El ex presidente Donald Trump, ayer en Nueva Hampshire, en un acto de campaña en busca de la candidatura republicana a la presidencia de EU en 2024. Foto Ap

Washington and New York. Advisers to Donald Trump contemplated provoking a constitutional crisis and deploying armed forces to suppress resistance under a 1792 law to keep the then-president in power after his lost 2020 election, with some observers warning that attempts by a coup d’état by the former president continue to threaten the democratic order of the United States.

Analysts and commentators, in assessing the criminal indictment filed against the former president for his efforts to reverse the election results last week, point out that actions to derail the 2020 electoral process were not only contemplated, but cannot yet be ruled out. the continuation of these anti-democratic efforts in the 2024 electoral contest.

One of the “most chilling paragraphs” in the criminal indictment highlighted by columnist Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times, revolves around a conversation between Jeffrey Clark, an ultra-conservative Justice Department official, who against orders from his own boss, the then-attorney general, who refused to endorse Trump’s accusation of widespread election fraud, secretly met with White House counsel Patrick Philbin on January 3, 2021, 17 days before the presidential transition of power. There they discussed strategies to keep Trump in the White House despite the election results, and when Philbin commented that there would be “riots in the streets of every major city in America” if such a thing were attempted, Clark replied: “well, that is why the Insurrection Law exists.”

Columnist Bouie concludes that since “Trump considered invoking the Insurrection Act – which authorizes the use of military force to suppress civil disorder, insurrection or rebellion – to stop the protests that followed the police killing of George Floyd”, it is likely that if “Trump had stolen power, he could very well have attempted to use such legislation to suppress the inevitable protest and resistance, which could have killed hundreds (perhaps thousands) of Americans in the attempt to secure his illegitimate hold on power.” ”.

in the middle of a hit

It’s not just a hypothetical version of a columnist, and it’s not something that just belongs in the past. Veteran columnist Maureen Dowd, also of the New York Times, wrote about the latest criminal accusation against Trump, stating that “the fact is, we are in the midst of a coup, not a post-coup. The former president is still in the midst of his diabolical ‘who will rid me of this meddling democracy’ plot, hoping that his dark knights will gallop out to complete the task”.

Inciting violence in order to order the military to restore law and order is a well-known tactic in the world’s coup playbook, but here in the United States there was reluctance among analysts to use that term, although the events of January 6, 2021 with the violent assault on the Capitol incited by Trump to stop the final certification of the vote began to change that. But now there are growing warnings that such efforts to incite violence for political purposes could continue beyond January 6, and that the former president’s trials could contribute to that effort.

Former US intelligence officer Donelle Harvin wrote in an article published in Political last week that “violent extremist groups have begun to coalesce around a unifying figure: Trump.” He added that what was once a fragmented and decentralized far-right movement has been co-opted by Trump to nurture his support base. “This, in my assessment, makes the former president a leading promoter of domestic extremism, and an unprecedented danger to our security,” he concludes.

Harvin is not alone in his appreciation. “As the 2024 election approaches, the threat of political violence and civil disorder will only increase,” write former US officials Steve Simon and Jonathan Stevenson in Political Magazine. They add that “despite all that American public safety and homeland security officials have learned since January 6, the country is not yet ready for a far-right revolt.”

Right-aligned police departments

A former Department of Homeland Security official, who spoke with the day Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said the federal government is particularly concerned that many local police departments are ideologically more aligned with the right than with federal authorities.

The most pressing concern at the moment, the former official said, is that Trump supporters, responding to his statements, could decide to take up arms and engage in acts of violence that could easily spiral out of control. Several commentators have pointed out that Trump continues to suggest violence: “if you come against me, I will go against you,” he declared on social media last week. Trump’s verbal attacks on special federal prosecutor Jack Smith and federal judge Tanya Chutkan, assigned to oversee his trial, prompted the prosecutor to ask the court to order that the defendant be kept silent about this case.

Defense attorneys argue that such an order would be a violation of his right to free speech just as the presidential election approaches. “In a lawsuit over rights protected by the First Amendment (free speech), the government seeks to limit First Amendment rights,” Trump’s lawyers responded, charging that this is an attack on “the main opponent of this government , during an election season when the (Biden) administration, prominent members of his party and their allies in the media have campaigned on the impeachment and their false allegations have proliferated.”

Commentators say that the possibility of Trump’s return to the presidency cannot be ruled out for now. “Until now, tens of millions of Americans are willing to ignore not only Donald Trump’s multiple criminal accusations, but also his legal mishandling of covid-19, his inhumane handling of children at the border, his multiple statements of racial bigotry and misogynism, his assaults on a free press and the rule of law, his disregard for national security and the climate emergency, his fondness for autocrats around the world, his impeachments and his many schemes to enrich his family,” wrote David Remnick, editor-in-chief of The New Yorker.

The greatest danger, the former Homeland Security official told the day, is if Trump loses by a narrow margin, violence breaks out and his armed supporters take to the streets. “Then we would have a civil war,” he warned.

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