accusation en réponse à leurs attaques potentiellement mortelles », a déclaré le directeur adjoint du FBI William F. Sweeney. « Leur comportement criminel a mis des vies en danger, a détruit des équipements qui servent la communauté, a siphonné les ressources d’intervention et a créé une menace pour ceux qui avaient le droit de se réunir et d’exprimer leur opinion en toute sécurité. »

Les trois résidents de New York risquent la prison à vie. Chacun d’entre eux a été accusé d’avoir utilisé des explosifs, d’avoir utilisé des explosifs pour commettre un crime, d’incendie criminel, d’utilisation d’un dispositif de destruction, de conspiration en vue d’un incendie criminel, de désordre civil et de création et possession d’un dispositif de destruction.

Urooj Rahman (à gauche) et Colinford Mattis ont été inculpés pour avoir prétendument lancé des cocktails Molotov sur un véhicule de la police de New York. (Bureau du procureur américain – district Est de New York)

Samantha Shader, 27 ans, de Catskill, New York, sur une photo de présentation. (Centre de sécurité publique du comté de Pottawatomie)

« Ceux qui mènent des attaques contre des officiers ou des véhicules de la police de New York ne sont pas des manifestants, ce sont des criminels, et ils seront traités comme tels », a déclaré le procureur américain Richard P. Donoghue.

Personne n’a été blessé lors de ces deux incidents, qui ont eu lieu lors d’une manifestation à la fin du mois dernier. La bouteille enflammée de Samantha Shader n’a pas explosé le 30 mai dernier, lorsqu’elle a été lancée contre un véhicule de la police de New York, occupé par quatre officiers de police, brisant deux de ses vitres, selon le dossier du tribunal (pdf).

L’explosif que Urooj Rahman et Colinford Mattis auraient lancé le 29 mai a effectivement mis le feu au véhicule de police inoccupé dans le quartier de Fort Greene à Brooklyn. Les suspects ont ensuite fui la scène à bord d’un minivan de couleur fauve, selon les procureurs.

Les policiers ont poursuivi le minivan et ont arrêté Urooj Rahman et Colinford Mattis, qui conduisait apparemment le véhicule. À l’intérieur, les agents ont déclaré avoir trouvé différents éléments destinés aux cocktails Molotov, dont un briquet, une bouteille remplie de papier toilette et de liquide, sans doute de l’essence, ainsi que d’autres bouteilles et du papier toilette.

Les restes d’un véhicule de police calciné ont été vandalisés lors des émeutes qui ont eu lieu dans le quartier de Fort Greene, à Brooklyn, dans l’État de New York, le 29 mai 2020. (Thomas Urbain/AFP via Getty Images)

Samantha Shader a également été filmée par une caméra de surveillance, les officiers ont procédé à son arrestation après qu’elle a lancé l’explosif.

« La violence, comme celle qui est alléguée ici, non seulement met en danger nos officiers de police de New York, mais menace le droit constitutionnel pour les personnes qui veulent manifester pacifiquement. Ces mises en accusation par nos partenaires fédéraux traduisent notre condamnation commune pour ce type d’actes isolés qu’une société juste ne pourra jamais tolérer », a déclaré le commissaire de la police de New York, Dermot F. Shea.

L’affaire a suscité un grand intérêt, car Urooj Rahman et Colinford Mattis sont tous deux avocats.

Selon son profil LinkedIn, Colinford Mattis est employé par Pryor Cashman LLP, tandis que Urooj Rahman est une avocate spécialisée dans les droits de l’homme.

Urooj Rahman a été libérée sous caution par un autre avocat, Salmah Rizvi, basé à Washington, qui a travaillé dans les départements d’État et de la Défense sous l’ancien président Barack Obama. Colinford Mattis a également été libéré sous caution.

Mais tous deux sont retournés en prison la semaine dernière lorsque la Cour d’appel américaine pour le second circuit a accédé à la demande de sursis d’urgence du procureur.

Voir de même:

The Wages of Our Recklessness
Noah Rothman
Commentary
January 07, 2021

On January 6, 2021, the president of the United States fomented a violent insurrection against the federal government.

On this point, the semantics matter. This was not a coup d’etat, the definition of which is an organized effort to remove the existing government, in which all the levers of governmental power are seized by force. Nor was this a mere protest. No sane observer could equate what happened yesterday with a public demonstration of dissent which, though not necessarily law-abiding, is nevertheless a peaceful display. This was an organized, terroristic assault on the seat of elected government.

The president organized yesterday’s mob. On its eve, he appealed to the crowd directly—as grave a civic offense as the Founders dared to imagine—for the redress of his political grievances. He threatened Congress with street action if they did not reject the voters’ verdict. At the rally, he egged the crowd on, legitimizing the delusions spoon-fed to them by some members of Congress, that the 2020 election could somehow still be overturned. And he guided the mob toward the Capitol and set them loose, resulting in terror and vandalism this country has not seen in that hall for more than 200 years.

This was not an organic and spontaneous expression of rage. It was a planned, organized, and orchestrated attack on the U.S. government. The rioters were in constant communication with one another. They targeted specific members of government with violence. And as police later learned, the plotters were armed with improvised explosive devices and Molotov cocktails, which were strategically stationed around Washington D.C.—including at both the Republican and Democratic National Committee offices.

The collection of violent nihilists who descended on the Capitol building had no coherent political program beyond violence and mayhem. They are no one’s constituency, and they deserve to be treated like the contemptible political orphans they are. But we have not done that. Cretins and fools who fear nothing as much as they do a comprehensive theory of events that indicts anyone other than their political adversaries will reject this notion, but prominent actors from both parties—yes, both sides—have for years found the mob a useful tool. And because of that recklessness, what happened yesterday could be just a sign of what is to come.

Donald Trump lionized violence in service to his political claims from the moment he first ran for office, but the first expressions of violence in his name occurred in March of 2016. Then, following several months in which he fantasized aloud about the prospect that his supporters might lash out violently, someone did just that. But rather than condemn this criminal act, he promised to pay the legal fees of those who followed this example. And while Republican lawmakers condemned Trump’s accommodating instincts at the time, particularly those who were competing with Trump for primacy over the GOP, their sense of urgency faded after he took the White House.

In the months and years that followed, Trump would reprise this act, praising the violent mobs who lashed out in his defense. This is what led to his indefensibly confused and ambiguous response to the racists and rioters who descended on Charlottesville, and it’s what led him to call for counter-demonstrators—”GREAT PATRIOTS!”—to confront the violent protests that erupted over the summer of 2020 following the killing of George Floyd.

It would be a mistake to attribute this convergence of interests between Trump and the mob to a shared ideology. There is no ideology on display here other than the idea that meting out pain to the right people is a virtue. The mob is nothing more than a tool for Trump. They, among other instruments, strike fear in his enemies and allies alike. The mob, too, sees Trump as a vehicle for power and influence, as do the Republicans who have abetted Trump to this point. All are complicit⁠—passively or otherwise⁠—in the violence we’ve witnessed for the past four years.

But Democrats, too, countenanced their share of violence. Just as Trump declined to condemn those who committed violence in his name in 2016, Democrats looked the other way as vicious counter-demonstrators descended on Trump-campaign events, assaulting peaceable rally-goers and vandalizing the surrounding property. Democratic lawmakers and their allies in media heaped praise on the conglomeration of malcontents calling itself Antifa merely because it nominally claimed to be “fighting fascism.” And as city after city was engulfed by riots last summer, Democrats declined to condemn the excesses to which demonstrators appealed in the name of racial justice. Indeed, when the chaos in American streets was addressed at all, it was framed as a wholly righteous and unblemished demand for historical rectitude.

And while Democrats looked the other way, left-leaning media embraced the utility of street violence. “Riots are destructive, dangerous, and scary,” Vox.com observed, “but can lead to serious social reforms.” In an unusually soft interview with NPR, author Vicky Osterweil insisted that “looting is a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society.” As COMMENTARY‘s Christine Rosen observed at the time, excusing the violence as though it was an anomaly and not a consistent feature of these demonstrations became a media fixation. “Group Breaks Off of Mostly Peaceful Protest, Vandalizes Police Station, Sets Courthouse on Fire,” read one NBC News headline. “Third night of looting follows third night of mostly peaceful protest,” asserted another from the Wisconsin State Journal. To even call what municipal police routinely deemed riots “riots” was, in the estimation of CNN’s Chris Cillizza, an act of “desperation” by embattled Republicans.

If anyone wants to know how we arrived at this lamentable time in American history, the place to look for answers is in the mirror. Violence does not happen in a vacuum. One side’s menace feeds off the other’s and justifies its own actions based on those of its opponents. You cannot excise one but not the other⁠—both must be anathematized.

This shameful past does not have to be a portent of a violent and unstable future, but that will be our fate if responsible politicians continue to see disturbed and impressionable people as a weapon to be harnessed and directed at their domestic political opponents. If cynical politicians continue to lie to their constituents, feeding them comforting fictions about how the country’s institutions are tainted and arrayed against their interests, we will endure more insurrections, more violence, and more instability. And that will have profound consequences.

As I wrote in my book, published two years ago this month, condemning political violence in whatever form it takes isn’t evasive. It’s consistent. Anything less is a corruption of the sort that “eats away at the foundations of a healthy society. And one day, when the rot has been ignored for so long that no one believes it can be expunged, another mob will come along. And that time, the republic’s weakened edifice may not withstand the pressure.” Let January 6 be a wake-up call. Orphan your violent.

Noah Rothman is the Associate Editor of Commentary and the author of Unjust: Social Justice and the Unmaking of America.

Voir également:

The Looting Lobby

Where’s the cancel culture when we really need it?
James Freeman
The Wall Street Journal
Aug. 31, 2020

Is this the moment for centrist Democrats to part ways with the modern American left? Perhaps they’ve been disturbed to see their party’s politicians and press allies largely ignore violence perpetrated by the likes of antifa and describe fiery protests as “mostly peaceful.” Now a full-throated defense of destruction is receiving a respectful media hearing.

Natalie Escobar writes for National Public Radio:

In the past months of demonstrations for Black lives, there has been a lot of hand-wringing about looting… just this week, rioters have burned buildings and looted stores in Kenosha, Wis., following the police shooting of Jacob Blake, to which Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson has said: “Peaceful protesting is a constitutionally protected form of free speech. Rioting is not.”

Writer Vicky Osterweil’s book, In Defense of Looting, came out on Tuesday. When she finished it, back in April, she wrote (rather presciently) that “a new energy of resistance is building across the country.” Now, as protests and riots continue to grip cities, she argues that looting is a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society. The rioters who smash windows and take items from stores, she says, are engaging in a powerful tactic that questions the justice of “law and order,” and the distribution of property and wealth in an unequal society.

The book features a picture of a crowbar on its cover. Ms. Escobar, who conducts a friendly interview with the author, is not posting to an obscure internet chat site, but a massive taxpayer-funded media outlet. And her bio on NPR’s site shows that she carries other credentials of the media establishment—experience at the Atlantic magazine and ProPublica and a degree from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism.

The looting book has also received a cordial reception at the Verizon -owned HuffPost, which may not be as popular as in its Obama-era heyday but still reaches millions of people every month. Questions for the author of the looting manifesto from the HuffPost’s Claire Fallon include:

Your book really could not be more directly speaking to the moment, in a lot of ways, especially because there ended up being as there often is during these waves of protests — a lot of discourse about looting and whether it’s effective, whether protest should be nonviolent… How have we seen looting and sort of non-nonviolent tactics playing a role in what’s going on with these Black Lives Matter protests?

It turns out that book author Vicky Osterweil has been happy to make the looting argument in other moments, too. A magazine article of the same name as the book was published in 2014 and has recently been recommended by Ohio’s Columbus Metropolitan Library, according to the city’s NBC television affiliate. WCMH says the library is featuring the article among resources “for what it describes as antiracist work and meaningful inclusion.”

Shop owners and residents of cities nationwide have been praying for the exclusion of those “sort of non-nonviolent tactics,” though perhaps the HuffPost’s Ms. Fallon should get credit for the euphemism of the year. Here’s another of her questions for the author of the looting book:

…You discuss organizing, as opposed to something like rioting, as being a bit of an obsession for a lot of people on the left, as being almost fetishized as the only right way to oppose the state and white supremacy. I would love for you to talk a little bit about why we should, in fighting white supremacy, be more skeptical of organizing and organizations, and what the risks and pitfalls are of relying on organizing as a tactic.

This column never expected to be defending community organizers. But if the choice is between those who “fetishize” promoting a cause and those who commit crimes in order to get their way, this shouldn’t be a tough call. Is such disturbing and dangerous confusion limited to NPR and the HuffPost?

What’s clear is that Americans with a range of views and backgrounds are not enjoying living in places that have seen a surge of sort of non-nonviolent tactics. Christen Johnson reports in the Chicago Tribune:

They understand why protesters and rioters have poured onto the streets of downtown, and some acknowledge that crime is worse in other parts of Chicago. Some also agree with protesters that something systemic needs to be changed.

But they don’t want to wait it out here in the city, fearful of stepping outside at night… They want out.

“Not to make it all about us; the whole world is suffering,” said Amber, a 30-year-old nurse who lives in River North… “But I do think that I’ve never had to think about my own safety in this way before.”

Voir également:

Riots are destructive, dangerous, and scary — but can lead to serious social reforms

To prevent more violent uprisings and protests, we need to take their causes seriously.

German Lopez

Vox.com

Sep 22, 2016

When tensions in Charlotte, North Carolina, over the police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott quickly boiled over into violence, looting, and riots, many people on social media had the same reaction: Why are people destroying their own communities in such senseless violence?

But this misses the point. This sentiment, experts previously told me, underplays the real anger behind riots and urban uprisings. « People participate in this type of event for a real reason, » Darnell Hunt, a UCLA professor who’s studied the 1992 Rodney King riots in Los Angeles, said. « It’s not just people taking advantage. It’s not just anger and frustration at the immediate or proximate cause. It’s always some underlying issues. »

Riots are the culmination of these underlying issues. They might be catalyzed by one particular cause — such as a police shooting — but they’re also the result of long-held angers — broader police abuse, residential segregation, economic inequality, and racial tensions, generally, in America.

What’s more, riots can lead to serious attention and change.

We see some of this in media coverage today: When Baltimore burst into riots after Freddie Gray died in police custody, its policing problems received a lot more attention by the press — and even led to a US Justice Department investigation that found a local police department plagued by racist practices.

But riots don’t just lead to more attention — other urban upheavals in the 1960s and 1990s led to real reforms in local police departments and governments, and the Justice Department is now pushing the Baltimore Police Department into reform following its investigation.

This doesn’t mean that people should go out into the streets and destroy their communities. But as tensions remain high in Charlotte, Baltimore, and other US cities, acknowledging the lingering rage and feelings of neglect that led to the riots as genuine political viewpoints is important not just to understand what would compel someone to burn down or loot local businesses, but also how to prevent such events from happening again in the future.

Riots are caused by genuine anger, not solely opportunists looking to loot

Historians and experts argue that these types of riots aren’t solely random acts of violence or people taking advantage of dire circumstances to steal and destroy property. They are, instead, a serious attempt at forcing change after years of neglect by politicians, media, and the general public.

« All of these politicians that get completely overwhelmed and outraged from this level of chaos in their cities during these upheavals seem surprised, » Heather Ann Thompson, a historian at the University of Michigan who’s studied America’s 1960s riots, previously told me. « Yet … the origins of the upheaval are very much in their control. »

In the 1960s, despite the victories of the civil rights movement, economic disparities and police abuse against black communities culminated in violent demonstrations across the country. Throughout the decade, people rose up in cities like Los Angeles, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Baltimore.

These riots were, like the current protests in Charlotte, triggered by specific catalysts. The 1968 riots in Baltimore — and across the country — were galvanized by the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. But they were deeply rooted in discontent with police departments that were predominantly white and neglected and abused black neighborhoods.

« There’s a long memory of historical injustice »

« Almost all of the several hundred riots that happened between 1963 and 1970 were sparked by confrontations between African Americans and the police, » Thomas Sugrue, a historian at New York University who’s also studied the 1960s riots, said. But, he added, « There’s a long memory of historical injustice — going back to slave patrols, to police officers enforcing racial segregation and arresting nonviolent protesters, and the commonplace tension, conflict, and harassment directed at African Americans by law enforcement officials. »

Similarly, in 1992, South Central Los Angeles rose up in riots that lasted six days, killed more than 60 people, and injured thousands.

The riots were triggered by the acquittal of police officers who were caught on tape beating Rodney King, a black man, after a high-speed chase.

But, Hunt of UCLA explained, the riots were really a culmination of anger in black and Hispanic communities over decades of economic inequality and police abuses in Los Angeles. Previous research found, for example, that high unemployment and poverty in South Central Los Angeles made it a hotbed for violent outbursts. Hunt also said the community was simmering with anger at the time over the recent sentence of Soon Da Ju, a Korean-born shop owner who was sentenced to five years’ probation for fatally shooting a black teenager she thought was stealing a bottle of orange juice.

« It was the accumulation of slights and insults and disrespect, » Hunt said.

Baltimore and Charlotte faced years of neglect before rising up

More recent riots have also been fueled by years of issues, even if they were seemingly catalyzed by a single event.

The catalyst for the protests and subsequent riots in Baltimore in April 2015 was Freddie Gray’s death and questions about why he was arrested and whether the cops who arrested him caused his fatal spinal cord injury. And in Charlotte, the main catalyst was the police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott.

But there were deeper issues, as well. Gray’s West Baltimore neighborhood, for example, has languished in poverty: More than half the residents weren’t working and one-third of residential buildings were vacant or abandoned, according to a February 2015 report by the Justice Policy Institute and Prison Policy Initiative. At the same time, the city had to pay $5.7 million in settlements to more than 100 people — most of whom were black — since 2011 over allegations that police abused and beat them, according to a September 2014 report by the Baltimore Sun’s Mark Puente.

Charlotte, similarly, has long been mired by racially skewed policing and residential segregation. Thompson explained in an op-ed for NBC News:

In short, Charlotte is one of the wealthiest cities in the country, but this prosperity hasn’t touched overwhelmingly black West and Northeast Charlotte and it is one of the most heavily policed. And the police don’t spend much energy policing — throwing people up against cars on a regular basis to search them for drugs — in overwhelmingly white South Charlotte.

And the excessive and aggressive policing of only Charlotte’s poorest and blackest neighborhoods leads there, as it does in every other city in the country, to the killing of citizens by the police. It has led there, as it has elsewhere to outrage.

The anger toward these systems, particularly in black communities, extends outside Baltimore and Charlotte. The Black Lives Matter movement took off following the police shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black 18-year-old, in Ferguson, Missouri. Since Brown’s death, the rallying call of Black Lives Matter has been pushed in protests for several other police killings — of Eric Garner in New York City, Tamir Rice in Cleveland, and Walter Scott in North Charleston, South Carolina. These deaths and many others have fed into the idea in black communities that their own members — or their sons — could be the next victims of police brutality.

An analysis of the available FBI data by Vox’s Dara Lind found that US police kill black people at disproportionate rates: Black people accounted for 31 percent of police killing victims in 2012, even though they made up 13 percent of the US population. Although the data is incomplete, since it’s based on voluntary reports from police agencies around the country, it highlights the vast disparities in how police use force.

(Alvin Chang/Vox)

Higher crime in black communities doesn’t fully explain the disparities. A 2015 study by researcher Cody Ross found, « There is no relationship between county-level racial bias in police shootings and crime rates (even race-specific crime rates), meaning that the racial bias observed in police shootings in this data set is not explainable as a response to local-level crime rates. » That suggests something else — such as, potentially, racial bias — is going on.

But Thompson said it also takes years of neglect, despite peaceful calls for change, for discontent to turn into violence. « Riots never come first, » she said. « They only come after a sustained attempt to change whatever is the problem through other means. »

In the 1960s, people engaged in nonviolent protests as part of the Civil Rights Movement, filed complaints through the NAACP, complained to media, and threatened litigation, Thompson said.

In Baltimore, locals complained to media, filed lawsuits over police abuse, and, finally, protested peacefully for weeks before the protests turned violent. In Charlotte, black communities have long complained about mistreatment by police — including, previously, the 2013 police shooting of Jonathan Ferrell, an unarmed 24-year-old black man who was shot 10 times and killed by a white police officer after he crashed his car.

It was only when these attempts at drawing attention to systemic problems failed that demonstrators rose up in violence, including in modern-day Baltimore and Charlotte.

« I was one of the ones who started the peaceful protests … the first seven days [after Gray’s death], when it was fine and dandy, » William Stewart, a West Baltimore resident who didn’t participate in the riots, told Jenée Desmond-Harris for Vox. « I walked about 101 miles in peace. But if you protest peacefully, they don’t give a shit. »

Violent demonstrations can and have spurred change

Social justice riots are often depicted as people senselessly destroying their own communities to no productive means. President Barack Obama, Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, and members of the media all used this type of characterization to describe the riots in Baltimore. It was a widespread sentiment online after the Charlotte protests, too.

But riots can and have led to substantial reforms in the past, indicating that they can be part of a coherent political movement. By drawing attention to some of the real despair in destitute communities, riots can push the public and leaders to initiate real reforms to fix whatever led to the violent rage.

« When you have a major event like this, the power structure has to respond, » Hunt of UCLA said. « Some very concrete, material things often come out of these events. »

« When you have a major event like this, the power structure has to respond »

The 1960s unrest, for example, led to the Kerner Commission, which reviewed the cause of the uprisings and pushed reforms in local police departments. The changes to police ended up taking various forms: more active hiring of minority police officers, civilian review boards of cases in which police use force, and residency requirements that force officers to live in the communities they police.

