Donald Trump, an alleged "master brander," has liberally stolen all of his most famous slogans from other politicians, starting with "Make America Great Again" which he took from Ronald Reagan. During the 2016 campaign, he made a big announcement that he was going to be the "Law and Order" candidate, which made many people chuckle since it evoked the famous TV show. But it was also one of Richard Nixon's winning slogans in 1968, used to appeal to the white conservatives who were freaking out over civil rights and anti-war protests.
I've never been sure if Trump is consciously aware of the political echoes of these thefts or if he really believes he came up with them himself. Either way, they resonated with Republicans who either nostalgically recalled their former leaders using those terms or think Trump is a very stable genius for creating such instantly memorable campaign slogans.
From the moment he came down the escalator in 2015, Trump's been demonizing undocumented immigrants as murderers and rapists and promising to eliminate the problem with draconian crackdowns. He loves to regale his crowds with lurid, detailed accounts of violent crimes allegedly committed by undocumented migrants and goes to great lengths to present such isolated incidents as evidence of an unprecedented crime spree. In Michigan on Tuesday, he proclaimed that they have "wrecked our country" and said that even though some people think it's wrong to call them "animals" he was going to continue to do it because "they're not humans."
"They're not humans. They're animals ... I'll use the word 'animal,' because that's what they are" -- Trump pic.twitter.com/T5IyRXNOFE
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 2, 2024
This standard piece of his stump speech thrills Trump's followers, of course, which is a big part of why he does it. Racism and xenophobia are the coins of the MAGA realm. The current Agenda 2025 plan to enlist the local police and deploy red state national guard troops to blue cities to round up migrants and send them to deportation camps is undoubtedly a huge hit with the faithful. And he made the promise explicitly in his Michigan speech, declaring that "we have to get law and order back" as he stood in front of a line of police officers who all applauded when he said it.
Donald Trump, who is currently facing 88 felony charges: “We have to get law and order back.” pic.twitter.com/UdI7HaE15h
— Republican Voters Against Trump (@AccountableGOP) April 2, 2024
He also promised to pass laws to give law enforcement immunity from prosecution which he usually discusses in the context of his whiny demand for presidential "total immunity" As he posted on Truth Social:
A PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES MUST HAVE FULL IMMUNITY, WITHOUT WHICH IT WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE FOR HIM/HER TO PROPERLY FUNCTION. ANY MISTAKE, EVEN IF WELL INTENDED, WOULD BE MET WITH ALMOST CERTAIN INDICTMENT BY THE OPPOSING PARTY AT TERM END. EVEN EVENTS THAT “CROSS THE LINE” MUST FALL UNDER TOTAL IMMUNITY, OR IT WILL BE YEARS OF TRAUMA TRYING TO DETERMINE GOOD FROM BAD. THERE MUST BE CERTAINTY. EXAMPLE: YOU CAN’T STOP POLICE FROM DOING THE JOB OF STRONG & EFFECTIVE CRIME PREVENTION BECAUSE YOU WANT TO GUARD AGAINST THE OCCASIONAL “ROGUE COP” OR “BAD APPLE.” SOMETIMES YOU JUST HAVE TO LIVE WITH “GREAT BUT SLIGHTLY IMPERFECT.” ALL PRESIDENTS MUST HAVE COMPLETE & TOTAL PRESIDENTIAL IMMUNITY, OR THE AUTHORITY & DECISIVENESS OF A PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES WILL BE STRIPPED & GONE FOREVER. HOPEFULLY THIS WILL BE AN EASY DECISION. GOD BLESS THE SUPREME COURT!
Perhaps this is the reason the Michigan Police Officers Association gave Trump their enthusiastic endorsement on Tuesday. Donald Trump is explicitly running on a platform that says both he and law enforcement across the land should be immune from prosecution because they need to be able to break laws in order to protect the citizens from lawbreakers. Evidently, his ecstatic supporters see nothing illogical about any of that.
And he's doing this at the same time that he's promising to pardon the Jan. 6 insurrectionists, specifically pledging to release the detainees being held in the Washington D.C. jail whom he has taken to calling "hostages" and with whom he collaborated on a recording of the national anthem. Just Security reports that the movement to free these prisoners has been organized by the mother of Ashli Babbit, the anointed MAGA martyr of Jan. 6. She told the Washington Post that Trump called her and told her “to pass that on to the guys inside that they’re on his mind, and when he gets in they’ll get out.”
Just Security took a look at who these so-called hostages are and it turns out that 27 of the 29 are charged with assaulting police officers, among other crimes like throwing an explosive device that detonated on at least 25 cops, tasing them with electro-shock devices, spraying them with pepper spray, bludgeoning them with various makeshift weapons and generally beat them with whatever else they had at hand. These are the people Trump considers to be "hostages" and promises to pardon even as he's basking in the warm glow of endorsements from police unions around the country and campaigning on a platform of law and order.
Last week he ostentatiously attended the wake of a New York policeman who was killed in the line of duty and the local GOP official who had invited him said they gave him an "ovation" at the service. Trump himself said he was overwhelmed by the love that the family and fellow officers showed to him and the right-wing media extolled his great empathy and compassion for the victims of this horrific violence for days afterward.
The family of another officer who died in the line of duty wasn't as impressed. Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, who died after suffering two strokes following a confrontation with some of those "hostages" on Jan. 6 didn't rate a visit from Trump. In fact, Trump's never had a word to say about any of the hundreds of police who were injured that day. Sicknick's brother had something to say about him, however, and his words were on the money:
"The fact that he states he's law and order but he sent a mob that ultimately ended up killing my brother. He has such a lack of self-awareness of what he does. He's using that officer's death as a campaign platform."
Trump is currently under eighty-eight felony indictments in four jurisdictions and has been held liable in civil court for defamation, sexual assault and fraud. Some of the crimes he's been accused of committing have to do with his actions on Jan. 6 that resulted in a violent assault on the police who were guarding the U.S. Capitol. Running for president again as a champion of law and order while promising to pardon all those who believed they were carrying out his wishes that day is the Trumpiest thing he's ever done. Even more disturbing is the fact that police all over the country are endorsing him anyway.
