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President Donald Trump on Tuesday threatened to forcibly put down any protests that spoil the military parade he has ordered up for his birthday on Saturday to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army’s founding during the American Revolutionary War.
Speaking in the Oval Office following an impromptu event to discuss forest management ahead of the upcoming summer wildfire season, Trump was riffing on what he described as violent excesses by protesters who’ve been demonstrating against Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids in Los Angeles when he was asked about the possibility of protests against the June 14 parade.
The president said it would be an “amazing day” and cited the “tanks … planes … all sorts of things” that will be on display during the spectacle, which is ostensibly meant to mark the Army’s semiquincentennial. He also compared the parade, which breaks from the American tradition that largely eschews militaristic or jingoistic displays of the sort routinely seen in authoritarian countries, to European celebrations of the end of the Second World War.
“We won the war, and we’re the only country that didn’t celebrate it, and we’re going to be celebrating big on Saturday. We’re going to have a lot of and if there’s any protest that wants to come out, they will be met with very big force,” he said.
He reiterated the explicit threat a moment later, telling “those people who want to protest” that they would be “met with very big force” once more.
He also opined further that any protest against the parade on Saturday would consist only of “people who hate our country.”
The president has a long history of pushing for the use of state violence against protests which he considers to be a personal affront and a reflection of weakness on his part.
During protests for racial justice in Washington following the May 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis, Minnesota police officer, Trump reportedly became enraged after news reports indicated he’d briefly been taken to a bunker beneath the White House after demonstrators breached a Secret Service fence line.
He also reportedly pushed to have military and law enforcement open fire on other protesters, asking then his then-Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, General Mark Milley, why National Guard troops deployed as a result of the demonstrations could not shoot protesters in the legs.
Trump’s ominous threat against protesters exercising their constitutional right to free speech came just moments after he mused aloud about invoking the 1807 Insurrection Act, which would allow him to deploy active duty military forces against the protesters in Los Angeles.
Asked whether he’d make use of the 200-year-old law, which would provide an exception to a separate law forbidding active duty troops from engaging in domestic law enforcement, he replied: “If there’s an insurrection, I would certainly invoke it.”
Trump referred to television footage of some protesters breaking up concrete bollards to make projectiles and claimed those violent actors were now in custody because of his decision to deploy thousands of National Guard soldiers to Los Angeles without consulting California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom.
“They were throwing it at our police. They were throwing it at our soldiers that are there, and we got it stopped, and we have them in custody right now. Look, if we didn’t get involved right now, Los Angeles would be burning just like it was burning a number of months ago, with all the houses that were lost, Los Angeles right now would be on fire, and we have it in great shape,” he said.
Pressed further on how he’d determine whether the sporadic and limited violence met the definition of “insurrection” under law, the president says there had been “certain areas of Los Angeles” that met those criteria over the weekend and attributed the violence to “paid insurrectionists” and “paid troublemakers,” echoing a common Republican trope which posits that most, if not all, protests against Trump’s policies are fueled by professional protesters collecting a salary rather than legitimate opposition to his administration.
He also said he last spoke with Newsom “a day ago” to complain about the job he’s done during the unrest in Los Angeles.
“He’s done a bad job, causing a lot of death and a lot of lot of potential death if we didn’t send out the National Guard, and last time we gave him a little additional help, you would have Los Angeles would be burning right now,” he said.