« This is one of the greatest ironies. People would say that this kind of level of upheaval in the streets and this kind of chaos in the streets is counterproductive, » Thompson said. « The fact of the matter is that it was after every major city in the urban north exploded in the 1960s that we get the first massive probe into what was going on — known as the Kerner Commission. »

Sugrue agreed. « It’s safe to say some changes would have happened a lot more slowly had there not been disruptive protests, » he said.

Similarly, in Los Angeles, the 1992 riots led the Los Angeles Police Department to implement reforms that put more emphasis on community policing and diversity. The reforms appear to have worked, to some extent: Surveys from the Los Angeles Times found approval of the LAPD rose from 40 percent in 1991 to 77 percent in 2009 — although approval among Hispanic and black residents was lower, at 76 percent and 68 percent respectively. It’s hard to say, but these types of changes might have prevented more riots over policing issues in Los Angeles.

« It’s not perfect — far from that, » Hunt said. « But it’s better. »

But there’s always the threat of backlash to riots

Rioting can spur change, but it can also lead to destructive backlash.

In the immediate aftermath, riots can scare away investment and business from riot-torn communities. This is something that remains an issue in West Baltimore, where some buildings are still scarred by the 1968 riots.

In the long term, they can also motivate draconian policy changes that emphasize law and order above all else. The « tough on crime » policies enacted in the 1970s through 1990s are mostly attributed to urban decay brought on by suburbanization, a general rise in crime, and increasing drug use, but Thompson and Sugrue argued that the backlash to the 1960s riots was also partly to blame.

« Riots cut both ways, » Sugrue said. « They do give a voice to the voiceless, but they can also lead to consequences that those who are challenging the system don’t intend. »

The « tough on crime » policies pushed a considerably harsher approach in the criminal justice system, with a goal of deterring crime with the threat of punishment. Police were evaluated far more on how many arrests they carried out, even for petty crimes like loitering. Sentences for many crimes dramatically increased. As a result, levels of incarceration skyrocketed in the US, with black men at far greater risk of being jailed or imprisoned than other segments of the population.

The irony is that many of these « tough on crime » policies led to the current distrust of police in cities like Baltimore, as David Simon, creator of The Wire and former Baltimore crime reporter, explained to the Bill Keller at the Marshall Project:

[I]t’s time to make new sergeants or lieutenants, and so you look at the computer and say: Who’s doing the most work? And they say, man, this guy had 80 arrests last month, and this other guy’s only got one. Who do you think gets made sergeant? And then who trains the next generation of cops in how not to do police work? I’ve just described for you the culture of the Baltimore police department amid the deluge of the drug war, where actual investigation goes unrewarded and where rounding up bodies for street dealing, drug possession, loitering such — the easiest and most self-evident arrests a cop can make — is nonetheless the path to enlightenment and promotion and some additional pay.

So by viewing riots as criminal acts instead of legitimate political displays of anger at systemic failures, the politicians of the 1970s, ’80s, and ’90s pushed some policies that actually fostered further anger toward police — even as other, positive reforms were simultaneously spurred by urban uprisings. By misunderstanding the purpose of the riots, public officials made events like them more likely.

« By having done that, these communities are far worse off, » Thompson said. « The crisis of police brutality, poverty, exploitation, and black citizens not feeling like full citizens have all gotten much, much worse in 40 years. »

Voir de même:

One Author’s Controversial View: ‘In Defense Of Looting’

Natalie Escobar

NPR

August 27, 2020 

This story was updated on Sept. 1, 2020. The original version of this story, which is an interview with an author who holds strong political views and ideas, did not provide readers enough context for them to fully assess some of the controversial opinions discussed.

In the past months of demonstrations for Black lives, there has been a lot of condemnation of looting. Whether it was New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo saying that stealing purses and sneakers from high-end stores in Manhattan was « inexcusable, » or St. Paul, Minn., Mayor Melvin Carter saying looters were « destroy[ing] our community, » police officers, government officials and pundits alike have denounced the property damage and demanded an end to the riots. And just last week, rioters have burned buildings and looted stores in Kenosha, Wis., following the police shooting of Jacob Blake, to which Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., has said: « Peaceful protesting is a constitutionally protected form of free speech. Rioting is not. »

Writer Vicky Osterweil’s book, In Defense of Looting, came out on Tuesday. Osterweil is a self-described writer, editor and agitator who has been writing about and participating in protests for years. And her book arrives as the continued protests have emerged as a bitter dividing point in the presidential race.

When she finished it, back in April, she wrote that « a new energy of resistance is building across the country. » Now, as protests and riots continue to grip cities, she stakes out a provocative position: that looting is a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society. The rioters who smash windows and take items from stores, she claims, are engaging in a powerful tactic that questions the justice of « law and order, » and the distribution of property and wealth in an unequal society.

I spoke with Osterweil, and our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

---

For people who haven’t read your book, how do you define looting?

When I use the word looting, I mean the mass expropriation of property, mass shoplifting during a moment of upheaval or riot. That’s the thing I’m defending. I’m not defending any situation in which property is stolen by force. It’s not a home invasion either. It’s about a certain kind of action that’s taken during protests and riots.

Looting is a highly racialized word from its very inception in the English language. It’s taken from Hindi, lút, which means « goods » or « spoils, » and it appears in an English colonial officer’s handbook [on « Indian vocabulary »] in the 19th century.

During the uprisings of this past summer, rioting and looting have often gone hand in hand. Can you talk about the distinction you see between the two?

« Rioting » generally refers to any moment of mass unrest or upheaval. Riots are a space in which a mass of people has produced a situation in which the general laws that govern society no longer function, and people can act in different ways in the street and in public. I’d say that rioting is a broader category in which looting appears as a tactic.

Often, looting is more common among movements that are coming from below. It tends to be an attack on a business, a commercial space, maybe a government building — taking those things that would otherwise be commodified and controlled and sharing them for free.

Can you talk about rioting as a tactic? What are the reasons people deploy it as a strategy?

It does a number of important things. It gets people what they need for free immediately, which means that they are capable of living and reproducing their lives without having to rely on jobs or a wage — which, during COVID times, is widely unreliable or, particularly in these communities is often not available, or it comes at great risk. That’s looting’s most basic tactical power as a political mode of action.

It also attacks the very way in which food and things are distributed. It attacks the idea of property, and it attacks the idea that in order for someone to have a roof over their head or have a meal ticket, they have to work for a boss, in order to buy things that people just like them somewhere else in the world had to make under the same conditions. It points to the way in which that’s unjust. And the reason that the world is organized that way, obviously, is for the profit of the people who own the stores and the factories. So you get to the heart of that property relation, and demonstrate that without police and without state oppression, we can have things for free.

Importantly, I think especially when it’s in the context of a Black uprising like the one we’re living through now, it also attacks the history of whiteness and white supremacy. The very basis of property in the U.S. is derived through whiteness and through Black oppression, through the history of slavery and settler domination of the country. Looting strikes at the heart of property, of whiteness and of the police. It gets to the very root of the way those three things are interconnected. And also it provides people with an imaginative sense of freedom and pleasure and helps them imagine a world that could be. And I think that’s a part of it that doesn’t really get talked about — that riots and looting are experienced as sort of joyous and liberatory.

What are some of the most common myths and tropes that you hear about looting?

One of the ones that’s been very powerful, that’s both been used by Donald Trump and Democrats, has been the outside agitator myth, that the people doing the riots are coming from the outside. This is a classic. This one goes back to slavery, when plantation owners would claim that it was Freedmen and Yankees coming South and giving the enslaved these crazy ideas — that they were real human beings — and that’s why they revolted.

Another trope that’s very common is that looters and rioters are not part of the protest, and they’re not part of the movement. That has to do with the history of protesters trying to appear respectable and politically legible as a movement, and not wanting to be too frightening or threatening.

Another one is that looters are just acting as consumers: Why are they taking flat-screen TVs instead of rice and beans? Like, if they were just surviving, it’d be one thing, but they’re taking liquor. All these tropes come down to claiming that the rioters and the looters don’t know what they’re doing. They’re acting, you know, in a disorganized way, maybe an « animalistic » way. But the history of the movement for liberation in America is full of looters and rioters. They’ve always been a part of our movement.

In your book, you note that a lot of people who consider themselves radical or progressive criticize looting. Why is this common?

I think a lot of that comes out of the civil rights movement. The popular understanding of the civil rights movement is that it was successful when it was nonviolent and less successful when it was focused on Black power. It’s a myth that we get taught over and over again from the first moment we learn about the civil rights movement: that it was a nonviolent movement, and that that’s what matters about it. And it’s just not true.

Nonviolence emerged in the ’50s and ’60s during the civil rights movement, [in part] as a way to appeal to Northern liberals. When it did work, like with the lunch counter sit-ins, it worked because Northern liberals could flatter themselves that racism was a Southern condition. This was also in the context of the Cold War and a mass anticolonial revolt going on all over Africa, Southeast Asia and Latin America. Suddenly all these new independent nations had just won liberation from Europe, and the U.S. had to compete with the Soviet Union for influence over them. So it was really in the U.S.’ interests to not be the country of Jim Crow, segregation and fascism, because they had to appeal to all these new Black and brown nations all over the world.

Those two things combined to make nonviolence a relatively effective tactic. Even under those conditions, Freedom Riders and student protesters were often protected by armed guards. We remember the Birmingham struggle of ’63, with the famous photos of Bull Connor releasing the police dogs and fire hoses on teenagers, as nonviolent. But that actually turned into the first urban riot in the movement. Kids got up, threw rocks and smashed police cars and storefront windows in that combat. There was fear that that kind of rioting would spread. That created the pressure for Robert F. Kennedy to write the civil rights bill and force JFK to sign it.

But there’s also another factor, which is anti-Blackness and contempt for poor people who want to live a better life, which looting immediately provides. One thing about looting is it freaks people out. But in terms of potential crimes that people can commit against the state, it’s basically nonviolent. You’re mass shoplifting. Most stores are insured; it’s just hurting insurance companies on some level. It’s just money. It’s just property. It’s not actually hurting any people.

During recent riots, a sentiment I heard a lot was that looters in cities like Minneapolis were hurting their own cause by destroying small businesses in their own neighborhoods, stores owned by immigrants and people of color. What would you say to people who make that argument?

People who made that argument for Minneapolis weren’t suddenly celebrating the looters in Chicago, who drove down to the richest part of Chicago, the Magnificent Mile, and attacked places like Tesla and Gucci — because it’s not really about that. It’s a convenient way of positioning yourself as though you are sympathetic.

But looters and rioters don’t attack private homes. They don’t attack community centers. In Minneapolis, there was a small independent bookstore that was untouched. All the blocks around it were basically looted or even leveled, burned down. And that store just remained untouched through weeks of rioting.

To say you’re attacking your own community is to say to rioters, you don’t know what you’re doing. But I disagree. I think people know. They might have worked in those shops. They might have shopped and been followed around by security guards or by the owner. You know, one of the causes of the L.A. riots was a Korean small-business owner [killing] 15-year-old Latasha Harlins, who had come in to buy orange juice. And that was a family-owned, immigrant-owned business where anti-Blackness and white supremacist violence was being perpetrated.

What would you say to people who are concerned about essential places like grocery stores or pharmacies being attacked in those communities?

When it comes to small business, family-owned business or locally owned business, they are no more likely to provide worker protections. They are no more likely to have to provide good stuff for the community than big businesses. It’s actually a Republican myth that has, over the last 20 years, really crawled into even leftist discourse: that the small-business owner must be respected, that the small-business owner creates jobs and is part of the community. But that’s actually a right-wing myth.

A business being attacked in the community is ultimately about attacking like modes of oppression that exist in the community. It is true and possible that there are instances historically when businesses have refused to reopen or to come back. But that is a part of the inequity of the society, that people live in places where there is only one place where they can get access to something [like food or medicine]. That question assumes well, what if you’re in a food desert? But the food desert is already an incredibly unjust situation. There’s this real tendency to try and blame people for fighting back, for revealing the inequity of the injustice that’s already been formed by the time that they’re fighting.

I have heard a lot of talk about white anarchists who weren’t part of the movement, but they just came in to smash windows and make a ruckus.

It’s a classic trope, because it jams up people who might otherwise be sort of sympathetic to looters. There’s a reason that Trump has embraced the « white anarchist » line so intensely. It does a double service: It both creates a boogeyman around which you can stir up fear and potential repression, and it also totally erases the Black folks who are at the core of the protests. It makes invisible the Black people who are rising up and who are initiating this movement, who are at its core and its center, and who are doing its most important and valuable organizing and its most dangerous fighting.

One thing that you’re really careful about in your book is how you talk about violence at riots. You make the distinction between violence against property, like smashing a window or stealing something, versus violence against a human body. And I’m wondering if you can talk a little bit about why making that distinction is important to you.

Obviously, we object to violence on some level. But it’s an incredibly broad category. As you pointed out, it can mean both breaking a window, lighting a dumpster on fire, or it can mean the police murdering Tamir Rice. That word is not strategically helpful. The word that can mean both those things cannot be guiding me morally.

There’s actually a police tactic for this, called controlled management. Police say, « We support peaceful, nonviolent protesters. We are out here to protect them and to protect them from the people who are being violent. » That’s a police strategy to divide the movement. So a nonviolent protest organizer will tell the police their march route. Police will stop traffic for them. So you’ve got a dozen heavily armed men standing here watching you march. That doesn’t make me feel safe. What about that is nonviolent? Activists themselves are doing no violence, but there is so much potential violence all around them.

Ultimately, what nonviolence ends up meaning is that the activist doesn’t do anything that makes them feel violent. And I think getting free is messier than that. We have to be willing to do things that scare us and that we wouldn’t do in normal, « peaceful » times, because we need to get free.

Voir de plus:

Mostly Peaceful: The Birth of an Excuse

Christine Rosen

Commentary

October 2020

In late August, when riots erupted in Kenosha, Wisconsin, CNN featured a reporter standing in front of a burning car lot above a chyron that read: “Fiery but mostly peaceful protests after police shooting.” The use of the chyron was striking in its peculiar earnestness, considering that the words “mostly peaceful protest” had long since become a bitter in-joke for right-leaning social media. Indeed, from the moment the first protests began in late May, mainstream media outlets have downplayed or ignored instances of violence or destructive looting. On May 29, MSNBC’s Ali Velshi was reporting from Minneapolis in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd when he insisted he was seeing “mostly a protest” that “is not, generally speaking, unruly” despite the fact that he was literally standing in front of a burning building at the time.

Yet Velshi was hesitant to ascribe blame to the arsonists and looters. “There is a deep sense of grievance and complaint here, and that is the thing,” he explained. “That when you discount people who are doing things to public property that they shouldn’t be doing, it does have to be understood that this city has got, for the last several years, an issue with police, and it’s got a real sense of the deep sense of grievance of inequality.”

Reporters such as the New York Times’ Julie Bosman openly struggled to describe what happened in places like Kenosha by using words like “riots” or “violence.” “And there was also unrest. There were trucks that were burned. There were fires that were set,” Bosman said, relying on the passive voice in an appearance on The Daily, the Times’ podcast. “People were throwing things at the police. It was a really tense scene.” So tense, in fact, that the next night, when protestors clashed with volunteer militia members and a 17-year-old named Kyle Rittenhouse shot three of them, killing two, Bosman wasn’t there to cover it. “It felt like the situation was a little out of control. So I decided to get in my car and leave,” she explained.

Why would a Times journalist need to flee from a “mostly peaceful” protest?

A few days after his network’s “mostly peaceful” chryron, CNN’s Chris Cillizza tweeted, “Trump’s effort to label what is happening in major cities as ‘riots’ speaks at least somewhat to his desperation, politically speaking.” Cillizza then linked to a CNN story whose featured image was a police officer in riot gear standing in front of a burning building in Kenosha. In July, NBC’s local television station in Oakland featured a headline that read: “Group Breaks Off of Mostly Peaceful Protest, Vandalizes Police Station, Sets Courthouse on Fire.” On June 3, the Wisconsin State Journal in Madison actually ran this headline: “Third night of looting follows third night of mostly peaceful protest.”

Despite the media’s strenuous effort to downplay their existence, the destructive riots and looting this summer were easily found by anyone willing to look. Six weeks into the summer’s protests, independent journalist Michael Tracey drove across the country documenting them. As he wrote in the UK digital magazine, Unherd: “From large metro areas like Chicago and Minneapolis/St. Paul, to small and mid-sized cities like Fort Wayne, Indiana, and Green Bay, Wisconsin, the number of boarded up, damaged or destroyed buildings I have personally observed—commercial, civic, and residential—is staggering.” Andy Ngo and other nonmainstream types have spent months documenting the destruction in cities like Portland and Seattle. And yet, the “peaceful protest” mantra has remained ubiquitous.

Moreover, when media outlets did acknowledge protest-related violence, they often implied that it was instigated by the members of law enforcement sent to respond to it. In a roundup about protests on a single day in early June, for example, the New York Times featured headlines such as “Police crack down after curfew in the Bronx” and “Police use tear gas to break up protest in Atlanta.” Later that month, the New York Times featured a tweet thread with video of protests in Seattle that included images of police in tactical gear and the statement: “Officers dressed for violence sometimes invite it.”

Some journalists sought not to deny that violence was happening, but to engage in whataboutism regarding its effects. GQ correspondent Julia Ioffe tweeted, “So in case you’re keeping track, being very frustrated by the continual and unpunished killing of Black people by police that you decide to burn and loot—bad. If you’re so frustrated by some protesters burn and loot that you decide to kill some of them—totally understandable.”

Reporters invested in the “mostly peaceful” narrative mocked people who were concerned about increases in violent crime and civil unrest. In September, CNN correspondent Josh Campbell tweeted a bucolic scene from a park in Portland and wrote, “Good morning from wonderful Portland, where the city is not under siege and buildings are not burning to the ground. I also ate my breakfast burrito outside today and so far haven’t been attacked by shadowy gangs of Antifa commandos.” At that point, nearby parts of the city had been effectively under siege by antifa and Black Lives Matter rioters for months, and a protestor had recently shot and killed a Trump supporter in cold blood.

Paul Krugman of the New York Times joined in, tweeting, “I went for a belated NYC run this morning, and am sorry to report that I saw very few black-clad anarchists. Also, the city is not yet in flames…claims of urban anarchy are almost entirely fantasy.”

Worse, journalists committed to the “mostly peaceful” narrative have targeted fellow journalists who don’t fall into line with the messaging. The most outrageous example came when the Intercept’s Lee Fang was denounced on social media as a racist by fellow staffer Akela Lacy after he reported on communities of color negatively affected by the rioting and looting. Lacey described Fang’s reporting as “continuing to push racist narratives” when Fang allowed a black resident of a looted neighborhood to raise concerns about the damage. Fang was forced to apologize.

The journalists who attempt to explain away or justify the violence that erupted during some protests do so because they believe the cause is righteous. As E. Alex Jung of New York magazine argued, “the entire journalistic frame of ‘objectivity’ and political neutrality is structured around white supremacy.” How can a good journalist do anything but promote a narrative sympathetic to protestors supposedly fighting it? Needless to say, such justifications and excuse-making would never happen if pro-life or pro–Second Amendment protestors turned to looting and violence.

The problem with such ideologically motivated narratives is that, once crafted, they require strenuous effort and often outrageous contortions to maintain. Ultimately, they have the effect of legitimizing extremism and lawlessness, which undermine whatever cause the majority of protestors who don’t partake in violence are promoting. It’s also offensive to those who must suffer the costs of the destruction. One assessment by the Andersen Economic Group of just one week of rioting and looting in major cities (from May 29 to June 3) placed the costs of the destruction at $400 million, an estimate that did not include the costs to state and local governments or the damage done in smaller cities and towns.

Social scientists swooped in to try and save the day for the “mostly peaceful” argument. A report by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, issued in September in partnership with Princeton University’s Bridging Divides Initiative, concluded that 93 percent of the summer’s protests were peaceful. The ACLED had made its agenda clear in June, when it issued a statement of solidarity with the same protests its report purports to analyze and called for “systemic and peaceful change.” Nonetheless, the report cannot suppress the facts it gathered; by the researchers’ own estimates, there were more than 500 violent riots related to Black Lives Matter gatherings across the country this summer.

But at least the others were “mostly peaceful.”

Voir encore:

Trump s’est réfugié dans un bunker de la Maison Blanche alors que les manifestations faisaient rage

France 24

1 juin 2020

Vendredi soir, des agents des Services secrets ont précipité le président américain Donald Trump dans un bunker de la Maison Blanche alors que des centaines de manifestants se rassemblaient devant le manoir exécutif, certains d’entre eux jetant des pierres et tirant sur les barricades de la police.Trump a passé près d’une heure dans le bunker, qui a été conçu pour être utilisé dans des situations d’urgence telles que des attaques terroristes, selon un républicain proche de la Maison Blanche qui n’était pas autorisé à discuter publiquement de questions privées et a parlé sous couvert d’anonymat. Le récit a été confirmé par un responsable de l’administration qui s’est également exprimé sous couvert d’anonymat.

La décision abrupte des agents a souligné l’humeur agitée à l’intérieur de la Maison Blanche, où les chants des manifestants à Lafayette Park ont ​​pu être entendus tout le week-end et les agents des services secrets et les forces de l’ordre ont eu du mal à contenir la foule.

