The Militarization of Our Immigration Program

Dictator Trump wants to use military judges in immigration courts

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

Before we get into today’s outrage too deeply, let’s do a quick review of how we got here. We all know that Dictator Trump desperately wants to dispense with local law enforcement and send in the Marines to deal with any unruly citizens.

But he can’t thanks to the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 which forbids the use of the military for domestic law enforcement.

He has been doing his level best to get around this pesky law. During his first term, he sent the National Guard to the southern border. Everyone screamed “Posse Comitatus” but he said not to worry, they were just there to help the Border Patrol with paperwork and shit.

Yeah, right. We’ve all heard of mission creep.

The second time around, now that there are no adults in the room, the dictator has become bolder, first federalizing the National Guard and sending them to Los Angels over the governor’s objections, then sending active-duty Marines over the objections of the governor.

People screamed “Posse Comitatus” again. The dictator said not to worry, they are just there to protect ICE agents from demonstrators against their roundups of undocumented immigrants.