ICE Is Going To Murder More People

The situation hasn’t changed; outcomes won’t change either.

The massive public backlash to the murder of Alex Pretti has made it feel like we’ve entered a new moment in Trump’s presidency. Polling analyst G. Elliott Morris points out that the president’s approval on immigration has cratered; border patrol miniature fascist Greg Bovino has been demoted; the NRA has turned on Trump; DHS secretary and dog murderer Kristi Noem appears to have lost the support of even Republican senators; Democrats are united (even Fetterman) in blocking funding for DHS and ICE in its current form.

The massive backlash against Trump, even from his own party, has led some news outlets to report that Trump has changed his tone. There in turn has led more progressive commenters to point out that the tone hasn’t actually changed, much less the conditions on the ground, and that we shouldn’t be fooled.

I agree that we shouldn’t be fooled. But I’m not really all that worried about people being fooled by the latest Trump pseudo-charm offensive. That’s first because (as Morris says) polls show pretty clearly that people have been turning on Trump for some time. And second, it’s because the main worry right now is not that we’ll all be fooled and forget, but that ICE is going to murder more people.

Again, people on the ground say that ICE continues to operate as lawlessly and violently as ever in Minnesota. Meanwhile, the supposedly chastened Trump has said he thinks the invasion of Minnesota should function more like his recent lawless and murderous invasion of Venzuela—in which he killed over 100 people. Also, the administration is preparing for a violent pogrom of Haitians in Springfield, OH.

Trump and his minions are mostly acting as if a few phone calls and a change of lower level personnel can paper over the current unpleasantness, and that people will then forget about it. But if ICE continues to behave in the same manner—racing around the city in masks, leaping out to assault and kidnap non-white people on the street, treating bystanders who object as enemy combatants to be harassed, pepper-sprayed, beaten, and worse— there is no reason to expect different outcomes.

Those outcomes, as everyone is aware, include mass brutalization of the populace—very much including children—and occasional, but not all that occasional, murders. It’s possible that some ICE agents will feel a little less impunity given Bovino’s demotion.

But, on the other hand, Bovino’s de facto replacement, ludicrously corrupt border czar Tom Homan, got up on his swamp-stained hind legs and declared that the murder was caused by “the rhetoric” from Trump’s critics. Blaming a political murder on one’s partisan opponents is not meant to prevent bloodshed. It is a signal that the bloodshed should continue.

And the bloodshed will continue. Trump has not implemented a meaningful change in policy, nor even really a meaningful change in tone. He and his goons are still committed to ethnic cleansing and the violent subjugation of partisan opponents. They are still committed to flooding Minneapolis and other blue cities and states with masked gunman and kidnappers.

The future is difficult to predict. I do not know how, or if, this current fascist nightmare ends. I cannot say how an increasingly enraged and horrified country will react to another killing; nor can I predict whether or how Trump’s coalition may or may not split. But, again, it seems clear that if nothing meaningfully changes, you can expect that there is not going to be a meaningful change. Right now, the status quo—the expected result of our fascist government policies— is that fascist government agents will periodically murder people in the street.

I, and a majority of Americans, think that we need to change the policies which produce these results—ideally by abolishing ICE altogether. Trump and Republicans do not agree. How many people do ICE agents need to murder to change their minds? More than two, clearly. More than eight. More than 10? More than 20? More than 100? 1000? Unfortunately, on our current trajectory, we are going to find out.