Les manifestations de vendredi ont été déclenchées par la mort de George Floyd, un homme noir décédé après avoir été coincé au cou par un policier blanc de Minneapolis. Les manifestations à Washington sont devenues violentes et ont semblé surprendre les officiers. Ils ont déclenché l’une des alertes les plus élevées sur le complexe de la Maison Blanche depuis les attentats du 11 septembre 2001.

« La Maison Blanche ne commente pas les protocoles et décisions de sécurité », a déclaré le porte-parole de la Maison Blanche Judd Deere. Les services secrets ont déclaré ne pas discuter des moyens et méthodes de ses opérations de protection. Le déménagement du président dans le bunker a été signalé pour la première fois par le New York Times.

Le président et sa famille ont été ébranlés par la taille et le venin de la foule, selon le républicain. Il n’était pas immédiatement clair si la première dame Melania Trump et le fils de 14 ans du couple, Barron, avaient rejoint le président dans le bunker. Le protocole des services secrets aurait exigé que toutes les personnes sous la protection de l’agence soient dans l’abri souterrain.

Trump a déclaré à ses conseillers qu’il s’inquiétait pour sa sécurité, tout en louant en privé et en public le travail des services secrets.

Trump s’est rendu en Floride samedi pour voir le premier lancement spatial habité des États-Unis en près d’une décennie. Il est retourné dans une Maison Blanche sous siège virtuel, avec des manifestants – certains violents – rassemblés à quelques centaines de mètres de là pendant une grande partie de la nuit.

Les manifestants sont revenus dimanche après-midi, affrontant la police à Lafayette Park dans la soirée.

Trump a poursuivi ses efforts pour projeter sa force, en utilisant une série de tweets incendiaires et en livrant des attaques partisanes pendant une période de crise nationale.

Alors que les villes brûlaient nuit après nuit et que les images de violence dominaient la couverture télévisée, les conseillers de Trump ont discuté de la perspective d’une adresse au bureau ovale afin d’atténuer les tensions. L’idée a été rapidement abandonnée faute de propositions politiques et du désintérêt apparent du président pour délivrer un message d’unité.

Trump n’est pas apparu en public dimanche. Au lieu de cela, un responsable de la Maison Blanche qui n’était pas autorisé à discuter des plans à l’avance a déclaré que Trump devrait établir dans les prochains jours une distinction entre la colère légitime des manifestants pacifiques et les actions inacceptables des agitateurs violents.

Dimanche, Trump a retweeté un message d’un commentateur conservateur encourageant les autorités à répondre avec plus de force.

« Cela ne va pas s’arrêter tant que les gentils ne seront pas prêts à utiliser une force écrasante contre les méchants », a écrit Buck Sexton dans un message amplifié par le président.

Ces derniers jours, la sécurité à la Maison Blanche a été renforcée par la Garde nationale et du personnel supplémentaire des services secrets et de la police des parcs américains.

Dimanche, le ministère de la Justice a déployé des membres du US Marshals Service et des agents de la Drug Enforcement Administration pour compléter les troupes de la Garde nationale à l’extérieur de la Maison Blanche, selon un haut responsable du ministère de la Justice. Le fonctionnaire n’a pas pu discuter de la question en public et a parlé sous couvert d’anonymat.

——

Lemire a rapporté de New York. L’écrivain d’Associated Press Michael Balsamo a contribué à ce rapport

Voir par ailleurs:

The Mob on the Hill Was Far From a Coup

The only description that makes sense is a venting of pent-up resentments.

Edward N. Luttwak

The Wall Street Journal

Jan. 7, 2021

Insurrections are common but Wednesday’s aborted insurrection on Capitol Hill was unique. The usual purpose of mobilizing a mass of people and deploying their sheer momentum against the edifices of power, a royal or presidential palace, or a parliament is to seize power—through the act of seizing that iconic building. But that is logically impossible when the ruler is not the enemy to be replaced but rather the intended beneficiary of the insurrection.

What happened was certainly not an attempted coup d’état, either. Coups must be subterranean, silent conspiracies that emerge only when the executors move into the seats of power to start issuing orders as the new government. A very large, very noisy and colorful gathering cannot attempt a coup.

There have been quite a few cases around the world of what is best described as mass intimidation directed against parliaments. But in all such cases it was some specific law that was wanted or not wanted, which legislators under the gun might then vote for or against. For that to happen, the legislators have to be all gathered in the legislature and kept there to be coerced. Most recently in Beirut last August, Lebanon’s Parliament was besieged by a crowd demanding and forcing the government’s resignation. This conspicuously did not happen in Washington on Wednesday because it was a crowd that invaded the building, not snatch teams sent to seize individual legislators to be cajoled or forced into their seats.

Given all these exclusions, only one description remains: a venting of accumulated resentments. Those who voted for President Trump saw his electoral victory denied in 2016 by numerous loud voices calling for “resistance” as if the president-elect were an invading foreign army. These voices were eagerly relayed and magnified by mass media, emphatically including pro-Trump media.

Then they saw his victory sullied by constantly repeated accusations of collusion with Russia from chairmen of intelligence committees and ex-intelligence chiefs who habitually accused Mr. Trump of being Vladimir Putin’s agent, claiming they had secret information, which, alas, they could not disclose. They deplored Mr. Trump’s “subservience” to Mr. Putin weekly for four years while refusing to entertain the possibility that in a confrontation with China, it might be a good idea to overlook Mr. Putin’s sins, as Nixon embraced Mao to counter the Soviet Union.

When Joe Biden is inaugurated on Jan. 20, Wednesday’s venting of resentments may prove to have been beneficial. Mr. Biden’s own conspicuous refusal to adopt the language of resistance in 2016—and his abstention from false accusations of collusion with Russia, even under extreme provocation about his son—makes it that much easier for the new president to be the healer he convincingly promised to be.

Overwrought talk of a coup attempt or an insurrectional threat seems to induce a pleasurable shiver in some people. But on Wall Street the market was supremely unimpressed: Stocks went up, because investors know it will all be over in two weeks.

Mr. Luttwak’s books include “Coup d’État: A Practical Handbook” (1968) and “The Endangered American Dream” (1993).

Voir aussi:

Le dernier front des syndicats américains

Le Midwest est le théâtre d’un bras de fer épique entre gouverneurs républicains et syndicats. Reportage dans le Wisconsin, épicentre de cette bataille qui préfigure la présidentielle de 2012.

Laure Mandeville

Le Figaro

08/03/2011

À Madison (Wisconsin)

Arpentant jeudi dernier la place centrale de Madison, où trône le Capitole, un bâtiment d’un blanc éclatant coiffé d’une coupole qui rappelle le Congrès de Washington, le conseiller en stratégie politique républicain Scott Becher désigne du doigt les manifestants armés de pancartes et les camions des grandes chaînes de télé américaines garés sur le parvis. «Regardez-moi ça! CNN, ABC, NPR… Ils sont tous là et depuis trois semaines. Madison est devenu l’épicentre de la politique américaine. Peut-être l’élection présidentielle de 2012 vient-elle de commencer dans le Wisconsin.»

De l’intérieur de l’imposante bâtisse du Parlement de cet État politiquement crucial dans l’Amérique du Midwest, que se disputent régulièrement démocrates et républicains, parvient le bruit assourdissant de tam-tam africains sur lesquels des manifestants tapent en cadence. «Le Capitole envahi chaque jour par des milliers de personnes, 100.000 protestataires pendant les week-ends… C’est incroyable pour notre État, on n’avait jamais rien vu de pareil, en tout cas pas depuis l’époque des droits civiques ou du Vietnam», insiste Scott, abasourdi. «On n’est pas en Europe ici, et les syndicats n’ont cessé de perdre de leur influence, ce qui rend le phénomène d’autant plus impressionnant», confirme le journaliste Jason Stein, accrédité au Parlement pour le Journal Sentinel.

Depuis trois semaines, le Wisconsin vit en état de guerre politique et de paralysie législative. L’homme qui a déclenché la tempête est le nouveau gouverneur républicain, Scott Walker, un brun et fringant conservateur, fils de prêcheur baptiste soutenu par les Tea Party, qui se voit comme un «nouveau Reagan», investi d’une mission historique de rééquilibrage des finances publiques. Dopé par sa victoire en novembre, avec quelque 52% des suffrages (les républicains ont également pris les deux Chambres du Congrès local), il a tenté de faire passer en force une loi d’ajustement budgétaire qui coupe dans le vif des avantages accordés aux employés du secteur public. Invoquant la nécessité de partager l’effort budgétaire, le projet Walker prévoit de forcer les fonctionnaires à payer de leur poche 12,6% de leurs primes d’assurance-maladie, alors qu’ils cotisent à hauteur de 6% – et les salariés du privé de 29%. Ils devraient aussi contribuer pour leurs retraites à hauteur de 5,6% (zéro aujourd’hui).

Droits de négociation collectifs

La mesure n’aurait sans doute pas ému grand monde, dans une Amérique qui affectionne peu l’État-providence, les fonctionnaires comme les syndicats et comprend l’urgence de combler ses trous budgétaires, évalués par le gouverneur pour le seul Wisconsin à 137 millions de dollars cette année – 3,6 milliards pour les deux prochaines. Mais, en décidant de priver carrément les fonctionnaires locaux de leurs droits de négociation collectifs, le gouverneur a franchi une ligne rouge. «Même si beaucoup de gens sont méfiants à l’égard des syndicats, les milliers d’enseignants et d’employés concernés ont tiqué à l’idée de se retrouver sans recours, alors qu’ils ont été paupérisés par la crise financière de 2008», note la jeune représentante démocrate Kelda Helen Roys, installée dans son bureau où des activistes ont placardé des posters la remerciant de son soutien. «Les professeurs avaient conservé leur statut de membres des classes moyennes exclusivement grâce à leur endettement. Mais, avec la tempête financière qui a dévasté le secteur immobilier, la façade est tombée, dévoilant leur condition véritable», poursuit-elle, jugeant cet élément «capital» pour expliquer la mobilisation.

Les coupes sombres prévues dans le budget de l’éducation (834 millions de dollars), point sensible dans un État qui se vante d’avoir des universités publiques créatrices d’activité économique à haute valeur ajoutée, ont décuplé les inquiétudes, de même que l’annonce par le gouverneur de la vente des 37 centrales productrices d’électricité à des intérêts privés, décision qui fait craindre des licenciements massifs. La gauche a lu aussi avec effroi dans cette volonté de casser les syndicats, l’amorce d’une offensive républicaine destinée à priver le parti d’Obama de l’un de ses plus puissants contributeurs à un an de la présidentielle. «Pour moi, il s’agit de casser la machine électorale du Parti démocrate», affirme John Vander Meer, ex-conseiller d’un élu libéral.

Résultat, le projet Walker est devenu l’étincelle qui a embrasé le Wisconsin, suscitant une protestation qui a débouché sur une occupation pacifique du Parlement. Des pancartes notant que «l’éducation qui est l’avenir de nos enfants» tapissent les murs. Des milliers de post-it multicolores signés par les manifestants ont été collés sur les lourdes portes de bois du bâtiment. À l’intérieur, sous la Coupole, des happenings tenant autant du cirque que du combat politique, ont ameuté enseignants, pompiers et étudiants, ainsi que des centaines d’ex-activistes chevelus et barbus, qui semblent tout droit sortis de manifestations contre la guerre au Vietnam. «Le spectacle a été surréaliste, on a tout vu ici, même un chameau sous la rotonde», confie Jason, correspondant du Sentinel.

«Chacun a ses raisons d’être là»

Bonnet de laine sur la tête, enveloppée dans son manteau car il ne fait pas chaud sur la couverture qui lui tient lieu de QG, Sarah rêve d’une douche. Cette étudiante en médecine, qui est là «par solidarité avec ses professeurs», et parce qu’elle craint «un effondrement économique de l’État si on touche aux universités», a passé six jours et six nuits au pied d’un pilier de marbre vert. Elle montre les matelas, les réserves de pommes, d’oranges et de céréales offertes par des bénévoles. Il y a même un «coin calme» réservé aux enfants des protestataires. «Chacun a ses raisons d’être là», dit Sarah. Elle salue les policiers, qui gardent patiemment les lieux, des boules Quies dans les oreilles à cause du tam-tam. L’un d’eux glisse qu’il soutient les protestations. Un autre est au contraire favorable à un retour de l’ordre. «Le gouverneur a été élu, pourquoi ne pas le laisser travailler, les élections, cela a un sens», dit-il. «Le gouverneur n’avait jamais dit qu’il toucherait à ces droits syndicaux pendant sa campagne; nous ne pouvons le laisser casser 50 ans de d’acquis sociaux», réplique Céleste, une employée du privé, qui arbore un tee-shirt «Kill the bill», («Tuons la loi»).

Le projet de Walker a été voté à la Chambre des représentants du Wisconsin, mais les sénateurs démocrates, invoquant le caractère «exceptionnel» de la situation, ont fui vers l’Illinois pour empêcher un vote au Sénat. Furieux, le gouverneur a menacé de lancer la police à leurs trousses, initié un blocage du versement de leurs salaires et annoncé le compte à rebours pour 12.000 licenciements dans le secteur public si la loi ne passe pas. Son pari est que les mouvements ne sont qu’un baroud d’honneur des syndicats minoritaires et que la majorité silencieuse le soutient. De leur côté, les élus démocrates invoquent de récents sondages pour «souligner la légitimité de la politique de la chaise vide». Selon une enquête de l’Institut Rasmussen, près de 57% de la population de l’État seraient hostiles à la politique de Walker concernant les droits de négociation collectifs, alors qu’il est soutenu sur les augmentations des contributions à la santé et aux retraites.

«C’est comme la guerre de Corée!»

Résultat, l’impasse est totale. Les élus démocrates ont indiqué leur volonté de revenir à Madison, mais il est difficile de passer à l’acte sans avoir l’impression de capituler. «Quand on a tracé des lignes aussi intransigeantes, on se demande quelle peut être la sortie de crise, c’est comme la guerre de Corée!», note le stratège républicain Scott Becher. Il dit ne jamais avoir vu une telle division, malgré la tradition de combat social du Wisconsin, un État manufacturier pionnier dans la promotion des droits syndicaux.

De Madison à Washington, les observateurs se demandent si la bataille du Wisconsin va faire «tache d’huile», au-delà de la victoire probable du gouverneur à court terme. Certains prédisent que son courage politique lui vaudra au minimum une place de vice-président sur un ticket républicain. D’autres pensent au contraire qu’il surestime sa «main» et qu’il sera «révoqué» d’ici à un an, selon une procédure lancée par les démocrates visant à rassembler les signatures de 25% des votants, pour convoquer une nouvelle élection… Des révoltes sociales très comparables ont en tout cas éclaté dans l’Ohio et l’Indiana, mettant leurs gouverneurs républicains sur la défensive. Le conflit intéresse aussi les gouverneurs du Texas, Rick Perry, et du New Jersey, Chris Christie, qui se sont bien gardés, malgré leurs promesses de rigueur budgétaire, de toucher aux conventions collectives du secteur public. «Ce mouvement a indéniablement redynamisé la base démocrate», note Adam Schrager, journaliste de télévision local, qui se demande si la bataille du Wisconsin pourrait avoir le même «effet boule de neige» que la bataille de la santé a eu pour la mobilisation des Tea Party. «Ce qui se profile, c’est un discours de guerre de classe pour 2012, avec d’un côté les démocrates dénonçant Wall Street et les intérêts spéciaux, de l’autre les républicains fustigeant les syndicats.»

Conscient de l’importance de l’affrontement, mais soucieux de ne pas se mêler d’un combat dont l’issue reste incertaine, le président Obama est resté relativement discret. «Le président a d’autres chats à fouetter, il doit gérer les révoltes du Middle-East (Moyen-Orient). Nous nous occuperons du Midwest», dit Céleste en agitant le poing. Le journaliste Adam Schrager s’inquiète, quant à lui, de cette ambiance guerrière. Il a été stupéfait qu’un seul élu, le républicain Dale Schultz – «le seul adulte de toute cette histoire» – ait proposé un compromis. «Cela en dit long sur le fonctionnement politique général de notre pays, dit le reporter frustré. Nous ne cessons de recommencer les batailles du passé. Chaque nouvel élu se sent investi d’un mandat idéologique, alors que les gens veulent seulement que les partis s’allient pour résoudre les problèmes profonds qui se posent.»

Voir encore:

Cairo in Wisconsin
Andy Kroll
CBS news
February 27, 2011

The call reportedly arrived from Cairo. Pizza for the protesters, the voice said. It was Saturday, February 20th, and by then Ian’s Pizza on State Street in Madison, Wisconsin, was overwhelmed.

One employee had been assigned the sole task of answering the phone and taking down orders. And in they came, from all 50 states and the District of Columbia, from Morocco, Haiti, Turkey, Belgium, Uganda, China, New Zealand, and even a research station in Antarctica. More than 50 countries around the globe.  Ian’s couldn’t make pizza fast enough, and the generosity of distant strangers with credit cards was paying for it all.

Those pizzas, of course, were heading for the Wisconsin state capitol, an elegant domed structure at the heart of this Midwestern college town. For nearly two weeks, tens of thousands of raucous, sleepless, grizzled, energized protesters have called the stately capitol building their home. As the police moved in to clear it out on Sunday afternoon, it was still the pulsing heart of the largest labor protest in my lifetime, the focal point of rallies and concerts against a politically-charged piece of legislation proposed by Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, a hard-right Republican.

That bill, officially known as the Special Session Senate Bill 11, would, among other things, eliminate collective bargaining rights for most of the state’s public-sector unions, in effect eviscerating the unions themselves. »Kill the bill! » the protesters chant en masse, day after day, while the drums pound and cowbells clang. « What’s disgusting? Union busting! »

One world, one pain

The spark for Wisconsin’s protests came on February 11th.  That was the day the Associated Press published a brief story quoting Walker as saying he would call in the National Guard to crack down on unruly workers upset that their bargaining rights were being stripped away. Labor and other left-leaning groups seized on Walker’s incendiary threat, and within a week there were close to 70,000 protesters filling the streets of Madison.

Six thousand miles away, February 11th was an even more momentous day. Weary but jubilant protesters on the streets of Cairo, Alexandria, and other Egyptian cities celebrated the toppling of Hosni Mubarak, the autocrat who had ruled over them for more than 30 years and amassed billions in wealth at their expense. « We have brought down the regime, » cheered the protesters in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, the center of the Egyptian uprising. In calendar terms, the demonstrations in Wisconsin, you could say, picked up right where the Egyptians left off.

I arrived in Madison several days into the protests. I’ve watched the crowds swell, nearly all of those arriving — and some just not leaving — united against Governor Walker’s « budget repair bill. » I’ve interviewed protesters young and old, union members and grassroots organizers, students and teachers, children and retirees. I’ve huddled with labor leaders in their Madison « war rooms, » and sat through the governor’s press conferences. I’ve slept on the cold, stone floor of the Wisconsin state capitol (twice). Believe me, the spirit of Cairo is here. The air is charged with it.

It was strongest inside the Capitol. A previously seldom-visited building had been miraculously transformed into a genuine living, breathing community.  There was a medic station, child day care, a food court, sleeping quarters, hundreds of signs and banners, live music, and a sense of camaraderie and purpose you’d struggle to find in most American cities, possibly anywhere else in this country. Like Cairo’s Tahrir Square in the weeks of the Egyptian uprising, most of what happens inside the Capitol’s walls is protest.

Egypt is a presence here in all sorts of obvious ways, as well as ways harder to put your finger on.  The walls of the capital, to take one example, offer regular reminders of Egypt’s feat. I saw, for instance, multiple copies of that famous photo on Facebook of an Egyptian man, his face half-obscured, holding a sign that reads: « EGYPT Supports Wisconsin Workers: One World, One Pain. » The picture is all the more striking for what’s going on around the man with the sign: a sea of cheering demonstrators are waving Egyptian flags, hands held aloft. The man, however, faces in the opposite direction, as if showing support for brethren halfway around the world was important enough to break away from the historic celebrations erupting around him.

Similarly, I’ve seen multiple copies of a statement by Kamal Abbas, the general coordinator for Egypt’s Center for Trade Unions and Workers Services, taped to the walls of the state capitol. Not long after Egypt’s January Revolution triumphed and Wisconsin’s protests began, Abbas announced his group’s support for the Wisconsin labor protesters in a page-long declaration that said in part: « We want you to know that we stand on your side. Stand firm and don’t waiver. Don’t give up on your rights. Victory always belongs to the people who stand firm and demand their just rights. »

Then there’s the role of organized labor more generally. After all, widespread strikes coordinated by labor unions shut down Egyptian government agencies and increased the pressure on Mubarak to relinquish power. While we haven’t seen similar strikes yet here in Madison — though there’s talk of a general strike if Walker’s bill somehow passes — there’s no underestimating the role of labor unions like the AFL-CIO, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, and the American Federation of Teachers in organizing the events of the past two weeks.

Faced with a bill that could all but wipe out unions in historically labor-friendly states across the Midwest, labor leaders knew they had to act — and quickly. « Our very labor movement is at stake, » Stephanie Bloomingdale, secretary-treasurer of Wisconsin’s AFL-CIO branch, told me. « And when that’s at stake, the economic security of Americans is at stake. »

« The Mubarak of the midwest »

On the Sunday after I arrived, I was wandering the halls of the Capitol when I met Scott Graham, a third-grade teacher who lives in Lacrosse, Wisconsin. Over the cheers of the crowd, I asked Graham whether he saw a connection between the events in Egypt and those here in Wisconsin. His response caught the mood of the moment. « Watching Egypt’s story for a week or two very intently, I was inspired by the Egyptian people, you know, striving for their own self-determination and democracy in their country, » Graham told me. « I was very inspired by that. And when I got here I sensed that everyone’s in it together. The sense of solidarity is just amazing. »

A few days later, I stood outside the capitol building in the frigid cold and talked about Egypt with two local teachers. The most obvious connection between Egypt and Wisconsin was the role and power of young people, said Ann Wachter, a federal employee who joined our conversation when she overheard me mention Egypt. There, it was tech-savvy young people who helped keep the protests alive and the same, she said, applied in Madison. « You go in there everyday and it’s the youth that carries it throughout hours that we’re working, or we’re running our errands, whatever we do.  They do whatever they do as young people to keep it alive. After all, I’m at the end of my working career; it’s their future. »

And of course, let’s not forget those almost omnipresent signs that link the young governor of Wisconsin to the aging Hosni Mubarak. They typically label Walker the « Mubarak of the Midwest » or « Mini-Mubarak, » or demand the recall of « Scott ‘Mubarak.' » In a public talk on Thursday night, journalist Amy Goodman quipped, « Walker would be wise to negotiate. It’s not a good season for tyrants. »

One protester I saw on Thursday hoisted aloft a « No Union Busting! » sign with a black shoe perched atop it, the heel facing forward — a severe sign of disrespect that Egyptian protesters directed at Mubarak and a symbol that, before the recent American TV blitz of « rage and revolution » in the Middle East, would have had little meaning here.

Which isn’t to say that the Egypt-Wisconsin comparison is a perfect one. Hardly. After all, the Egyptian demonstrators massed in hopes of a new and quite different world; the American ones, no matter the celebratory and energized air in Madison, are essentially negotiating loss (of pensions and health-care benefits, if not collective bargaining rights). The historic demonstrations in Madison have been nothing if not peaceful. On Saturday, when as many as 100,000 people descended on Madison to protest Walker’s bill, the largest turnout so far, not a single arrest was made.  In Egypt, by contrast, the protests were plenty bloody, with more than 300 deaths during the 29-day uprising.

Not that some observers didn’t see the need for violence in Madison. Last Saturday, Jeff Cox, a deputy attorney general in Indiana, suggested on his Twitter account that police « use live ammunition » on the protesters occupying the state Capitol. That sentiment, discovered by a colleague of mine, led to an outcry. The story broke on Wednesday morning; by Wednesday afternoon Cox had been fired.

New York Times columnist David Brooks was typical of mainstream coverage and punditry in quickly dismissing any connection between Egypt (or Tunisia) and Wisconsin.  On the Daily Show, Jon Stewart spoofed and rejected the notion that the Wisconsin protests had any meaningful connection to Egypt. He called the people gathered here « the bizarro Tea Party. » Stewart’s crew even brought in a camel as a prop. Those of us in Madison watched as Stewart’s skit went horribly wrong when the camel got entangled in a barricade and fell to the ground.

As far as I know, neither Brooks nor Stewart spent time here.  Still, you can count on one thing: if the demonstrators in Tahrir Square had been enthusiastically citing Americans as models for their protest, nobody here would have been in such a dismissive or mocking mood.  In other parts of this country, perhaps it still feels less than comfortable to credit Egyptians or Arabs with inspiring an American movement for justice. If you had been here in Madison, this last week, you might have felt differently.

Pizza town protest

Obviously, the outcomes in Egypt and Wisconsin won/t be comparable. Egypt toppled a dictator; Wisconsin has a democratically elected governor who, at the very earliest, can’t be recalled until 2012. And so the protests in Wisconsin are unlikely to transform the world around us. Still, there can be no question, as they spread elsewhere in the Midwest, that they have reenergized the country’s stagnant labor movement, a once-powerful player in American politics and business that’s now a shell of its former self. « There’s such energy right now, » one SEIU staffer told me a few nights ago. « This is a magic moment. »

Not long after talking with her, I trudged back to Ian’s Pizza, the icy snow crunching under my feet. At the door stood an employee with tired eyes, a distinct five o’clock shadow, and a beanie on his head.

I wanted to ask him, I said, about that reported call from Cairo. « You know, » he responded, « I really don’t remember it. » I waited while he politely rebuffed several approaching customers, telling them how Ian’s had run out of dough and how, in any case, all the store’s existing orders were bound for the capitol. When he finally had a free moment, he returned to the Cairo order.  There had, he said, been questions about whether it was authentic or not, and then he added, « I’m pretty sure it was from Cairo, but it’s not like I can guarantee it. » By then, another wave of soon-to-be disappointed customers was upon us, and so I headed back to the capitol and another semi-sleepless night.

The building, as I approached in the darkness, was brightly lit, reaching high over the city. Protesters were still filing inside with all the usual signs. In the rotunda, drums pounded and people chanted and the sound swirled into a massive roar. For this brief moment at least, people here in Madison are bound together by a single cause, as other protesters were not so long ago, and may be again, in the ancient cities of Egypt.

Right then, the distance separating Cairo and Wisconsin couldn’t have felt smaller. But maybe you had to be there.

Bio:Andy Kroll is a reporter in the D.C. bureau of Mother Jones magazine and an associate editor at TomDispatch.com. This piece originally appeared on TomDispatch.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.

Voir enfin:

D.C. police and businesses prepare for possible Election Day unrest

Peter Hermann and Emily Davies

The Washington Post

Oct. 30, 2020

Concerned about the possibility of unrest on Election Day, or in the days that follow, businesses in some areas of D.C. are boarding their windows. Officials are advising shop owners to sign up for crime alerts and to keep their insurance information handy.

D.C. police have limited leave for officers starting this weekend to ensure adequate staffing, and the District spent $100,000 on less-lethal munitions and chemical irritants for riot control to replenish a stockpile depleted by clashes over the summer.

As a turbulent election season draws to a close, authorities across the country worry frustration may spill onto the streets, and officials are watching for disturbances at the polls or protests in their communities. That tension is heightened in the nation’s capital, where the White House and other symbols of government regularly draw demonstrators.

“It is widely believed that there will be civil unrest after the November election regardless of who wins,” D.C. Police Chief Peter Newsham told lawmakers this month. “It is also believed that there is a strong chance of unrest when Washington, D.C., hosts the inauguration in January.”

Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) said the District’s public safety officials have been discussing plans for post-election unrest “for many weeks if not months.” The D.C. National Guard is already called up because of the coronavirus crisis and could be deployed, though Bowser expects to use them only for traffic control, if at all.

On Thursday, D.C. police announced possible street closures and parking restrictions that are expected to cover much of downtown Washington on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Police brace for potential Election Day unrest in a year when ‘everything is uncertain’

Officials have not recommended that shop owners board up their buildings, according to a resource guide for businesses distributed by city leaders this week. Some small-business owners are heeding their guidance, focused on bolstering sales as winter approaches. Others are boarding anyway, and concrete barriers were being installed outside the U.S. Chamber of Commerce building across from Lafayette Square.

“We do not have any intelligence on planned activity to suggest the need to board up; however, we remain vigilant,” John Falcicchio, the deputy mayor for planning and economic development, said in a statement. “We understand the difficult position building owners and operating businesses are in, and we call upon all who participate in First Amendment activities to denounce violence and report it immediately should it occur.”

Officials say they are concerned that a politically polarized electorate coupled with divisive rhetoric and President Trump questioning the integrity of the election could create flash points in the District and elsewhere.

Newsham said several groups have applied for demonstration permits starting Sunday and for days after the election. The National Park Service is considering permit applications from several organizations with various views on the election.

Shutdown DC is planning weeks’ worth of demonstrations around the White House and Black Lives Plaza starting Tuesday. “After you vote, hit the streets,” the group posted on its website.

George Washington University sent students a message recommending they prepare for Election Day as they would for a snowstorm or hurricane and stockpile a week’s worth of food, supplies and medicine.

Federal and local authorities in and around the District are also taking pains to reassure the public they are working for a secure and safe election. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) joined state and federal officials to say a “confident public is more likely to vote” and trust the outcome. D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine (D) reminded residents that destroying election signs is illegal. And Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn J. Mosby is telling prosecutors to pay close attention to crimes that “occur in the context of the election.”

The acting U.S. attorney for the District, Michael R. Sherwin, announced that a federal prosecutor will oversee election-related complaints and allegations of election fraud in D.C.

Shouting matches, partisan rallies, guns at polling places: Tensions high at early-voting sites

The District endured months of sustained demonstrations after the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, which targeted areas outside the White House but also impacted the downtown business district and neighborhoods such as Georgetown, Adams Morgan and Shaw.

The demonstrations were mostly peaceful, but outbreaks of violence — much of it attributed to agitators more intent on destruction than protest — resulted in hundreds of arrests after nights of fires, looted stores and clashes with police. D.C. police said that on May 30 and May 31, the two most volatile days, 204 businesses were burglarized and 216 properties were damaged.

In recent days, crowds gathered outside a police station in Northwest Washington to protest the death of a young man in a moped crash after police attempted to stop him because he was not wearing a helmet. Those protests resulted in clashes with police, broken windows and damaged police cars.

There also were store windows smashed in Georgetown on Wednesday night, casting some doubt on the city’s recommendations for business owners to maintain calm in advance of the election. It was unclear whether those causing the damage, which business leaders described as attempted looting, had any link to those demonstrating at the police station.

A handful of Georgetown businesses requested plywood after Wednesday night’s events. One boarded up overnight.

“It seems like we are sitting on a tinderbox, and there are so many different things that could potentially cause problems,” said Rachel Shank, executive director of Georgetown Main Street. “We saw some serious devastation back in May and June, and we are trying to avoid that, but we are also trying to avoid Georgetown looking like a ghost town.”

Business improvement district leaders across the city are working with contractors to implement what they describe as standard protocol in advance of any anticipated large gathering in the area, which includes tying up loose ends at construction sites to remove material that could easily be used for destruction.

Josh Turnbull, a general manager at Oxford Properties Group, oversees three buildings in downtown D.C., including one on the edge of Black Lives Matter Plaza. He never removed plywood from the property closest to the White House and said he planned to board up the other two this week in anticipation of unrest around the election.

“It’s really like an insurance policy,” he said. “The cost-benefit analysis here just makes sense.”

On Monday, security contractors were hard at work down 17th Street, fastening plywood to open glass. By Friday, businesses could be seen boarded up along K and L streets downtown.

Other business owners are planning to avoid fortification, putting faith in D.C. leadership to guide them through the next few weeks and hoping that keeping their windows open may contribute to a more peaceful November.

“It has been such a difficult year, so financially challenging, that the attitude right now is we will wait until the last possible moment or until we hear something definitive from the government,” said Alexander Padro, executive director of Shaw Main Streets, where more than three dozen businesses were damaged in late May and June.

In May, rioters smashed windows at Dan Simons’s downtown restaurant, Founding Farmers. When a member of his team emailed him asking whether he planned to reinstall plywood on his windows in advance of Election Day, he balked.

“Sometimes, by preparing for war, you create war,” he said recently, providing insight into his decision, at least for now, to avoid fortification. “And I am not that guy. Might that make me a fool? Yes. But that is probably a risk worth taking.”

A few blocks away, Michelle Brown stood in her downtown restaurant, Teaism, which was still charred and damaged from when rioters set it on fire one night in May. Four months later, on the last Monday in October, there was still no HVAC unit, no 20-year-old tea chest that greeted customers on the back wall and no stream of revenue to help her through the daily slog of pandemic-time entrepreneurship.

Brown supports the Black Lives Matter movement (a sentiment she shared in a series of viral tweets after the restaurant was damaged). Now, anticipating a month that could bring about even more unrest, she harbors the same steady focus on the importance of free expression.

“This is just part and parcel of being a neighbor to the White House,” she said.

Brown said the owner of her building added fencing to brace for Election Day. But like many of her neighbors near the White House, she is listening carefully for guidance from city officials and “rumorville on the street” to determine whether she should take additional precautions.

“It’s all just wait and see now,” Brown said, watching a truck full of red cones and plywood drive past her shuttered store.

Julie Zauzmer and Susan Svrluga contributed to this report.

Voir par ailleurs:

Majority of Young Americans View Trump as Illegitimate President: Poll

NBC news/AP

March 19, 2017

Jermaine Anderson keeps going back to the same memory of Donald Trump, then a candidate for president of the United States, referring to some Mexican immigrants as rapists and murderers.

« You can’t be saying that (if) you’re the president, » said Anderson, a 21-year-old student from Coconut Creek, Florida.

That Trump is undeniably the nation’s 45th president doesn’t sit easily with young Americans like Anderson who are the nation’s increasingly diverse electorate of the future, according to a new poll.

A majority of young adults — 57 percent — see Trump’s presidency as illegitimate, including about three-quarters of blacks and large majorities of Latinos and Asians, the GenForward poll found.

GenForward is a poll of adults age 18 to 30 conducted by the Black Youth Project at the University of Chicago with The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

A slim majority of young whites in the poll, 53 percent, consider Trump a legitimate president, but even among that group 55 percent disapprove of the job he’s doing, according to the survey.

« That’s who we voted for. And obviously America wanted him more than Hillary Clinton, » said Rebecca Gallardo, a 30-year-old nursing student from Kansas City, Missouri, who voted for Trump.

Trump’s legitimacy as president was questioned earlier this year by Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga.: « I think the Russians participated in helping this man get elected. And they helped destroy the candidacy of Hillary Clinton. »

Trump routinely denies that and says he captured the presidency in large part by winning states such as Michigan and Wisconsin that Clinton may have taken for granted.

Overall, just 22 percent of young adults approve of the job Trump is doing as president, while 62 percent disapprove.

Trump’s rhetoric as a candidate and his presidential decisions have done much to keep the question of who belongs in America atop the news, though he’s struggling to accomplish some key goals. Powered by supporters chanting, « build the wall, » Trump has vowed to erect a barrier along the southern U.S. border and make Mexico pay for it — which Mexico refuses to do. Federal judges in three states have blocked Trump’s executive orders to ban travel to the U.S. from seven — then six — majority-Muslim nations.

In Honolulu, U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson this week cited « significant and unrebutted evidence of religious animus » behind the travel ban, citing Trump’s own words calling for « a complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States. »

And yes, Trump did say in his campaign announcement speech on June 6, 2015: « When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best…They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people. » He went farther in subsequent statements, later telling CNN: « Some are good and some are rapists and some are killers. »

It’s extraordinary rhetoric for the leader of a country where by around 2020, half of the nation’s children will be part of a minority race or ethnic group, the Census Bureau projects. Non-Hispanic whites are expected to be a minority by 2044.

Of all of Trump’s tweets and rhetoric, the statements about Mexicans are the ones to which Anderson returns. He says Trump’s business background on paper is impressive enough to qualify him for the presidency. But he suggests that’s different than Trump earning legitimacy as president.

« I’m thinking, he’s saying that most of the people in the world who are raping and killing people are the immigrants. That’s not true, » said Anderson, whose parents are from Jamaica.

Megan Desrochers, a 21-year-old student from Lansing, Michigan, says her sense of Trump’s illegitimacy is more about why he was elected.

« I just think it was kind of a situation where he was voted in based on his celebrity status verses his ethics, » she said, adding that she is not necessarily against Trump’s immigration policies.

The poll participants said in interviews that they don’t necessarily vote for one party’s candidates over another’s, a prominent tendency among young Americans, experts say. And in the survey, neither party fares especially strongly.

Just a quarter of young Americans have a favorable view of the Republican Party, and 6 in 10 have an unfavorable view. Majorities of young people across racial and ethnic lines hold negative views of the GOP.

The Democratic Party performs better, but views aren’t overwhelmingly positive. Young people are more likely to have a favorable than an unfavorable view of the Democratic Party by a 47 percent to 36 percent margin. But just 14 percent say they have a strongly favorable view of the Democrats.

Views of the Democratic Party are most favorable among young people of color. Roughly 6 in 10 blacks, Asians and Latinos hold positive views of the party. Young whites are somewhat more likely to have unfavorable than favorable views, 47 percent to 39 percent.

As for Trump, 8 in 10 young people think he is doing poorly in terms of the policies he’s put forward and 7 in 10 have negative views of his presidential demeanor.

« I do not like him as a person, » says Gallardo of Trump. She nonetheless voted for Trump because she didn’t trust Clinton. « I felt like there wasn’t much choice. »

The poll of 1,833 adults age 18-30 was conducted Feb. 16 through March 6 using a sample drawn from the probability-based GenForward panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. young adult population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4 percentage points.

The survey was paid for by the Black Youth Project at the University of Chicago, using grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Ford Foundation.

Respondents were first selected randomly using address-based sampling methods, and later interviewed online or by phone.

Voir enfin:

What Schumer really meant when he told Kavanaugh and Gorsuch ‘you won’t know what hit you’

Marc A. Thiessen

The Washington Post

March 5, 2020

Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) is correctly under fire for threatening Supreme Court Justices Neil M. Gorsuch and Brett M. Kavanaugh. But what did Schumer really mean when, on Wednesday, he warned the justices “you won’t know what hit you” if they vote the wrong way on an abortion case?

Here is what Schumer said: “I want to tell you, Gorsuch; I want to tell you, Kavanaugh: You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.” That drew a rare rebuke from Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who issued a statement declaring that “threatening statements of this sort from the highest levels of government are not only inappropriate, they are dangerous.”

At first, Schumer refused to apologize but rather said through a spokesman that he was making “a reference to the political price Republicans will pay for putting them on the court.” No, he wasn’t. He didn’t say Republicans will “pay the price” or that Republicans “won’t know what hit you.” He directed those threats squarely at the two justices. On Thursday, Schumer said, “I shouldn’t have used the words I did, but in no way was I making a threat.” Of course he was.

So, what was he threatening — what “political price” did Schumer have in mind for the Supreme Court justices? He was almost certainly warning Gorsuch and Kavanaugh that if they did not vote as he saw fit, Senate Democrats, when they are in the majority, would follow through on their threats to “restructure” the court by packing it with liberal justices and eliminating its conservative majority.

It wouldn’t be the first time Senate Democrats have made such threats. Last August, Schumer’s second in command, Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), threatened to restructure the court if the justices took up a gun case. In a legal brief, Durbin, along with Democratic Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.), Mazie Hirono (Hawaii), Richard Blumenthal (Conn.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.), warned in an amicus brief: “The Supreme Court is not well. And the people know it. Perhaps the Court can heal itself before the public demands it be ‘restructured in order to reduce the influence of politics.’” As all 53 Senate Republicans wrote in a letter to the court, “the implication is as plain as day: Dismiss this case, or we’ll pack the Court.”

In other words, this is the second time in seven months that Senate Democratic leaders have tried to intimidate the court to rule their way on a case, issuing threats of political reprisal. These repeated threats should be taken seriously — because if Democrats win the White House and the Senate in November, they will have the power to follow through.

The election could be one of the most consequential in modern history when it comes to shaping the Supreme Court’s future. Those on the left are apoplectic because they know that if President Trump is reelected and Republicans keep control of the Senate, there is a strong possibility that they will have the chance to expand the court’s conservative majority. The left also knows that if Democrats win, their best hope is to replace liberal Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer — keeping those seats in the court’s liberal bloc.

From the left’s perspective, that isn’t good enough, because it wouldn’t change the court’s ideological makeup. Democrats know that they won’t be able to advance the battle for an activist liberal court unless they expand the court’s size.

Former vice president Joe Biden has said he opposes expanding the court. He also opposed taxpayer funding of abortion until last June, when he realized he could not win the Democratic nomination without changing his position. The judicial left will almost certainly demand that he similarly reverse his position on court-packing. As for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), he has declared his intention, if elected, to push for rotating justices off the Supreme Court and replacing them with lower-court judges. “A federal judge has a lifetime appointment,” Sanders told MSNBC last month, but the Constitution “doesn’t say that lifetime appointment has got to be on the Supreme Court — it’s got to be on a federal court.”

This much is certain. If Democrats win in November, their base will not be satisfied with simply replacing aging liberal justices with younger ones. They have watched with horror as Trump has transformed the federal judiciary. They will not accept the status quo and what they consider an illegitimate conservative majority on the Supreme Court. In other words, regardless of who the Democrats nominate, the future of the Supreme Court is on the ballot in November.

COMPLEMENT:

The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election

Molly Ball

Time

February 4, 2021

A weird thing happened right after the Nov. 3 election: nothing.

The nation was braced for chaos. Liberal groups had vowed to take to the streets, planning hundreds of protests across the country. Right-wing militias were girding for battle. In a poll before Election Day, 75% of Americans voiced concern about violence.

Instead, an eerie quiet descended. As President Trump refused to concede, the response was not mass action but crickets. When media organizations called the race for Joe Biden on Nov. 7, jubilation broke out instead, as people thronged cities across the U.S. to celebrate the democratic process that resulted in Trump’s ouster.

A second odd thing happened amid Trump’s attempts to reverse the result: corporate America turned on him. Hundreds of major business leaders, many of whom had backed Trump’s candidacy and supported his policies, called on him to concede. To the President, something felt amiss. “It was all very, very strange,” Trump said on Dec. 2. “Within days after the election, we witnessed an orchestrated effort to anoint the winner, even while many key states were still being counted.”

In a way, Trump was right.

There was a conspiracy unfolding behind the scenes, one that both curtailed the protests and coordinated the resistance from CEOs. Both surprises were the result of an informal alliance between left-wing activists and business titans. The pact was formalized in a terse, little-noticed joint statement of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and AFL-CIO published on Election Day. Both sides would come to see it as a sort of implicit bargain–inspired by the summer’s massive, sometimes destructive racial-justice protests–in which the forces of labor came together with the forces of capital to keep the peace and oppose Trump’s assault on democracy.

The handshake between business and labor was just one component of a vast, cross-partisan campaign to protect the election–an extraordinary shadow effort dedicated not to winning the vote but to ensuring it would be free and fair, credible and uncorrupted. For more than a year, a loosely organized coalition of operatives scrambled to shore up America’s institutions as they came under simultaneous attack from a remorseless pandemic and an autocratically inclined President. Though much of this activity took place on the left, it was separate from the Biden campaign and crossed ideological lines, with crucial contributions by nonpartisan and conservative actors. The scenario the shadow campaigners were desperate to stop was not a Trump victory. It was an election so calamitous that no result could be discerned at all, a failure of the central act of democratic self-governance that has been a hallmark of America since its founding.

Their work touched every aspect of the election. They got states to change voting systems and laws and helped secure hundreds of millions in public and private funding. They fended off voter-suppression lawsuits, recruited armies of poll workers and got millions of people to vote by mail for the first time. They successfully pressured social media companies to take a harder line against disinformation and used data-driven strategies to fight viral smears. They executed national public-awareness campaigns that helped Americans understand how the vote count would unfold over days or weeks, preventing Trump’s conspiracy theories and false claims of victory from getting more traction. After Election Day, they monitored every pressure point to ensure that Trump could not overturn the result. “The untold story of the election is the thousands of people of both parties who accomplished the triumph of American democracy at its very foundation,” says Norm Eisen, a prominent lawyer and former Obama Administration official who recruited Republicans and Democrats to the board of the Voter Protection Program.

For Trump and his allies were running their own campaign to spoil the election. The President spent months insisting that mail ballots were a Democratic plot and the election would be “rigged.” His henchmen at the state level sought to block their use, while his lawyers brought dozens of spurious suits to make it more difficult to vote–an intensification of the GOP’s legacy of suppressive tactics. Before the election, Trump plotted to block a legitimate vote count. And he spent the months following Nov. 3 trying to steal the election he’d lost–with lawsuits and conspiracy theories, pressure on state and local officials, and finally summoning his army of supporters to the Jan. 6 rally that ended in deadly violence at the Capitol.

The democracy campaigners watched with alarm. “Every week, we felt like we were in a struggle to try to pull off this election without the country going through a real dangerous moment of unraveling,” says former GOP Representative Zach Wamp, a Trump supporter who helped coordinate a bipartisan election-protection council. “We can look back and say this thing went pretty well, but it was not at all clear in September and October that that was going to be the case.”

Biden fans in Philadelphia after the race was called on Nov. 7

Michelle Gustafson for TIME

This is the inside story of the conspiracy to save the 2020 election, based on access to the group’s inner workings, never-before-seen documents and interviews with dozens of those involved from across the political spectrum. It is the story of an unprecedented, creative and determined campaign whose success also reveals how close the nation came to disaster. “Every attempt to interfere with the proper outcome of the election was defeated,” says Ian Bassin, co-founder of Protect Democracy, a nonpartisan rule-of-law advocacy group. “But it’s massively important for the country to understand that it didn’t happen accidentally. The system didn’t work magically. Democracy is not self-executing.”

That’s why the participants want the secret history of the 2020 election told, even though it sounds like a paranoid fever dream–a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information. They were not rigging the election; they were fortifying it. And they believe the public needs to understand the system’s fragility in order to ensure that democracy in America endures.

THE ARCHITECT

Sometime in the fall of 2019, Mike Podhorzer became convinced the election was headed for disaster–and determined to protect it.

This was not his usual purview. For nearly a quarter-century, Podhorzer, senior adviser to the president of the AFL-CIO, the nation’s largest union federation, has marshaled the latest tactics and data to help its favored candidates win elections. Unassuming and professorial, he isn’t the sort of hair-gelled “political strategist” who shows up on cable news. Among Democratic insiders, he’s known as the wizard behind some of the biggest advances in political technology in recent decades. A group of liberal strategists he brought together in the early 2000s led to the creation of the Analyst Institute, a secretive firm that applies scientific methods to political campaigns. He was also involved in the founding of Catalist, the flagship progressive data company.

The endless chatter in Washington about “political strategy,” Podhorzer believes, has little to do with how change really gets made. “My basic take on politics is that it’s all pretty obvious if you don’t overthink it or swallow the prevailing frameworks whole,” he once wrote. “After that, just relentlessly identify your assumptions and challenge them.” Podhorzer applies that approach to everything: when he coached his now adult son’s Little League team in the D.C. suburbs, he trained the boys not to swing at most pitches–a tactic that infuriated both their and their opponents’ parents, but won the team a series of championships.

Trump’s election in 2016–credited in part to his unusual strength among the sort of blue collar white voters who once dominated the AFL-CIO–prompted Podhorzer to question his assumptions about voter behavior. He began circulating weekly number-crunching memos to a small circle of allies and hosting strategy sessions in D.C. But when he began to worry about the election itself, he didn’t want to seem paranoid. It was only after months of research that he introduced his concerns in his newsletter in October 2019. The usual tools of data, analytics and polling would not be sufficient in a situation where the President himself was trying to disrupt the election, he wrote. “Most of our planning takes us through Election Day,” he noted. “But, we are not prepared for the two most likely outcomes”–Trump losing and refusing to concede, and Trump winning the Electoral College (despite losing the popular vote) by corrupting the voting process in key states. “We desperately need to systematically ‘red-team’ this election so that we can anticipate and plan for the worst we know will be coming our way.”

It turned out Podhorzer wasn’t the only one thinking in these terms. He began to hear from others eager to join forces. The Fight Back Table, a coalition of “resistance” organizations, had begun scenario-planning around the potential for a contested election, gathering liberal activists at the local and national level into what they called the Democracy Defense Coalition. Voting-rights and civil rights organizations were raising alarms. A group of former elected officials was researching emergency powers they feared Trump might exploit. Protect Democracy was assembling a bipartisan election-crisis task force. “It turned out that once you said it out loud, people agreed,” Podhorzer says, “and it started building momentum.”

He spent months pondering scenarios and talking to experts. It wasn’t hard to find liberals who saw Trump as a dangerous dictator, but Podhorzer was careful to steer clear of hysteria. What he wanted to know was not how American democracy was dying but how it might be kept alive. The chief difference between the U.S. and countries that lost their grip on democracy, he concluded, was that America’s decentralized election system couldn’t be rigged in one fell swoop. That presented an opportunity to shore it up.

THE ALLIANCE

On March 3, Podhorzer drafted a three-page confidential memo titled “Threats to the 2020 Election.” “Trump has made it clear that this will not be a fair election, and that he will reject anything but his own re-election as ‘fake’ and rigged,” he wrote. “On Nov. 3, should the media report otherwise, he will use the right-wing information system to establish his narrative and incite his supporters to protest.” The memo laid out four categories of challenges: attacks on voters, attacks on election administration, attacks on Trump’s political opponents and “efforts to reverse the results of the election.”

Then COVID-19 erupted at the height of the primary-election season. Normal methods of voting were no longer safe for voters or the mostly elderly volunteers who normally staff polling places. But political disagreements, intensified by Trump’s crusade against mail voting, prevented some states from making it easier to vote absentee and for jurisdictions to count those votes in a timely manner. Chaos ensued. Ohio shut down in-person voting for its primary, leading to minuscule turnout. A poll-worker shortage in Milwaukee–where Wisconsin’s heavily Democratic Black population is concentrated–left just five open polling places, down from 182. In New York, vote counting took more than a month.

Suddenly, the potential for a November meltdown was obvious. In his apartment in the D.C. suburbs, Podhorzer began working from his laptop at his kitchen table, holding back-to-back Zoom meetings for hours a day with his network of contacts across the progressive universe: the labor movement; the institutional left, like Planned Parenthood and Greenpeace; resistance groups like Indivisible and MoveOn; progressive data geeks and strategists, representatives of donors and foundations, state-level grassroots organizers, racial-justice activists and others.

In April, Podhorzer began hosting a weekly 2½-hour Zoom. It was structured around a series of rapid-fire five-minute presentations on everything from which ads were working to messaging to legal strategy. The invitation-only gatherings soon attracted hundreds, creating a rare shared base of knowledge for the fractious progressive movement. “At the risk of talking trash about the left, there’s not a lot of good information sharing,” says Anat Shenker-Osorio, a close Podhorzer friend whose poll-tested messaging guidance shaped the group’s approach. “There’s a lot of not-invented-here syndrome, where people won’t consider a good idea if they didn’t come up with it.”

The meetings became the galactic center for a constellation of operatives across the left who shared overlapping goals but didn’t usually work in concert. The group had no name, no leaders and no hierarchy, but it kept the disparate actors in sync. “Pod played a critical behind-the-scenes role in keeping different pieces of the movement infrastructure in communication and aligned,” says Maurice Mitchell, national director of the Working Families Party. “You have the litigation space, the organizing space, the political people just focused on the W, and their strategies aren’t always aligned. He allowed this ecosystem to work together.”

Protecting the election would require an effort of unprecedented scale. As 2020 progressed, it stretched to Congress, Silicon Valley and the nation’s statehouses. It drew energy from the summer’s racial-justice protests, many of whose leaders were a key part of the liberal alliance. And eventually it reached across the aisle, into the world of Trump-skeptical Republicans appalled by his attacks on democracy.

SECURING THE VOTE

The first task was overhauling America’s balky election infrastructure–in the middle of a pandemic. For the thousands of local, mostly nonpartisan officials who administer elections, the most urgent need was money. They needed protective equipment like masks, gloves and hand sanitizer. They needed to pay for postcards letting people know they could vote absentee–or, in some states, to mail ballots to every voter. They needed additional staff and scanners to process ballots.

In March, activists appealed to Congress to steer COVID relief money to election administration. Led by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, more than 150 organizations signed a letter to every member of Congress seeking $2 billion in election funding. It was somewhat successful: the CARES Act, passed later that month, contained $400 million in grants to state election administrators. But the next tranche of relief funding didn’t add to that number. It wasn’t going to be enough.

Private philanthropy stepped into the breach. An assortment of foundations contributed tens of millions in election-administration funding. The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative chipped in $300 million. “It was a failure at the federal level that 2,500 local election officials were forced to apply for philanthropic grants to fill their needs,” says Amber McReynolds, a former Denver election official who heads the nonpartisan National Vote at Home Institute.

McReynolds’ two-year-old organization became a clearinghouse for a nation struggling to adapt. The institute gave secretaries of state from both parties technical advice on everything from which vendors to use to how to locate drop boxes. Local officials are the most trusted sources of election information, but few can afford a press secretary, so the institute distributed communications tool kits. In a presentation to Podhorzer’s group, McReynolds detailed the importance of absentee ballots for shortening lines at polling places and preventing an election crisis.

The institute’s work helped 37 states and D.C. bolster mail voting. But it wouldn’t be worth much if people didn’t take advantage. Part of the challenge was logistical: each state has different rules for when and how ballots should be requested and returned. The Voter Participation Center, which in a normal year would have supported local groups deploying canvassers door-to-door to get out the vote, instead conducted focus groups in April and May to find out what would get people to vote by mail. In August and September, it sent ballot applications to 15 million people in key states, 4.6 million of whom returned them. In mailings and digital ads, the group urged people not to wait for Election Day. “All the work we have done for 17 years was built for this moment of bringing democracy to people’s doorsteps,” says Tom Lopach, the center’s CEO.

The effort had to overcome heightened skepticism in some communities. Many Black voters preferred to exercise their franchise in person or didn’t trust the mail. National civil rights groups worked with local organizations to get the word out that this was the best way to ensure one’s vote was counted. In Philadelphia, for example, advocates distributed “voting safety kits” containing masks, hand sanitizer and informational brochures. “We had to get the message out that this is safe, reliable, and you can trust it,” says Hannah Fried of All Voting Is Local.

At the same time, Democratic lawyers battled a historic tide of pre-election litigation. The pandemic intensified the parties’ usual tangling in the courts. But the lawyers noticed something else as well. “The litigation brought by the Trump campaign, of a piece with the broader campaign to sow doubt about mail voting, was making novel claims and using theories no court has ever accepted,” says Wendy Weiser, a voting-rights expert at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU. “They read more like lawsuits designed to send a message rather than achieve a legal outcome.”

In the end, nearly half the electorate cast ballots by mail in 2020, practically a revolution in how people vote. About a quarter voted early in person. Only a quarter of voters cast their ballots the traditional way: in person on Election Day.

THE DISINFORMATION DEFENSE

Bad actors spreading false information is nothing new. For decades, campaigns have grappled with everything from anonymous calls claiming the election has been rescheduled to fliers spreading nasty smears about candidates’ families. But Trump’s lies and conspiracy theories, the viral force of social media and the involvement of foreign meddlers made disinformation a broader, deeper threat to the 2020 vote.

Laura Quinn, a veteran progressive operative who co-founded Catalist, began studying this problem a few years ago. She piloted a nameless, secret project, which she has never before publicly discussed, that tracked disinformation online and tried to figure out how to combat it. One component was tracking dangerous lies that might otherwise spread unnoticed. Researchers then provided information to campaigners or the media to track down the sources and expose them.

The most important takeaway from Quinn’s research, however, was that engaging with toxic content only made it worse. “When you get attacked, the instinct is to push back, call it out, say, ‘This isn’t true,’” Quinn says. “But the more engagement something gets, the more the platforms boost it. The algorithm reads that as, ‘Oh, this is popular; people want more of it.’”

The solution, she concluded, was to pressure platforms to enforce their rules, both by removing content or accounts that spread disinformation and by more aggressively policing it in the first place. “The platforms have policies against certain types of malign behavior, but they haven’t been enforcing them,” she says.

Quinn’s research gave ammunition to advocates pushing social media platforms to take a harder line. In November 2019, Mark Zuckerberg invited nine civil rights leaders to dinner at his home, where they warned him about the danger of the election-related falsehoods that were already spreading unchecked. “It took pushing, urging, conversations, brainstorming, all of that to get to a place where we ended up with more rigorous rules and enforcement,” says Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, who attended the dinner and also met with Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and others. (Gupta has been nominated for Associate Attorney General by President Biden.) “It was a struggle, but we got to the point where they understood the problem. Was it enough? Probably not. Was it later than we wanted? Yes. But it was really important, given the level of official disinformation, that they had those rules in place and were tagging things and taking them down.”

SPREADING THE WORD

Beyond battling bad information, there was a need to explain a rapidly changing election process. It was crucial for voters to understand that despite what Trump was saying, mail-in votes weren’t susceptible to fraud and that it would be normal if some states weren’t finished counting votes on election night.

Dick Gephardt, the Democratic former House leader turned high-powered lobbyist, spearheaded one coalition. “We wanted to get a really bipartisan group of former elected officials, Cabinet secretaries, military leaders and so on, aimed mainly at messaging to the public but also speaking to local officials–the secretaries of state, attorneys general, governors who would be in the eye of the storm–to let them know we wanted to help,” says Gephardt, who worked his contacts in the private sector to put $20 million behind the effort.

Wamp, the former GOP Congressman, worked through the nonpartisan reform group Issue One to rally Republicans to the effort. “We thought we should bring some bipartisan element of unity around what constitutes a free and fair election,” Wamp says. The 22 Democrats and 22 Republicans on the National Council on Election Integrity met on Zoom at least once a week. They ran ads in six states, made statements, wrote articles and alerted local officials to potential problems. “We had rabid Trump supporters who agreed to serve on the council based on the idea that this is honest,” Wamp says. This is going to be just as important, he told them, to convince the liberals when Trump wins. “Whichever way it cuts, we’re going to stick together.”

The Voting Rights Lab and IntoAction created state-specific memes and graphics, spread by email, text, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, urging that every vote be counted. Together, they were viewed more than 1 billion times. Protect Democracy’s election task force issued reports and held media briefings with high-profile experts across the political spectrum, resulting in widespread coverage of potential election issues and fact-checking of Trump’s false claims. The organization’s tracking polls found the message was being heard: the percentage of the public that didn’t expect to know the winner on election night gradually rose until by late October, it was over 70%. A majority also believed that a prolonged count wasn’t a sign of problems. “We knew exactly what Trump was going to do: he was going to try to use the fact that Democrats voted by mail and Republicans voted in person to make it look like he was ahead, claim victory, say the mail-in votes were fraudulent and try to get them thrown out,” says Protect Democracy’s Bassin. Setting public expectations ahead of time helped undercut those lies.

Amber McReynolds, Zach Wamp and Maurice Mitchell

Rachel Woolf for TIME; Erik Schelzig—AP/Shutterstock; Holly Pickett—The New York Times/Redux

The alliance took a common set of themes from the research Shenker-Osorio presented at Podhorzer’s Zooms. Studies have shown that when people don’t think their vote will count or fear casting it will be a hassle, they’re far less likely to participate. Throughout election season, members of Podhorzer’s group minimized incidents of voter intimidation and tamped down rising liberal hysteria about Trump’s expected refusal to concede. They didn’t want to amplify false claims by engaging them, or put people off voting by suggesting a rigged game. “When you say, ‘These claims of fraud are spurious,’ what people hear is ‘fraud,’” Shenker-Osorio says. “What we saw in our pre-election research was that anything that reaffirmed Trump’s power or cast him as an authoritarian diminished people’s desire to vote.”

Podhorzer, meanwhile, was warning everyone he knew that polls were underestimating Trump’s support. The data he shared with media organizations who would be calling the election was “tremendously useful” to understand what was happening as the votes rolled in, according to a member of a major network’s political unit who spoke with Podhorzer before Election Day. Most analysts had recognized there would be a “blue shift” in key battlegrounds– the surge of votes breaking toward Democrats, driven by tallies of mail-in ballots– but they hadn’t comprehended how much better Trump was likely to do on Election Day. “Being able to document how big the absentee wave would be and the variance by state was essential,” the analyst says.

PEOPLE POWER

The racial-justice uprising sparked by George Floyd’s killing in May was not primarily a political movement. The organizers who helped lead it wanted to harness its momentum for the election without allowing it to be co-opted by politicians. Many of those organizers were part of Podhorzer’s network, from the activists in battleground states who partnered with the Democracy Defense Coalition to organizations with leading roles in the Movement for Black Lives.

The best way to ensure people’s voices were heard, they decided, was to protect their ability to vote. “We started thinking about a program that would complement the traditional election-protection area but also didn’t rely on calling the police,” says Nelini Stamp, the Working Families Party’s national organizing director. They created a force of “election defenders” who, unlike traditional poll watchers, were trained in de-escalation techniques. During early voting and on Election Day, they surrounded lines of voters in urban areas with a “joy to the polls” effort that turned the act of casting a ballot into a street party. Black organizers also recruited thousands of poll workers to ensure polling places would stay open in their communities.

The summer uprising had shown that people power could have a massive impact. Activists began preparing to reprise the demonstrations if Trump tried to steal the election. “Americans plan widespread protests if Trump interferes with election,” Reuters reported in October, one of many such stories. More than 150 liberal groups, from the Women’s March to the Sierra Club to Color of Change, from Democrats.com to the Democratic Socialists of America, joined the “Protect the Results” coalition. The group’s now defunct website had a map listing 400 planned postelection demonstrations, to be activated via text message as soon as Nov. 4. To stop the coup they feared, the left was ready to flood the streets.

STRANGE BEDFELLOWS

About a week before Election Day, Podhorzer received an unexpected message: the U.S. Chamber of Commerce wanted to talk.

The AFL-CIO and the Chamber have a long history of antagonism. Though neither organization is explicitly partisan, the influential business lobby has poured hundreds of millions of dollars into Republican campaigns, just as the nation’s unions funnel hundreds of millions to Democrats. On one side is labor, on the other management, locked in an eternal struggle for power and resources.

But behind the scenes, the business community was engaged in its own anxious discussions about how the election and its aftermath might unfold. The summer’s racial-justice protests had sent a signal to business owners too: the potential for economy-disrupting civil disorder. “With tensions running high, there was a lot of concern about unrest around the election, or a breakdown in our normal way we handle contentious elections,” says Neil Bradley, the Chamber’s executive vice president and chief policy officer. These worries had led the Chamber to release a pre-election statement with the Business Roundtable, a Washington-based CEOs’ group, as well as associations of manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers, calling for patience and confidence as votes were counted.

But Bradley wanted to send a broader, more bipartisan message. He reached out to Podhorzer, through an intermediary both men declined to name. Agreeing that their unlikely alliance would be powerful, they began to discuss a joint statement pledging their organizations’ shared commitment to a fair and peaceful election. They chose their words carefully and scheduled the statement’s release for maximum impact. As it was being finalized, Christian leaders signaled their interest in joining, further broadening its reach.

The statement was released on Election Day, under the names of Chamber CEO Thomas Donohue, AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka, and the heads of the National Association of Evangelicals and the National African American Clergy Network. “It is imperative that election officials be given the space and time to count every vote in accordance with applicable laws,” it stated. “We call on the media, the candidates and the American people to exercise patience with the process and trust in our system, even if it requires more time than usual.” The groups added, “Although we may not always agree on desired outcomes up and down the ballot, we are united in our call for the American democratic process to proceed without violence, intimidation or any other tactic that makes us weaker as a nation.”

SHOWING UP, STANDING DOWN

Election night began with many Democrats despairing. Trump was running ahead of pre-election polling, winning Florida, Ohio and Texas easily and keeping Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania too close to call. But Podhorzer was unperturbed when I spoke to him that night: the returns were exactly in line with his modeling. He had been warning for weeks that Trump voters’ turnout was surging. As the numbers dribbled out, he could tell that as long as all the votes were counted, Trump would lose.

The liberal alliance gathered for an 11 p.m. Zoom call. Hundreds joined; many were freaking out. “It was really important for me and the team in that moment to help ground people in what we had already known was true,” says Angela Peoples, director for the Democracy Defense Coalition. Podhorzer presented data to show the group that victory was in hand.

While he was talking, Fox News surprised everyone by calling Arizona for Biden. The public-awareness campaign had worked: TV anchors were bending over backward to counsel caution and frame the vote count accurately. The question then became what to do next.

The conversation that followed was a difficult one, led by the activists charged with the protest strategy. “We wanted to be mindful of when was the right time to call for moving masses of people into the street,” Peoples says. As much as they were eager to mount a show of strength, mobilizing immediately could backfire and put people at risk. Protests that devolved into violent clashes would give Trump a pretext to send in federal agents or troops as he had over the summer. And rather than elevate Trump’s complaints by continuing to fight him, the alliance wanted to send the message that the people had spoken.

So the word went out: stand down. Protect the Results announced that it would “not be activating the entire national mobilization network today, but remains ready to activate if necessary.” On Twitter, outraged progressives wondered what was going on. Why wasn’t anyone trying to stop Trump’s coup? Where were all the protests?

Podhorzer credits the activists for their restraint. “They had spent so much time getting ready to hit the streets on Wednesday. But they did it,” he says. “Wednesday through Friday, there was not a single Antifa vs. Proud Boys incident like everyone was expecting. And when that didn’t materialize, I don’t think the Trump campaign had a backup plan.”

Activists reoriented the Protect the Results protests toward a weekend of celebration. “Counter their disinfo with our confidence & get ready to celebrate,” read the messaging guidance Shenker-Osorio presented to the liberal alliance on Friday, Nov. 6. “Declare and fortify our win. Vibe: confident, forward-looking, unified–NOT passive, anxious.” The voters, not the candidates, would be the protagonists of the story.

The planned day of celebration happened to coincide with the election being called on Nov. 7. Activists dancing in the streets of Philadelphia blasted Beyoncé over an attempted Trump campaign press conference; the Trumpers’ next confab was scheduled for Four Seasons Total Landscaping outside the city center, which activists believe was not a coincidence. “The people of Philadelphia owned the streets of Philadelphia,” crows the Working Families Party’s Mitchell. “We made them look ridiculous by contrasting our joyous celebration of democracy with their clown show.”

The votes had been counted. Trump had lost. But the battle wasn’t over.

THE FIVE STEPS TO VICTORY

In Podhorzer’s presentations, winning the vote was only the first step to winning the election. After that came winning the count, winning the certification, winning the Electoral College and winning the transition–steps that are normally formalities but that he knew Trump would see as opportunities for disruption. Nowhere would that be more evident than in Michigan, where Trump’s pressure on local Republicans came perilously close to working–and where liberal and conservative pro-democracy forces joined to counter it.

It was around 10 p.m. on election night in Detroit when a flurry of texts lit up the phone of Art Reyes III. A busload of Republican election observers had arrived at the TCF Center, where votes were being tallied. They were crowding the vote-counting tables, refusing to wear masks, heckling the mostly Black workers. Reyes, a Flint native who leads We the People Michigan, was expecting this. For months, conservative groups had been sowing suspicion about urban vote fraud. “The language was, ‘They’re going to steal the election; there will be fraud in Detroit,’ long before any vote was cast,” Reyes says.

Trump supporters seek to disrupt the vote count at Detroit’s TCF Center on Nov. 4

Elaine Cromie—Getty Images

He made his way to the arena and sent word to his network. Within 45 minutes, dozens of reinforcements had arrived. As they entered the arena to provide a counterweight to the GOP observers inside, Reyes took down their cell-phone numbers and added them to a massive text chain. Racial-justice activists from Detroit Will Breathe worked alongside suburban women from Fems for Dems and local elected officials. Reyes left at 3 a.m., handing the text chain over to a disability activist.

As they mapped out the steps in the election-certification process, activists settled on a strategy of foregrounding the people’s right to decide, demanding their voices be heard and calling attention to the racial implications of disenfranchising Black Detroiters. They flooded the Wayne County canvassing board’s Nov. 17 certification meeting with on-message testimony; despite a Trump tweet, the Republican board members certified Detroit’s votes.

Election boards were one pressure point; another was GOP-controlled legislatures, who Trump believed could declare the election void and appoint their own electors. And so the President invited the GOP leaders of the Michigan legislature, House Speaker Lee Chatfield and Senate majority leader Mike Shirkey, to Washington on Nov. 20.

It was a perilous moment. If Chatfield and Shirkey agreed to do Trump’s bidding, Republicans in other states might be similarly bullied. “I was concerned things were going to get weird,” says Jeff Timmer, a former Michigan GOP executive director turned anti-Trump activist. Norm Eisen describes it as “the scariest moment” of the entire election.

The democracy defenders launched a full-court press. Protect Democracy’s local contacts researched the lawmakers’ personal and political motives. Issue One ran television ads in Lansing. The Chamber’s Bradley kept close tabs on the process. Wamp, the former Republican Congressman, called his former colleague Mike Rogers, who wrote an op-ed for the Detroit newspapers urging officials to honor the will of the voters. Three former Michigan governors–Republicans John Engler and Rick Snyder and Democrat Jennifer Granholm–jointly called for Michigan’s electoral votes to be cast free of pressure from the White House. Engler, a former head of the Business Roundtable, made phone calls to influential donors and fellow GOP elder statesmen who could press the lawmakers privately.

The pro-democracy forces were up against a Trumpified Michigan GOP controlled by allies of Ronna McDaniel, the Republican National Committee chair, and Betsy DeVos, the former Education Secretary and a member of a billionaire family of GOP donors. On a call with his team on Nov. 18, Bassin vented that his side’s pressure was no match for what Trump could offer. “Of course he’s going to try to offer them something,” Bassin recalls thinking. “Head of the Space Force! Ambassador to wherever! We can’t compete with that by offering carrots. We need a stick.”

If Trump were to offer something in exchange for a personal favor, that would likely constitute bribery, Bassin reasoned. He phoned Richard Primus, a law professor at the University of Michigan, to see if Primus agreed and would make the argument publicly. Primus said he thought the meeting itself was inappropriate, and got to work on an op-ed for Politico warning that the state attorney general–a Democrat–would have no choice but to investigate. When the piece posted on Nov. 19, the attorney general’s communications director tweeted it. Protect Democracy soon got word that the lawmakers planned to bring lawyers to the meeting with Trump the next day.

Reyes’ activists scanned flight schedules and flocked to the airports on both ends of Shirkey’s journey to D.C., to underscore that the lawmakers were being scrutinized. After the meeting, the pair announced they’d pressed the President to deliver COVID relief for their constituents and informed him they saw no role in the election process. Then they went for a drink at the Trump hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue. A street artist projected their images onto the outside of the building along with the words THE WORLD IS WATCHING.

That left one last step: the state canvassing board, made up of two Democrats and two Republicans. One Republican, a Trumper employed by the DeVos family’s political nonprofit, was not expected to vote for certification. The other Republican on the board was a little-known lawyer named Aaron Van Langevelde. He sent no signals about what he planned to do, leaving everyone on edge.

When the meeting began, Reyes’s activists flooded the livestream and filled Twitter with their hashtag, #alleyesonmi. A board accustomed to attendance in the single digits suddenly faced an audience of thousands. In hours of testimony, the activists emphasized their message of respecting voters’ wishes and affirming democracy rather than scolding the officials. Van Langevelde quickly signaled he would follow precedent. The vote was 3-0 to certify; the other Republican abstained.

After that, the dominoes fell. Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and the rest of the states certified their electors. Republican officials in Arizona and Georgia stood up to Trump’s bullying. And the Electoral College voted on schedule on Dec. 14.

HOW CLOSE WE CAME

There was one last milestone on Podhorzer’s mind: Jan. 6. On the day Congress would meet to tally the electoral count, Trump summoned his supporters to D.C. for a rally.

Much to their surprise, the thousands who answered his call were met by virtually no counterdemonstrators. To preserve safety and ensure they couldn’t be blamed for any mayhem, the activist left was “strenuously discouraging counter activity,” Podhorzer texted me the morning of Jan. 6, with a crossed-fingers emoji.

Trump addressed the crowd that afternoon, peddling the lie that lawmakers or Vice President Mike Pence could reject states’ electoral votes. He told them to go to the Capitol and “fight like hell.” Then he returned to the White House as they sacked the building. As lawmakers fled for their lives and his own supporters were shot and trampled, Trump praised the rioters as “very special.”

It was his final attack on democracy, and once again, it failed. By standing down, the democracy campaigners outfoxed their foes. “We won by the skin of our teeth, honestly, and that’s an important point for folks to sit with,” says the Democracy Defense Coalition’s Peoples. “There’s an impulse for some to say voters decided and democracy won. But it’s a mistake to think that this election cycle was a show of strength for democracy. It shows how vulnerable democracy is.”

The members of the alliance to protect the election have gone their separate ways. The Democracy Defense Coalition has been disbanded, though the Fight Back Table lives on. Protect Democracy and the good-government advocates have turned their attention to pressing reforms in Congress. Left-wing activists are pressuring the newly empowered Democrats to remember the voters who put them there, while civil rights groups are on guard against further attacks on voting. Business leaders denounced the Jan. 6 attack, and some say they will no longer donate to lawmakers who refused to certify Biden’s victory. Podhorzer and his allies are still holding their Zoom strategy sessions, gauging voters’ views and developing new messages. And Trump is in Florida, facing his second impeachment, deprived of the Twitter and Facebook accounts he used to push the nation to its breaking point.

As I was reporting this article in November and December, I heard different claims about who should get the credit for thwarting Trump’s plot. Liberals argued the role of bottom-up people power shouldn’t be overlooked, particularly the contributions of people of color and local grassroots activists. Others stressed the heroism of GOP officials like Van Langevelde and Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger, who stood up to Trump at considerable cost. The truth is that neither likely could have succeeded without the other. “It’s astounding how close we came, how fragile all this really is,” says Timmer, the former Michigan GOP executive director. “It’s like when Wile E. Coyote runs off the cliff–if you don’t look down, you don’t fall. Our democracy only survives if we all believe and don’t look down.”

Democracy won in the end. The will of the people prevailed. But it’s crazy, in retrospect, that this is what it took to put on an election in the United States of America.

–With reporting by LESLIE DICKSTEIN, MARIAH ESPADA and SIMMONE SHAH

Voir par ailleurs:

Opinion: 89 former Defense officials: The military must never be used to violate constitutional rights

Opinion by 89 former Defense officials

The Washington Post

June 5, 2020

President Trump continues to use inflammatory language as many Americans protest the unlawful death of George Floyd and the unjust treatment of black Americans by our justice system. As the protests have grown, so has the intensity of the president’s rhetoric. He has gone so far as to make a shocking promise: to send active-duty members of the U.S. military to “dominate” protesters in cities throughout the country — with or without the consent of local mayors or state governors.

On Monday, the president previewed his approach on the streets of Washington. He had 1,600 troops from around the country transported to the D.C. area, and placed them on alert, as an unnamed Pentagon official put it, “to ensure faster employment if necessary.” As part of the show of force that Trump demanded, military helicopters made low-level passes over peaceful protesters — a military tactic sometimes used to disperse enemy combatants — scattering debris and broken glass among the crowd. He also had a force, including members of the National Guard and federal officers, that used flash-bang grenades, pepper spray and, according to eyewitness accounts, rubber bullets to drive lawful protesters, as well as members of the media and clergy, away from the historic St. John’s Episcopal Church. All so he could hold a politically motivated photo op there with members of his team, including, inappropriately, Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper and Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Looting and violence are unacceptable acts, and perpetrators should be arrested and duly tried under the law. But as Monday’s actions near the White House demonstrated, those committing such acts are largely on the margins of the vast majority of predominantly peaceful protests. While several past presidents have called on our armed services to provide additional aid to law enforcement in times of national crisis — among them Ulysses S. Grant, Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson — these presidents used the military to protect the rights of Americans, not to violate them.

As former leaders in the Defense Department — civilian and military, Republican, Democrat and independent — we all took an oath upon assuming office “to support and defend the Constitution of the United States,” as did the president and all members of the military, a fact that Gen. Milley pointed out in a recent memorandum to members of the armed forces. We are alarmed at how the president is betraying this oath by threatening to order members of the U.S. military to violate the rights of their fellow Americans.

President Trump has given governors a stark choice: either end the protests that continue to demand equal justice under our laws, or expect that he will send active-duty military units into their states. While the Insurrection Act gives the president the legal authority to do so, this authority has been invoked only in the most extreme conditions when state or local authorities were overwhelmed and were unable to safeguard the rule of law. Historically, as Secretary Esper has pointed out, it has rightly been seen as a tool of last resort.

Beyond being unnecessary, using our military to quell protests across the country would also be unwise. This is not the mission our armed forces signed up for: They signed up to fight our nation’s enemies and to secure — not infringe upon — the rights and freedoms of their fellow Americans. In addition, putting our servicemen and women in the middle of politically charged domestic unrest risks undermining the apolitical nature of the military that is so essential to our democracy. It also risks diminishing Americans’ trust in our military — and thus America’s security — for years to come.

As defense leaders who share a deep commitment to the Constitution, to freedom and justice for all Americans, and to the extraordinary men and women who volunteer to serve and protect our nation, we call on the president to immediately end his plans to send active-duty military personnel into cities as agents of law enforcement, or to employ them or any another military or police forces in ways that undermine the constitutional rights of Americans. The members of our military are always ready to serve in our nation’s defense. But they must never be used to violate the rights of those they are sworn to protect.

Leon E. Panetta, former defense secretary

Chuck Hagel, former defense secretary

Ashton B. Carter, former defense secretary

William S. Cohen, former defense secretary

Sasha Baker, former deputy chief of staff to the defense secretary

Donna Barbisch, retired major general in the U.S. Army

Jeremy Bash, chief of staff to the defense secretary

Jeffrey P. Bialos, former deputy under secretary of defense for industrial affairs

Susanna V. Blume, former deputy chief of staff to the deputy defense secretary

Ian Brzezinski, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Europe and NATO

Gabe Camarillo, former assistant secretary of the Air Force

Kurt M. Campbell, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Asia and the Pacific

Michael Carpenter, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia

Rebecca Bill Chavez, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Western hemisphere affairs

Derek Chollet, former assistant defense secretary for international security affairs

Dan Christman, retired lieutenant general in the U.S. Army and former assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

James Clapper, former under secretary of defense for intelligence and director of national intelligence

Eliot A. Cohen, former member of planning staff for the defense department and former member of the Defense Policy Board

Erin Conaton, former under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness

John Conger, former principal deputy under secretary of defense

Peter S. Cooke, retired major general of the U.S. Army Reserve

Richard Danzig, former secretary of the U.S. Navy

Janine Davidson, former under secretary of the U.S. Navy

Robert L. Deitz, former general counsel at the National Security Agency

Abraham M. Denmark, former deputy assistant defense secretary for East Asia

Michael B. Donley, former secretary of the U.S. Air Force

John W. Douglass, retired brigadier general in the U.S. Air Force and former assistant secretary of the U.S. Navy

Raymond F. DuBois, former acting under secretary of the U.S. Army

Eric Edelman, former under secretary of defense for policy

Eric Fanning, former secretary of the U.S. Army

Evelyn N. Farkas, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia

Michèle A. Flournoy, former under secretary of defense for policy

Nelson M. Ford, former under secretary of the U.S. Army

Alice Friend, former principal director for African affairs in the office of the under defense secretary for policy

John A. Gans Jr., former speechwriter for the defense secretary

Sherri Goodman, former deputy under secretary of defense for environmental security

André Gudger, former deputy assistant defense secretary for manufacturing and industrial base policy

Robert Hale, former under secretary of defense and Defense Department comptroller

Michael V. Hayden, retired general in the U.S. Air Force and former director of the National Security Agency and CIA

Mark Hertling, retired lieutenant general in the U.S. Army and former commanding general of U.S. Army Europe

Kathleen H. Hicks, former principal deputy under secretary of defense for policy

Deborah Lee James, former secretary of the U.S. Air Force

John P. Jumper, retired general of the U.S. Air Force and former chief of staff of the Air Force

Colin H. Kahl, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Middle East policy

Mara E. Karlin, former deputy assistant defense secretary for strategy and force development

Frank Kendall, former under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics

Susan Koch, former deputy assistant defense secretary for threat-reduction policy

Ken Krieg, former under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics

J. William Leonard, former deputy assistant defense secretary for security and information operations

Steven J. Lepper, retired major general of the U.S. Air Force

George Little, former Pentagon press secretary

William J. Lynn III, former deputy defense secretary

Ray Mabus, former secretary of the U.S. Navy and former governor of Mississippi

Kelly Magsamen, former principal deputy assistant defense secretary for Asian and Pacific security affairs

Carlos E. Martinez, retired brigadier general of the U.S. Air Force Reserve

Michael McCord, former under secretary of defense and Defense Department comptroller

Chris Mellon, former deputy assistant defense secretary for intelligence

James N. Miller, former under secretary of defense for policy

Edward T. Morehouse Jr., former principal deputy assistant defense secretary and former acting assistant defense secretary for operational energy plans and programs

Jamie Morin, former director of cost assessment and program evaluation at the Defense Department and former acting under secretary of the U.S. Air Force

Jennifer M. O’Connor, former general counsel of the Defense Department

Sean O’Keefe, former secretary of the U.S. Navy

Dave Oliver, former principal deputy under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics

Robert B. Pirie, former under secretary of the U.S. Navy

AD

John Plumb, former acting deputy assistant defense secretary for space policy

Eric Rosenbach, former assistant defense secretary for homeland defense and global security

Deborah Rosenblum, former acting deputy assistant defense secretary for counternarcotics

Todd Rosenblum, acting assistant defense secretary for homeland defense and Americas’ security affairs

Tommy Ross, former deputy assistant defense secretary for security cooperation

Henry J. Schweiter, former deputy assistant defense secretary

David B. Shear, former assistant defense secretary for Asian and Pacific security affairs

Amy E. Searight, former deputy assistant defense secretary for South and Southeast Asia

Vikram J. Singh, former deputy assistant defense secretary for South and Southeast Asia

Julianne Smith, former deputy national security adviser to the vice president and former principal director for Europe and NATO policy

Paula Thornhill, retired brigadier general of the Air Force and former principal director for Near Eastern and South Asian affairs

Jim Townsend, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Europe and NATO policy

Sandy Vershbow, former assistant defense secretary for international security affairs

Michael Vickers, former under secretary of defense for intelligence

Celeste Wallander, former deputy assistant defense secretary for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia

Andrew Weber, former assistant defense secretary for nuclear, chemical and biological defense programs

William F. Wechsler, former deputy assistant defense secretary for special operations and combating terrorism

Doug Wilson, former assistant defense secretary for public affairs

Anne A. Witkowsky, former deputy assistant defense secretary for stability and humanitarian affairs

Douglas Wise, former deputy director of the Defense Intelligence Agency

Daniel P. Woodward, retired brigadier general of the U.S. Air Force

Margaret H. Woodward, retired major general of the U.S. Air Force

Carl Woog, former deputy assistant to the defense secretary for communications

Robert O. Work, former deputy defense secretary

Dov S. Zakheim, former under secretary of defense and Defense Department comptroller

Voir enfin:

The Strength of America’s Apolitical Military

Statement by Former U.S. Ambassadors, Military Officers, Senior Officials

by Ambassador Douglas A. Silliman, Ambassador Deborah A. McCarthy and Thomas Countryman

Just security.org

June 15, 2020

First published on June 5, 2020. Updated: June 15, 2020.

Retired members of the U.S. diplomatic corps, many of whom had seen first-hand in non-democratic countries the use of the military as a tool to suppress public protest, were alarmed this week at what seemed steps in that direction on the streets of Washington. The following letter expresses their concern at such measures and their support for the U.S. military’s proud tradition of staying outside of politics. It is addressed to national, state, and local leaders, and has been endorsed by 612 former officials from the diplomatic, military, and other services, as listed below.

The Strength of America’s Apolitical Military

The United States is passing through a period unlike any our country has experienced before. Our population, our society, and our economy have been devastated by the pandemic and the resulting depression-level unemployment. We deplore the brutal killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis which has provoked more widespread protests than the United States has seen in decades.

As former American ambassadors, generals and admirals, and senior federal officials, we are alarmed by calls from the President and some political leaders for the use of U.S. military personnel to end legitimate protests in cities and towns across America.

Many of us served across the globe, including in war zones, diplomats and military officers working side by side to advance American interests and values. We called out violations of human rights and the authoritarian regimes that deployed their military against their own citizens. Our values define us as a nation and as a global leader.

The professionalism and political neutrality of the U.S. military have been examples for people around the world who aspire to greater freedom and democracy in their own societies. They are among our nation’s greatest assets in protecting Americans and asserting American interests across the globe.

Cities and neighborhoods in which Americans are assembling peacefully, speaking freely, and seeking redress of their grievances are not “battlespaces.” Federal, state, and local officials must never seek to “dominate” those exercising their First Amendment rights. Rather they have a responsibility to ensure that peaceful protest can take place safely as well as to protect those taking part. We condemn all criminal acts against persons and property, but cannot agree that responding to these acts is beyond the capabilities of local and state authorities.

Our military is composed of and represents all of America. Misuse of the military for political purposes would weaken the fabric of our democracy, denigrate those who serve in uniform to protect and defend the Constitution, and undermine our nation’s strength abroad. There is no role for the U.S. military in dealing with American citizens exercising their constitutional right to free speech, however uncomfortable that speech may be for some.

We are concerned about the use of U.S. military assets to intimidate and break up peaceful protestors in Washington, D.C. Using the rotor wash of helicopters flying at low altitude to disperse protestors is reckless and unnecessary. The stationing of D.C. Air National Guard troops in full battle armor on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial is inflammatory and risks sullying the reputation of our men and women in uniform in the eyes of their fellow Americans and of the world.

Declaring peaceful protestors “thugs” and “terrorists” and falsely seeking to divide Americans into those who support “law and order” and those who do not will not end the demonstrations. The deployment of military forces against American citizens exercising their constitutional rights will not heal the divides in our society.

We urge the President and state and local governments to focus their efforts on uniting the country and supporting reforms to ensure equal police treatment of all citizens, regardless of race or ethnicity.

Ultimately, the issues that have driven the protests cannot be addressed by our military. They must be resolved through political processes.

Anne H. Aarnes
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

Gina Abercrombie-Winstanley
Ambassador (ret)

Edward Abington
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Jonathan S. Addleton
Ambassador, USAID (ret)

Terry Adirim
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense

James A. Adkins
MG, US Army (ret)

Cynthia H. Akuetteh
Ambassador (ret)

Karl P. Albrecht
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Leslie Alexander
Ambassador (ret)

Javed Ali
Former Senior Director, National Security Council

Craig Allen
Ambassador (ret)

Jay Anania
Ambassador (ret)

Claudia E. Anyaso
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Ricardo Aponte
Brigadier General, USAF (ret)

Richard H. Appleton
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Hilda Arellano
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Raymond Arnaudo
Senior State Department Official (ret)

Kirk Augustine
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Liliana Ayalde
Ambassador (ret)

Alyssa Ayres
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State

Daniel Baer
Ambassador (ret)

Gary G. Bagley
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Jess L. Baily
Ambassador (ret)

Tom Baltazar
Senior Executive Service, USAID (ret)

Robert C. Barber
Ambassador (ret)

Donna Barbisch
Major General, USA (ret)

Denise Campbell Bauer
Ambassador (ret)

James A. Beaver
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

Frederick Becker
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Robert Mason Beecroft
Ambassador (ret)

Rand Beers
Former Deputy Assistant to the President

Colleen Bell
Ambassador (ret)

William Bellamy
Ambassador (ret)

Daniel Benjamin
Ambassador (ret)

Eric D Benjaminson
Ambassador (ret)

John E. Bennett
United States Ambassador (ret)

Virginia L. Bennett
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Jenna Ben-Yehuda
Former Senior Military Advisor, Department of State

Rob Berschinski
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State

James Bever
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

John Beyrle
Ambassador (ret)

J.D. Bindenagel
Ambassador (ret)

Jack R. Binns
Ambassador (ret)

James Keogh Bishop
Ambassador (ret)

Rebecca Black
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Stephen J. Blake
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

James J. Blanchard
Ambassador (ret)
Former Governor of Michigan

Ronald R. Blanck
Lieutenant General (ret)

Beryl Blecher
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Peter W. Bodde
Ambassador (ret)

Barbara Bodine
Ambassador (ret)

Michael A. Boorstein
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Michele Thoren Bond
Ambassador (ret)

Eric J. Boswell
Ambassador (ret)

Paul L. Boyd
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Spencer P. Boyer
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State

Aurelia E. Brazeal
Ambassador (ret)

Pamela Bridgewater
Ambassador (ret)

Ken Brill
Ambassador (ret)

Carol Moseley Braun
Ambassador (ret)

Philip J. Breeden, Jr.
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Peter S. Bridges
Ambassador (ret)

Dolores Marie Brown
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Gordon S. Brown
Ambassador (ret)

Sue K. Brown
Ambassador (ret)

Steven A. Browning
Ambassador (ret)

Lee Anthony Brudvig
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Jennifer Brush
Ambassador (ret)

Judith L. Bryan
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Todd Buchwald
Ambassador (ret)

Craig Buck
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

David P. Burford
Major General, USA (ret)

Sandy M. Burkholder
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Peter Burleigh
Ambassador (ret)

Nicholas Burns
Ambassador (ret)

William J. Burns
Ambassador (ret)
Former Deputy Secretary of State

Prudence Bushnell
Ambassador (ret)

Patricia A. Butenis
Ambassador (ret)

Michael A. Butler
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Anne Callaghan
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Robert J. Callahan
Ambassador (ret)

Beatrice Camp
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Donald M. Campbell, Jr.
Lieutenant General, US Army (ret)

Piper A. W. Campbell
Ambassador (ret)

Glenn L. Carle
Former Deputy National Intelligence Officer, CIA

Lisa M. Carle
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

George Carner
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

James Carouso
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Steven A. Cash
Former Intelligence Officer, CIA

Ronnie S. Catipon
Senior Foreign Service Special Agent (ret)

John Caulfied
Senior Foreign Service Officer, (ret)

Carey Cavanaugh
Ambassador (ret)

Judith B. Cefkin
Ambassador (ret)

Robert F. Cekuta
Ambassador (ret)

Jeffrey R Cellars
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Wendy J. Chamberlin
Ambassador (ret)

Peter R Chaveas
Ambassador (ret)

Phil Chicola
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Karen L. Christensen
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Gene Christy
Ambassador (ret)

David A. Cohen
Senior Foreign Service, USAID (ret)

Herman J. Cohen
Ambassador (ret)

Maryruth Coleman
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Maura Connelly
Ambassador (ret)

Elinor Constable
Ambassador (ret)

Ellen M. Conway
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Frances D. Cook
Ambassador (ret)

Frederick B. Cook
Ambassador ret)

Suzan Johnson Cook
Ambassador (ret)

Thomas Countryman
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Cindy Courville
Ambassador (ret)

Ertharin Cousin
Ambassador (ret)

Philip E. Coyle III
Former Associate Director, Office of Science and Technology Policy, White House

Gene A. Cretz
Ambassador (ret)

Daniel Thomas Crocker
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Christopher D. Crowley
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

James Dandridge II
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

John J. Danilovich
Ambassador (ret)

Glyn T. Davies
Ambassador (ret)

John W Davison
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Luis C. deBaca
Ambassador (ret)

Kimberley J. DeBlauw
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Carleene Dei
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Jeffrey DeLaurentis
Ambassador (ret)

Greg Delawie
Ambassador (ret)

Christopher W. Dell
Ambassador (ret)

Anne E. Derse
Ambassador (ret)

Joseph M. DeThomas
Ambassador (ret)

Richard T. Devereaux
Major General, USAF (ret)

James Dickmeyer
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

John Dickson
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Elizabeth L. Dibble
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Dirk Willem Dijkerman
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

Anne Chermak Dillen
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Robert S. Dillon
Ambassador (ret)

John Dinger
Ambassador (ret)

Kathleen A. Doherty
Ambassador (ret)

Shaun Donnelly
Ambassador (ret)

John Douglass
Brigadier General, USAF (ret)
Former Assistant Secretary of the Navy

Mary Draper
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Audrey B. Dumentat
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret.)

David Dunford
Ambassador (ret)

Polly Dunford
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

Morton R Dworken
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Renee M. Earle
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Paul D. Eaton
Major General, USA (ret)

William A. Eaton
Ambassador (ret)

Alan W Eastham
Ambassador (ret)

Luigi Einaudi
Ambassador (ret)

Harriet L. Elam-Thomas
Ambassador (ret)

Susan M. Elliott
Ambassador (ret)

Nancy H. Ely-Raphel
Ambassador (ret)

Larry Emery
Senior Executive Service (ret)

Ellen Connor Engels
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Tom Engle
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Andrew Erickson
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

John M. Evans
Ambassador (ret)

John Ewers
Major General, US Marine Corps (ret)

Kenneth Fairfax
Ambassador (ret)

John Feeley
Ambassador (ret)

Gerald M. Feierstein
Ambassador (ret)

Lee Feinstein
Ambassador (ret)

Robert J. Felderman
Brigadier General, USA (ret)

Dan Feldman
Former Special Representative for Afghanistan/Pakistan

Jeffrey Feltman
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Judith R. Fergin
Ambassador (ret)

Jose W. Fernandez
Former Assistant Secretary of State for Economic, Energy and Business Affairs

Susan F. Fine
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Jon Finer
Former Chief of Staff, Department of State

Thomas Fingar
Former Assistant Secretary of State

Mark Fitzpatrick
former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State

Lauri Fitz-Pegado
Former Director General, Foreign Commercial Service

Stephen J. Flanagan
Former Senior Director, National Security Council

Paul Folmsbee
Ambassador (ret)

Jim Foster
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Stephenie Foster
Former Counselor, Office of Global Women’s Issues)

Anita Friedt
Senior Executive Service (ret)

Laurie S. Fulton
Ambassador (ret)

Julie Furuta-Toy
Ambassador (ret)

James I. Gadsden
Ambassador (ret)

Larry Garber
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

Janet E. Garvey
Ambassador (ret)

O.P. Garza
Ambassador (ret)

Walter E. Gaskin
Lieutenant General, USMC (ret)

Mary Ellen T. Gilroy
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Mark Gitenstein
Ambassador (ret)

Robert A. Glacel
Brigadier General, US Army (ret)

Fred S. Glass
Rear Admiral, JAGC, USN (ret)

Edward W. Gnehm
Ambassador (ret)

Robert Goldberg
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Christopher E. Goldthwait
Ambassador (ret)

Rose Gottemoeller
former Undersecretary of State

Colleen Graffy
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State

Gary A. Grappo
Ambassador (ret)

Thomas P. Gratto
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Gordon Gray
Ambassador (ret)

Mary A. Gray
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Thomas F. Gray, Jr
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Ronald Greenberg
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

Douglas C. Greene
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Kevin P. Green
Vice Admiral, USN (ret)

Theresa Grencik
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Ken Gross
Ambassador (ret)

Charles H. Grover
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Michael Guest
Ambassador (ret)

Sheila Gwaltney
Ambassador (ret)

Nina Hachigian
Ambassador (ret)

Anne Hall
Ambassador (ret)

Danny Hall
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Suneta L. Halliburton
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Pamela Hamamoto
Ambassador (ret)

John R. Hamilton
Ambassador (ret)

William P. Hammink
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

David Harden
Senior Foreign Service Officer, USAID (ret)

Robert A. Harding
Major General, USA (ret)

Keith M. Harper
Ambassador (ret)

Grant T. Harris
former senior director, National Security Council

Douglas A. Hartwick
Ambassador, (ret)

Jennifer C. Haskell
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Patricia M. Haslach
Ambassador (ret)

William J. Haugh
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Patricia M. Hawkins
Ambassador (ret)

John Heffern
Ambassador (ret)

Samuel D. Heins
Ambassador (ret)

Douglas Hengel
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Christopher R. Hill
Ambassador (ret)

William H. Hill
Ambassador (ret)

Catherine Hill-Herndon
Senior Foreign Service (ret)

Joseph Hilliard
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Jim E. Hinds
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense

John L Hirsch
Ambassador (ret)

Eric L. Hirschhorn
Former Undersecretary of Commerce

Richard E. Hoagland
Ambassador (ret)

Heather Hodges
Ambassador (ret)

Karl Hoffmann
Ambassador (ret)

Christopher J. Hoh
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Laura S. H. Holgate
Ambassador (ret)

J. Anthony Holmes
Ambassador (ret)

James H. Holmes
Ambassador (ret)

Jim Hooper
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Samuel M. Hoskinson
Former Vice Chairman, National Intelligence Council

Thomas C. Hubbard
Ambassador (ret)

Franklin Huddle
Ambassador (ret)

Vicki J. Huddleston
Ambassador (ret)

William J. Hudson
Ambassador (ret)

Arthur H. Hughes
Ambassador (ret)

Marie T. Huhtala
Ambassador (ret)

Thomas N. Hull
Ambassador (ret)

Cameron R. Hume
Ambassador (ret)

Ravi R. Huso
Ambassador (ret)

Dorothy Senger Imwold
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Karl F. Inderfurth
Former Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian Affairs
Ambassador (ret)

David R. Irvine
Brigadier General, USA (ret)

Susan S. Jacobs
Ambassador (ret)

Tracey Jacobson
Ambassador (ret)

Jeanine Jackson
Ambassador (ret)

Jeffrey A. Jacobs
MG, US Army (ret)

Morris E. “Bud” Jacobs
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

Les Janka
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense

Bonnie Jenkins
Ambassador (ret)

Charles J. Jess
Senior Foreign Service Officer (ret)

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Voir par ailleurs:

Peter Navarro ‘The Immaculate Deception’ Report News Conference Transcript

Dec 17, 2020

White House Advisor Peter Navarro released his own 36-page report alleging election fraud called “The Immaculate Deception.” He presented the contents of the report in a press conference on December 17, 2020. Read the full transcript here.

Peter Navarro: (00:00)
The big takeaways for me is there appears to be a coordinated strategy effectively to stuff the ballot box with Biden votes, and at least some evidence of the destruction of Trump ballots. That’s number one. Number two, when you go across the six battleground states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, you can see that the number of votes that are being contested, the arguably illegal votes, dwarf the relatively thin Biden victory margins in five of the six states. So, that’s number two.

Peter Navarro: (00:54)
And this is something I think that’s been missing from the discussion. This is death by a thousand cuts, but more precisely deaths by the six dimensions of election [inaudible 00:01:10] a smoking gun. And to that point, number four, the famous Tolstoy quote about happy families being all alike, but unhappy families are unhappy in their own way. We have a similar situation here where each of the six battleground states is different in its own way in terms of this election irregularities. Georgia has consent decree issues. Wisconsin has definitely confined voter issues. Michigan has the observer issues and so on.

Peter Navarro: (01:57)
And then the last thing which is very troublesome to me is that there seems to be a tremendous effort on the part of many of what should be our pillar institutions in this country to basically self-censor anybody who challenges the results of the election, and it effectively mounts to a coverup. And obviously we’ve got issues with the anti-Trump media, which has hammered him for four years and predicted a landslide win for Biden that never came. We’ve got corporate America. We got surprisingly some of the Republican establishment, and then finally we have state legislatures and the courts themselves.

Peter Navarro: (02:51)
And then the other two things I’ll say before working through this whole thing is that you can’t, as a reporter, at this point responsibly say there’s no evidence. There’s a ton of evidence. There’s a mound of it. And you can’t say that just because the courts have ruled against Trump in a number of cases that there’s no evidence of fraud. Most of these cases have been decided on procedure and process rather than the evidence itself.

Peter Navarro: (03:27)
All right, well that is the big picture. Let me explain what I did and why I did it. I think he started at midnight on election night when the Trump red tide effectively showed an insurmountable lead, what seemed to be insurmountable leads in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Georgia was over 350,000 votes, Pennsylvania over half a million, Michigan almost 300,000 and Wisconsin over 100,000. And what you saw beginning kind of in the dead of night, these votes counts that started to come in that over time turned the Trump red tide into Biden blue. And what’s striking about what happened is the narrowness, the razor thin margins by which Biden appears to have won those four battle ground states.

Peter Navarro: (04:46)
It’s also true, and I don’t know if this is out in the public record that even though the president was behind in both Arizona and Nevada by small margins, there was great confidence within the Trump campaign itself based on internal polling, that the president would close both of those gaps, at least Arizona. And it looked like at midnight that this was going to be a landslide victory in the electoral college, contrary to everything we had been subjected to for months before the election, in terms of the pollsters. So what happened? That’s the question in the wake of this astonishing reversal of Trump fortune. What we’ve had is basically a national firestorm erupt over a country which [inaudible 00:05:48] one another. It’s a 50/50 country right now. It’s just sharply divided on partisan grounds, on ideological grounds. It’s the Democrats versus the Republicans, the nationalists versus the globalists, the working class versus the progressive elites and so on. And so we’ve been fighting about this. There’s court cases and things like that. And at this point, I mean, there’s evidence that the American public has a great suspicion as yourself.

Peter Navarro: (06:22)
So, why did I come in as a private citizen and kind of do my scholar thing, which I had done for 25 years? For me, what’s been missing in this whole debate is kind of a chess board look out of a 30,000 foot view of what exactly was going on across the entire terrain. I just simply got tired of hearing people talk about anecdotes and individual things without kind of connecting all of the dots. So I wanted to get to the bottom of all this. I think it’s important for the future of this country that we do this and we do this before Inauguration Day.

Peter Navarro: (07:15)
And so here’s what I did. I started with the available evidence and that evidence consists essentially of thousands of affidavits and declarations, which I had access to. Many of those are not in the public record. I also looked at the testimony that had been presented in a variety of state venues. There’s published reports and analysis by think tanks and legal centers. There’s videos, for example, of the famous suitcase in the Atlanta arena. Photos, public comments, press publish and the like.

Peter Navarro: (08:02)
And from that, from the study of that evidence, I was able to tease out what I see as six major dimensions of these election irregularities. And these include, if you start with the outright fraud, okay? In the report, there’s close to 10 categories of these things. So for example, the worst kind of offense is this large scale fake ballot manufacturing. And we have the story of the tractor trailer that got missing in Pennsylvania that may have had 100,000 votes in it. We saw what happened in the State Farm Arena in Georgia. There’s allegations as well in Arizona. We have indefinitely confined voter abuses where people who claim that they’re indefinitely confined are skiing in Aspen and voting without appropriate ID. Bribery, like what happened in Nevada on the Indian reservations. Ineligible voters, legal aliens, for example, or under-aged voters. There’s maybe tens of thousands of those. The dead voters. There seems to be a persistent problem of dead voters popping up across a number of the battleground states. Ghost voters are those that voted from an address they no longer reside in and so on.

Peter Navarro: (09:51)
So, there’s a whole bunch of outright fraud that’s possible. Right? And if you look at the report, you find that a check-mark in the matrices we have indicates substantial evidence and the star indicates some evidence. So there’s plenty of that across the six battlegrounds. If you look at ballot mishandling, you have again, a variety of things there. And this is the granularity that I hope all of the reporters will kind of focus on. There’s the broken chain of custody, for example. You have all these drop box abuses where they were placed in places like Wisconsin without any supervision. We don’t know whether the ballot that was maybe cast by a voter and wound up in one of those drop boxes was anyway interfered with.

Peter Navarro: (10:53)
There’s the naked ballot problem, which I mean, that was huge because there was just a lot of ballots that came in without outer envelopes. So there’s no way you can do the signature match, yet a lot of these were entered into the tabulation. Pennsylvania kind of jumps out at you at that. Ballots accepted without postmarks and so on.

Peter Navarro: (11:19)
And then if you go to the third dimension of these regularities, you have what I call contestable process fouls. These are examples of where you have effectively, in a lot of cases, the Democrats pushing the envelope of existing in ways where they just blew right over the edges of that envelope. For example, mail-in extensions contrary to law, voters not properly registered, allowed to vote.

Peter Navarro: (12:05)
A big one here, and this is kind of like the pillar of a fair election. This is like letting poll watchers and observers come in and see whether the ballots that are being brought in are proper. That they have a proper signature match, they’re not naked ballots, and that they’re not counted more than once when they go through the machines. And we just saw there’s just a lot of affidavits talking about these kinds of things. Michigan was arguably the worst in Detroit and Wayne County and that was pure thuggery what appeared to happen there. And other things like absentee ballots requested and accepted too early or taken too late.

Peter Navarro: (12:58)
The next dimension really addresses the 14th Amendment Equal Protection Clause issue. I mean, this is a sea of check marks across all six states, across three dimensions of violations. I mean, the Democrats basically used the absentee ballot, mail-in ballot process to flood the zone. And one of the big problems with that, for example, as an equal protection issue is that you had much higher standards of ID verification for people who actually went to the polls, the in-person voters versus the mail-ins. And it’s an equal protection issue because you had many more Democrats voting as a mail-in or absentee ballot-

Peter Navarro: (14:03)
… voting as a mail-in or absentee ballot person. So you had much less stringent voter ID checks for Democrats. And if you combine that with all the other attempts at abuses dealing with the chain of custody issues, it’s a real issue. You have different standards of ballot curing across jurisdictions. I don’t know. I never assumed that Republicans were more polite than Democrats, but the patterns in the battleground states indicated pretty clearly that if you were a Republican observer or poll watcher in these six battleground states, you were subject to significant harassment, intimidation, and other kinds of things. And then you go to the category of election statistical anomalies, there’s just some weird stuff happened there. You had some cases where the turnout was over 100%. You’ve got evidence of votes switching. You’ve got a case where statistically improbable vote totals based on party registration and historical patterns, and things like that.

Peter Navarro: (15:22)
And then lastly, you’ve got these voting machine irregularities. And those are associated with the Dominion machine, but there was two other things going on in Nevada. There’s this thing called the Agilis, which was used for doing ID checks, essentially. And you can’t use that machine, because Nevada law says you have to do these things with humans, not machines. So strike one, there. But it’s also true these machines had an incredibly poor accuracy rate. So effectively in Nevada, where you also had these corresponding problems of people who probably weren’t residents of the state actually voting, weren’t really able to check that properly. And then in Arizona, you had this Novus software, which was used to cure damaged ballots, and that was a train wreck as well. I mean, again, that’s a tremendous amount of granularity. And if you go through each of these six dimensions and then in the various 3 to 10 sub-dimensions, there’s just a lot going on there that should give people pause.

Peter Navarro: (16:58)
And that’s the essence of the report. And you can go through… It’s 31 pages with 150, almost, footnotes. And I would ask everybody to kind of just go through it carefully and make up your minds based on that and in some further investigation. As reporters, I think the ask here is that you don’t dismiss this out of hand, and you also use this as a motivation to do some further investigation. So I’ll stop there, and I’ll turn it over to the moderator to handle questions. I have the one question per, and it will be questions that will be limited simply to the report itself. Otherwise, we’ll move on to the next question. So turn it back to Rebecca and [crosstalk 00:18:12].

Rebecca: (18:16)
We thank everybody for coming on, people who in the media or not in the media, but this is first and foremost geared towards the media for dialogue and question availability. I want to call in [Will Steakin 00:18:28] From ABC News. Will, if you just unmute yourself, be delighted to have a question for Dr. Navarro from your vantage point.

Will Steakin: (18:43)
Thanks for doing this, Dr. Navarro, appreciate [inaudible 00:00:18:50]. So you said at the top of this call that there’s mounds of evidence, and obviously you say you were laying that out in this brief, this document, but the courts have almost unanimously rejected the president’s team, allies. Almost over 50 cases have been thrown out, and you said that that was mostly because of process, but that’s not necessarily true. A lot of the courts have said specifically, “These claims are speculation, it’s conjecture.” That’s a quote from a judge in Pennsylvania has thrown this out. The DOJ has said there’s been no evidence of widespread voter fraud. So I guess my question is, if there’s this much evidence, is it just the president has a bad legal team? Why is it floundered [crosstalk 00:05:35]-

Peter Navarro: (19:43)
Yeah. I think there’s a couple of things going on. I think that that Bill Barr had no business making the statement he did. I thought that was premature, particularly in light of the fact we have what appears to be an FBI and Department of Justice that’s reticent about making any kinds of investigations. I mean, I’m still waiting for the Durham Report. I’m still waiting for there to be a clean accounting to the American people of what Brennan, Clapper, [Comey 00:00:20:19], [Page 00:00:20:20], and Strzok did in terms of trying to manipulate the 2016 election. I mean, I don’t put any stock in what the Department of Justice had to say, number one. Number two, look. I think that going forward, one of the lessons I think the Republicans need to learn is that, and both parties should have learned this with Bush V. Gore, is that a political campaign needs to have a legal component to it.

Peter Navarro: (21:10)
And there was plenty of warning signs over a year in advance of this election that the Democrats were going to implement this coordinated strategy which I discussed. Because you saw that consent decree going to place. I’m not sure people understood the full implication of what destroying the signature verification would be, but that should have and could have been challenged. Digression… I mean, in the report, please look at my calculation carefully, because that consent decree, we went from a 6% rejection rate down to virtually nothing, and a massive increase in absentee ballots. And the delta on that is more than sufficient for a Biden win with ballots which would likely have been otherwise thrown out. So we saw the consent decree coming. We saw the machinations that were going on in Wisconsin, in Pennsylvania.

Peter Navarro: (22:24)
And certainly if you’re Monday morning quarterback, then you could say that we should have been on this as a party earlier, and with more forces. Okay. But having said that, let’s be clear. If in fact what has happened is as I have described it, that doesn’t take away the fact that something damaging has been done. So you asked, I think, a really important question. And I do think that… Look, I’m a pragmatist here. When I look at judicial branch, it’s as political as legislative and administrative branches. So there is that to deal with. I think it’s criminal that the Republicans holding majorities in state legislatures in both parties have not had the courage to use their power and authority to conduct the appropriate investigations, and I say that in the report.

Peter Navarro: (23:55)
So I hear you, but what I’m asking you to do with this report is just go through it carefully and parse it and come to your own conclusions. I think it’s probably the most comprehensive chessboard look at what’s happened of anything that’s out there. So [inaudible 00:24:21] the next question.

Rebecca: (24:22)
Okay, great. Sam Stein. Sam, if you just unmute yourself… From The Daily Beast.

Sam Stein: (24:32)
Hey guys, thanks so much for doing this. [crosstalk 00:24:34]. Yes.

Rebecca: (24:33)
Thank you for [inaudible 00:24:37], Sam.

Sam Stein: (24:37)
Yeah, I appreciate it. Dr. Navarro, so you’ve laid out a fairly comprehensive [crosstalk 00:00:24:42]-

Peter Navarro: (24:45)
Okay. Yeah, sure.

Sam Stein: (24:47)
Yes. No, the press briefing refers to you as Dr. Navarro. You’ve put out-

Peter Navarro: (24:51)
I know. You were doing your Daily Beast thing with your emphasis there. So I had to laugh, but go ahead.

Sam Stein: (25:00)
This report, it lays out a comprehensive case for these dimensions of irregularities and fraud. There are very few, I guess, tension points left in the electoral process by which to do these investigations that you’re calling for. So I’m wondering, in your personal capacity, do you believe that Republicans in Congress should object to the validation of the election when it comes to a vote on January 6? And secondarily, you’ve made the case that Republicans statewide have not stepped up to the plate, so to speak, in how they’ve handled the electoral irregularities in their own states. I’m wondering, do you feel like, for instance, Governor Brian Kemp deserves to be challenged in a primary over what’s happened in the 2020 elections? Is this the type of thing that should haunt their political futures?

Peter Navarro: (26:01)
Well, I think it’s [inaudible 00:26:02] that you’d haunt this country. I’m telling you that we have a situation now where the… I call it the anti-Trump media, and it’s the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, MSNBC, a little bit of The Daily Beast in there, probably. I mean, there’s a tremendous attempt right now to suppress anybody or anything that calls these results into question, and I think that’s a very dangerous thing. I mean, this is like supposed to be the greatest democracy in history, and if you can’t have what people in this country believe is a fair election, all hope is lost. And there’s sufficient skepticism and doubt right now, and the reason is, Sam, is because we haven’t really done the full investigation. The initial line from the anti-Trump media was, “There’s no evidence.”

Peter Navarro: (27:12)
Then it was, “There’s some evidence, but not enough to overturn the election.” And now the line is, “Well, the Electoral College has ruled and it’s over, so let’s move on.” But let’s remember that the election was stolen from Nixon in 1960, stolen, flat out. It took decades for anybody to fully acknowledge that, and it had a great effect on our history, including probably a great impact on how the Vietnam War might’ve even unfolded. So these elections have consequences. My concern is that if we don’t deal with this before Inauguration Day in a comprehensive way-

Peter Navarro: (28:02)
… before Inauguration Day in a comprehensive way, that it will undermine the integrity of our process, and now [crosstalk 00:28:13]. Yeah, I’m going to give you your answer. First of all, first thing you have to do is you cannot hold that election for Senate in Georgia on January 5th. You have to at least push that until February to clean up Georgia’s act. Georgia is a frigging cesspool of election irregularities, and there’s no sign of any cleanup prior to January 5th. They’re going to double down. The Democrats are going to double down in every trick they pull in Georgia to try to take that election through these election irregularities. So I think we need to do that. I think that what Ron Johnson did yesterday in the hearing was healthy. I think that every state legislature needs to get their butts back into session and hold an investigation. And should people be held accountable for this, regardless of party? Yeah. I mean, this is like-

Sam: (29:22)
There’s a big vote coming up on January 6th. Big vote coming up on January 6th. Congress needs to validate the election. There has been some talk among some members-

Peter Navarro: (29:31)
But you’re looking for a headline now. I mean, look, my role here is to say that the emperor in the election has no clothes, all right? Your job as reporters, I believe, is to dig deeper into the granularity that I’ve put before you, okay? There’s something rotten here in Denmark, right? And as to what we do about it, as every day goes by, it becomes more complicated and you’re absolutely right that our options narrow. But the last thing this country needs is an Inauguration Day where we have what is perceived to be an illegal and illegitimate president inaugurated. I’m going to move to the next question, but thank you, Sam. I appreciate your thoughts. Yeah. All right, what else?

Alexandra: (30:24)
Thank you, Sam. Next question is Penny Starr from Breitbart. Just unmute yourself. Willem might mute you and just we’ll have you unmute yourself, Penny. We’ll be delighted to take your question.

Alexandra: (30:36)
Penny?

Peter Navarro: (30:36)
We lost Penny. All right, move on to the next person. We’ll come back to Penny.

Alexandra: (30:54)
Next one is Simone Gao. Simone? We’ve unmuted you and Penny.

Peter Navarro: (30:59)
From where?

Alexandra: (31:00)
Pardon me, from the Epoch Times and NTD, Japanese television.

Peter Navarro: (31:05)
Okay.

Simone Gao: (31:06)
Hello? Can you hear me?

Alexandra: (31:08)
Yes.

Simone Gao: (31:11)
Dr. Navarro, in your report, you listed six categories of irregularities. And in them, there’s no foreign interference. So I was wondering, have you done research in this area or you have done research, but you haven’t found anything?

Peter Navarro: (31:32)
Option three. I’ve done research, but I didn’t want to put that into the report because it’s a whole nother issue. And I think it would have detracted from everything else that’s in the report. But I do strongly urge our heads of state to look into possibilities. And it may be as we dig deeper into, for example, the dominion issue and possibly get access to analyzing the ballots in Maricopa County, it’ll be able to track some of that back. All right. Next question.

Alexandra: (32:17)
Okay. Penny does have a question. Penny, if you can unmute your line. If not, we can ask the question for you. All right. Seems she’s not able to do it. We’re going to go to John Zmirak from The Stream. John, we’re unmuting your line. Please make sure you unmute yourself as well. John?

Peter Navarro: (32:51)
What’s going on there?

John Zmirak: (32:51)
Sorry, can you hear me?

Alexandra: (32:53)
Yes, we can. Doctor-

John Zmirak: (32:55)
I’m sorry. I’m not used to this interface. Okay. Thank you for this report. I will try to publicize as much as possible as soon as I have a written form of it. I would ask why? Why are so many in the legacy conservative media, particularly, and why are so many Republican lawmakers such as Mr. McConnell eager to shut this down without an examination of the merits? Can you speculate as to what’s going on? Do they simply want to get the Trump phenomenon out of the way so they can return the Republican party to what it was before? Or is this a desperate attachment to respectability, to pretending we live in a 1946 textbook? I’m baffled why you see nationally all these people lining up to silence and mock the people who are raising these serious questions after four years of the Russia collusion hoax.

Peter Navarro: (33:58)
Well, I think what part of your question indicated, I think you understand exactly what’s going on here. If you look at Donald Trump, Donald Trump ran in 2016 as an economic nationalist. And two of the key pillars of economic nationalism are fair trade rather than free trade. And secure borders. Okay? The fair trade issue is basically stop sending our jobs off shore in pursuit of slave labor and cheap supply chains, to protect American workers, and secure borders is basically, at an economic nationalist level, a way of restricting the supply of cheap labor to protect primarily lower income minorities in our urban areas, Blacks and Hispanics. American Blacks and Hispanics are really the ones who get punished the most by illegal immigration. Right?

Peter Navarro: (35:20)
So that economic nationalism was very contrary to traditional Republicanism which supports free trade, as they define it, which basically means cheap labor, environmental pollution havens, government subsidies, and all of that. And open borders in order to basically attract cheap labor for American corporations. Right? So Trump basically beat 16 of these economic globalists that he ran against, beat them handily, and governed for the last four years accordingly. And national review think tanks like Heritage, much of the Republican universe, which is, at the think tank level, is funded by corporate America, has never embraced the President. Ever. Ever. And the same problem you have in the Congress, particularly in the Senate, where you have the poster child for that are people like Toomey.

Peter Navarro: (36:52)
So no one should be surprised by Toomey and Romney and the rhinos deserting the president. What is more puzzling, my friend, is the lack of intestinal fortitude at the state legislature level. I mean, it really is truly remarkable. You have Democrat governors in some of these states, the Republicans have a lock on the state legislatures. And those state legislators have the full power, basically, to overrule the electoral college vote total in those states. I mean, they could’ve stopped this and they could’ve put that baby in its crib just simply by investigating these charges. So that’s what’s going on here. This is, again, you have a case where close to 80 million Americans, the president’s deplorables, the people who are just, they’re just middle America working class folks that joined the Trump Republican party who were being, simultaneously in a pincer movement, harmed by a Democrat party, which is effectively, strategically gamed the electoral process. And traditional Republicans who want to go back to the status quo and forget all about Trump.

Peter Navarro: (38:32)
Now, the danger here is two fold. It’s like we can’t live in a country where we can’t have fair elections. And I think there’s too much thinking in the media itself in the Democrat party that somehow, in this special case, Trump is so bad that somehow the ends justify the means. And that’s just wrong. And at the same time, if any of these traditional Republicans think that the Trump revolution is over just because they won’t stand up for the president, they got another thing coming, number one. And number two, hell hath no fury like a deplorable scorned, and that’s what’s happening here. So anyway, next question.

John Zmirak: (39:27)
Thank you.

Alexandra: (39:29)
Okay. We have several more questions. Thanks, everybody, for being so patient here. Next one, Penny Starr has asked a question. And then we’re going to go to Jeremy Peters. Penny Starr at Breitbart says, “Will the report changed the outcome of the election? And if so, how would that unfold?”

Peter Navarro: (39:52)
My aspiration with this report is that it’ll be a catalyst for a full investigation of all of these alleged election irregularities on a fast track and done before Inauguration Day. And my view is that let the truth come forward. And if Biden won fair and square, then I’ll be the first to congratulate him. But if there are sufficient election irregularities and illegal votes to overturn the thin Biden margins in those battleground states, then America deserves a different outcome. So let’s see what happens, as the president likes to say. Next question.

Alexandra: (40:47)
Okay, great. We’re going to go to Jeremy Peters from the New York Times. You’re unmuted. Thank you so much, Jeremy.

Jeremy Peters: (40:55)
Hi there. Thanks for doing this, everyone. I know you said only one question, but my first question is very short, yes or no. And it’s have you shared this with the president, what you’ve laid out here, this report? And two, describe this kind of ever widening effort by people to undermine the integrity of the election that’s grown from the Democrats to Republicans and state legislatures, many of whom supported and voted for Trump, to Trump’s own justice department and his own attorney general and his own three Supreme Court justices, which he has hand picked. So I guess isn’t it more likely that rather than there being this kind of conspiracy to undermine Trump, that these folks are all looking at at your evidence and saying, “It’s just not there?”

Peter Navarro: (41:51)
So, no. That’s not possible at all because they haven’t seen all everything I looked at. They haven’t done their homework. I mean, I’ve literally read thousands of affidavits. I’ve read every-

Peter Navarro: (42:03)
I’ve literally read thousands of affidavits, I’ve read every single court case, I’ve looked at all the testimony that was done at the state legislature level and I can count on one hand the number of people who’ve done that in this country. So, no, I think what needs to happen is folks need to look at this.

Peter Navarro: (42:25)
The Supreme Court, the ruling of The Supreme Court, was not on facts or evidence. It was on standing. Let’s be clear about that, right? You can draw no conclusion from the legitimacy of the illegitimacy of this election, from what The Supreme Court rules, okay, so let’s be clear about that. Again, a previous caller talks about whether it was Mitch McConnell or Mitt Romney or whoever in the Republican party and these people are not aligned and never have been with the Trump agenda so it’s not surprising that they have pardoned company on this issue.

Peter Navarro: (43:21)
What I’d urge you, Jeremy, is like, look, I would say this. The New York Times has the most power of any news organization in the world to do effectively a hard investigation of all of this. It simply has not done that. It simply has not done that. The knee jerk reaction these days is to- if you’re on the left it’s like something that comes out that doesn’t fit your narrative, it’s like you knock it down. You kind of like- skeptics, this that and the other thing, give it no credence and if you’re on the right maybe you do the same thing but gray lady, love to see you guys do your job on this and there’s more at stake than you know.

Speaker 1: (44:32)
[crosstalk 00:44:32] Did you hear this one?

Peter Navarro: (44:35)
He hasn’t queued up any of his inbox. I don’t know if he’s read it yet.

Alexandra: (44:44)
Okay, next we’re going to go to Alexa Corse from The Wall Street Journal. Alexa, I’m muting your line if you want to unmute yourself.

Alexa Corse: (44:54)
Hi Dr. Navarro thanks for doing this. I wanted to return to what you said about Georgia because that was the first time I heard about the idea of postponing it. Have you talked to Governor Kemp or other Republicans in Georgia? What do you think the Governor should do about the situation there?

Peter Navarro: (45:20)
I think that there’s a court filing filed by Lynn Wood that has put that option on the table. It’s not my job to call Brian Kemp, but if he were to read this report I would not be unhappy about that. He really needs to step up, Ducey needs to step up, the state legislatures in these states need to step up. I mean these- in the presentation I didn’t go through kind of the individual states but this whole idea of each state and the toll story idea has it’s own- it’s kind of compromised in it’s own ways and yeah part of the problem in Georgia is Kemp was directly involved in that consent degree. So it’s kind of hard for him to admit that it’s illegal and basically gave the Democrats the weapon to destroy the Republicans. So that’s a little bit tough.

Peter Navarro: (46:40)
In Arizona, again, let’s be frank here the McCain factor is operative in Arizona politics there and there might be something going on in terms of the Arizona Republicans doing a little payback here but I mean, again, Alexa I get back to what I’m seeing here. I mean it’s like if you look very, very carefully at all of the evidence it’s frightening the scope of this and there’s plenty there and you can’t say that there’s no there there. There’s just plenty there and I mean, look, why don’t we know where that tractor trailer is that allegedly went from New York to a polling place in Pennsylvania? Where is Bill Barr and the justice department and Chris Wray on that? I mean why aren’t we seeing that?

Peter Navarro: (47:48)
By the way, somebody asked me earlier about the FBI and the justice department. Let’s think about this, it’s like prior to the election when Joe Biden was saying that the Hunter Biden laptop from hell showed nothing on it and the FBI had evidence to the contrary and was already conducting investigations yet they let that stand. I mean what’s going to happen here after the inauguration day and Joe Biden gets in and then they’ll tell us all this stuff happened? So, anyway it’s a dangerous game that the media is playing, that the political establishment is playing and that our justice branch of government is playing and I think we can do better.

Peter Navarro: (48:46)
So I urge The Wall Street Journal, who never liked our fair trade policies either, to investigate this a little bit more fully. Anyways, next question.

Alexa Corse: (49:00)
I just wanted to clarify, it was a little muffled, you said that Governor Ducey of Arizona also needs to step up?

Peter Navarro: (49:09)
Yeah of course. I mean Arizona is … Look, there’s, again, if you look at the report there’s a lot of things going on there in terms of ballot mishandling, there’s weird statistical anomalies and machine irregularities. Yeah, I mean let’s get to the bottom of it and remember here’s the tell in the [inaudible 00:49:34] game. This is the [inaudible 00:49:35]. We went to huge Trump leads in four of the battleground states and all we got across six battlegrounds was razor, razor thin margins. Razor thin margins and the ballots in question are five and 10 times those margins. So, yeah I mean we should get to the bottom of this because I think if we got to the bottom of it … Look, if we get to the bottom of it and there’s nothing there hey, again, I’ll be the first to congratulate the Biden/Harris ticket and America can breathe a sigh of relief that they had a fair election.

Peter Navarro: (50:21)
But up until then, no. The public smells something is wrong, Republicans don’t trust this election any more than they trust The New York Times and The Washington Post. Next question.

Alexandra: (50:41)
Thanks Alexa for the question and thanks to all the media on the call and the patients and Dr. Navarro for your time. We have tons of questions from people who are not reporters and I just want to sprinkle some of those in. Charles Gray, we’re going to unmute your line and just unmute yourselves.

Peter Navarro: (51:09)
Let’s do this. If the reporter questions are done let’s take two more questions from the audience and then it’s two o’clock.

Alexandra: (51:19)
Yes, thank you everybody for staying on so long.

Peter Navarro: (51:25)
Yeah.

Alexandra: (51:27)
All right we do have another reporter question we missed. Jeff Earl from The Daily Mail if you could unmute your line.

Jeff Earl: (51:44)
Can you hear me now Dr. Navarro?

Alexandra: (51:46)
Yes, sorry. Sorry I missed it. I missed you on asking a question, I apologize.

Jeff Earl: (51:51)
No problem. Thanks so much guys. Listen, I just wanted to ask since you mentioned at the top that you’re nearing your personal capacity. There is this issue of the Office of Special Council I think sent a letter from some of your past meetings-

Peter Navarro: (52:06)
Yeah, we’re not going there dude. Next question. Mute this guy.

Jeff Earl: (52:11)
Well, but hang on.

Peter Navarro: (52:12)
No, no. Mute that guy. Mute the guy. Mute the guy.

Jeff Earl: (52:17)
I’m not just a guy-

Peter Navarro: (52:19)
We’re talking about the … Hey, Alexandra? Okay.

Alexandra: (52:29)
Yes?

Peter Navarro: (52:29)
Next question.

Alexandra: (52:33)
We’re going to ask a question. Charles’ line is unmuted. Charles? If you just unmute your line there. Okay. Doesn’t seem to be working.

Peter Navarro: (52:56)
Why don’t we do this, why don’t we do this, hey, this has been great a full hour of Q&A here and we’ll leave it at that and I urge all you good reporters including the guy from The Daily Mail to write a good story about the report itself, and let’s see what happens as the President said. All right, thank you.